John squinted his eyes open and then almost scrunched them shut again just to keep himself from coming over very undignified. The view of his wife's ass, in close proximity to his face as she leaned over to dot kisses closer and closer to the kind of 'good morning' that used to thoroughly embarrass him, only made the whole situation that much more appealing. And when her mouth wrapped around him…

"Shit!"

"Mr. Bates," She licked her tongue up the length of him, turning over her shoulder as if attempting to chide him. "Language."

"Says the woman…" John's fingers dug into the sheet under him as she swirled her tongue over his tip. "What did I do to deserve this?"

"Who said you had to do anything to deserve this?" Anna half turned, one of her hands splaying on his chest to support herself while the other continued a dutiful stroke of his erection. "Besides, I don't get this opportunity often."

"To what?"

"Seduce you." Anna leaned back, kissing his lips as John's hands released a bit on the sheets. Just as he went to put his hand to her face, hoping to continue the kiss, Anna broke off to put her mouth back on his arousal. Her next words muffled slightly before she withdrew to repeat herself. "I like it."

John only tipped his head back into the pillow, his neck arching as his knuckles whitened in the sheets. His hips bucked as he tried to rein himself back but Anna only offered more when he struggled not to give everything. And the tingle at the base of his spine had him moaning out something unintelligible. Anna paused and John swallowed hard to speak.

"I don't… I don't want to finish that way."

"What if I want you to finish that way?" Anna let her fingers graze over him, dragging steadily. "You finish me this way."

"It takes me more time than you." John shuddered as Anna laid a final kiss on him before going to shift off his hips.

John grabbed her hips and slid to the end of the bed. He held there for a moment, trying to breathe, and turned around to keep Anna on her knees while he stood behind her. Another pause allowed him to find the words to speak before he could only manage enough air to rasp in her ear.

"Are you alright?"

"That depends," Anna moved, running her ass purposefully over the swollen length of him, and looked over her shoulder while placing her hands firmly on the bed to match the position of her knees. "Are you going to do what you want?"

"I want to." John's hands smoothed over her, no more sense returning that before as Anna persisted in her motions.

"I already took what I want," Anna spread her knees on the bed and gave a little shrug of her shoulders. "I think it's your turn."

That was all the permission John needed. His fingers firmed in their grasp of her and without preamble he drove into her. They groaned in unison when he reached the end of her, driven forward by dampness she left from her earlier ministrations and the evidence of her desire already coating him.

John held there a moment before risking the slick, sucking sound of drawing back just to enter her again. Anna only kept herself still long enough for John to seek some semblance of control before she ripped it away again. Out of the corner of his eye he caught the way her fingers mimicked his earlier motions in digging into the sheets. With the vague recollection of her body, John noted the slight arch to her spine before her hips coiled to shove back on him.

It drove his breath from him and John barely caught himself as Anna thrust backward to take control of her own pleasure, despite the angle of their bodies and the relative disparity of their positions. But she took what she wanted and John barely managed the grin that came over his face when she whimpered as he took what he wanted right back.

They collided like the first matter in the universe that crashed and broke apart only to form worlds without number. Each of her keening cries only made John want to leave the marks of his teeth and lips over every possible inch of her back. The expanse stretched and undulated before him as he dragged his tongue down the ridges of her spine before shunting into her with swift, short motions made to rub and taunt at her clit. And when his hands finally reached her breasts, kneading and massaging them to bring the guttural groans from the back of her throat, John dragged his strokes long and deep until Anna shuddered and quivered around him, tightening her walls all the more.

Each motion brought them together as it tore them apart. Every move of their bodies shattering control in a futile fight before inevitable surrender to chaos. Eventually leading to their mutually assured destruction in the aftermath of a catastrophic cataclysm.

But what an event it would be. Always was. Forever continued to evolve and become as they tempted the beginnings of the universe with the end of it in the primal cycle of perpetuating personal satisfaction from selfless pleasure.

Evidence of their battle left John almost biting through his tongue when he noted how it shined him from root to tip and even dampened between Anna's legs. He growled and dipped to put his teeth and tongue over her shoulder, meeting her lips for a harsh, almost animalistic kiss she returned with a brutal ravishing of his mouth with her insistent tongue before putting a hand between her legs. A hand that excited her toward a finish and then edged back to run along him before cradling his sack. It hitched his motion and she released with a deep throated moan.

John's hands gave up their physical adoration of her breasts to hold her hips as he rutted into her, responding to half-sighed, half-growled orders of 'faster', 'harder', 'right there', and 'don't stop' before they all turned into incoherent keens of burgeoning climax. A climax that strangled in the clutching cling of her walls around him and gave John no other option than to surrender or risk a continued hostage situation. But one he would have prolonged even a minute more, had he found the self-control or the willpower to do so.

His feet slipped a little on the carpet and he barely grabbed the edge of the bed before sliding to the floor with his back to it. His chest filled and caved, the only thing he recognized in the haze of his vision, and it took him a moment to realize that Anna draped her head near him. Turning to smile at her, the lazily lopsided nature of their expressions matching in their mutual afterglow, John tried to kiss her. It was as sloppy as his vision but Anna returned it with the same sapped enthusiasm until they broke apart to giggle together.

"How'd you manage to turn?" John pointed his finger at her head, now holding by her neck at the edge of the end of the bed.

"I wanted to see you." Anna brought a finger to trace down John's nose. "Haven't seen much of you yet this morning."

"Curse of the position." John sighed, resting his head back and closing his eyes. "But I'd do it again in a heartbeat if I could."

"I know." Anna snorted and John cracked an eyelid to see her. "I've been the grateful recipient of your lack of self-control, on occasion."

"Keep saying it in that tone of voice and it might not take long for another round." John tried to move toward her but his body would barely respond. "What've you drugged me with? I can't move."

"Love," Anna rolled to her shoulder to kiss his cheek, her hair brushing over his skin as it hung over the end of the bed. "Affection, and a more than a little tongue on a few places I'd like to kiss more."

"Minx." John took her lips again, more direct in his kisses as sensation returned to his limbs and he realized the ache in his ass was his awkward position against the floor. "I need to get up."

"We both do." Anna groaned, going back onto her back as John put his hands on either side of her head to hold himself steady and over her at the same time. "Could we just not go and trust that all those hours of testimony and cross-examination and filing out legal paperwork finally did it's job?"

"If we don't go then we'll never know." John bent to kiss her one last time before offering her a hand to help her up. "Are we bringing Daniel with us? We never did get a sitter and I doubt my mother returned from bingo last night."

"How are you sure about that?"

"Because she'd already be banging around in the kitchen to argue about the relative position of her room to this one and preparing her comments and complaints about how she 'fears there's something squeaking in the walls'."

"Your mother doesn't sound like that." Anna swatted at him, pulling the covers in place as John picked up their previously discarded pajamas and other clothes from the floor.

"You're right," John dumped them in the hamper. "It's a bit more nasally."

He dodged a pillow as Anna arranged the others on the bed. "But you're right, we do need to think about Daniel."

"He could come with us." John shrugged, tossing Anna the pillow to arrange on the bed as he opened the wardrobe. "He's not fussy now that he's over that ear infection and we'll get a spot near the door if we need to leave."

"I don't…" Anna worried her fingers for a moment before throwing her dressing gown over her shoulders but not tying it in place so a strip of skin from her neck to her ankles still showed. "I don't want him there."

John paused, sucking the insides of his cheeks a moment before speaking. "Are you afraid he'll recognize his father or that his father'll see him?"

"Can't I be afraid of both?"

"Of course you can."

"Then that's what I'm afraid of."

"Anna," John walked over to her, stopping the inevitable cross of her arms with his sneaking under her dressing gown to hold against her skin so they were almost touching. "It's alright to be afraid."

"We could still lose you know?" Her voice was quiet, her fingers touching tentatively over John's chest as if worrying his skin might burn her. "There's still time for his guardian angel or demon or whatever to swoop in and save him. For money to win out and all this time to be a waste."

"None of it's been a waste."

"But if-"

John moved his hands from her hips to her face, pulling Anna's eyes from his chest to his. "None of it. Even if he walks free none of this has been a waste. He'll be marked, forever, for what he did and what people now know about him. And it gave those women a chance to confront their attacker. To show him that they're still standing and he's the one who needs to be ashamed."

"I don't want him to go free."

"Nor do I but, if he does, we'll not fear him." John kissed Anna's forehead harder than he intended but Anna seemed to sigh into the emotion. "He's got no hold over us anymore Anna… If he ever really had one at all."

Anna nodded, sinking back to wrap her arms around John. He held her close, his hands moving up and down the satin of her dressing gown as he dotted intermittent kisses over her hair. And they might have stayed that way forever if not for the cry they both jumped to hear as it echoed down the corridor.

"There goes my proposal for a shared shower." John shrugged and put up both hands when Anna went to the door. "I've got him."

"Like that?" She drew her eyes over him and John peeked at his naked body before giving another shrug.

"He's not going to notice. And besides, maybe he wants to see what he inherited from my side of the family."

Anna tried to get him with another pillow.

Within the next two hours, after a shared shower between John and Daniel when he decided to spit up all of his baby food, they arrived at the courthouse. Daniel snoozed in his carrier, the ride having rocked him far more efficiently than either of his parents as his teeth started coming in. John hefted the carrier in one hand while Anna steered them through the crowd with the nappy bag on one arm and the other holding her purse. They drew a few curious eyes and more than a few raised eyebrows but they entered the courtroom and took their seats as the other onlookers and witnesses filled the interested seats.

John nodded at those they had come to know well over the course of the trial, those whose stories were shared with tears and terrors so similar to their own. But he was distracted from his recollections when a hand knocked on the wood of the dividing barrier between the prosecutor's bench and the gallery. He smiled at Mrs. Aldridge before extending a hand to shake first hers and then the beaming man with the perfect smile next to her.

"Glad you both could make it." She whispered at them, shaking hands with Anna as well. "I was hoping for the last rally of support to tip in our favor."

"Afraid it won't?" John took Anna's hand as her words held the edge of the tremor threatening to take her voice.

"There's always a chance." She waved her hand to someone behind them and John looked over his shoulder to see Laing approaching. "I believe he's got definite good news for the two of you though."

John shifted in his seat, checking on Daniel as Laing took a temporary place on the bench behind them. "Mrs. Aldridge says you've news."

"I do." Laing handed over a file that Anna immediately snatched to peruse. "The family court ruled in your favor this morning. In different circumstances they'd have both you and the plaintiff come and they'd announce it with you all present but I told them the complications of this overlapping trial would make that difficult and they were kind enough to render their verdict without you there."

"So Daniel's never got to see Green? Ever?" John reached for Anna's hand and she dropped the folder onto her lap to clutch at him. "He's all ours?"

"For good and proper." Laing nodded to them both. "Apparently it doesn't do well for a paternity case when the act of conception wasn't consensual, they were unaware of his existence, he attacked you on multiple occasions, and is the subject of a very public rape trial."

"What about the other request?" Anna pressed, picking up the file again to scan the pages as quickly as she could.

"All medical histories are in there, for Daniel's future medical records." Laing clapped his hand on the bench. "And Mr. Bates's case was also called in his favor. No mark on anyone's records… Except for Green's."

"Thank you." John shook Laing's hand. "For everything."

"I'm sure you'll see the extent of my efforts reflected in your bill." Laing winked at them and hurried out of the bench as the judge appeared in the room.

The other shoe dropped, and hard, for Green.

The judge, after hearing the testimonies and seeing the evidence could only rule positively in two of the cases but brought down the maximum sentence. John wondered if the drain of color from Green's face was just his imagination when the sentence of thirty years came down like an anvil on the smug expression he maintained throughout the case. And it only took a single glance over at Anna, to the tears of joy streaming down her face in reflection of the other women present, to realize it was over.

He was gone. From their lives, from their thoughts, from their worries. There was no place for Alex Green in their future anymore.

It was not even until the drive back to their house, Anna sitting in the back of the car to play with Daniel until his eyes closed again, that John even considered half of a thought in Green's direction. A thought he winced over when he tempted himself to tell Anna. But try as he might to think he was a good actor, Anna caught the flash of expression in the rearview mirror.

"What is it?"

"Should I even attempt to suggest that it's nothing?"

"Not if you respect that I'm neither blind nor ignorant." Anna put a hand forward, rubbing over his shoulder. "What is it?"

"I was just thinking about Daniel."

"Then why the look like you just stepped on a Lego?"

"Because it also involves Green." John caught Anna's stiffened jaw. "I know, it's wrong because he's out of our lives and it's-"

"You're wondering if we should tell Daniel about him."

John sighed. "For all the things Alex Green is, and I could give you a long list where there's not a single good thing I could say about him for a full five minutes, he is Daniel's father."

"We already have his medical records so we'll know if there's a family history to be aware of."

"That's not what I mean." John pulled into their driveway and parked before getting out of the car to help extract the carrier from the back of the car. "I'm talking about the moment Daniel realizes he's not my biological son."

"You're afraid of that?"

"No, but he'll notice." John hefted the carrier clear, noting Daniel still snoozing peaceful inside it. "The different color of his hair, if he's a cleft chin or something, and a host of other developmental things he'll notice he's got but I've not and, when he's daring enough to ask you, that you've not got either."

"What of it?"

"Daniel deserves to know the truth." John put up a hand when Anna went to argue. "Not today and I'm not saying we should take him to visit his father. The relationship, if there ever is one beyond the basics of biology, will be up to him but he needs to know he's got that choice one day."

"I was planning on telling him when he's eighteen."

"You were?"

Anna nodded, "You're right. Daniel'll grow up with a wonderful father but if you're his father he's not going to be stupid. He'll notice he doesn't look quite like his other siblings. He'll notice he's growing differently and not looking like you. He'll wonder where that's from and he deserves to know the truth."

"How much of it?"

"However much he asks about when he asks about it."

John went to smile and then stopped, "Wait a minute."

"What?"

"You just said 'siblings'."

"So?"

"Not 'future siblings' but 'siblings'."

Anna shivered on the stoop, "John, I looks like it's about to rain. Can you finish your thought so we can go inside, please?"

"Why'd you say it like that?" John dug the keys from his pocket but Anna released them from his grip to get the door open so they could escape the threatening portent of thunder. "Why say it like that Anna?"

"Because," Anna shut the door and John set Daniel's carrier gently to the side so the boy could continue sleeping. "I think there might be one on the way."

John blinked at her. "You're sure?"

"Not a hundred percent but pretty sure." Anna grinned, taking his hands. "I was going to wait until we renewed our vows but I'll be showing by then and…"

John kissed her, holding her close and not stopping until they needed air.

"Wow," Anna let a smile come over her face as she looked up at him. "I should tell you I'm pregnant more often."

"How far along?"

"Maybe a month or two. I've already arranged to have Sybil check me over." Anna reached around John for the carrier. "It'll make our vow renewal a little more interesting since we'll have to explore all those other positions that aren't the basic one but-"

"Right now." John stopped Anna reaching the carrier. "Before we don't have another chance. If you want, that is, because I don't-"

"John." She put a hand over his mouth, holding there until his breathing eased. "I'm going to feed our first son and get him changed. Then he's going down for a nap and we can not take one of our own. Okay?"

John nodded his head and Anna removed her hand. "Again, if I'd known the effect this would have on you I'd have told you much sooner."

"Anna," He took her fingers in his, kissing them. "You make me the happiest man on earth each and every day."

"I'll remind you that you told me that the next time we try a sketchy Thai food place and I'm the one wishing to die as I sit on the toilet and you hold the bin in front of my face."

"I'd do it again in a heartbeat. It's what relationships are made of."

"Then maybe you'll make me something to eat while I feed our child."

"Anything for you." John kissed her cheek and left her to attend to Daniel as he set about the kitchen.

But for all his romantic intentions of the moment, the rest of the day did not go as planned. Or the one after that. Or even the one after that.

It was not until they finally collapsed together after mutually stressful days on a Friday that John turned to Anna, sprawled next to him on the sofa with the baby monitor ready on the coffee table, that he brought it up. "What if we elope now?"

"Now?"

"Well not right now but now… ish." John pushed himself up slightly on the sofa as Anna only managed to turn her head on the cushion to look at him. "We're coming up on a year since you moved in with me and we had our first date. By the time our anniversary rolls around you'll be six months pregnant, Daniel'll almost be a year, and we'll regret having delayed for a moment of nostalgic significance when all we'd end up doing is taking the weekend we'd have alone to sleep in a hotel."

"Is that a bad thing?"

"No, but it's not what we'll want when we look back on a vow renewal." John reached for Anna's hand. "I'm willing to listen to arguments but I think we should take a week now. Daniel's handling baby food better, he's already attached to formula, and he's sleeping through most of the night now so it's the perfect time before he realizes we're not around."

"If we did it now then work'd just be hell when we got back."

"Work'll be hell for us regardless." John snorted, "Women are always having babies and there's no end to the interns and graduates and turnover you have in a job with a boss so demanding she's convinced everyone she's heartless."

"You know that's not true."

"I said 'convinced everyone' not that it was true." John held up a finger and Anna smiled. "Besides, it's right before you get news about those bids and you know you'll just wear a hole in the carpet as you pace over it."

"I've already got a bit of a patch in my office floor." Anna admitted, biting at her lip before sighing. "It'll make the turnaround about a quick as last time, which we were trying to avoid, remember."

"I know." John settled next to her. "But we'll plan this one better."

"Okay." Anna interlaced their fingers. "Let's do it on the anniversary of our first date. It'll be special to us."

John paused, trying to bite back his mischievous grin. "Our first real date or the first time we slept together?"

"That was a real date, thank you very much." Anna pulled him closer to kiss. "And I'd love to celebrate that day about the same way this time around."

John could not agree more so he just kissed her deeply.

Between the efforts of their planning and their enthusiasm, they assembled a small group of their friends and family in the small church near Anna's mother's house. They walked up the aisle to where Anna's stepfather sat in his wheelchair. The words he managed with the Stephen Hawking machine allowed them time to say their vows to one another and then kiss to the cheers of their friends. John and Anna endured the kisses and hugs of their mothers before running together to the car waiting for them just outside.

Bundling into the backseat, John pulled Anna close and kissed her again before allowing them to breathe. "So, did the dress turn out the way you thought it would in the end?"

Anna looked down at her dress, lace and silk on the bodice and sleeves that just hid the evidence of a growing baby, to the satin skirt that hung past her feet to pool on the floor. "Just like on my Barbie."

"Good." John tucked them together in the rear. "Because I want this to be the kind of wedding you remember."

"I think our little ceremony in the Registrar's Office, with Daniel kicking rather insistently between us, is all I needed." Anna let her fingers stroke over John's face. "This is just icing on the cake."

"I live to serve." John kissed her fingers. "Are you going to miss Daniel?"

"My mother's agreed to let me FaceTime him twice a day but refuses to interrupt our three days away for more than that." Anna pouted, resting her head on John's shoulder. "But maybe she's right. We don't get many chances like this one."

"That's right we don't."

The car took them into the countryside, Anna sitting up and gawking slightly at the large castle rising up before them. Her finger stabbed at the window as she turned to John, "We're staying in that?"

"Mary's got some connections and reserved us the Princess Amelia suite… Although I've no idea if that's the largest room they have or the one in the corner because I don't think she likes me."

"She's indifferent toward you. Respectful but not close."

"I don't feel loads better after a comment like that."

Anna patted his cheek before kissing it, "You'll feel better soon."

They took the tour of the castle, learning the locations for breakfast, riding if they felt the inclination to meet the horses, and the best route into town. The tour of their room took in the bed almost twice as large as the one they had at home and the bathroom with marbled shower and tub. All of which gave John a series of risqué ideas that only continued down a licentious path until Anna politely refused more information about the gardens, the walking paths, or any other amenities offered to them during their stay.

When the door shut Anna leaned on it, the satin of her skirt billowing out slightly as she met John's eyes. "I do believe you had far more ignoble intentions than a walk through the gardens."

"I'd never do you the dishonor of suggesting anything so scandalous." John approached her, removing his suit jacket and tie before slipping his shoes over his heels to kick them free. "Your honor is of paramount importance."

"I'm sure." Anna teased back, prancing her fingers to John's collar so she could pull his shirt open one button at a time.

"But I'll help you out of your dress, if you're feeling uncomfortable."

"I could find a way to feel more comfortable."

They were careful with their clothes, the slightly nicer appearance of them giving pause to what otherwise might have been a rather violent disrobing. But they left a trail of steady seduction from the door to the bed they then took as their own with their nude bodies pressed together. John's weight bore down slightly on Anna's and he wondered if the sensation in his gut was the tiny spark of life growing in her or just his imagination of a deeper connection to the child they made together.

He wondered which moment it was, which one of the times when Anna allowed him to pleasure her and experience pleasure in return. Which one of her climaxes took hold of the one he gave her so life could grow and thrive inside her.? Which kiss that they shared started the path that led to the conception of their own miracle? Which touch set off a chain reaction that ended in life?

As John kissed over Anna's body, burying his head between her legs until she shrieked through enough orgasms to haul him out by the roots of his hair, he realized it did not matter. The exact moment was nothing but a beat on the path. A path they walked together and used to bring the life they now shared closer through the starting of another life.

John loomed over Anna, sinking into her and moving so purposefully that she writhed and bucked against him as if to urge him on. But he did not heed her urge. Instead he drew the moment out as long as he could stand it, wringing as many more moans and groans from her as he could stand in the repetitive ripple of her vaginal walls around him, and then joined her.

Laying together, wrapped haphazardly around one another as they tried to breathe and not stick to the sheets, John kissed Anna. His hand swept the familiar path over her abdomen as if he could touch the life there. Her fingers trailed over the skin on the back of his hand and the clink of their rings resounded in the chambers of his heart.