Grandage Place was in darkness as he approached it and his first instinct to knock at the front door was quickly quashed by his own realisation that despite wanting to be honest, there was only one person he wanted to be honest with. He had to see her and her alone because only she would be able to provide him with the succour he needed. Also the need not to stain her reputation, submit it to the idle gossip of servants stopped his hand.

Like a shadow he slipped round the back of the house, retrieved the back door key from the hiding place that never changed and entered the darkened kitchen, the only light emanating from the kitchen fire banked for the night. The house was quiet though not silent. Through the door leading the succession of small rooms that he'd rarely had need to enter he could hear the muffled, sonorous snores of Bennett. For a moment his heart contracted knowing that Sembene would have woken at his step on the threshold and before he'd even put the key in the lock would have been there to challenge the intrusion. But his friend, the man the monster he was had slaughtered, had for over a year now resided in the hot, red earth of his home and the pain still blossomed like a fresh wound.

Although he was sure that Bennett was a heavy sleeper he removed his boots to ensure he made no more noise than necessary and made his way through the sleeping house. His mind as he climbed the stairs replayed what had occurred between him and Victor less than an hour before and desire flooded through him again. Part of him wanted to deny his part in it. To admit to only Victor's misdemeanour, to brand him a miscreant and leave himself untainted. To beg her to leave with him that very night because the fact her husband could not love her physically was because he only had want of his own sex. How easy it would be to let Victor take the blame to transpose the pain onto his slight form to walk away vindicated but it was impossible. He knew she was too wise, her mind and gaze too astute. She would see past his fabrication straight to the truth and as a result he would become less in her eyes and he could not bear that. The truth needed to be told, pure and unadulterated; it was what she, all of them deserved.

As he climbed the stairs to the upper floor other scenarios found their way into his brain. The three of them could leave London together and find a small house, somewhere private, somewhere out of the way. They could live there together. Build a life together. Find some way of being together. For God's sake they all loved each other, why could they not find a way of making it work and be damned to convention and respectability. When had those concepts ever mattered to people like them? The idea of having them both, being able to love them as he wanted to, not to have to make a decision was incredibly appealing. The allure of Victor's livid innocence in juxtaposition to the lure of Vanessa's deep passion was a heady mix that both the man and beast in him ached to explore. To mark them as his with his mouth and hands, to feel them come undone under him and around him excited his desire further than he'd ever experienced. But there was more, more beyond the physical. He wanted to hold them, care for them, protect them, for his body to be their shield against the scorn of day and the horrors of the night. Together they made him whole. Together they created a triptych. An unholy trinity of sorts. But in the deepest recesses of his heart he knew that it would never work. They loved too deeply, too passionately, too completely to share even with each other. That eventually something akin to jealousy would enter and then what? As difficult it was to choose between them now, once marked as his, once laid bare to the beast within him it would become impossible. Their love would spoil, fester and with that they would lose everything. He would lose everything again and that was the pain that would rip him apart.

He hesitated just as he got to her door aching to see her and yet terrified of the consequences that could come from the words that were going to pass between them. Again he raised his hand to knock and again thought better of it. This was not a moment for conventionality. He had come to stake a claim whatever that was going to be and the polite mannerisms of society meant nothing here. Carefully he pushed out with his wolf sense, finding her spirit as if the wood between them was nothing. He could feel her awake and waiting the part of her that was akin to him had known the moment he'd stepped into her domain and so he pushed open the door.

The light was dim, only the fire in the grate casting any light into the room but even in the blackest darkness he would not have struggled to find her so imbued with her scent as he was. She stood in front of the fire, her hair an ebony wave cascading over and becoming part of the dark, silk shawl she had wrapped round her thin shoulders one hand clasping the front at her neck the other holding a smoking cigarette. Dressed as she was in tones of shadow she resembled more than ever the woman he remembered. The woman from before. The woman he'd left. Dressed in those tones she was his and the realisation hit him as wild as the storm on the moor and as gentle as the touch of her hand against his cheek. Swathed in pale colours she had pledged, shown her allegiance to Victor but enveloped in the shades of nights she demonstrated kinship to him. They were both creatures of the night.

For a long moment he made no moment towards her content just to gaze at her to see her stripped of her armour of clothing dressed for private moments, reserved only for the eyes of a husband or lover. She too was still her eyes soft on his face her expression neutral but he could feel the depth of her feeling washing over him imbruing his skin. There was no pain and it almost broke his heart to feel that total acceptance.

He moved then to stand behind her and pulled her against him one arm over her chest his hand on her shoulder the other wrapped round her supple waist. She relaxed immediately into him melding her body to his, welcoming the support, allowing him the control, content to be held, submitting to his strength and protection. Again they stood for a quiet moment and he knew like him she gazed into the fire although there was no sign in her of the whirl of emotions that flooded though him. It felt so good to hold her, to be alone with her. Of course he was conscious of her lack of clothing and the close proximity of the bed. The fact that only seconds were between his hands and her naked flesh. He wanted her, God he always did and always would but he could not take her with what there was between them. His mind slipped away to a room two miles away where a young men slept curled into sheets musky with his scent and his heart bled that he too was not here wrapped in his arms, safe in his love.

"Victor's safe?" Her words, a curious echo of his own thoughts softly spoken, shattered the silence almost as if she'd screamed them.

"He's sleeping in my bed. He drank a lot of brandy."

"He could never hold his drink." The light laugh that punctuated this utterance was gentle and he knew even without looking that she smiled and her eyes glowed with affection. The silence stretched again although there was no embarrassment it was nothing but comfortable until she said, "Did you make love?"

Before he spoke he dropped his arms and moved to stand in front of her. This moment and those that would follow were not ones to be had behind backs, comforted by embraces with eyes hidden. What would fall from their mouths needed the stark honesty of faces, of eyes looking into each other's. The fact that she was aware of her husband's predilections and his came as no surprise and in fact made what he had to say easier.

"No. We kissed. He initiated it but I didn't stop him. He wanted me and God Vanessa I wanted him too and if it hadn't been for you I would be there now, with him."

Her look was steady and cool. "So you love him." It wasn't a question.

"Yes."

"And I love him too."

"Yes."

"But you love me and I love you."

He nodded the urge to pull her into his arms was almost overwhelming but he knew he must not. He knew he had no right to put any kind of pressure on her.

"Oh my love what a tangled web we have woven." She lifted the cigarette to her lips inhaling deeply before flicking the end into the fire.

She moved then to sit on the bed and patted the coverlet inviting him to sit with her. As he sat down she smiled at him and in her eyes for the first time since his return he saw her heart reflected there and as before a stab of agony ripped through his.

"Why in such joy my darling does there have to be so much pain? And there will be pain because one or all of us will be hurt in this. Even if, as I am sure you have thought we try to live together in the end the love we share will damage, become undone. If Victor loves you even a part of how I love you sharing you will eventually tear him apart. I know what jealously I would feel watching you leave my bed to be with him. Imagining you together, the kisses and touches that should be mine being given to him. And when you returned the unspoken thoughts, the terror that you might prefer him to me that whilst you are with me, you were thinking of him, wanting him. And yet in loving him how can I deny him that love and how can I deny you him?"

He was astounded at her honesty and also her acceptance. He remembered back to a dark night where she'd run to him in terror, when he'd held her and then finally tucked her into his bed. She had told him she was there to accept him but the secret that lay so hard between them did not allow him to believe it but now, finally he did. And in that moment he found clarity. It was like up until that moment he'd been looking through stained glass but the colour was now bleached and for the first time his vision was clear, unobscured, true.

He stood, looking down into the face that had haunted his every moment since he'd first laid eyes on it and then sunk to his knees before her, a supplicant to her power, to her love placing his head for a moment into her lap, feeling her fingers in his hair before he lifted it to stare deep into her eyes.

"Whatever happens Vanessa Ives I am yours. Whatever you decide I swear on my tainted blood for what it is worth that I am with you and will be with you for eternity. I came back for you and whatever there might be between me and Victor it is nothing compared to what I feel for you. It was the thought of you that stopped me from doing any more tonight than I did. It is you I want, have always wanted in whatever capacity you need but if you don't want me, then I won't go back to him. I can't."

"And I can no longer live this lie Ethan. To live without you is like living without oxygen. Your happiness even at the expense of his is something I have to make my first priority. The only way I can make you happy is to walk away from him and our marriage despite the consequences. By giving you my heart and soul I will break his, but then it was always yours."

The mixture of joy and pain on her face he knew was a reflection of his own. Joy overwhelming because she had chosen him, would be his but edged with pain. His own at hurting the man that had not only saved his life but kept his very reason for being safe together with the pain of thwarted desire. And then there was Victor's pain. The fact that not only would he deny him his love but would also take from him the only other person that loved him, would leave him alone, suffering alone.

He leaned forward then and pressed his mouth to hers revelling in its sweetness in the rightness of it but pulled away as his passion began to stir.

"We need to talk to Victor. Face him together, try and make him understand, if we can. I'll leave you to dress." And he got up and left the room. He knew that she would have not asked him to leave, that she would have been happy to change with him there. In every sense he was more husband to her than the young man that lay, he hoped still asleep in his bed. But until he saw Victor he could not risk being with her in a position that could ignite further the passion he felt for her. Even fully dressed he found her alluring and the prospect of being in the same room as her disrobed would, he knew have stretched his will further than he thought it could bare.

And so he waited for the second time that night leaning against the wood of a door, his thoughts focused on the bitter sweet tragedy that would end that night.

When she emerged from the room he was not surprised to see her dressed in one of her old outfits of deepest mourning black, her hair pulled severely away from her face. With this choice she had pinned her colours to a standard, his standard and she looked as though she were dressed for battle and he supposed she was as such, a battle for happiness but one that they would fight together against a beloved enemy. She smiled on seeing him raising her hand to his cheek to cup it gently before slipping it into his and just as on that rain torn evening outside the shelter for the sick and destitute he experienced the total rightness of her palm against his, their fingers entwined.

Silently they moved down the stairs leaving by the front door. He would no longer walk in the shadows with her hiding away from the eyes of others. They would leave this house side by side as they always should have and would continue to walk together in defiance of what others would say. The journey back to him rooms was silent and slow in the velvet blackness of the night, they were in no hurry to reach their destination but if she were worried about what would ensue once they got there she showed no fear, her head held high and every once in a while she would turn to look at him squeezing his hand and smiling at him which caused his heart to flip in pained pleasure.

As they came up to the door of his lodgings she spoke for the first time since leaving Grandage Place asking him to stop before he put the key into the door.

She stood in front of him as close as she could without touching him and looked deep into his eyes. What he saw there was enough to convince him that even if he hadn't been sure of what they were about to do it was the only thing they could do. Her eyes shone and in them he saw pure, unfettered love. Tenderly he gathered her into his arms pulling her into the strength of his body wanting to absorb every fibre of her being into him to reassure her of his utter love and complete commitment to her, his willingness to fight for her even against another he loved. If he had to die in that instance he knew he finally would have died happy.

The hall was empty and the door of his room was shut as he'd left it. For a moment he laid his hand against the wood reaching out to the young doctor but he was not surprised he could not sense him, the connection between them would never be the primordial bond he felt for the woman that stood silently next to him.

Quietly he pushed the door open. The candles had guttered out and the fire was only glowing embers but even in the dimness he could see the room was empty. The bed in which he'd so tenderly laid Victor down was made, the coverlet smoothed the only flaw a piece of paper. The feelings that crashed through him were so mixed for a second he found it difficult to breath. Joy, hope, fear, relief, despair reeled through him in equal measure punctuated by a sharp intake of breath from Vanessa.

It was Vanessa who recovered first moving quickly to the bed and picking up the paper.

She peered at the writing scrawled across the front and then looked up.

"It's for both of us. Light the candles Ethan. We should read it together."

He did as she asked and then moved to join her on the settle that a few hours ago he'd sat with the man who'd penned this note before he'd disappeared into the night. The man who if circumstances had been different would now be lying in the circle of his arms their bodies sated, skins dewy with sweat, and his heart clenched. Vanessa opened the paper and together they began to read the words scrawled across the whiteness.

'Dear Ethan and Vanessa,

The rightness of your two names written side by side on a page is evidence enough that my decision to leave is also right. I looked so long for love and finding it with both of you has shown me its true nature. But I also see that I stand in a place I have no right to and in doing so I deny the two people I love their true love. Love should not be hidden, repressed, locked away. It should be revealed, celebrated, released and my exit will allow that. Will allow you to love freely as you should, to be together as you need. It was always the two of you, I was never more than a shadow cast by your light.

I thank you both for your love, for showing one such something I never thought I was worthy of.

Victor '

He looked up from the page to find her looking at him a single tear glistening on the alabaster of her cheek and again the notion of clarity, of finally seeing the truth struck him. If anyone was undeserving of love it was not the pale physician who'd penned this note full of love it was him a man with sin stitched into every fibre of his being. And yet love had been gifted to him. Victor's love and most of all the love of the goddess who sat by his side, her heart in her eyes.

The searing pain of want and denial had been washed away to be replaced with the sweet agony that was the realisation of utter love and utter loss.

Finally he reached for her and she came into his arms and fit against his body like she was meant to, like she'd always been meant to. As she clung to him, her face buried into his chest he raised his hands to her hair pulling the pins that secured it allowing it to cascade down merging with the darkness of her dress. She looked up then her eyes shining her mouth curved finally into a true smile and laid her hand against his cheek. He looked deep into her eyes, feasting on what he saw there and then took her left hand in his. Still not speaking he looked down at the slim gold band that still encircled her finger and touched it gently. Her other hand immediately moved and started to pull it off.

"No, don't darlin' leave it." He murmured. Although for months that ring had been a thorn in his side, the physical representation of why she couldn't be his and he'd wanted to rip it from her hands he knew he now wanted it to stay. It represented sacrifice and would stay as a reminder of that and the love he had for the man who'd made it. Carefully he reached into his vest pocket and slipped the ring he'd removed from there onto the same finger to sit on top of Victor's. It was a simple golden band studded with tiny alternate black and white pearls.

"It was my mother's, it's the only thing I have left of her. She told me to give it to my wife on our wedding day. So I give it to you with my heart and ask you Vanessa Ives will you take me as your husband of the heart?"

Her finger caressed the two bands and then softly her eyes glowing sapphire bright she looked up at him.

"I do."