The next morning when Belle awoke, she took her time stretching, content and relaxed. Or at least to some degree. She was happy to be back. She was almost sure that Gold was happy to have her back, though he might grumble and act like it was no big deal.
But it was.
She was sure of it.
He had destroyed his place. And there was a reason for that. She couldn't doubt that. The rage that she had seen visited upon Keith in the alleyway had been taken out on his own possessions. All those precious objects that had been squirreled away over God knows how many years now lay in pieces, strewn across the floor.
Why, was the question she still had no answer for.
Why, was the question she wasn't sure she'd ever get an answer for.
Gold was tight-lipped to start with, closed down, keeping everyone out as best he could. She had managed to worm her way in, but only so far. She kept hitting wall after all, pushing through little by little. But this latest incident had caused him to shore up all his defenses. The walls he was hidden behind now seemed even larger, stronger.
And she wasn't sure if she could get through them again. With a sigh she got dressed and made her way downstairs to face the beast in his lair. Sometime they needed to have this out. It might as well be that day.
When she stepped into the living room she found everything had been picked up, set back to rights, the signs that he had ever had such a raging temper were gone. Oh, they were there if someone knew the house well and knew what they were looking for. Belle did. She saw which knick-knacks were gone, saw the way he had carefully arranged the handful that remained to cover up their fallen compatriots. She even saw a few new ones mixed in, likely pulled from his bedroom or another room to make sure the living area looked as cluttered with things as it once did.
But she knew. She saw. She remembered. And it wasn't like he would expect her to forget.
Was it?
She spoke his name softly as she stepped out of the living room and entered the kitchen. He was there, his back to her, standing in front of the stove.
"Ah, there you are Miss French." The words sounded jovial enough and that perhaps should have been taken as the warning she expected it was.
"Belle," she started to say.
"Omelet?"
The word caught her off guard and she blinked once. "Pardon?"
He glanced over his shoulder at her and she was relieved at least to see a small grin playing about the corners of his mouth. "Would you like an omelet?"
She blinked once. Hard. "You don't cook," she pointed out. She had been making all their meals during their time together. Not once had he ever mentioned he even had the ability to cook and yet here he was, standing in front of the stove and looking like quite the natural.
"I can manage to cook up an egg and throw a few things into the pan with it," he pointed out.
"Well, yes. I suppose you can," she murmured, shaking her head and taking a seat at the small kitchen table.
"I did manage before you arrived."
Belle just shook her head. "I don't even know how." She could see his back stiffen and she knew he was bristling at the comment. He was always the prickly sort and so quick to find offense where none was meant. She didn't dare roll her eyes at him. Their relationship, or whatever they had here exactly, was already so strained.
"Well, I did just fine." There was a bite to the words, one she hadn't been expecting. They fell into a sort of uncomfortable silence then, only the sizzling of the pan and the scraping of the spatula interrupting the quiet.
He tossed her omelet on a plate and brought it to her, turning away before she even had a chance to speak. He was back at the pan, making his second one when she finally sighed and couldn't hold back anymore. "Gold?" He didn't respond. "Tavish?"
"I thought I told you not to call me that."
"You did. But it won't stop me." She tried for a light tone but the snarl he answered with told her all she needed to know. "What happened?"
His shoulders tensed and she watched as he gripped the handle of the pan hard. "I do believe the sheep need to be tended to, Miss French."
It was a dismissal. That much was clear. She took a few more bites of her omelet before responding. "That night…" she started with but he cut her off again, turning to glare at her with eyes that blazed with anger and something else, something bitter, something sad.
"Are you going to tend to the sheep or do I need to call Mr. Nolan?" His voice had turned hard as he snapped at her. He still wouldn't look at her, still watched the pan even though she could smell that it was starting to burn.
She watched him for a moment, then finally shook her head and stood. "You really won't talk to me."
He kept his back to her but turned his head slightly. She knew he heard her. She knew he was well aware of what she wanted to talk about, what they needed to talk about. There was so much really, so much they had been avoiding. The kiss, the incident outside The Rabbit Hole, the destruction, the whole damned bloody thing. And instead he just wanted her to go out, tend the sheep and pretend nothing had happened.
"Fine," she finally managed to say and couldn't help the little bit of anger that crept into her voice. He didn't move and so she left him then, tugging on her boots and coat and heading out into the cool spring day to take care of the sheep.
It was her job after all.
And was that all she was to him? Just a farm worker? She knew that wasn't so. If she was, he wouldn't have given her the library, wouldn't have kissed her. If she were nothing to him, he wouldn't have destroyed his possessions after she left.
But that left her with wondering what exactly she was to him. And maybe even more importantly, what he was to her and that was territory she wasn't sure she was ready to explore. She was attracted to him. That much she knew. Perhaps that was enough for now. With her father ill and her life in a bit of a turmoil, she couldn't quite imagine her life being entwined with anyone else's. She wasn't ready for it, drawn to the man though she might be.
It was simply too much right now.
And yet she had to know. She needed to know. A small part of her thought that perhaps she deserved to know, if not everything, then at least something. But she didn't think she had any right to a part of him. He kept himself so separate, so closed off. His story about his childhood dog was the closest he got to telling her about himself. She really did want to know the rest of that story. Sometime. When he was ready to go into it again.
She was starting to think that might happen when hell finally did freeze over.
Belle had gotten everything done in the barn as quickly as possible. It felt good to be back at it, good to be working again. Even though her muscles felt a little strained at the end of it, she still felt good about the work she had put in. And it helped settle her mind a bit, the physical exercise giving her a chance to think and work things out in her mind.
She needed to talk to Gold.
And it wouldn't wait. They had to hash this out if they were going to live together like this. It could not hang over them, making every moment fraught with a tension that threatened to spill over.
She couldn't deal with that.
She shouldn't have to deal with that.
And so there was simply no other recourse.
She had hoped that Gold would stop by the barn. He usually did, showing up just as she finished her chores and waving her out to the edge of the field, sometimes with nothing more than a crook of his finger, sometimes with a mock bow that looked utterly ridiculous but at the same time she found rather charming.
But this day there was no sign of him when she finished up. Bandit was at her side, ready to go and as she exited the barn the dog started to rush toward the field. "No girl," Belle said and the dog turned back to her. "This way." And she turned toward the house, Bandit rushing to catch up.
He was hiding. She knew that much. Gold wasn't one to face his demons, even if that demon came in the form of a five-foot-two Australian woman. He was going to today, though. God help her if she couldn't get the bastard to at least acknowledge that there was something going on between them.
She called his name almost as soon as she walked in the door, releasing Bandit to find her comfortable spot on the couch as she removed her boots.
There was no response. Which didn't surprise her, really.
She didn't find him in the living room, nor did she find him in the kitchen. The house was so quiet, no sign of Taz anywhere. So quiet that if she hadn't see his truck out front she might have believed he'd left. But he was there. Somewhere. And she'd ferret him out.
When she got to the upstairs, she could hear music playing from down the hallway. She didn't go that way often. Her room was to the right, the library she now frequented just past it. His room lay to the left and she hadn't set eyes on it since her first tour of the house.
But the music wasn't coming from there.
It was coming from a room to the far end, opposite her library. She had never really noticed the door there, set back into the wall, the dark wood blending in with the equally dark paint of the hallway. But from the light coming from under it and the doorway, she'd guess she found one of those places that Gold tended to hide out when he didn't want to deal with her.
She knocked lightly on the door and received no response. When she knocked a second time, a little harder, she was rewarded with the music being turned up. With a sigh, she brought her fist to the door and hit it as hard as she could. If it caused her to hiss in pain, well, so be it. It was a price she was willing to pay to get the damned man out there to talk.
When she went to raise her first to the door again, it suddenly swung open. "Miss French." She could barely hear his voice over the music, but the narrowed eyes, the stiff corners of his mouth told her exactly what his opinion on her disruption was.
"What the hell is that music?" She practically shouted the words as the music swelled to an even louder volume.
"Verdi, Miss French," he said as he stepped away and turned the volume down just a hair. Not much, certainly not enough to make conversation comfortable. It was a statement, that much was certain. "The Dies Irae from his Requiem Mass. The day of judgment, the day of wrath…" He stopped speaking and his eyes shut for a moment as the music pounded around them.
"You listen to this crap?"
"This crap is some of the best music ever written," he shot back. "Some of us don't like all that rock and roll nonsense you folks listen to."
Belle crossed her arms over her chest. "I prefer Satie."
"Of course you do," he said and shook his head. "What do you want? I have work to do."
"We need to talk."
"Ah, the words no man ever wants to hear." As she stepped forward, tried to skirt around him, he held out his cane to stop her. "I believe we have nothing to talk about, Miss French."
"No?" One eyebrow rose. Was he really going to do this? No, she decided. He was not. No matter how much he wanted to avoid it, she was not letting this go.
"No," he shot back and tried to turn from her. "Now if you'll excuse me…"
She reached out a hand and put it on his shoulder. He tensed beneath her grip, froze. "Why did you do it?" She wasn't even sure what she was asking about here. The kiss, saving her, beating her attacker half to death. Any of it. It didn't even matter at that moment. She needed an answer for something. They couldn't go on like this.
"Do what?" he answered with and his voice was dark and sharp as he turned his head just slightly back toward her.
"Everything." She spoke the word softly and was surprised to hear a small snarl in answer from him.
And then he was turning, facing her, and she could see his teeth slightly bared in a grimace. "You mean why did I beat that man half to death?"
"You saved me," she answered with instead. "You came to my rescue, swooped in and saved me."
"I did."
"Why?"
"Because isn't that what Prince Charming does?" His voice went up as he spoke the words, a strange high-pitched emphasis on the name that she had never heard before. His eyes were dark, darker than she remembered.
She knew she should back off.
But she also knew she wouldn't.
"Yes," she answered honestly. "It is. But you've told me before that you're not quite that type."
"I'm not."
"But you saved me." She spoke the words softly, so much so that she wasn't sure he could hear them over the music.
"Indeed," he muttered.
She could hear that and closed her eyes for a moment. "Thank you," she finally managed to say. "I don't think I ever thanked you for saving me from him."
Gold waved a hand in the air and then brought it back to his chest, fingers rubbing together. "It's no matter."
She wanted to say more about the issue, press it. There was more there. She was sure of it. But she stayed silent, watching him, waiting.
"If that's all…" he started and she could see his eyes start to shutter.
"It's not," she said and stepped closer to him. Too close really. She could see the moment he knew what she going to bring up, could see the way his shoulders tensed, the way his arms went stiff at his sides. He leaned back away from her, just slightly. Enough that she knew he wanted her to leave this.
And yet she couldn't.
The elephant in the room had to be dragged out into the open if they were going to get past this, move onto…well…whatever it was that they had here. "Why did you kiss me?"
He cleared his throat and she found herself actually smiling. Not that she enjoyed making him uncomfortable but dammit, they had to talk about this. "I don't think that's any of your business."
"You had your tongue in my mouth, it certainly is my business," she shot back. "Why did you kiss me?"
He snarled something at her and backed up, his legs hitting the desk as he did so. He let out a curse as Belle stalked closer.
She asked the question again. Maybe this wasn't the best way to go about it. He looked cornered, like a wounded animal that would do anything to escape before being eaten alive.
"Get out." The words were snarled.
"No. Why did you kiss me?"
"Miss French."
"Belle."
"Dammit, you just won't leave well enough alone will you?" His accent had thickened with his anger and just a touch of fear. He sounded frantic and desperate. But dammit, he was going to address this issue now. Before it became such an overwhelming thing that it drove a wedge between them. It was already on its way there.
"Why. Did you. Kiss me?" She tried to keep the anger out of her voice but he was not making this easy. A simple question. A simple answer. What was there between them? It clearly wasn't nothing like he was trying…and failing…to pretend.
He snarled again, incoherent and with bared teeth. "Because I bloody well wanted to." The words were almost unintelligible, but Belle manage to make sense of them just one moment before his arm came out to wrap around her waist and he hauled her up tight against him. His eyes searched hers. "Why did you kiss me?" The words were whispered and there was a sense of urgency there.
She knew if she said the wrong thing he'd back off, turn away, and this moment would be ignored like the last one. It might be the last chance she had to make something of this. Not that even she knew what she wanted. "Because I bloody well wanted to," she finally managed to respond with.
The words had barely gone past her lips when his came crashing down on hers and wasn't it just everything she remembered and then some. There was a fierceness there, a desperation, that hadn't been the last time. His arm held her tight to him, her hands came up to tangle in his hair.
When his tongue touched her lips she opened them for him, allowing him access as her hands tightened on his scalp, nails scratching him lightly. He moaned into her mouth and she answered him, tugging harder on his hair, pulling him closer. She wanted to wrap herself around him, wanted to feel every bit of him.
When he finally released her mouth and murmured her name, her first name, Belle knew he was well and truly gone and she pulled him back in for another long kiss, softer this time but no less desperate.
"Bed?" She whispered the word, breathless. She couldn't manage to get anything else out.
"Fuck yes," Gold responded with and without giving him a chance to think, tugged him out of the study and into his nearby bedroom. His, because it was closer. His, because she didn't want to give him a chance to think and decide they were making a mistake. His, because it smelled like him and she wanted to be surrounded by everything that was him in that moment.
She sat on the bed and pulled him after her and he came willingly, using his cane to leverage himself onto the bed with her and then dumping it off the side. He wouldn't need it there in the comfort of the bed.
As soon as she leaned back he followed her.
But stopped. Just inches from her lips and she opened her eyes to look back up at him. "Yes, I'm sure," she murmured to his unspoken question. He kissed her again then, lips hard against hers as she wrapped herself around him like she'd wanted to do in the study. He groaned as her leg came around him, pulled him tight to her.
She liked the weight of him there, pressed against her. It felt right somehow. It felt even more right when his lips left hers with a groan and he pulled the hair away from her neck to press kisses down the side of it, nipping lightly at the base of her neck before using his tongue to soothe the sharpness of the pain.
Without even considering what she was doing, her hands came up under his sweater and pushed it up. She wanted to feel skin, wanted to feel him against her. He left her neck for a moment to tug impatiently at the sweater, tossing it across the room before returning to her. There still wasn't enough skin for her to touch, but his forearms were bare and she was able to get her hand up underneath the undershirt he still wore, caressing his stomach and feeling the muscles bunch there.
His hand under her own shirt was tentative, soft touches of calloused fingers on her skin before closing over the lacy cup of her bra.
This wouldn't do. It simply wouldn't. And so she pulled her shirt over her head and was gratified when he reached behind her to undo the bra himself. When she was bare he stopped. Stopped. Stared. "Beautiful," he murmured and his gaze even more than the word made her feel as if she truly were. His hand cupped one of her breasts reverently and he leaned down to nose at it, breathing her in. She could feel the tickle of his breath fan out across her just before he touched his tongue to the underside of her breast and how did he know that she preferred that, that she liked to feel lips and teeth and tongue at the sensitive underside even more than the nipple.
Not that he ignored the latter, coming up to suckle lightly, tongue touching it. Her back arched and she gripped his hair and she swore to God if he stopped she would have words, harsh words, for him.
But no, he didn't stop, making his way to the other breast before pressing kisses to her stomach, nipping lightly at the skin just above where her pants ended before unbuttoning them. She helped him pull them off and her lacy panties went the same way just moments after. It felt strange being bare before someone. It had been a long time, longer than she even wanted to face. There had been things she needed to do, a sick father to care for, school, and life that just came between her and the thought of a relationship.
She let him spread her legs apart and suddenly he was there, his mouth coming down on her center and she let out a sound that even surprised her. "You don't…" She started to say. "I never…" But he didn't even seem to notice her frantic half-finished sentences.
She had never had anyone do this. Oh, she had read about it, imagined it. But her ex was adamantly against going down on her and she hadn't much dated since then. There had been no time to experiment, to try new things. Missionary position. That was the sum total of her sexual experience. Missionary position and masturbating to get herself off since her ex never seemed to much care if she did or didn't.
But now Gold was between her legs, his mouth on her, and it was glorious. His tongue lapped at her, circled her clitoris and then he sucked. He pressed one finger inside her and crooked it and she couldn't even think straight. All she could focus on was the wetness of his mouth, the motions of his tongue, that finger inside her that was joined by another. And then he hit something deep inside her and her whole body tightened for a moment before she felt herself let go, her hands gripping at his hair, keeping him there until the sensations became too much.
"Tavish," she murmured.
When she looked down at him, he was staring at her and she couldn't quite figure out exactly that look meant. "I'm sorry," he murmured.
She reached for him. "What…" she started to say, but he slipped through her grasp and backed up a pace. She could see his own arousal tenting his pants and his hand came there briefly, trying to block her view. As if it were something to be ashamed of.
"I shouldn't have," he said and she realized everything was all going terribly wrong. He was shutting himself off again, the walls going up faster than she could tear them down,
"Tavish," she crawled to the edge of the bed as he bent to pick up his cane. He moved away from her then, faster than she might have expected considering his ankle and, well, everything else. "Tavish, don't. Please."
He hesitated on the last word and she could see the hand that gripped his cane shaking. "I'm sorry," he said again. Then he was gone.
And Belle was left wondering what exactly he was sorry for.