John took a deep breath and stepped over her threshold. His fingers missed the door on the first grab and he hissed when they hit the wall. Shaking them out, a quick examination confirming he did not break anything, John closed the door with his other hand. As it fit the jamb, a door across the hall opened and John ducked his head to avoid the stink-eye glare from the old woman grabbing for her morning paper.

"Uh," John curled his fingers into his palm, noting the woman across the hall as Anna turned around, leaving her handbag on a table near her kitchenette. "Is she going to mind that I'm-"

"My neighbors can think what they like." Anna went to remove her coat but John put a hand on her shoulder. "Is there something you want to say?"

"I…" John bit his lip, shaking his head quickly. "I'd hate to think that I might be the reason your reputation is damaged or you are evicted from your flat and-"

"Mr. Bates." Anna put a hand over his mouth. "I can't be evicted from a flat I own… especially if I own the whole building."

"You own the building?" John moved her fingers from his mouth. "How's you manage to afford the whole building?"

"Inherited it from an uncle when he passed a few years ago." Anna slipped her fingers from his grip. "But I appreciate your concern about my honor."

"It's not right but a woman is her reputation and I wouldn't want to risk that because you've got a steady job and you're respected here and-" Anna raised her eyebrows and sucked her lips as John continued to fumble his words. "I wouldn't-"

"Are you always so noble you'll fall on swords that don't actually exist?"

"Theses do exist and-"

"Mr. Bates." Anna grabbed his hands, forcing his eyes to hers. "I'm strong enough for this, unless you think otherwise."

"I don't think that. You're one of the strongest people I think I've ever met."

"Then," Anna ran her thumbs over his skin, prickling at his blood, and persisted in holding his gaze. "What if we both assume that the fact you crossed that threshold means you want this?"

"I do." John's voice was barely more than a whisper, his words threatening to betray him. "I want this."

"Then we must also assume that you're moment of doubt just now is a combination of your great regard for me and your fear that the shattering of this reality could mean we might lose that for one another."

"Yes." John wondered if Anna heard the words they brushed the air so softly.

But when one of her hands left his grip to hold his cheek he knew she heard him. Not just with her ears but with everything. In that moment, as she raised his fallen chin so her lips could whisper over his own, John understood the depth of comprehension that could only come when two souls synchronized. And when she pulled away he hoped he would never lose that clarity.

"Can we just have this night and confront what might be in the future in the morning?"

John finally managed a smile. "It's already morning."

"Then in our version of the morning." She narrowed her eyes at him, "I might've made a mistake when I didn't realize what a pedant you'd be."

"If you've changed your mind then I'll just-" John made as if to grab the handle on the door but Anna yanked on his hand so he had to pivot to avoid knocking them both to the floor.

It forced him to crowd her into the wall and as John went to apologize he noticed the glint in Anna's eyes. "Not a chance."

Faster than John shedding his coat and before it could even thump on the floor, his lips were on hers again. Unlike the corridor outside her flat, where they need worry over others seeing them, John took his time. His hand, gentle but firm, ran along her jaw to hold her in place as he guided their kiss. She gave over control willingly, her fingers sliding from his chin to hold onto the durable material of his jacket lapels, and only broke away to grin at him.

"I do believe we'd be more comfortable doing this elsewhere."

"What? Bothered by the idea of a good snog in the foyer of your flat?" John moved his lips to her jaw, tracing the lingering warmth of his touch there to taste instead and enjoyed the shiver that accompanied Anna's moan when his tongue flicked out to reach the spot where her jaw met her neck.

"Not at all." Her chest bumped his, the increased necessity for air forcing her breaths shallower. "I just want to be somewhere I could have you on your back."

"I think I'd prefer that as well." John kissed behind her ear and dragged the lobe through his teeth before breaking away entirely to hang his coat and jacket on hooks by the door. "Lead the way Ms. Smith."

With the growing light in the windows, they maneuvered through the small flat until Anna's hand wrapped the doorknob. A turn later and they were in the shadowed confines of a bedroom that, from what John could make out in the varying shades of gray, supported one person who rarely slept there. He could not stifle the chuckle that escaped and immediately tried to cover it with a cough when Anna turned to him.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"I do hope we're not already lying to one another when we've only just met." Anna worked off her shoes, kicking them toward a corner before putting her hands on her hips. "Are we?"

"It's just-" John's hand flailed toward her bed and then gestured about the room. "It's the same as mine."

"How so?"

"You barely sleep in your bed, the wardrobe over there is always open because you've never got time to close it since you're always dashing between home and work, and you keep everything out of a direct path between your bed and all necessary destinations." John shrugged his shoulders, his shirt rasping over his skin with the action. "It would seem we're already very much alike Ms. Smith."

"I find I don't mind that at all." Anna stood before him again, taking a moment to look down before frowning.

"What is it?"

"You're…" Anna looked up and then down again. "You're quite tall."

John snorted, "I do hope this isn't the first time you've noticed."

"It's the first time it's been a concern in the face of our interactions." Anna took a dramatic step back. "Perhaps if you're not wearing shoes?"

With a smile, John bent to untie his shoes and toed them off, stuffing his socks into the mouths for good measure. He yanked off his tie, letting it fall on the self-made pier to his daily uniform, and turned back to Anna. He spread his hands, as if awaiting her inspection.

"Better?"

Anna made a show of walking up to him and then around him before shaking her head. "I'm sorry, you're just too tall."

"Or, perhaps, you're not tall enough."

She put her hand to her chest, a scoff of feigned offense rising from her. "I'm shocked your mother never taught you that you never insult a woman in her bedroom."

"She taught me never to ask a woman's age." John stepped closer to Anna, matching the devious grin on her face.

"I'm old enough that it doesn't count anymore because after four hundred what's the point?"

"I'm never supposed to ask about a woman's weight."

"You'll never lift me. I weigh as much as a steamer."

"And never leave off a chance to compliment then." John bent over enough so their eyes were on the same level. "You do have the most dazzling eyes I've ever seen Ms. Smith. Like two tempting oceans just begging for me to explore them."

"What would you hope to find there?"

"Myself." John blinked and their mouths met again.

Anna's unrestrained ferocity set his nerves on fire. Her fingers clawed at his shirt, pulling the buttons from their holes as quickly as she could before sending two of them skittering across her floor. John almost attempted to help her out of her blouse but caught sight of the delicate buttons there and abandoned the attempt to simply hold on for dear life as Anna's hands smoothed over his chest.

He closed his eyes, basking in the sensation of her hands on him and her lips working over his own, and broke the kiss. Anna froze and went to move her hands away but John put his over hers, holding her close as he dipped down to kiss her again. But he avoided her lips and went to set a series of kisses over her jaw instead. Anna worked herself closer and John's hands slipped off her shoulders to her skirt.

When his fingers skittered over her zipper, he missed the catch the first time but managed to pulled it down in the next attempt before his fingers caught on the hook. Anna's giggled vibrated along her cheek, disrupting his kisses, and her fingers left his chest to help him ease the hook from the catch so her skirt could drop to the floor. She stepped out of her skirt and put her fingers to work on her buttons to leave her blouse floating to the floor.

John could almost hear his jaw drop. She smiled at him, walking backward toward the bed, and sat on the edge before pointing at him. "Are you going to join me or do you need a bit more help?"

He put his hands on his shirt and went to pull it from his shoulders but stopped. Meeting Anna's raised eyebrow, John walked toward her and moved his hands to hers. This action pulled her upright as she sat on the edge of the bed and put her hands on his shirt.

"Maybe you should help me."

"Happy to." Anna used her hold on his shirt to get on her knees on the bed, putting herself head and shoulders above him. She smirked, pushing his shirt from his shoulders. "Finally."

"Finally?"

"I'm taller than you." Anna placed her hands on his shoulders, tracing the lines of his skin and muscles. "Is this what it feels like to be taller than the rest of the world?"

"Mostly I just live in constant fear of knocking my head on the doorjambs." John closed his eyes as Anna drew her lips over his face in a series of barely-there kisses.

"Tragic." Anna placed her lips over his jaw and neck, kissing along his pulse point before sucking there. John shivered under her attentions and raised his hands to her hips. His fingers tensed into her skin when her hands continued to stroke over his arms and back. When she dug her fingers into his skin it pulled him closer to her and John barely stopped himself stumbling when his knees knocked into the bed. "It's so much better from this angle."

"Yes," John opened his eyes to see her slip and brassiere right in front of him. "Yes it is."

When she lifted her head John leaned forward. Anna's fingers gripping for his shoulders and the back of his head to hold herself steady while John kissed through her slip was enough for him to continue. His hands found the edge of her slip and lifted it enough to feel her skin under his fingers. Skin he caressed in time with the dig of Anna's nails into his scalp.

Forcing more of her slip up, John bent further to cover her exposed abdomen with kisses and nips. A tremor through Anna's body gave him pause but John used the moment to adjust them both. He helped Anna lie back, letting her slip fall on his shirt as if to construct another pile of abandoned clothing that now resembled a trail of breadcrumbs from the door to the bed.

Anna's hand gasped at John's belt, tugging him forward with it so his hands flailed a bit to land on either side of her head to hold himself above her, and raised up enough to whisper to him. "I think we'd better help you lose this."

His fingers moved with all the dexterity of sausages but he successfully flipped the catch and went to yank the leather loose of his belt loops. Before he could, Anna's fingers found his zipper and mimicked his earlier motions to grind the air with the sound of separating teeth. With his trousers gaping open, John attempted an awkward shuffle and put his hands on the band to lower them.

Once again, Anna stopped him. Her hands pushed his away and pulled his trousers down far enough that she could run the length of his pants with her palms. John quivered now, biting his tongue when Anna's casual investigation threatened to move higher, and let out a relieved sigh when Anna laid back on the bed to nod at him.

"You might want to do the rest yourself. I'd hate to distract you."

"You're distracting just laying there."

"Then hurry up so you can lay here too."

John kicked free of his trousers far less elegantly than Anna had left her skirt earlier but got them off his ankles all the same. His knee hit the bed before he realized the position gave Anna full view of his right leg. The bed groaned when John attempted to pivot away, to hide his leg in the growing light of the room that exposed their every move, but Anna's hand caught his. He turned to her but she only shook her head.

When John went to speak, to explain himself, she put his hand firmly on her breast and laid back to force him to follow. The new grip, accompanied by the fact the light also gave him unparalleled access to adore Anna from his vantage point, helped John forget. As he stroked and kneaded her breast, John lowered his lips toward hers again.

"We've not got time to tread over old wounds today." Anna whispered, meetings his lips with hers and a hand to his shoulders that then set a teasing pace in exploration over his back. "And it wouldn't matter anyway."

"Why not?" John retraced his earlier steps around her jaw to her ear, now appreciating the lines that dragged him back toward her neck and the trapping cups of her brassiere.

"Because what I want isn't going to have anything to do with it." Anna raised her leg to hook over his hip and drag him closer to her. Close enough to grind against his growing erection. "This part of you seems to work just fine."

John covered her mouth with his, a hand taking hold on her raised leg to force her slightly higher and allow him to thrust against her. Her nails raked down his back and dug into the skin at the base of his spine. His other hand persisted in its study at her breast before following the line of the material guarding it from view to find the catches at the back. Another set of hook and catch closures almost stopped him but with a bit of maneuvering John released each one. A release that left her open to his finally place his skin on hers.

Anna shuffled, moving her arms enough to drop her brassiere over the side of the bed, and went to wrap John close again. But he resisted, holding himself back to just stare at her. She almost wrapped an arm over her chest, torso visibly moving to cover herself from his gaze. When their eyes met, Anna's widened with a touch of terror, John moved her hand to his scarred and injured leg.

They lay in silence a moment as they appreciated what held their gaze. John's unparalleled view only begged him for further attention and he answered the call. His mouth closed over her breast and sucked heartily at her nipple until Anna practically tore rivulets in his leg and back. But all that did was alter John's direction from one breast to the other.

Continuing down her body, care and adoration in every motion of his mouth over her skin, John reached the line of her knickers. He pecked along it, leaving the occasional reddening spot where he sucked with a bit more enthusiasm than he had on her neck or shoulders. Anna's hips lifted and she shifted against him until John lifted the edge enough to tug them down her legs. They dangled off one ankle a moment before John dropped them in a new spot on the floor.

A new territory opened to them. A new frontier for them to cross with vigor and passion. A new way to celebrate their expanded horizons.

And while John almost laughed to himself at those thoughts, the sight of Anna wearing nothing but her garters, hose, and a nervous smile would have driven him to his knees if he were not already there. He glided his hands back over her legs to remove the last vestiges of her clothing and smoothed the skin he exposed. Each part of her skin softened under the rasp of his calloused fingers until John wondered if he could ever be worthy of touching so magnificent a creature. But he continued until he landed back at her hips. His position there offered him the leverage to return to the destination of his last affections.

But with her legs opened around him, with her whole body responding in time with the whimpers and moans from her mouth, John could not content himself with kisses. His tongue swirled her navel and his fingers tentatively brushed her folds. Her jerked reaction timed perfectly with his groan at the sensation of damp on his fingers.

He tried again, waiting for Anna to push him away or speak, but all she did was rock her hips toward his hand. John watched her fingers clench the bedclothes beneath her, yanking them out of place with each cautious touch. Slowly, John emboldened himself enough to finally open her to his fingers. Fingers that found her wet enough to slide inside.

Anna's howl at that almost forced John to jump away. But one of her hands flew out to grab his wrist and force him deeper. John tried to read her expression but Anna's eyes hid behind screwed shut lids while beads of perspiration dotted her body. A body John continued to tangle into knots when his lips joined the fray to suck at her clit, lick over her folds, and send his tongue delving into her.

Each gasping cry sent John closer and closer until al he could hear, smell, taste, touch, and see was Anna. She surrounded him, consumed him, and gave over to him a moment later. A moment when John almost pried himself loose from the suffocating hold of her tightened thighs around his head.

He could only stare at her, watching as her mind calmed enough for her eyes to open. But even they were hazy. Not so hazy they could not meet his or invite him closer, but hazy enough that John wondered if she saw him.

Her tongue darted from behind her teeth to taste over his lips. A taste that she turned into a kiss when she grabbed for any part of him she could reach to allow her better access to his mouth, his lips, and his tongue. John gave over to it willingly, basking in the adoration reflected back on him, and sank closer to her while her hips worked to bump and grind over his own.

John drew back from the kiss, dotting a few more about her eyes and cheeks before leaning back enough to attempt to manage his pants. His position, made more precarious by a sudden movement from Anna that almost sent him tumbling back to the floor, forced him off the bed to drop the fabric to the floor. They joined her knickers, appearing as no more than shapeless and weak copies of her elegance, and John flashed a moment of doubt.

But Anna put her hand on his, guided him back between the legs she immediately raised to his hips, and drove his doubts away. With each kiss she gave him she made him a new man. With each moan at the sensation of him thrusting as deeply into her as he could go she told him what she wanted. With the raise of her leg, the dig of her nails, the scoring of his back, Anna battled his doubts away.

He came first, sagging almost on top of her while his body completed its primal procreation, and tried to adjust his hips to help Anna finish as well. Her fingers bumped into his and they managed a quick giggle before Anna keened her final call. A call that echoed around the room a moment before dying down with the light entering the room.

John moved away from her, shifting on the bed to lay beside her, and turned onto his side. Anna did not move, her chest rising and falling slowly as if nothing and no one could defeat the soothing peace she found. One of her hands idly stroked over his leg, fingers tracing delicate scars there before running back toward his hip.

They did not speak and soon Anna's steady breathing lengthened and deepened as the slightest hint of a snore escaped her lips. John snorted his laugh, moving a few strands of Anna's hair from her face as she slept. He could not sleep but his own calm came at watching Anna free herself from the cares and concerns of the world they occupied in sleep was its own convalescence.

When her eyes did flutter open John smiled at her. She stretched her mouth back at him, still slowly blinking as if to fight away the tempting hold of sleep over her. Her fingers resumed their earlier trails over his leg but paused when her hand brushed his arousal.

Without looking at him, although John wondered if she knew he could see her grin, Anna teased her way about him to leave John groaning. She turned on the bed, pushing John to lie back, and sat up. Her movements retained a bit of sluggishness from sleep but Anna positioned herself next to his legs. John frowned and then forced his eyes closed when Anna's hand wrapped over him.

Tugs, pulls, and strokes to match his earlier ministrations over her skin, drove John's arms over his head to tear at his pillow or hold the headboard. Neither proved distraction enough so John reached for Anna. Reached for her as she mounted his legs and bent over him to kiss at his chest while she continued to tease his erection harder.

But even his hand in her hair, trying to hold himself steady, or the hand working over her skin was no aid to him. Anna lowered her mouth and took her own shy foray into pleasure with a lick of her tongue over his arousal. Only gravity held John back and his sharp cry gave Anna reason to spread her tongue and take to licking over him like an ice cream cone. A cone she quickly abandoned for the idea of sucking down on him.

John could not take much more, urging Anna up when his hips bucked for the third time of their own accord. She responded, kissing over the head a final time, but put her hands on John's shoulders to keep him flat on the bed when she slid forward. As she rose onto her knees, positioning them perfectly, John forgot to breathe. And he was sure he died and went to heaven when Anna sheathed herself in that position.

The slow ride quickly escalated, driven there with John's mouth on Anna's skin and lips and her fingers adding scars to his chest that could match his back. Her knees dug into his hips to control her motions and John gripped her hips to thrust into her. And as they both tumbled over the edge again, Anna leading the charge this time, John wondered if his earlier misgivings and self-castigations were even from the same man enjoying a woman riding him so thoroughly that they both collapsed back onto her bed. As his fingers stroked through her hair, following the natural lines of it, John wondered if that man had been murdered by the both of them in that very room.

"Stop brooding." She muttered into his skin and John laughed, forcing Anna's head up. "I can hear it turning cogs in your brain."

"You don't know that I'm a brooder."

"Then why don't you just fall asleep, like you didn't last time, and we'll both dream about how we'll manage a round three." Anna replaced her head on his chest, her laugh now vibrating through him.

"I'm already dreaming of a round four."

"Then get to sleep and figure out how we make that happen."

John lay back, letting himself fully relax on the foreign bed with the settled weight of Anna Smith on his chest, and eased into sleep.