Chapter Text
Creatures of stillness pressed out of the clear
unravelled forest from lair and nest;
and it came to pass, that not by cunning
and not out of fear were they made so quiet,
but simply out of hearing.
– Rainer Maria Rilke, Sonnets to Orpheus, “First Sonnet”
He’d wired her that he would be in London to meet her in time for the New Year. The telegram was propped against the ornate modern brass lamp on her bedside table as if it were a love letter (which it might as well have been) or an invitation (which she certainly hoped it was).
Phryne Fisher, alone for the evening in her flat, as she often preferred to be these days, reclined naked on her bed after her evening bath and regarded the telegram with a mixture of excitement and apprehension. He would be here in less than two weeks, and then... what? “Come after me, Jack Robinson,” she had ordered him, and he had risen to the challenge and called her bluff, if bluff he thought it was. But then what had she expected to happen? That he would travel halfway around the world appear on her doorstep in black tie without any indication that she wanted more than a fling?
The truth was, Phryne hadn’t thought. At all. Not about flying her father home, not about daring Jack to follow her, not about kissing him eagerly when he tugged her into his demanding embrace. If he hadn’t pulled away for breath, she might well have studiously not thought about having her way with him right there on the air field, in full view of her father.
“Come after me, Jack Robinson.”
She had tried to make that clear, in the language that they had established as their own, in the playful, painful, purposeful give-and-take that marked all of their interactions, that she wanted him with her. She couldn’t promise always. Always was too frightening a prospect. But she could give him… what?
“‘She makes hungry, where most she satisfies...’”
“And I’m not here to apologize...”
“Come after me, Jack Robinson.”
Phryne sighed and slid her hands down her soap-clean body. She luxuriated in the feeling of satin coverlets against her skin, compared it to the feeling of Jack’s lips on her, and found it wanting. Wanting… she wanted him. As a lover, as a sparring partner, as an integral part of her life. Part of the tapestry, part of the dance.
“I think we’re more of a waltz, Miss Fisher…”
“Steady me any time, Inspector.”
“Come after me, Jack Robinson.”
Her hands dragged lazily over her breasts, tugging at her nipples, tracing her familiar contours with smooth fingers, remembering less-smooth fingers gentle against her bruised throat, in that dangerous delicious breathless moment that had been so sweetly promising and so quickly spoiled. If Dottie hadn’t walked in… what might have happened? The way he had touched her, met her joking in kind, the way he had looked at her, lips barely smiling, eyes blue and wicked and laughing, had promised… much.
“Would you like me to improve on it?”
“More than anything.”
“Come after me, Jack Robinson.”
She parted her folds and sank her fingers into her eager wetness, and lost herself in the memory of his voice, husky and low in the cool night air, his hand under her coat and warm against the small of her back, through the thin crepe of her blouse… and then later, with the oil-and-grass-scented breeze blowing about them, his hand in her hair and his tongue in her mouth.
“Come after me, Jack Robinson.”
“Say it again.”
“Come after me, Jack Robinson”… Jack, Jack… come after me… come…
“Oh Jack, Jack!”
She felt into the afterglow of the dream of his arms, and stayed there. She could have stayed there forever, and that was not nearly as terrifying an idea as she’d once thought.
Something jerked her awake, suddenly and unpleasantly.
She looked around in bleary-eyed confusion. Morning light trickled through her curtains, and there was a commotion in the hall.