Well, this was fun – hope you enjoy it.
Add the usual – not mine, wish they were.
__________
Dr. Lecter expected to meet Jack in the hallway. When Crawford didn't appear, he moved silently into the kitchen doorway. Seeing Clarice enfolded in Jack's arms, unleashed within the doctor a moment of blind rage. With no outward sign the doctor managed to slam the door closed on his powerful emotions, becoming once again the detached psychiatrist of world renoun. He noted with calm the greedy clutch of Jack's hands on Clarice's back, but he couldn't prevent a silent sigh of relief when he noticed Clarice's white knuckles clenched on te counter top behind her. And yet she wasn't pushing Crawford away. In an instant he understood the nature of the conversation preceeding this little tableau. His course of action was decided in half that amount of time; he would deal with each accordingly.
_________
It took Jack's bemused mind a moment to place the cold voice at his shoulder in the proper schema. On the heels of realizing who was standing behind him, the import behind the words came crashing through his fogged brain. These combined thoughts caused him to pull away from Clarice as his staomach bounced into his throat. Clarice thought he looked like he was going to have a heart attack. Jack misinterpreted the look of concern in her eyes as fear, He wasn't sure he could get both of them out of this unscathed.
He paused looking down at her, as if counting to three, and then he spun to face Lecter. The doctor, easily anticipating Jack's actions, caught Crawford's ankle with his own. Jack went sprawling on the kitchen floor, his head narrowly missing the counter of the island.
"Mr. Crawford!" Clarice cried out.
"That's a little formal for someone you were just – how would you say? – frenching?" Dr. Lecter commented in his best dungeon voice. Clarice met his gaze, her confusion apparent in her eyes. Gone was the caring, teasing man she had woken up with; in his place was the controled persona from asylum interviews. Which was the real man? Or was it all part of the whole?
He reached out lightening fast and the next thing she knew she was plastered to his side, her wrists held immobile at the small of her back in his left hand. She met hhis gaze but could read nothing in his eyes.
"Did you call all your sticky fumblings 'Mr. So-n-so'?" he whispered in her ear, pausing to nuzzle her neck. She tried to control anger; if she could have hit him she would have. Her struggles to free her hands only resulted in being held more securly to his side. He smiled, a sight that made her shiver and Jack cringe. Jack could tell Lecter was enjoying her struggles – who wouldn't enjoy being snuggled up to that georgous body?
A flash of sunlight drew Crawford's attention to the knife in Lecter's hand. Crawford moved to get up, but stopped when the knife flashed in front of Starling's face.
"Careful Jack, we wouldn't want to cause an accident now would we?" Dr. Lecter warned. Clarice quit struggling for the moment and Lecter met her gaze. He was accutely aware of his thigh nestled between hers under her robe. The robe, however, was blocking Jack's view of the situation.
"Let's see what she has to offer, eh Jackie-boy?" Dr. Lecter said as the knife flashed at her waist cutting the sash. He grabbed her collar and pulled it down her back, entagling her arms. He enjoyed the feel of her hair on the back of his hand.
Jack understood that Lecter was just trying to taunt him by using Starling, but even so he couldn't help looking at her long legs below her boxer shorts. He'd always been a leg man. Bella had had nice legs, but Starling's ankles were something else.
"What would you like Jack? A thigh maybe?"Dr. Lecter shifted his weight and Clarice felt the brush of his pantleg on the inside of her thighs. Involuntarily she clenched her thighs together trapping the doctor's leg between. In response he hummed low in his throat,
"No, I think I'll keep those for myself. What about a shoulder Jack?" he asked again as the harpy flashed again at the shoulder seam of Clarice's t-shirt. Clarice felt like she was a cooked chicken with two little boys arguing over the drumsticks. The similie was frightening for different reasons. When the creamy flesh of her shoulder was exposed, the doctor rand the backside of his knife across her collar bone and over her shoulder. Clarice shivered in response and had to hold back a sigh when the doctor spoke again.
"Have you ever wondered what she tastes like, Jack? I know I have." Jack gasped as he saw Lecter bend his head to Clarice's shoulder. The surveillence video of Lecter attacking the nurse flashed in his mind, and all he could thing was thank God it wasn't her face. When Clarice cried out and turned her head away, Jack bounded to his feet and rushed forward. Dr. Lecter's head came up as he reached out with his right hand. Jack managed to jump back just in time, but a thin crimson line stained the shoulder of his slashed shirt.
"She's mine, Jack," Dr. Lecter said in a low voice. "She has been since you sent her to me – to do with as I wish." Jack's gaze moved to the livid red mark on Clarice's shoulder. She struggled against the robe again and Lecter whispered something in her ear. She quit struggling and her hair hid her eyes.
"If you harm her, Lecter…" Jack threatened holding his shoulder.
"You'll what Jack?" Lecter asked with a caulked eyebrow. "You never could catch me, and I promise you'll never find Clarice."
"You can't take her!" Jack yelled. What had the monster said to her? She'd just quit fighting.
"Can't I?" Lecter asked with a small smile.
"No!" Jack shouted, tensing as if to move forward.
"Alright Jackie-boy," Dr. Lecter hissed, forestalling Crawford's lethat decision. "I'll make you a deal. You do something for me and I'll do something for you." Dr. Lecter tossed him a pair of hand cuffs. Jack caught them reflexively. Clarice's head snapped up and she gazed at the doctor. He struggled not to laugh at the look on her face. He turned back to Jack,
"Now open the cupboard under the sink and cuff yourself to the water pipe. That's right, just pull the garbage can out." When Jack was securely cuffed, Dr. Lecter turned his full attention back to Clarice.
"Now for you, my dear," he said as he pulled the sash out of her robe and bent down to tie her feet. Clarice suddenly seemed to come back to life. Her leg flashed out in a kick that should have sent him flying backward. Instead, she found her ankle held fast against his chest.
"I'm starting to wonder if Anthrax island wasn't your idea after all. You seen to have trouble sticking to your word, Clarice," the doctor commented looking up at her, just as he had the night before. He jerked her foot sharply sending her down hard on her backside. She cried out as she hit the linolium of the kitchen floor. Jack, who souldn't really see what was going on with his head in the cupboard, swore at Lecter,
"God dammit Lecter! You promised!"
"Actuall, Jack, I didn't promise anything," the doctor responded calmly as he sliced strips off the bottom of Clarice's robe and trussed her up like a roast of beef. He grabbed her elbows to assist her to her feet. He bent his shoulder to her stomach and the next thing she knew she was hanging upside down like a sack of potatoes, with his left arm behind her knees.
Dr. Lecter stepped over to where Jack would have an unobstructed view of this latest development. When Jack saw Clarice slung over Lecter's shoulder he reacted to the primative imagery, just as the doctor knew he would. He strained against the cuffs and his face went three shades of red. Clarice squirmed attempting to get loose,
"Dr. Lecter put me down!"
"Demanding little hussy aren't you?" he chuckled. "You'll be begging before I'm done with you. In fact I think I'd like to hear you scream before the end."
"God no!" Jack yelled at this pronouncement. Clarice squirmed furiously, but the doctor merely tossed her in the air, knocking the wind and the fight out of her when she landed on his shoulder again.
"You said you'd make me a deal!" Jack called from under the sink.
"Ah, now there you are correct," the doctor replied. "You see, Jackie-boy, she's mine and if I can't have her no one can. The intimate little scene I walked in on proved something to me, and there's no undoing it now," Lecter explained as he moved towards the patio door. "You held up your end of the bargain like a good boy, and I'm in a generous mood so I promise I'll hold to my end." Dr. Lecter met Jack's gaze once more over Clarice's shapely backside.
"I won't forget to send you a doggy bag." The doctor enjoyed the tormented cry of rage that followed them out onto the patio. Lecter decided that leaving Jack alive like this was even better than killing him. Crawford would wonder for the rest of his days. Now, he just had to deal with Clarice he thought as he enjoyed her warm weight on his shoulder. He admitted that he found her position rather satisfying even if it wasn't at all gentlemanly. He inhaled deeply and was supprised when he caught her scent. So she liked it a little rough, did she?
"Mmm," he purred, this was going to be fun.
