"Why did you become a crime reporter?" John tangled his fingers with hers, Anna's head resting on his chest while his other fingers ran through her hair.

"I told you, I wanted to tell people about how life really was but also that there were people who could help them."

"I remember you telling me how you'd been inspired by American journalist women. However," John shifted enough to see the top of her head, noting Anna's hitch in breathing. "Was that all?"

"No," Her head stayed in position, keeping her focus on the wall.

"But it's what you told everyone else, isn't it?"

Anna nodded against his skin, her fingers loosening their grip on his hand and adjusting her position to look at him. "I didn't want to tell them all the truth because I didn't need their pity."

"Pity for what?" John pushed himself to sit up and look at her. "Why would anyone need to pity you?"

Anna crumpled the sheets between her hands, twisting them for another minute before facing John. "Because I watched my friend die in front of me and there was nothing I could do."

"What are you talking about?"

"When I was at University there was a woman working with one of the charity organizations I covered for my journalism reading. I met her at a function I attended and we got on so we continued to stay in contact. In my last year we were walking back from an event and…"

"What happened?" Her lips quivered and John put a hand to her face, "You don't have to tell me if you don't-"

"I need to," She managed a shaky breath, "Rose would've wanted me to."

"Was that her name?"

"Rose MacClare… or, it was until she got married. Then it was Aldridge but that's neither here nor there now since she's no longer with us and neither is her husband."

"Did he do it?"

"Atticus?" Anna's head could not have shaken in a more violent negative if she tried. "He adored her. Everyone could see it."

"Then how is he no longer 'with us', as you put it?"

"Because Atticus killed himself shortly after Rose's death." Anna swallowed so heavily it echoed around the room, "He couldn't live without her and he couldn't live with the guilt."

"You said he was innocent."

"The guilt of not knowing who did it and having no way to catch them."

John quieted, "They never found Rose's killer?"

Anna shook her head far more slowly this time. "The police had no leads and eventually had to rule it all as a random act of violence."

"Like Green taking the Sixth Earl of Grantham for a moment of profit."

"In a way."

"In a way?"

"Rose wasn't missing anything and she was the daughter of a Marquess. She had means and she had money. That was why she was on the board for the charity. She was their chief patron and managed to find all the other funding they needed to keep the organization solvent."

"What about after her death?"

"They were still solvent." Anna managed a smile, "Rose and Atticus had one child, Victoria, who inherited the vast fortune of both her parents but Rose arranged for an endowment to go to the organization."

"Then the police ruled out foul play?"

"It wasn't about money, if that's what you mean."

John bit the inside of his cheek, "Why didn't Atticus stay alive for his daughter?"

"I asked myself that same question but the only answer I could find was that he couldn't bear to look at his daughter or be separated from his wife."

"Seems a bit selfish."

"I think people don't always have the perspective they need when they're buried in grief." Anna adjusted on the bed, snorting to herself, "I wonder what everyone else thinks of us."

"Why?"

"We ask them questions, join everyone at group meals, and then sneak off to odd places alone?" Anna managed a sly smile, "They must be thinking some rather salacious things."

"I don't care what they think as long as I know what you think." John interlaced their fingers. "What was it about Rose's death that made you want to report on crime?"

"I had this notion, think what you will of it, that I could help in some way if people were aware of the dangers and the efforts."

"Of the police?"

Anna nodded, "So often we think they're not on our side and I wondered, for a few years after Rose died, if maybe the reason the police never found anything was because no one felt safe telling them. They'd heard all the horrible stories of beatings and thuggish activity from men in the uniform so they withdrew when the time came to help them."

"Because they didn't see the police as being a force to help them in return?" John sighed at Anna's indication of affirmation. "It's the way of things. It only takes a few bad apples to spoil the lot."

"I wanted to give the people I knew a better image. One to stop deaths like Rose's from ever happening again if I could."

"That's very noble of you." John massaged his other hand at the back of his neck. "But I think it was about more than just what people didn't report to the police that they saw."

"How do you mean?"

"You said Rose worked as the head of a charity, established an endowment for it, but that you believed her murder wasn't about money."

"She wasn't robbed."

"There is always a motive." John folded his legs under him, "As I'm sure policemen have told you before, those motives guide all the decisions we make."

"You don't think it was just a crime of opportunity?"

"If she wasn't robbed and there wasn't any money given to someone else then I'd think not." John pursed his lips, "What was the charity?"

"It was for Russian refugees still trying to escape the Bolsheviks. The aristocrats made their way to England but there were others who followed and she worked to get them all jobs, homes, and English tutors if need be so they could restart their lives here."

"Was that the event you attended?"

"It was a party for those who had transitioned to life. They were there to provide support for the latest arrivals and give the aid they could. Not many of them were in a position to do more than speak Russian to those longing for the mother tongue but it was enough for them."

"And it could've been enough for others."

Anna frowned, "What do you mean?"

"There are quite a few people who held no love for the Russian aristocracy and even less for their status as refugees." John shrugged, "Perhaps it was someone making a statement."

"I don't recall the killer saying anything."

"Anna," John tightened his hold on her fingers, "If it's not too painful, could you tell me exactly how it happened?"

She did not speak immediately but eventually her voice whispered out, gathering strength as she went. "We left the meeting, helping ensure everyone reorganized the room since we rented the space, and started back along the alley."

"Alley?"

"It was in York and the charity thought a larger, lighter space was a bit out of budget but they found an old church willing to allow us the use of their basement."

"So you left through an alley?"

"It was the fastest way back to the train station. Rose needed to get home to Victoria and Atticus would've been out of his mind with worry if she'd missed her train." Anna gave a bitter, breathy laugh. "She missed the train all the same."

"You didn't know she would."

"Do you know that feeling, at the back of your neck, when you walk somewhere or see someone and it puts you edge?" Anna met his gaze, "That feeling you can't explain but you have deep in your chest that sets all the hair on yours arms standing straight up?"

"I had it when Green spoke to us the first night."

"I had that knot in my stomach and I couldn't explain why so I didn't say anything."

"Anna," John put his free hand to her cheek, forcing the eyes that threatened to falter to meet his. "The evil actions of another are not your fault."

"I saw the shadow John and I froze. I watched that man grab her and stab my friend and I never said I word. I couldn't even scream for help until Rose was in my arms, bleeding out in that alley." Tears escaped to run rivulets down her cheeks. "I couldn't save her, John."

"It's alright." John pulled Anna to him, holding her close as she cried. "It's alright Anna. We've all had those moments."

"That can't be true," She pushed back to look at him, "Not you."

"Why do you think it took me so long to escape my marriage?" John dropped her gaze, "I was a coward and I couldn't face the truth I knew."

"What if I could've saved her John? What if…" Anna heaved a shuddering breath, "What if I could've saved them both?"

"Or ended up dead with them." John shook his head, "You didn't let Rose die alone, Anna. There wasn't anything you owed more than that and you stayed with her. She didn't have to face the dark on her own."

"Atticus did."

"He made a choice and, as unfortunate as it sounds, he couldn't see past his grief to the little girl who would've reminded him painfully of his wife but could've been his salvation." John reined his own emotions, "What happened to her?"

"Victoria?" John nodded and Anna furrowed her brow a moment as she remembered. "His parents took custody of her, since most of her inherited fortune was theirs, and everything else Rose's parents managed… what little they could."

"What do you mean?"

"Her mother and father divorced some time ago and their relationship was never genial, by any means, and they wouldn't be the ideal place for a child to grow up." Anna shivered, "It was hard enough for Rose to grow up there. I can't imagine her daughter trying to break free of that house."

"Rose did."

"Rose wasn't the kind of person you'd want to know well when she did. Atticus changed her for the better and that's the person she wanted to be for her daughter." Anna's voice mellowed to a hush again, "The person she never had the chance to be for her daughter."

"I don't think we're ever the people we want to fully be when we want to be that."

"No?"

"The moments that matter aren't the moments we recognize until much later. If we wait, thinking we'll be ready for them, we'll miss the chance to really change when we should've."

"Do you wish you were different now?"

"Of course I do, everyone does."

"I don't."

John widened his eyes, "You don't?"

"No." Anna tugged the covers down to the end of the bed to leave them dangling over the edge. "I'm exactly where I want to be, with the person I want to be with, and representing the best person I can be at the moment."

"Naked as the day you were born?" John tried to taunt but when Anna's fingers brushed over his budding arousal he twitched under her.

"Free of all cares and worries is an attractive appearance."

"I quite agree."

"Which is why I'm about to ask something that I might not otherwise suggest." Anna snorted, "Actually, none of this is something I would normally do."

"Engage in rampant sexual activities with a relative stranger?"

"I'm of the opinion that if you're investigating a murder case on a train stranded in snow then you're no longer strangers." Anna put her hands on his shoulders, keeping to her knees to hold herself above him. "Isn't that what Lord Grantham was trying to accomplish with lunch and tea yesterday?"

"I think it was." John cupped the back of her neck, "Unless you feel we're still strangers and want to do something to fix that."

"I wouldn't do this with a stranger." Anna put her mouth to his ear, "I'm sure, in your vast realms of experience, you've got something you'd like to try."

"Many things."

"Then you won't mind if I suggest something?"

"Anything," John could barely breathe, wanting so desperately to move but also incapacitated by the moment.

"Then would you please…" He felt her swallow with the vibration of the action trilling down his own neck. "Take me from behind?"

"Are you sure?" John risked a motion to move Anna into his line of sight. "I don't want to do anything if you're not-"

"I'm sure John." Anna's eyes did not waver, "I want something new, something… something primal to block out the reality of what we're doing."

"What we're doing?"

"We're finding the deepest griefs in the people we know John. The people who responded on instinct when the moment struck." Anna placed his hand over her heart. "I want to feel that."

"Only if you're sure."

"There are few things I've been more sure of in a moment like this." Anna slipped back from him, "I want to feel that."

John nodded and leaned forward, "Then you'll have to trust me."

"I already do."

With a swift motion, John kissed Anna. Her hands fluttered to grasp at his neck and scalp, holding him under her control, until she cried out in surprise as John flipped her so her back rested on his chest. He forced their pause, waiting for her to change her mind. But Anna only turned her head to kiss him again.

It took them a touch of maneuvering but John held Anna around the waist as he leaned over her. His kisses over her shoulders and back soothed her tightened muscles until John could sense the tension leaving her. And he used it to his advantage as his hand sculpted down her stomach to tease between her legs.

Anna moaned, head hanging low, and John worried the folds of slick skin under his care. Careful and conscious kisses landed over her back and neck to heighten her pleasure while his fingers delved inside her. When her voice betrayed that she could take no more, John gripped her hips and drove forward.

They stayed still, panting, until John drew to the edge. Anna whimpered and John acquiesced, maintaining a slow pace to drive her toward the climax just out of her reach. His fingers, grabbed by hers in a quivered flurry, pressed at her bundle of nerves until she broke in his arms.

John went to withdraw but Anna thrust herself back. The motion caught him by surprise and he choked a moment, his own arousal hanging by a thread of tension. Her hips rocked against him and John took a moment to appreciate the view of her exposed back that swooped toward her ass as it nestled securely between his hips. It was all he needed to respond to her need.

That primal part of himself worked free, raw and desired in the privacy of their berth. It plunged and drove, rutting mercilessly until she broke under him again, before allowing his freedom. The beautiful release that came with a growl and a groan.

They both slumped down, Anna's face buried in the pillow and John maneuvering them carefully not to rest his weight on her. She took his arm, wrapping it around her, and sighed at the comfort she found in the motion. The sigh he returned as he spooned around her.

"Are you satisfied Ms. Smith?"

"Yes," She relaxed against him. "Thank you."

"My pleasure."

"I believe it was mine… twice." Anna nudged his ribs with her elbow and John responded with a line of kisses over her neck.

They settled, quiet in the presence of one another, until John finally spoke. "I believe we need to get about our job again soon."

"Why can't we just stay here?" Anna whined and John leaned over her. "We could just tell Mr. Moseley we were wrong."

"I'm not going to lie to the man, Anna. He's already been through more than he should've on what was such an easy job for him before."

"And the others?"

"I don't know." John huffed, "I just know we've got to set things right. However that happens and whatever that means, I don't know but I know we're not done yet."

"Then," Anna pushed away from him, walking toward the water closet, "We've not got time to lose."