Elizabeth fingered the stitching going down his wrist as they lay in bed together.
"You should be asleep by now," Hannibal scolded lightly.
He was right; it was two in the morning.
"I can't sleep," she replied and sat up. "I was so scared. I was scared of losing you."
"You love me as I love you…it's expected."
"I can't believe…I just can't seem to wrap my head around what my brother was going to do to you." Elizabeth said softly. "He knows how much you mean to me, Hannibal. Why was he trying to kill you though? What did you ever do to him?"
Hannibal shrugged. "I don't know why he wanted me dead."
"I wish I did though." Elizabeth confessed. "I want to know…but I just can't bring myself to see him right now."
"And you shouldn't."
"He's my brother though," she reminded him. "I'll have to face him eventually. I want to understand."
Hannibal sighed and sat himself up against the headboard of his bed. "I want you to get hurt."
"Will won't hurt me."
"I'm not so sure anymore," Hannibal confessed solemnly.
Elizabeth shook her head. "I'm going to get some ginger ale soda. I'm feeling sick."
Elizabeth stood up from the bed, calling behind her, "Go back to sleep, Hannibal."
She made her way down stairs and went to the kitchen to the fridge where she grabbed a bottle of ginger ale. Elizabeth was walking out of the dining room when her eye caught something on the floor near the head chair of the dining room table.
Elizabeth set the bottle down after she gulped some of it down.
She bent down and her fingers softly traced the random small hole in the floor. She felt air on her hand and furrowed her brows in confusion. Is there a basement?
Elizabeth shrugged and stood up with a sigh, "It's just a basement, Elizabeth."
She grabbed the bottle and drank from it as she walked back up the stairs. She passed a mirror then stopped. She went back to the mirror and touched her stomach, then lifts up her nightgown. Elizabeth felt the firmness around her stomach. She cupped her breasts in her hands and they felt a little bit bigger than usual.
Sadly, her stomach was still flat, but she could see a very, very tiny bump in her stomach. She wondered how far along she was in her pregnancy.
She sighed and pulled her nightgown down, walking back to the bedroom. She saw Hannibal was still awake, waiting for her which made her smile. Elizabeth crawled onto the bed and said, "This is an awfully large bed, Dr. Lecter."
Hannibal grabbed her waist and slid her under him. He kissed down her body, squeezing her breasts as she let out a small moan. Hannibal smirked and lifted her nightgown up. He kissed her stomach and pulled down her panties, kissing her inner thighs.
Elizabeth smiled down at him. "It's gonna be a long pregnancy, Hannibal…"
Elizabeth sighed in frustration as she heard the doorbell ring and threw the instructions down on the living room floor before standing up. She walked over to the window and saw Jack out on her porch.
She opened the door, saying, "I thought that I still had a week left until I had to go back to work."
Jack chuckled. "I remember. I want to talk to you about something."
"If it's about Will, then I have nothing to say," Elizabeth replied, opening the door and letting him inside.
"I know, but I went to him last night," Jack told her as he closed the door behind him, pausing when he saw the living room. "What are you doing?"
"I'm trying to build a crib."
Jack's eyebrows lifted up in surprise. "For who?"
Elizabeth chuckled nervously. "For…I'm pregnant, Jack. Hannibal's the father and he knows about me being pregnant. He already ordered many, many things for the baby."
Elizabeth rubbed her eyes as Jack said, "Congratulations. I'm happy for you two…but you seem a little frustrated right now."
"I'm stressed that I'm gonna fuck up this baby…excuse my French, Jack. Hannibal's excited and he's trying to convince me to not work anymore," she chuckled mirthlessly.
Jack gestured for her to sit down on the couch. "I don't think that you're really stressed out about Hannibal and the baby, but the fact that Will isn't here to share your happiness."
"He's family," Elizabeth said softly. "He knows how much I love Hannibal and he knew that I was pregnant too! So did Klaus! And yet they still did it! They tried to kill him, but why?!"
"I know that I probably shouldn't tell you this because of the condition that you're in-"
"Oh please, Jack, I'm not some fragile China doll. I can handle anything."
"Will told me something that I would think you would like to know. It's about The Ripper," Jack explained. "Do you know why The Ripper kills in sounders of three or four, in quick order?"
Elizabeth nodded which actually surprised him. "Will already explained this theory to me as I did for him and The Copycat being The Ripper. We Grahams have the same mind…including Klaus sadly."
Jack nodded in agreement. "He says it's because if he waits too long, then the meat will spoil. He then…he says if the Ripper's killing then Hannibal Lecter's planning a dinner party. He even suggested that we ate them."
Elizabeth's hand ghosted over her stomach in protection. "I don't know who to believe anymore."
"Me too."
"For all we know, we've already met The Ripper," Elizabeth suggested. "I hate having them on opposite sides of each other because they like to whisper in my ear about the other. I just can't take this crap anymore. For now on, I'm freaking Switzerland until the baby comes."
Jack laughed. "Good luck."
"I hope this baby just makes it out of my hostile womb okay."
"Hostile womb?"
"People always seem to go for the stomach when we're fighting," Elizabeth explained. "I miss him and all that."
Before Jack could respond, dogs came piling into the living room, stepping on everything as they scurried to get some kind of love from Jack and Elizabeth. She laughed and stroked their fur coats and rubbed their bellies.
"I can't wait to have you back, Lizzie," Jack sighed as he stood up.
"Oh, so the Kids are driving you crazy already?"
Jack gave her a look that made her laugh as she walked him out of the house. "You and Katz were always the only two to make sure that they stay in line. Brian and Jimmy are a piece of work together."
"Oh, I know how you feel. I need 45 minutes away from them before I can be their best friend again."
They laughed and Jack replied, "Well, I have to go. Will and Hannibal can also be like children playing hide and seek with each other."
"Such a dangerous game," Elizabeth mused. "Say hello to Bella for me, will you, Jack?"
Jack nodded. "She wants me to tell you thank you for the flowers and the basket full of sweets you sent her."
Elizabeth smiled and turned around, seeing Winston holding the instructions for the crib in his mouth. "What? Are you going help me build a death trap for my kid now?"
Buster barked while the other dogs jumped and twirled around in excitement. She pointed at all of them as she walked back into the house. "Then you all better start protecting my spawn when he's torn through my vagina."
Elizabeth kneeled down and heard clattering in the back room. She stood up again, grabbing her gun as she walked over to the room slowly and as silently as possible. Elizabeth settled her breathing as she put one foot in front of the other carefully.
Her hand reached out and turned the doorknob and when she opened the door, she let out the loudest scream she had ever voiced before.
Hannibal sped down the street and pulled up into Elizabeth's driveway while the streets were filled with police cars and an ambulance. Hannibal ran up the steps just as the coroners were carrying out a black body bag. He strode into the house and called out, "Elizabeth! Where are you?! Elizabeth?!"
"Hannibal," she sniffled as she shuffled into the hallway from her bedroom.
His heart calmed down immediately as he wrapped his arms around her, breathing in her scent.
"What's happened?" he asked softly as he stroked her hair gently.
He heard her sniffle. "Mer…she's dead. S-She…her body was…oh my God, that fucking bastard! I'll kill him when I get my hands on him!"
Hannibal knitted his eyebrows in confusion. "The Ripper?"
Jack walked into the hallway and to them. "The Ripper tore out Meredith Hopkins's organs and put Elizabeth's favorite flowers in her stomach, mutilated various body parts too, and…and he apparently butchered her corpse as well."
"The Ripper did this?" Hannibal questioned in shock.
Hannibal remembered where he kept Meredith and she was definitely far away from Elizabeth. He made sure that there was no way of her getting out and yet here she was…except he didn't kill her. No, someone else did the deed for him…but who?
Jack pulled Hannibal aside as Elizabeth complained about having the sudden need to go pee and went to the bathroom quickly.
"What is it, Jack?"
"This looks like a copycat of The Butcher's murders."
"How? He's in prison."
Jack nodded. "There are things in Meredith's body that we never released to the public."
"Like what exactly?"
"Well, The Butcher would rip apart the uterus and carve an X into the heart. There's also another thing too." Jack explained.
Hannibal and Jack leaned in closely as Jack continued in a hush voice, "You remember that necklace that The Ripper took from Elizabeth's house?"
Hannibal nodded. "Yes, Will's father gave it to her when she was young."
"Didn't you get her a rose one after that?"
"Yes, I did."
Jack took out two evidence bags from his coat pocket and handed them to Hannibal. "These were found in Meredith uterus."
Hannibal examined the two necklaces which were from two different places. The silver moon necklace was hidden in Hannibal's house and the rose necklace was in Elizabeth's jewelry box last time he checked, still unworn. Finding them in the body could only mean one thing.
"Whoever this was, was in her house and The Ripper's. They took them and planted them in her body after death probably," Jack told him.
"So, they've been watching Elizabeth closely," Hannibal concluded.
"It looks like an obsession actually. It probably all began long ago when she first started The Butcher case," Jack said to him.
Hannibal remembered the eerie phone call he had received after Bedelia ended their doctor-patient relationship.
Hannibal heard his office phone ring before he answered it, "Hello. This is Dr. Hannibal Lecter's office, Dr. Lecter speaking."
"Dr. Lecter," a male's smooth voice greeted from the phone. "You may not know me, but you will, Dr. Lecter."
"Who is this," he demanded.
He laughed softly. "No, but you will. I know what you are, Hannibal Lecter."
"Hannibal?"
Hannibal came back to the present and handed the necklaces to Jack.
As another hour went by, Hannibal found Elizabeth staring ahead into a window then he saw her stride forward and out of the house. He followed her of course, worrying about her no matter what she had said about her not being some damsel in distress.
Elizabeth walked to the trash cans and picked up a puppy who was sleeping next to it.
A stray, he thought. Perhaps she is more like Will than she realizes.
The puppy appeared to be a tricolor Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. Elizabeth giggled as it licked her cheek, its small tongue poking out before it wagged its tail and barked at her.
"Oh my God, you are the cutest thing in the world," she cooed and walked over to Hannibal.
"You're going to keep it, aren't you," Hannibal mused.
She nodded enthusiastically. "Yup! I even know what I'm going to name her too!"
"Good. You need to see something good right now," he encouraged, noting how the tears were still there in her eyes, but her cheeks were dry.
Elizabeth gave him a weak smile and kissed his lips as the puppy licked his chin. "She likes you."
"And how do you know it's a girl?"
"Well, seeing as how there's now penis down there…that's one thing," she explained in amusement, clearly trying not to look behind her where lied all of the reminders of Meredith including Freddie Lounds who was taking pictures of everything. Including them.
"What should we call her then?"
"Well, I guess our little boy does need someone to play with too so it has to be something fun?"
"Our little boy?"
She shrugged. "I feel as though it's a boy since I can't hold my pee in for long. No self-control like most men."
"I have control."
"But I make you lose control, remember?"
"That's right…now I do. So what's her name?"
Elizabeth opened her mouth to answer when Alana came over and handed her a PB & J sandwich. "Here you go."
"Oh, thank you so much, Alana. I'm starving-hey!" she whined as the puppy suddenly leaned forward and started to slowly eat the sandwich out of Elizabeth's hand.
"Wow, she's really going for the peanut butter, huh?" Alana considered in amusement. "She's very cute though."
"Yeah, which means that she can get away with everything." Elizabeth grumbled as the puppy was now almost finished with HER sandwich.
"I know what to call her," Hannibal said and took the puppy out of Elizabeth's arms, holding her.
"What?"
"Peanut Butter," he suggested and scratched her head. "For her love of peanut butter."
Elizabeth brightened immediately at the name. "Yeah! And we can call her Peanuts for short."
They kissed each other passionately with Peanuts between them who was still licking the peanut butter off of her tiny mouth.
A camera clicked.
The picture showed of Elizabeth and Hannibal in a passionate kiss with their new dog between them.
Happiness in a field of darkness, the man thought cynically.
The man scowled a little bit at the happy site, but turned around, walking into the crowd as he blended in well with them quite easily.
TBC…
THANK YOU FOR THE REVIEWS, FOLLOWS, AND FAVORITES! You should look up Elizabeth's and Hannibal's dog cause when I found it on Google, it was the cutest puppy ever. You'll see why it's named Peanuts a.k.a. Peanut Butter. There is a new threat in town and Hannibal's throwing a P-A-R-T-Y, but Jack and Frederick have their suspicions, but will Elizabeth believe them? Meanwhile she has a confrontation with a familiar face. I hoped you liked this chapter.
REVIEW. FOLLOW. FAVORITE. Until next time…