Yes sir, that's my baby now
Jan. 2nd, 2017 11:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
st_illunsmearedPhryne encounters someone she very much wished to see, who also very much wished to see her.
Where: Building 1
When: January 2, 2016
As far as it went, the hotel was rather nice. As a hotel, Jack had… not ‘no complaints’, but few complaints. The lack of staff was likely to be a thorn going forward, but thus far his fellow tenants (or prisoners, or detainees, the nomenclature was uncertain) seemed to be, for the most part, reasonable and sensible beings. It was unlikely that a large-scale fight would break out and burn their mutual dwelling to the ground.
One hoped so, anyway.
Once a policeman, always a policeman, though, so he’d pulled his notebook out of a pocket and gone exploring. As he came upon rooms, he noted them down along with whether they were occupied or not, and by whom if that could be determined. It was a small enough area that he was all but certain to get to know everyone there, but given that he intended to make security his concern, the sooner the better.
If she had to be stuck in a hotel for the rest of her life (or so she had been told, though she hardly believed it to be the case), at least it wasn't the Grand where she'd forever be reminded of a certain waltz. And any hotel that kidnapped its guests was bound to have mysteries and riddles enough to keep her occupied for a little while at least.
Determined not to waste what might be a rollicking adventure on maudlin grieving, Phryne retrieved her notebook from among her belongings and seated herself at the desk with a map of the hotel and the in-room concierge book. Within half an hour, she'd devised a suitable plan for searching the hotel and noted several places she could secret herself if the situation called for it. And then dressed in her least conspicuous outfit--the white trousers and the scalloped aubergine jacket and top--to be off.
She'd gone several paces down the hallway before she turned back, retrieved and pinned the sheriff's star Jack had given her to her lapel. Smiling bravely at herself in the mirror, she touched up her lipstick and was off again. It was practical, not sentimental. Surely a hotel with a staff of five would need some sort of security.
For several hours, she greeted people as she passed, noted the rooms they came out of and any significant belongings they possessed on their person (theft seemed more likely than murder, in any event). Whenever her mind drifted in an unwelcome direction, she hauled it back by cataloging the contents of some particularly egregious room.
Yet even her enthusiasm had begun to flag by the time she crossed the property to "Building 1". In fact, she'd begun considering ordering room service to one of the empty rooms. Tea, or perhaps brandy wouldn't go a--
Two doors down, a door opened and the man who stepped out looked so much like Jack, it took her breath away. She sagged against the wall, eyes burning and chest aching with the fear she'd never see him, or Mac, or Jane, or even Aunt Prudence ever again.
Some of the rooms in the hotel were positively hideous. Most of the truly terrible ones were still empty, or so it seemed, but if in the future they should not be….
Arson might be something to watch out for, even when simply moving to a different room would be far easier. Jack tapped his pencil on the pad thoughtfully, in his own world for the moment, and considered whether it might be worth making a particular list of the hideous rooms that were as yet unoccupied, just to try and be forewarned when someone was placed in one. Of course, his own taste tended to the… he would say ‘conservative’ while someone like Phryne might call it boring. Someone else might have to establish the list of hideous….
Steeling herself, Phryne pushed off the wall, took a breath, and turned toward the only other person in the hall at the moment. She studied that so familiar jawline and told herself it was wishful thinking, but when he didn't look up from the notebook in his hands as she drew closer, Phryne's heart lurched.
"...Jack?"
It was hardly a whisper, breathless, uncertain and desperately hopeful.
Jack wasn't the sort of man to hallucinate or have waking dreams, and he'd had multiple occasions to be very glad for that, during the War and afterward. Most recently, in Gotham - it would have been pure hell seeing or hearing a Phryne who wasn't there, and the real, diluted hell of simply wishing she was there or thinking about what she would have said or done in a given situation was far preferable. So when the almost-whisper reached his ears, he didn't even consider that it might be wishful thinking or some sort of hallucination.
He looked up, and there she was, real and alive. And... very glad to see him, clearly, but also upset. The little sheriff's star pinned on her was reassuring in a way, it said that she couldn't be from too far before him. Still, he restrained his greeting to a stare and an abortive little step towards her. (What he wanted to do was haul her into a kiss, as if she were about to climb into an airplane. But that was a dangerous want, so he suppressed it.) "Ph... Miss Fisher. I... didn't know you were here."
If she'd had any doubts, they vanished in the face of that first unguarded look that seemed to devour her whole. In all the months they'd known each other, Phryne could count the number of times she'd seen such naked emotion in his soulful brown eyes. She let out a soft breath, shaped it into a huff of laughter that landed just the right side of manic.
Summoning up her considerable will, Phryne replied, "I should hope not, my dear Inspector, else I would have to be cross with you about not coming to my rescue sooner," with a saucy (if somewhat forced) little smile. The same bravado that fueled the quip allowed her a few short steps toward him, arm outstretched, until her fingertips grazed his jacket over his ribs.
She was quite sure her own eyes exposed her heart, but in the moment, Phryne couldn't bring herself to care.
It took quite a lot of will not to give in and ignore the 'don't kiss her' drumbeat in his brain, but Jack managed that much even if he didn't manage not to stroke her cheek briefly. If she'd told him to come after her, her quip likely would have been phrased including either 'you're late' or 'well finally'. That the theme was rescue instead meant... be careful. Be careful. "You don't seem to be in danger at this exact moment, fortunately for me. You didn't need rescuing." Not that rescue in any real sense was possible. They weren't, he was almost sure, getting to either the London or Melbourne version of home anytime soon.
Quite oblivious to the mantra running through Jack's brain, Phryne's heart had struck up it's own, contrarily opposite, of Kiss me, please kiss me. She tilted her face into the brush of his fingers, eyes closing at the exquisite pleasure of his willing touch. "To the contrary, Jack, I'm in terrible danger," she whispered and stepped close enough to feel the warmth of this body along hers. The seductive quip that ought to have followed...didn't. Instead, as her fingers closed around the fabric of his jacket, she offered, "Of dying of boredom," but meant (quite clearly as far as she was concerned) of drowning in grief.
"As I have no case demanding your interference, I suspect I can't help with the boredom." He could, though. He absolutely could. For the most part, touches between them had been carefully regulated - socially acceptable and expected, or brief with one or the other backing away for their own comfort or the other's. Stepping away now, though, was more than anyone could reasonably expect of him. He'd gotten at least somewhat used, he'd thought, to the idea of never seeing her again, but that was like being surrounded by misery and just accepting it like fish accepted water. Without what he'd call conscious intent, his hand and arm stole around her waist, to make her closeness more like an embrace. "Unless you actually want to help me rank the unoccupied rooms by hideousness."
"Since you seem to be without the services of a constable, and--" Her free hand fluttered to indicate her notebook without calling his attention away from her face (her mouth, to be precise, which bore her favorite and most striking shade of red, giving emphasis to the yes, please, Jack her lips shaped between words). "I've already embarked on a similar project, a collaboration would seem to be in order." Though the sort she had in mind had less to do with ranking rooms than in locking the door to one and promptly ceasing to notice their environs in favor of each other. After all he had drawn her into his arms again, and if the quickening beat of her heart had rather more to do with Jack than the prospect of indulging in an afternoon of skin and sex, it was only to be expected since she'd already begun to ache with the prospect of life without him.
"I had thought that I could use someone with... shall we say less conservative tastes than mine to determine exactly what constitutes hideous." Her mouth was unfair, the more so since he knew (remembered!) what kissing her was like. Going into bedroom after unoccupied bedroom with her, even just to investigate or catalog, would be torture. And heaven, at the same time, because Phryne's presence tended to brighten... everything. "How fortunate for me that I have you here."
The response -- you have me, may have me, anywhere -- rose so swiftly to mind and so unbidden that Phryne almost gave it voice. She very much feared that it showed on her face, even though she replied, "How fortunate for you I've earned my star and you've reconsidered your position on our partnership," with characteristic aplomb and without the Jack, darling that seemed determined to append itself to everything she said.
Phryne – in his mind if not on his lips – was often flirtatious and inviting, but rarely as openly so as her expression now indicated. The sense before was always that she would be pleased to accept him, but it wasn’t of any real significance to her. Until recently, but even with the new and more emotional depth to the flirtation, it wasn’t so… naked.
That should have made him back off again, should have been his cue to back off and reevaluate. Should have been, but wasn’t. “Then I’m a lucky man all around.” The only way not to kiss her at that point was to continue, “Shall we tackle the next room together, then?”
His words scrambled, they must have, because for a moment she heard shall we tackle each other in the next room? The unlikeliness of it made her laugh, a soft, warm, breathy laugh redolent of her natural sensuality. "It cannot possibly be worse than forty-four hours in flight with only my father for company."
God, that laugh. If it wouldn’t make her run screaming for the hills and/or wasn’t something she knew already, Jack would have observed that that laugh could make anywhere feel like home. At least, insofar as ‘home’ had become wherever they were together. Melbourne, yes. Gotham, no. Here… possibly.
Rather than embed his foot that firmly in his mouth, Jack shifted them so their arms were linked and they could progress into the next empty room without having to take his hands off her completely. And that next room was… not that bad, all reds and dark woods. Some fantasist’s idea of a hunting lodge motif, perhaps? “Ah, a not-horrible room.”
If he wasn't going to kiss her, which she'd begun to give up hope he would ever do unless she took matters into her own hands like she'd advised Dot to do, at least he didn't seem to want to let go of her any more than she did him. But, just in case he were inclined to think it merely obliging, she curved her hand intimately about his bicep and leaned closer than was strictly necessary.
"A bit on the nose with the hunting lodge theme, and it could do with a bit more neutral," she said after a moment. "And perhaps a patterned carpet instead of this painful crimson. But far better than some. Shall we take a look upstairs, da- Jack?" Even more obviously than usual, she wrapped his name in playful warmth and familiarity, and only in part to distract him from the wayward slip of her tongue. Dot made being here survivable, but Jack... Jack made it possible to be Phryne.
Upstairs was likely to contain a bedroom, which was a danger, except... except she'd let slip that she was about to leave for England with her father. If she hadn't told him to come after her (and she hadn't, he was nearly sure of it) the omission was by a few minutes, if that. What difference should a few minutes make? One thing he could be sure of was that Jack Robinson and Phryne Fisher were anything but snap decisions to each other.
Trying and failing would hurt more, in this place where they wouldn't be able to avoid each other. But not trying was... untenable. It had been when he'd left Melbourne, it had been while alone in Gotham, and it was especially so now that there was in fact an option other than doing nothing. "For a thorough investigation, I think we must. Ladies first."
Upstairs almost certainly contained a bedroom, which ordinarily would have delighted her...but he'd accepted so blithely that she found herself uncertain. To be with Jack in so intimate a space and not be able to indulge...hurt. She'd accepted theirs would never be a casual dalliance, acknowledged a desire for him to make a romantic overture, even turned away other lovers for him, and still he resisted her. In any other man, she would have considered it a challenge. With Jack...it felt untenable.
Deciding that perhaps it would force the issue, she smiled, tugged down her jacket and marched for the stairs. Halfway there, she glanced back over her shoulder, gave him her best boudoir smile, and chided, "Hurry up, Jack. Or I'll be finished before you arrive."
Jack raised both eyebrows, amusement warring with… something else. He couldn’t tell her why, of course, but it was entirely possible he didn’t have to. She might never need to know. He also didn’t exactly hurry up the stairs. She spent enough time, it seemed, teasing him that this felt more like fair play. Only, admittedly, because he’d made a decision she knew nothing about.
As expected, the upstairs area was a bedroom. The crimson carpet made another appearance, but the queen bed was as inoffensive as the rest of the furniture.
As though to spite her, Jack took his time joining her in the bedroom. Part of her wanted to take the moment to pose on the bed, as though she'd been waiting for her lover to join her. But he'd accused her of toying with him more than once (although not in precisely those words), and she'd hate for him to misread a genuine invitation as something more frivolous.
Schooling herself to calm acceptance, she took the moment to inspect the drawers (and her hair and lipstick in the mirror) in the bureau. She found nothing but a Bible, which she gingerly pushed out of the way as though it might bite, and was just looking up when Jack emerged into the room.
Her heart caught in her throat and her mouth felt uncommonly like she'd swallowed sand. How had she ever imagined she'd do well with a break from him if he didn't follow her to London?
Jack had been expecting her to pursue the obvious course and pose on the bed, and when he found that she hadn’t… it was oddly touching. Wherever they were, personally, the depth of Phryne’s genuine care for the people in her life took every form. That made it easy to move to join her at the dresser – with its Bible shoved to the back, hah – and pretend to investigate it for a few seconds.
Pretend, because what he did next was slide his hand behind her neck and pull her into a kiss, every bit as passionate and hungry as the one she had not, in fact, received before leaving for London.
Phryne had just pulled in breath to say something about the hotel's taste in reading material when he stole it from her utterly. It had been so long, it seemed that she wanted it (not quite since Rene, but that had certainly planted the seed, the contrast between the two of them), that the moment of its arrival stunned her and froze her in place.
Froze her for a moment, but only that, because this was no tentative exploration from a would-be admirer. Jack took her mouth with a full-blown heat and passion she had rarely known. The strength of his desire, it's...maturity, thrilled and terrified at once. So when her body caught up and her hand stole around first his hip and then the other up to his shoulders, it was as much to steady herself as to pull him closer and deepen the kiss.
Unlike would-be admirers, Jack was certain of his welcome, certain that he wanted Phryne and she wanted him. She had been going to tell him to come after her, she’d been minutes at most from doing it. But Phryne’s response in the moment was still thrilling and slightly surprising – in the sense that it was always a surprise that someone like the Honourable Miss Phryne Fisher didn’t simply look past a dull civil servant like him.
He didn’t want the kiss to end, but they actually couldn’t breathe while attached to each other’s mouths. Breathing, however, didn’t mean that he was letting her get even an inch further away from him. “I’ve wanted to do that for months.”
It was good, Phryne reflected with the one remote working corner of her mind, that Jack had gentleman stamped on his soul. Without his arm around her, she would very definitely be swaying on her feet. He had left her, literally, weak in the knees.
"Oh, Jack. What took you so long?" Her attempt at a playful demand fell entirely flat and sounded far too much like a plea. In truth, she felt uncomfortably like she might simply fall to pieces if he let her go.
“I’m a careful man.” It felt like a weak reason, and in some ways it was. How long had he been divorced? Longer than he’d known he was a special case for Phryne, but he hadn’t been sure how special his case really was… until she’d chosen him over someone more casual, and told him to come after her. She could be as free as she wanted, because he was sure now that she would never leave him entirely behind. “You’d have seen me in short order at the airfield, anyway. I had no intention of allowing you to leave without a proper good-bye.”
Were he any other man, Phryne would have taken it for a misguided attempt at charm. Any other man would not have caught her--at all, let alone seconds before take off when she had already been climbing into her cockpit. But Jack Robinson had a terrible, wonderful, habit of always being right where she needed him to be.
"Well, then, you're late by almost a day," she said, the intended tartness blunted by the tide of grief rising in her chest. Where were you when someone was telling me I was probably dead and there was no Jane to greet me? she couldn't, although she felt it keenly. This once, she hid nothing of herself from him, and added with the utmost, heartfelt sincerity (and perhaps a suspicious shine in her eyes), "But I'm terribly glad to see you, even so."
“You told me to come after you, so I did.” He kissed her again, because there was no such thing as too much kissing of Phryne Fisher, and also she seemed to be teetering on the edge of tears.
An answer in words seemed terribly beside the point with his mouth so soft on hers now, his breath mingling warm and sweet with hers. She slid her hand into his hair instead and gave herself to him, offering, inviting, and asking him please not to back away this time.
She took a step backward and then another, drawing him after her toward the bed, where she needn't concentrate on remaining on her feet and she could be as close to him as she felt she needed to.
It wasn't exactly something he considered - though if asked later of course he'd planned it - but when Phryne angled them towards the bed, Jack turned them both just enough that he could sit and she'd almost-naturally fall into his lap. Considered or not, it made sense; when Miss Fisher wanted sex, she made no bones about it. He'd have been sans coat and quite probably sans waistcoat before reaching the bed in that case, but here he was, still fully layered.
Therefore, she wanted something else, and closeness was the only answer he could come up with. And from his lap she'd be able to move however she pleased. Away, if she wished, or more in line with her usual thought processes regarding beds and men she was attracted to if she wished. Or, of course, she could remain exactly as she was.
Like a moment in one of her fondest fantasies, she found herself -- not abruptly, not jarringly, not awkwardly because Jack Robinson did nothing haphazardly -- in his lap on the bed, with her arms about his shoulders--without having to stop kissing him, a fact that she appreciated immensely. But at length, she did stop because here they were, finally.
She stroked his face and his jaw with her fingertips, slowly and rapt, entranced with being permitted this intimacy with him. All the while, her gaze never left his; she couldn't bear to look away, in case it were all a dream and he disappeared. "Darling Jack," she murmured, voice silken and husky with all of the emotion of the moment.
"Phryne." Endearments would come in time, certainly, once he'd figured out what he felt comfortable saying and she felt comfortable hearing. For now, though, the simple use of her first name would do... if only because this was the first time he was using it without a silent prayer along the lines of 'don't be dead, please don't be dead'. And for him, in the moment, it was enough to know that she fit as perfectly against him as he'd (guiltily and then hopelessly) thought she might, and to see her expression proving every fear he'd suppressed wrong on its face. No part of this was play, at this moment, to his ever-playful Miss Fisher.
Her mouth shaped a small, intimately personal smile, more genuine than her brighter ones, and much quieter somehow. "Isn't it strange," Phryne began, her voice filled with breathy wonder and heart fluttering behind her ribcage. "That I've heard my name thousands of times, and it has never seemed so much mine as just now?" There could be no doubt, of course, and no denial of why, but it might take her some time to say it with as unaccustomed to the experience as she'd grown since the war.
Jack had to kiss that smile, something like a reward for being real. Her usual smiles lit up a room, yes, but this more personal smile was warmer. Afternoon sunlight compared to an electric floodlight, maybe. "You've not heard it much from me."
"I hope I'll hear it more often, now, Jack." Phryne let out a soft breath and drew her fingers down his tie the way she had so many times before, only this time she didn't have to stop there. "Do you suppose you might take off your tie and jacket, now, while we're alone?" It didn't seem presumptuous to think they would stay while, not when they'd waited so long and felt so much.
"Why don't you take off my tie?" he invited. A fair number of those guilty/hopeless reveries had involved Phryne taking off his tie. (For a start.) There was likely symbolism involved, but in the moment that was unimportant. Besides, if she removed the tie and him the jacket, he could get both items off at once instead of sequentially.
Her lashes fluttered at the invitation. "Why, darling, are you inviting me to undress you?" she teased, even as deft fingers worked the knot on his tie to loosen it. Although she could have done it in her sleep (had, in countless waking dreams), Phryne took her time, enjoyed the feel of the silk between her fingers, admired the precision in the knot, absorbed the warmth of his skin through his shirt against the back of her hand. "Because I've been wanting to do that almost since I met you."
While her hands were otherwise occupied, Jack slipped off his jacket and let it fall on the bed. Ordinarily he'd have hung it somewhere or folded it, but this was something of a special circumstance; namely, he didn't want to dislodge a Phryne in his lap. "Perhaps I'm simply being practical and giving you something to do so I can get the jacket off?"
"Perhaps. You are the ever-practical Jack Robinson," she murmured as the tie slipped from beneath his collar. She didn't stop there, though, and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, so she could stroke the hollow of his throat with her fingertips. "I do hope you won't be practical all the time, now."
“It’s likely,” he murmured. “But you never know, I may surprise you from time to time.”
"You've already surprised me twice in one day." She unbuttoned the next button and then lowered her head to press her lips to the soft pulse where her fingers had been. "It wouldn't do to overexert yourself." Every caress, every tiny step forward had been savored until now, and, unusually, she had no desire to change that and rush to a conclusion.
"Very true." And it similarly wouldn't do to keep on the current path of undressing, however much part of him thought that that was a very good idea indeed. Even tilting her face back up with fingers under her chin to take her mouth again felt like... zero to sixty, racing car levels of too much. Slow waltz to... what, jitterbug? No, expanding the borders slowly was best. (As was mixing metaphors as little as possible, but too late there.)
Mindful that it had been at least since his divorce that Jack had been with a woman, Phryne ceased unbuttoning her very buttoned up Inspector without prompting. It would be...painful for him to reject additional advances now, and if she were completely honest, she needed time to accustom herself to the new rules, whatever they were. Yet...
She lifted her head to meet his gaze, eyes darkened with a boudoir intensity new between them, even as the fingers resting on the bare skin of chest trembled. "It would not be too terribly surprising, I think, if we were to put the bed to its more common function." A breath, and then an admission, "I've slept poorly. I wouldn't mind resting... in your arms." As long as he didn't hold on too tightly. "For awhile. I believe we have a fair few things to discuss."
This was an unoccupied room. There was no one to object to any use they put the room to, and housekeeping would no doubt be along to clean and set to rights anything off. As well, simply resting with Phryne in his arms was very likely more intimate than she generally allowed her less long-term paramours. “I’ve no objections, and I have no doubt of our ability to fill time with discussion.”
"I would like that, Jack," came an uncharacteristically soft, direct response from Phryne, who promptly leaned over the edge of his lap to unlace her boots. Not until the moment she'd seen him had she realized how on edge she had been. Not until he'd kissed her had she realized how many months she'd been holding her breath in anticipation. To simply be with him without social pretense, to touch and be touched...even the prospect eased a tight knot in her chest.
"Then that we will do." And he would, deep enough inside that it wouldn't display, be rather smug that while Phryne could be as free with her favors as she pleased (of course), this sort of closeness was all and only his. For now, at any rate.
When she'd removed her boots, Phryne shifted off his lap onto the bed and drew her feet up. She very deliberately and very pointedly waited then for him to join her, so that she could her arrange herself against him in a way that satisfied her need to be with him without triggering the inevitable panic of being held. "What made you change your mind about wanting this?"
"You were leaving," Jack said simply, as soon as he'd removed his own shoes and settled comfortably. "I imagined I wouldn't get another chance, for anything, so I decided to... risk it." And she would know him well enough to know that the decision, once made, wasn't going to be unmade for anything as petty as reality changing around them both.
Phryne thought on that a moment before lowering herself down to the bed with her head on his shoulder. Then she didn't think at all for another moment or so, instead closing her eyes to take in the sensation of being in a man's arms. Jack's arms. Rolled up onto her side and pressed very intimately against him, she allowed herself just to breathe, stroke her fingers over his chest (albeit through his shirt), before saying, "Surely you knew I'd never turn you away, not for the world."
After a moment or two of consideration, he said, "I took my risk once you were in the plane and the engine was started, Phryne. Not just now." In for a penny, in for a pound, as the saying went. She needed to know. "Had I done nothing then, you might well have not come back from England. Or met someone more interesting there. Or any number of things."
As much as she disliked the entire phenomenon of time and dimension travel (for such she had decided to believe this), Phryne refused to permit herself to be jealous of herself of all things. Nor would she permit Jack to be jealous of phantom suitors who could never exist. "Jack," she began, voice more a caress than it had ever been. "Even had I met the most interesting man in the world, he wouldn't have been more than a temporary diversion. I've never wanted what we have, but we do have it, and I'm not so much a fool I don't know what that's worth."
For a moment, Jack nearly told her about what the other her – God, how confusing – had said at the airstrip, the if he didn’t come after her or was too slow, she would find someone else. Here and now, it didn’t matter, and this Phryne hadn’t said it. Perhaps even there and then she hadn’t meant it. But it was still worth a little care, even if he’d already made his choice. “As you say, of course.” No part of this would work, after all, if he was unwilling to take what she said on face value until proved wrong.
She fell quiet for a time, considering Jack's words and his reactions. He had no reason to believe her, of course. It strained credulity, given how often she'd made the point that she wouldn't let any man have a hold over her. And yet, how could she deny that he did? "It can't have been easy. I'll do my utmost to be sure you don't regret it."
Whether he regretted or not at some point in the future was inescapable now. Jack appreciated the statement for the attempt at reassurance that it was, but Phryne being Phryne she likely wouldn’t understand how relaxing it was, in a way, to simply have the decision made and a course committed to. “I’m not in need of reassurance, Phryne. Whatever happens, I’ve made my choice.”
"And yet," she murmured, somehow more uncertain herself at his profession of contentment. "I was in need of providing it, or perhaps simply of saying it out loud." To commit herself to the course, or to hear it said, or to make a promise to Jack, because she found her promises to him easier to keep than anything she merely thought important to try to do. "Can you really be so sanguine about the prospect of me destroying what's between us?" Because if this failed, it would not be down to him.
“I wouldn’t say I’m sanguine. I honestly dread that possibility.” As he dreaded the possibility of him ultimately being unable to keep her interest. “But for now, at least, there are no decisions to be made.”
"I can honestly say--" It started out almost as saucy as any other day's conversation, but her voice softened again quickly. "I'm terrified I'll do something unforgivable." Because she would, certainly, do things that made him angry or hurt him.
"Assuming you don't intend to commit murder or set up a drugs ring, I don't think you have anything to worry about, there." Yes, Phryne meant on a more personal level, but... they'd known each other more than long enough, in more than enough variety of circumstance that if anyone could be said to be walking into whatever this actually was with open eyes, it was them. He was aware of who and what she was, she was aware of who and what he was.
Softly, uncertainly, she asked the question that had been worrying at the back of her mind since he'd taken her into his arms. "And what of other more liberal men?" Because he had to know...she wouldn't choose another man over him, but she couldn't let any man have that much of hold over her. Even her most darling inspector.
“What of them?” Jack had no illusions; Phryne was no more inclined to monogamy than to marriage. Her other lovers would hurt, no doubt, but no doubt she’d be circumspect enough to keep them as much out of his sight as possible, if only for her own peace.
Phryne lifted her head from his shoulder to look him in the eyes. He would let her have her freedom and have this? The tears she'd been fighting before sprang up again and her perfectly unsmeared lips trembled. "Jack?"
The tears were honestly growing very disturbing; Phryne had never struck him as a woman given to tears. Jack kissed her again, in small part to see if that turned aside the threat to weep. "I doubt I could be anyone else if I tried."
"Nor would I want you to be, or to try for that matter," she said, no (visible) part of her trembling any longer. She found his kisses quite restorative. A tonic she would have to sample as often as he were inclined to offer. "Have I said how very glad I am that you're here?"
“Offhand, I don’t recall.” Just because he could and felt like it, Jack kissed her again. “But I believe I’ve gotten the gist of that.”
"Have you?" Phryne curled her fingers in his shirt and drew him into a longer, sweeter kiss. "I don't believe I've had my fill of saying it. So you may have to hear it now and again. Dot seems to--"
She lifted her hand to cover her mouth, eyes alight with self-directed amusement. "Do you know, I completely forgot to tell you that Dot's here too? Only, she's from before us. She doesn't know that she and Hugh are married. So you mustn't tell her, darling. She'd be devastated."
“Understood.” And if Collins arrived at the Inn himself, at some point, it was more properly his place to acquaint Miss Williams (still, and Jack committed it to memory) with their marital status or lack thereof. “I have no desire to upset Miss Williams.”
"Naturally not. You are the consummate gentleman." Had she once cursed that as an obstacle to bedding him? She hardly recalled it. It had become as dear to her as everything else about him.
Appreciative, she patted his chest and then nestled close against his side with her head on his shoulder. She truly had slept poorly, and if he was not yet ready to exhaust her, she would still avail herself of any other intimacy he wished to provide.
Where: Building 1
When: January 2, 2016
As far as it went, the hotel was rather nice. As a hotel, Jack had… not ‘no complaints’, but few complaints. The lack of staff was likely to be a thorn going forward, but thus far his fellow tenants (or prisoners, or detainees, the nomenclature was uncertain) seemed to be, for the most part, reasonable and sensible beings. It was unlikely that a large-scale fight would break out and burn their mutual dwelling to the ground.
One hoped so, anyway.
Once a policeman, always a policeman, though, so he’d pulled his notebook out of a pocket and gone exploring. As he came upon rooms, he noted them down along with whether they were occupied or not, and by whom if that could be determined. It was a small enough area that he was all but certain to get to know everyone there, but given that he intended to make security his concern, the sooner the better.
If she had to be stuck in a hotel for the rest of her life (or so she had been told, though she hardly believed it to be the case), at least it wasn't the Grand where she'd forever be reminded of a certain waltz. And any hotel that kidnapped its guests was bound to have mysteries and riddles enough to keep her occupied for a little while at least.
Determined not to waste what might be a rollicking adventure on maudlin grieving, Phryne retrieved her notebook from among her belongings and seated herself at the desk with a map of the hotel and the in-room concierge book. Within half an hour, she'd devised a suitable plan for searching the hotel and noted several places she could secret herself if the situation called for it. And then dressed in her least conspicuous outfit--the white trousers and the scalloped aubergine jacket and top--to be off.
She'd gone several paces down the hallway before she turned back, retrieved and pinned the sheriff's star Jack had given her to her lapel. Smiling bravely at herself in the mirror, she touched up her lipstick and was off again. It was practical, not sentimental. Surely a hotel with a staff of five would need some sort of security.
For several hours, she greeted people as she passed, noted the rooms they came out of and any significant belongings they possessed on their person (theft seemed more likely than murder, in any event). Whenever her mind drifted in an unwelcome direction, she hauled it back by cataloging the contents of some particularly egregious room.
Yet even her enthusiasm had begun to flag by the time she crossed the property to "Building 1". In fact, she'd begun considering ordering room service to one of the empty rooms. Tea, or perhaps brandy wouldn't go a--
Two doors down, a door opened and the man who stepped out looked so much like Jack, it took her breath away. She sagged against the wall, eyes burning and chest aching with the fear she'd never see him, or Mac, or Jane, or even Aunt Prudence ever again.
Some of the rooms in the hotel were positively hideous. Most of the truly terrible ones were still empty, or so it seemed, but if in the future they should not be….
Arson might be something to watch out for, even when simply moving to a different room would be far easier. Jack tapped his pencil on the pad thoughtfully, in his own world for the moment, and considered whether it might be worth making a particular list of the hideous rooms that were as yet unoccupied, just to try and be forewarned when someone was placed in one. Of course, his own taste tended to the… he would say ‘conservative’ while someone like Phryne might call it boring. Someone else might have to establish the list of hideous….
Steeling herself, Phryne pushed off the wall, took a breath, and turned toward the only other person in the hall at the moment. She studied that so familiar jawline and told herself it was wishful thinking, but when he didn't look up from the notebook in his hands as she drew closer, Phryne's heart lurched.
"...Jack?"
It was hardly a whisper, breathless, uncertain and desperately hopeful.
Jack wasn't the sort of man to hallucinate or have waking dreams, and he'd had multiple occasions to be very glad for that, during the War and afterward. Most recently, in Gotham - it would have been pure hell seeing or hearing a Phryne who wasn't there, and the real, diluted hell of simply wishing she was there or thinking about what she would have said or done in a given situation was far preferable. So when the almost-whisper reached his ears, he didn't even consider that it might be wishful thinking or some sort of hallucination.
He looked up, and there she was, real and alive. And... very glad to see him, clearly, but also upset. The little sheriff's star pinned on her was reassuring in a way, it said that she couldn't be from too far before him. Still, he restrained his greeting to a stare and an abortive little step towards her. (What he wanted to do was haul her into a kiss, as if she were about to climb into an airplane. But that was a dangerous want, so he suppressed it.) "Ph... Miss Fisher. I... didn't know you were here."
If she'd had any doubts, they vanished in the face of that first unguarded look that seemed to devour her whole. In all the months they'd known each other, Phryne could count the number of times she'd seen such naked emotion in his soulful brown eyes. She let out a soft breath, shaped it into a huff of laughter that landed just the right side of manic.
Summoning up her considerable will, Phryne replied, "I should hope not, my dear Inspector, else I would have to be cross with you about not coming to my rescue sooner," with a saucy (if somewhat forced) little smile. The same bravado that fueled the quip allowed her a few short steps toward him, arm outstretched, until her fingertips grazed his jacket over his ribs.
She was quite sure her own eyes exposed her heart, but in the moment, Phryne couldn't bring herself to care.
It took quite a lot of will not to give in and ignore the 'don't kiss her' drumbeat in his brain, but Jack managed that much even if he didn't manage not to stroke her cheek briefly. If she'd told him to come after her, her quip likely would have been phrased including either 'you're late' or 'well finally'. That the theme was rescue instead meant... be careful. Be careful. "You don't seem to be in danger at this exact moment, fortunately for me. You didn't need rescuing." Not that rescue in any real sense was possible. They weren't, he was almost sure, getting to either the London or Melbourne version of home anytime soon.
Quite oblivious to the mantra running through Jack's brain, Phryne's heart had struck up it's own, contrarily opposite, of Kiss me, please kiss me. She tilted her face into the brush of his fingers, eyes closing at the exquisite pleasure of his willing touch. "To the contrary, Jack, I'm in terrible danger," she whispered and stepped close enough to feel the warmth of this body along hers. The seductive quip that ought to have followed...didn't. Instead, as her fingers closed around the fabric of his jacket, she offered, "Of dying of boredom," but meant (quite clearly as far as she was concerned) of drowning in grief.
"As I have no case demanding your interference, I suspect I can't help with the boredom." He could, though. He absolutely could. For the most part, touches between them had been carefully regulated - socially acceptable and expected, or brief with one or the other backing away for their own comfort or the other's. Stepping away now, though, was more than anyone could reasonably expect of him. He'd gotten at least somewhat used, he'd thought, to the idea of never seeing her again, but that was like being surrounded by misery and just accepting it like fish accepted water. Without what he'd call conscious intent, his hand and arm stole around her waist, to make her closeness more like an embrace. "Unless you actually want to help me rank the unoccupied rooms by hideousness."
"Since you seem to be without the services of a constable, and--" Her free hand fluttered to indicate her notebook without calling his attention away from her face (her mouth, to be precise, which bore her favorite and most striking shade of red, giving emphasis to the yes, please, Jack her lips shaped between words). "I've already embarked on a similar project, a collaboration would seem to be in order." Though the sort she had in mind had less to do with ranking rooms than in locking the door to one and promptly ceasing to notice their environs in favor of each other. After all he had drawn her into his arms again, and if the quickening beat of her heart had rather more to do with Jack than the prospect of indulging in an afternoon of skin and sex, it was only to be expected since she'd already begun to ache with the prospect of life without him.
"I had thought that I could use someone with... shall we say less conservative tastes than mine to determine exactly what constitutes hideous." Her mouth was unfair, the more so since he knew (remembered!) what kissing her was like. Going into bedroom after unoccupied bedroom with her, even just to investigate or catalog, would be torture. And heaven, at the same time, because Phryne's presence tended to brighten... everything. "How fortunate for me that I have you here."
The response -- you have me, may have me, anywhere -- rose so swiftly to mind and so unbidden that Phryne almost gave it voice. She very much feared that it showed on her face, even though she replied, "How fortunate for you I've earned my star and you've reconsidered your position on our partnership," with characteristic aplomb and without the Jack, darling that seemed determined to append itself to everything she said.
Phryne – in his mind if not on his lips – was often flirtatious and inviting, but rarely as openly so as her expression now indicated. The sense before was always that she would be pleased to accept him, but it wasn’t of any real significance to her. Until recently, but even with the new and more emotional depth to the flirtation, it wasn’t so… naked.
That should have made him back off again, should have been his cue to back off and reevaluate. Should have been, but wasn’t. “Then I’m a lucky man all around.” The only way not to kiss her at that point was to continue, “Shall we tackle the next room together, then?”
His words scrambled, they must have, because for a moment she heard shall we tackle each other in the next room? The unlikeliness of it made her laugh, a soft, warm, breathy laugh redolent of her natural sensuality. "It cannot possibly be worse than forty-four hours in flight with only my father for company."
God, that laugh. If it wouldn’t make her run screaming for the hills and/or wasn’t something she knew already, Jack would have observed that that laugh could make anywhere feel like home. At least, insofar as ‘home’ had become wherever they were together. Melbourne, yes. Gotham, no. Here… possibly.
Rather than embed his foot that firmly in his mouth, Jack shifted them so their arms were linked and they could progress into the next empty room without having to take his hands off her completely. And that next room was… not that bad, all reds and dark woods. Some fantasist’s idea of a hunting lodge motif, perhaps? “Ah, a not-horrible room.”
If he wasn't going to kiss her, which she'd begun to give up hope he would ever do unless she took matters into her own hands like she'd advised Dot to do, at least he didn't seem to want to let go of her any more than she did him. But, just in case he were inclined to think it merely obliging, she curved her hand intimately about his bicep and leaned closer than was strictly necessary.
"A bit on the nose with the hunting lodge theme, and it could do with a bit more neutral," she said after a moment. "And perhaps a patterned carpet instead of this painful crimson. But far better than some. Shall we take a look upstairs, da- Jack?" Even more obviously than usual, she wrapped his name in playful warmth and familiarity, and only in part to distract him from the wayward slip of her tongue. Dot made being here survivable, but Jack... Jack made it possible to be Phryne.
Upstairs was likely to contain a bedroom, which was a danger, except... except she'd let slip that she was about to leave for England with her father. If she hadn't told him to come after her (and she hadn't, he was nearly sure of it) the omission was by a few minutes, if that. What difference should a few minutes make? One thing he could be sure of was that Jack Robinson and Phryne Fisher were anything but snap decisions to each other.
Trying and failing would hurt more, in this place where they wouldn't be able to avoid each other. But not trying was... untenable. It had been when he'd left Melbourne, it had been while alone in Gotham, and it was especially so now that there was in fact an option other than doing nothing. "For a thorough investigation, I think we must. Ladies first."
Upstairs almost certainly contained a bedroom, which ordinarily would have delighted her...but he'd accepted so blithely that she found herself uncertain. To be with Jack in so intimate a space and not be able to indulge...hurt. She'd accepted theirs would never be a casual dalliance, acknowledged a desire for him to make a romantic overture, even turned away other lovers for him, and still he resisted her. In any other man, she would have considered it a challenge. With Jack...it felt untenable.
Deciding that perhaps it would force the issue, she smiled, tugged down her jacket and marched for the stairs. Halfway there, she glanced back over her shoulder, gave him her best boudoir smile, and chided, "Hurry up, Jack. Or I'll be finished before you arrive."
Jack raised both eyebrows, amusement warring with… something else. He couldn’t tell her why, of course, but it was entirely possible he didn’t have to. She might never need to know. He also didn’t exactly hurry up the stairs. She spent enough time, it seemed, teasing him that this felt more like fair play. Only, admittedly, because he’d made a decision she knew nothing about.
As expected, the upstairs area was a bedroom. The crimson carpet made another appearance, but the queen bed was as inoffensive as the rest of the furniture.
As though to spite her, Jack took his time joining her in the bedroom. Part of her wanted to take the moment to pose on the bed, as though she'd been waiting for her lover to join her. But he'd accused her of toying with him more than once (although not in precisely those words), and she'd hate for him to misread a genuine invitation as something more frivolous.
Schooling herself to calm acceptance, she took the moment to inspect the drawers (and her hair and lipstick in the mirror) in the bureau. She found nothing but a Bible, which she gingerly pushed out of the way as though it might bite, and was just looking up when Jack emerged into the room.
Her heart caught in her throat and her mouth felt uncommonly like she'd swallowed sand. How had she ever imagined she'd do well with a break from him if he didn't follow her to London?
Jack had been expecting her to pursue the obvious course and pose on the bed, and when he found that she hadn’t… it was oddly touching. Wherever they were, personally, the depth of Phryne’s genuine care for the people in her life took every form. That made it easy to move to join her at the dresser – with its Bible shoved to the back, hah – and pretend to investigate it for a few seconds.
Pretend, because what he did next was slide his hand behind her neck and pull her into a kiss, every bit as passionate and hungry as the one she had not, in fact, received before leaving for London.
Phryne had just pulled in breath to say something about the hotel's taste in reading material when he stole it from her utterly. It had been so long, it seemed that she wanted it (not quite since Rene, but that had certainly planted the seed, the contrast between the two of them), that the moment of its arrival stunned her and froze her in place.
Froze her for a moment, but only that, because this was no tentative exploration from a would-be admirer. Jack took her mouth with a full-blown heat and passion she had rarely known. The strength of his desire, it's...maturity, thrilled and terrified at once. So when her body caught up and her hand stole around first his hip and then the other up to his shoulders, it was as much to steady herself as to pull him closer and deepen the kiss.
Unlike would-be admirers, Jack was certain of his welcome, certain that he wanted Phryne and she wanted him. She had been going to tell him to come after her, she’d been minutes at most from doing it. But Phryne’s response in the moment was still thrilling and slightly surprising – in the sense that it was always a surprise that someone like the Honourable Miss Phryne Fisher didn’t simply look past a dull civil servant like him.
He didn’t want the kiss to end, but they actually couldn’t breathe while attached to each other’s mouths. Breathing, however, didn’t mean that he was letting her get even an inch further away from him. “I’ve wanted to do that for months.”
It was good, Phryne reflected with the one remote working corner of her mind, that Jack had gentleman stamped on his soul. Without his arm around her, she would very definitely be swaying on her feet. He had left her, literally, weak in the knees.
"Oh, Jack. What took you so long?" Her attempt at a playful demand fell entirely flat and sounded far too much like a plea. In truth, she felt uncomfortably like she might simply fall to pieces if he let her go.
“I’m a careful man.” It felt like a weak reason, and in some ways it was. How long had he been divorced? Longer than he’d known he was a special case for Phryne, but he hadn’t been sure how special his case really was… until she’d chosen him over someone more casual, and told him to come after her. She could be as free as she wanted, because he was sure now that she would never leave him entirely behind. “You’d have seen me in short order at the airfield, anyway. I had no intention of allowing you to leave without a proper good-bye.”
Were he any other man, Phryne would have taken it for a misguided attempt at charm. Any other man would not have caught her--at all, let alone seconds before take off when she had already been climbing into her cockpit. But Jack Robinson had a terrible, wonderful, habit of always being right where she needed him to be.
"Well, then, you're late by almost a day," she said, the intended tartness blunted by the tide of grief rising in her chest. Where were you when someone was telling me I was probably dead and there was no Jane to greet me? she couldn't, although she felt it keenly. This once, she hid nothing of herself from him, and added with the utmost, heartfelt sincerity (and perhaps a suspicious shine in her eyes), "But I'm terribly glad to see you, even so."
“You told me to come after you, so I did.” He kissed her again, because there was no such thing as too much kissing of Phryne Fisher, and also she seemed to be teetering on the edge of tears.
An answer in words seemed terribly beside the point with his mouth so soft on hers now, his breath mingling warm and sweet with hers. She slid her hand into his hair instead and gave herself to him, offering, inviting, and asking him please not to back away this time.
She took a step backward and then another, drawing him after her toward the bed, where she needn't concentrate on remaining on her feet and she could be as close to him as she felt she needed to.
It wasn't exactly something he considered - though if asked later of course he'd planned it - but when Phryne angled them towards the bed, Jack turned them both just enough that he could sit and she'd almost-naturally fall into his lap. Considered or not, it made sense; when Miss Fisher wanted sex, she made no bones about it. He'd have been sans coat and quite probably sans waistcoat before reaching the bed in that case, but here he was, still fully layered.
Therefore, she wanted something else, and closeness was the only answer he could come up with. And from his lap she'd be able to move however she pleased. Away, if she wished, or more in line with her usual thought processes regarding beds and men she was attracted to if she wished. Or, of course, she could remain exactly as she was.
Like a moment in one of her fondest fantasies, she found herself -- not abruptly, not jarringly, not awkwardly because Jack Robinson did nothing haphazardly -- in his lap on the bed, with her arms about his shoulders--without having to stop kissing him, a fact that she appreciated immensely. But at length, she did stop because here they were, finally.
She stroked his face and his jaw with her fingertips, slowly and rapt, entranced with being permitted this intimacy with him. All the while, her gaze never left his; she couldn't bear to look away, in case it were all a dream and he disappeared. "Darling Jack," she murmured, voice silken and husky with all of the emotion of the moment.
"Phryne." Endearments would come in time, certainly, once he'd figured out what he felt comfortable saying and she felt comfortable hearing. For now, though, the simple use of her first name would do... if only because this was the first time he was using it without a silent prayer along the lines of 'don't be dead, please don't be dead'. And for him, in the moment, it was enough to know that she fit as perfectly against him as he'd (guiltily and then hopelessly) thought she might, and to see her expression proving every fear he'd suppressed wrong on its face. No part of this was play, at this moment, to his ever-playful Miss Fisher.
Her mouth shaped a small, intimately personal smile, more genuine than her brighter ones, and much quieter somehow. "Isn't it strange," Phryne began, her voice filled with breathy wonder and heart fluttering behind her ribcage. "That I've heard my name thousands of times, and it has never seemed so much mine as just now?" There could be no doubt, of course, and no denial of why, but it might take her some time to say it with as unaccustomed to the experience as she'd grown since the war.
Jack had to kiss that smile, something like a reward for being real. Her usual smiles lit up a room, yes, but this more personal smile was warmer. Afternoon sunlight compared to an electric floodlight, maybe. "You've not heard it much from me."
"I hope I'll hear it more often, now, Jack." Phryne let out a soft breath and drew her fingers down his tie the way she had so many times before, only this time she didn't have to stop there. "Do you suppose you might take off your tie and jacket, now, while we're alone?" It didn't seem presumptuous to think they would stay while, not when they'd waited so long and felt so much.
"Why don't you take off my tie?" he invited. A fair number of those guilty/hopeless reveries had involved Phryne taking off his tie. (For a start.) There was likely symbolism involved, but in the moment that was unimportant. Besides, if she removed the tie and him the jacket, he could get both items off at once instead of sequentially.
Her lashes fluttered at the invitation. "Why, darling, are you inviting me to undress you?" she teased, even as deft fingers worked the knot on his tie to loosen it. Although she could have done it in her sleep (had, in countless waking dreams), Phryne took her time, enjoyed the feel of the silk between her fingers, admired the precision in the knot, absorbed the warmth of his skin through his shirt against the back of her hand. "Because I've been wanting to do that almost since I met you."
While her hands were otherwise occupied, Jack slipped off his jacket and let it fall on the bed. Ordinarily he'd have hung it somewhere or folded it, but this was something of a special circumstance; namely, he didn't want to dislodge a Phryne in his lap. "Perhaps I'm simply being practical and giving you something to do so I can get the jacket off?"
"Perhaps. You are the ever-practical Jack Robinson," she murmured as the tie slipped from beneath his collar. She didn't stop there, though, and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, so she could stroke the hollow of his throat with her fingertips. "I do hope you won't be practical all the time, now."
“It’s likely,” he murmured. “But you never know, I may surprise you from time to time.”
"You've already surprised me twice in one day." She unbuttoned the next button and then lowered her head to press her lips to the soft pulse where her fingers had been. "It wouldn't do to overexert yourself." Every caress, every tiny step forward had been savored until now, and, unusually, she had no desire to change that and rush to a conclusion.
"Very true." And it similarly wouldn't do to keep on the current path of undressing, however much part of him thought that that was a very good idea indeed. Even tilting her face back up with fingers under her chin to take her mouth again felt like... zero to sixty, racing car levels of too much. Slow waltz to... what, jitterbug? No, expanding the borders slowly was best. (As was mixing metaphors as little as possible, but too late there.)
Mindful that it had been at least since his divorce that Jack had been with a woman, Phryne ceased unbuttoning her very buttoned up Inspector without prompting. It would be...painful for him to reject additional advances now, and if she were completely honest, she needed time to accustom herself to the new rules, whatever they were. Yet...
She lifted her head to meet his gaze, eyes darkened with a boudoir intensity new between them, even as the fingers resting on the bare skin of chest trembled. "It would not be too terribly surprising, I think, if we were to put the bed to its more common function." A breath, and then an admission, "I've slept poorly. I wouldn't mind resting... in your arms." As long as he didn't hold on too tightly. "For awhile. I believe we have a fair few things to discuss."
This was an unoccupied room. There was no one to object to any use they put the room to, and housekeeping would no doubt be along to clean and set to rights anything off. As well, simply resting with Phryne in his arms was very likely more intimate than she generally allowed her less long-term paramours. “I’ve no objections, and I have no doubt of our ability to fill time with discussion.”
"I would like that, Jack," came an uncharacteristically soft, direct response from Phryne, who promptly leaned over the edge of his lap to unlace her boots. Not until the moment she'd seen him had she realized how on edge she had been. Not until he'd kissed her had she realized how many months she'd been holding her breath in anticipation. To simply be with him without social pretense, to touch and be touched...even the prospect eased a tight knot in her chest.
"Then that we will do." And he would, deep enough inside that it wouldn't display, be rather smug that while Phryne could be as free with her favors as she pleased (of course), this sort of closeness was all and only his. For now, at any rate.
When she'd removed her boots, Phryne shifted off his lap onto the bed and drew her feet up. She very deliberately and very pointedly waited then for him to join her, so that she could her arrange herself against him in a way that satisfied her need to be with him without triggering the inevitable panic of being held. "What made you change your mind about wanting this?"
"You were leaving," Jack said simply, as soon as he'd removed his own shoes and settled comfortably. "I imagined I wouldn't get another chance, for anything, so I decided to... risk it." And she would know him well enough to know that the decision, once made, wasn't going to be unmade for anything as petty as reality changing around them both.
Phryne thought on that a moment before lowering herself down to the bed with her head on his shoulder. Then she didn't think at all for another moment or so, instead closing her eyes to take in the sensation of being in a man's arms. Jack's arms. Rolled up onto her side and pressed very intimately against him, she allowed herself just to breathe, stroke her fingers over his chest (albeit through his shirt), before saying, "Surely you knew I'd never turn you away, not for the world."
After a moment or two of consideration, he said, "I took my risk once you were in the plane and the engine was started, Phryne. Not just now." In for a penny, in for a pound, as the saying went. She needed to know. "Had I done nothing then, you might well have not come back from England. Or met someone more interesting there. Or any number of things."
As much as she disliked the entire phenomenon of time and dimension travel (for such she had decided to believe this), Phryne refused to permit herself to be jealous of herself of all things. Nor would she permit Jack to be jealous of phantom suitors who could never exist. "Jack," she began, voice more a caress than it had ever been. "Even had I met the most interesting man in the world, he wouldn't have been more than a temporary diversion. I've never wanted what we have, but we do have it, and I'm not so much a fool I don't know what that's worth."
For a moment, Jack nearly told her about what the other her – God, how confusing – had said at the airstrip, the if he didn’t come after her or was too slow, she would find someone else. Here and now, it didn’t matter, and this Phryne hadn’t said it. Perhaps even there and then she hadn’t meant it. But it was still worth a little care, even if he’d already made his choice. “As you say, of course.” No part of this would work, after all, if he was unwilling to take what she said on face value until proved wrong.
She fell quiet for a time, considering Jack's words and his reactions. He had no reason to believe her, of course. It strained credulity, given how often she'd made the point that she wouldn't let any man have a hold over her. And yet, how could she deny that he did? "It can't have been easy. I'll do my utmost to be sure you don't regret it."
Whether he regretted or not at some point in the future was inescapable now. Jack appreciated the statement for the attempt at reassurance that it was, but Phryne being Phryne she likely wouldn’t understand how relaxing it was, in a way, to simply have the decision made and a course committed to. “I’m not in need of reassurance, Phryne. Whatever happens, I’ve made my choice.”
"And yet," she murmured, somehow more uncertain herself at his profession of contentment. "I was in need of providing it, or perhaps simply of saying it out loud." To commit herself to the course, or to hear it said, or to make a promise to Jack, because she found her promises to him easier to keep than anything she merely thought important to try to do. "Can you really be so sanguine about the prospect of me destroying what's between us?" Because if this failed, it would not be down to him.
“I wouldn’t say I’m sanguine. I honestly dread that possibility.” As he dreaded the possibility of him ultimately being unable to keep her interest. “But for now, at least, there are no decisions to be made.”
"I can honestly say--" It started out almost as saucy as any other day's conversation, but her voice softened again quickly. "I'm terrified I'll do something unforgivable." Because she would, certainly, do things that made him angry or hurt him.
"Assuming you don't intend to commit murder or set up a drugs ring, I don't think you have anything to worry about, there." Yes, Phryne meant on a more personal level, but... they'd known each other more than long enough, in more than enough variety of circumstance that if anyone could be said to be walking into whatever this actually was with open eyes, it was them. He was aware of who and what she was, she was aware of who and what he was.
Softly, uncertainly, she asked the question that had been worrying at the back of her mind since he'd taken her into his arms. "And what of other more liberal men?" Because he had to know...she wouldn't choose another man over him, but she couldn't let any man have that much of hold over her. Even her most darling inspector.
“What of them?” Jack had no illusions; Phryne was no more inclined to monogamy than to marriage. Her other lovers would hurt, no doubt, but no doubt she’d be circumspect enough to keep them as much out of his sight as possible, if only for her own peace.
Phryne lifted her head from his shoulder to look him in the eyes. He would let her have her freedom and have this? The tears she'd been fighting before sprang up again and her perfectly unsmeared lips trembled. "Jack?"
The tears were honestly growing very disturbing; Phryne had never struck him as a woman given to tears. Jack kissed her again, in small part to see if that turned aside the threat to weep. "I doubt I could be anyone else if I tried."
"Nor would I want you to be, or to try for that matter," she said, no (visible) part of her trembling any longer. She found his kisses quite restorative. A tonic she would have to sample as often as he were inclined to offer. "Have I said how very glad I am that you're here?"
“Offhand, I don’t recall.” Just because he could and felt like it, Jack kissed her again. “But I believe I’ve gotten the gist of that.”
"Have you?" Phryne curled her fingers in his shirt and drew him into a longer, sweeter kiss. "I don't believe I've had my fill of saying it. So you may have to hear it now and again. Dot seems to--"
She lifted her hand to cover her mouth, eyes alight with self-directed amusement. "Do you know, I completely forgot to tell you that Dot's here too? Only, she's from before us. She doesn't know that she and Hugh are married. So you mustn't tell her, darling. She'd be devastated."
“Understood.” And if Collins arrived at the Inn himself, at some point, it was more properly his place to acquaint Miss Williams (still, and Jack committed it to memory) with their marital status or lack thereof. “I have no desire to upset Miss Williams.”
"Naturally not. You are the consummate gentleman." Had she once cursed that as an obstacle to bedding him? She hardly recalled it. It had become as dear to her as everything else about him.
Appreciative, she patted his chest and then nestled close against his side with her head on his shoulder. She truly had slept poorly, and if he was not yet ready to exhaust her, she would still avail herself of any other intimacy he wished to provide.
