Chapter Eleven

"Angel?"

"Hmm?" Hermione asked, tearing her gaze away from the turbulent Scottish sea across the road from the pub they had flooed into.

Glancing at her hand clasped protectively around the ring she wore, Marcus murmured, "I need to take you by Side-Along."

"Right, of course," she answered, shaking the distracting thoughts from her head as she offered Marcus her free hand.

Placing her hand in his, he laced their fingers together and pulled her in close, the curves along their sides easily slotting together. Tucked under his arm and staring down between her whiskey colored eyes and the secret she had held onto all these years, he kissed the top of her head causing her to tense before Disapparating them.

Getting the blackmail and moving him somewhere secure while they began to dig was the most pressing of issues and still lingered at the forefront of her mind. However in the several minutes lull that existed between leaving Golden Fire Solutions and arriving at his Montrose home, Hermione's mind was dominated with their earlier conversation, her following introspection, and her clumsy, forgetfulness at having not removed her necklace, thus revealing her hand to Marcus before she had accounted for all the possible outcomes of such a move.

Regardless of his words and of her beliefs, she still wasn't sure if she could trust him again. Even removing everything else that had occurred over the years and that had hurt her — knowing for a time she had been just as wild and free as he had following the trauma of the war — the trust that had been shattered seemed irreparable to her. And that was without taking into consideration the fact that she had been casually seeing and sleeping with his best friend for the last two years, that relationship — if it could be called such a thing — having only run its long overdue course three months ago.

Yes, Marcus knew of what she and Blaise had done. And yes, he had been quietly paying blackmail and acting on her behalf. But while that revelation spoke to a depth of security she could find with him, she still couldn't be sure if she would be safe with him. If her heart would be safe in his hands as she had once thought it to be. There wasn't much of it left for her to lose and if she gave what she had to him and he vanished on her again or decided the memories and dreams were better than the new reality, she didn't think she could survive. She was already closed off and hardened against the idea of being serious with anyone else; hating the vulnerability that came with allowing oneself to love another. If the only person she wanted to open those long since bolted doors for found her lacking, it would devastate her all over again, ruining her more than it had the first time.

Landing with a soft pop in front of a seaside home with a thatched roof and diamond paned windows that reminded her of a much larger Snow White cottage, she awed, "Your home is beautiful… It's like a fairy tale cottage brought to life."

Looking up at him and causing his eyes to snap up from staring at the hand at her chest, she smiled and spoke with a sudden candor of the past saying, "It reminds me of the one I saw in that realtor window when we took that trip to Cambridge with my parents over the spring holiday. The one that I told you if it had a room for a library would be my dream home."

Exchanging his hold on her hand for engulfing her face as he cupped her cheeks, he said, "I remember. You were so starry eyed looking at it, I don't even think you realized you were talking out loud when you pointed at one of the interior pictures and said, 'that room right there would be our baby's nursery.'

"It was the first time you ever spoke of us having a future beyond my finishing school. I was already so fucking in love with you but had been terrified of saying it. Hearing that though… gods… I wanted to propose marriage to you right then and there, buy you that house, and promise to start filling you with all the babies you wanted the moment you finished school, even if you wanted a quidditch team's worth.

"Then I thought Sam was going to use his muggle teeth tools as instruments of torture on my prick and bollocks when he found us snogging in that alleyway with no explanation, let alone a believable one, as to why your leg was hooked around my hip and my hand so far up the skirt of your dress."

Closing her eyes at the memory, Hermione felt herself smile as she recalled her mother sitting her down that evening to readdress, the talk, with her. The embarrassment had been thick as her mum had tried to find her footing in giving something more detailed and less clinical than when she had first explained where babies came from. Already having made several forays into sexual activity with Marcus and ever an inquisitive sort though, she had simply charged ahead and asked the things that were most pressing on her mind about what to expect when — not if — she decided she was ready to go the rest of the way with him, because everything surrounding her further with Marcus Flint was a when and never an if in her mind.

She also remembered knowing that whatever her dad had talked about with Marcus that afternoon and with her mother, had given her parents the peace of mind they needed in regards to knowing where things were headed between their daughter and her slightly older boyfriend. Because when it was time for everyone to turn in for the night, her mother had winked at them and teased, "You two don't have to keep pretending he isn't sleeping in your room every night, you know. Besides, you've done a terrible job at it considering his bed has been made exactly as I prepared it every morning he's been here."

"I've missed you so much, angel," he whispered, before bending down to kiss her.

Turning her face and ducking under his arm before his lips could touch hers and begin to tear down what little resolve she still possessed, Hermione began making her way up the front path, calling out, "Well come on; we're here for a reason. A time sensitive one at that," banishing her thoughts and memories to their lockbox in her mind.

There would be plenty of time for her to go to battle with herself, and with him, after they were done. And if his fixation on the ring he had given her was any indicator, when he learned of where she would be sequestering them for the next week, they would be spending plenty of time reliving the past and dancing back and forth with the various avenues of the present and future while they tried to figure out where to go from their current impasse.

"You can't avoid it forever, Hermione!" Marcus yelled, before quickly catching up to her. "We're having this discussion."

"Not now we're not," she replied, following him through the door. "Right now we're discussing where you keep everything you've been sent about the blackmail." Stopping in her tracks, the sudden silence of her clicking heels on his dark, wood floors imminently making him turn back to face her, she slowly asked, "You have kept it all, right? You didn't burn it or throw it out?"

"Minus the first letter that I told you I ignored, yes, I've kept everything," he replied, continuing to lead her through the front of his home too fast for her to take it in. "Every picture, all the demands, the extra payments I've incurred by not following through, I have it all. Anything they sent, as well as a ledger I've kept of how much I've been paying, when, and for what, is all stored in my office, just here," he finished, sharply turning left and opening a set of French doors that were off of what was a very welcoming and casually decorated living room.

With the doors open, a fireplace on the right side of the room roared to life, illuminating the space in a warm glow. Before it was a plush, cream colored rug that she wished she could stretch out on that was layered over another that covered most of the wood floors throughout the room and large, firewhiskey colored leather chairs that begged for someone to pass an afternoon curled up in one with a good book. Opposite the fireplace were floor to ceiling shelves whose finish had them blending in with the midnight blue painted walls. Each one was lined with an artful arrangement of books, framed awards and articles, and trophies that boasted his achievements over the last ten years of his career. In the center of it all was an entire display dedicated to his 2002 Quidditch World Cup win. The Firebolt Millennium — the racing broom designers having sponsored the National team — was mounted vertically on the left side of the wall, over a dozen quaffles from what she guessed were of the winning balls from each bracket match, including the final game, were suspended on fishing line on the right, his jersey framed in the center, and capping it all off were the bracket medals lined up to flank each side of the World Cup trophy.

Running her fingers along the engraving of his name on the cup's base, she softly commented, "I'm happy for you, Marcus. This was always your dream and I am genuinely happy that you made it happen. When we get everything handled for you, I'll be happy to watch you do it all over again this summer."

Lifting one of two massively sized prints off one of the walls that framed the picture window behind his desk, he murmured, "One of my dreams. I've yet to make the other happen."

Studying the series of four photos — one taken in the heart of each season — that hung even more proudly than the story of his career, Hermione finally released her necklace as her mouth parted on a silent gasp. They all showed a small waterfall emptying into a stream with a stone cottage beside it. Not just of the cottage but of its ruins. Ruins that were an illusion she had created before the war to turn anyone away who was not a part of its Secret Kept location, ensuring their home remained standing if she were ever tracked to it. The charms surrounding the property were supposed to prevent people — muggle or magical — from lingering over the sight for too long and yet he had stayed and returned several times over, capturing it on film, and coming back to Montrose to hang it in a room that was dedicated to the most pivotal moments of his life thus far.

"Why did you leave?" she breathed, her nose beginning to prickle as her chest grew tight once more, turning her breath shallow as her eyes welled with tears.

Forgetting the magic laced safe he had opened and the thick file in his hand, Marcus turned around and asked, "What?"

"Why did you leave?" she repeated, nearly slapping herself in her haste to clear away an escaped tear. Grabbing the ring and holding it out while pointing to the pictures, she asked again, growing more and more hysterical with each question, "Why did you leave me? You told me you loved me and that you were going to play for the Magpies so you could be close to me and easily come see me during the school year — which I never even would have considered thinking about, let alone asking of you just so you know, because I knew how badly you wanted to play for Puddlemere.

"You bought me that cottage and called it our home.

"You fucked me and made love to me against its walls, on its floors, and within its bed, telling me how much you loved me; how much you wanted forever with me; how I was everything to you.

"And after, you laid in that bed with me, making plans for our future together while you wiped your leaking come off my thighs and pushed it back into me, whispering along my body how you couldn't wait for the day to come when you could have me without charms and potions working against you leaving a part of yourself behind to grow inside me.

"And then I wake up only to find that you left me! You left me and you didn't even have the decency to tell me why! You left me and still I waited all day in that fucking place for you to come home to me and you didn't. I waited all summer to hear from you, wearing this fucking ring like it and I meant something to you only for you to have completely forgotten about me.

"For years, I've loved you and waited for you to come home to me. Getting my hopes up when I came back from Australia to find out you had moved back and were in Montrose only to have them shattered. And again seeing that bloody tattoo on your back and knowing it was for me only to be harshly pushed back down into reality when I had to see you and that fucking whore walking out of that club with her hand down your jeans, touching what you had promised would only ever be mine.

"And now you tell me you still love me, have always loved me; that you miss me and still want me; that you've been paying exorbitant amounts of blackmail for years to keep it from coming out that I helped Blaise commit and clean up cold blooded murder. And to cap it all off, you bring me here to this home that we both know you fucking bought for me and have photos of our first home hanging up in what is clearly a shrine to the highlights of your life and I still don't know why you fucking left me all those years ago and why you stayed away!" she screamed, savagely grabbing and yanking on the lapels of his tux.

Then resting her head on his chest, her tears having long since begun a rippling cascade down her cheeks, her nose running and mixing in with the briney expression of her eyes, she hoarsely whispered, "I'm strong and capable and self reliant in all aspects of my life, able to stand my ground and bend for no one, forcing them to rise up and meet my standards and have been this way for years. But with you, I'm a weak, pathetic, addicted mess who can't help but be drawn in by your touch and scent and your pretty, romantic words and seemingly genuine overtures of love despite knowing that if there's one thing I can count on with you, it's that you'll burn me in the end because you always do," before further pulling on his tux to bend him down to her and brutally crash her mouth against his.

Nothing about the way she kissed him was soft and gentle, nor in the way he kissed her back. Scooping his hands under her bum, his grip dimpled her skin as he lifted her up into his arms so that her legs wrapped around his waist. Where she held the side of his face, her fingers pressed into his skin leaving behind crescent shaped markings and where her other hand carded through his hair, she held a fist full of the short ends to move and manipulate him as she pleased.

Their tongues warred and wrestled with each other, neither one of them willing to give up an inch in their quest for dominance. Their lips falling off center and lining back up while their teeth equally nipped and bit at the other when they weren't clattering together. Growls and savage moans rumbled and reverberated out one mouth only to be swallowed whole by the other.

The overgrowth and unresolved excess of their decade's worth of emotions grew tangible as they desperately pressed and pulled to both get closer and further apart. With the popping of the buttons on the jacket of his tux as Hermione yanked it open and down his arms, she gave life to her anger over his leaving. She allowed it to further blossom and expel from within herself as she continued to ruin his formal wear by tugging his bow tie loose and ripping his dress shirt open, a spray of small buttons falling to the floor.

Tearing herself free of his mouth, she began sucking and licking at his neck, her teeth continuing to assault him as she grazed them along his protruding veins. In answer, he latched his mouth onto the juncture of her neck and shoulder, biting into her with a growl that made her hiss and throw her head back in with a sharp keen as he soothed the attack with sucking kisses, her hips rolling and grinding over his lower abdomen as her clitoris pulsed and her pussy burned. Then, dropping her hand from his hair to wrap her arm around the back of his neck and hold on to the hairs at his nape, she met him punishment for punishment for the sins of breaking the other's heart by moving the one at his face to rake down his chest, marring his skin with raging, red welts, her name falling from his lips like the filthiest of swear words before he sucked her breast into his mouth over her dress.

Urging him on as he switched between the two, she peppered his face, jaw, and neck with open mouthed kisses as she continued to rub herself along his body, his hold on her bum bruising as he dragged her harder and pushed her closer against himself.

With a swipe of his tongue, he released her and caressed his hand down the long line of one of her legs and tightened her clenching hold at his waist. Repeating the action to her other leg and making sure her ankles were securely locked together, he turned them around and let go of her to sweep his desk clean of what little clutter it had. Files and parchment, quills and inkwells, lamps and paperweights as well as cups of pins and various paperclips all rained down on the floor, clearly the way for him to lay her back across its length.

Running his large hands from her hips, up her stomach, over her breasts and down her shoulders and arms, he laced his fingers through hers and stretched her limbs above her head, dragging his nose and swirling his tongue up her neck until he reached her ear, purring, "Tell me you want me, angel."

With inhibitions and thoughts of repercussions long since thrown out the window, Hermione offered up more of her neck to him, her skin hyper aware and reactive under him in a way it had never been for anyone that had come between the bookends of him being her lover and obediently moaned, "I want you, Marcus."

"Tell me you're mine; that you've always been mine," he demanded, his exploring mouth slowing down as the ghosts of their broken past started to release them both.

"I am," she whimpered, her nipples drawing taut as their little peaks poked through her gown to be lightly brushed against by his chest. "I have been."

Caressing a hand down the left side of her body while he held both her wrists in his other, he reached for her leg and brought her heeled foot up to stand on his desk, requesting, "Tell me no one has ever managed to learn to touch you like I did, lick you as I did, fill you as completely as I did, and make you scream and come like I did."

Shaking her head back and forth, she sobbed and confessed as he brushed the skirts of her dress away from her leg and left butterfly kisses in a trail up her inner thigh, "I couldn't even get off with them if I wasn't thinking of you, wishing it was you. I would have to bite my tongue to keep from shouting and screaming your name as I came."

Passing over her soaking pussy and making his way up to circle his tongue around her hip bone, Marcus's lust blown, glassy, blue-green eyes looked up at her and when their gazes locked, he too confessed, "There were times when I would say your name," moving more of her dress out of his way as he licked across to her other hip. "I would be fucking into them and wishing they were you as I remembered the feeling of your sweet little cunt strangling my cock as you came. The memory of you was all I ever need to get off, but then it would make your name fall from my lips like a fucking prayer as I pulled out of them to come on the sheets instead of inside them or even on them.

"Ten fucking years and the only witch whose pussy I've truly filled is yours. No one has been allowed to have that part of me, it's always belonged to you. You have always been my future, my dream, and the one I love, Hermione. Always and only you."

Making his way down her other thigh, her dress now fully rucked up around her hips, he continued to repeat how much he wanted her; how much he still loved her; how he too had always belonged to her; and how no matter who had come after her, being with her had remained an unattainable experience, giving her as much of himself in return for the truths she had given him.

Finally releasing her wrists, he brought both hands to the waist of her knickers and from between her spread legs, his eyes fixated on the spot where she had soaked through the gusset, asked, "Am I still allowed?"

"I never wanted you to stop," she answered candidly, lifting her hips as he started to peel the lace down her thighs and legs, letting them drop to the floor. "I only ever wanted to be shown love and explored by you, Marcus."

"I love you, angel," he said reverently, kissing the sensitive spot where her soft and toned thigh gave way to her smooth and puffy lips.

No sooner had his kiss caused her to gasp and sigh, was he forcibly extracting a guttural keen from within her as his flattened tongue swiped up from the end of her spread opening to her clit. Curling her fingers over the edge of his desk as her hips reflexively jerked up into his mouth, she whimpered as he flicked and circled the swollen bundle of hooded nerves between her legs. Crying out as the vibrations from his lust-filled groan heightened the sensation of his wicked kiss to her cunt, she dug the sharp points of her heels into the finished wood of his desk.

She had said it over a month ago when Lavender had asked how things had been with Marcus and it still rang true. Every touch and kiss, whispered breath and moaned word were so much more when shared with him. As he had said, being together was an experience that was unattainable with anyone else. Having him between her legs and remembering the feeling of herself stretching around him for the first time was transcendent.

The sexual acts they shared in and gave to each other out of a desire and a need to physically express their love made her heart and love for him grow as rapidly as her lust. With him, she was left without her worrying inhibitions over how much she moved and writhed; how reactive and sensitive she was to certain touches; or how vocal she was when a particularly delicious spot was simulated or when she needed more or a slight adjustment to get the full experience.

She was free with Marcus. Free to take. Free to give. Free to be filled as emotionally as she was physically. Free to pour into him everything she couldn't voice. Free to be herself and free to love him with utter abandon as he did her.

Matching the shallow thrusts of his tongue as his thumb worked her overly needy and throbbing clit, bringing her closer and closer to the tightening knot within her core snapping, she begged, "Marcus, please, I need… I need… oh fuck, yes right there…"

"What do you need, sweetheart?" he asked, his voice muffled as he refused to stop lapping at her long enough to be able to speak clearly.

Snapping her knees around his head at the endearment, she instantly changed what she needed from him and crunched up to look down at him and seriously said, "Please, don't call me that."

Pulling back from her but still keeping his arms threaded under her thighs and his hand reaching around to hold her legs open, he asked, "Do we need to stop? Are you okay?"

Letting go of the desk, she swiped her thumb over his glistening lips and smiled as he caught the finger in his mouth to suck on it, "No, we don't need to stop and yes, I'm okay. At least so long as you keep up what you're doing. I was so close, I was only going to ask for your fingers too."

"Anything," he answered, giving a playful nip to her inner thigh before eagerly moving to suck on her clit again, causing her to release a short, panting scream as she fell back onto the desk.

As his finger began to pet her arousal and spit slicked pussy, she whimpered and humped his face, desperate for more. Her whole body was hot and wired with need. Shivers passed down her spine to disappear into the back of her core and come out in the form of added wetness in her cunt. Her breasts, heavy and wanting, were an inferno of sensitive nerves as they grazed the fabric of her dress. And between her legs, her inner thighs and the walls inside of her plush and swollen vagina clenched and released with the burning desire to grip something between and within her.

Reaching behind her neck, she unfastened the halter of her dress and tugged the bodice down to free her wanton nipples. Cupping the mounds as Marcus began to work the first of his long, thick, and dexterous fingers inside of her, she rolled and tweaked her puckered areolas, pinching at her nipples, feeling each touch connect like bolts of distant lightning to her clit.

Gazing up at her from where he knelt at the feast of her body he had spread out for himself, he swore at the sight of her pleasing herself in time with his sucking and licking tongue, making her smile wickedly at him as she hummed, "If I recall, you always did like watching me touch myself."

Nodding his head, he pulled back as he focused on fucking her with his finger and said, "I did. I loved watching you get yourself off and fucking my hand to the sight of it. Still do," he smirked, rubbing the palm of his hand over his erection and making his eyes flutter from the stimulation before returning his whole attention to her body and her needs. "You've always been beautiful but you're wild and carefree, turning otherworldly, when you're in the throes of passion."

Feeling his finger push in deeper and stroke along her front wall until it hooked on the spongy texture within, her back arched off the desk as she bared down on the single digit, pinching and twisting her nipples tighter as she fervently wailed his name.

"Fuck… Marcus, please… I'm so close… I need more…"

Instantly complying, he continued to watch her and replaced his mouth on her clit with the fingers of his other hand. Applying pressure on the heavily distended bundle of nerves and vibrating it back and forth, she felt the liquid heat within her grow molten as he worked his second finger into her opening.

Petting, tickling, and massaging the secret spot inside her pussy in time with her clit, Hermione started to both tense and writhe for him. When the fingers on the outside of her body weren't pressing and working her in a matching rhythm of those inside, his tongue would take over, flicking and circling her bud while he stretched and prepared her for his cock.

Working a third finger into her, the pleasure coursing through her body took on an echo of sharp pressure. The sudden and gentle promise of a euphoric sort of pain that came with her pussy being stretched and filled beyond imagination by his large cock, heightened things for her. Impaling herself further on his fingers as they and his mouth dragged her to the edge of release, she leaned up on her elbows to better watch him.

Catching his eye, she reached between her legs and lovingly brushed her fingers through his short hair until her hand came around to cup his face. Turning slightly into her touch, he squeezed her thigh in response to the devotion she knew was shining forth from her eyes. And as Marcus unblinkingly watched her watching him get her off, Hermione felt herself shatter.

With her head thrown back, she screamed his name and sobbed unintelligible words as her cunt clenched and pulsed around his fingers. Her body was all at once both strung tight and languid as a puddle as her vision blurred and her head swam, her knees holding him to her like a vice. Then as her spasming core released a final gush of arousal, she collapsed back on the desk, chasing down her breath as her legs fell open, freeing him to lap at her swollen lips and leaking entrance, slowly bringing her down from the high he had supplied her with while working her up to needing another fix.

After only partially regaining her ability to breath without the obstruction of an air stealing orgasm, she sat up and began frantically pulling him up by his opened shirt. Reaching for the buckle of his trousers, she simultaneously fought with Marcus's belt and caressed the thick outline of his erection.

Looking up at him with desperate eyes, she begged, "Please, I need you to fuck me. It's been too long."

In response, he kissed her and pushed his tongue that was coated in her taste into her mouth as he batted her hands away and tore the leather open himself. Groaning as she sucked on his tongue, stealing what he had been savoring, she circled her arms around his neck and scooted herself to the edge of the desk until her exposed breasts were flush against his heated and bare chest.

Then with an arm hooked under her knee, he lifted her leg up and lined his cock up with her swollen pussy. Keening into his mouth before breaking free, she looked between them and groaned once more as she watched her body welcome his large and veiny member back home. Breathing his name in reverence as he slowly started to sink into her, Hermione buried her face into the crook of his neck, kissing and sucking at his strained muscles as he warred with himself for control.

Running her tongue up the thick tendon, she sucked on his earlobe before murmuring, "Fuck me, Marcus. Fuck me, claim me, own me, love me. Let go and take me with abandon. We have all night and all week to be slow and loving."

Hooking her other knee over his arm, he lifted her up from the desk and allowed gravity to sink her down on him the rest of the way, her nails raking down the back of his shirt as she screamed under the sudden stretch that threatened to split her open. Lifting her back up to drop on down his cock again, her breasts bouncing and swaying under the motion, he growled, "Every time I fuck you, I'm loving you, angel. Every fucking time," he repeated, punctuating each word with another gravity aided yank of her body down on his shaft.

"Bloody hell, Hermione," he groaned as his pace started to pick up. "You feel so fucking good. I can't believe I've gone over ten years without this, without you. I am never fucking letting you go again. Do you hear me? You're mine, angel."

"Yes!" she shouted, the repeated strokes of his cock along her front wall and brushing of her clit along his pubic bone sending her sprinting for the edge of another orgasm. "God yes! I'm yours, Marcus… I'm all yours... so please don't leave me again. I can't survive it a second time."

Sealing her lips to his before he could respond and whining as his tongue fucked her mouth as his cock did her pussy, she felt a second levy on her emotions give. Tightening her arms around him, her tears from earlier returned as she held onto him with a decade's worth of desperate longing. Moving her lips from his, she eagerly kissed along his jaw and cheek until her face nuzzled against his and his sweat misted face tilted to reciprocate the affection. So close to each other's ears, the sounds of their heaving breaths and lewd, wet noises had everything else fading out until her entire being was drowning in Marcus Flint.

Nothing existed outside of the two of them as he repeatedly lifted and impaled her on his cock, his hips thrusting as he searched to push even further than his already deep penetration of her pussy was allowing. Everything she heard was him or caused by him. His breathing; her mewling moans; the erotic slap of their flesh meeting; the squelching of her drenched cunt. The only things she could feel was the way he filled her and completed her only to leave her bereft before once more claiming her; her breasts so tightly smooshed against his chest that she could feel his heartbeat seep into and bleed together with her own; his grip on her simultaneously erotic and secure keeping her safe and aroused; her own limbs clinging to him as if she were caught in a storm and he was the only thing keeping her from being dragged under.

But more than the physical sensation of being joined with him again, was the emotional. Years of sorrow and longing melted away with each kiss and thrust. Her heart was full and healing as he spoke a litany of devoted words into her ears, making sure she believed in the purity of his heart and love for her again.

Kissing the side of her face, he reluctantly murmured, "I'm getting close but I can't keep this up. How do you want to take me?"

Unwilling to let go for fear of losing him now that she finally had him back, she strained her muscles to stay wrapped around him and replied, "On my back, I don't want to let go again."

With a bruising kiss to her lips, he swore, "You can hold on to me forever, Hermione. I swear to you, I'm never leaving you again. I won't survive losing you either. I love you."

Nodding her head as she kissed him through her continued tears, she felt him repeat his process from earlier and slowly maneuver her legs so that her ankles locked around his waist, taking care to move slow enough so that he stayed buried inside her. Then with his hands free, he cupped the back of her head and circled his arm around her waist and deepened their kiss as he walked them over to the warmth of the fire. Keeping her tucked into him, he lowered them onto the rug, unfortunately slipping free and making her cry out at the loss.

"I'm coming right back, angel. Don't worry," he soothed.

True to his word, once he had them laid out, he was guiding his prick back into her pussy, the intrusion sweet and brutal as he slowly started to thrust in and out of her, giving her time to adjust to the new position and angle. Searching his fingers down her side to her hip and back up to her breast, Marcus cupped the mound and pressed his lips to its dusky pink tip, giving a playful flick of his tongue to her nipple. After repeating the action on her other side, he continued to move his exploring fingers up her shoulder and down her arm, once more engulfing her much smaller hand in his and stretching their arms up over her head.

With his weight settled onto his other arm, and her opposite leg hooked over his hip, he started to pick up his pace, looking down at her face and further along her body as she lay hidden beneath him, marveling, "Merlin, you're so fucking small. I used to wonder if I imagined how tiny you looked beneath me. But here you are, as small as ever. Completely covered by me and stuffed so full I bet I could trace my cock while it's making your tight little pussy its home again along the outside of your body."

To prove his theory, he shifted his weight to the arm that was laced around hers and ghosted his fingers down the center of her chest, stopping at the necklace she wore. Giving it a yank, he broke the chain despite her yelp of protest and freed the double knotted promise ring. Like herself, it looked impossibly small grasped between his large fingers as he brought it over to her right hand.

Sliding it onto her third finger, he kissed it once it was in place and said, "I was ready to finally give up this evening after you didn't respond. I was so fucking angry with you and hurt I didn't think I could take any more of it. Not just loving you without the return of your affection but being around you and pretending that I wasn't dying inside for it all to be real again.

"Then your tardy little arse came sprinting down those stairs and there it was, my grandmother's promise ring around your neck and I knew. I knew as surely as you did seeing my tattoo that regardless of how you acted and what you said, you still loved me and there was still a chance for me to earn you back as I did before."

His sweet honesty was punctuated with a particularly deep thrust of his cock, his pelvis pressing and dragging along her clit until she was nearly ready to come before he retreated again, taking her orgasm with him. Bringing their hands to her soft mound, he pressed their spread fingers down on the smooth flesh as he deeply pumped back into her, bumping her cervix for a delicious blend of pleasure and pain. Pushing even harder as he continued to gently prod the delicate end of her channel, she felt him fucking her from the outside just as he groaned into her chest and reached out to suck on her breast.

The idea of him stretching her so much that he was nearly pushing through her walls, made her toes curl into the carpet as she too groaned at the reminder of just how large every part of Marcus was in comparison to herself.

Feeling his pace pick up as he began to untangle his limbs from her, Hermione began lifting her hips and meeting each of his brutal and relentless thrusts. Sitting back on his heels, he dragged her along the carpet by her bum until only her back remained on the rug and threw her legs over each of his arms. Laying back and allowing herself to be thoroughly used by him, she threaded her fingers through the fibers of the rug and watched his face as it started to give way into concentrated, mind blanking pleasure.

She had forgotten how beautifully primal he looked as he neared release. Broad shoulders, straining, sculpted muscles, enlarged veins exposing themselves down his forearms. His full lips remaining parted under his continuously short breaths and grunts, his cheeks flush with exertion, rivulets of sweat cascading from his temples and along his neck. Then there were his eyes… they were always so expressive but as he repeatedly joined their bodies, interchanging between watching himself sink into her and staring into her own eyes with unguarded love and devotion, they were a beacon into his soul.

And falling into the truth of his gaze as her body once more readied itself to explode with built up pleasure, she finally returned, "I love you too, Marcus," making his movements cease as he stopped to search out the truth of her words.

Nodding her head to confirm that he had heard her correctly, she repeated, "I love you," breaking whatever temporary spell she had cast on him.

Redoubling his efforts, he pistoned his hips between her thighs, pumping her with such force that her small breasts wildly jiggled about until she cupped them to hold them steady. Then as he started to lose his rhythm, he reached his fingers between them and tightly rubbed at her clitoris, coaxing the little bundle of erect flesh back out until she too was desperately chasing her orgasm and screaming out her release as it slammed into her.

Hooking an arm under hers and curling over her body as he continued to work his trapped fingers over her clit, drawing out the waves of her release and the sound of her hoarse cries, Marcus swelled and erupted within her, ropes of hot come lashing the walls of her pussy as he gave short, jerky thrusts, pushing it deeper and deeper within her.

Peppering kisses along her chest, up her neck, across her cheeks, and against her lips, he panted over and over again, "I love you, Hermione. I swear I will never leave you again, ever. You have always been everything to me and you always will be."

Rolling himself under her as he his body finished going limp and he was unable to keep his weight from crushing her, Marcus, lazily started to caress his fingers along her spine as his cock softened and slipped free, their bodies cooling down, and the sweat on their skin drying. In turn, Hermione gently ran her fingers up and down the ladder of his ribs and muscles, moving and shifting until her head was comfortably pillowed on his chest.

Kissing his flat nipple, she quietly smiled, "I love you," wanting him to hear it outside of the throes of passion.

Wrapping his arms around her, he kissed the top of her head and begged, "Say it again."

"I love you."

"Again."

"I love you, Marcus."

"One more time, please."

Giggling, she sat up just enough to meet his eyes and slowly said, "I, Hermione Jean Granger, am in love with you, Marcus Hawthorne Flint."

"Forever," he added, picking up her right hand and stroking his thumb over the ring. "I love you, forever."

Even though he wasn't prompting her to repeat that part to him, she said, "Forever, nothing has or ever will change that. You were and are the love of my life, the one I want to love forever, will love forever, and be with forever."

Despite the still pressing need to get him to the cottage and away from whoever was blackmailing him while Lavender and Blaise traced the accounts and dug into whatever information he had retained over the last five years, Hermione and Marcus continued to lay in front of the fire caressing and kissing each other's bodies. And as they recovered from the physical manifestation of a decade's worth of lost emotions, he finished stripping her of her gown, garter, and hosiery — and her divesting him of his ruined tux. Then, notching his cock into the opening of her pussy, she sank down on him and rode him until they were both coming apart under a vocal deluge of passion and devotion. And as they slowly made their way to his bedroom, they first stopped to christen the couch in his living room with her on her knees for him as he had done for her and then the counters of his custom kitchen where she needed her heels on to be properly bent over the marble before repeating the cycle over and over again, until finally in the small hours of the morning, their bodies' need for sleep overruled their hearts' need to keep making love to each other for all the years they had missed.