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forasecondtherewedwon · 3 years ago

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Sailors’ Hands

Fandom: Why Didn’t They Ask Evans? Pairing: Frankie Derwent/Bobby Jones Rating: E Word Count: 5797

Summary: He was undoing the cuffs of his shirt. He was rolling them up in tidy folds that brought his sleeves to just below his elbows. She couldn’t form the words that would jokingly inquire whether Lieutenant Jones was preparing for filthy hands, she could only study him, his practiced readying.

She needed to go before he could, and she needed to kiss him before she went. He stood there so stoically, on the steps of her absentminded father’s house, braving her gusto, her verve. His posture was—she knew this one—at ease, but only in the military sense; behind his back, both hands grasped his twisted cap. She knew she made him nervous. That his heart, even now, leapt like a caged rabbit in his chest when she passed in front of him, when she let her pleated skirt flap against her legs and tossed her head so the perfume she’d sprayed on her neck while she changed would be carried to his nose by a conspiratorial gust of air.

He was going to London tomorrow and, at this moment, she could only flee as far as the house, but it was imperative that she make her escape so as not to have to witness him walking away from her.

A nice boy (like Bobby Jones most definitely was) was meant to make himself rigid with terror at the first warning sign of incoming physical affection, to be shocked (as only nice boys truly could be) that a pair of painted, smirking lips had found his cheek. But somewhere along the way, as she stepped quickly from there to here, they set themselves on rather a different path.

She intended the parting peck to take him by surprise. The turning of his face slightly towards hers rather than slightly away surprised her instead. Her mouth skimmed across the corner of his. She felt his quick breath in and out, smelt his sun-warmed skin, and then it was done. She had kissed him. Or possibly he her.

She only jerked her head back. He took a step the size of a long stride, hands now in front of him, abusing that poor cap.

“Frankie…” he began, hanging his golden head and staring fixedly at the lawn. She might’ve been his superior officer, primed to berate him for conduct unbecoming or some such, not that she could imagine he’d ever found himself in that position. “I am so sincerely sorry—”

“That you kissed me?” she cut in sharply.

“I swear I didn’t mean to.”

“No,” she teased, leaning wryly away from him on her back foot to assess his posture of contrition, “of course you didn’t. Why would you ever want to do something so dreadful?”

She was grinning now, showing her teeth, if he would only look up to see it. Though he could undoubtedly hear it in her voice.

“You’re putting words in my mouth,” Bobby accused, toughening up now, defending himself against her merciless mischief.

“Is that where they ended up? I do tend to fling them about so carelessly.”

He raised his head and she grinned at him, squinting against the bright sunshine.

“It was an accident,” he said with earnest firmness.

“And the next?”

“Next?”

Frankie bit her lip with pre-emptive joy before moving forward with a step that was almost a skip, aiming her face at his. Wearing an expression of alarm, Bobby dodged her, throwing a glance at the tall windows along the back of the house. Some had the curtains drawn, some did not. What did she care? Her mother and father were busy quarrelling about a dress and dear Mr. Singh wouldn’t say a word to anyone, lovely, loyal fellow that he was.

“A hasty retreat is it, Bobby Jones?” Frankie taunted, adopting his earlier stance with her hands clasped behind her.

“Are you calling me a coward?”

There was a flicker—there, his eyebrow—that said he longed to be amused and yet was forbidding himself the surrender, unsure in the face of her attack and trying so damned hard to be proper.

“You certainly stole a look at the house like you were afraid of being caught.”

“Frankie, this isn’t very funny.”

“I’m not laughing, only smiling.”

“I wish you wouldn’t…” Bobby grimaced and sighed heavily, turning away from her.

Frankie frowned.

For a few seconds, she stared silently at his back (damn him). What a serious man he might’ve seemed, had she not known him. How dutiful—how good. He tipped his face towards the ground and then the pale, hard sky. The main thing he appeared to be feeling was frustration. Luckily, that was entirely the product of the glummer side of his imagination and she was happy to tell him so.

“This is your fault,” Frankie announced. “If only you would quit trying to believe you don’t deserve me.”

He spun, exasperated. She offered her softest smile, to be kind after her bluntness, to let him see she had only revealed him to himself.

“Pig-headed prig,” she added moments later, because his self-realization was taking a smidge too long to coalesce among his obstinate features. “Unless you really don’t want to kiss me.”

“You know that I can’t, and if you’re teasing me with any sincerity, well. You know it’s cruel.” His eyes held hers. Yes, it would be cruel to bait a good man who looked at her like that.

“It’s only cruel because you insist on suffering.”

A laugh burst from his mouth.

“Suppose we walked down to the treeline,” she prompted, nodding her chin down the slope of the hill on which the house sat. There was a second set of stone stairs, just there, where the hill fell away. It really wasn’t far. Completely out of view of the house.

She got a thrill at the understanding in the turned-up corner of Bobby’s mouth.

“Suppose we didn’t,” he countered. His noble sense of propriety really was infuriating, and he employed it with such obvious satisfaction at her expense.

“We might find some wild strawberries.”

“In the shade? Currants, more likely.”

“Well, some of those then. What do you say?” She folded her hands in front of her daintily.

He appraised her, then had the audacity to shake his head.

“Afraid I’d better go.”

Bobby made as though to turn away and the words rushed from Frankie.

“Naturally, it doesn’t mean much that we’ve stumbled upon one another again after however many years, and that you’ve almost died,” she said flippantly.

He froze.

She felt a stab at the memory of the terrible condition he’d been in the night of the carnival and pressed her palm hard against her stomach to suppress it. She narrowed her eyes at him.

“Do you really still believe I could care one way or another about you becoming a used-car salesman? The only thing I need for you to be is alive.”

He squared his feet to hers and looked at her. His eyes were full of gentleness; she was terrified that it would morph into pity. Poor, selfish Frankie, manipulating him just to get her own way. She didn’t want to see it, didn’t want kind words of reassurance that he was alright, that he would always be alright. Lies for children. He mustn’t treat her as a delicate young lady on the verge of falling to pieces, or as a worrying sister. How awful.

What a relief when Bobby cracked a smile and said, “You make quite a fuss for some strawberries.”

“Currants,” she corrected with a tentative smile of her own.

“You sure you want to risk it?” He glanced at the descending steps, though Frankie knew he didn’t mean those.

“It’s only a walk, Steve,” Frankie said with a smirk. She reached for the knot of his tie and wiggled it playfully against his throat. “Can’t I tempt you?”

She beamed when he took the first steps, then followed, leaving London, the house, and trench coat unrealities behind.

—

He took some coaxing yet. She effectively took her life in her hands forcefully tripping over the fat, protruding root of an old oak just so he would throw out his arms and catch her. But really, he’d been ambling along as though this were a woodsy stroll for the sake of their health. Positively maddening. What on earth was she supposed to do?

“That’s better,” she said, grinning at the steady press of Bobby’s hand against her back.

He swallowed and attempted to right her balance. She wouldn’t make it easy; she entrusted her weight to the support of his arm, seized his shoulder to keep him near when he attempted to give her space, teetered her tragically unreliable ankles on her espadrilles. A lovely blond curl had fallen across Bobby’s forehead.

“Frankie,” he said, “I still—”

“Wish to persist in annoying me. Yes, you’re working very hard at it.”

There was a compromise as she stood on her own but refused to be separated from him completely. His arm, where she gripped it, was solid. She thought of all that filthy rigging he had mentioned. She thought of the tension of heavy rope, the relied-upon strength of braided cables and greased chains. The harshness of the sun was scattered and softened by the foliage up above, dappling the earth with patches of light and shade. As she held on to the clean, white sleeve of Bobby’s shirt, everything that existed beyond this spot felt a world away. Temporarily callous, she considered that even a murder in cold blood seemed inconsequential.

“What if they saw you come down here with me?” he asked.

Frankie laughed blithely.

“With sweet, responsible Bobby Jones? They’d think nothing of it. A pair of old chums on a half-hearted hunt for some wild berries, that’s what we are, isn’t it?” With her eyes, she goaded him.

At last, Bobby inclined his head and gently kissed her. Their first proper kiss. Her eyelashes fluttered, resisting the closing, eager for a glimpse of his own lowered lashes and the expression he might wear, the potential war fought on the front that was his brow. Was that furrowing an indication of focus or restraint? His lips were already leaving hers and she hadn’t made up her mind.

She exhaled as he held her gaze. Then he held her chin as well, angling her face for their second kiss—or third, if the first had counted, she wasn’t sure. It was still terribly tender, the touch of his lips terribly light, the press of his thumb into her chin no harder than you’d hold a very ripe piece of fruit. Her mind was all peachy: fuzzy and blushing, yes, even there inside of her skull. It was oddly pleasant.

“Complaints?” he checked, drawing back, tracing his thumb below her lower lip.

She grinned up at him.

“Certainly not.”

“So.” He cleared his throat and said in a voice that was suddenly brisk, “Shall we go back up to the house?”

Frankie’s mouth fell open and Bobby’s hand dropped away.

“You had better be joking,” she snapped.

Slowly, a smile stole across his mouth. His arm came around her waist and the hand that had abandoned her chin found the middle of her back. She sulked for show, savouring the warmth of his palm through her dress.

“You’re nearly as bad as me,” she said.

“Good to hear you admit it.”

“Two peas, don’t you think?”

Something made her reach out a hand and trail her fingers down the row of small, dark buttons on his vest. Her hand halted over his stomach. She didn’t need to cover his heart; she could see its pounding in the way his chest rose and fell—quite far above her palm.

In the next instant, he had crushed her against him, kissing her faster, pulling her up on her toes. Her fingers gripped those buttons, clung to that vest. Here. Here was the boy who had gone off to sea and the man who had come home from it. Here was the boy who’d taken a spill on his bicycle and the man she’d been acutely aware of as he sat behind her in the saddle, refusing to hang on to her even as she urged the horse to go faster in the hope of producing that outcome. His patience, her provocations, this friction between them. Here. Frankie moaned and Bobby tugged her closer, pushing forward with his hips. Goodness. She snatched up his tie in her fist when he made to step away.

“Will I ever get to be the first to chastise you?” she demanded breathlessly. “You always seem to beat me to the punch.”

“And yet you always chastise me anyway,” he pointed out, face tilted down as regretful eyes summoned the courage to meet hers.

“I wasn’t going to this time.”

“You should.”

“Then that is society’s failing for not making me a primmer young lady. There’s not much I can do about it now.”

He looked at her. She gave his tie a little yank. He lowered his head and kissed her cautiously. Releasing his tie, she slid her hand to his collar where it lay against the back of his neck.

“It’s alright,” she whispered against his lips, and leaned into him since he would not lean into her.

She felt him again, stiff against her belly. Still, he was reluctant, as though he could hide from her the passion he had only just displayed. If the earlier gentleness described the whole of what Bobby was, then she wanted that, but he could not expect her to forget the urgency in how he’d taken her in his arms. He couldn’t fool her by pussyfooting now, only irritate her with his tiresome moat of good intentions lapping between them.

Once more, his hips shied back. Frankie huffed.

“Is there anything scoundrelly about you at all, or are you a perfect gentleman through and through?”

“I’m afraid it could be the latter.”

“Well then, Steve, I must warn you that I’m prepared to be scoundrel enough for the both of us.”

She saw his brows twitch together in thought, then, as she watched, he clamped his cap to his side under his arm. With two hands free, Bobby neatly loosened the knot of his tie. She took her hand back and he undid the top button of his shirt, turned up his collar, and slipped the tie free. Expression entirely sober, he folded the collar back into place. Even crossing a road in his blue pajamas could not make him look too badly disheveled, and yet the unfastening of a single button lent him an aspect that was utterly indecent. It could have been that he had done it with his own hands, and that she had been incapable of looking away while he had.

“Can’t let you do it on your own,” he explained.

She grinned.

“Your one weakness.”

They came together again—him clutching his cap and tie, her sneaking her hand inside his collar this time, smoothing her fingers over the warm nape of his neck. He broke the kiss when their lower halves met. For a moment, he panted against her cheek, but she waited in silence (a trial), and he returned his lips to hers with renewed vigour. There he was. Her man after all.

Frankie began to get hot, and she began to feel a bit weak in the ankles, not at all put on. He was curving over her, keeping her upright with his arms locked around her. She couldn’t help wondering what they might try if his arms were free. If he had the use of his hands.

“Perhaps a tree,” she suggested. He frowned in confusion and she clarified, “To lean back against.”

Bobby didn’t blush, but his face certainly wasn’t composed.

“If that’s what you want,” he said.

Frankie nodded. Bobby eyed the oak whose roots she’d pretended to fall over.

“It won’t do,” she told him. “The bark will flake and get my dress all dirty. We’d have to make up a ridiculous story that nobody would believe.”

“Or just say you backed into a tree by accident.”

“That’s even more ridiculous. I never do anything by accident.”

“No, my mistake.” He smirked at her.

“That’s alright,” she said loftily. “I think there’s a little copse of birch trees nearby, do you remember?”

He smiled.

“I do. I know where.”

Frankie tucked her bottom lip behind her teeth, pleased, as Bobby very naturally took her by the hand and led her to one of the places they’d played as children, when she’d sat demurely on the sofa indoors and then gone flying through the woods with him the minute she was unobserved. While he’d read Robert Louis Stevenson and Edgar Rice Burroughs and fashioned pirate forts and shinned up the very birches they sought, she’d scared the starlings and gotten sticks in her hair as she poked into brambles in a vain search for a rabbit to be her pet. What a happy time, the long days of summers with Bobby Jones.

He brought her to a silver stand and she circled it while he tucked his things into the crook where the branches split off. She sensed his eyes on her and tossed coy glances his way in response, trailing her fingers over the smooth, papery trunks. It was something she always did: darted to and from the feeling she got when their gazes connected. His look was so perennially fond, and she was rarely able to stare at it for too long. Like stargazing at the sun.

Her fingertips stuttered across an unexpected gouge in the bark and she stopped to look. She was beaming as she peered around the trunk and waved Bobby over.

“I don’t remember this,” she said.

He came around and looked where she pointed. It was still clear, the heart that cleaved into the pale surface, the initials at its center. B + F.

Bobby laughed in embarrassment, but it was too late for that. It could only have been his handiwork. She wouldn’t credit a denial.

He ran his fingers over the shallow cut.

“Guess I was always handy with a knife.”

“When did you do this?”

“Years ago, obviously. Definitely while you weren’t looking. You would’ve told me to scratch it out.”

“I would’ve told you the heart was a little lopsided.”

Bobby scrutinized his boyhood carving.

“It is not.”

She slipped into the narrow gap between him and the tree, pressing her back comfortably to the trunk and blinking up at him expectantly. He gave her a small smile. Then he bent down to her and it was even better than the times before, the physical promise of him, the span of him as he braced a hand against the tree above her head. His other hand found her waist and now his fingers kneaded her as though they were actively curious about the flesh beneath the fabric. She felt full of birdsong as their lips met again and again, her affection for him tumbling gaily down the hill of her heart. She put her hand to his cheek and knew that he belonged to her, knew it profoundly. Her lips parted and he kissed her more deeply.

The buttons of his vest continued to taunt her, and so she slipped them from their holes and flattened her shaking hand to Bobby’s shirtfront. He gathered her to him until his hand against her waist became a hand upon her hip and that hand upon her hip flexed and tensed, bunching her skirt.

Very soon, they would go too far.

They had gone too far already.

She didn’t want him to stop.

“Go on, Bobby,” she murmured to him, running her fingers over and over the placket of his shirt.

His hand drew up her skirt. She felt him stroke the silk slip she wore underneath. Thus far, he hadn’t touched the bare skin of her leg, but she could practically feel it tingling in anticipation.

Bobby rested his forehead against hers.

“When we were in port—when I was—I never did those things you think I did.”

Frankie smiled.

“Which things?”

“Any of them.” Her gaze went to his throat as he swallowed. “But I heard things.”

“How mysterious.”

He shut his eyes, exhaling through his nose.

“You’ll think I’m a cad.”

“I think you’re a prince.”

Up went the slip, draped over the back of his wrist as his fingertips swanned up her leg. He unclipped her right stocking; she felt it go slack. She recalled childhood memories of the Great War, her mother irritable when stockings had been difficult—and then impossible—to get, for love or money. She thought of sweethearts (she wouldn’t have had one, too flighty, too fearful of the empty gulf of eternity in the eyes of the young men shipping out to France and Flanders and Gallipoli) and photographs. A soggy snapshot of her in the breast pocket of a certain ocean-tossed naval officer. It was a thing that had never been, and thank god that was all over and that Bobby had been much too young to go, but the idea of it still romanced her: her image, carried close to his heart.

His hand closed around her naked thigh.

It stayed there while they kissed distractedly, overwhelmed by this new contact. It was as though he was concerned he’d lose his nerve if he let go and had to start over. That was what Frankie thought. But then he removed his hand from her person. She felt him doing something and pulled out of the kiss to investigate. He was undoing the cuffs of his shirt. He was rolling them up in tidy folds that brought his sleeves to just below his elbows. She couldn’t form the words that would jokingly inquire whether Lieutenant Jones was preparing for filthy hands, she could only study him, his practiced readying.

“Alright,” he said when he was done, and she didn’t know if it was a question, but she nodded.

The watch on Bobby’s wrist glinted in a ray of sunlight as he hitched his trousers and squatted before her. She could see the column of him beneath the wool and it thrilled her. Her palms went to the trunk of the tree. She didn’t know what it was that she was waiting for, but she knew that Bobby did, and somehow that was more exciting.

So unlike lifting the hood of a car, he felt underneath her skirts a second time and did his tinkering on her other stocking until it slouched like the first. He placed a hand on each of her bare thighs, silk and linen pooling at his elbows. His thumbs rubbed her skin. He shifted so that he was kneeling at her feet. Then, he shocked her by pressing his face to the crux of her legs. She gasped almost as much at the impulsiveness of his movement as at the impossible fact of him burying himself against her. Her dress was in the way, so there was a strange innocence to it, except that he held the back of her thighs—thighs that trembled—and that she could feel him breathing. She could feel him breathing where it had never occurred to her that he might.

Frankie wasn’t sure what to do besides pluck at her skirts, freeing them from how Bobby’s embrace had them trapped. She raised them inch by inch. He looked up into her eyes before her rucking could lift the fabric to the level of her hips, selectively honourable as he steadfastly held her gaze. She understood that he wouldn’t look without permission.

“On your mark, Lieutenant.”

Wearing a faint smile, he dropped his gaze. Ah, so he could blush, colour flushing his face as he looked and looked. Her arm hardly seemed attached to the rest of her body when she skimmed the back of her fingers down his neck. He glanced up at her. She bobbed her chin. His fingers tightened on her legs and he tilted forward, kissing her thigh with a simmering hunger. Hand flying to the back of his neck, she scraped her fingers up into his thick hair, all of the heat from before rushing back to her at once. His mouth barely left her skin between that kiss and the next, his lips dragging higher.

“So you don’t know what you’re doing?” she asked, because she must’ve heard wrong.

“Right.” He tipped his head back to meet her eye. “D’you want me to stop?”

“No, no,” she said weakly. “Do continue.”

Was it because she had teasingly accused him of cowardice up at the house that he was so bold with her here? His mouth crept higher; it was a challenge to judge exactly how high (she had closed her eyes) until his lips swept across the front of her knickers. With a twitch of her hand, she urged him closer. The pledge of his hot breath was fulfilled by the press of his open mouth. She panted, fingers raking aimlessly through his hair. Now, maybe, a lady more seasoned than she could have recognized in Bobby’s actions an amateur’s technique. To Frankie, it was all wonderful, all blazingly electric as the carnival lights, as pleasingly dizzying as a ride on the tilt-a-whirl. She was glad he had never done this before. She was insensible of any lack.

Through cream silk, she unmistakably felt his tongue.

“Take them off,” she muttered, cradling the back of his head. “Take them off, take them off.”

She trained her gaze aloft, watching the high green leaves flash like overturned playing cards and listening to the foul language Bobby uttered in an undertone. With quick, sure hands, he stripped the knickers down her legs. She let go of her dress in favour of the stability of his shoulder as he lifted one of her feet and then the other.

He hiked her dress in a fistful at her hip and surged forward, returning to her as she longed for him ever to return. She cried out as he hugged her to his face and applied his tongue to her again with reverent violence. He would rise to any occasion, she realized—dead bodies at the feet of cliffs, illicit rendezvous below the boughs where they had cavorted as children. There was a connective thread wound from bravery, duty, and decency that ran through everything Bobby Jones did, everything he was. She saw how he wanted so strongly to make her happy, how frequently he stepped aside because he thought it best, and yet how frequently he put himself at her disposal, protecting and partnering her without a second thought. She’d forgotten, somehow, in the years she’d spent away. She’d misplaced a youthful playmate and discovered a devoted lover.

Keeping her perpetually at the forefront of his awareness, he noticed before she did that her back was skidding down the tree; standing with her hips positioned forward compelled inferior balance.

“Turn around, Frankie, would you?” Bobby said.

His voice was gruff with something other than impatience. Even so, Frankie acted quickly, rotating and taking hold of the tree. A smile broke over her face as she confronted Bobby’s heart, their initials etched into the bark side by side. He pulled her hips back towards him. He pursued his goal so heartily that she thought her sailor might drown. It was doubly gratifying, then, to lose herself not long after: his mouth vanished and she heard his deep groan as his finger made an easy, rocking intrusion. Her call soared to the woody rafters.

She could feel him shaking as he got to his feet, a shiver in the fingers that righted her dress. Straightening, she encountered his chest at her back. He didn’t touch her in any other way while they stood there panting. Her gaze took the flightpath of a bumblebee, though it moved without any conscious design, hurrying over the striated bark before her and all the green in her peripherals. Her arms prickled with the suspense until she couldn’t stand it and spun around.

Bobby didn’t step back, not an inch, and Frankie nearly knocked her forehead against his chin. She raised her eyes and found his almost stern with desire. An uncomplicated young man—that was how the people of Marchbolt regarded him, but she knew it was only that he was so good at keeping so many things inside. He needn’t yearn for her any longer, she thought, not now. Frankie stretched up and kissed him on the cheek.

Immediately, his expression was younger, more carefree, sporting the sort of amusement she often saw there when she was trying hardest to make him take her seriously. But he wasn’t laughing at her, oh no. His hand rose and his fingers hesitated next to her face, eyes asking if he might be permitted. Hers said, Yes, you may, and he brushed back the styled wave of her hair, then stroked his knuckles down her cheek. When Frankie sighed contentedly, Bobby stooped to kiss her.

She sensed an intimacy between them that wasn’t precisely new—it was as though a wobbly wall within the charming old house of their friendship had collapsed to reveal another room which had existed in secret the entire time. It was simple: her feelings for him expanded to fill the space.

He held her closer as they kissed and she slipped a hand inside his open vest, following the strap of his braces down to his trousers. She curled her fingers into the waistband.

“It was enough,” he murmured, softly batting her hand away.

Yes, it had been enough for her—it had been more than enough, a pleasure unlike anything she’d ever experienced—but she couldn’t very well ignore what she felt when their bodies pressed together. That he still stood at the ready.

“Let me do it,” she coaxed, though she didn’t know exactly what, but who better to be at sea with than a sailor?

“No.”

“Bobby—”

“Lady Frances,” he replied pointedly.

She looked away from him, annoyed.

“I’m only Lady Frances when it suits you. Who was I a minute ago? You can’t treat me as if I were two different people.”

“It’s different.”

“It most certainly is not,” she argued, digging in.

“Please, Frankie,” Bobby said in his sensible tone. “Let me be at least a bit of a gentleman.”

She crossed her arms.

“We’ll negotiate the terms.”

He laughed in disbelief.

“We will not.”

“We will. Something has to be done.” Her gaze dipped. “It isn’t… it isn’t equitable.”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“How dare you speak that way to a lady.” She could only maintain her scowl for a moment before a smile displaced it.

They stared at one another. For a while, Bobby put on a good show of immovability, crossing his arms to mirror her. What she had over him was a history of getting her own way; when he yielded to her, it felt perfectly natural from her end of things.

“Go back to the oak tree and wait for me there,” he said.

“I’ll go behind this one,” she countered, and reached out a hand to touch the trunk behind her. He gave her a weary look and she grinned. “Do you find me completely aggravating?”

He smiled.

“No.”

Frankie pushed away from the tree, wrapping her arms around Bobby’s neck and bringing his lips down to hers. It wasn’t a very good farewell kiss—not a tremendously effective one, anyway. From the start, drawing back was an unattractive choice; kissing Bobby Jones had quickly become her favourite activity. Any instinct he possessed to debate her she felt disintegrating as his arms encircled her. Nothing he refused himself was due to not wanting it, that was why she couldn’t just let him have his way.

When she finally tore herself away, backing off with sultry eyes, he stared after her. His expression made her vow upon vow.

She made herself scarce on the other side of the tree, disturbed only once: when Bobby cleared his throat and passed her the knickers he’d taken off her earlier. Frankie dressed herself, reattached her stockings, but mostly she rested her back against the trusty birch and listened.

He was making every effort to be quiet, she could tell, but there were the measured puffs of breath that sounded like attempts at self-control. And, of course, there were the low grunts he couldn’t prevent. Those coursed through her like a scalding drink, finding all the sensitive places inside her and burning. Into her ears, into her memory—because she wouldn’t forget this, not a chance. There was a rustling of fabric and a meaty smacking noise repeated at a frantic pace and Bobby huffing like he was in a footrace. He would be thinking of her, no doubt, and so it was only fair—only equitable—that she was thinking of him too, eyes closed and lips parted as she savoured each desperate inhalation and rasping groan.

And she knew he’d instructed her to wait at a distance…

And she knew it wasn’t right…

Edging around the tree, she was too nosy to feel much guilt. Her espadrilles weren’t meant for the bumpy ground at the base of trees. She snapped fallen twigs and scuffed through dead leaves. Nevertheless, amongst the natural noises of all sorts, she thought she might not be heard. She peeked at him and was startled by how undone he appeared, even in profile. Bobby’s face glowed with heat, mouth slack like a drunk. Her eyes moved over him, absorbing everything, glancing away in visceral prudishness and then back, twice as quickly, to the pumping of his arm. She didn’t need to be able to see his hand to understand.

Frankie was fixated on the jump of muscle exposed by his rolled-up sleeves, though not so fixated as to miss the instant Bobby’s head whipped around and he caught her spying. Her ability to react or so much as form a prediction of what might happen next was hopelessly delayed when her fearless, dependable Bobby didn’t look away. With the blurting of her name, his body jolted inward. The spasm scared her at first; the memory of him lurching and seizing at the carnival remained fresh in her mind. She staggered backwards to remove him from her sightline, then pressed a hand to her chest, calming her heart, letting out a light laugh as she slumped back against the tree.

Now she would be amenable. Now she would wait.

“I can’t believe you looked!” he called over to her.

“I can’t believe you thought I wouldn’t!”

“You’ll have to marry me now,” he dared.

Frankie felt along the birch’s delicately peeling bark until she found the heart.

“If you ask me better than that,” she challenged, tracing the curve, “I might say yes.”

#my writing #Why Didn't They Ask Evans?#WDTAE #Frankie Derwent #Frankie x Bobby #Bobby Jones #Frances 'Frankie' Derwent #Why Didn't They Ask Evans fanfiction

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