Anna closed the front door behind Robin and Philomena and turned the lock with slightly shaking hands. All week long she'd been aching for Robert to take her to bed, but their heavy caseload at the office and the presence of their inquisitive daughter at home had made that dream impossible.

But now, tonight…

Tonight the workweek was over, Robin and Philomena had gone to stay with Philomena's cousin, and the night was entirely theirs. Anna felt a shiver of delicious anticipation run through her body from head to foot at the thought.

She turned to search out Robert's face and found him gazing at her with a quiet hunger in his eyes that made her insides melt.

Wordlessly she held out her hand to him. He approached her slowly, one steady step at a time, his gaze never leaving her own. She felt mesmerized by the magnetic pull of his eyes, and as his hand reached out to clasp hers she found herself falling into their pale blue depths as if diving headlong into the sea. Thinking that she'd never been more in love with this man than she was at this very instant. Their palms touched and their fingers entwined, and only then was the spell released. Swallowing hard she turned and led him into her bedroom, accompanied by no sound other than that of their breathing and of her own pulse hammering in her ears.

Her feet walked them over to the bed without any conscious input from her brain. Anna stared down at the duvet, swaying slightly, taking a moment to gather herself before turning to face him. Closing her eyes as she bit down on her lower lip, feeling her cheeks flush with desire. She wanted this so much, had imagined it and dreamed about it for years and years, without ever believing the dream could actually come true.

But now here they were. Finally, it was about to happen once more. An impossible wave of joy welled up in her chest at the thought, causing her heart to flutter madly as she finally turned to meet his gaze.

Her eyes met his and suddenly her whole face shone, and Robert felt his heart skip a beat. She looked incandescent with happiness and he knew he'd never seen anything so lovely in all his life. She dazzled his senses – her unquenchable beauty and strength, her confident vitality, her vibrant, irrepressible joie de vivre that made her a veritable force of nature. He shook his head in silent wonder. How he loved this woman. She meant more to him than life itself.

His clear blue eyes radiated the intensity of his feelings and Anna found herself becoming lost in them once more. "I can't –" her throat tightened as emotion threatened to overwhelm her, "I can't believe this is actually happening."

"I know," he agreed, his voice low and sultry, suffused with a tenderness he could barely begin to express. "I can't either."

Without a word she lifted the hand she still held in hers to her lips and brushed a line of delicate, reverent kisses across his knuckles before tucking it securely under her chin. "You have always been my once in a lifetime love," she whispered, shaking slightly with the knowledge of just how much she did love him.

"Anna –" he murmured, her name on his lips a caress.

"Robert. When…when I was with you I never wanted anyone else." Her voice dropped to a mere breath, a gossamer feather drifting on the air around them. "You were my first – and more than anything I want you to be my last."

"Oh," he groaned. "I want that, too."

And then suddenly he was spine-tinglingly close, pressing into what with anyone else would be her personal space but which never seemed to exist where Robert was concerned.

Anna let go of his hand and reached forward, aching to touch him, to erase the unbearable distance that the last nine years had put between them. To assuage the constant heartache that had been her companion for every minute of the time they'd been apart. Her entire body trembled with anticipation and longing.

She tugged at the buttons down the front of his shirt until they came undone, then parted the fabric and skimmed her fingers across his skin. Across the swell of his muscular chest, lightly along the protrusions of his ribs, and down along the rippling muscles of his abdomen. Each contour, each line and curve and plane, felt familiar, felt right.

If she were blind, she'd still know him. She'd memorized every inch of him – each dip and rise of his body, the ragged edges of the scars that dotted his torso, the texture of his skin and the places where he shivered and moaned at her touch. The taste of his sweat, and the heady musk of his masculine scent that clung to his clothes and skin.

Needing even more contact she unceremoniously pushed the shirt off his shoulders and onto the floor, snaking her arms around his waist before leaning in and tracing her lips along his throat, leaving feather light kisses before pausing to breathe in deeply against his sternum.

As she felt his arms come around her she pressed a kiss to the scar on the left side of his chest, just below the collarbone, a fraction of an inch from his heart.

The scar that started their journey back to one another.

She had so nearly lost him then, she recalled, pressing another kiss more fervently against the gnarled knot of skin. One shot from an enemy's weapon, the memory raising bile in her throat, and he had nearly died, but she wouldn't think about that now, not while he was here in her arms –

And then without warning he was grasping her shoulders in his hands and holding her slightly away from him with a grip that was gentle but firm.

Anna tore her eyes from his torso and through a haze of desire sought his face, breathing hard with the sudden disorientation. Not at all sure what was happening, why he wanted to stop. Gods she wanted this – wanted him – with everything that was in her, every fiber of her being. But she would stop if that was what he wanted – she would force herself to wait if he wasn't yet ready –

Yet his eyes gazing into hers were avid. Wordlessly he reached behind her to release her tight braid from its tie and slowly began to comb his hands though the long silken strands to smooth out the kinks. The feel of his gentle fingers sliding through her hair was almost sinfully erotic and she felt her breath hitch as his grip tightened just slightly and he leaned down to press his mouth against hers. His lips were soft and warm as his tongue brushed along the swell of her lips, delving between them with a languid stroke only to pull away for just an instant and then return, over and over again until she was quivering beneath his touch.

Anna let her eyes drift closed, abandoning herself to the sensation. His slow, tender kisses were making her feel dizzy with need and she had to remind herself to breathe as his lips teased hers again and again, the sweetness of the contact leaving her lightheaded and trembling.

Then she felt his lips part from hers and as she opened her eyes he lifted his arms to cradle her jaw ever so gently in his hands. The pads of his fingers skimmed across the line of her jaw and down the soft skin along either side of her throat as carefully and delicately as if tracing the outline of a butterfly's wings. With a slow deliberateness that left fire trailing in their wake his hands reached the base of her neck, where they paused for an agonizing moment before he began to rub light circles over the tips of her collarbones with his thumbs.

Anna let her head tip back to allow him greater access, feeling sparks flying with each brush of his hands against her bare skin, pleasure singing through her veins. Reveling in the intensity of the emotion in his eyes. Sensing the force of his absolute concentration on her body, and suddenly exquisitely conscious that his fingers trembled with barely suppressed passion.

Robert's eyes shimmered into hers as he lowered his head to capture her lips once more. This time the kiss was soft and sweet and full of promise, a languid, equal give and take of pleasure, redolent with a sense of comfort and an indefinable yet indelible feeling of home.

A glowing warmth spread through her body and Anna reached up to wrap her arms around his neck, drawing his head down insistently to deepen the kiss even as her hands swept up to ruffle her fingers through his hair. How she remembered this – remembered it like it was yesterday. Remembered it like it was the most important thing in the world.

Which it was.

Then their lips parted and she could see him properly again, and from the look on his face it was clear he remembered it, too.

"I never –" he began in a husky whisper, his voice low and raw with the sheer wonder of having her in his arms again, "I never thought I'd be this happy again."

Anna swallowed hard. "Me neither."

"How I love you," he breathed, drawing out each word with such deliberate care and precision it was as if he wanted to etch them into stained glass.

Anna gasped back a sob. Hearing those words, feeling the love resonating from his body to hers, seeping deep into her heart and saturating her soul, she felt as if she was whole again for the first time in over nine years. As if she was truly reborn. Renewed. Finally free of the old Anna and the burden of her past forever. But she could never say that aloud to him – even as attuned to her as he was he could never fully understand – so she tucked the feeling away in her heart and leaned into their embrace again, craving ever more of him, her body strung taut against his, humming like a live electrical wire, the heat rising between them now urgent and unstoppable.

This time when they kissed it was with a bruising intensity that left them both breathless and gasping, the forcefulness of the contact igniting their long dormant yet searing passion and robbing Anna of all thoughts except one – one shining, radiant conviction that burned in her mind like a beacon:

She was back where she belonged.

They were back where they belonged.

And this time, it would be forever.

…the end…