Father Brown and the Baxter Twins

AvalonReeseFanFics

A/N: Trying a new writing style here. I hope it reads okay. I love Sid as a character and it surprises me that there aren't more fanfictions about him... more about Father Brown in general actually. Please tell me what you think!

Chapter 1: The Girl on the Moor (Unedited)

Wriggling got the ropes loose and then she was running. Running as fast as she could away from the literal hole in the ground where she had been held captive and the two men that had been holding there. She ran through the trees at a speed that surprised her seeing that she had been underground for... well... she didn't know how long she had been underground, dealing with all sorts of terrible tortures that she didn't want to think about anymore.

She burst through the bushes and out onto the misty moonlit moor. She caught her breath and searched the moor for any sign of a good place to hide other then throwing herself down into the grass in the middle of the moor in the hopes that they wouldn't notice her. In her search she spotted a light in the distance just as she heard the frantic scramble of footsteps on the wooded path behind her.

The girl in distress made up her mind. Unlike other girls in distress she didn't scream and give away her position. Instead she sprinted forward towards the light, hoping that whatever it was could help her.

Sidney Carter had had such a lovely night out, filled with smoking, booze and pretty woman. His little green caravan was spinning all around him, as he got himself ready for bed. But even lying down the world spun around him in a dizzying display. It was on nights like this that he swore he wouldn't drink anymore, wouldn't be found at late night rowdy parties or consorting with women who were known heartbreakers or little minxes. He'd tell himself that he'd settle himself down, get a real house, find himself a proper woman, and a respectable job that didn't involve him nicking things or finding a cheap buck. But who would hire a man with a record like his, what proper lady would love a man with a reputation like his. And then the next night, or the next weekend he'd end up in the pub again making the same mistakes.

Poor Father Brown kept trying to keep him on the righteous path but Sid kept falling off of it.

In his drunken stupor Sid almost missed the knocking on his door, at first it was in time with the pounding of his head so he was certain he was imagining it. Then it broke out of time with the pounding and he realized there was someone at his door in the wee hours of the morning. He briefly wondered if it was one of the women he had been flirting with in the pub, had they followed him home, snuck out for a midnight illicit affair with the lowly criminal chauffer?

Then he heard the scream.

Blood curdling, definitely feminine, and literally right outside his door. Someone of the female variety was in need of assistance and Sidney Carter was her guy!

Launching to his feet Sid staggered to the door of his camper, picked up a discarded beer bottle, and threw the door open. There was a girl alright. And holy hell was she fighting the two guys that had her in their arms. Or well… were trying to anyway.

One had her by the back, his arms wrapped around her chest and partially her neck while the other was trying to grab her feet probably to cart her off. The one with her feet was struggling because she kept kicking him, hard, the one on her neck was having problems because shew as literally trying to claw his eyes out and missing his eyes but gouging other pieces of his face. The guy behind her tightened his hold on her neck and Sid heard the gasp for air being cut off.

This was his time to shine. Sid practically leapt onto the back of the guy who was holding her feet. He dropped her immediately to try and get Sid to let go of his neck but Sid was squeezing too hard. It took a matter of seconds for the man underneath him to fall unconscious and when he did Sid found that the girl had gotten the other man off of her and was in the process of fending him off with an interesting looking boxing technique. Sind pulled her out of the way and knocking him as hard as he could with the bottle he still had in his hands and the guy went down.

Sid staggered back and let the silence sink in. But it wasn't all silence, there was the ragged breathing and whimpering that didn't belong to him. He turned to find the girl, the one he was going to save, laying in the grasp barely moving. He went to her immediately and pulled her up into his lap. She had this long, flowing raven hair and a pair of light green eyes, and the palest, smoothest skin he had ever seen and that's couldn't Lady Felicia. She was in a torn dress, he couldn't tell the pattern, but he could definitely tell that it didn't fit her anymore… it was too loose, and she was covered in bruises and cut marks. The most shocking of ones was the gash across her cheek that was highlighted by a gruesome purpling bruise.

She clung to the front of his shirt, she was shaking so hard he was worried she might go into a seizure. "Don't," she whispered to him and Sid's eyes narrowed in confusion. He wasn't sure what it was that she didn't want him to do. "Don't call the police, please…"

Now that surely was a strange request. Most women who were assaulted in the middle of the night by two men wanted the police called. Sid opened his mouth to tell her that surely he had to tell the police. He couldn't just leave these men in the field to wake up and try to attack them again but tears were in those vibrant green eyes and suddenly Sid couldn't talk anymore.

"Please don't, you can't, don't call them. Please. Please!" she begged before she suddenly slumped in his arms.

Sid sat there for a second holding her, letting her head rest on his chest right above his heart, cradling this strange woman in his arms. Really there was only one thing for it.

She awoke to a dazzling pain, a sort of burning in all her limbs and every inch of her skin. Light was streaming in from behind a curtain but she could feel it on her face as much as she could feel the arms around her. There was a steady rhythmic beating, a soft thrumming soothing the troubles in her mind. She lifted her head off of a broad chest and found herself in the arms of a stranger. Not surprising, not the first time that had happened, and it wasn't rare that the man she found herself with was attractive but this man in particular seemed to strike a chord in her. Maybe it was that tuftish brown hair sticking up in odd directions, or the way the stubble seemed to define his jaw line. He wasn't a rugged man, he kept himself well groomed by the looks of it. He was a lot softer looking then her usual type.

The terrors of the previous night came back to her full force and she tried to disentangle herself from his limbs and finding that the skirt of her dress was caught beneath his gangly legs. He shifted, realized she was moving and pulled her back down to his chest. He hushed her and stroked her hair in a soft way that she hadn't felt for at least nine years now. She found herself not resisting but melding into him, allowing this more different form of captivity and figuring that if it really were all that bad the sound of his heart in her ears the feeling of his chest moving up and down beneath her wouldn't be acting like a lullaby. In a few moments she was asleep again despite the burning pains in her limbs and the sun on her face.

Not only had Sid not turned up for work that day but the night before he had called in to Inspector Mallory that someone had attempted to attack him on his property. According to Lady Felicia two men had been carted away and were now in the jail cells. Neither were talking, other than to say that they had no interest in Sid, so it was a mystery as to why they were attacking him. Lady Felicia had also said that when Sid phones to say that he wasn't coming in he had sounded strangely distant and distracted but had insisted that he was fine.

So Father Brown, worried for his friend, was heading in a calm fashion towards Sid's camper. He was certain that if Sid was in any real danger he would have said so. He was also certain if it was a big an issue as Lady Felicia thought it was then Inspector Mallory would have found a way to arrest Sid for it.

Sid's camper looked quiet and it didn't look like a big ruckus had happened. The only thing that Father Brown could note was that grass of the moor had been trampled down at some point in the night, not by two people, but by three. He could see the lines in the grass each woven by a different person. There was no noise coming from the camper. Not completely unusual. If Sid were awake he'd be making some sort of noise but if he were sleeping it made sense for it to be quiet around here. Except Sid shouldn't have been asleep.

Father Brown knocked, three sharp raps on his door with the handle of his umbrella and waited. He heard the shuffling of movement inside the cabin, and a hushed whisper of "Just be quiet" before Sid opened the door.

He was wearing nothing but a white undershirt and his trousers from yesterday. Father Brown could see the stain of strawberry jam from Mrs. McCarthy's award winning strawberry scones, put on his pants when she snatched the scone out of Sid's hands before he could even manage to get a bite and a dollop of the jam fell on him. Despite the frantic scrubbing of Sid and Mrs. McCarthy together the stain would not come off. She had told him how to clean and it and when he seemed at a loss she demanded that he bring them to her the next morning and she would do it for him. Yet another reason for Father Brown to find an excuse to come see Sid.

Other than his dirty trousers, and the worried look on Sid's face, Sid seemed to be just fine. "Oh, hey there Father," he said quickly descending the small steps of the camper and onto the grass. He shook hands with Father Brown quickly. "What are you doing out here?"

Father Brown tried to glance past Sid's shoulder to into the shadowed camper. He had a feeling that Sid was hiding something or someone but Sid shifted and all view into the camper was blocked. "Well, I heard what happened last night. Frightful Business. Are you alright?"

Sid nodded. "Sure am Father, nothing to cause alarm."

"Do you know what they wanted? Why they chased you?" Father Brown asked him and for a minute Sid seemed confused.

"What do you mean?" he wondered.

"The moor, there are three distinct paths coming through there. Two for your assailants and one for you presumably. Unless there was a third attacker that got away. You would have told Inspector Mallory if there was a third wouldn't you?" Father Brown asked.

Sid shot a long glance over his shoulder to whatever was behind him in the camper. He thought long and hard for a minute before saying: "I don't know Father Brown, not going to lie I was pretty snockered last night. It's all a bit of a blur. Now I don't want to be rude but my head's killing me and I'd like to get back to sleep if that's alright with you Father."

He clapped a hand to Father Brown's back quickly before turning and ducking down his head to get back into the camper.

"Just one more thing Sid," Father Brown called. "If I don't bring those pants to Mrs. McCarthy she'll have my head and yours."

Sid looked down to his stained pants and then back into the shadows of his camper. Father Brown noted that Sid was particularly interested in the side of his camper that housed his bed. Clearly it was a someone that he was hiding from Father Brown. Maybe he had female company last night and didn't want to mention her in his police report to protect her reputation.

Sid quickly took his pants off and threw them at him. He stood there in his white under trousers and said: "Tell Mrs. M I say thanks." And then he shut the door.

Father Brown stood there for a bit before folding up the stained pants and going back to his bike. He waited to hear if there would be any more conversation to catch but after a few seconds of silence he realized that he wasn't going to get that lucky. But as he climbed up onto his bike he couldn't help but feeling that a mystery was unfolding right under his nose and that Sid was definitely hiding something other than his latest conquest from him.