Title: Gilded
Fandom: Doctor Blake Mysteries
Pairing: Lucien/Jean
Rating: T
Summary: In addition to planning the wedding, they also must sort out the details of their new life. Set just before and during Family Portrait.
A/N: Big thank you to gabolange for her beta work on this. All remaining errors are my own.
Ever since they set a date Jean feels like she's been caught in a whirlwind. The past several weeks have been filled with sorting out wedding details, including picking out the invitations, signing the agreement to rent the club as a venue, and it's all very exciting. But it also means their attention has been narrow, a sprint to the finish to prepare for this one day, and it hasn't left much time to discuss everything else that comes after.
With the dinner dishes washed and put away, the lodgers scattered to various corners of the house, they have the kitchen to themselves and perhaps it is now or never.
"Lucien, I think there are a few things that we should discuss." She turns from the countertop to face him, tea towel tossed over her shoulder, "Regarding certain expectations… for after we're married."
"Go on."
It's the way he looks at her just then, with a glint in his eye, whatever few words she'd gathered together in preparation for this conversation fly away.
"Well." Jean is determined to get through this. They are adults and they're going to be married in two months for heaven's sake. There are several things that they should work out ahead of time, most of them practical, but the normally self-confident Jean Beazley is currently finding it hard not to blush. "Some couples maintain separate bedrooms after they are married and I didn't—"
The phone rings. That bloody phone, if there weren't possibly patients on the other side in need of a doctor she'd consider getting the phone line disconnected all together.
It is four long days later, after the conclusion of a gruesome murder at a car dealership. She and Lucien are sharing a late night celebratory drink from a single glass in his study.
"I've been thinking about what you said the other night." He passes the glass back to her.
"Oh?" Jean raises a brow, because it could be any number of things really, from that on and off leak in the roof to an unconnected detail of this case he's still mulling over.
"About after we're married." But of course it's that one thing, and she's been distracted thinking about it too. He watches her swallow another sip of whisky before he says, "Please tell me you weren't about to advocate for separate bedrooms?"
"No, Lucien." She rushes to reassure him, not wanting any doubts to take root. She only started with the topic of where they would sleep because it seemed the easiest, most innocuous one, compared with other particulars of their post-married life she's been considering bringing up as well.
"Good," he smiles, and a small amount of relief washes over his features. But his voice is steady, if not a drop deeper in his baritone than usual as he continues, "I'd like to have you close to me at night."
His words warm her inside more than the sips of liquor they've shared. "Yes, of course," she says, matching his smile with her own, "I was leading up to asking you who should move bedrooms?"
"As I said, I've been thinking about it, and both your room upstairs and mine at the front are rather small. Then I had an idea." Lucien takes the drink from her and sets it on the desk, clasps her empty hand in his and begins to lead her out of the room. She follows him through the house until he ends up at the door to his mother's studio. He pauses before pulling the door open, leading her inside, and switches on a single lamp.
Dim yellow light casts many shadows across the cavernous space, yet to Jean it doesn't feel gloomy. Genevieve's paintings, brushes, and drop clothes still clutter the room but Jean has made an effort to come in to dust once in a while, so the light shines clear.
Lucien steps closer to her, saying, "I was thinking this could be our new bedroom." He puts an arm around Jean's lower back and then uses the other to gesture across the room, painting a vision for her of their lives together here. He talks of buying furniture, a new vanity for her over there, putting a bed along one wall, fitting in a sitting area near the fireplace. The attached smaller room that already has a sink could be their ensuite; he says he'll call a plumber to get an estimate on renovations. He tells her there will be evenings that they'll want to escape the rest of the household, just the two of them, here alone where they can sit together in front of the fire. It is a space he wants to be special and their own, and how does that sound to her?
Jean hardly lets him finish before she's pressing herself to him, overwhelmed by this gesture almost as much as the idea of what nights in this room might be like with him. She would've been happy moving into his room on the first floor if that's what would make him happy. But this? This is beyond her imagination and she bubbles with joy at the idea, so long as it's right. She kisses him thoroughly, forehead, cheeks, the tip of his nose, and finally his mouth. Soft and sweet at first, then slips her tongue between his lips and he groans in appreciation, pulling her body tighter against his own.
She breaks away.
"Is that a yes?" he asks. For a moment it reminds her of their engagement, the second and more successful attempt. It was always her habit, or a crutch, to answer Lucien's biggest questions with clues. These days they're working on it. But before she finally answers with words, she has to make sure of one thing.
"Are you sure this space doesn't hold too many painful memories for you?" Because she needs to be certain that their new start is the right new start, a step for both of them to take in synch.
"I think my mother would be pleased. That the room has a purpose again, and new memories can be made here. It should never have been locked away for as long as it was." There's that glint in his eye again, perhaps at the thought of the nature of some of those "new memories" to come. He's been unmasking this sort of flirting and teasing ever more as their wedding date approaches. It hints at the delicious trouble she'll be in as soon as the ink dries on their marriage certificate.
Like Jean has done dozens of times recently, she laughs to herself and shakes her head. To find a devoted equal partner is a blessing. To have it come with this much heat between them is a dream. His fleeting touch or a private smile is all it takes, and she feels like a young girl learning these feelings for the first time. His kisses have the power to melt her. Literally he makes her knees go weak sometimes, when she believed that was merely a silly phrase found in the illicit novels that some of the more liberal members of the ladies film society pass between each other. She's learned that it can be very real, and ever so wonderful.
"Lucien." She can't come up with more, so she kisses him again and hopes that is enough. It is for a time, until his fingertips brush the underswell of her breast and all of the sudden nothing is enough, and their kisses grow more urgent. He backs her against the table and his knee slides between her legs, and oh this is everything. He's humming against the column of her neck and his tongue flicks out to lick her collarbone. She's fighting against her nature to grind against him and seek the relief that her body desperately wants.
He stops. He holds her, simply breathing. "Jean, darling, I didn't mean to—."
They are supposed to be waiting until their wedding night. They decided this together in a stilted conversation some while back after she'd struggled with the concept on her own. For a time she weighed her faith in God versus mortal men writing church doctrine, and the way whispers in the pews or the shops in town turned her stomach. Guilt from her transgressions the first time she was engaged still lingers all these years later. But before she could confess any of that to Lucien, he was one step ahead. He insisted that they wait, surprising her. He never wanted Jean to doubt, even for a brief second, that he wants her as anything less than his wife. So, the wedding night, they agreed. Even if there are moments like this one when she doesn't want to stop for all the world, and wonders why only a few weeks will matter.
Lucien sighs and moves his hands back to safer territory, then guides her over to the worn-down sofa. They wait because it will matter someday, for all their years to come, that they waited. It's when he gets up to go retrieve the drink in the other room that her heart rate returns to normal and the passion that was building knots in her belly relaxes. There will be plenty of time for all that, she reminds herself. Years spent here in this room with him, and it's not only the act of lovemaking they will share, but all the other small acts of intimacy she can't wait for. She should never have worried over this, seeking his reassurance when she already knew.
Lucien will reach for her in his sleep. He will like having her nestled against his side, and the way her hair tickles his chest. There will be nights they will climb into bed exhausted, and it will feel good to do nothing more but drift off side by side. Other nights they will hold tight, with a hesitant compromise in place following a fresh argument, because she well knows the man she is marrying and there will be arguments. In winter when her feet are cold she knows he will let her tuck them in between his legs to keep warm. He will kiss her good morning, each and every time they wake without fail. He will tell her she's beautiful even when she's sick, or frustrated, or in tears.
She knows these things, even though they are all in her future. Because it's Lucien, and she knows him, and who they will be together is not a mystery to her.
He returns with their drink. "Here you are, my dear." He goes about starting a fire in the fireplace and joins her on the sofa.
It occurs to Jean suddenly that she never actually put into her own words what she should have said from the beginning. "Yes, Lucien. I very much like this new bedroom of ours."
On a bright afternoon, Jean sets a heavy case on the dining room table and wipes her hands down the front of her pants. Once the decision was made, she and Lucien got started on clearing out the former studio together right away but it's been quite a chore. Jean realized they would need help, and is not above asking for it from their friends. When Rose arrived earlier with questions, Jean persuaded her to assist in the effort of hauling more boxes and various objects into the dining room to sort through. Rose interrupts talk of the current murder case to ask why they are finally tidying up the studio now?
"The studio. Yes. It's, um—" Lucien looks to Jean. They haven't called it the studio in a while, and it's almost startling to hear the term again. They've been escaping there more and more, already referring to it as "our room" in quiet conversations.
"My bedroom's upstairs," Jean explains, pointing in a vague direction, "Lucien's is at the front of the house, and, um, they're both rather small."
"Very small," Lucien says. "Aren't they? And. Which means that I— We-"
They should have expected this question and not been so ill-prepared. But Jean recognizes that look on Lucien's face in the middle of all the stammering: memories of wandering hands and breathless kisses that have already been taking place with some regularity in "our room" have invaded her fiancé's brain, which are not making this any easier.
She tries to help, "We—"
But Rose is back to speculating about the case again. Until she adds a helpful suggestion to Danny, "I think Lucien here might need a hand moving some furniture."
"Thank you, Rose."
Jean hides a smile.
Later that night, Jean joins Lucien on the sofa in their room. He's melancholic tonight, and she's reminded once again that despite it, he's happy in ways he never expected, living this life together with her. She squeezes his hand and he settles closer to her with a sigh, setting the old letters in his hand aside. She glances about, noticing the few items they've begun to gather up from their separate bedrooms to merge here. This room accented in gold will hold all their future happiness. Jean loves it already.