Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Tu aurais pu mourir! Tout aurait pu aller mal, tu aurais pu mourir, et comment cela m'affecterais-tu?! Moi?! Nous?!” The Honourable Phryne Fisher took a breath as she stormed into her sea-blue parlour, and threw her cloche to the floor, pulling at the buttons on her coat and stripping her sodden gloves off of her hands. Jack Robinson entered the room on her heels, shaking his head at Mr. Butler when he had offered to take his coat, and forcing a smile at Dot as she noted his appearance in the household, how he had followed her mistress inside and out of the rain.

It had been one of those cases, she thought to herself, leaning on the dining room table and continuing folding the pile of laundry which had just returned from the Covent. One of those cases where Miss Fisher had been respectfully told to stay home, where the Inspector had locked eyes with her, pleaded with her to stay sat at her kitchen table for her own good, and to not up and bounce into the fray of bullets that would likely be a result of the criminals that City South had found themselves dealing with this time. Of course, thought Dot, Miss Fisher hadn’t listened. Not ten minutes after the Inspector had left, she was grabbing her gloves, tugging a bright red cloche down over her hair, and placing her pearl handled pistol in her handbag. The handbag was swung onto her shoulder, a dagger was shoved into her garter, and with the click-clack of heels, she had been off, telling the general household to not come after her, and to certainly not try and get ahold of Jack to let him know she would be joining him. Dot had sighed to herself as she heard the Hispano pull away from the curb. Miss Fisher never did listen.

This time, or so it seemed, her own penchant for not listening had gotten Phryne into some hot water. All Dot could hear from the parlour (even though the door was closed!) was a tirade of angry French, and every so often, the Inspector trying to raise his voice. These attempts were always in vain, however, as each time he was cut off by an even louder foreign outburst. Dot sighed into the stockings. It would be a long evening.

“Pourquoi tu ne comprends pas ça? Je ne peux pas rester à la maison et ne rien faire! Et si tu étais blessé?! Qu'est-ce que Collins pourrait faire!?” Phryne’s breathing was ragged as she paced the room, her soaked dress clinging to her skin, her body cold even with the fire that was roaring in the grate. She couldn’t bring herself to make eye contact with Jack, who had simply seated himself in his usual armchair, and was looking at her with a mix of confusion and terror in his eyes. She gulped. Why was she doing this, again? Ah. Right.

The Belcharana gang. Well known for knife fights, illegal liquor smuggling, and now, apparently, the murder of well-to-do women in and around Melbourne proper. Their most recent target? A Mrs Annabelle Rosin, 37 years old, killed while she was sat reading her Sunday paper. Her husband had left for the weekend, on business (or so it had seemed at the time), and she was found by her youngest child. The case itself had been simple enough to solve: Mr Rosin of course, had not simply ‘gone away for business’, and had been working to try and persuade the gang to stop smuggling liquor into the country. Even if the appropriated liquor did help his own business (for he ran a bar in Centre City), he was beginning to find that the gangs were becoming too rowdy. Their couple of murders had become a string of murders, killing multiple women in hopes as to get to their husbands, and continue their own illegal trading.

Jack had been most adamant that he went to the Rosin household alone, after an anonymous tip-off had alerted them that the gang were due back there to fetch the last of Rosin’s money. He had sat down with Miss Fisher on the afternoon before, and when she sat on his desk, had rested one hand on her knee.
“You can’t come to this raid, Miss Fisher.” he passed her a white peach out of the picnic basket she had bought, and she had bitten into it with a pout.
“But whyyyyy, Jack?”
She munched her peach thoughtfully while Jack continued speaking.
“Because, Miss Fisher.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“I don’t want you to get hurt. If they’re targeting high society women with fortunes anyway, who knows what they’ll do with one who just walks into their path!”
Miss Fisher, as per usual, had put up a fight, picking holes in his reasoning and kicking her heels against his desk like a child, deeming his rule over her partaking as ‘utterly unfair’.
He had sighed at that point, and made sure to tell himself to go to Wardlow before the raid tomorrow, make sure she was sat firmly at her kitchen table with a novel, and then go on his way, assured that she was safe and sound.

He had done that, he told himself as he sat in his usual armchair, and now look where he was. Stuck with an angry Miss Fisher, yelling at him in a language he couldn’t even begin to comprehend. It was at this point he wished he had tried a little harder to learn French during the war. It would be of help to him now, and if this were ever to happen again, of help in the future.

“Je n'allais pas te laisser partir seul!”

He was snapped out of his thoughts with another wave of angry foreign speech, and looked up at the woman who just couldn’t keep herself away from crime. Her eyes were steely, her mouth set in a grim line, and her fists were clenched at her sides. She was still pacing.

Jack, although having no idea what was going on, had a pretty decent idea of why she was so mad. She wasn’t used to the idea of him being alone and in danger. She was used to them being in danger together, which was how they had ended up after she threw herself into this raid!

He clenched and unclenched his jaw as she went on. Admittedly, he was glad she had turned up when she did, for he had been completely outnumbered, seven to one. His gun had been kicked to the floor in a scuffle when he first entered the Rosin residence, and all of the Belcharana gang had been armed. Of course, she had swooped in, pistol in hand, in that deeper, authoritative voice, and given the men a stern talking to, and a gunshot wound in a couple of their legs. He wouldn’t be telling the commissioner it had been her gun that shot the men, but he was thankful for it nonetheless.

“Tu serais mort maintenant!”
That much he understood. He would be dead now, and, honestly, Phryne, irritatingly and as per usual, was right. He stood up, and going over to where she was still pacing the floor, grabbed her wrists, turning her to face him.

Her eyes suddenly widened and she tried to get out of his grip, struggling her arms one way, then the other.
“Miss Fisher,” Jack all but growled,
“Don’t yell at me in languages I don’t understand.”
His tone was firm, and Phryne blinked, falling uncharacteristically silent. Jack faltered and released her wrists.
“Phryne?”
She sniffed, and he noticed that in the last five seconds or so, she had teared up. When she opened her mouth and no words came out, Jack lead her carefully to the chair in which he had been sat, before kneeling down next to her, and waiting. He wasn’t going to force her to talk, but if she was willing to, then he would listen.

When Phryne finally did talk, her voice was soft, muted by the fact she was trying to hold in tears. The salty droplets made their way down her face regardless, and she tucked her legs under herself on the chair, picking at the wet hem of her scarf.
“I was- I was scared.” her words were mumbled, and Jack strained to hear them.
“I didn’t want you to get hurt- I knew- I knew if I left you to your own devices, the next person on Mac’s autopsy table would be you.”
Jack reaches out and clasped her hand in his own, rubbing circles in her cold skin.
“I would never let that happen, Phryne.” he said, cautiously meeting her eye.
“But what if it did?” her voice was barely a whisper.
“I couldn’t live with myself if I let you go somewhere that dangerous, alone. I would be beside myself, Jack, if you died.”
She gulped.
“If you died, and I knew I could have been there to change matters, I wouldn’t be able to go on.”
She hung her head, and her black hair fell into her eyes, shielding them from Jack as she started to cry. Sobs wracked her body, and without even questioning his actions, Jack wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close into his chest. Once the sobs had resided slightly, she looked at Jack.
“You won’t be able to get rid of me, you know.”
Detective Inspector Jack Robinson had met many women in his life, but Phryne was different.
He clasped her tiny hand in his own.
“I’m fully aware, Miss Fisher. Just be more careful.”
A slightly laugh escaped her lips.
“Me? Careful? Oh, Jack. If anyone should be careful, it’s you.”

Jack stood up, and walking over to the cart where the Fisher household kept their whiskey, poured a measure for both of them. When he returned to Phryne, she scooted over in her chair, patting the space next to her, and after handing her the couple of fingers worth of drink, sat down. She immediately leant into his side, and Jack wrapped one arm around her as they gazed into the fire that had finally started to warm the room. After a while, he felt her body begin to slump, and removed the whiskey from her hands, before tucking his overcoat around her.
“I’ll be careful, Miss Fisher.” he murmured to her dozing form,
“But only if you will be too.”