It wasn't a long ride to Grantham House, just about half an hour. But even as Robert helped Cora into the carriage, his eyes lingering on her backside as she climbed in, he thought it would be interminable.

They had hardly pulled off into the intermittently lit street when Robert found his arms filled with the warm, delicately scented body of his wife. Her tongue followed his gasp, both of them humming their pleasure into the other's mouths when they kissed.

"God." Cora panted into his ear, an edge of desperation in the word. "God."

"Robert will do." He mumbled into her decolletage, the words unintelligible around the lapping of his tongue against her sweat salted skin. He chased the valley between her breasts as far as he could, thinking he would happily suffocate himself to explore there more fully. But she was laced up tight, an unbreakable vault until they were home. Years of practice had taught him just how to unlace her bloody corset, a skill he learned after the scolding he received when, in a fit of passion, he used Cora's sewing scissors to cut her loose.

She threatened to make him explain the neatly sliced laces to O'Brien, a punishment she blessedly did not follow through on. But for six months she held off his advances until she was properly undressed, not allowing him the pleasure of uncovering her skin himself until he knew how to behave.

"There isn't time," Cora whispered into the warm air in the carriage and she was right. There wasn't time, their half hour dwindling with each clop of the horse's hooves. But he was not one to let such a detail deter him, so he wove his hands up under her skirt until he could press the heel of his hand against her mound.

"R-r-r…" she was going to tell him off, tell him no, but he began an erratic rhythm that had her arching in his touch. He could feel the heat of her, the dampness, but he cursed that he could get no further.

"Do you know how long it's been?" He asked into her neck, transfixed by the sight of his hand disappearing beneath her skirts. She rocked with him and shook her head, tried to speak.

"Uh….we-eks?" She hiccuped over the word, pleasure spiking even as he drew his hand away. She tunneled his fingers through his curls and pulled, not particularly gently and he cupped her again.

"Six weeks." He tried to bite the tendon in her neck but she jerked away with a huff. "And four days."

"You counted." Cora laid her hand his, layers of heavy material separating them, and pressed urgently. She wanted to guide him - harder, faster. Release was only just there, just out of reach. She pressed her feet to the floor, her toes curling in her fancy dancing slippers and her hand raked at the seat beside her, scrabbling for purchase. Her desperate noises of pleasure eclipsed even the sound of the hoofbeats, and Robert found himself rutting against her skirts, his erection straining against the seam of his pants.

A soft neigh, a jerk of the carriage and the sound of the driver alighting to the ground. Cora's moan of disappointment as Robert disengaged from her. Her body was alive with energy, her denied release making her legs unsteady. She bit her lip and whimpered as Robert helped her down, apologizing for her ladyship, that she was unwell. She would remember that, and berate him later, when she wasn't thrumming with unfulfilled need and half-drunk on desire for him.

The air was bracing and she took a couple of deep breaths as they crossed into Grantham House, the door closed firmly behind them by the butler. He was a new chap, nothing like Carson who had stayed behind to keep Downton and the girls safe in their absence. Even under threat of torture, neither Robert nor Cora could have recalled his name in that moment so Robert simply nodded and ushered Cora up towards their room.

The moment they turned into the hallway, Cora surged forward to press Robert against the wall. Her right hand curled around the nape of his neck and drew his face down to hers while she stepped forward into his thigh. Her gorgeous dress was somewhat in the way but Robert understood her intention when she canted her hips forward and dropped onto his thigh. She was drawing his tongue into her mouth, holding him steady with the hand on his head. She jerked against his thigh once, twice, three times and her back arched, the hint of a cry pressing into their kiss. And then she pulled away, her skin flushed and her breathing uneven and tried to look composed.

She'd just taken her pleasure against him, in the hallway of Grantham House and he could only blink at her owlishly while she inclined her head in the direction of their bedroom.

"Shall we?" She asked, and her voice hardly trembled at all.

"Cora!" Robert hissed, looking scandalized as if he wasn't the entire reason she'd been so frenzied in the first place.

"Don't act a prude because it suits you," She said, turning towards their bedroom. "Not when you ravished me beyond the point of sense in the carriage."

He still stood, unmoving, as she reached the door.

"Shall I call O'Brien then?"

"You never would." He said, as he crossed to her in three great strides. Together they tumbled through the door and locked it firmly behind them.

In the years since Sybil's birth, heading towards 15 to be exact, the intimacies between Cora and Robert had changed. Even during a rocky first year of marriage, both of them had found their physical connection enjoyable and far easier to maintain than their emotional one. It was not merely a duty, even before Mary was born. Yet Sybil, and the first handful of years after her birth, ushered in another change. They both knew, without voicing the thought out loud, that the chances of another child grew ever slimmer. Patrick was the heir, he'd marry one of their daughters, and all would be well. And so the first and foremost priority of their coupling, creating an heir, existed no longer. They came together for pleasure, for intimacy, and for love. While they had never been particularly shy, they slowly became more adventurous.

If the main point was no longer to get Cora with child, they could explore other avenues. They could chase pleasure for its own sake. So that's exactly what they did. The old position they thought most reliable for procreation, Robert above and Cora flat below him, was abandoned as they found other positions more to their liking.

They used their mouths more, something they found delightful (and sinful, which was in turn, delightful). Robert would never tire of the brush of Cora's glorious hair across his bare thighs, the glint of her eyes through her dark lashes as she held him between her lips causing him to spend almost immediately. Age had not made him any more immune to the pressure of Cora drawing his cock deeper into the hot wetness of her mouth and he always came embarrassingly quickly. Cora, for her part, sometimes accused Robert of speaking just because he enjoyed the sound of his own voice - but even she had to admit that perhaps his loquaciousness kept a talented tongue in fit form to draw multiple releases from her, one after the other.

Their favorite, by far, was something they came across quite by accident, with Cora's chest fitted to Robert's chest, her thighs spread wide over his, both of their hands busy with her breasts and their joining. Robert could keep his mouth busy dining on the flesh of Cora's shoulders and throat and she could vocalize her excitement freely, little noises (and some not very little at all) that spurred Robert's passion.

They undressed hurriedly after their arrival home from the ball, abandoning their clothing haphazardly. When Cora presented her back to Robert for the unlacing, his fingers were steady and practiced, unlacing her with even more haste than her steadfast maid.

"Well done," She murmured as the ivory cage slid down her hips and she was able to shimmy out of it, taking her first real breath of the day.

"Shame it's a talent I can't share with the world." Robert said, hopping sideways to step out of his pants.

"Better not," Cora warned and drew her shift over head and tossed it on the chair of her dressing table, turning to Robert with an extra shimmy. His eyes followed the little bounce of her breasts and she giggled, untying her drawers and pushing them down.

"I'm not the one meeting boys in the garden for assignations," Robert said, perhaps unwisely as Cora's eyes narrowed. And then she chuckled, shaking her head.

"How embarrassing that was." She admitted.

"For him, maybe." Robert started to fold his shirt and then, looking at it in his hands in confusion, he simply dropped it. "He is but one of many who wish for your affections my dear."

"Pshhh." She huffed, one stocking and then two tossed over the back of the chaise.

"La belle dame sans merci." He straightened and then, cocking his head to one side, he gave her a gleeful little smile. "And she belongs with me."

Grinning, happiness a bubble of warmth in her chest, she made to bolt past him into the bed. One arm caught her up, pulling her into his embrace. He was so very strong, but his touch was gentle. He held her there, inspecting her upturned face, tracing the curve of her cheekbone and the swell of her lips. He knew every centimeter of that glorious face, and knew it in every emotion. When she realized he wasn't going to kiss her she opened one eye.

"What are you waiting for?" She asked, her brow arched.

"I've just…missed you, dearest one." Robert's voice had dropped several octaves, the price of being so honest with his emotions. And he had missed her, terribly. Not just the joy of joining with her, but the simple pleasure of simply existing by her side. So often the pressures of Downton, their titles, their daughters and all the rest seemed a far heavier toll than he'd been prepared for. He, who had been prepared for it since birth. It stunned him that she could carry it all as effortlessly, she who didn't seem quite as needy as he in moments like this.

With a sigh of understanding, she wound her arms over his shoulders, drawing him into a closer embrace. She laid her cheek over his heart and nodded her head. How could she tell him how exhausted she was. Immeasurably proud and pleased with both herself and Mary for the success of her presentation. But also somewhat resentful that it had taken so much of her time from…everything. It was easier for him to admit such a thing, as British as he may be, because he would never be as vulnerable as she was. She knew in her heart that Robert was a kind, gentle, generous man who would never purposely harm her. But the fear that accompanied her in the first few years of her marriage, that he would set her aside in favor of a woman who could give him a male heir, leaving her destitute and alone in a foreign country, had followed her well into adulthood. She was braver now, challenging him more directly (and more specifically, challenging Violet more directly). But still she guarded her emotions most fiercely, more afraid to burden him with them, than anything these days.

With Mary presented and Edith on her heels…and Sybil just a few years beyond that, they would have only each other now.

She nodded again then pressed her lips to his heartbeat, whispering into his chest. "I love you," it was a confession and a promise all in one. That they would not let their connection falter, that they would stand with one another and love one another, whatever came their way. She hoped they could both live up to the pledge.

"Now," she stepped away before pulling Robert towards the bed, humor and hunger returning to her features. "Make love to me."

To emphasize her point she wrapped her fingers around his softened member, squeezing before dropping back into the pillows.

The sweet interlude was over. Robert climbed over her and pinned her arms to the mattress above her head.

"I intend to ravish you." Holding her hands with one of his, his other slipped between them into her folds.

"Thank God," she whimpered.

"Robert will do," he said once more, and her laughter died on a cry as he pressed a finger to the bundle of nerves before dipping into her folds. He teased her until she was keening with need, her thighs tense beneath him, gripping at his hips, her lower half chasing his hands.

Once more, just shy of her release, he withdrew and the sound Cora made was a guttural growl of frustration.

"Greedy," Robert sat back on his knees, drawing her up and attempting to turn her.

"Not that way," She shook her head and looped her arms around his neck, mirroring their earlier embrace. She straddled his thighs and lowered herself to his cock, not taking him in but caressing him with her wetness. He groaned deeply in response.

"I want to see your face as you come apart," She said, pressing her forehead to his and nodding, encouraging him to help complete the union.

He slid into her easily and her thighs trembled as she held herself there, fully connected to Robert, and matched her breathing to his. When they could stand it no longer, they began to move, the frenzy of earlier replaced by something no less urgent but far more intense. Cora did not drop her gaze as she often did but held his, determined to make the connection fiercer. When she licked her lips and then leaned forward to lap at his, Robert felt himself growing even harder, hoping he could hold on long enough for her to come again. He wanted to feel her pulsing around him, drawing him deeper.

She lifted his hand to her breast, guiding him in the squeeze and release motion she liked best, abandoning him when he tweaked her nipple in just such a way, so she could press her own fingers to her center.

The only sound in the room was their harsh breathing, punctuated by little exclamations of love, louder demands for more, harder, and mingled calls to God. Their movements became more frenzied and Robert took hold of the perfect globes of her bum, using the force of his arms to give him leverage to thrust deeper. Cora's eyes were fluttering, her gaze going unfocused, a sure sign she was on the edge.

And then she was wailing, her back bowing so far he almost lost his grip on her as her muscles clenched in release. It was all Robert needed to let go, and his should began just as hers tapered to silence.

Once their taught muscles released, they slid into a heap of panting, tangled limbs. It took a few minutes of recovery before they could speak and another handful before they could move.

They were sweat-slicked and messy when they crawled beneath the sheets and Cora knew she'd have to bathe again come morning. But for the moment she was content to smell him on her skin and curl into his embrace as they succumbed to exhaustion.

"All in all," Cora murmured sleepily. "A successful London Season."

Robert's soft snore was the only reply.

a/n - i did it! before the end of the month and everything! i even remembered to include my prompt, considering these little horny kids were like "emotion later, sex now plz". but we all got there in the end, yeah? anyway, thanks for the fun challenge. now to read everyone else's offerings!