Chapter 28: Rosehip

Jack awoke in the grey morning light shivering. The warm body usually keeping him warm was absent and he was still wondering if he wanted to go looking for her when Phryne quietly pushed open the door, two cups in hand. The smell of coffee wafted through the bedroom and Jack smiled at his lover.

"You have made your point, Miss Fisher."

With a grin, she sat down on her side, sneaking her cold feet back under the duvet and handing him his cup.

"It was a rather long night," she stated, snuggling up to him.

Jack took a sip, wrapping an arm around her. This was exactly how he imagined heaven. Then something occurred to him.

"Phryne, it's all a little hasty now, but... my father had a proposal for you last night," he said. She hummed sleepily against his shoulder. Jack fished the ring from his nightstand's drawer, holding it in front of her eyes. With some effort Miss Fisher pried an eye open, staring at it.

"Your father wants to marry me?" she grinned.

"He is a little late for that," Jack joked.

"Oh, I don't know. We haven't tied the knot just yet."

Phryne pulled herself into a sitting position, studying the piece closer, while the Inspector watched her, waiting for her verdict.

"It's your mother's isn't it?" she finally asked.

Jack nodded, swallowing nervously.

"Please understand there is no pressure, Phryne. It is an offer. If you do not feel comfortable with a ring that belonged to a dead woman you have never met, I understand."

Phryne looked up into the sincere eyes of her future husband, reading him like a book. She trailed her hand down his cheek and Jack leaned into her comforting embrace. It would have been nice, he thought sadly, but it didn't really matter.

"Of course, I'll wear it."

He ripped open his eyes to look at her. She smiled.

"Your father has brought this with him to Daylesford, so it is obviously very precious to him. And yet, he has given it to us. I am not going to refuse a peace offering, Jack."

She gently pressed a kiss to his still wordless lips.

"And also your mother did have excellent taste."

Jack allowed himself a wry smile and Phryne laid the ring back into his palm.

"She was a very special woman," the Inspector said, looking at the little circlet.

"I had gathered that," Miss Fisher smiled. "And there is no doubt on my mind about wearing her ring. I would be honoured."

Jack nodded at that, closing his fingers over the gold band that suddenly held so much more meaning than ever before.

"So, when were you thinking of doing this, Inspector?" Phryne asked beside him. He stared at her startled and cleared his throat.

"I hadn't really thought about that yet, Miss Fisher. There is no rush."

"Well," Phryne said, rolling onto her back, "if you are intent on getting married in the grounds of Wombat hall, there might be. It is becoming autumn fast and I do not wish for my lips to freeze together before I can utter my vows."

"We might have to wait for spring then," Jack said, trying to hide his disappointment by sipping his coffee.

Phryne looked up at him, a cheeky smile appearing on her face.

"Or we could do it right here and now."

To his credit, the Inspector didn't splutter any coffee onto the white sheets. But his voice sounded a little ragged, when he resurfaced from his attempts to contain the hot beverage in his mouth.

"Now?"

"Well we are already here, Jack. So are most of the people we care about. We might as well get this over with, before your father changes his mind about his approval."

Jack raised his eyebrows.

"'Getting it over with' is not quite how I want to approach our wedding, Miss Fisher."

She rolled her eyes at him and leaned on her elbow.

"Oh, don't be so literal, Jack. We know we will get married, so we might as well do it tomorrow as next year. And I honestly don't want to wait till next year."

He smiled at her, his heart fluttering in his chest.

"Tomorrow might not be quite possible. There is some bureaucracy attached to a wedding, Miss Fisher."

"You would not believe the things that are possible, Inspector," Phryne smirked, "with enough money and a nice little title. But you will find out, once you are my husband."

She kissed him and rolled herself out of bed.

"Where are you going?" he asked, watching her get dressed.

"Well, even with my riches at hand a wedding licence isn't going to fly through the door by itself. And also," she stepped to the bed and lifted his arm to check his watch, "Hugh is due to arrive at the train station in three hours. By then we should have talked to your family, found out when exactly Mr. Barton is back from Sydney and looked through the Coroner's report."

Jack sighed without any sincerity and dragged himself out of bed. He had kind of hoped for a nice quiet morning in bed, but with Miss Fisher by his side, that wasn't to be. Yet, the idea of applying for a marriage licence made him feel more giddy with excitement, than such a piece of bureaucracy by rights should have.

"I think I also need to talk to Mac," Phryne tore him from his thoughts. "I don't mind personally, but I do fear that Aunt Prudence is not going to take kindly to their nightly activities, should she discover them."

Jack had up till now tried to avoid wondering where the noises he heard last night had come from.

"They have nowhere else to go," he pointed out, buttoning his cuffs.

"I know that, Jack," Phryne sighed, making him wonder for a moment, if she did mind after all. He didn't expect such a reaction from her. Miss Fisher was all about breaking as many rules of society as possible and she did adore Mac. But then, maybe the reality of her friend parading her sexuality around in front of her eyes was more confronting than the abstract. To his surprise, Phryne sat down, sighing.

"I am worried, Jack. Mac is losing her heart and fast. And while I like your cousin, your family is not exactly free from prejudice."

He sank down beside her, nodding in silent agreement.

"It's hard, not living up to expectations," he said, after a moment of silence, thinking about all the pain it had brought him over the years. To his surprise, he didn't get an answer. When he looked up, Phryne had visibly paled and sat stiffly at the edge of the bed.

"Jack, there is something I feel I need to ask," she said. Jack gulped. The seriousness in her voice scared him even more than her white face. When she looked up at him, her eyes were bright and huge.

"Are you really, absolutely certain that you want to go through with the wedding?" she asked into the silence. Jack felt his heart stop, then it kept going, pounding painfully in his chest. He felt numb.

"Phryne," he finally croaked out, "please don't do this to me."

He rubbed his face with both palms, resolving to stare at the floor. He wasn't sure if he could have stopped himself from crying if he looked at her.

"Jack..."

Phryne trailed off, not certain, what she could say. She felt he had misunderstood her completely.

"I never wanted to force you into marriage. If you don't want this, we call the whole thing off," Jack said in sudden resolve. His lover still looked at him stunned.

"I'm sure your father would appreciate us returning to our previous state of sin," she joked finally.

"I couldn't care less," Jack lied. "I want to..." he trailed off, deciding on honesty, "I need to be with you, Phryne. And I want you to be happy. If that requires that we keep living in any form of immoral arrangement, so be it."

He looked up at her, discovering the tears in her eyes and felt his throat tighten. She couldn't mean to end this, could she? Jack Robinson knew that a blown engagement usually didn't mean that only the wedding was off. But he hadn't anticipated that their wedding plans could endanger what they had. It was too strong, too right.

"Please," he heard himself beg, grabbing her hands. They were ice cold. A silent tear dripped onto his fingers, then a hand cupped his cheek.
"Jack, what are you on about?"

He looked at her, confused to find soft, wet eyes looking at him with so much love that it took his breath away. He shook his head slowly, trying to understand.

"I want to be your wife," she whispered. "But I need you to understand, that we are not going to have children. Other than Jane," she added on afterthought.

It was his turn to be speechless, as she babbled on.

"It's not like marriage, Jack. I am not going to change my mind about this. And I see you with Lizzy and I..." she paused to swallow down the knot in her throat, "I can tell that you want this, Jack. You're good at it and you should be a father. I cannot give you that without betraying myself, so please, if this is something you need, you need to go. Now. I can..." she paused, as her voice broke, "I can let you go today, but once you have promised me eternity, I will hold you to it," she ended with a teary half-smile.

Jack escaped her grasp, pulling himself to his feet, as if sitting down he could not control his racing thoughts. Miss Fisher tried to ignore the pain in her chest, threatening to suffocate her. So this was when the choice would be made. He spun, looking at her with red eyes.

"Phryne, has it never occurred to you that I have been married for 16 years, without having a family?"

She gaped at him. Truth be told, she had avoided thinking too hard about his marriage so far. Or his sex life with Rosie, which she was quite sure was necessary for the conception of children, even in proper families. He crouched down in front of her, when she just wordlessly shook her head.

"We tried, two years before the war. Six years after," he said calmly, grasping for her hands. Phryne didn't move.

"Considering that and the fact that you probably don't have your family planning device at hand when we lose our heads somewhere in a random lavender field, I believe it is safe to say that I might not be capable of having children of my own."

Phryne swallowed, realising that this, while a relief for her, was huge for Jack. There was pain attached to it and she had just stirred it up again.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, pressing his sweaty hands.

"Don't be," he smiled tearily. "I have given up on being a father many years ago. I have gotten over it. And here you come, Phryne, and you give me a daughter."

Now he was openly crying and Miss Fisher decided that it was only fair to stop pretending and join in. Pictures came back to her, while she stroked his wet face, pictures of last night that she had been too distracted to let properly sink in. Jack laughing at Jane's interpretation of the London Bridge, them whispering together, while Will tried to demonstrate an Amazon on a horseback. The two of them sharing playfully cutting remarks about Hazel's last move, which for sure had let Mac win the round. Phryne had been too busy wondering if Jack wanted to be a father, to see that he was already working on it. She felt like a fool.

His fingers came up to wipe a wet lock from her face in an intimate, gentle gesture that meant more than any words he could have uttered and she leaned her hot, tired forehead against his.

"I love you," she heard herself whisper, "so don't you dare cancel our wedding."

"As you wish," he smiled. "But," he glanced at his watch, "if you still want to tell our families and apply for a licence we had better get on our way."

Phryne thought about this. She had fully intended to pull him into bed and make love to him till they were both worn out enough to go back to sleep. But sadly, he was right. She couldn't have it both ways. She sighed, kissing a left-over tear from Jack's cheek, before pulling herself upright, followed by the Inspector.

"You know, reason really is a very annoying habit."

"I know, Miss Fisher," he grinned, finally managing to finish buttoning his shirt before capturing her head and kissing her in a way that made her almost regret her decision. "But we do have a lifetime to be unreasonable."

X

The two women sat, their heads leaned against the bed frame, wrapped in the duvet. Soon they would have to get up and surely Rupert would miss his wife when he woke. But for the moment they were just happy to be were they were. Feeling connected again after a sleepless night.

"So, how did you know?" Hazel asked quietly, bringing up the subject, they had in all their talking not really returned to after they had retreated from the cold hall.

"A certain glimmer in your eyes," Iris smiled. "Some looks here, some gestures there. It wasn't all that hard to guess."

Hazel looked at her with huge eyes. She had never told her sister about her preference for her own gender. It had been hard sometimes, not sharing it with anyone.

"I expected you to be more shocked," she finally admitted quietly. Iris shrugged.

"I was a little, when I found out. Then I waited for you to tell me. It has been a few years since then."

"You never said anything."

Iris tried to wrap her cold feet tighter into the blanket.

"It wasn't my secret to share. I was waiting for you," she explained. Hazel let that sink in.

"Who else knows?" she asked into the resulting silence.

"Only Jack. He pointed it out to me, even though I believe he didn't really mean to."

Hazel pulled her shoulders together in a gesture, her sister knew since they had been little. She was feeling guilty and scared.

"I didn't think it was that obvious," she admitted miserably.

"He is a detective," Mrs. Walker smiled. "And I am quite certain that his watchful eye wouldn't have missed Doctor MacMillan's preferences either. They are friends as far as I can decipher."

Hazel snuggled back under the covers, taking her sisters hand, who was looking at her quietly.

"I think I might be falling in love," she whispered, with a faint grin to her face. Iris mirrored her smile.

"And I think you need to tell me everything about it," she whispered back, then frowned in thought. "Actually, leave the bawdy details out, if you don't mind. But tell me all the rest of it."