Episode 12, Season 2. Spoilers, sweetie! This could be read as what would have happened, had Aunt Prudence not interrupted, or as a dream had by Jack or Phryne that night after they were interrupted. Argh, Aunt Prudence and her meddling ways! A short piece written on a whim
(Cue Blackadder and Baldrick: "Do you want the short answer, or the long answer, my Lord?" "Ooh, the short answer please." "Whim." "Right. And out of interest, what was the long answer…?" "IT WAS A whim.")
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"The man who always does the right thing," she says, head tilted to the side as she watches him.
"Not always," he murmurs, voice low with desire as he leans towards her, gaze fixed on her mouth.
Phryne's breath catches in her throat as Jack's hands come up to grasp her hip and the back of her head. He leans in and finally - finally - kisses her the way she's wanted him to for so long.
The kiss is gentle but there is an undercurrent of demanding hunger as Jack's hands tighten and he tugs Phryne closer. When they part, Jack seems incapable of looking away from the havoc he's wrought. Phryne's hair is messed from his fingers, her bare lips blushed with natural colour, her eyes dark and wide.
She looks as if he has already made love to her.
Repeatedly.
Jack closes the gap between them again and Phryne meets him eagerly. The lateness of the hour, their exposed location in the front hallway, the shocks of the day's case: all forgotten. Now there is no room for anything but the instinctual deepening of the kiss and hands desperately searching for bare skin.
When Jack's questing fingers slip down the neck of Phryne's robe and find her breast, she bites down on his lip with a moan.
"I think we should remove ourselves to a less public venue," Phryne whispers as her own hands trace Jack's waistband. The need surging through her is making it difficult to remember why she shouldn't lie down right here on the stairs and let Jack bury his head between her thighs.
But through the lust driving through his system, Jack's brain reminds him that perhaps jumping straight into bed isn't the best idea. Reluctantly, he releases the soft skin from between his fingers and watches Phryne's robe slip back into place. When he drags his gaze back to her face, she reads his expression and sighs.
"Jack, please, let's leave the overthinking and recriminations for another day. For tonight, can't we just…feel? For once?"
Phryne is aware that she is perilously close to begging, but Jack seems to be on a knife edge between running off to pretend this never happened, and giving into what they've both been building up to for over a year now.
What sort of friend would she be if she didn't help him make the right decision?
Jack hesitates a moment longer. But it is the look on Phryne's face, more than her words, that really makes up his mind: a look of hopefulness coloured with resignation, as if she expects to be disappointed and turned down by one of the few men she's ever trusted. Loved.
"Why do I find myself ever unable to say no to you? From the moment you first interfered with a police investigation…" Jack casts about for a way to express the way Phryne has worked herself irrevocably, indispensably into his life and can find no words more apt than those of the Bard. "That instant was I turned into a hart, and my desires, like fell and cruel hounds, e'er since pursue me."
By the time he finishes the quote, he is looking down at her face from bare inches away. As Phryne kisses him softly and leads him by the hand up the stairs to her bedroom, Jack reflects that sometimes, not doing the right thing can be very, very right.
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The title is from what seems to be Jack's (second) favourite Shakespeare play – Twelfth Night. The quote is from Act 1 Scene 1, 22-24. My poor, battered old '65 copy has had a good few re-reads since Jack suggested it to Hugh for 'romantic inspiration' and it seemed fitting for this scene, especially since this is the twelfth episode of season two.