He drove until he found a park, fresh and green and the antithesis of all that Collingwood had been. He parked the vehicle and once again handed her down, offering her his arm. For a few moments they wandered in silence, until the tension drained away from Phryne and she led him over to a bench. He sat close to her, his arm about her shoulders.
"Are you alright?" he asked eventually, not knowing what else to say.
She sighed, leaning into him. "I will be. It's just... being there brought it all back. All the things I've tried so hard to forget. Not about Janey, but about what it was like, to live like that. To have that fear always hanging over you, hunger always gnawing at you." She looked up at him from haunted eyes. "Desperation, Jack. Do you have any idea what that's like to live with?"
He nodded slowly, and at her sceptical eyebrow said simply "the trenches."
He saw understanding and sympathy in her gaze before she continued. "It's like a war, every day. You don't dare to think about the past, or the future. You don't dare to hope, or plan, or dream." Her tone hardened. "And if you want something, or someone, you don't bother to think about the consequences of your actions, or how they might feel about it. You just... take."
Jack nodded. "Mrs. Halswell said Thomas got an apprenticeship at a mechanic's in Fitzroy. We'll have to wait until tomorrow, but with luck we'll be able to track him down there. Under the circumstances, I can't see her tipping him off that we're after him."
She nodded and sighed. "Then I suppose it's time we headed back to the station."
...
She dropped into the chair across from him as he pulled paper and pen near and began working on his report. A few moments later, Collins entered with tea, handing them each a cup.
"Thank you, Constable."
"You're welcome, sir." Hugh left, pulling the door almost shut behind him. Jack sipped his tea, then sighed, regarding Phryne over the rim of his cup.
"I shouldn't have taken you with me, should I?" he observed gently.
She took a sip of her own tea, her eyes regretful. "Probably not."
He set his cup aside and walked around to her, laying a hand on her shoulder as she looked up at him, calmer now but still not her usual carefree self. "The problem is, I find it almost impossible to say no to you."
She smiled slightly at that. "As I recall, you managed it for almost two years. That's more than most men."
He chuckled softly, relieved that she could still joke. "Do you want me to stay with you tonight?" He removed his hand from her shoulder and leaned back against his desk, keeping his voice low, aware of the partially-open door, and the second, closed, door leading deeper into the station. The very walls had ears.
She sipped her tea again before answering in similarly quiet tones. "Do you want to stay with me tonight?"
"I..." he tried to think of a way to answer that could put into words all that he wanted and needed without risking hurting her. "I never want to be apart from you, Phryne, not ever. But, I don't know how to do this. The first night I spent with Rosie was our wedding night. I don't know how to be with someone I'm not married to, who I'm not sharing a home with."
"You want to go home," she interpreted without, he was relieved to see, evidence of either surprise or hurt. "A clean shirt, some time to think. Did you ever dissect a frog when you were at school?"
The tangent was so sudden and unexpected, even from her, that he could only stare at her in bemusement. "I... once, yes. Why do you ask?"
"Miss Charlesworth had us do it once. Well, some of the girls refused." She rolled her eyes, and he knew she hadn't been one of them. "You remember how it goes, I'm sure. You chloroform the poor creature, then you pin it down, peel back the skin and cut it apart, piece by piece. By the end, you know everything there is to know about how a frog works; and the frog is dead."
"I hope you're not comparing me to a frog?" he asked, amused.
"Only if you found a princess to kiss you a very long time ago. No, what I mean is, I don't know how to make this work, either, except that if we spend too much time examining it in order to work out the answer, we might very well find we've killed it in the process. At least you've been married. For the last ten years I've strenuously avoided commitment, or anything that looked like commitment, or anything that looked like it could start looking like commitment if I looked at it too long. I haven't the faintest idea how to do this, except that you're right, this isn't a marriage. You still have your home, and I assume you'd like to spend at least some time there."
He nodded, although he wasn't sure why. His house was a cold, empty, silent place, and had been for longer than he cared to think about. He couldn't simply move in with Phryne lock, stock, and barrel, but he was suddenly resolved that he would find another alternative soon, and sell the damned house that was little more than a mausoleum to dead hopes and dreams. It was time to look to the future.
"But you will always be welcome with me, Jack, in my home and in my bed. And when you're not there, I don't want you to wonder whether anyone else will be. Because there won't be anyone else." She kept her gaze levelly on his. It was a tremendous promise to make, and she felt a stab of apprehension at the enormity of trying to keep it, but she knew that she would indeed try. And she had an awful lot of try in her.
He smiled at her. "Then I shall see you here tomorrow morning."