Author's usual notes and disclaimer: I don't own any of the original characters nor the original Inspector Lynley Mysteries – they belong to Elizabeth George and the BBC. I have borrowed the characters from the TV-Show and solely own the ideas of my stories and the developments I've let them go through.
Please write a PM if I did something terribly wrong. Thanks!
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Author's notes: Just a short story, because I was challenged ;-) Actually there wasn't a story behind the incident in Who Cares - Book 2 and this is just the product of a five minute's thinking after receiving a PM.
The challenge: Write a short story about how a pair of handcuffs end up in the pocket of Tommy's bathrobe. Set terms: something to chuckle about later, Barbara is not involved, no sexual context and the bathrobe is hanging in Tommy's cottage in Nanrunnel. Feel free to write down your own ideas (location is optional). Here's my result:
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Handcuffs in the bathrobe
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Tommy Lynley, Detective Inspector of the Met and 8th Earl of Asherton, was taking some weeks off from work after the funeral of his late wife. He spent it in his homeland Cornwall, going long walks at the coast, spending time grieving, sorting out his feelings and dark thoughts, and drowning his sorrow in too much alcohol and too much self-imposed loneliness. He had a cottage in Nanrunnel, the small village near the Asherton manor of Howenstow where his mother lived and so, after one of his long exhausting walks on the South West Coastal Path, when he had no intention of meeting her or his sister he went straight to the Mary Bryant, his favourite pub in the harbour, had an unspectacular dinner, some pints and two glasses of whisky, and then returned to Emerald Cottage in order to take a long hot bath on his own.
Earlier this evening he had witnessed a row and punch-up at the pub and had called for the local constables because he had felt no need to act out the job himself. Of course he always had his badge and stuff with him, after all he was not suspended or had retired. If not on his person then he always has it in a bag at home which momentarily was Howenstow or rather Emerald Cottage in Nanrunnel.
The well known local brawler who had been responsible for this evening's fight had seen Lord Lynley sitting at the table in the corner and knew exactly whom he had to thank for this new record but obviously he did not know exactly where the cottage Tommy stayed at was so now in the middle of the night when Mark Waldryn, said local brawler, had been released from the nick and obviously afterwards spent some more time in another pub Tommy heard a loud banging of fists against wood and someone slurringly calling his name
"Lynley! Lynley! Yer bloody Lor'ship! Get outta there! Lemme give [HICKUP] givvid back to you!"
Tommy climbed out of the tub and turned off the lights to look out of the window where he saw Waldryn on the other side of the street, fiercly banging and kicking against the door to the house of Miss Janet Parrick, the nice old woman who owned the small village store at the end of the street. Without losing sight of the scenery on the other side of the street for too long the Detective Inspector searched his mobile and then tried to call the constables again but nobody answered for about five minutes. Tommy made a mental note to reprimand the local officers. On his way down the stairs he put on his bathrobe and some sneakers but nothing more. He had wanted to put an end to the noise outside soon and had been sure that the drunken villain would be a simple thing.
Silently he opened the door, stepped out and crossed the street. "Waldryn?! Shut up! I arrest you- BLOODY HELL!"
The Metropolitain Police officer, on the verge of being tipsy himself, had the handcuffs ready and almost managed to put it around the raised wrist of the man when he slipped on the wet cobblestone. It actually had been a warm and dry day but Waldryn had spilled most of the beer he had with him. The can still laid next to the little flower pot in front of Miss Parrick's door. Tommy had slipped on the beverage and now laid on the floor, nastily cursing all saints of the christian seafaring.
Waldryn turned, unsteady on his feet, totally irritated to hear his Lordship from behind - wasn't he at home at this hour of night?! He turned even more irritated about his Lordship lying on the floor in a bathrobe with handcuffs in one hand. His clouded brain was working too slow to say something and much slower to do something else than gawking.
Right in that moment Miss Parrick opened that poor maltreated door and with all her might she whacked him over the head with a frying pan. Waldryn immediately pancaked down.
"Now that's for disturbing my sleep!" she said and then nodded at Tommy. "Your Lordship! OH, DEAR GOD!"
In the faint light of her doorlights Tommy could see her face turning crimson to the roots of her hair. But nonetheless she did not avert her eyes from his openly presented maleness. After all he only wore a bathrobe and it had shifted up and opene while he had fallen to the floor.
Now that Waldryn was unconscious Tommy had all the time in the world to get up and put his clothing in order. Not that it looked decent but he was at least covered. He searched for the handcuffs on the floor and had wanted to close the metal around Waldryn's wrist but the dear Miss Parrick already had tied him with some cable fixers.
"That will do until Victor would come around." Victor, PC Victor Parrick, was her cousin and she already had phoned him out of his bed. She had not been able to reach someone at the station too.
Tommy had let his handcuffs slide into the pocket of his bathrobe when finally Victor came around the corner in half of his uniform, with his pyjama top under the open jacket and without a tie but of course with his hat and some cufflinks ready to be closed around some troublemaker's wrists.
"Waldryn, you're a real pain in the ass!" Victor said to the brawler.
"Oh, that's so true..." Tommy muttered and seeing that all was well and Miss Parrick in safe hands he was rubbing his poor bottom and vanished behind the green door to his cottage. Everything else could be handled tomorrow by daylight.
The handcuffs in his bathrobe were forgotten for years. Though she had washed his bathrobe a few times inbetween his cleaning lady from the Christian Neighbourly Help never would have mentioned them. Miss Parrick was not as prim and had recovered from the nightly sight quite well. From this day on when they met she always took her time to greet his Lordship with a small smirking twitch in the corner of her mouth and and a mischievous twinkle in her eye.
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