"Dot darling, you've done nothing for which you need reproach yourself!" Phryne Fisher tightened her arm around the shoulders of her companion and administered a kiss to Dot's temple. "Of course, Constable Martin couldn't help but notice what a lovely, clever girl you are. But you didn't ask for his attentions, my dear, or encourage them."
"Truly, Miss Phryne?" Dot asked, her voice still a little tremulous. Phyrne couldn't help but admire both the girl's compassion and pluck. Dot seemed almost more distressed by Constable Martin's emotional turmoil than by the fact that she'd been bound and gagged only yesterday.
"Truly," Phryne replied decisively. "And if nothing else, this experience has let you know where your heart truly lies."
A sweet smile crossed Dot's face, and her eyes shone through their tears. "With Hugh…" she whispered, before her smile wavered a little. "Do you – do you think he will be back soon, Miss?"
Phryne held her hand in a firm grip. "I do, Dot. And the two of you will be all the stronger for this time apart."
"I don't think Inspector Robinson could survive another new constable."
"Neither do I. Now, up to bed with you!" Phryne declared as Dot tried to stifle yet another yawn. Dot began to raise her voice in gentle protest, but Phryne was resolute. "No, no, I will fend for myself tonight. It's been a trying last few days, and I'm sure we're all entitled to an early night and lie-in tomorrow."
After one more hug, Dot rose from the chaise and Phryne watched her make her way up the stairs, before letting out her own weary yawn. A trying last few days indeed… Despite all her worldly experience, Phryne could never spend more than a few minutes in her father's company without feeling herself a child again, subject to his selfish caprice and folly. She had known she was happy in her life in Melbourne, but she hadn't realized the extent of it until Baron Henry Fisher had barged in uninvited, disturbing the peace she had created for herself here.
But despite the frustrations of dealing with her father, the anger she'd felt as she'd banished him to Lilydale…other recent memories were now easily maneuvering themselves into a place of precedence. Memories of Jack, looking utterly dashing in a new blue suit. Jack, caressing her wrist with his strong hands, confessing that for all she had turned his ordered world upside down, he couldn't imagine a world without her. Jack, masterfully encircling her waist and guiding her body in time to the music, while she felt herself melt into his arms.
To be honest, she had never cared much for the waltz before. Beyond the notion of her mother falling for her father's dubious charms until its spell, it so often turned into an exercise in male obstinacy. How often her partners would mulishly tread the same path over and over again, while steadfastly refusing the inspiration of the movement or music.
Not so with Jack, though. He'd moved with a lithe elegance and grace, with strength and purpose in his steps. She could still feel his eyes blazing across the back of her neck as he passed behind her, before he curved his hand around her side again for the promenade. Sasha de Lisse had been such a skilled dancer, but it had only taken a minor bullet graze to reduce him to an infant. He probably couldn't ride a motorcycle over rough terrain or kick in a door if his life depended on it.
They'd danced until the tune had reached its end, standing still in one place while another waltz began to play. Jack's face, until then poised and inscrutable, had softened with the briefest of changes to a look of utter adoration and passionate desire – a look which had probably been mirrored on her own breathless visage.
She'd received that look before, from so many other men, but they usually hadn't known more about her than her name and the way she looked in an evening dress. It had never come from someone who had known her deepest heartaches, her family's shameful secrets, most every infuriating facet of her nature. She knew what it was to be desired, but it was a much less familiar feeling to be cherished. And not as a porcelain collectible, set upon a shelf, but as the vibrant, independent, maddening being which Jack asserted he would never ask her to change.
A kiss had seemed certain then, their faces coming together with aching slowness, until…the still-trembling voice of Constable Neville Martin, seeking out his superior, had cut through their trance, and Phryne had wondered if she might have to arrest Jack for throttling a member of his own constabulary.
But despite the interruption, Phryne had to acknowledge that Jack was teaching her to savour the thrill of anticipation, the wonderment of when and where he might dare touch her again. For someone who had spent a decade immediately indulging almost every desire, such a methodology had its occasional frustrations. She must be positively Victorian these days, if he could set her heart pounding with the merest of touches. But if he could do that simply with two fingers at her neck, what might he be able to accomplish in later, more private moments? Her mind whirled at the thought. Perhaps it wasn't a coincidence that her and Jack's first case had ended in a blazing inferno.
Yawning again, Phryne reached for the half-full glass of milk which Dot had left on the side table. She would save Mr. B the trouble of fetching it later, and drop it off in the kitchen before seeking out her own bed. Her fingers had just closed around it when Mr. Butler, seemingly the only unperturbed member of the household, unexpectedly opened the parlour door.
"The Inspector to see you, Miss," he said with an indulgent smile, and before Phryne could react, Jack strode into the room. She hardly felt the femme fatale in her pyjamas and slippers, but she found herself beaming at the pleasure of his unexpected appearance tonight. That was, until Jack noticed the milk glass in her hand and raised an eyebrow in sardonic question.
"No cheek, thank you," Phryne said sternly, even while she tried to suppress a laugh. "I'll have you know, this was Dot's."
"As you say," Jack answered, tilting his head and flashing a rare smile.
"I thought you had paperwork?" Phryne queried, curling back into her corner of the chaise and gesturing to the other end. He was still wearing his blue suit, she mused – how well it set off his eyes.
Jack lowered himself onto the chaise. "It will keep. Our investigation was interrupted this afternoon." He turned a steady gaze on her, and his voice lowered. "As an officer of the law, I like to see a matter through to completion."
"I'm always in favour of a strong finish," Phryne replied with deceptively innocent eyes, unable to help herself. She was rewarded by the flinch in Jack's jaw, and the recurring, delicious feeling that despite his starched and buttoned-up appearance, Jack would likely be anything but that in more…"intimate settings".
Mr. Butler quietly appeared in that moment, offering a tray of martinis to the pair and whisking the milk glass out of Phryne's hand.
"Much better, Mr. B – thank you!" she called as the butler retreated and shut the door.
"But what exactly were we investigating this afternoon, Jack?" Phryne asked softly, raising her glass.
Jack lifted his own in salute. "Your dancing skills," he replied with a look of open candour, angling his body slightly towards her. "I had concerns."
Phryne raised an eyebrow. "I learned to dance in Europe's finest finishing schools," she chuckled, her inflection conveying exactly just what she thought of said schools. "And you?"
"My mother's parlour. Still, I felt there might be reasonable doubt."
"But you haven't seen my tango." Phryne murmured. At once, the tension in the room seemed to shift into something decidedly less light-hearted, and Phryne decided that she would very much like to embark on a new level of savouring, before all of Greater Melbourne decided to deprive her and Jack of yet another moment alone. Lifting a foot, she arched her satin slipper and delicately ran it over Jack's kneecap, all while taking a ladylike sip of her martini. She thrilled at the shudder that he only just managed to contain.
"True," Jack stoically replied, and Phryne watched in delight as his chest rose and fell with quicker breath.
"But you have seen my fan dance." Her voice was barely above a whisper.
She knew she'd surprised him, at that – Jack's eyelids drifted shut for the briefest of moments, as though a flash of memory were glimmering before them, and his mouth fell slightly open. As delightful as it was to see him blush, she'd never mentioned the dance after that night, but she'd wondered. Wondered if it entered his dreams, wondered if he might ever daringly ask for a repeat performance…
Recovering quickly, Jack's eyes reopened.
"True again," he said, as his free hand ran around the slippered foot that still rested near his knee, and he grazed two fingers down the top of it. "It was a most exquisite view of…your ankles."
"And today?" Phryne asked, after a small gasp at the heady feeling of Jack's thumb running across her ankle bone . "Did I pass muster, Inspector Robinson?"
He raised his darkened eyes to hers. "Expectations were exceeded."
"That is my usual aim."
"So I would imagine." A smirk ghosted across his lips as he continued to stroke. He took another drink, his eyes never leaving her face.
Phryne set her glass down and eased herself a little closer. "So, you have… 'imagined', Jack?"
"Perhaps I have." Jack quickly finished his own martini.
Phryne curved her body in even more, her own breath now heavy. "What remained of our dance, then?"
"This."
Still keeping one hand around her ankle, Jack quickly took her face in the other, cradling her cheek before lowering his mouth to hers. The kiss was slow, warm, luxuriant, as though Jack might have kissed her a hundred times before. Phryne gasped as the memory of Café Replique surged forth, recalling the fervour in Jack's lips which had inexplicably taken her mind away from Rene for those brief seconds. No, she would not apologize for kissing him then, and she had no apology to give now. Phryne leaned back into her corner, giving Jack no choice but to follow. Long moments passed as hands pressed, tongues mingled, and needful sighs filled the room.
After a time, Jack pulled back slightly for breath, still keeping his face to hers. Phryne could barely see his eyes, but she stroked his face tenderly , keeping her other hand in the lovely place where it had ended up at base of his spine.
"Is that the traditional end to a waltz, Jack?" she purred.
She could feel his smile against her mouth. "It's a modern interpretation," Jack growled, before taking her lips with his once more.
AUTHOR'S NOTES:
Written between Episodes #6 and #7 of Series 3.
This is why I will never be able to write anything "M" - my inner-Dorothy is dying at even this level of innuendo. But if Jack and Phryne won't kiss themselves, I'm just going to have to make them, dangit. ;)