The bus driver had been kind enough to drop her off in front of the Red Lion. Had warned that the bus she wanted was driven by a different man and would stop at a different place altogether. He gave her the location amiably. It was not terribly far from the pub, but far enough that Mr. Bates insisted on walking with her. At a precise and respectable distance of seven inches of course. They walked together in silence before she curled her hand possessively about the crook of his elbow.

"I meant what I said," she glanced at him, her eyes holding his briefly but boldly. "I'd chuck it all out and come away with you in a heartbeat."

"Anna," her name was an anguished sigh. "You don't understand what you are suggesting." He ducked his head, settling his hand on hers and running his thumb over the back of it. She pulled away from him abruptly: wanted neither comfort or coddling.
"What is it exactly, Mr. Bates, that you think I don't understand?" She spoke low enough not to be overheard by passersby, few though there were. Kept her tone detached and cool, her face smooth, "That I'd be giving up my career, my place, my standard of living? That I would be judged and shunned, called horrible names? That it would be harder to make ends meet? Do I strike you as a sheltered, innocent, fool girl about to throw her life away on the first boy to pay her mind and offer her two words?"

He stopped them at the lane the bus drove along, looked satisfyingly uncomfortable.

"I know what I am offering Mr. Bates. I know the import of my reputation, and just how hard I have worked to build it," she stood tall and squared her shoulders, using her posture to convey what her whisper could not. "And despite all that, whether I wish it or not, nothing matters to me if my life doesn't have you in it. I'd work gutting fish, or washing laundry, or selling coal tailings on the street, if it meant I could come home to you at night and wake up with you in the morning, and do silly domestic things like rub your feet when they were sore. I'll not live the whole of my life without knowing what it is to lay together in the dark and whisper about the mundane things we have to do the next day, even if it's just once."

He shook his head, and shivered. The way he looked at her made her breath go shaky in her chest. "It wouldn't be just once, Anna, and you are too precious to me to ruin you like that."

"So you would make us both miserable?" She furrowed her brow, kept her words to a calm whisper, but felt herself bristle slightly. Blinking away the sudden welling of stinging, angry tears. She refused to back down. "I remember the last time we spoke of ruin, and I'll say now what I said then," she almost hissed, stepping further from the bus stop and pulling him along with barest of touches to his arm. "The only ruin I recognize is life without you. I know your motives are noble, Mr. Bates, but your selfless nobility has only ever broken my heart, and likely your own with it."

To his credit his face fell. He sought her eyes after a few moments of what must have been him gathering himself. "What would you have me do Anna? Everything I touch crumbles away from me in the end. You are the one thing left in my life that makes it worth living, that gives me strength and purpose. I want nothing more than to see you happy, but the only thing I can guarantee you is pain."

"That's it?" she asked, her arms crossed across the bones of her corset. "You would make us both miserable because you've had a rotten go so far?"

His eyes widened and he looked a bit panicked for a moment. It was not the response or tone he expected, she supposed. He expected her to accept his limits, his timelines, the promises of soon that he imposed on her heart, to get on the bus that was trundling towards them over the far rise, the one that would take her back to Downton and away from him. As if telling her he loved her, when she asked him how he liked her hair, was apology enough. Of course, in the moment she hadn't helped things, acting the love struck fool. Though, that was another topic entirely.

"I love you, Anna. So much. More than I knew was possible. You are the most important thing in my life. I just want you to be able to be happy. Don't you see? I could only ever cause you pain."

"I see," she said vaguely, the words hardening her. She watched the bus grow larger as she calculated the time of the month in her head. "So you are hurting me and keeping me at a distance because you don't want to cause me pain. That's a sorry way to love someone."

She raised her eyebrows expectantly at him, chewed at the corner of her mouth.

"You know it's more than that," he poked at a soft spot in the grass with the toe of his cane, hiding his eyes from her expression, once he saw it.

"Is it?" She focused her attention fully on him, and he shrank under the sharpness of her gaze. "You say I am the most important thing in your life, but I am not a thing. I am a woman. Not a child. A woman grown, with a heart and a soul and a mind and desires of her own, who is neither asking for nor needs your protection. You say you love me, and I believe you, but what if something had happened to you? I would've had no way of knowing if you were alive or dead, Mr. Bates. Is that any way to treat someone you love?"

His eyes darted from her to the sound of the bus' brakes and back. She made her decision; she stood her ground.

"Anna, that's the last bus."

"I know." She spat defiantly.

His eyes widened. "Anna..."

She uncrossed her arms and placed her hands on her hips, daring him to argue. He looked at the bus again as it finally pulled away. She kept her eyes trained on him. Watched emotions war with one another just beneath the surface of his skin. Finally he sagged in resignation and scrubbed a hand over his face. "Come on then. I don't expect you'd let me rent you a room for the night?"

He sighed raggedly at her look and began to lead the way back into town. "We might as well get something to eat for tea later. I haven't got anything back at my room."
A sensation unlike any other slid up her spine, sluiced behind her kneecaps, flushed her breasts. His room. His personal space. She would sleep in his room tonight. She'd never been where he slept before.

"What will you tell Mrs. Hughes?"

The tips of her ears burned with the heat of her blush. She didn't like deceiving people, most of all Elsie Hughes, but she could tell an incomplete truth, "That I missed the last bus, and a friend put me up for the night. Is there a post office nearby, so that I might send a telegram to Downton?"
Nodding without looking at her, he pointed ahead of them. "It's just before the market. Do you want to send it while I get us a bite?"

He was probably trying to avoid having the two of them seen together as much as possible. She relented, her anger softening at the defeated cast of his shoulders, at how she knew he was likely blaming himself already for what had yet to happen. "That would be lovely, thank you."

When the telegram was sent and food had been procured, they walked together meekly. She bit back a smile when she came out of the post office and saw him juggling the parcels; most items were bundled together in newspaper cones he had tucked into the cradle of his forearm. The tin of tea and jug of milk were awkwardly shaped and giving him problems. She took them from his hands and peeked inside the parcels. Shortbread biscuits, some fresh strawberries, a few small warm rolls, and two flakey meat hand-pies, steaming and fragrant. She smiled. He'd thought of everything, admitting to getting her a bit of honeycomb for her tea, when she asked what was wrapped so neatly in waxed paper and tucked in with the berries.

His face turned bright red when he guided her down an alleyway. "There is a rear door that is closer to my room," he explained in a stilted voice. "I don't want the landlady to ..."
He stopped at her glance and his brows furrowed. The edge of her frustration wavered, and she touched his elbow softly, "I could care less what she thinks, Mr. Bates. What anyone thinks." She would have let him take her right there in the semi privacy of the alleyway if he had wanted it. That, she would not voice aloud, it was bad enough to own the truth of it in her mind.

He sighed and led her to a dirty door that had been whitewashed at some point, but not recently. It was a large Victorian, a house that was once grand, but now was parted out to as many renters as there were rooms, or more. He had to pass her several newsprint cones to fish out his keys. She held them in her arms and passed over the threshold into the dim interior light of the hallway. Inside was dingy but not as filthy as she feared, though she expected, that was likely his doing. He stopped at the first room they came to; a low door on the right. He had to stoop to get through it.

He didn't look at her for a long time after she followed him inside. He took the groceries and set them on a small table, next to a messy stack of books. He drew out taking off his gloves as long as he possibly could. There was only one chair and a twin bed besides. And a narrow wardrobe. It was spare and small. Smaller than the room she shared at Downton, and very narrow, but clean. He had a fireplace and a window. That meant he was warm at night, (the scuttle was two thirds full,) and could get fresh air if he needed it. Those realities pleased her - that he had those small comforts. The window overlooked a worn down looking garden, she saw when she pushed the curtain aside. Still. It was green. She let the curtain fall and pulled at the fingers of her gloves, sliding them off and placing them in the pockets of her coat.

The room smelled of sleep and rosemary and him. That alone was worth any repercussions. He tucked rosemary in his drawers; he had told her once a long time ago that it reminded him of his mother, as her middle name was Rosemary and understandably she had preferred the scent over lavender. She turned and took him in, resisted trailing her fingertips over the rough looking blanket on the bed. She supposed if she did that he'd likely bolt out the door and spend the night walking the streets to preserve his notion of her honor.

He looked nervous, but well. She supposed the tight expression on his face was entirely her fault. He wouldn't look at her. Instead he bent at the waist awkwardly to start the fire for tea. He left, kettle in hand for the tea water without a word, opening the door just wide enough to squeeze through and returning shortly. The room was too small to continue standing. She should sit, but she didn't want to sit on the only chair or on the bed, so she perched on one hipbone on the windowsill near the foot of the bed and the table. He hung the kettle over the fire and pressed himself against the wall opposite her.

"I'll sleep on the floor. You can have the bed." He finally rasped. She smiled with fond exasperation at the desperate attempt to make her presence in his room respectable and proper. She wouldn't argue the point just yet, it was only late afternoon.

"Is that so?"

He looked at her then and looked away just as quickly, as though she had burned his eyes.

She sighed and pulled the chair over by the fire, spoke softly, aware of her volume, and the thinness of the walls, "Sit."

When the only change in his countenance was a pained expression, she rolled her eyes and continued quietly but insistently, "Don't be ridiculous. It'll do you a world of good to warm yourself and rest after standing all day."

He hadn't taken off his hat or coat. But then neither had she. He stared hard at the chair. She held her hand out to him. "Go on then, give us your coat. The fire feels nice."
She moved sideways towards him, like she had approached that wounded bird with her brother when they were little. It had floundered and flapped away from him, but she had managed to sidle up to it slowly and calmly wrap it in her scarf and bring it home. Her father had set it's wing. Her mother had complained, but she had caught the sour faced woman hand feeding it crumbs of milk soaked bread after she and her brother had gone to bed for the night.

Mr. Bates watched her like that bird had, wary and unsure, ready to bolt. She took hold of the collar of his overcoat and moved away from him to pull it off. He obliged, turning, shrugging out of it, the took it from her hands to hang it and his hat on their hooks by the door.

She wanted to wrap herself around him. She wanted to rail at him, beat at his chest like a ridiculous penny dreadful heroine. She wanted to tear open her own chest to show him her heart and how it ached every moment of every day that she could not hear his voice or see his face. She settled for shivering when she felt his hands graze her shoulders to help her from her coat. She pulled from its grip and sighed, stretching her arms to find the pin that held her hat in place. The hat was lifted out of her hands as well when she had finished. The coat he hung in the wardrobe, on a wooden hanger, the hat he placed atop it. She watched the easy way he reached upwards to set the hat down, traced the graceful line of his arm to his body with her eyes. She wanted to run her fingers through the closely cropped hair at the nape of his neck. She wanted more than that. Needed more than that. Felt her breath catch for the hundredth time that afternoon. She turned the chair so that his right side, his injured side would be closest the fire. "Sit."

To her surprise he did. Not without a bone rattling sigh. She stared at the slope of his back, could see the tension in the way he held himself.

"You shouldn't be here Anna," the gravel whisper made her acutely aware of how deeply she wanted him, of how her breasts felt with each inhalation, in the tight confines of her corset. Which in turn made her angry, because all he had to do to disarm her completely was say her name.

"And you should have stayed at Downton and fought for us," she retorted to the back of his head. It sounded shrewish and bitter to her ears. But shrewish was preferred to the pitiful, wounded way she continued, "You left me, Mr. Bates. With nothing but silence and broken dreams." She swallowed and stepped to the window, where she could see his face from the corner of her eye as she gazed at the fire. She smoothed out her voice and her face like she was smoothing wrinkles from a sheet with her hands. "I know you did it for all the most noble of reasons, but in the end you still left. Less than twenty four hours after we were planning our future together, you told me to forget you." Her quiet murmur dropped to a whisper, "Could you? Could you ever forget me and be happy? Could you ever love again, as you have loved me?"

Staring into the fire, he was silent for too long. "No," he choked finally. "Never."

"Then why insult me by insisting that my feelings for you are not as strong or sure as yours for me?"

He turned to her sharply then, eyes narrowed, words hushed and thick with emotion, "How can you say that? You know I don't feel that way."

"Don't you?" She leaned against the windowsill again, looking back into the fire. Drawing in a steadying breath, she was suddenly unsure of herself and her insistence. She soldiered forward: she'd begun something, was always beginning something with him, this time she would finish it. "Every time you tell me not to miss you or to forget you, every time you presume I could ever love anyone else, want anyone else, that is exactly what you are doing. Do you really think my love so foolish, my heart so fickle? That I would ever be able to forget you and be anything but miserable?"

He was silent at this, and she had to bite back a smile. She had him there at least. She let her heartache be a whetstone on which to sharpen herself. "As it stands, you took my choices away."

She stopped, waited for him to look her in the eye and when he did, in the calmest voice she could muster, continued, "You hurt me. More than I knew it was possible to hurt." She hardened herself to the forlorn look on his face. "I repeat, I am not a thing; I am a person. I have a right to decide for myself what I shall and shan't do." Absently, as if of their own volition her fingers found the buttons at her wrists and one by one freed them, "And you may have a few years on me but you aren't my father, thank heavens. You do not need to try to be him. He did a fine job of teaching me how to live my life wisely. And I'll thank you to stop patronizing me and trying to help me choose what you think is the right path. When it is my life that is affected, I should at least have some say."

Her arms had found their way crossed in front of her chest again. The sound of the water boiling was the only thing that saved him from having to speak. He let it draw his attention to the fire, hooked the kettle's wire handle and swung it off the flame. The set of his shoulders looked so defeated that when they started shaking, she thought perhaps he had begun to weep. Instead his laugh sounded out, though it was brittle and dry.
"I only have the one teacup. I didn't think about that at the market." He shook his head but didn't look at her, "You can be very distracting, you know."

She wanted to to show him just how distracting she could be, to unbutton his shirt and tug it from the waist of his trousers, push it from his shoulders and taste the salt on his skin. She took a breath, regarded him as he was, sitting and fumbling with the tin of tea, not yet willing to admit that this was not the reason she was here. With intent, she pulled open one button after another in the trail down her blouse. Pushing off of the sill, she took two silent steps and she was close enough to touch him.

"I have a soup bowl, I'll use that," he droned, looking further away, the closer she moved. He began to bounce his good leg with the ball of his foot.

"John."

She'd said it. Out loud. She took a breath. The shape of it on her tongue tasted even better than she thought it would. More private; filling up the air of the small space and charging it.

"I don't want tea." The words were air more than anything, but the effect on the two of them was very physical.

He looked at her, lost - desire and yearning restraint clouding his eyes, and multiplying when he took in her open blouse. His eyes widened and arced off, refusing to return to her. He sat stiffly on the edge of his chair, his voice rising a desperate octave, "Anna, what are you doing?"

"Well I haven't any other clothes, have I? I can't exactly afford to lose a button because we've ... missed each other." A smile quirked her lips, "Nor do I intend to spend the morning mending a tear." She unhooked and unzipped her skirt, stepping out of it with care, she folded it once and draped it on the back of his chair.

His hands shook when she took the tin from his grasp and set it on the small table. She heard his breath leave him like wind and after that it was fast and reedy in his throat; he couldn't seem to catch it. Dropping his face into his hands, he slumped forward in the chair. "Please, Anna."

Her own hand lifted to hover over the nape of his neck. When she finally touched him, he shuddered and leaned back, into her palm. "You know, I was going to go to the men's corridor that night to convince you to stay," she droned. "The key was gone. Mrs. Hughes must have guessed I would try and hidden it. I shouldn't have let that stop me." She blinked back tears that rose metallic to the back of her throat. It felt so good to touch him, to just be near him. She had missed that, had missed him. "Anna..." She felt her name become a plea on his tongue, the sound of his voice vibrating up through her arm. A pulse of heat answered from between her thighs, sweet and familiar.

She stilled his restless leg by sitting down on it, balancing herself with one hand on his chest. Under her open hand she felt his heart beat like the wings of a wild bird in a cage. Her back soaked up the heat of the fire, her fingers still anchored gently to the back of his neck. He leaned his forehead against hers, then seemed to think better of it and turned his face away from her. He sank his head onto her shoulder like a forlorn child. She pressed a kiss to his hair, could hear the tears he was swallowing as he kept trying to speak."I've missed you so much," he finally rasped.

"You are the other half of my heart, John Bates," she whispered after a time, not trusting her own breathing, knowing the edge of it betrayed her with every uneven exhale. "I need you."

He groaned and slipped his arms around her hips, pulling her tighter to him as he spoke, "Anna, we can't."

"We can." A sudden calm washed over her, a sense of surety and purpose. She felt something lifting away from her, leaving her honeyed and serene. She slid her fingers through close cut hair, took time to cherish the feel of him as he trembled and bucked under her touch. She did too, just from sound of his breath catching in his throat, from the radiating warmth of his body; it had been such a long parting. "We can, John," she whispered the affirmation with finality, into the cloth of his jacket. She filled her lungs with him, tried to deepen her breathing to calm his.

"What if something does go wrong and I'm not able to divorce her?" His whisper grew desperate and pleading, "What then? Anna, what if I get you with child?" He clutched at her like a drowning man. She hushed him softly with another kiss to his closely cropped hair; he smelled of rosemary and ale and smoke and pomade. "Look at me," she said as loudly as she dared into that hair.

He lifted his head, and she lost her train of thought for a moment at the raw current of desire written over his face. She breathed him in, and held his eyes with an earnestness that she feared bordered on mania, "We belong to one another, you and I. Regardless of what any piece of paper says. Am I right?" She waited, holding space with him, searched his expression. He blinked, nodded, and lowered his eyes.

"Look at me," she repeated, with murmured, but gentle insistence. The term helpless to obey came to mind when he immediately looked up again, with a pained expression. She searched eyes that held colors and patterns she didn't have names for, tried to keep her face open and loving, but not lose the fierceness and earnestness she felt, "I need you to promise, from this day forward, no matter what comes or what you think, you will tell me the whole truth." She hardened her jaw before she continued, willed her eyes to stay dry, "And you will swear to me to never even think of leaving me again."
At that his eyes filled with tears, tears that spilled down his cheeks even as he tried to blink them away. "Oh Anna, I am so sorry."

"Do you swear?"

"I do."

"Well then. I know the rest. If and hopefully, when, you are able to get a divorce we'll get a special license the very next day." She smiled. She had missed the flecks in his eyes. She had noticed the kindness in his eyes long before she noticed their color; the thought sombered her, along with the thought of just how much time they had wasted, "I've been your wife in my heart for long enough now. This ... us ... and whatever should come of it is nothing but beauty. There isn't anything wrong or shameful in it. So we live each day together to its fullest, as though it was our last, and take them one at a time. We deal with the challenges as they come and we do it together." She rubbed at his tensions, at muscles that jumped and tightened beneath her fingers. Found herself running her hands along the edges of him, tracing and remembering his depth and dimensions. He mapped her with hungry, haunted eyes, trying to hold her at half an arms length, and failing. The feel of cloth over sinew and muscle, tendon and bone made her want to hold his face, feel the meat of his cheeks press into her palms, and kiss him until she forgot what it had been like without him. He was trembling, still sitting rigidly unmoving, but he held to her as if she might drift away or disappear. He was on the edge, wide eyed and wild, still coiled like a watch spring, silent, wary of the passing time and what it was bringing. Too much and he would bolt. So she simply continued the lazy meander of her hands.

Something shifted in his gaze, in the slackening of his jaw; his grip on her eased. She felt taut muscles disengage and in silence she loosely encircled his neck. He began his own subtle exploration: the slide of his skin here, a searching touch there. Mirroring his earlier embrace, she rested her head on his shoulder. She sighed her contentment and closed her eyes, smiled as patterns were painted over her skin, with the languidness of seeds setting root. They lit the darkness behind her eyelids like trails of fire. The air fairly crackled between the two of them. He pressed his lips against her shoulder. She felt it like she felt music when there were concerts at the Abbey and dances in Ripon, with her entire body. Her lungs expanded sharply, and now it was her turn to jump and flinch at the surging electricity of his touches. He traced his knuckles over her collar bones, pushed her blouse back to kiss her shoulder. Then it was pooled on the floor. And she felt his mouth open on her shoulder - a warm, wet blossom of flesh and teeth. He claimed her with his teeth and tongue and hands. His muscles bunched and coiled and her stomach fluttered at the motion of him heaving the both of them, his arm suddenly beneath her legs, up out of the chair. There was one uneven step and then the bed was beneath them incredibly narrow and protesting loudly. And she bit her lip to keep from laughing because it was perfect in its absurdity; the two of them consummating their love, like this, when all her sweet would-be-husband wanted was his idea of fairy tale and moralistic perfection.

There was shuffling and scrambling for purchase and balance. Clothing or lack thereof was for the most part ignored. The tightness of her corset made her lightheaded. His mouth sought hers out and for a moment, he held back, forearms on either side of her head. She opened her eyes, fearful that he might be changing his mind. His eyes were closed, his expression made her shiver, close her own eyes and enjoy sharing breath with him. He brushed his mouth over hers. He explored the shape and dimensions of her lips like she had smoothed her hands over him, not quite kissing her, conjuring even more need, even more desire between them out of thin air. Then he nipped her lower lip and their mouths met with a wild urgency. The line of stubble that edged his lips was her undoing as always and it was all she could do not to cry out as he kissed her soundly. She wasn't quite sure how it was that her legs came to be wrapped tightly about him, but she didn't much care either.

He gave a little cry when she touched his face. And then she was pushing his jacket from his shoulders and her hand slipped down his chest and caught him up between their two bodies, searching out the firmness and softness she found there. Blood rushed loudly in her ears. She could hear little else besides her own heartbeat and the ragged sound of their racing breath as she unbuttoned his trousers, and then with haste, she was pushed onto the mattress again. He fumbled against her, managing finally to get her knickers pulled just far enough of the the way for their purposes. She watched him through her eyelashes and pulled him down to kiss her. She felt him against her and her hips angled towards his touch. They both gasped at the sudden sweet shock of pleasure of their joining. Her eyes flew open and she reached up to hold his face and his gaze as he moved shallowly inside of her, gaining depth and momentum with each desperately tentative stroke. The broadness of his back pleased her nearly as much as the thickness of his neck. She wrapped an arm around him and slowed and deepened her shallow breaths to focus on the sensation of taking him inside of her. He was a bit bigger than she had expected, but she welcomed the pain with the pleasure, committing it to memory, letting herself relax into his touches, open herself to the pressure and fullness. He kissed her and whispered his first apology of the night against her lips. She delved into his mouth with her tongue in fierce answer. She knew all about pain, and this was the sweetest she'd ever experienced. It didn't hurt properly anyway, not like her first time, when she was a fool thirteen year old with somethin to prove, riddled with hormones and resentment at her mother's strictures. He was just a bit of a snug fit. The thought drew her to smiling broadly against his lips, then she gasped as he surged into her. The bed frame screeched loudly and he froze, seemed to come out of himself.

She panicked when he began to pull away, when he slipped out of her. Already it felt strange for him to not be there, but when he helped her out of the bed she smiled. He wouldn't be helping her out of the bed if he had come to his senses and was leaving. When she was out of the way he braced himself against the bed frame and in one sharp motion yanked the mattress from the bed. Her breath hitched and she snatched up her blouse and the chair and moved them out of the way, as he dragged it the few steps backwards in front of the fire. His limp barely noticeable, he was so intent on the solution to the noise. She shifted the tiny table as well, to give him room. He turned and looked at her, at the scraping table legs. How it was possible for her body to feel as though he was touching her when all he did was look, she would never know. It overwhelmed her that he could literally turn her existence on its ear with a glance and she retreated backwards to her perch at the windowsill. There she turned her focus towards buying time to ground herself and catch her breath, slowly unbuttoning her suspenders, taking off her best Sunday shoes and carefully removing her good wool stockings. She thanked the heavens that her heels were the new style; open, with a buckle and a strap, and didn't need a button hook. She could feel everywhere he had been as though they were brands seared into her skin. He watched her, his gaze gone predatory. She looked pointedly at the mattress, then raised her eyebrow at him, "Will it do?" She smirked.

Few things tickled her soul more than the slightly befuddled look that sometimes came upon his face, like a puppy who doesn't quite understand what its master is asking of it. She swallowed a giggle and surprised herself at the low register her voice dropped into when she spoke, "Sit back down."

From the look on his face, it surprised him as well, though she took note that he very quickly complied. She padded over the use-worn floor and stopped just shy of the mattress, toes touching its edge.
"Would you help me Mr. Bates?" she purred as cheekily as she dared, for she was still very afraid of spooking him. She arched her back and tilted her hips slightly, with a smirk indicating the askew knickers.

"Oh God, Anna," he shook his head, seemed to choke on his own breath for a moment before he could reach for her. His touch was reverent as he curved his fingers under the fabric and slid them gently from her body. The corners of her lips curled into a sensual smile. She knelt on the mattress where he sat and turned, presenting the ties of her corset. She wanted him again terribly, but she wanted to do it properly, wanted to feel his skin on hers.

She gasped when she felt him feather light touches over her exposed skin. "I love you Anna," he wrapped his arms around her waist and pressed a long kiss to her shoulder and then whispered huskily in her ear, "Someday you'll be my Anna May Bates."
She could almost cry from the comfort of the sound of it, but instead she sighed, happy to bursting, "I already am."

She felt him smile against her skin.

Still, before he took up the knot that loosened her corset he had to reassure his flustered conscience. "Are you sure this is what you want?" he asked into her upswept hair. She tried not to giggle at the question and failed, "It would be a bit too late If I weren't, now, wouldn't it?"

He relaxed into the embrace, this time his chuckle was quiet, but genuine. She could feel him inhale deeply, taking in the scent of her hair. After he meandered about a bit, kissing her neck and shoulders, he found and set to work unknotting the lacings.