Summary: Melrose has some explaining to do. Melrose Plant, Richard Jury. (Melrose x Bea Slocum)

Setting: Sometime after Bea Slocum enters Melrose's scene.

Rating: PG

Good Intentions

Melrose held up his hands and took a careful step backwards. "Richard, I swear I can explain everything."

Jury looked at the disaster that had once been his flat. The furniture had all been shoved in one corner of the living room, and every cupboard in his kitchen hung open, utensils, pots, and plates strewn everywhere. A pan of something burned beyond recognition still smoldered in the sink. The windows had been thrown open to let out the smoke, and a stack of case files had blown all over the flat. A small pile of brightly-colored clothing lay in the middle of the floor near a broken lamp. His other lamp leaned drunkenly against the bookcase, which was draped in a large sheet of clear plastic.

Bright orange paint was splattered across at least half the flat. It looked like someone had brutally murdered a pumpkin.

Jury pointed to lump of fur cowering under his reading chair. "Is that a rabbit?"

"Richard…"

Jury took a step forward, and something squished under his shoe. He glared at Melrose.

"…if you'll just listen for a few minutes before you kill me, I'll explain."

"Should I sit down?"

"That might be a good idea."

Jury gingerly made his way to the chair, avoiding paint globs on the floor.

"Bea swears those'll come out," Melrose said, perching carefully on Jury's plastic-encased couch.

Jury grunted and sat in the chair, thankfully splatter-free. The rabbit shot out from beneath it, dashing through his bedroom door and under his bed. Something caught his eye, and Jury craned his neck to get a better view. The blankets and sheets had been shoved to the end of the bed, making room for a foot to dangle off the edge.

The foot twitched. Jury knew that nail polish.

"Why is Carole-Anne in my bed?" he asked.

Melrose shifted his weight—crinkling plastic—and turned pink. "She, ah, passed out. Wine."

Jury started to rise, but Melrose stopped him with an outstretched hand.

"She might be naked."

Jury fell back into the chair. "What?"

Melrose's blush deepened. "I'm not sure. Bea took care of her, but she was definitely naked at one point. Wine." He cleared his throat. "I, uh, hid in the kitchen, making some dinner, while Bea tried to talk her back into her clothes." He looked pointedly at the clothing lying on the floor. "Obviously she wasn't entirely successful, but she may at least have got her back in her knickers."

Jury sighed and tried not to wonder if Carole-Anne had bothered to wear any. He looked instead at his kitchen. The smell of smoke still lingered. "You cooked."

Melrose coughed. "Yes. Not well."

"Apparently."

"I'll clean it up."

"Yes." Jury rubbed his forehead. "Let's hear this explanation."

"Well, we didn't think you'd be back for a couple days. Wiggins swore."

"That's not helping your case."

"I doubt anything I say will. Oh, you should probably also know that your Mrs. Wasserman thinks I'm a Nazi collaborator."

Jury swore. "What'd you do to her?"

"Do to her?" Melrose repeated, looking wounded. "Absolutely nothing. She took one look at me and slammed the door. It took Bea twenty minutes to talk her into coming up, and then she'd only stay as long as I was locked in the bathroom."

"Why did you need her, anyway?"

"For the painting. Your Christmas present. Bea's idea."

A breeze from the window blew a crime scene photo up against Jury's leg. "The path to hell, and all that?"

Melrose nodded. "Indeed. As I was saying, Bea thought some wine might calm Mrs. Wasserman down long enough to get her painted. Unfortunately, Carole-Anne drank most of it, so then she needed to use the loo." He pointed at a orange-blotched lump of fabric near the kitchen. "As soon as Mrs. Wasserman saw me, she attacked me with Bea's paints, ruining my favorite jacket, then fled."

"I'm finding it hard to pity your suit right now, since my flat's in much the same shape."

"I told you, Bea can get those out."

"Where is she?" Jury asked, peeking in his bedroom again. Nothing but Carole-Anne's legs.

"Out fetching some cleaner."

Jury looked at his decidedly more colorful walls, furniture, and carpet. "Mrs. Wasserman did all this?"

"No—she only got me. Carole-Anne did the rest. She came out of the bathroom just in time to see Mrs. Wasserman's coup de grâce, and drunkenly decided we were doing your painting Pollack-style. Bea had to bodily fling herself in front of the canvas to save the work she'd done. By the time I wrestled the paint tube away from Carole-Anne, she'd accomplished this." Melrose waved his hand, encompassing the whole of Jury's flat.

"And her clothes came off when?"

Melrose blushed again. "When it was her turn to model. She was getting rather belligerent by that point, so Bea just let her…go. Easier that way to get her part of the painting done."

"While you cooked."

"Badly. Yes. Sorry about that."

Jury sat up. "Wait. I'm getting a nude painting of Carole-Anne?"

Melrose shook his head. "No, no, no. No. It's a portrait." He held a hand up to his collarbone and raised it in a quick motion above his head. "Safe zone."

Jury relaxed, then frowned. "But what about the rabbit?"

"Ah. That came before the paint. Carole-Anne wanted it in her portrait, but he got away from her. We chased him for half an hour. I'm afraid we knocked over a lamp or two. I'll replace the broken one, of course."

Jury waved his words away. "I always hated that lamp, anyway."

The two men sat in silence for a while. Jury could feel a chuckle starting in his chest when Melrose spoke.

"Do you want to see it?" he asked softly.

"See what?"

"Your painting. Bea will kill me, so you can't let on you've seen it when we give it to you proper, but I think it's extraordinary."

Jury nodded, and Melrose beamed at him.

"It's behind you."

Jury stood and leaned over the back of the chair. Propped in the small space between the chair and the wall sat a canvas.

"We hoped it'd be safe there until it dried," Melrose said, moving to Jury's side. "In case of further disasters."

Jury lifted the canvas off the floor, careful to grip the sides, and turned it toward him.

Carole-Anne and Mrs. Wasserman stood side-by-side, their faces turned away from each other and angled down. The painting only showed half their faces—jaws, cheeks, the corner of their lips. Carole-Anne's fiery hair cascaded down her back, one tendril falling forward, the line of her neck gracefully dipping into a bare shoulder. A tiny, curled wisp of hair had escaped Mrs. Wasserman's bun, tickling her ear. The high, laced collar of her black dress hid her neck, but Jury could see the powder dusted over her lined cheek.

Carole-Anne's hand, her fingernails matching her hair, rested on Mrs. Wasserman's shoulder, bright against the fabric of her dress. Mrs. Wasserman's hand, in turn, lay on Carole-Anne's shoulder, pale and gnarled against the perfection of the younger woman's skin.

Jury stared at it.

"She's not sure what to call it yet," Melrose said softly. "Her 'utter rubbish' title right now is Generations."

Jury shook his head. "No, that's not right. Flamma et Cinis. Fire and Ash."

He could feel Melrose watching him as he carefully replaced the canvas behind the chair.

"I'll be sure to hint about it to Bea," the ex-earl said. "I'm glad you like it."

Jury smiled at him. "You're still cleaning the flat."

"Oh, of course." Melrose smiled.

Jury weaved across the splattered carpet to the drinks cabinet. He waved a bottle of scotch at Melrose, who nodded.

"By the way," he asked. "Why is there a rabbit in my flat again?"

Melrose accepted his drink. "Ah. That, I'm afraid, is Carole-Anne's Christmas present for you."

Jury choked on his drink.

"Precisely," Melrose said.

End.

Usual disclaimers apply: Not mine. Nonprofit organization.