Tifa felt like she was being watched even though she was completely alone in her apartment. She blushed at the absurdity of this as she packed her lingerie, knowing he liked to see it on her. She carefully took out the concealed ring and put it in her purse for later.

She took her suitcase downstairs and cheerfully pretended he wasn't sitting at the bar smuggly having a beer while she said goodbye to her friends as they thought she was going to visit her grandmother.

She wondered why people were so easily fooled when she had lost all her family in the fire that burnt down her town. Yet she invented a grandmother she religiously visited once a year at the same time and everyone accepted that without question.

"So you're going to see your grandmother?" Reno asked her in a perfectly innocent voice.

"Yes, she doesn't like to be alone this time of year. It's a special day for her" Tifa explained.

"Oh what is the special day?" Reno probed.

"Her wedding anniversary" she said looking right at him.

"Oh it's nice that you're going to be with her on such a special occasion. Have fun, yo" Reno said, clearly amused.

"I have to go, Barret's driving me to the airport" she said dismissively.

"I'll see you later" he said turning his attention back to his beer so that no one would see the amusement in his eyes. How he loved to put her on the spot!

He finished his beer, paid Yuffie for it, who was acting as bar manager with Tifa gone. He drove to airfield and got into the fighter jet he had managed to convince Rufus he needed to borrow for a week. He was already at his destination and checked into the hotel before Tifa's commercial flight even left the ground. He made sure all of his arrangements were in order; they were.

Getting a ring off the chain around his neck, he slipped it onto his ring finger as he did once a year. He hummed as he got into the black suit he'd brought and went to the bar to have another drink, knowing Tifa would want time to get ready in private. Besides, he liked to see her when she was dressed up in the clothes he'd bought her just as much as when she was naked.

The purple dress hung on the closet, it was modest by Tifa's standards and she knew it would fit her perfectly and would look beautiful on her. It was obviously expensive. It amused Tifa no end that Reno loved hitting on sluttily dressed women, but preferred modest dress for his own wife. He'd explained that he could go see her wearing her own attire any time when at the bar but when they were alone together, he didn't like other men staring at her. She smiled in irony at this. Reno mentally compartmentized so much in his life; that was what allowed him to do the job he did and not go insane.

She looked at herself in the mirror as she put on the black lace garter belt with sheer stockings and put the skimpy panties over top and slipped into the dress and stepped into the kitten heels provided. A quick hairbrush was all that was needed to complete her toilette and she went downstairs to where she knew he would be.

"Hello wife" he said, standing in greeting and kissing her on the cheek. He thought she looked beautiful and told her so

"Hello husband" she greeted in return.

"How's your grandmother doing?" he asked her facetiously.

"Let's just go eat" she suggested.

"Certainly" he said.

"You're wearing your ring" he observed when they received menus.

"And you're wearing yours" she said, glancing at him.

"I sometimes wonder what you do with it when you don't wear it. Do you put it at the bottom of your underwear drawer? Do you have a special ring box for it?" he asked her.

"None of your business" she said.

"I keep telling you; I can get this dissolved or divorce you whenever you want" he said. "But I think that even having a shadow husband to you is better than none at all. It is the sex? That you you're the only one on my insurance policy and shall receive a pension for life if something were to happen to me? Or perhaps you're not as indifferent to me as you pretend?" he inquired of her.

"You're the one that made me agree to celebrate our wedding anniversary this way. All of this must be expensive. Why bother" she demanded.

"I feel something like this should be celebrated. You're worth it. I don't force you to come and it's not like I mistreat you. You stay in the bridal suite with me of the nicest hotel in town and I treat you as my wife. I spoil you in every way possible and you were the one who got us into this in the first place" he reminded her.

"I shouldn't have listened to you, I was young and naive" Tifa insisted.

"You were barely eighteen when you found me badly injured, you got me the medical attention I needed. I'm grateful for that" he said.

"You were whining that you would die alone with never marrying. Why did I listen to you?" she snapped.

"You didn't have to have the hospital chaplain marry us, considering we were enemies at the time, but you did. I guess I must really have seemed like a lost cause to you. Because that's the kind person I got to know. I wasn't even supposed to have pulled through the surgery" he reminded her with a tender smile that she didn't return.

"I could have been a widow all this time" she said.

"What would the fun be in all of that? There wouldn't be us" he said, taking her hand.

"There isn't an us. I don't even know why you don't divorce me yourself. It's not like you're faithful, I have to watch you parade other women before me" she said.

"So you do get jealous? I was wondering if you even noticed while thinking of your valiant hero" he said in a voice laced with sarcasm. "Do you even like me?" he asked her.

"I care for you" she answered, feeling confused about him as ever. Loving how her body reacted to his, waking up sometimes in her lonely bed wishing he were there. Liking his company but craving the future she had envisioned for herself at the same time.

"You could have just left me alone in the hospital" he gently reminded her.

"You were technically my husband, of course I was going to visit you" she said and she had and her heart had been stirred by injured and helpless he was, causing her to do whatever she could for him. It made her happy when he responded to her kindness in turn. How grateful he was for her attention made her feel funny inside. She wondered why he seemed to get more handsome every time she saw him until it was like she was with him daily.

"The look on your face when the doctor said I was healthy enough to resume our sex life" he said and even she had to smile at this. "And we did have sex; eventually" he said.

"You were my first" she said.

"I guess you really must have wanted your dream wedding night if you had to settle for me?" he said keeping the bitterness from his voice.

"I didn't settle, I cared about you in my own way. I still do..." she offered.

"Yes, despite that my tattoos give me a comical look and you don't think much of my haircut" he said with a wink that made her crack up, he was so different from Cloud. He wasn't the sort of husband she had envisioned for herself, but there were moments when she wished she could claim him for what he actually was to her, despite repercussions from her friends. He made a good income, had a nice house that she frequented when she could get away and it was a nice escape from her constant loneliness. He was friendly, outgoing and obviously cared for her.

"Why do you want to see me for our anniversary every year?" she asked him.

"I have no family left. I don't celebrate any holidays. At least I have this with you. I haven't divorced you because I like the idea that someone will mourn me if I were to die on the job and benefit from it" he explained.

"What if I don't?" she asked him.

"You would. I know you like to hide how much you actually care about me" he said and raised a glass to toast her and she toasted him back.

Back at their suite, they undressed each other as their hands ran all over each other and she gasped and moaned as he took his time arousing her until she was aching with need. A single thrust into her caused her to orgasm and she held him tightly with all four limbs as he took her gently, but with just enough force to give her the friction she needed until she brokenly cried out his name again. She felt perfect, she always did. She was wet with need and gripped him so tightly. Tifa made love with her whole being and kiss after dizzying kiss were shared as they moved in perfect synchronicity until her final climax drew him over the edge and they came together. He held onto her just as tightly, it was only at this moment he felt she was completely his.

Tifa was the only woman Reno trusted not to use a condom with, he knew she was on the pill.

She lay in his arms. "Tell me you don't like this part?" he asked her.

"Must you be so crude? Of course I love having sex with you, but I should be having sex with the man I love" she said.

"So you don't think you will ever love me?" he asked her.

"Since when do you worry about that?" she asked him.

"I don't like being denied. I will win you" he insisted.

"I'm not yours for the taking" she said with pity in her voice.

"You practically live in my house, you could move in on a permanent basis. You could give up your bar. You wouldn't need it, AVALANCHE doesn't even exist anymore. You can do whatever you want. You spoke of wanting to become a pediatrician to treat sick children. I can finance that dream" he said persuasively.

"I'm sorry I can't be with you. I don't love you and therefore, can't take your money" she said.

"You're listed as my emergency contact, you're the first person they will call when I make you a widow" he bitterly said. "I shall not bother you anymore and call an end to these encounters. I'll have this marriage dissolved in a way that your friends shall never know it occurred. It's a simple document to be signed and registered I understand" he said getting up and starting to dress. "The hotel room is paid for until the end of the week, have everything charged to the room" he said going to repack.

"Wait, you're leaving?" she said, not wanting him too.

"I won't force you to spent time with me" he firmly said.

"Stay, you know I want you. You know I care" she said wrapping her arms around him and giving him a tight hug that always made him feel like he wished he could melt into her embrace and he gave in as ever. He could deny hundreds of people but never her.

He delivered her to her door after their time was through, her body coming down from the high of making love so much, to feel so worshipped and desired made her always feel she returned from her honeymoon. She clung to him a little longer than she realized she should as he kissed her goodbye. "Tomorrow night. I can come over before I open the bar and make us dinner" she offered between breathless kisses.

"I have to go on mission, no I can't tell you where" he said with regret in his voice.

"Please promise me to be careful, to keep yourself safe" she practically begged him, she wasn't indifferent to him, she worried about him when he was gone and found herself praying even when she wasn't religious. She prayed for both her men.

"I promise" he said and after more kisses goodbye. "You know if it's just a matter children...you and I could..." he suddenly offered before he could stop himself.

"What a funny joke. I know how much you want children" Tifa said with a forced laugh.

"You're right, it was a joke" he said forcing one himself and realized he had been serious.

She went inside and unpacked and opened the special box she kept under lock and key and opened it. Inside was a photo taken of the two of them shortly after they married when he was convalescing, he's been twenty at the time and she eighteen.

He wore jeans, a t-shirt and a leather jacket and she wore something similar. The picture had been taken by another couple who insisted on taking one of them. She had protested, but he just put his arm around her and said, "smile for the picture" and she had. He still had the scars on this body that had almost ended his life and often traced them as was habit of hers after they made love.

Her friends knew nothing about them, but the Turks did. He had to report it after he woke up and realized it hadn't been a dream, he had a wife who was also their enemy. They had interrogated Tifa and realized she was fairly harmless and didn't want anyone finding out. He had put her on his insurance plan once they grew closer with her visits to see him first at the hospital and then his home. It was months before he was able to return to work and each day was spent with her until one night she didn't go home and became a woman in her young husband's arms and had been hooked on him ever since.

They both looked so young and hopeful in the picture as Tifa studied it, teetering on the brink of something that she'd never allowed to happen. Where had eight years gone? She wondered. She pulled off her ring and placed it in the ring box he had given the ring to her in. She kept other souvenirs of their time together in there too that he didn't know she had.

He got home and took off his own ring, he threaded it onto a chain he normally wore when off duty so he could conceal the ring beneath his clothes and hung it on a photo of them he always hid when she visited him. He wasn't the sentimental sort and it embarrassed him to display it.

It was taken on their last vacation, she wore a red dress. They had their arms wrapped around each other, she had been slightly tipsy on champagne and looked at him in such a winsome way that he had had it professionally framed and mounted. He had had engraved in silver letters below their photo "to have and to hold".