Mary awoke in the middle of the night. The event did not surprise her; it had been a common occurrence since the weeks following "the incident." What did surprise her, however, was that for once she didn't feel alone and scared in the darkness, shaken from blissful unconsciousness yet again by the haunting corpse which had lain here. No, for once, she felt... Safe. Within the window of silver moonlight she could see Matthew's pale, sinewy arms around her and feel the warm reassuring solidness of him against her back.

It was nice. So, so much nicer than she wanted it to be. He was so much nicer than she wanted him to be.

Her mind drifted back to a conversation a few days ago, where her mother had yet again urged her to marry Matthew. "Please, Mama, as if I could ever enjoy being his wife!" she had exclaimed, rolling her eyes and exiting the room dismissively.

But now, in the middle of the night, with the rest of society and her family and all the judging eyes which fixated on her every choice, closed in sleep, she allowed herself to wonder about it.

Matthew Crawley's wife would get to hear his ridiculously sensual voice every night before bed, teasing her and admiring her.

Matthew Crawley's wife would get to watch his long fingers slide open the buttons of his shirt every night, and see him peel away his dress to reveal that broad, toned chest and dark dusting of gold hair trailing downwards…

Matthew Crawley's wife wouldn't have to instruct him to leave his pants on, for form's sake.

And Matthew Crawley's wife would get to lie in his warm, strong arms, every night, feeling wonderfully removed from, yet not alone in, the world. Instead she would enjoy the feel of his slightly rough chin against her shoulder, his warm, even breath tickling the sensitive skin of her neck, and she indulged in the simple pleasure of hearing him breathe. She could lose herself in the sensation of his heartbeat pounding in rhythm with hers against her back, and she wouldn't have to restrict herself to sensing its beats through the cloth of her nightgown. Matthew Crawley's wife could lie skin to skin with him, and lose herself in the secure, optimistic hopefulness which permeated every fiber of his being, and which he enveloped her in as his arms encircled her.

It had been a long time since Mary had been truly, genuinely, hopeful.

And yet…

Matthew Crawley didn't want her as his wife. He had made that abundantly clear from the beginning, hadn't he? "They're clearly going to try to push one of the daughters at me…"

She could not resign herself to want any part of him if he held no hope of wanting her.

And yet…

What about tonight? Those words she had heard slip from his lips.

"Mary, my darling… Mary, my love…"

He had been dreaming, certainly, and yet all dreams had to spawn from some seed of truth, didn't they? Or did they? It seemed absurd for Mary to base the entirety of her belief in the reversal of his attitude on some half-whispered words from a dream. There was no other proof of the matter.

Or was there?

All this time, Mary had been focused on the compassion resonating from the feeling of Matthew's upper body entwined about hers. Now, though, as her thoughts shifted away from that topic, she suddenly became aware of the feeling of something warm and hard pushing into the back of her upper thigh. It wasn't an immense pressure, but she found now that she had acknowledge it, she could no longer ignore it. It remained there, nagging at her, the simple fact that she was certain Matthew was aroused.

She didn't, however, have much experience with the situation. The only other time she had been aware of such an event had been a few heavy kisses with suitors on dark balconies during the season, and, well, the situation with Pamuk… The circumstances here shared little with the others, as all they had been doing was sleeping. Did this mean Matthew Crawley desired her? Or was it yet another mystery that the stolid walls of propriety prevented from even being whispered about to women?

She took an inventory of the situation. Besides the curious occurrence down below, his arms were wrapped rather possessively around her. His hands, however, lay folded chastely across her stomach. Slowly she slid one of her hands over his and removed it gently from the embrace, lifting it out so she could examine in it in the moonlight.

His hands were large, much larger than hers, but there was something delicate about his slender fingers. She traced the warm surface of his palm even as she studied his fingers, noting the slight calluses from writing, and from other chores, which never would have been the case if he were a proper noble man. Intrigued, though, she remembered the nimble way his fingers had undone the buttons earlier that night, and then suddenly she knew. She knew she wanted Matthew Crawley's warm hands everywhere on her, that she'd die if she didn't feel them. It was a funny thing, really, that she could desire this so strongly after how repulsed she had felt at Kemal's hands slithering across her flesh, but nevertheless, she couldn't even begin to damper this sudden desire. She felt herself warming already at the thoughts; she was certain she was blushing even, and it was embarrassing! Who was Matthew Crawley to make the collected, proper, Lady Mary blush, especially when he wasn't even awake? And yet, the more she stared hungrily at his hand, the more she yearned to feel it softly skimming the along the planes of her legs, tracing the contours of her chest, gliding from freckle to freckle across the expanse of her bare back, and sliding upward to relieve the maddening need burgeoning between her legs with its pressure… She shivered, and tried to relieve some of this infectious desire by slowly rubbing her buttocks against that incessant point of pressure between them.

She felt his breath catch, and she knew he was awake.

And how could Matthew not be awake? He had never been a heavy sleeper, and the feeling of Mary's warm, supple bottom, grinding against his arousal, the friction ever the sweeter because of the silk night gown she wore, was enough to inspire life in every limb of a dead man. He was disoriented for a moment, as his eyes opened to the unfamiliar room and the sight of muse of all his fantasies wrapped in his arms. Even now, with her warm form melting against him and her delicious derriere sliding against him there, he still felt dizzy, but he had no qualms about his location.

Mary paused in her movements, and both of them lay still, perhaps trying to feign sleep for the others, but they failed; their stillness was far too great for a sleeper to accomplish. Mary turned her attention to his hand again, examining it once more, before, slowly, shakily, pressing it against her torso again. Both of them held their breath as her hand, still on top of his own, slowly slid it up her chest. Each rib they crossed served as a delicate marker on a path to a place they could never return to now, and finally, their hands paused in their journey at the base of her breast, so that Matthew's thumb was just barely pressed against its underside. He could feel the tantalizing weight of its softness against his hand, and he lay, spellbound, as they both felt their hearts pounding heavily, rapidly, in unison. Mary's hand continued then, leading his to the side of her bosom, so the tops of his fingertips brushed sensitively against the edges of the swell, and both of them felt her shiver. Mary, however, felt another surge of heat in her loins, as that impossible need at her core grew. So, with a final fortifying breath, she swiftly moved his hand so that the entirety of her breast lay beneath it, before removing her own hand.

Both of them sighed passionately at the sensation, and Matthew marvelled at the feeling of the her chest, which he had so guiltily oggled from occasion to occasion, impossibly soft beneath his fingertips, although her nipple pressed into the warm center of his palm. He squeezed her twice, feeling her body ripple from his ministrations, and then his fingers continued their exploration, sliding up and down her decolletage, pinching and pressing at the sides, his thumb brushing teasingly across her nipple before his fingers rolled it between them… They were both panting heavily by now, Mary writhing deliciously against him, and his other hand slid slightly from its position on her stomach to grasp at her hip, holding her against him despite all her erratic movement. And, despite his best attempts at composure, he found his own hips pitching forward, rubbing his erection against her bottom even as his hand continued to greedily clutch at the yielding flesh of her chest.

Their pants were starting to shift to moans when Mary's hand once again found his own, and he stilled immediately. Disappointedly, he thought she was ending this exploration abruptly as she guided his hand away from her bustier and back towards her stomach, but every muscle in his body tensed as she realized that she had bypassed the original location on her stomach and was instead leading them lower still… Finally she planted his hand on her knee, and he could feel the lacy hem of her nightgown just above his fingers. Then, gingerly, their hand began gliding up. Though they were beneath the covers, Matthew could picture every inch of the smooth, creamy flesh of her slender legs which glided below his own fingertips from his numerous fantasies. Their breath caught and again became uneven as his hand, egged on by hers, rose higher and higher, now halfway up her thigh, now three quarters of the way, her nightgown bunching above their wrists… Matthew felt himself grow harder and harder with each inch that his hand rose, and as the heat from between her legs began to radiate onto his hand. They paused, again, at the base, and then she shifted his hand directly to the apex of her legs, pressing his fingers against her, and his other hand gripped her hip ferociously because she was deliriously wet, and warm, and ohh, against his hand…

Satisfaction coursed through Mary's whole body as the feeling of him touching her there finally began to satiate her immense, aching need. She bucked against him, and although it was most unladylike, it was inexcusably pleasing. Her pleasure continued at his fingers slid back and forth against her slick folds, before pinching at that nub of unimaginable pleasure, drawing high-pitched whimper from her as her whole body convulsed. His lovely, lovely fingers continued to press and circle at her there, driving her absolutely wild. She dropped away from reality, her whole body quivering uncontrollably; her only anchor to the world was him, her only certainty the feeling of him touching her there. Her mind was sliding away, into the stars, into a world of passion and desire entirely focused on Matthew Crawley, and she began to moan louder and louder… His fingers disappeared and she thought she'd die from the loss, but then his thumb continued the ministrations, and the suddenly his fingers re-entered her world as they plunged into her.

Oh Lord, she was so, so tight around him… Matthew moaned in appreciation as his fingers entered her, the unbearably warm, heated moisture tightening around him. In and out, in and out, he moved his fingers, driving them both wild. He felt her convulse impossibly tighter around him and he screwed his eyes shut in desperation to not give into the sensation. His cock, confined yet in his pants, was painfully harder than he could ever recall it being before in his life. Desperately, he slid his wet hand out of Mary, and suddenly rolled so that he was on top of her.

Perhaps Mary should have been concerned, but at that moment, she didn't have the mental capacity to worry rationally. Matthew had his pants on yet, and despite all of her middle class jibes, he was far more of a gentleman than Kemal Pamuk had ever been, and that was all the more attention she could give to the matter, because his entire solid, very masculine body was pressing her against all the right places and into the mattress. He pushed her skirt up a bit further, but made no move to open his pants, yet they both cried out as he thrust against her, placing them very forcefully center to center. Even with his pants as a barrier, the throbbing hardness of the tip of his shaft pushed insistently against her heated moistness made both moan deliriously. Matthew could feel the warmth very clearly through his pants, which were already becoming soaked from her wetness. Unable to bear the stillness any longer, he began to rock against her, reinstating the delicious friction from earlier.

Mary began to pant and moan as Matthew's hardness rubbed faster and faster against. Her hands clung at the taut muscles of his bare back, her fingernails scraping against his slick flesh as she worked to match his pace. Matthew groaned at the shivers she conjured in from the movement even as he worked more furiously at his task. Each time their centers collided ravenously, intimately, they flew faster and faster towards the edge of oblivion, until finally they were crying out, losing themselves in an overwhelming moment where only pleasure at the existence of the other could be acknowledged… they lost sight of themselves completely. As their climax slowly finished, Matthew's arms gave out and he collapsed on top of Mary, their bodies once again pressed together, chests heaving, although he was careful not to crush her.

"Well, that was… certainly something…" he broke the silence which had previously only been filled with their heavy breaths. He raised himself from her shoulder, so his face hovered centimeters above hers.

Mary observed his deliciously tousled hair, and the look of unimpaired compassion filling his impossibly blue eyes, and she knew, without a doubt, he intended to kiss her. And so Mary Crawley rolled over, away from him, because despite the intensity of what they had just shared, it no way matched the intimacy that would come with kissing him. Because kissing him would mean acknowledging who it was that had inspired such passion, such adoration, and such contentedness in her, and while Mary could perhaps, alone, in the dark, fathom the idea of loving Matthew Crawley, there was no way she could while he was awake. Because if he was awake, and kissing her, it was no longer a faraway supposition lost in the hours of midnight; it was an idea, a feeling they shared, and would continue to share in the daylight, in the real world, and there was no way Mary felt ready to handle loving anyone that way, yet, let alone Matthew Crawley, who could make her feel so impossibly safe and yet so desperately scared.

And so she turned away, trying to block these questions out, trying to go back to sleep, even as she knew it would never come, that she could never go back now.

-
Nothing can ever be simple for these two, can it? Next up we will see how daylight treats them.