"Call me your wife," Felicity told him. It came out a bit breathless, given where his hands were, but she'd meant every word. "I'd like to be able to tell people who you are to me without giving them directions to a window."
For a long moment Voss held her on that borrowed coat with the warmth of him against her back. Then he kissed her shoulder, where the mark of Victor's teeth could still be felt, and said, "My wife. Christ, Felicity, I was working up to asking for the seat next to you at breakfast."
"You can have that too, if you'll kindly get back to what we came up here for." He laughed into her hair, and when he moved inside her again it was with the sure, hard stroke she'd wanted. He kept his hand at her hip until she was steady on her knees. His other hand found the soft fur of her ear, stroking gently where it made her arch back toward him.
Below them, a gull gave a cry that ended abruptly when something large snapped at it. On a different morning, that would have ruined the mood. Right now she was married to a wolf with both their clothes in a heap on a fire escape, and she felt the gull was entitled to work out its own problems.
She caught his clean hand and drew his knuckles to her mouth. He let her take his fingers between her lips, watching the way she held his wrist while he thrust into her. When she came, every muscle in her thighs shook. He wrapped an arm under her belly and held her until her knees could bear her again. She heard him lose the last of that careful control against her neck as he finished inside her. They stayed there for a while, cheeks together, trying to catch their breath in the cold.
"Yours," she said once she could speak. He pulled the coat around her shoulders and kissed her brow. For all his talk about wanting her, he looked rather startled by the reality of a woman who wanted him back. She decided to enjoy that look a little longer before she told him his sweater was on inside out.
They got dressed sitting side by side on the step. When she reached for her shoes, Voss crouched with his back to her and told her she could have a lift. She had every intention of walking downstairs as a newly married woman under her own power. Then she bent one knee, felt exactly how much exercise she'd just had, and climbed onto his back with what dignity remained available.
Victor had come back to the inner landing with a jug of drinking water. He took one look at the two of them and gave her the cup. She was thirsty enough to finish it before she let him ask how she felt about the morning.
"I'm getting my wife a hot bath," Voss told him. The words sounded quite ordinary until his voice caught on the one she'd asked for. "I wanted you to hear it here first, Silver."
Victor looked straight at Felicity. She nodded once. He hooked a finger in the handle of her empty cup and took it back. "Then let's get our wife inside before she freezes her ass off. And I'll want the whole story about that sweater at some point."
Voss glanced down at the seams sticking out on his arms. She laughed so hard against his shoulder that he had to stand still halfway down the flight. By the time they were among other people again, she felt warm enough to leave the coat open.
She asked for clean water to wash in. Tommy found an enamel basin and coaxed a thin stream from the sound part of a pipe. When a rusted joint started to whine, he stopped and drew the rest from a storage barrel. Victor put his hand beneath the basin and warmed the water. Voss slung the blanket across the doorway to the old staff washroom. The men still in the corridor caught the scent of all three of them. Victor's black-tipped wing shut out the last few curious faces before she had to ask.
"Where was this level of service when I used to pay rent?" she murmured. She dipped the cloth and washed the tender skin between her legs herself. When she tipped her head back, Voss worked water through her honey-blond hair, taking care to keep it out of her ears. He'd wanted to get both hands in that fur since the yard at the brewery. She made a small, contented sound and felt his careful fingers go still in sheer pleasure.
"There you go, sunshine," he said, blotting her hair dry. Victor gave her the clean dress he'd taken out of his space and let her steal a second drink from his cup. She liked being able to ask one of them for something while the other was still touching her.
They ate bread, eggs and peaches from Victor's supplies in the vault. It tasted better than anything that had come out of a can had a right to. When Voss took the seat beside her without asking if it was free, she saved him the last piece of peach. Across from them, Victor went on marking the watch list with her pencil. He put his hand out for the little pool of syrup left on her plate, which she supposed was one benefit to a husband who'd learned how fond she was of the crisp edge of his eggs.
That evening she checked on the little foxes upstairs. The boy could turn his arm over without wincing. His sister was quiet until Felicity fixed the loose tongue inside their little bell ball and gave it one soft jingle. Then she wanted to know whether Felicity would still be there in the morning. She could hear how hard the child was working to make it sound like an ordinary question.
"I'll come back when it's light. I've got something for both of you," she promised, tucking the mended ball into her pocket to go with a stuffed mouse from the donations and two strips of dried fish. Felicity left a fresh bottle of water. The little girl put her fingers in the crook of her brother's good arm. This time he let her hold on without checking the door first.
Down in the vault, Felicity worked her way between Victor and Voss on the sleeping mats. Victor drew the blanket over her feet. Voss curled his hand around hers, and she nearly laughed at the absurd luck of getting exactly what she'd wanted on both sides of her at once. Then her ears picked up a whisper from the cupboard overhead, small enough that even the wolf beside her missed it. "If she comes back," the boy was telling his sister. Felicity lay awake a little longer, wondering how many mornings he'd waited for somebody who never came.