Jack liked to think that he knew Miss Fisher—Phryne—rather well. Not only was he in the business of picking up on seemingly small details, it was near impossible not to catalogue and commit to memory the bewilderingly delightful habits of the woman who occupied nearly every corner of his mind. And so he knew, from the experience of countless cases, dinners, and random invitations alike, that Miss Fisher would be precisely on time for their evening together. To arrive any earlier would normally be considered extremely unfashionable, and that was certainly never a term ascribed to her, but Phryne made a habit of arriving just at the start of things, perhaps because she, too, enjoyed picking up small details right from the start. He'd never considered the all too dangerous notion that it simply might have been the company she'd been arriving on time for.

It was for this reason that at precisely seven o'clock when the sharp knocking of the door drew him from his musings, his shoes were polished, his hair neatly combed, and the bottle of wine he'd picked up from a shop near the station was uncorked and resting atop the kitchen table ready for consumption. However expected she was, though, Miss Fisher had a knack for overwhelming him rather quickly. Fumbling haphazardly with the lock, Jack threw the door open and found himself doubly thrown off kilter when faced with the woman herself, standing on his doorstep precisely on time and in a delicately beaded red dress and matching black fur.

She brushed past him with an ebullient, "hello, Jack!" and for a dizzying, terrifying moment he thought she might lean forward to kiss his cheek. But, no—she only pressed her hand to his and chuckled, holding up a large picnic basket.

"I've brought provisions," she explained, popping up the lid of the basket with a conspiratorial glint in her eyes. There looked to be a bottle of wine and a baguette in plain view, and Jack thought he smelled Miss William's peach cobbler, too.

"I believe I told you I would provide refreshment, Miss Fisher," Jack answered, closing the door as he watched her take in the room.

Phryne always had the distinct talent of looking as though she belonged absolutely anywhere, but even he had to admit, as he allowed her into his space, that her shimmering dress rather showed up the place completely. He fought the niggling discomfort deep in his belly, the urge to apologize for his sparse dwelling, and instead cleared his throat.

"Hm?" She looked up, having been distracted by a framed photograph of his family that rested on the parlor table, and blinked up at him, eyes bright and questioning.

Jack shook his head. "Nothing at all, Miss Fisher. Shall I—uh—take your basket into the dining room?"

Now it was her turn to shake her head, though Jack thought she rather pulled off the maneuver better than he. Her shiny black hair swished against pale cheeks, and she chuckled, patting the space beside her on the settee. "No, no," she answered. "We have work to do. I must feel the space—" she paused here, for dramatic effect, "—and, anyway, I quite like the idea of having a picnic in Detective Inspector Jack Robinson's parlor."

Chuckling, Jack assumed the place beside her and rested his palms atop his knees, feeling the lack of distance between them curiously intoxicating, even though she'd only just arrived. He cleared his throat, and turned his gaze downward to her slim hands, watching the way her fingers drummed against her leg. If he'd not known her so well, he'd have thought her nervous.

"So will the picnic take place before or after you feel the space?" He smiled again, watching as she quirked her lips into a curious half-grin, nails still drumming against the beaded fabric.

"J—ack." She sounded out his name, teasing as the fingers moved upward, brushing against the sleeve of his jacket. "Before, of course. Don't you know the rhyme?"

"—Rhyme?"

Grinning again, Phryne moved from her place on the settee and kneeled onto the floor, leaning forward to tip open the lid of the picnic basket. She pulled out a bottle of expensive looking wine and handed it to him as she recited in a sing-song voice, pulling out forks and checkered napkins, too:

"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,

All play and no work makes Jack a mere toy."

The words were enough to make the tips of Jack's ears red, and he mumbled something about procuring a bottle opener before wandering out of the room in the direction of the kitchen. Once inside, he set the bottle atop the counter and braced himself against the stone top, the warmth having traveled from the tips of his ears down to his neck, too. It would never do, not if he was so easily undone by her—they would never move past this seemingly endless phase of banter, of skirting round the feelings they both had. Or, well, the feelings he certainly knew he had.

He ran a hand through his hair, hoping he'd not mussed it, and completed the task he'd removed himself for. He did not dare serve the wine he'd bought earlier, as even the bottle's label looked inferior next to the one Miss Fisher had brought. By the time he returned to the living room, Phryne had removed what looked like the contents of a small restaurant from the basket. She was fiddling with a silver candlestick holder when he held out a glass of wine in her direction and sat back down beside her.

"I wasn't sure if you would have the right ambiance—" she said by way of explanation, striking a match and clapping with delight when the wick began to flicker.

"—And candles are required ambiance for a picnic?" Jack retorted, taking a generous sip of wine and hoping it might bolster his nerves.

She laughed again, the sound tinkling and melodic, and reached for the proffered glass he'd set down beside her. "This is rather good," she hummed appreciatively, not answering his question.

He nodded in reply, taking one more sip.

The room began to grow warm again as they sat silently, the weight of the silence—which usually felt comfortable—suddenly palpable. He wanted to say something, anything, really, but she was sitting beside him again, having moved from her place on the floor, and his eyes were fixed on the glittering beads of her dress and the intoxicating scent of her jasmine perfume. Jack felt his heart beating out an unsteady rhythm against his chest, each beat reminding him of the silence, of how dangerously, perfectly close she was, and before he knew quite what he was doing, his body betrayed his better thinking and he slid the final few inches closer, closing the small gap between them.

He took her hand. Somehow he knew, knew it in the way one knows something but does not want to know it and so one ignores it. He knew that it had to be him. As certain as he was that Phryne cared for him—was he, though, certain, he suddenly wondered?—he knew that she would never take this from him, would never coax him into something he might not want simply because she could.

And so he took her hand, his thumb brushing methodical circles into her palm. She was looking at him, he knew, but he dared not meet her gaze. In just that moment, for he knew he only had this one moment, he focused on the feel of her skin pressed against his, no thick fabric to inhibit the touch in the way it always did when she took his arm. His stomach turned with excitement and terror and the possibility of what once might have seemed impossible suddenly before him. Here he was, now, at the precipice.

He looked up, slowly, and there she was.