Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story are the property of Thomas Harris, Bryan Fuller, and their related affiliates. This is an amateur writing effort meant for entertainment purposes only.
Summary: Because it's not like she wouldn't taste delicious.
Author's Notes: In the film Red Dragon, Will and Molly are already married. With that in mind, I had to come up with some reasons why Hannibal would have let her live. These are the five I decided to write about. Happy reading!
5 Reasons Hannibal Doesn't Kill Molly Foster
1) She is polite.
Molly Foster is not who Hannibal expects to find when he arrives at Will's house that day. He thought Alana Bloom had replaced him as a caretaker for the dogs, so he's a little surprised when a stranger joins him in the kitchen. She's surprised too but hides it well.
"Hello," she says, a little uncertain, "can I help you with something?"
"I'm a friend of Will Graham's," Hannibal replies, masking his curiosity with professional courtesy. "I knew he was out of town for a few days, and he normally asks me to mind his dogs for him."
"Oh, I'm sorry. I was just coming by today to check on Winston anyways though, and Will asked if I wouldn't mind feeding them too."
Beneath the scent of dog that covers everything in Will's house, Hannibal can detect faint traces of avocado (her hair) and lemon grass (her moisturizing cream) emanating from her. "I'm terribly sorry to have startled you," he gives a slight nod.
"Not at all," she extends her hand to him. "I'm Molly Foster. Will's veterinarian."
Hannibal takes it. Her palms are coarse, and now that's she's close enough, he catches the faint scent of leather and oil clinging tightly to her skin. She works around livestock, horses mainly, but she takes care not to smell like them. "Hannibal Lecter," he says. "A pleasure."
"Likewise," she agrees. Hannibal returns her hand to her. "The dogs are just outside on a run. I was about to put the kettle on. Can I interest you in a cup of tea?"
"I couldn't impose."
"No imposition," Molly smiles softly. Hannibal is almost instantaneously endeared. He appreciates kind manners, but her lack of suspicion is equally refreshing.
"If you insist," he says with a smile.
2) She can keep secrets.
The next time he appears at Will's house, Hannibal is expecting her as much as she's expecting him. He comes bearing a full lunch for them. Molly prepares a pot of Earl Gray for two – organic, much to the good doctor's delight – with farm fresh milk and honey on the side.
They settle into chairs on Will's back porch, tea and Tupperware between them. Molly compliments his cooking, claiming she's eaten lamb all her life (her father is a rancher in Idaho), but has never tasted anything like the one he's prepared. A flush bursts forth from under her freckles, and she makes not a single attempt to hide it. She emotes quietly, Hannibal notes, but she's honest about her emotions, a trait Will would find particularly attractive given how many layers he usually has to penetrate at Crawford's command.
Hannibal breaks the companionable silence with a rare question of interest. Normally he would sneak to find his answer, but he gets the sense that Molly, honest Molly, will appreciate some forwardness. He's correct. "Why didn't you tell Will about my coming here before?"
It's been bothering him since their meeting. Hannibal had been prepared to lie to Will when asked – the young man does so love his privacy; case in point: he has yet to mention Molly in any of their sessions together – but it's never come up. Either Will is covering for Molly, or Molly never mentioned it, and if it's the latter, Hannibal wants to know what she's playing at.
Molly shrugs and leans back in her chair, cup and saucer in her hands. "Will mentioned that he was seeing a psychiatrist. I assumed that was you."
"An astute observation," Hannibal notes. Very astute. "Whatever gave me away?"
"Will doesn't have many friends," she replies with a sideways smile.
"Only a veterinarian and a psychiatrist."
She doesn't flinch at her title. If they were intimate, Hannibal thinks, that would have stung, or at least elicited some kind of explanation. As it stands, she just looks out at the field where the dogs are playing.
Hannibal decides to play with her a little more. "How is Good Will?"
"I think you would know better than I would," she grins.
Good girl, Hannibal thinks, taking another bite of his lamb. A woman who keeps his secrets is exactly who he wants around Will right now.
3) She stabilizes Will.
"Who is she, Will?" Hannibal finally asks when adequate evidence has presented itself. As if Will's disposition wasn't enough of an indicator (his anxiety's lower, he's sleeping through the night, and he actually mentions positive things in his conversations with Lecter), Hannibal still waits until the physical signs of a relationship present themselves.
(That damned aftershave lingers on though, Hannibal laments, hoping for another covert luncheon with Molly in the future when he can suggest a welcome change to that odour.)
"I think we keep the same company of women, Doctor," Will replies sarcastically.
"Neither Alana Bloom nor Beverly Katz have inspired you to buy a new shirt before," Hannibal observes.
Will's eyes scan the room, searching for a way out of the corner he's walked himself into, and finds the only one. "I had dinner with my veterinarian."
"A romantic engagement?"
"A way to say thank you," he says easily. "She answered a house call at an obscene hour. Well, what most people would call an obscene hour."
"Does she make a habit of responding to house calls at obscene hours?"
"As a matter of fact, she does."
"Does she make a habit of accepting dinner invitations out of gratitude as well?"
"One of her clients gave her two racks of ribs for tending to one of their horses."
"Offering food is very different from sharing a meal together."
"It was just dinner."
Hannibal wants to correct Will – no meal is or ever should be just anything – but he's cornered the profiler now and all the new calm that had descended upon the office has been stirred up again. Will has to actually prepare himself for the next part of the conversation. "She doesn't ask me about my work," he offers. "She doesn't press about how tired I look or how quiet I am. And, you know, when she's happy, she smiles; when she's upset, she frowns. She doesn't bother with any kind of performance, and I find that...I find that safe."
"Do you find me safe, Will?"
Except that Hannibal doesn't ask that. He would be giving far too much of the game away. "Will you be having dinner with your veterinarian again?"
Will tosses his head, considering. "Depends."
"On what?"
"On how many house calls I need her to make."
4) She stands up to Jack Crawford...and wins.
Jack Crawford is walking too quickly to notice, but Hannibal spots her when they turn into the driveway. Molly Foster is enjoying a leisurely Wednesday morning on Will's porch: e-book in her lap, tea service on the table, blanket around her legs. She's dressed only enough to receive company, and though Hannibal prefers women with professional appearances, there's something genial and comforting about the vision of Molly on the porch in a dressing gown basking in the dawn.
"Good morning, Agent Crawford. Dr. Lecter," she spares not a glance for the imposing agent but flashes a polite grin at Hannibal. "Tea?"
"Where is he?" Crawford asks, marching towards the door.
"He's asleep," she informs them, raising her own mug of – Hannibal sniffs – organic English Breakfast for a sip, "and he's going to stay that way for a while longer."
Crawford doesn't have time for this. He throws open the screen and pounds on the door. "Will?"
Molly smiles at Hannibal. "How are you, Dr. Lecter?"
"I am well, Miss Foster. And yourself?"
"I'm well," she folds her e-book into her lap. "Can I offer you a cup of tea?"
"Wake him up," Crawford demands.
Molly takes another sip of tea, pausing to savour it, to flick the tip of her tongue against her lips, to sigh and hum from the brew. Then, only as she's setting the mug back on the table, says, "No."
Agent Crawford puffs up as if this is the first time someone's ever said no to him before and goes back to pounding on the door. "WILL?"
"He won't wake up."
"Why the hell not?"
"He agreed to take a Valium at about three this morning. He won't be waking up for a while yet," she gestures to her tea set and cookies. "Tea, gentlemen?"
"Do I look like I'm here for a cup of tea?!"
Jack Crawford's voice rattles everything it touches from the window panes to the porch rails to the tea set to the awnings; everything except Molly Foster. She simply rolls her eyes, bored already with the trajectory of this conversation. "I could have you charged with obstruction of justice," he threatens, marching over to loom.
Now she scoffs him. "There's not a judge in the country that could make those charges stick, Agent Crawford, and I'll shake the hands of the one that does."
"You are not his doctor! You had no right convincing him to take a sedative! Just like you don't have the right to avoid waking him now. You're very swiftly committing a gross obstruction of justice, Miss Foster."
Molly stands up from her chair and places herself eye-to-eye with Crawford. "And you're getting on my last nerve," Crawford opens his mouth but she shoves his interjection straight back in his face by saying, "Don't you dare talk to me about my rights when you storm onto the property at seven o'clock in the morning reading me the riot act. I know the law, Agent Crawford, so I know damn well you can't charge me with obstructing justice for letting a man sleep in his own house."
"You have no idea what you're interfering with here, Miss Foster," Crawford snaps at her.
"And you have no idea who you're interfering with here, Agent Crawford," she wipes her hands of the argument on his pyjama pants, "Whatever it is you need Will Graham for can wait until he wakes up. And so help me, you raise your voice one more time, I'll have you charged with disturbing the peace and harassment."
"I play golf with the judge who could make those charges stick."
"Then go ahead and keep yelling," she triple dog dares him. "It's not going to get Will Graham off the property any faster."
"What makes you think that?"
"Because you'll have to get through me first," she folds her arms over her chest.
Crawford laughs. "It would be my pleasure, Miss Foster. It would be my pleasure."
Molly rolls her eyes again. "Likewise, Agent Crawford," she sighs, long bored of this conversation. "So, can I interest either of you in a cup of tea?"
Hannibal expects Crawford to go back to yelling after he's made his disgusted sound and walks away from her, but he doesn't. He takes up pacing the porch instead, tail hovering just between his legs, while his cell phone sits in his hand and rings Will's over and over and over again.
Molly doesn't seem at all concerned by this. Clearly, she's put the phone on silent or hidden it somewhere where it won't disturb Will. "I'm terribly sorry, Dr. Lecter, to have you witness that."
"Not at all, Miss Foster."
"Tea?"
Impressed that Molly convinced Will to take some of his medication, curious as to how she accomplished this, and always looking for ways to undermine Jack Crawford, Hannibal joins Molly in one of the withered but clean porch chairs.
"This is no time for tea, Doctor," Crawford says sternly.
"I believe that's all it's time for right now, Agent Crawford. Even if we were to rouse Will, he would not be cogent enough to work a crime scene. Thankfully, I believe Valium metabolizes faster than your person of interest."
"My crime scene doesn't have that long."
Molly ignores Jack. She pours for Hannibal, refills her own mug, and eases back into the quiet of the morning.
5) She doesn't interfere between him and Will.
"Why haven't you and Will ever joined me for dinner?"
Molly looks only slightly less tired than Will does by this point, but she still smiles, rubs her eyes, and meets Hannibal's gaze when he asks. "It's not for lack of interest, Doctor, or any matter regarding taste."
"Has Will not extended my invitation?"
"No, he hasn't."
Rude, but not unexpectedly so for Will. He still shies away from any questions about Molly during his conversations with Hannibal, and the two have been intimate, by good doctor's estimation, for over six months now. This alone marks the fourth secret teatime he's had on Will's back porch with Molly Foster, and Hannibal has tired of the pretense, tired of observing two halves of the same whole. He wants to see what they're like together, if for no other reason than understand who will hurt more when this game finally ends.
"Will likes to compartmentalize," Molly says. It's the most she's ever said about Will during one of their meetings. "A place for everyone, and everyone in their place."
"And never the two shall meet," Hannibal adds.
She nods. "I get the sense that you and I belong to different compartments, Doctor."
"Anyone who stands up to Jack Crawford could easily overpower Will Graham."
"True," Molly laughs lightly, "but that would make Will uncomfortable, and I try very hard not to make Will uncomfortable."
The sounds of the wind passing through the grass and the dogs barking occupy them for a long while before Hannibal breaks the silence. "Will rarely accepts my invitations anyways."
"I'm glad you extend them. He needs to be reminded that there are things outside all those dark places he goes to."
"I do believe you're one of those places for him, Miss Foster," Hannibal says to her. Which is precisely why Will never invites her to dinner, why Molly never presses him to go, why it will hurt her so much when he tears Will Graham apart, and ultimately why Hannibal decides to let her live to see the end. Will needs something light to see him all the way into the good doctor's darkness. Hannibal just hopes he's around to see the light of Molly Foster go out.