Anna rubbed at her eyes, pushing back from the desk and closing the file in front of her in the same motion. John mimicked her motions at his desk and shrugged up at her before adding his file to a towering pile. "Another dead end."

"I don't think I realized how common a last name 'Green' actually was." Anna laid her file carefully atop John's like a dangerous game of Jenga. "Or even if I ever wanted to contemplate it."

"I didn't." John checked the time. "Come on, let's get something to eat and give ourselves a bit of a breather. Put fresh eyes on this."

"How much better will an hour do after a week of digging into the detritus of service files?" Anna raised her eyebrows but grabbed her coat all the same at the sight of John's outstretched hand. "Fine. But just an hour and then I'm going home for a shower and sleep in a real bed."

"You mean that sofa in the break room's not good enough?"

"Being better than face-planting on my desk isn't really a resounding recommendation." Anna stretched her arms back, pulling herself straight. "Besides, we've got a wedding tomorrow and we need to look our best."

"Can't say I'd mind calling in sick to that so I could get myself a night of sleep in a bed I call mine." John led them into the street, pulling his coat tightly about himself and shivering. "It's brass monkeys out here."

"It's probably the best way to wake me up at this point since I've already super-saturated on tea."

"Don't think I didn't notice you managed to guzzle a coffee earlier." John snorted and Anna swatted at him. "What? I skipped Branson's stag night for this so don't think I didn't notice every little thing."

"Then should I mention that you managed to fall asleep standing straight up?" Anna shook her head burrowing her hands under her armpits as she burrowed into her coat. "But Branson would kill you if you missed it."

"When did you and he get so chummy?"

Anna grinned, following John across the street. "I guess he failed to mention that I grew up with the Crawley sisters and therefore I met him when Sybil brought him to a family vacation where we all cruised the Mediterranean?"

"Tom hates boats."

"He endured that one for Sybil and it's part of what helped endear him to Chief Crawley really." Anna shook her head, "He's a hard man to impress."

"You impressed him enough that he requested you come all the way here." John paused, stroking his shoe along the line of the pavement. "I know we've not… gotten off on any of the right feet."

"Tripped ass over tits would be a better summation of our relationship thus far." Anna shrugged, "But it's what happens when tensions run high."

"And that's my fault, on a grander scale." John huffed out a breath, nodding at a path that leading toward the water. "I've not been the most forthcoming and I've rather stuck my head as far up my ass as it can go."

"I do hope that's not some tantalizing piece of information before you yank it away like you did the last time." Anna nibbled at her lip. "If it is, I just want to be very clear that I plan to make this relationship one where either we're entirely professional and therefore our only conversations are about a psychopath who could strike at any moment or where we're going to be open and honest with one another."

John took a deep breath, nodding at her. "I understand and I respect your perspective because I've been giving that a lot of thought as we've dug ourselves into a very large hole of personnel files."

"You had time to think in between all of those?"

"Mostly I was enduring a lot of Branson's scowls and glares… and more than a few unfortunate side-eyes from Chief Crawley."

Anna cringed, "Yeah, I can't say that we gave ourselves a very good start on our first day when we got tazed-"

"Your friend bashed me in the back of the head."

"Okay… I admit he wasn't acting at his best."

John guided them to the water, leaning on the railing. "What if we decide that we're going to be completely honest with one another right now?"

Anna dropped her arms on the railing, leaning forward and glaring across the water as the lights blinked from the other side of the water. After a moment she nodded, "I think that would be best."

They stood in silence a moment before Anna faced John. "Are you going to go first or should I?"

"I guess, since you're the one who shared the relevant parts of your life story on the rooftop, I should go first." John took a deep breath, "The thing that lost me my naiveté on this job was because of the death of my mother."

"How'd she die?"

"She was sick, had been for awhile, but what drove her over the edge was when I happened to anger a drug lord and he decided to make it personal."

"Did he-"

"She didn't kill my mother, at least no directly." John shook his head, "My mother overworked herself beating the shit out of the two wankers that got sent to her house to find me and her heart gave out."

"She beat the shit out of two men who broke into her house?" Anna pointed in the general direction of John's house. "That same house where we-"

"Don't worry, I got all the blood cleaned out of the carpets and she passed peacefully. Albeit not in her own bed, like she wanted." John pushed away from the railing, holding to it with one hand and pushing against it for a moment before standing straight. "But that was what told me that the life I chose, the one where we protect people and we make life better wasn't actually true."

"You think you don't protect people?"

"Why do you think Batman wore a mask?" John opened his arms but Anna stayed quiet and waited for him to finish. "Because while we're out there, putting our faces on everything and making it so everyone knows who we are as we're trying to nail the bad guys to the wall, we put those we love in danger. It's the reality of our existence that we can protect everyone but those we actually love."

"So you either turn yourself into a hardened cynic and make it so nothing and no one can hurt you or you turn yourself into a sobbing pain box?" Anna shook her head, "I guess it's better than existing in a little anger cage that, when you open the lid, allows you to spring out of it like a demon-possessed jack-in-the-box."

"Is that what they wrote on your evaluation when you joined this team?"

"No, that's something I said about Mary when she was being absolutely horrible to Matthew after they unintentionally shagged each other last Christmas Eve." Anna turned slightly, still leaning over the railing. "She's not been the same since and it's rather unfair to him."

"Kind of the way I've been to you?"

"I wasn't going to say anything."

"But you should've." John winced, "I've… I've not been fair to you on multiple occasions and that's rather bad form."

"It's what happens when you're not sure what to do about things you can't quite express." Anna pointed, "Does that thing still run when it's this cold outside?"

"We could get someone to take our money for it I'm sure." John nodded toward it, leading them down the walk. "Dun Laoghaire was one of my favorite spots as a child. My dad would bring me here and we'd ride the Ferris wheel until he almost chucked all over."

"You and your dad were close?"

"Until a lorry went too fast on a one-way street." John sighed, "It's funny how the actions of one person change the lives of so many when you least expect it."

"Statements like that always make me think everyone took Philosophy 101 and then decided that was enough morality for them." Anna shook her head, tugging her coat tighter until it could not stretch anymore. "It's what gets you through the cold nights."

"Is that what gets you through the cold nights?"

"And there it is." Anna pulled them to a halt, pivoting to face him. "I guess fair is fair."

"You did promise we'd be all in the open." John pointed, directing them across the road and toward the Ferris wheel. "I'm willing if you are."

"And you've been more than fair." Anna took a deep breath, "You already know the first part and I'll admit, it wasn't entirely true."

"Wasn't entirely true?" John frowned, digging his hands into his pockets. "Which parts of it did you edit?"

"It wasn't like I censored anything for children."

"Because then you'd have to not talk about how I got you drunk and took you home."

"For the record, I was merry, not paralytic. And even the idea of being merry is entire the hormones, not because I was drunk in any way." Anna shook her head, "I don't get drunk anymore."

"So that part of your story, the one about Uni, was true?"

Anna nodded, "My personal involvement where it comes to Green was entirely true but how I changed my name and got in on this case wasn't."

"Chief Crawley didn't ask you in on this?"

"No, he did, but I'm talking about why I'm the one who's studied Green." Anna cringed, "And how I know Henry."

"I'm not letting go of the fact he knocked me over the head."

"And I don't blame you for that but he's actually a good man."

"Is he the one who got you your new identity?"

"No, that would be our mutual boss. Or our old, mutual boss." Anna puffed out. "I work for British Intelligence."

"And what do you do for them?"

"I study psychos and serial killers and analyze the behavioral patterns of people that might represent threats to the empire. Hence…" Anna shrugged, "It's what keeps the nation safe."

"And that's how you met Talbot?"

"He's the one they send to take out those psychos and killers."

"So you set them up and he knocks them down?"

Anna nodded, "Special Branch covered enough of my background to allow me to track Green."

"Then don't you have access to let us find him?"

"It's buried deeper than I've got access to." Anna snorted, "I'm basically an analyst and not much better than."

"But you've got enough experience to know he's one of yours?"

"Or else he's associated with us. He's got a rich father who's got a lot of strings he can pull with the right dollar amount." Anna stopped, twitching her head to the side a moment. "Or did."

"Is his father dead?"

"I think it might've been a trigger."

"I thought that girl's death was an accident."

"It was…" Anna shook her head. "It's got Henry all worked up because it was his friend's wife and so he took the case to finally get rid of a thorn in our side."

"Why let it go on so long? Why let him have free range for ten years to kidnap and rape women?" John shook his head, "If the government let him do that then-"

"Who do you think got the money and the secrets he extorted?" Anna nodded toward the Ferris Wheel? "Is it still a bad time to ask for a ride on it?"

"Feels like the perfect time since the government's favorite psycho decided to jump shores and kill ten women in as many weeks." John dug out his wallet as an older woman came toward him, babbling in Cant. "Although I'm curious about how we got onto that roof the other day and heard the music if-"

"Pressure sensor." Anna ground her teeth, waving at the woman when she snatched the money from John's hand and waved them onto the open seats. "It was activated to lure me down there."

"Or anyone?"

"No, me." Anna ground her teeth again, "It's inevitable that he'd figure out I'm after him because while he's not the genius he'd like to think he is he's not stupid."

"He knows the government'd turn on him and send it's psycho hunter and psycho killer out to find him?"

"Not sure he knows about Talbot but I've not exactly been quiet in academia." Anna tucked herself into the seat and waited for the bar to come up and restrain them. "It's not like the song You're So Vain."

"Then he's taunting you with this?"

"No, the song was his taunt. All the rest is him trying to figure himself out."

"And do what when he does?"

Anna shrugged, "I don't know and that terrifies me."

They rode around a circuit and stopped at the top, John's fingers tapping on the bar for a moment before he spoke. "We'll catch him, you know. All we need is a face and we've got the bastard. We plaster it everywhere and we get him."

"Or Henry does."

"Him sucker punching me from behind aside-"

"You're really not going to let that go, are you?"

"No." John rubbed his hands together and continued. "That aside, I'm not sure he's wrong about this being the perfect way to kill the bugger. He did kill that poor girl in York-"

"Rose."

"And now he's dropped ten more bodies here. Bodies, I'll admit, who don't have snipers for friends but someone somewhere still cared about them and that's enough for me to think that they deserve for a nice bullet to go between the bastard's eyes to set all right with the world again."

"Did you ever get the bullet you wanted between the eyes of the drug lord who got your mother killed?"

"No." John bit the inside of his cheek and Anna frowned. "She divorced me and ran away to Scotland before I could get all the evidence gathered."

"What?"

"Yeah, you wouldn't believe the inquest when they found out." John tried to lean back in his chair but they both started when it rocked a little too far for their liking. "I had to answer the same questions twenty time before they all finally realized I'd never shared details of the case and that it really was the oddest coincidence."

"Your ex-wife was a drug lord?"

"Yep." John rubbed his gloved hands together, meeting Anna's eyes. "Like I said, it's funny how the actions of one person affect the lives of so many."

"Did they get her in Scotland?"

"Not as far as I know but I got removed from that case for obvious reasons."

Anna did not respond, only gasping slightly when the Ferris wheel moved again to deposit them at the bottom. She handed over a few more bills to the still grumbling woman, and walked with John back toward the precinct. Before they could cross the road there, John put a hand on her arm.

"I do hope we're both on the same page now. It's been a rough ride- and all my fault- but I do want to make sure we're resolved."

"Why do I feel like the next comment you're going to make is say that all further discussions we have will be through a solicitor?"

"I'm…" John hung his head, snorting a chuckle that Anna shared with him. "I'm not doing very well with this am I?"

"I'd say we're about evenly matched in this one." Anna took John's hand with hers. "We're both a little more broken by what we've been through than I think we'd like to admit."

"As evidenced by the fact that all of our conversations revolve around our work?" John sighed, swinging their hands a moment. "I wish we could go back to when we were just two strangers not sharing drinks in a bar. When we couldn't talk about our jobs and didn't have all this hanging over our heads. Back when it was simpler."

"And in that scenario, do we repeat the awkward moment when, the next morning, we realized we were the problems we feared the night before but couldn't say?" Anna examined their hands, staying on the corner just away from the office. "Or do we realize that maybe a chance meeting in a pub was a bit more than that?"

John stepped closer and Anna noted how their breath billowed together. "Would you want it to be more than that?"

"I don't think that two people meet by chance. I don't think anything really happens by chance."

"Then I'd like to propose another indecent thing." John tugged their hands up so he could kiss over her gloves. "We're not in a romantic comedy where we fight until the halfway point of the movie and then decide it's all unresolved sexual tension but I'm not entirely sure my animosity wasn't based in something deeper."

"Something like the idea that we wanted what we realized was a dream and we were more than a bit miffed it wasn't what we thought?"

"Something like that."

Anna took the final step closer to him. "Than I think I'd like to hear you indecent proposal."

"You're sure?"

"I enjoyed the last one. Why wouldn't I enjoy this one?"

"Even after I've been a massive dick to you?"

"Even after that."

"Why?"

"Because," Anna grinned, "While there's no denying you've been a huge dick to me and about this whole situation, you've also got a large dick and you know exactly how to use it. I'm a pragmatist, if nothing else."

"Then may I invite you back to mine?"

"That would be best since the Crawleys have got me staying at theirs and it's a bit overrun by all the wedding preparations."

"Not to mention we wouldn't want my partner knowing we actually resolved all that tension the night before his wedding in the same house."

"Or your boss finding out the exact same thing." Anna slipped her hands free of John's. "I'm quite the screamer."

"Yes you are."

It took almost no time at all for them to sort out their desks. Anna quickly organized her piles, wrote relevant notes about her work on sticky notes she then stuck to the tottering stacks before grabbing her things. They barely made it to the door before John tried to grab for her hand. But he missed and Anna caught it on the upswing.

He paused and Anna used the moment to get on her tiptoes to kiss him. John staggered back to the wall and her bag swung on her arm to knock the light switch. The crack broke them apart and they stared wide-eyed at the broken fixture before John shuffled them out the door. Anna tried to turn back, to assess the damage a bit more, but John directed her down the street and through the turns toward his place.

"The cameras probably already caught it." He breathed, hurrying them along. "And we'll get a bit of flack for it but not as much as we'll get for making it worse."

"You're alright with Chief Crawley knowing we were snogging so hard we broke a light switch?" Anna's breath puffed about her in a cloud as they waited at a corner for a light before John guided them across.

"He'll be angry about other things come Monday." John laughed, "Like the fact his second-best detective is deflowering his favorite daughter."

"Pretty sure he deflowered her a long time ago."

"But now Robert knows it's happening." John held up a finger as they entered his street. "That's a different matter entirely."

"About as different as your neighbors'll be when we make a racket with our deflowering process tonight?"

"Most of them are half-deaf anyway and those that aren't are all deaf. If their hearing aids aren't in they won't hear anything." John unlocked his door, shuffling Anna inside. "I promise, there won't be any noise complaints around here tonight."

Anna pushed John against the door to close it, her hands going around the back of his neck the moment he landed solidly on both feet. "I sincerely hope that's not going to stay true."

Her bag hit the floor and their coats and gloves came off in a hurry that left a trail of rumpled coats, mangled gloves, and a scarf dangling from the bannister after almost strangling John. His hands tugged and yanked at her jacket, one of the sleeves half pulled out in Anna's effort to extricate herself from it, to roam more freely over her torso. As she freed him from his loose tie and looser jacket, Anna enjoyed a moment to just kiss him.

All the emotions from he case, from the chase, and from their out-of-step march rolled from her in a moment as John's tongue edged along her lip. She opened to him and groaned into his mouth when he tasted every part of her he could reach. When she went to take a breath John almost tumbled them down the stairs as he pressed Anna into the wall to attack her neck with licks, nips, and kisses that forced them both onto uneven footing.

She pushed him back enough to kick her shoes down the stairs with distinct thumps. His shoes, caught on the laces, forced John to catch himself on the stairs but they came off in another tumble and his belt whipped out to land on the bannister and slide down until the scarf caught it. Once there they both maneuvered with and around one another to get toward John's room.

The wall outside his door offered another place for John to kiss her again. Her fingers threaded in his hair and Anna pulled him tightly toward her to better explore his mouth for herself. John's hands, never idle, worked her button-down shirt from her trousers and slid underneath to pull her closer to him with a hand on her lower back. Anna bent into the motion and tried to wrap herself sinuously around him with a leg over his hip. A leg that John held to keep her in place as he pressed her into the wall so she could feel him against her when he shunted his hips into hers.

Anna let out a moan, breaking the kiss to try and meet John's motions from her position but trapped between him and the wall left all the balls in John's court. His thumbs brushed over the skin of her hips as he drew his hands out to unbutton the delicate fastenings holding her shirt to her. He even managed the cuffs before dropping the shirt to the floor. It fluttered there, the first real exposing move of the evening, and Anna waited for John's response.

She need not have worried. It was exactly as it had been the first night, when she shed her bra, and even in the dark of the house Anna could see the glint in John's eyes. He lowered his mouth to the skin left out of the cups and sucked a line of red there. A line he used to trace around the fabric before his hands sculpted up her back to play with the clasp.

Once it loosened, the cups hung limply over her breasts and John's hands took up a more serious occupation. He filled his hands with her, massaging and kneading to the tune of her whimpers and keens of pleasure, and then his mouth when his lips wrapped over the newly exposed skin. Anna tossed the bra aside to allow John all the access he could want and then clawed the wall when he sucked her nipples into his mouth one at a time.

Every patch of her skin, from trouser waistband to her shoulders, took the affection of his lips or his hands until Anna practically vibrated with the promise of more to come. She pushed him back, gaining access to his wrinkled shirt, and pulled the buttons loose with enough force to send a few pinging and dangling from the material. But John joined her in the rush to remove the shirt to then press her back to the wall and rub his chest over hers so the hair tickled her sensitive skin and puckered nipples.

Her nails scored over his shoulders and side, tugging him closer to her, and Anna handled his mouth by covering it securely with her own. Their hands and arms struck and bumped against one another in a rush to free one another of the bonds of their trousers. When they both tangled and bunched about their ankles, John and Anna managed the acrobatics necessary to free their feet and pressed into John's room.

One of his arms wrapped Anna's waist and tossed her to the bed. She barely bounced on the mattress before John covered her body with his and lifted her leg to slot himself right next to her. They shifted and thrust their hips, trying to build friction they both needed but could not manage from their positions. Anna shoved at John's boxers, forcing them down his legs enough to expose him to the wrapping grip of her hand while he tangled her knickers.

Between the two of them, acting the part of randy teenagers in the evening's tableau, they finally discarded the last vestiges of fabric left separating them. Anna slipped back over the bed, perpendicular to the wall, and yanked John closer to her so his lips could meet hers. While their tongues tangled his hand worked between her legs to slip and slide over her folds and press forward so he could get a finger inside her.

Anna tightened her legs around him, fingers forming claws around his cheeks to try and express the sensations through a kiss she would not break. John's palm shifted to rub and press at her clit when he added another finger and Anna's legs opened to allow him deeper. She broke the kiss, grasping for the sheets under her as she gasped for air and still John drove deeper before adding another finger.

The idea that she might boil alive from the inside out, her blood on fire and thundering in her ears to match the swift gallop of her heart, almost had Anna crying out for a reprieve. But she instead sobbed his name and whatever guidance she could manage to give someone already quite adept at managing her pleasure. And when he finally helped her fall from the edge, Anna screamed out his name as promised.

It took no more warning for John to lift her leg and slide himself inside her. Anna tightened all her muscles, holding him where he was so John's eyes scrunched shut at the wet cling of her around him. His expression only made her wish she had the energy to smile when she tilted her hips upward, releasing her hold, and allowed him to slide even deeper. But whatever thoughts of sweet torture she had planned were ripped away in an instant as John withdrew before slamming into her as deeply as he could go.

They both paused, shuddering and quivering together at the depth they discovered. He held himself over her, arms shaking from their modified plank position on either side of her head, and Anna moved one hand to his hip and raised her leg on the other to hold him. It gave her the leverage she needed to wrap both legs around his waist and get her hand around the back of his neck so she could pull his lips to kiss hers.

The pace slowed, but only for a second, as they adjusted to one another. Once they found a rhythm John offered no quarter and Anna asked for none. She tilted her hips so he hit her clit on every thrust and slipped a hand to grab the flesh of his ass to grind herself better against him when he struck deeply inside her. John drew to the very edge, teasing her with short strokes until she whined and he quieted her complaints by rutting against her until she sobbed toward another orgasm.

His fingers danced over her skin and his lips closed over her breast to send her crashing over the edge. Anna's fingers dug into his skin, trembling when he released his control for the frantic frenzy that overtook him until he finished. Even the weight of him on her only offered additional comfort to the glorious haze around her.

But when John's weight proved a bit much she shifted and adjusted enough so he rolled off her. They lay together in the dark, lit only by the streetlamps that muffled and danced through the curtains over his windows, breathing together until they stabilized as one. His fingers intertwined with hers and Anna drew them to her mouth to lay a kiss over his knuckles.

"Do you regret it?" She frowned and shifted to try and see his face in the dark.

"What?"

"Do you regret it?" John motioned between them, the rumpled blankets tucking and bending under them. "If it was just to let off steam or whatever then it's what-"

Anna's lips came down on his, her head over him and holding herself there until a tremor in her arms forced her away from him. She waited until his eyes refocused on hers to speak. "I don't regret it."

"None of it?"

"Not a single moment." Anna snorted, "Although I'll admit I wish it hadn't taken you so long to get over yourself and stop being a dick."

"But you got it in the end."

"I got it very nicely." Anna kissed him again, brushing a bit of hair from his forehead. "We had to destroy a few illusions first but I got it."

"And we all know how much we hate to destroy our carefully crafted illusions, don't we?" John helped to shift them both so they lay along the bed, tucking themselves underneath the covers when they shivered. "We never did end up getting food."

"But we've definitely cleared our heads." Anna punched the pillow under her head to look at John more closely. "Although I do hope it was more than that for you."

"If I wanted to clear my head I'd just splash some cold water on my face." John shook his head, face muffling in the pillow as he did. "I don't usually have sex with coworkers to clear my head."

"It does rather complicate things doesn't it?" Anna sighed, her fingers going to tangle with his where his hand lay between them. "I don't suppose you've got another indecent proposal to solve the issue of the last two."

"We could keep it a secret." John shrugged, "Since you're only here as a consultant you're not technically breaking any fraternization rules if we keep seeing one another."

"And what if we decide we don't?" Anna made sure he did not turn away. "You didn't handle the aftermath of the first time very well."

"No, I didn't, but this time is different." John risked a finger forward, stroking over her hair before slipping it back behind her shoulder. "This time we're completely bare to one another."

"In every sense of the word." Anna edged closer to him. "I hope we can always be that way."

"We're working toward the same goal and as long as we're both committed to telling one another the truth this time around…" John's hand slipped down her arm and under the blanket to dance over her hip. "I don't see why we couldn't at least try to see where it goes."

"Alright then." Anna smiled at him, her hand covering his. "Let's see where it goes."