"Your… your wife?" Éponine stared at Javert, who seemed supremely confident as always in what he'd said. He stared right at her and nodded as he said firmly,

"I could give you a new life, Éponine. I could give you… food, and shelter, and… and in return, all I would ask of you would be -"

"My body," Éponine said, gnawing her lip, but Javert's cheeks pinked a little, and he amended,

"I was going to say companionship."

"Oh." Éponine was so shocked that she had no idea what to say or do. She shook her head a little and asked, "Why do you want to marry me? I'm just a burden, aren't I? This is just you using me as your little pet project… the girl who started over. That's it, isn't it? You just want to see the transformation of the girl from the streets to -"

"It's actually because I find myself rather fond of you," Javert interrupted, "and we are both of us, it would seem, in need of… another. I have found your companionship to be quite agreeable, as it happens. I have no desire to return to my previous life, solitary as an oyster, in three weeks' time once the Commissaire de Police signs a document cutting off funding for your supervised protective custody."

"Then why not just hire me as your maid?" Éponine asked skeptically, eyeing Javert's wrinkled face and his greying hair. He was old, she thought again. She didn't mind, she thought once more. His face went red again, and he licked very carefully at his bottom lip as he said,

"I should think it is very plain why I do not merely keep you on as a maid. You were just kissing my neck. I am not a religious man, Éponine, and I hold little regard for the idea of sin or corporal iniquity. However… there are practical matters. If I put a bastard in your, or…"

He seethed a breath through his teeth and shut his eyes, and he admitted quietly,

"I want you, Éponine. I desire you."

"You… you do?" Éponine's eyes burned ferociously then. When he opened his eyes again, Javert seemed confused by her sudden burst of emotion, but Éponine confessed, "I never, ever thought I'd hear a man say those words to me. Ever."

"Well, believe me; it is very true," Javert said a bit uncomfortably, and Éponine edged nearer to him. She nodded and whispered,

"I would very much like green ribbons for my hair. Inspector Javert… from Toulon."

He smirked a little and said bitterly, "I need… erm… this is difficult. The law requires your father's permission. I'll have to get an act of consent and have him sign it with a notary. That means…"

"That means you have to go to Saint-Michel and inform my father that you're marrying me," Éponine said gravely, "and then you'll have to work out some sort of deal with him, because that's the sort of man he is, else he won't go to the notary with you."

Javert nodded seriously and said, "But I will do it, Éponine, so that you might start anew."

Éponine suddenly thought of Marius. Would Marius ever marry a girl like her? No, she thought. Not in a hundred thousand years. Someday, Marius Pontmercy was going to find himself some pretty little flit of a girl, and she would have lacy bonnets and lacy gloves. She would have a doll's face. And that woman would make Marius Pontmercy very happy indeed. Éponine's stomach churned a little as she thought of all the nights she'd lain awake in Gorbeau House pining over Marius, thinking of him, dreaming of him. What a colossal waste of time all that had been, Éponine thought.

"Éponine?"

She snapped to rights and looked at Javert, who was sitting upright looking exhausted, and he told her,

"I'll go see him this evening; I'm off work. But I do need to sleep a bit."

"Oh. Right. You've just come home from work." Éponine nodded, remembering how she'd fretted over his late arrival. She'd really worried over him. She was going to marry him.

She was going to marry this man.

"Please, may I kiss you again?" she asked, and he did not smile as he nodded. He slid his fingers up against her jaws, and he pulled her face against his as they delved into another deep kiss.


"Monsieur… Jondrette?" Javert approached the pipe-smoking man who was loitering up against a brick wall, and he jumped up in alarm at the sight of the policeman. His eyes went wide, and he declared,

"I haven't done nothing wrong, Inspector."

Javert held his hands up in a conciliatory move and asked quietly, "May we speak? It concerns your daughter."

"'Ponine? She all right?" Jondrette gnawed his pipe, and Javert sighed a bit as he asked again,

"May we speak in private? Allow me to buy you some lunch, Monsieur."

Now Jondrette seemed utterly confused, but at the offer of free food, he hurried after Javert into a nearby tavern and sat willingly at a table, ripping his filthy hat from his head. He grinned and ordered stew, bread, and mulled wine. Javert waited for the man to scarf down some of the food, and then he finally lowered his voice and said,

"I assume that Éponine's birth certificate is filed under the name Thénardier?"

Jondrette glanced up from his food and then set his bread down, and he said cautiously, "No. We never filed no birth certificate. Thought that wasn't necessary."

Javert shut his eyes and squeezed at the bridge of his nose. He could work around the fact that Éponine had no birth certificate, but it would mean more paperwork. He finally opened his eyes and said to the criminal before him,

"Éponine will be raped if she is released from protective custody. Luckily, she has the opportunity to begin life fresh - to start over as a woman of modest but livable means. A woman with food in her belly and clean clothes, access to hot baths, and a husband who cares for her."

"Sounds like paradise." Jondrette swiped stew away from his mouth with his sleeve, looking bored. "Who's this man? That Marius boy next door?"

"No." Javert's chest stirred with irritation. He sighed and pursed his lips before he said, "It is me. I am the one who would marry Éponine and give her a new life."

Jondrette choked out a laugh and swigged his mulled wine. "'Ponine, the wife of a policeman? Don't think she'd like that very much."

"She is much enthused," Javert insisted. He opened his leather bag and pulled out the folded act of consent. "If you will accompany me to a notary public to have this signed and notarised, then she will have your legal permission to wed."

Jondrette scowled at the paper as he slowly read it. He passed it back, and a defensive look came over his dark eyes.

"What do you want in return?" Javert asked knowingly, and Jondrette sniffed, swiping at his lips again.

"Friend of mine's in jail," he said. "He'll be in there for another three months."

"I am a police inspector; I do not have the ability, even if I felt it were moral, for the early release of a prisoner," Javert clipped. "Try again."

"Fine." Jondrette pinched his lips and leaned forward, stinking of rot. "I'll give you specific names and locations of the Tappapieds who threatened 'Ponine. I have it on good knowledge of when and where they're going to be. You promise me that 'Ponine won't be turned loose and that you'll catch 'em, and I'll give you all that I've got. Working together, you and I. Never thought that would happen, eh?"

"Indeed." Javert folded the document back up and tucked it away. "I vow to you to, Monsieur, that Éponine is going to be kept safe and given a good, new life. Now. You said you had some names and places."


"I couldn't possibly take your money for a fancy dress," Éponine insisted, shaking her head. Javert scoffed at her and declared,

"I will not have you get married in a casual calico day dress. You must have a gown, even for a civil wedding. I am not a wealthy man, Éponine, but neither am I a pauper. I work for my salary, and I am paid fairly."

"But I shall feel so terribly guilty wearing lace and velvet," Éponine complained.

"Éponine." Javert stared at her across the dining room table as they finished their breakfast porridge, and she sighed as she hurried to clear their dishes. She spent the next ten minutes in the kitchen scrubbing up bowls and spoons, and then she rushed to Javert's boots by the door with a rag. They were already mostly clean, but she felt like she needed to do more to earn her keep, so she hurriedly rubbed at them with the rag to get any hints of dirt off.

"Éponine," she heard from above her, and she looked up to see Javert looming over her. Suddenly she wanted him, craved him, and she stared up at him with a boot in her hand. He shook his head down at her and insisted, "I can clean my own boots. I've done so for decades."

"If I'm going to wear lace and velvet, then I'll clean your boots, Inspector," Éponine said, leaving no room for equivocation. He curled up half his mouth and nodded, and he told her,

"I'm off work tomorrow. We could go to the dressmaker's. All the paperwork should be finished within a few weeks' time, and so should a gown. Does that suit you?"

"Yes." Éponine rubbed some more at Javert's boot, staring at the worn black leather as she asked him, "Have you told your Commissaire that you're going to marry me?"
"I… am going to tell him today," said Javert matter-of-factly. "First thing, when I get to the station."

"Oh." Éponine blinked a few times. She was starting to feel overcome with want, with need, and kneeling before him was only making it worse for some reason. She wasn't certain why. It was almost as though…

Suddenly she had a vivid memory of a whore in an alley, a whore on her knees with a man leaning back against a wall. His cock had been in the whore's mouth, Éponine remembered. She had barely seen anything, but she could tell that much. Was that what Éponine was craving?

"Are you all right?" Javert asked softly, and when Éponine looked up at him, she gulped hard and asked,

"If I were to put your manhood in my mouth, would that put a bastard in me?"

"Éponine!" His eyes went round as the full moon, and his face flushed red all the way down his neck into his uniform jacket.

"I'm sorry." She whispered that bit, setting down his boot. But her fingers edged up beneath his uniform, toward his trousers, and Javert gasped. He groaned just a little, seeming very frustrated, and he declared,

"Believe me; I would like nothing more than that right now, Éponine, but if I do not leave in the next two minutes, I am going to be late for work."

"Oh. Right. Sorry." Éponine pulled her hands away and handed Javert his boots. As he slid his feet into them, he stared at her like she was some sort of odd specimen, and he suggested breathlessly,

"Later? Perhaps? Hmm?"

She smiled and nodded. "Yes. Most definitely later, Inspector. Now. Go tell your Commissaire your news."

"Stand up and kiss me goodbye, will you?" He helped her up, and he held her face in his hands as he touched his lips to hers. He touched his forehead against hers and huffed a breath as he whispered, "Of all the things to taunt me with just before work, Éponine…"

"I'm sorry," she giggled, and he gave her another fleeting kiss before hurrying out the door, leaving Éponine hungry and tingling in the foyer.

Author's Note: Just wanted to say a huge thank-you for the feedback on this story. I know this is a super niche ship, so I'm grateful for the readership and the reviews. :)