“Picking five favorite books is like picking the five body parts you’d most like not to lose.” — Neil Gaiman
Continuing from: http://redstarfiction.tumblr.com/post/147397338885/blood-is-thicker-and-missing-link
All manner of spoilers for those who have not read the books in terms of who’s who and where and why! Thank you as ever for reading my work.
Claire looked out of the window and a faint smile touched her lip at the sight of Jamie’s children dashing to and fro in play.
“Your grace and kindness is greatly appreciated… as is your discretion.”
John watched Claire’s face as he spoke and was slightly taken aback to see her roll her eyes.
“My discretion is a moot point as soon as one looks at William and Jamie together. Perhaps you might have considered that more stringently before coming to our home.”
“Ah…”
“I trust you remembered my husband’s face well enough to know this?”
John looked into those hawkish, golden eyes and allowed his nostrils to flair slightly before answering. It was a mildly aggressive action, one that he would normally have employed against a lady but he had the notion that Jamie’s wife was unlikely to weep and flee the room, no matter what his nostrils did.
“My memory of your husband is indeed intact. His loyalties as well as his features.”
“He is deeply loyal to his family and his people.”
“Precisely.”
John absentmindedly ran his finger along the smooth glass bottle fronts that lined the shelves in the brightly lit surgery.
“Do you consider yourself to be one of Jamie’s people?”
Claire asked, turning from the window to face him. Her hair was escaping in tendrils from the pins and ribbons which had been set to bind it and John was momentarily paralysed as if she truly were a Medusa turning him to stone.
“Do I …Yes. I suppose in a way I do.”
“Why? You were his captor.”
“I was in a position by appointment and Jamie was there by chance.”
Claire snorted and John felt his fingers twitch against his leg. To raise his hand to the woman would be certain death, Jamie would pulverise him without second thought, but as her lip curved upward contemptuously, he wondered if slapping the smile from her face would be worth it.
*At least you’d die with his hands on you, what other chance is there of that?*
He thought and immediately felt his skin flush hotly in response.
“You stalked him to Helwater, kept him close … there was not much left to ‘chance’.”
Claire pressed her finger tips into the softly grained wood of her workbench and stared hard at John. There was something more between he and Jamie than Claire knew, it was a small, empty vista in her knowledge of Jamie’s time without her and she could feel the ashes on the breeze of those memories washing over her as she looked at the man before her.
“What use has a little, blonde soldier with a …”
“Giant, Highland warrior?”
John offered, cutting across her insult sharply. He had been in enough duels fought solely with words to know when he was embroiled and he knew that a claim for Jamie Fraser was at stake. Of course not the man himself, that claim rested at the feet of the woman before him as surely as night followed day; but there were smaller plots of that huge heart to be had and if he wished to stay in the shadows of the minute sector that he had, he needed to win.
“What business do either of us have with him by rights?”
“I am his wife.”
“I am his friend.”
“You were his jailer.”
“Your husband was a truly honourable man, he still is. He deserved better than deportation.”
“They all did.”
“And yet I could not save them all. I could save him.”
John stepped up to the window and looked across the green expanse that stretched into the sky line.
“So you gave him servitude?”
“He had no family to return to – or felt he did not. He had space to live and honest work.”
“He had a larger cage!”
“He found ways to entertain himself.”
John heard the sharp intake of Claire’s breath and knew that he had drawn first blood. He turned to offer a consolatory compliment on some small thing but was met with her palm whipping across his cheek with enough force to make his eyes water.
He couldn’t blame her, it had been a callous and cruel remark designed to hurt and her reaction sparked the first genuine feeling of liking John had felt toward Lady Broch Tuarach. He refused to press his hand to his burning face, straightening to meet her eyes. Neither spoke for a moment and Claire held his gaze levelly without flinching. The small spark grew within John’s chest. Fraser was right; Claire was a rare woman indeed.
“I should have liked to offer you the same treatment, but I fear where I deserve it, you do not.”
He smiled, bowing lightly and was gratified to hear her snort with amusement.
“You also wish to live through the day.”
“And that.”
John’s lip curled upwards and he held his hand out to Claire
“We do not have to love each other, but we both love him. In our own ways.”
She took his hand, squeezing lightly.
“I can see that.”
“I am sorry for the shock but I hope you can see why…”
“I can.”
Claire cut across him and reclaimed her hand.
“I … ah… understand that your daughter, Brianna, was particularly distressed…”
“She won’t say anything.”
Claire snapped and John waved her of in mild irritation
“I have no doubt of that now that her temper has cooled. I only wished to say that I do understand that I have inadvertently caused quite a stir and that it was not my intention.”
For the first time, Claire softened towards him, her brows relaxing and something in her eyes retreating, giving him a very slender benefit of whatever doubts she felt.
“Brianna adores Jamie. She understandably does not want to share his affections with another long-lost child but …”
Claire shrugged and sighed
“She will have to. I make no apologies for spoiling my children with affection; it is the one gift every parent can give and I give it in abundance.”
“I quite understand.”
John nodded and Claire tilted her head to the side appraising him.
“Yes, I rather think you do. Taking on a child is … a large undertaking.”
The unasked question hung heavily in the air between them, so prominent John almost fancied that he could see each of the three letters briefly illuminated in the sunlight, dancing alongside the dust mites ‘Why?’.
Exceptional as Claire Fraser no doubt was, John declined to offer her an explanation. If she wanted one she could ask Jamie and no doubt he could shed some light on the matter for her if he so chose.
“Would you like a compress? For your cheek?”
Claire broke the silence and gestured to John’s face, long white fingers tracing the air inches from his still flushed skin.
“Thank you but no, I’ll be fine.”
“Of that I am sure.”
Claire inclined her head slightly and John realised he had been dismissed.
“Bloody Frasers!”
He muttered, closing the door softly behind him.
*
“What have we done?”
The voice, a little deeper than he had imagined, startled him and John looked round almost directly into the depths of the girls slanted cat eyes, the exact same shade as Willie’s … as Jamie’s.
“Pardon?”
“You said ‘Bloody Frasers’ – I wondered what we had done?”
The wide, full lipped mouth turned upwards in a mischievous smile that he had seen in his dreams more times than he dared to try and recall. John stepped away from the surgery door and made his way down the corridor, aiming for Jamie’s study and hopefully some refuge from the Fraser women.
“Ah … I …”
“Da says that you overheard my temper and that I am to apologise. I’m sorry for any discomfort caused.”
Brianna flicked a long strand of red hair over her shoulder nonchalantly and dipped into a miniscule and rigid curtesy. John fought back a smile but couldn’t resist one small snort of amusement.
“I see you inherited your father’s ability to earnestly say one thing, whilst leaving no trace of doubt that you mean quite the opposite.”
Brianna stood and blinked slowly at him, her face carefully blank.
“May I tell my father that you accept my apology?”
John pursed his lips. He was used to being bested by Fraser and accepted grudgingly that Fraser’s wife was also likely to have the best of him but he was damned if the next generation would have the run of him so easily.
“No, not yet.”
Brianna’s eyes narrowed but she forced her expression back to a neutral position.
“How old are you my dear?”
“Thirteen.”
“A curious age for any person.”
Brianna remained impassive, simply cocking one ruddy eyebrow at him and John bit his lip lightly
“Your mother assures me you won’t say anything …”
“About what?”
Brianna cocked her head innocently to the side and John noticed the first glimmers of Claire about her.
*Not a delicate blossom then.*
He thought and clasped his hands behind his back
“You know what I mean Miss Fraser. I should like to have your assurances.”
“The perhaps you ought tell me what you want.”
“I …”
“I can manage Latin, Gaelic or French if you cannot quite grasp English?”
“Brianna.”
The word ripped through the air between them like static electricity and John felt the hairs on the back of his arms stand up. Jamie stepped around the corner, cat-like in his menacing grace.
*Which of us is the mouse?*
John wondered briefly before his full attention was taken up by Jamie.
“I told ye to apologise, no’ further insult our guest.”
“I did apologise, he didn’t accept it.”
Bree turned her face stubbornly toward her father and John marvelled at the two of them stood like Viking raiders, ferociously carved in pale marble, impervious to all around them.
“Then ye seek to make peace, ye dinna exacerbate the situation by asking impertinent questions.”
“But I …”
“Seas!”
Jamie held up a hand and turned to face John in the same movement taking an iron like grip on his daughter’s arm.
“I am sorry for my child’s rudeness. It has been a deeply turbulent day, but it does not excuse such behaviour.”
John saw Jamie look down his nose at Brianna as he spoke and noticed a look of uncertainty cross her features. John himself felt particularly awkward. He had not intended for Brianna to get into trouble and he had rather goaded her…
“I’m sorry, what?”
Jamie had said something to him and John had completely missed it.
“I asked if ye would have me punish her for it?”
“Da!”
Brianna hissed and Jamie cocked an eyebrow at her.
“Ye ken ye are no too old to ha’ ye arse skelped lass and the lungs ye ha’ it wouldna remain secret for long anyway.”
The colour of the girls face almost matched her flaming hair and John felt truly sorry for her. He remembered a similar situation with his mother when he was more or less the same age and it had almost crippled his young pride.
“I would sooner you did not. I should have accepted your daughter’s apology immediately, not riled her further.”
He stammered. John was not against discipline but the thought of the young daughter of his beloved Jamie being beaten because he was trying to score back points he had lost to her mother …
“Are ye sure?”
Jamie raised both eyebrows at John and the younger man closed his eyes for a moment, striving for both strength and patience.
“Absolutely. Do not thrash her, Jamie. Please.”
Jamie made a noise at the back of his throat and looked down at the girl
“Then we’ll take that apology again, if ye please Brianna?”
“I’m sorry Lord John, please forgive my outburst.”
“I accept your apology Miss Fraser.”
John bowed in the same moment as Brianna curtsied.
“Good. Now ye aunt requires help in the kitchen and I wish ye to provide it.”
Jamie spoke firmly knowing that Brianna would likely prefer to hide in her room, but pulverising the venison steak for dinner would do her more good.
“As ye say father.”
Jamie stiffened slightly at the tone of her voice and sent her on her way with a sharp slap to the bottom that no doubt contributed to the slamming of the kitchen door a few seconds later.
“That was bloody mortifying!”
John snapped as soon as the reverberations of the door quietened
“Weel, it didna seem appropriate to bash ye heads together.”
“You … you bloody did that on purpose? Do you have any idea how excruciating that was?”
“Aye, as it happens I do; and ye didna get the worst end o’ it.”
Jamie spoke mildly but John knew well enough that he was still vexed from his encounter with his daughter.
“No I don’t suppose I did, which is surprising.”
Jamie shrugged, a small smile playing at the corner of his mouth
“Mmmphm. She is bonnie and braw and I love her more dearly than I can say, but I also ken that she is wild and temperamental and doesna ken her place nor hold her tongue near enough as much as she should.”
Jamie grinned at John
“I was as bad and worse at her age and I dinna begrudge her it, but all the same she has to learn.”
His smile faltered and he sighed heavily
“The world doesna look kindly on those who dinna bide and I would see her well prepared for it.”
John nodded and puffed out his cheeks
“To be a father, eh?”
“I am trusting that ye will be a fine one.”
Jamie murmured and placed a hand on John’s shoulder gently.
“I am trusting ye wi’ one third o’ my heart, John.”
“And I shall endeavour not to let you down.”
John bowed gravely and Jamie’s smile returned.
“Ye made a wee bit o’ peace wi’ Claire I take it?”
“Something like that.”
“Good.”
John cleared his throat.
“It really has been a tiring couple of hours. Do you think perhaps taking Willie and maybe Robert out riding might be a light break for all concerned?”
Jamie nodded,
“I will invite Bree as well, though I doubt she will be favouring me wi’ her company for a while.”
“No, I rather doubt she will.”
John said dryly and Jamie laughed; a sound that made every other heartache and humiliation John had endured that day more than worth it.
“I’ll fetch the boys.”
*
