London, England – 1816

If there was one thing John knew, it was not to interrupt a woman at her work. And interrupting Anna as she controlled their kiss was the last thought on his mind. Especially since her hand was already unbuttoning his trousers and moving inside to urge him back to a state he did not think possible given their recent exploits. But, as John soon learned, he should have never doubted Anna's abilities or her determination.

It was not wise to interrupt a woman at work.

Instead, John set about helping her. Or, contributing to the general effort. An effort he knew Anna already had advantage of and he could only play catch-up in a haste not to beat her to the finish line and leave her unsatisfied.

His hands moved over her, hitching up the skirt to her dress to try and wrestle her knickers out of the way. A task they accomplished together when Anna shimmied herself free enough to leave the satiny material on her abandoned seat. The flutter of said fabric only distracted John a moment before Anna's fingers wrapped over his wrist as she straddled his legs. Then, before John could even dare think, his fingers slipped between her folds and Anna's other hand wrapped around his burgeoning erection.

He almost lost all rational thought. The sensation of Anna, absolutely soaked from a combination of their earlier endeavors and whatever other thoughts she stimulated herself with in the interim, left his fingers stuttering against her. And it did not help matters that Anna's hand now stroked strongly over him. It was all John could do to not buck recklessly into Anna's grip and forget all about her pleasure.

But Anna took a modicum of pity on him and adjusted. The shift slipped John's fingers deeper into her and the familiar sensation of her muscles clenching to attempt to cling around the digits brought John from his reverie. A twist of his wrist, and a careful placement of his other hand at Anna's hip to hold her steady as the carriage bounced and shook, allowed John to easily spear two fingers inside her. And, when Anna moaned at the sensation, John added another finger and set a punishing pace of his own that left his digits crooking inside her to stroke and tease along the delicate skin that twisted Anna until she writhed on his lap.

They both keened together, the noise of the wheels clacking against cobblestones proving enough to mask their joined sounds. And the ones they could not cover with the sounds of the street they muffled in the fabric of one another's clothing. A move Anna took advantage of first as her vaginal muscles tightened and clung to John's fingers when his thumb brushed insistently and intently at her clit in time with the slick squelch of his digits into her.

Hot breath wafted toward his neck when Anna turned her head, body still quivering with her aftershocks, and her fingers drifted lazily over John's arousal. He twitched under her but only grunted in response when Anna, more deliberately this time, repeated the motion. In the passing lights of the street lamps, John caught a glimpse of Anna's salacious smile and the dart of her tongue licking over her lips as she used her grip on him to adjust and then slide down until their hips met.

John had never been more grateful for a carriage ride. Not only with how the general motion covered most of their noise but also, now, how the shifts and bucks of the transportation aided in Anna's efforts. Especially in the rise and fall that turned to a bouncing motion she used to ride him as effectively as she might a horse in a local race.

All he could do was submit to her. It was not hard. In fact, it proved no more difficult to do than had surrendering to her intentions when they first entered the carriage. This time, however, he could play more effectively. He knew the game and the desperation in her movements now matched his since her climax piqued her desire for more.

The more John was more than willing to give and his body more than ready to provide.

For a brief moment he wondered, sincerely, what could have left Anna so intent on this action. Not one to complain about being the main recipient of her affections, John found himself curious. Curious enough to lean forward, between dotted kisses he managed to her neck despite the shift and buck of the carriage, and ask it in her ear.

Anna, huffing slightly as her fingers crunched and clawed at John's jacket while his dug into the skin of her hips to ground them together as they thrust against one another in time with the clack of the wheels, grinned against John's cheek. Her voice, barely audible over the slick sounds of them coming together, drifted to John's ear. And when he deciphered her words, he groaned into the skin of her neck and sucked hard there while she nipped at his ear.

"Because you defended me. Because you value you. And because I want to express it in a way that puts actions to words I can't find." She whimpered, shifting just enough to leave herself crying out and squeezing him as she came again. "Because I want this. I want you."

John did not respond with words. Not in that moment. And not with that action. It would, he thought in a second, as he continued thrusting through the end of Anna's orgasm, not be enough.

Instead, John pulled free. The moment of shock on Anna's face, and the sensation of her wet walls attempting to hold him inside her almost left John spending himself over his trousers. With a herculean effort John managed to turn Anna and bring her back to his lap.

The change in their position left Anna's legs spreading back around him, her feet to the cushions behind them as John slid forward to jam his knees against the other seat. For a moment he was grateful for the size of the carriage and the cost saving thought that led to its more compact size. Otherwise this would be impossible and he would not now be sliding himself back into the scorching embrace of Anna's vaginal walls.

"John?" Anna's gloved hand scrabbled back, holding to John's neck as she tried to ground herself in the new position that allowed John to piston deeper inside her. Her other hand gripped at the arm he crossed over her body to massage her breasts through her dress while his other hand kept hold of her hips.

"I don't think we're finished quite yet." John grinned to himself, nipping at Anna's ear as he gave an imitation of her earlier words. "Do you?"

"No." Anna flexed against him, leaving John to muffle a groan into her shoulder and then bite down on the fabric through to bury his grunt as Anna rocked and ground against him.

They continued to move together, growing more desperate and sloppy as they neared their home and their mutual ends. For the fraction of John's brain still available to him, it proved amazed at how long he had already last under their current conditions. But he finally gave over to the primal and bodily need to release and did so with a moan of his own into the back of Anna's shoulder.

She followed after him, quivering in the aftermath as John's fingers and thumb moved back to her hip to keep her steady as she came down from her high and his work at her clit. They clung together, shuddering and stuttering as their bodies tried to reset and cool in time with the slowing of the wheels of the carriage. And, luckily enough for them, by the time the carriage stopped they were decent enough to trust the darkness of the night to hide anything untoward about their general appearance.

John tipped the carriage driver, noting the man's sliver of a smirk, and held out his arm for Anna as they ascended the stairs to enter their house. At the door, John stopped short and brought Anna's hand to his lips to kiss the back of it. She gave him a confused expression and a raised eyebrow but John only shrugged at her. This set her to giving an indulgent snort before John extended his other hand to rap his knuckles on the door.

It opened and John, with a smile on his face, went to speak to the footman but found their butler standing there, a grimace painted over the man's face. John's immediately fell and his brow furrowed as he entered the foyer with Anna just behind him. "Something wrong Spratt?"

"There's a man here sir. He arrived about half-an-hour ago and he's insistent that you see him tonight."

"It's well past midnight now, Spratt. Surely this can wait until morning."

"I assure you, Your Grace," John stiffened, and noted the catch of Anna's breath behind him as both turned to see the door to John's study open and Green standing there. "It shouldn't wait."

"Spratt," John did not break eye contact with Green. "Please summon the police. We've an unwelcome intruder in this house and he needs to be removed."

"Oh," Green feigned a shudder and a whimper, "Do you think I'm scared of your little show of power?"

"You're in my house, sir." John removed his coat, handing it to Spratt as he stepped toward Green. "It's not a show of power but a warning. Get out, now, and you'll not have to worry about the extent of what my power can do."

"Then you've not tasted the extent of my power." Green leaned just enough to catch sight of Anna and winked at her. "Or would you want me telling the papers, and your friend Lord Sinderby, exactly what you were doing in his upstairs library this evening?"

John paused a moment , his eyes narrowing. "What would it matter?"

"I'm sure you think it doesn't matter at all because you've got your house and your title and your reputation but it would ruin you."

"I doubt that."

"Only because you don't know what I could do with the information I have." Green leered at John and Anna. "What would everyone think if I could recall details about your wife? Intimate details that only her husband should know?"

John's jaw tightened. "Watch your tongue."

"Perhaps you should've been watching where yours was." Green nodded toward Anna. "Or where hers was? Because who could deny what I saw if I could provide evidence. Or, if I suggested, that I knew her from before your marriage? Or maybe after?"

Green snorted his laugh. "What would they all say about the Duchess of Reerbourne if I could put into everyone's minds the idea that she was unfaithful to her husband? The man who saved her miserable life from the poverty her stepfather was ready to abandon them to. Or, better yet, that she'd given herself up a long time ago to stave off the inevitable? Then I'd not only ruin her but also her miserable family while I was at it."

"You're out of line and out of time." John closed the distance between he and Green. "If you print or suggest a single one of those lies, I'll see you in prison for slander and libel. And I will not stop until you are nothing more than a black mark on my memory."

"But it won't take the niggling thought from anyone else's memory." Green tapped his temple. "Don't think it's not something everyone's already posited about the hastiness of your marriage."

John considered the man before him a moment before shaking his head. "What a small life you must lead. What unhappiness you must have." He stepped away from Green, keeping his eyes on him as he extended a hand to Anna. "Darling, I believe it's time we went to bed and left this man to his delusions. And the police, if he doesn't manage to remove himself from the house before they arrive."

When Anna's hand slipped into John's he turned them and made for the stairs. It was only the half-cry, lodged in Spratt's throat by the surprise of the action no doubt, that alerted John to something. Halfway up, John turned and only just managed to keep his footing, caught as he was between two steps. But the snarl from Green's throat had him raising an arm to defend himself.

The weight of Green bowled him over and John stumbled, slipping on the stairs as he released Anna's hand. She gasped out and John caught sight of her moving out of the way as he landed heavily and sideways on the stairs. With a rushed exhalation John winced at the pain of his hip, elbow, and shoulder impacting on the stairs while the weight of Green pushed on his other side.

They rolled on the stairs, sideways and then down three as Green tore and scrabbled at John. John kept one arm up to protect his face from the wild haymaker of nail-biting blows Green tried to rain down on him. But a well placed knee and a thrust of his arm threw Green into the wall and allowed John the second he needed to get to his feet and try to regain his balance.

It was not enough as Green darted up the stairs. John tensed, waiting for the blow, but realized almost a second too late that Green aimed for Anna and not him. So John dived, catching Green on the thighs and reversing their positions of but a moment ago. Positions that John was ready for as he kept his left arm to protect his face while his right came around to drive an elbow in Green's side.

Green bent with the pain, exhaling sharply at it, and John dodged a kick from Green's leg. Another drive of John's elbow split Green's arms apart and landed a glancing blow on Green's chin. But instead of knocking the man for a daze it only set Green frothing at the mouth as he lunged at John. A lunge that unsettled both of them and sent them toppling backward.

They clattered and clacked down the stairs. John felt every bruise and, when they landed, heard the sharp crack a second before his right leg flared in indescribable pain. He tried to roll free but Green's dead weight lay over his broken appendage and John could only cry out as his mind fought against the urge to surrender to the welcome blackness and tempting syncope.

Hands tugged at him and John cried out as the shift in Green's weight wrenched at his already painful leg. And the sight got no better when he noted the blood dampening his trouser leg. It was a small consolation then, as Spratt and Anna pulled him free and a footman bent to examine Green while another held the door for two entering policemen, that the blood was not his. Instead, the blood was from Green's head where it had cracked and bashed against the marble stair.

John could only manage a nod at the request for a doctor before he collapsed in Anna's arms and the welcoming beckon of darkness overtook him.

Yorkshire, England – Present Day

Glancing down at his phone, cracking his neck and blinking to try and clear his vision, John squinted at the message there. His brow furrowed and he stepped back from the side of the stone wall to remove one of his gloves and expose a finger so he could swipe his screen to read the message better. What greeted him sent John inhaling quickly and forced him to exhale slowly to try and stall the inevitable rise in his jeans.

He coughed and looked around, as if expecting someone to be looking over his shoulder to judge the message. But there was no one. There had been no one there all morning as he set about repairing a retaining wall that threatened to impair the view of one of Henry's carefully placed cameras. Instead there was only John and the buzzing and chirping of the outdoors to provide insufficient distraction from the content of the message.

With another snuck peek, John tucked the phone back into his pocket and removed his other glove. It still took him a moment, standing in the relative silence of nature, to fully commit to his decision. But when he did, leaving his gloves and the rest of his repair tools under a tarp in case the threatening gray of the sky fulfilled on its promise, John crossed the distance of the lawn and entered the back door to get into the basement of the house where he left his shoes on the waiting rack.

Where before there was only quiet and the stale presence of a single body drifting almost aimlessly through the tight corridors and small rooms, now there was sound. The shuffling of other feet and the soft hum of light music. The smells of laundry detergent with a more flowery scent and the clean lemon fragrance of cleaning supplies used more frequently when a baby proved to provide more than distracting babble in the background.

The baby in question was quiet now and there was no music but the door to one of the unused guest rooms was cracked. John checked, more out of habit than necessity these days, in Anna's room to see the sleeping form of Michael in his cot. One tiny arm thrown up, fist clenched with small fingers gripping nothing, and his legs occasionally kicking in response to unknown stimuli matched the steady rise and fall of his tiny chest. Smiling to himself, and noticing the baby monitor blinking consistently near Michael's cot, John closed the door almost the whole way and padded down the corridor to the other door.

Taking a shaky breath, John placed his hand on the door and bent his elbow as if to push into the room but he stopped. The beat of his heart in his ears almost crowded all thoughts out of John's brain but he fought the impulse to simply press forward and instead removed his hand from the door. Forcing another deep breath, John folded his fingers back into his palm and rapped his knuckles on the wood.

"Who is it?"

"It's… John." He frowned and shook his head as he tried to find his voice. He cleared his throat. "You sent me a text."

"Did you read it?"

"I…" John coughed to try and clear his throat again. "I did."

"Did you like it?"

"I… I did. Of course I did." John closed his eyes and snorted a laugh. "Can I come in or are we going to continue this conversation through the door?"

"Would you prefer that?"

"Given the context of your text I don't think you would."

"Oh?" John could have sworn he heard Anna's smile. "Could you remind me what I said in it?"

"What?" John stumbled over the simple word and his throat needed clearing again as Anna's light laugh ratcheted up the thunder of blood in his ears.

"Could you remind me what I said in my message to you?"

John tried to lick his lips but found his mouth so dry he could barely swallow. After a second of struggle to do just that, and an adjustment in his stance to try and relieve any of the pressure building in his groin that now rubbed unhelpfully against the seam of his jeans, he reached for his phone. His hands slipped, almost dropping his phone twice in the process, but he managed to get the screen unlocked and pulled up the message to read aloud.

"If you're not too busy, I'm ready and waiting for you inside."

"Well, it's more true now than it was then." Anna sighed, "Do you want to come in John?"

John swallowed so hard he almost scratched his throat, "Yes."

"Then come in."

Placing his hand back on the door, John flexed his elbow and pressed to leave the door swinging open on its secure hinges. The sight that greeted him left John's mouth dry again and he could only stand helpless in the doorway. Gobsmacked and speechless at the sight of Anna, laid out like a figure in a reclining painting, and naked as any number of models rendered on canvas or in stone.

She smiled at his posture and reaction before lifting a hand to wave at herself. "Well? What do you think? Is this ready enough for you?"

If words had ever failed John before, he did not know the reason. But he knew now. And there were no words he could summon to stop himself gawking at Anna. Even swallowing did nothing to clear his throat or redirect his thoughts. That left him only the option of stumbling over words in the vain hope that he could find enough to make some semblance of self.

"You…. You're naked and…"

"And waiting, as I said." Anna sat up, putting her arms behind her to support her pose. Unfortunately for John's attempt at concentration it also pushed out her breasts. "If you're interested, of course."

"Very." John spoke so quickly he barely had time to consider his words. In fact, by the time he found himself conscious of motion he was almost at the end of the bed. He stopped himself short and shook his head as if the physical motion would function as a mechanical action to literally reset his thoughts. "Anna…"

"Yes?" She raised her eyebrows at him and John scrunched his eyes closed to try and focus on anything else for a moment.

"You… This… I'm… I don't…" John knelt down at the foot of the bed and forced his eyes open to look at her. "If you're doing this because you think I won't be interested otherwise or because it's something you feel obligated to do then-"

"I'm going to stop you right there." Anna put her finger on John's lips, silencing him immediately. She did not speak immediately, leaving her finger there until John's eyes met hers. "I did this because I want it. If you don't then I won't do it again because I don't want you to be uncomfortable. But don't think, for a moment, that I don't want this."

"But you're…" John found swallowing a motion for grounding now and forgot its intended function. "After everything that's happened-"

"Do you think I don't want this with you?" Anna frowned. "Have any of our conversations told you otherwise?"

"I don't know but I worry that it could be…" John shrugged, helpless for words to dig himself out of the hole he unwittingly dug for himself in a vain attempt to not put Anna in an uncomfortable position. "I don't know. I know what I feel about what happened and about what we are and about what this means and why we're here but I worry that…"

He tried to take a steadying breath but the very ground shifted under him. Closing his eyes only gave him a sense of vertigo so he focused on Anna's eyes instead while one of his hands found hers where it rested on the bed between them after retreating from its position near his mouth. Interlacing their fingers and squeezing tightly for a moment, John looked into Anna's eyes. "I don't want this to be something you're doing to convince yourself you're alright. I don't want you to think you have to convince me that I'm alright. I know I'm not and I worry that something I might do or anything I might press would… Would put you in a position to remember things you deserve to forget."

John kissed Anna's knuckles. "I don't want to be someone you ever have to fear or who brings you pain. I don't want to be someone you think you have to impress or to whom you think you have anything to prove."

"Is that what you think I'm doing?"

"It's what I worry you might be doing."

Anna's frown changed. It was subtle but John noted the flick that moved from fear at his reaction to a study of him. "Is it because it's something you would do?"

"It's something I have done. It's an act I've played to force myself to wear a second skin so I don't have to think about what I'm doing means or how it might affect me. And I know…" John swallowed with a little less of a block in his throat this time. "And I know the damage that act can have on a person. I don't want that for you. I don't want you to feel like you'd have to act for me."

Anna's face softened from her frown to a slight smile. Her other hand reached out to gently caress John's face, following the line of it slowly as she traced the contours there. After a moment she withdrew to study him again.

"I don't think there's a person on this earth who's cared for me the way you have and I couldn't be more grateful for it." Anna brought their intertwined hand to her mouth and kissed each of John's fingers before repeating the motion on the back of his hand. "But I want this. And it's not to hide myself away in another version of me. It's not to bury any pain. And I'm not afraid of anything you could do triggering me back to a darker time."

She tugged slightly on his hand to slip her fingers free before proceeding to recline on the bed. "And I want this. If you don't then I won't do it again and I won't put you in a position like this again. But if you do…"

Anna only shrugged and John decided that words would do him little good. They had failed him so far and if any success could be attributed to them at all it was entirely in how they succeeded in mucking everything up. Therefore, wary of the hole words could dig for him, John used his actions.

Discarding his socks, and getting as comfortable as one could with an artificial leg, John reached out to slide his hands along Anna's exposed legs, Her position left them gathered toward her body but John's slight tug separated them. Another tug, this one urging a small squeak of surprise from Anna, brought her to the end of the bed. There, with one of her feet perched on his thigh and the other over his shoulder, John decided to see for himself exactly how ready Anna proclaimed to be.

She was as advertised. The degree of readiness greeted John's tongue almost immediately and it only took a second of adjustment of Anna's leg on his shoulder to find the perfect angle to slide his tongue through her folds. Then it was a matter of time, talent, and technique. Delicacy and elegance proved the mark of his consummate professionalism in the work of bringing Anna to the pleasure she desired. And desire a slight crick in his neck, or the threat of her finding himself smothered in her scent, John continued.

When her hips bucked strongly after her first climax, John wrapped his arm around the leg over his shoulder. The move shifted him just so, and he bit the inside of his cheek to distract himself from the pinch of his prosthetic at the motion. After a moment he lost himself in stroking his fingers over Anna's hip as the weight of his arm kept her on the bed and he managed the intricate maneuver to thread the fingers of his other hand into her.

With his tongue working at her clit and his fingers sliding inside her, John made a concerted effort in working to find the spot that would send Anna screeching toward another orgasm. One that a continuous and flexing crook of his fingers accomplished while his tongue wrapped her clit. One worth the pinch on his leg, the bite of the prosthetic, the ache in his jaw, and the crick in his neck. A finish that spoke his action and intent louder than his mishmash of poorly chosen words and clumsy phrases.

John pulled back, running his tongue over his lips while he wiped the remaining evidence of Anna from his chin with the edge of his shirt and could not help but smile to himself. Anna lay prone and practically boneless before him on the bed, her fingers flicking weakly in his direction. Fingers that John leaned over to kiss gently before he stood.

He winced as he removed his shirt and trousers, carefully unlatching himself from his prosthetic before managing the practiced twist and pivot to land his ass on the bed. The thump of it, as John shifted to move the medical miracle out of the way, distracted him enough that he did not feel Anna's hand on his back until her nails grazed over his skin. He jumped slightly, shivering at the sensation and turned to see her smiling lazily at him.

"Your turn?"

"Only if you'd like."

"I think you'd like." Anna's eyes flicked toward the tent in John's boxers as the twist he used to see her practically put him on display.

"I can manage."

"But you don't have to." Anna twitched her fingers again. "Come here."

John moved, holding himself over Anna. "Yes?"

"I'd like to have you now, if that's alright."

"How could I say no to such a polite request?"

"You sounded like you wanted to."

John shrugged, "I'm a man full of doubts."

"I know." Anna reached up a hand and slid it over John's cheek. "But I'm not. And, maybe one day, you'll trust me enough to lose some of the doubts you have about yourself."

"Maybe one day."

"Until then," Anna's other hand slid down to John's boxers and tugged at them. "Trust me enough to have me now?"

"As the lady wishes." John twisted and shimmied to free himself from his boxers and carefully positioned himself between Anna's relaxed legs.

Before he entered her, one of his hands gliding over Anna's leg, her hand landed on his and John paused. Anna smiled quickly, as if to dispel the thought that immediately worried John. "I'd like us to go slow, if you don't mind."

"Not at all."

At first it was easy. The slow roll of his hips against her as one of his hands held her thigh to his hip proved easy enough to leave their breaths syncing. Kisses traded between movements and light touches caressed skin as they ground into one another. But, as pressure and desire built, John found himself speeding up. He tried to slow, to keep the pace even and steady, but he could not stave off his desire any longer and gave over to it.

Soon they both lay sated, wrapped haphazardly together in the room as the smell of sex slowly dissipated.

Or would have dissipated had not Anna's hand continued to slide over John's right leg. And then graced back toward his hip and his groin. John stiffened and almost shifted away when he responded immediately. But from where Anna lay, her back pressed to his chest, the position only gave her the room she exploited to rub her ass against him.

"Anna?"

"Yes?"

"Are you…"

"Yes."

John's hand on Anna's hip tightened for a moment when she repeated the rubbing motion and her hand returned to his hip to scratch her nails over his skin. Shivering at the contact, John shifted into the motions and slid his arm over Anna's hips to bring their bodies closer together. And soon they moved against one another as their breathing picked up and hands stopped teasing to move with intent. Anna's to John's ass to bring his hips to hers with each of her gyrations against his rising arousal and his to her breasts to massage and knead before dipping back between her legs.

When Anna maneuvered her leg back over John's right, notching her knee over his hip and holding the curve of her foot against the scarred tissue of the end of his leg, John groaned into her shoulder. The shift left his arousal brushing against Anna's already wet folds until he could not tell what he left on her from what she left on him. And when Anna's fingers grazed over him again, John gripped Anna's hip and thrust forward.

Their position required a bit more creativity than before. But they managed to find a rhythm they could work with and soon the rising sounds of Anna's whimpers had John's hand dancing from her breasts to her clit and back as if she were a piano and he needed to perform Rachmaninov. And when she came, clenching and clinging to him, John could only follow her over with a flood of kisses trailing Anna's shoulders and neck.

Again they lay together, this time the only sounds being that of their labored breathing as it eased. A few minutes later Anna rose from the bed and left briefly to return with a wet cloth she passed to John while she gathered her dressing gown. John took the hint, cleaning himself up and examining the sheet before sliding to the end of the bed to grab for his prosthetic and snap the sheet loose.

With a practiced motion he managed to clip himself back into his prosthetic and gather his clothes, the sheet, and the cloth before he turned to where Anna waited. "Was that all you needed?"

"For now." Anna came up to him, her fingers sliding into those of his free hand before she went onto her tiptoes to leave a kiss on his lips. "But I'd like you to sleep with me tonight."

"What about my nightmares?"

"I'm not afraid of them."

"I am."

"Then we'll handle them together." Anna squeezed their joined hands before bringing the back of John's to kiss. "But I want you there."

"I'd be a fool to refuse you."

"You would." Anna grinned at him. "And thank you."

"For?"

"For trusting me with you." Anna released his hand. "You're safe with me, John. Just as I know I'm safe with you."

"I won't make you regret that."

"I couldn't. Not ever."