Attracted to you but ashamed of you--I give you dysfunctional bench time with Jackson & Diana
It’s evening, and the canal almost seems to glitter, more beautiful than it has a right to be. Diana is tired after a long day at the Park, but her step quickens at the thought of a meeting with Jackson, anticipation running through her body like a jolt of nicotine.
Halfway between the chauffeured car and their bench, the London mist had turned into rain. And she had forgotten her rather formidable umbrella in the backseat of her armored Range Rover. By the time she sat down next to Jackson, she was properly drenched.
Jackson, of course, is safe and dry under his sad little umbrella, which looked like something that had been pulled out of the bargain bin at Tesco’s. “You’re slipping,” he says.
“I’ve had a lot on my mind. It’s easy to lose track of one umbrella when you’ve got the whole of British intelligence to run,” she sniffs. Then sneezes.
“Well, come closer. I’ll not have First Desk dying of hypothermia on my watch.” When she hesitates, he adds, “I don’t bite. And even if I did, I’ve had all my shots.”
Diana sidles a little closer, close enough to smell the booze and those awful unfiltered cigarettes he favors. “Somehow I doubt that.”
Jackson just shrugs. “We going to get on with it or you going leave me here all night holding this umbrella like Mary bloody Poppins?”
“I need your contact in Riga,” Diana begins. “The Russians…they’re planning something big.”
“Christ, you’re like a broken record. I’ve been hearing the same tune for the past thirty years.”
“It’s different. Bigger. Potentially World War III in the making.”
“So, show it to me. The dirt. You want my man in the FSB, I want to know what for.”
She does show him. She trusts him with this. And as Jackson flips through the dossier, as they volley the intel back and forth, the years slip away. A light comes into Jackson’s eyes, and the moonlight shades his face forgivingly. It’s like watching a man come back from the dead.
And for a moment, she is younger, too. Lighter, without the burden of being First Desk and the drag of all of the horrid things she did to get there. She remembers the old Jackson, the charmer, the man before Slough House. She remembers that sly grin, the broad shoulders, that dangerous shiver of something he provoked every time he walked in a room.
All of the girls and good number of the boys in the service had wanted him then. Rumor was he’d gone to bed with at least half of them. But not Diana.
But there had been moments between them—last call at the pub, a stakeout at three am—moments when if one of them had stepped just a toe over the line something would have happened.
It had never happened.
“Where are you? Look like you’re miles away.”
She is. She’s back in East Berlin drinking aquavit in a darkened safehouse with him. “Nothing. Long day,” she says.
Jackson holds her gaze for a moment, as if he can tell what she’s thinking, then lets out a loud and noxious belch that smells like rancid curry.
It’s deliberately revolting and Diana can’t help but recoil. She’d nearly forgotten this Jackson had a tendency to excrete a defensive slime whenever anyone got too close. She snatches the file, more angry at herself than with him. “Well, I think that has put a punctuation on our time together. I’ll expect a name, Jackson.”
She turns and begins to walk brusquely away from the human-shaped lump of decay that is Jackson Lamb. Away from that brief, treacherous spark she feels in his presence, a feeling she should have smothered at birth.
“I hate that I want you, too, Di,” he calls after her, cigarette between his lips. “But the difference is, I can wash off my filth. Those stains on your soul ain’t the kind that scrub out.”
for the dysfuncentine prompt meme, how about bedannibal: 48. A failed tryst? 😈
ooof here be some pre-series sexy angst :)
There’s something about the warmth and humidity of Miami that seemed to melt all of the barriers between them. They’d attended each other’s panels at the conference and Bedelia had delighted in the spark of Dr. Lecter, her colleague. Hannibal, her patient, was a creature she had left behind in grey and dreary Baltimore. And so it had seemed natural to accept his invitation of a drink, and then dinner, just the two of them, at their hotel’s elegant waterfront bistro.
And when the check had come, and he had kissed her after paying, that had seemed natural, too.
So, they had stumbled, giddy as teenagers, to the elevators. His hands were everywhere, roaming her backside, fingering the curls of her hair. They’d kissed again in the solitude of the lift and she’d moaned as he’d pressed her up against the metallic wall, so lost in the moment they’d nearly missed their floor.
Hannibal made short work of the door, dragging her into his lavish suite. She kicked off her heels and all but launched herself into his lap as he reclined in one of the room’s pastel-colored armchairs. She ground against him, kissing him. She was so wild, so wanton, so hungry.
His lips traced the shell of her ear and he breathed, “Yes, yes. Oh, Doctor.”
Bedelia froze, stunned.
This was not an evening of passion between two colleagues. It was a tryst between a doctor and patient. She had been a fool to think otherwise.
“I…I need to go, Hannibal. We can’t.”
He looks at her, disappointment darkening the black pools of his eyes. “Why not?”
“You know why,” she says with emphasis.
“I respectfully disagree.” He releases his hold on her and she slides off his lap, collecting her shoes, wrapping herself in what is left of her tattered professionalism.
She leaves and he lets her go. She’d wounded him. But he’d wounded her more, when he let fall the veil between them and showed he’d only wanted the fantasy of Dr. Du Maurier and never Bedelia for herself.
if you are still taking prompts for the writing meme thing how about diana/jackson 46
"...that didn't count" happy friday, have some weird slightly NSFW bench time with them (and some background diana/flyte!)
Their business concluded, Diana and Jackson linger at their bench, content for a moment to bathe in the spring sunshine before returning to the cold elegance of the Park and the squalor of Slough House.
Jackson tosses a portion of his leftover chips to a passing family of ducks.
“You’re not supposed to do that,” Diana corrects. “I believe there’s a sign around here somewhere. It’s bad for them.”
Jackson glances at her slyly, before tossing the mallard a second chip. “All sorts of people doing things they ain’t supposed to be doing. Lot of that going around these days, or so I hear.”
Diana stills, but her expression remains perfectly composed. “If you don’t mind, I have a meeting with Emma at half past.”
“Oh, Emma is it now?” Jackson shakes his head and lets out a wheezy, broken chuckle. “You’ve got quite the pattern.”
Diana feels heat creep into her cheeks. “I don’t know what you’re implying.”
“My, my, you’ve acquired quite the impressive collection of workplace ‘situationships’ as the kids call them. Tearney, Flyte…me.”
“You??” Diana sputters. “Well…that, that didn’t count.”
Jackson leans back, basking in her discomfort even more than the warmth of the sun. “Christmas party, 1989. The Wall had just fallen and spirits were high. I was back in London for a debrief. We broke into Partner’s office and drank all his fancy port.”
“And schnapps. You had brought schnapps.”
“You do remember.”
How could she forget. It had been the worst hangover of her life.
“It was little more than a grope in a closet. Hardly an affair.” It flashes back to her now, his large hands seemingly all over her, the wool of his trousers grinding against the silk of her stockings. It fills her with an unwanted, unexpected heat. “You didn’t even…you know,” she says, throat gone quite dry.
Jackson chuckles again. “No, but you did.”
“I don’t think so.”
“You did,” he insists.
“I don’t remember,” she lies.
“Oh, but I do.” He leans in closer to whisper, “I’ve not forgotten the feel of you, wet and slick and quivering around my fingers. Those quiet little whimpers you let out, sweetest sound I’ve ever heard a woman make.”
Diana is dangerously close to making those sounds again. “Well, maybe just a small one.”
Jackson looks at her. “Which is it, Di? You don’t remember, or it was just a small one?”
Diana flicks her eyes at him and stares silently at the canal, unwilling to believe they are having this conversation at all, much less by the canal towpath in broad daylight.
“I tell you, I was surprised by the whole thing. Half-expected to find teeth up there if the rumors were to be believed.”
“Well, you always did like to live dangerously.”
“Still do,” he hints. “If you were ever interested in doing something that did count, I might be game.”
“That would require a level of cleanliness from you that I am not sure you're capable of.”
“Eh, might be worth it.”
“It might be beyond what the decontamination showers on Level 3 could handle, Jackson.”
“Well, you think on it, Di. You get tired of teaching your new Dog to turn tricks for you, you know where to find me.” He waggles his fingers at her suggestively in farewell. “Toodle-fucking-ooo.”
picking a fight for the hot sex afterward...like the most Ingridiana thing ever
under a cut, here there be porn
Diana stands in her immaculately clean kitchen, waiting. She’d had a luxuriously indulgent bath, dressed herself in a black silk peignoir and matching robe, and poured herself a tumbler of her second-best whisky.
At 9:05 there’s a knock at the door. Right on cue.
Diana hardly needs to check the peephole to know who is behind the door. “Ingrid, what a surprise,” she drawls.
Ingrid shoves past her, barely taking the time to shuck her bag and coat in the hallway, before launching into a tirade. “Was it really necessary to undermine me in front of the home secretary today, Diana? You have a problem with the operation, you bring it to me first. You start talking out of school and it makes the whole of the Park look bad.”
“Ingrid, dear, the man asked me for my opinion and I gave it honestly.” Diana pours her guest an inch of Glenmorangie, which she accepts with a scowl.
“I could have used that honest opinion before we went to Whitehall. You were fine with the Tbilisi op the last time we spoke.”
Diana circles around her kitchen languidly, making sure Ingrid gets a good glimpse of the silk clinging to her curves. “New information came to light. I showed the schematics to Lamb—”
“To Lamb?!!”
“Yes, to Lamb. And he felt we were spread too thin. That there’s no point in doing it if we’re not going to do it right. And I agree with him.”
“You trust Jackson Lamb’s opinion more than mine? More than the small army of analysts we employ at the Park?” Ingrid asks, fury building in her voice.
Diana lays a hand casually on Ingrid’s arm. “When it comes to field operations? Yes, Ingrid, I do. He was behind the Wall while you were cozied up at your desk.”
If there was anything that got Ingrid riled more than being brought up short with their paymasters, it was Jackson Lamb. Ingrid set down her glass on the counter and stalks Diana like a leopard after its prey. She advances until Diana feels her backside hit the wall. Diana licks her lips in anticipation, breathing heavily.
“Sometimes I think you do these things on purpose,” Ingrid breathes, hands at her waist.
Diana lowers her eyelids, fake demurely, and smirks.
She can sense, rather than see the moment Ingrid’s control snaps.
In a single swift movement, Ingrid flips Diana around. She pins Diana’s wrists against the wall and uses her muscular thigh to spread Diana’s legs apart. Diana lets out a breathy moan. Finally, the reaction she’d been hoping for. Things had been so nice, so normal, so boring between them lately, which was good for national security but made things bloody pedestrian in bed.
Ingrids hands caress her ass. She lifts up the hem of her short nightdress and finds her cunt, bare and swollen. “No knickers? Oh, you tawdry little thing.” She teases her folds, covering her fingers in slick. “You’ve been wanting this all day.”
She removes her hand, leaving Diana bereft, causing her to whimper. “Stay there,” Ingrid commands. Diana complies, body humming, cunt growing wetter with each passing second. She hears Ingrid rummage through her bag, the lewd sound of Ingrid’s zipper sliding down and finally the fastening of buckles and snaps. Her cunt trembles in anticipation, an almost Pavlovian response. And then with very little preamble at all, Ingrid is inside her, thrusting. It’s rough at first without any preparation, though Diana has hardly needed any. It feels bigger from this angle, punishingly thick and large. And Ingrid fills her and fucks her harder than Diana knew she could. Before Diana knows it, she’s coming with an orgasm so powerful she’d probably collapse altogether if it wasn’t for Ingrid’s arm gripping her around the waist.
Later, as they lay together in bed, woozy with afterglow, Ingrid says, “You know if you want me to rough you up or whatever, you could just ask me ahead of time. Instead of picking a fight in front of the suits.”
“Hmm. Oh yes, I suppose,” Diana says noncommittally.
“We could have conversations about these things like normal people. Talk about boundaries, safewords.”
Diana lets out a huff of laughter. “Where would be the fun in that?”
