The evening went surprisingly well, he reflected as he walked her back to her office through the now-deserted halls. He hadn't had such absorbing conversations in a while, in fact. They stayed on light subjects, but heavy things seemed to pass between them in the moments they weren't speaking, when she gripped his hand tightly in the dark of the theater, or put her arm low on his waist as they left.

They reached the door of her office. He looked at her face, half-hidden in shadow, and realized with panic he should probably do something.

"One more kiss for good measure?" she said softly.

"Just one?" Her eyes were dark and wide as she grinned at him, a crooked little smile he hadn't seen before.

"Not necessarily." She kissed him, deeply, and he parted her lips with his tongue and gently entwined it with hers. That irritating loose strand of hair flopped in front of his eyes.

"Definitely not just one if you do it like that." She reached up and ran her thumb slowly, possessively, over the curve of his lips. "Want to stop standing in this hallway, then?"

He didn't trust himself to do more than nod. His throat felt very tight. He followed her into her office and then they were kissing again. He could taste the wine she'd had earlier that night, sweet and sour on her breath. She had cast a spell to remove the alcohol and complained that it just tasted like rotten fruit juice… He kept kissing her, slowly stumbling across the room to lean her against one of the stone pillars. Her fingers gripped the collar of his shirt, pulling him closer, and he recalled a long-ago dream about this…

This was not a dream. Her breath was ragged in his ear, her teeth gently tugging his bottom lip as he felt the mingled sting of pain and pleasure. He bent his head and began to kiss her neck, wetly and enthusiastically, and she moaned in his ear. He tasted salt on her skin, and something else, deep and rich and indefinably woman-ish. Not a dream. His fingertips traced the curves of her breasts, running along the edge of her velvet top but not beyond it.

He watched her expressive face with pleasure, trying to commit these things to memory in case this was the first and only time. She had a dark look in her eyes that was unfamiliar to him, the moonlight slanting through the window making her face look watery and drowned. She was very, very beautiful. The smattering of freckles on her nose looked like stars, and he kissed them gently, affectionately. She smiled, a full smile that showed her teeth in the moonlight.

"I like your tooth. The chipped one."

"Really?" Her lips were pressed against the sensitive skin just below his ear and he felt the blood rushing from his brain. "You like some funny things."

"I like you." She laughed breathlessly.

"How 'bout you come upstairs then? If you like me so much."

"If you want me to." She rubbed her nose against his.

"What do you want, Severus?"

That one at least he didn't have to think about.

"You."

He kissed her again. It was easier than talking. It was easier than breathing. She led him up a small set of stairs to her room and he hardly noticed. A strand of her hair had come loose and was running down her shoulder, and he slowly undid the rest. Her back was turned to him but he could hear her breathing heavily as he ran his fingers through her dark curls, noting with satisfaction how they sprang back wherever he tugged them. He began to undo the buttons on the back of her suit and she chuckled lowly.

"You don't use magic for that?"

"I like this better." Her skin was soft and delicate until it wasn't. He had reached a point where thin scars criss-crossed her back, making hard tracks that shimmered in the moonlight. He knew what they were.

Without thinking he knelt down and kissed one, then another. The scar flesh was puckered and odd against his lips. She breathed his name in a way that made goosebumps prickle his skin. He trailed his kisses farther down until all the buttons were undone and her top hung limply around her waist. He was kneeling on the floor now, behind her, like a penitent, and she turned around slowly. Her hands were laced over her full breasts. She had a Muggle tattoo just below her left breast; it looked like an iris flower, bent along the curve of her ribs. He gazed up at her as though trying to drink her in, making love to her with his dark eyes.

She reached down to stroke his hair and he nuzzled his head into her stomach eagerly as her fingers trailed down to the darke queue that rested on the back of his neck. Her skin was soft and warm against his cheek and he kissed it, kissed her bellybutton and the delicate, jutting bones of her hips, his arms wrapped possessively around her waist. He could smell her arousal and it only made him more fervent, more heated. His breath was coming rapid and shallow.

She chuckled softly, hitched a finger into his collar and urged him up and into her bed. He perched on the edge, fumbling with the buttons of his vest. He was very aware of her eyes on him. After a few moments, she threw her leg across him and sat in his lap, laughing.

"Nervous, are we?" Her fingers undid the buttons of his vest, then his shirt. "You're bloody handsome, you know." She looked at his thin, bare chest, lined with scars and cuts, and the patch of straight, dark hair in the center. Her lips were slightly parted and he kissed them again. She flicked her hand and her boots and suit were gone; she was naked in his lap except for a pair of small black underwear. Her breasts were warm on his chest, the heat of her pressing pleasurably onto his erection. He leaned back and pulled her on top of him, her breasts and her hair swaying in front of his face. Gods, she was positively… edible.

He placed a hand on her upper back and pushed her gently down to him. He circled her nipple with his tongue, then pulled it into his mouth, sucking eagerly and letting it slide back past his lips with a satisfying wet sound. She moaned again, louder than before, and the sound made his cock leap eagerly underneath her. She was so close to him, her parted legs nestled against his hips, her every movement sending ripples of pleasure through him. Her hand reached down and ran slowly along his length through his trousers and he drew in a sharp breath. She unbuttoned him, smiling coyly.

"Oh, you are handsome indeed." Her voice was a soft, low purr. He kicked his trousers off hastily and she laughed again.

He hadn't been this exposed in font of anyone in years. Perhaps decades. He pulled her into another kiss to stop her from looking at him, letting the dark curtain of her hair fall over his face. His hand slowly moved over her pert ass, her thighs, down between her legs. She was hot and wet, even through her underwear. He could smell it, musky and sharp and sweet. He flipped her onto her back and paused.

"What do you want me to do?" he rasped. It was not plaintive, just considerate; he thought she might rather like bossing him around anyway.

"Good man." She grinned wryly, and her legs opened wantonly like a pale butterfly. He saw that the flesh of her left ankle was a band of smooth, purplish-red scar tissue. She had another tattoo on the side of that knee, a spider.

"Would you prefer a lecture or a… practical demonstration?" she murmured. He raised an eyebrow at her and she leaned in to nip at his ear gently.

"I know what I like, Severus." His grin in response was wicked and full.

"Good. Show me then."

She stared at him for a moment and then actually licked her lips.

"As you wish." She leaned back luxuriously on her pillows and closed her eyes. The dark, kohl-like substance around them glittered like water in the moonlight. She began to touch herself through her underwear, slow, deliberate strokes that made him shiver with sympathetic pleasure. He moaned softly, his mouth hanging open, as she finally pulled the irritating garment off and spread her legs for him. Her hand rested on the tangle of dark hair between her thighs, her small fingers rubbing over her clit, glistening with delicious wetness. He hissed her name in pleasure and she looked at him, her eyes darkened with desire.

"I love an engaged audience."

"Hush." He kissed her gently, his own hand slowly easing his cock out from its confines and stroking in rhythm with her. It was absolutely intoxicating, doing this with her, hearing the soft sounds she made as she slid one, then two, slick fingers inside her. The skin on her chest, between her large breasts, was flushed a rosy red.

"Reckon you have the hang of it now?" she purred.

"Yes." He took her fingers and slid them into his mouth one by one, licking them clean. She groaned softly. "I paid very… close attention."

"Oh gods, don't get all professorial on me." He laughed with her until his chest hurt. One night, he thought. The more I get, the more I take from her… the more I'll lose…

He slid off the bed and pulled her to the edge, parting her legs gently. She looked like a wet rose, all pink folds and dark curls of hair. Bless the witch or wizard who invented self-adjusting beds…

He kissed her gently, then more fervently, licking her clit with the same long, slow strokes she had used on herself. She clutched his dark hair in her fist, pulling him in deeper, and he obliged so willingly. She tasted odd—musky, salty, but not bad. Like the rich smell of a greenhouse in summer, growing things. To him it was delicious. Her hips rocked eagerly into his face, her thighs clenching and rippling on either side of him as she neared her peak.

She cried out his name as she came; gods, no one had ever spoken his name like that, and now he didn't think he wanted to hear it any other way… His cheeks and the tip of his nose were soaked with her and he dabbed his face proprietarily on a corner of the sheets, grinning up at her giddily.

"Enjoying ourselves?" she panted. Her cheeks were flushed, her mouth slightly open.

"Mmmhmm. Immensely. Did you like that?" She giggled.

"Yeah, couldn't you tell?" She tilted his chin up with a finger and smirked. "Come up here, you." He did.

She laid down beside him, nuzzling her face into his neck as her small, warm fingers wrapped around his cock. Her palm was rather sweaty. He moaned her name into the curly mane of her hair and it sounded good, so good, on his lips. The way she was touching him, her wrist twisting slightly on the upstroke, rubbing the whole of his considerable length… He fondled the soft swell of her breasts, not roughly, but not gently either, feeling fiery heat mounting within him.

"Penelope," he gasped. "You'll… Oh, gods, stop." She did so with one last flourish of her wrist, grinning at him wickedly. He kissed her, gently, and pushed her onto her back. "Is this… Is this what you want?"

"Oh fuck yes." Her voice was low and breathy. The more I'll lose…

He pushed into her slowly, feeling her stretching around him, enveloped in her warm wetness. She was slick and tight, and the sounds she made as she raked her nails up his back were the most wonderful sounds he had ever heard.

"Oh, gods, Penny…" he moaned. Her name had too many bloody syllables for moments like this, he thought as she laughed beneath him. He thrust deeper into her, long, slow, deliberate strokes, and her laughter grew into a cry of pleasure. He pressed his lips to her ear, his voice a low, raspy growl.

"You… ahh… you utterly undo me."

Her eyes were dark and wide with desire, and she bit her bottom lip in a way that made his cock leap inside her.

"Severus," she moaned as he slammed into her, delighting in the sound of her thighs slapping against his as she met his quickening pace. Strands of her hair clung to his sweat-slicked back. He buried his face in her neck and gasped raggedly as he felt his climax building, as she wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him in deeper, fingers knotted in his damp, undone hair.

"Oh, gods… that's it, that's it…" She cried out hoarsely and he felt her rippling powerfully and deliciously around him as she reached her climax. He followed soon after, unable to hold back any longer, and collapsed on top of her, his chest heaving.

The heady smell of sweat and sex and her permeated the air. She rolled him off her, laughing breathlessly, and snuggled up next to him.

"I utterly undo you, huh?" she purred lowly. "Gods, I never thought I'd make a poet of you, Severus." He smirked as she let out a long, cat-like yawn.

"Consider yourself mistaken, then, witch." She kissed him deeply, curled up with her back pressed against him, and was promptly asleep. He stayed awake a little while longer, holding her in the darkness.