I loved every one of your reviews, but Im not going to comment this time - I would just like you to get on and (hopefully) enjoy this next chapter. Let me know what you think and whether I did OK. lol, Severusgirl xxxx

Oh, except...Furys Grace; No! For the love of God, no! It will only end in tears. Trust me.

Chapter Eighteen

Bliss

"Professor?"

No answer.

She knocked harder, spoke firmer.

"Professor, I need to speak with you."

No response.

"Professor!"

Desperately, she turned the doorknob - the door opened.

Snape was hurrying into the room from the bedroom as Andi burst in through the door. He was dressed but his shirt was open and his feet bare. He looked at her, shocked.

"How did you open...? How dare you..?!"

Like a virtuous maiden he quickly began fastening his shirt. He looked at her, his expression changing to one that, a few days ago would have sent her scuttling back to her room. Not now, though.

"I need to speak to you."

"You are in my room uninvited. Please would you leave."

"You were in my arms uninvited, earlier this evening, Professor." She moved further into the room and took a deep breath, "But...but its an invitation I would extend, if I thought you would accept."

He blinked, as if for a moment wrongfooted. "Flashbacks, Miss Carver. It sometimes happens-"

"You said I wouldnt get flashbacks."

"Then obviously I was wrong."

"You were wrong?"

"None of us is infallible, Miss Carver."

She gazed at him sadly,

"True. And will you have failed if you give in to your basic instincts, Professor? You used some kind of...astral projection in order to hold me, didnt you - because you cant allow yourself to touch me physically."

He spluttered, disarmed. "I really think...it would be best if you returned to your own room, Miss Carver. You are obviously not quite recovered from the poison."

He made to usher her out of the room, but she stood her ground and grasped his arm to prevent him moving past her.

"But you did hold me in reality, didnt you Professor? That morning I was stung. We were sitting on the sofa and I threw my arms around you and held you, remember? And just now, back in my room, I remembered what happened next. You let me stay. You let me stay with my arms around you, and you...you held me! You held me close in your arms until Id calmed down."

"These were just hallucinations-"

"Oh, no. No, no, no. That is so not true." She held out the shawl to him. "You gave me this out by the lake."

"You left it on your chair."

"I didnt have a shawl, Professor, I was wearing just this dress at dinner - I think you do remember."

Yes, he did remember because her unexpected appearance at his door earlier that evening had surprised and delighted him, she was sure of that now.

He looked from her to the shawl. Was there a look of unease about his face? It was difficult to tell.

"This shawl belongs in a painting on the first floor. I dont know how it got on my chair, but it doesnt belong to me. What belongs to me is clarity. The shawl has brought me clarity - so I know you held me yesterday. Just as I know there are other people in the castle, arent there, Professor; you said so yourself, a bare minimum of staff, and one of them happens to be a medical person, doesnt it; but instead of taking me to that person and letting them take care of me when I was stung, you chose to give up your bed and look after me yourself."

He stood like a statue as she stretched towards his neck and sniffed.

"I know it was you by the lake tonight. I recognised your scent and now I recognise the angle my head has to take to look up at you." She gazed up at him, intently. "But I cant see what lies behind your eyes, Professor. You can switch them off, cant you, so that you appear to be a person without feelings, without emotion. Its all behind there; you do have poetry inside you, but with some clever magic and for some diabolical reason, you have to pull down the shutters."

She swallowed a lump rising in her throat as she continued.

"How could you allow yourself to hold me and kiss me the way you did out there by the lake, knowing you were unable to continue, knowing you would switch off, leaving me feeling...well, look behind my eyes, Professor, and see what I'm feeling. I can't pull down any shutters, so it must be obvious."

She stared into his eyes as she leaned upwards and very tentatively, placed a kiss on his closed lips. She recognised the softness of them, the texture of them, but there was no response.

His mouth did not move as her lips touched his. In fact his whole body seemed immobilised, as though deep in concentration.

She drew back and looked at him, her face as close to his as their different heights would allow.

"When was the last time you held someone in your arms as tenderly you held me yesterday, Professor?" she said, quietly. "When was the last time you kissed someone as softly and completely as you kissed me tonight? You lifted the shutters and allowed me in for a few moments, didnt you. Why? Why do that? With me?"

He swallowed hard. "Miss Carver-"

"I think you should call me Andrea."

"Miss Carver, I-"

"My name..." she looked up at him through her eyelashes as she moved her mouth closer to him, "Is Andrea."

He had neither moved away or towards her. He seemed to have turned to stone.

She pressed her mouth to his again and kissed him; not a quick kiss this time, but longer and with as much passion as his frozen lips would allow. It was like kissing the back of her hand when she was eleven.

She pulled away slightly, a small panic that shed got it wrong fluttered inside her.

("...and by tracing it twice

I fell through the ice

Of Alice.")

She lifted her hand to his face and stroked the bruise with the pad of her thumb and as she did, his hair brushed against the back of her hand; it felt sleek and silky, like a cat.

He didnt flinch at her touch. He didnt move away at her touch.

Emboldened by this and by her recent gift of clarity, she brought her mouth close to his.

"Let me in again," she whispered.

She kissed him again, as enticingly as she was able, as seductively as she knew how.

Then,

A momentary flutter, an awakening as she felt his mouth move against her own. Her heart quickened. Gently, she put more pressure into the kiss and then more as he responded, his mouth finally opening to her and meeting her pressure with his own. She gave a little moan of encouragement as she felt his tongue brush against her lips. The kiss deepened and once again she melted into the sweet delicious taste of him that set her body trembling with need.

Standing as high on her toes as she could, she threw her arms around his neck, pulling herself as close to him as possible and when his arms came around her back, she felt that bead of a tear form in the corner of her eye again, the relief was so great.

"I fell through the ice..."

Oh and she had...she had fallen. Her body was on fire with the need for him, the ache for him. Please God let this happen.

This kiss was not slow or soft and romantic like the one at the lake. This kiss had an urgency to it, a blatant demand that came from both of them, which she was so willing to claim, so eager to submit to.

Yet he gave no indication of moving this further. Oh, but she needed to!

Slowly, gently, she manoeuvred them around so that her back was facing the bedroom door. Making sure not to break the kiss in case it broke the moment, she began walking backwards, running her hands down his arms to take his hands, bringing him with her as she stepped across the threshold into the bedroom.

At last, she pulled away a little and he looked at her, his black eyes shining in the torch-light as she raised her hand to the sleeve of her dress and pulled it down over her shoulder.

Taking her arm out of the sleeve so that the material fell to her waist, exposing her breasts, she looked at him.

"You've watched me do this before, haven't you?" she said, quietly.

"Yes."

"I wanted you to see. I wanted you to watch."

"I know."

His hands moved to her hips and the fingers on his left hand began, with great deliberation, snapping the buttons open on her dress.

"Mmmmm. Your left hand is obviously more adept at undoing buttons than pouring water, Professor." She smiled, looking at him with big eyes.

"Obviously," he said huskily, as he looked back at her with a twitch to his lips, "my mind is better focused on the task this time, Miss Carver."

The silk slipped over her hips to the ground as the last button was released, and she immediately closed the gap between them, kissing him as her fingers found the fastenings of his trousers and undid them.

He moaned as she pushed her hand inside and caressed him, feeling the hardness and the length of him and wanting him so much she actually felt a little dizzy.

She slipped the clothes down over his hips, down his thighs, lifted her foot and placed it inside the crutch of his trousers, of his underwear, then pushed them down to the floor, enabling him to step out of them.

She gave a delighted squeal as he grasped the tops of her arms, taking her mouth to his with hot, insistent kisses, all the while guiding her backwards until her back met the bedpost. His body pressed against hers, pushing her against the post, her back cushioned from the hard wood by the thick bed hangings.

His hand cupped the back of her head, his thumb stroking her throat as he tilted her head up in order to kiss her deeper, harder; their tongues rolling, tasting, exploring; their breathing becoming heavy and noisy as the passion mounted.

The hand travelled down to her throat and then further until it found her breast and, as he caressed her she lifted her face towards the ceiling and sighed deeply as his touch sent her senses reeling.

She pressed her hips into him, urging him on, feeling every promising, enticing inch of him hard against her belly. There was now a furnace burning fiercely inside her. Frantically, she pushed his shirt open, away and off, his hand coming out of his sleeve and returning to travel up her thigh to her G-string.

His fingers found and released the catch as easily as though hed done it a hundred times before. The weight of the metal stars caused the whole thing to fall to the ground.

The last of the clothing now discarded, the need for each other became vital. Urgently, his hands ran over her bottom, around and down until they grasped the insides of her thighs from behind. The instant he lifted her, she wrapped herself around his hips, clutching him tightly, pulling him to her, both gasping their delight at the exquisite moment of oneness.

His hands moved back to her bottom and held her, supported her, encouraged her as they began a beautiful, beautiful rhythm that sent her tumbling over the edge of pleasure and into ecstasy.

Burning kisses placed on her shoulder, throat and neck saw her through her sighs and cries and desperate grasping of his back as she hit her peak, until she was able to return those kisses as his own moment of climax followed immediately after hers. His breathing came hard and hot against her neck, and as his body tensed, he gasped her name twice, making her splutter with relieved tears.

Panting, they stayed there; bodies hot and slippery with sweat, heads rubbing together slowly; lips kissing wherever they touched, until he whispered,

"Hold on to me."

She clutched him tightly as he moved away from the bedpost and knelt on the bed, manoeuvring their bodies to the centre.

They were still together; still joined.

"How...how are you doing this?" She gasped in disbelief.

"Hush," he whispered, softly. "Let me concentrate."

He put her down gently on the bed, his weight pressing on her inciting a whole new vortex of sensations inside. She felt enclosed by him, the scent of him, the immediacy of his flesh against hers. She looked up and their eyes met. For the first time she felt a warmth from his gaze and the intimacy of the look that passed between them sent an emotion flooding through her body, heating her whole being.

Slowly he closed his eyes and placed his lips upon hers and the kiss they shared was more delicious than any that had gone before.

She moaned with pleasure and surprise as he began moving again, slowly, sensually; his rhythm building until she picked it up and joined in.

She was writhing beneath him, meeting his body with movements of her own and as his thrusts deepened with the approach of his climax, she felt herself spiralling up into her own, their voices joined as they cried out with the sheer bliss of release at the same moment.

As they lay together quietly, in each others arms, she looked up at him.

"Now tell me how you did that."

"You forget," he said, softly. "You are not in the muggle world at the moment."

She grinned broadly. "Halle-bloody-lujah!"