Chapter Text
Catherine had nothing to hide, she knew it very well, but she really didn't want Lamb to find out that James was going to pick her up after work. She knew him well enough to know he was going to have some comment about it and she didn't feel like dealing with it right now.
James was nice, she had met him at her friend Lily's birthday party. He was a friend of Lily's friend, who was dragged to the party uninvited at his friend's insistence. They met in the kitchen, where Catherine was hiding so she could drink some water, and he was also hiding because his friend wanted to introduce him to another of Lily's friends. “The disadvantages of being over 60 and divorced” he had said. They ended up talking in the kitchen for most of the night and when it was over, he asked her for her phone number.
Catherine checked her face in the small mirror she kept in her bag. She was ready to grab her coat and bag and go downstairs discreetly, without making a sound, but her entire plan was ruined when Lamb shouted her name.
She sighed at the door to her office, her bag slung over her shoulder and her coat folded over her arm.
“What?” she answered without moving, hopefully he just wants to talk.
“I need a clean glass,” he demanded.
She frowned, she had handed him a glass and a clean mug a few hours ago when she cleaned his desk. “Your glass is clean.”
“Ash fell on it, I need another one.”
Catherine refrained from sighing and did not answer. She went down to the kitchen to get another glass and when she came back up, she left the clean glass on his desk without looking at him. The less eye contact she makes, the faster she will come out.
“See you on Monday,” she said halfway to the door.
“Are you wearing makeup?” He asked, as he took the clean glass and examined it as if he didn't believe it was clean.
She stopped in place, with her back to him, how the hell did he notice? She was just wearing a little mascara and a nude lipstick.
Catherine turned to look at him and faced him with her head held high. “Yes,” she said simply.
"Why?" He asked as if it were crazy.
“Because I felt like it,” she lied, although it wasn't entirely a lie. There was nothing wrong with looking good for someone else.
“The dress is new too,” he said, looking into her eyes and not at the dress. It wasn't necessary to look at her, he had noticed it as soon as she arrived in the morning.
Catherine looked at him for a moment, trying to understand what he wanted from her, did he want her to confess? She wasn't going to do it.
“Yes, it's new,” she ran a hand up the burgundy skirt, and adjusted the waist of the dress. She hadn't dated in a long time, and she thought it would be good to get something special for the occasion.
Lamb kept looking at her but didn't say anything else, instead he opened a new bottle and poured himself a glass.
“That's it, can I go? Or do you need something else?”
Jackson shook his head and waved her off. But as soon as Catherine left the building, Lamb walked to the window hoping to see her from there. Seconds later, he saw her walking next to a tall, thin man wearing a blue suit.
He watched them with the full glass in his hand until they disappeared down the street.
*****
On Monday morning, Catherine arrived early like any other day, even stopping to buy milk because she remembered it had run out last Friday.
When she reached the hallway of her office she heard the light snoring of Lamb sleeping on the couch. She was a little worried to think that he had spent the entire weekend there, she thought he was capable of doing so, but without wanting to bother him she continued on and entered his office.
Her phone rang in her jacket and she smiled when she saw James' name, he had texted her good morning message. Catherine answered him, standing in the middle of the office, still with her bag and her jacket on.
"Why do you smile?"
Catherine jumped in surprise when she heard Lamb's hoarse voice from the door, she had not heard him approach.
“Jackson!” she complained, holding her cell phone to her chest. "You scared me!" She turned to look at him, he was leaning against the door frame.
“How was your date with Prince Charming?” he asked, stretching his arms above his head, stretching his sleep-numb limbs.
“How…” Catherine frowned and then a look of terror passed over her face. “Please tell me you didn't follow me.”
“I don't even care that much about your life,” he growled.
“Excuse me for believing that you are capable of” she murmured and took off her coat.
"So?" He insisted, as he watched her approach him to leave her bag and coat on her coat rack next to the door.
"Do you really want to know?" She stopped in front of him, trying to understand what he wanted from all this. Lamb looked back at her, but said nothing.
“It was good,” she finally answered. She turned around and walked back to her desk.
"Where did he take you?" he asked, lighting a cigarette.
Catherine raised an eyebrow as she sat across from him, in her chair behind her desk. “If you want to know so much, we went to his house.”
It was only a second but she could notice the slight annoyance that passed across his face.
“First date and you're going to his house,” he mocked. “You don't waste fucking time, Standish.”
“It wasn't the first date,” she said seriously. It was their third date, and he had insisted on making dinner for her. When his wife left him, his friend, the one who took him to Lily's party, gave him some cooking classes so he could take his mind off everything and that's how he discovered that he loved cooking.
“Oh, it's serious then,” he smiled mockingly. “Should I reserve a suit for the wedding?”
“No,” she said immediately. “No… I mean… we're getting to know each other… no” she shifted uncomfortably in her chair.
Jackson looked at her for a moment.
His gaze made her more nervous.
"What 's his name?"
“James, and he's a lawyer, before you ask” since it seemed like Jackson wasn't going to leave, Catherine started going through the stack of files on her desk.
“I don't like lawyers,” he wrinkled his nose in disgust. “They are all idiots”
“Lucky that I'm going out with him and not you, then” She answered without looking at him while opening a folder.
***
Very soon everyone at Slough House realized that something was happening with Catherine, she looked better, more radiant, even happy.
River mentioned it to Louisa one afternoon while he was bored at his desk. She was in front of him, reading some papers.
“Do you think she's dating someone?”
“I hope so, it's not healthy for her to spend so much time with Lamb,” said Louisa.
"You're right"
One floor down, Shirley and Marcus were talking about the same thing, well, Marcus was talking, Shirley was typing on the computer.
“He's a tall, thin guy about her age, I saw them arrive together the other day,” said Shirley, interrupting Marcus' assumptions about who Catherine's partner could be.
"Oh that's good. Imagine that your only daily company is Lamb? Good for her for getting out of here.”
****
“No, I can't today, I have to finish organizing these files” Catherine said as she walked up the stairs to her office. She had her hands occupied by two boxes of files, one on top of the other, and she held the cell phone against her ear by her shoulder.
Since Taverner had sent all the files to be classified here, Slough House was a mess. And if Catherine didn't start organizing them, this catastrophe would never be resolved. Which meant that she should stay longer, at least until she could devise a system to make classification faster.
“I'll call you later, I'll be free tomorrow if you want” she sighed softly when she finished climbing the stairs.
Jackson left his office at that moment and met Catherine in the middle of the hallway. She looked at him and their eyes met.
"Perfect. See you soon” she said into the phone. James cut on the other side but Catherine couldn't move her hands without knocking everything over. "Can you help me?" She asked Jackson.
He approached her with a cigarette dangling from his mouth. She thought he was going to take the boxes out of her hands, but instead, he moved closer and took the phone from her ear. As he did so, his fingers gently brushed her chin and her body shivered a little. His fingers were rough against the soft skin of her face. Jackson cut the call and left the cell phone turned over on the box, without stopping looking into her eyes.
“Thank you,” Catherine murmured, still standing in her spot, with Jackson in front of her.
“Doesn't your boyfriend mind that you work so much?” he asked, cutting the silence.
Catherine moved, walking past Jackson and into her office. “He's not my boyfriend,” she reminded him with annoyance.
“Right, what is he waiting for?” He followed her to her office and stood at the door watching her put the boxes on her desk. “You are no longer in your prime, he has to hurry”
“I'm not 20, Jackson,” she complained as she opened the boxes, ignoring his last comment. “The very idea of a boyfriend seems silly to me”
“Don't be so hard on yourself,” he said sarcastically. “I'm sure the fact that he didn't ask you has nothing to do with your past.”
Catherine stopped what she was doing, taking the files out of the boxes onto the desk, and looked at him. "What is that supposed to mean?"
Jackson smirked, playing with the cigarette on his lips. “Does he know everything, Cat?”
“He knows I'm an alcoholic, if that's what you want to know,” her voice shook a little and her hands clenched the file she was holding. “He doesn't fully understand what I do and how I ended up here, and I prefer to keep it that way.” She put the file on the desk and picked up another one.
He wanted to ask something else, she knew it, she could feel his penetrating gaze on hers and the question he didn't dare ask on the tip of his tongue, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of answering that question.
When she raised her head again, he was no longer standing at the door and a sigh escaped her lips.
*****
Catherine had finished late that night, but she didn't want to cancel on James, they hadn't seen each other in days and he was already out. Taking advantage of the fact that Jackson had gone out, Catherine took her things, turned off the light and quickly left Slough House. She always left quickly because she didn't like James coming to look for her at the door, she always preferred him to wait for her on the corner or look for her at her house. She wanted to have both worlds as separated as possible. Far from Jackson, actually.
When she walked out the door, he was waiting for her at the top of the stairs with a smile, a small bouquet of white roses and a tartan umbrella over his head. It was raining, not too hard but it was kind of annoying after a while.
She went down, kissed him, took the roses and started walking towards the sidewalk, the faster they got away from there, the better. But she barely made it to the street when she collided with Jackson.
“Oh! Look who I find, the happy couple!” he said with his mouth full. He had a kebab in his hand, and a white bag hanging from his elbow. He had gone out to buy something for dinner and the rain caught him halfway.
“Jackson,” Catherine said warningly, before even thinking about it, the warning left her lips.
James looked at her between amusement and confusion at the way she had said his name. She looked like a mother warning her naughty child.
“I'm sorry, who are you?” He asked when the seconds had passed and no one introduced somebody.
“I'm sorry,” Catherine said uncomfortably, looking away from Lamb and back to James. “Jackson, James, James, Jackson. My boss"
James stretched out his hand to greet him but Jackson didn't move, his hands holding his food.
“Sorry, mate, dirty hands.”
“Sure,” he answered slowly, and turned his hand back.
Jackson's phone started ringing in his pocket. “Now what the fuck” he sighed and took it out with one hand while holding his kebab with the other.
Catherine and James stood to the side under the umbrella while Jackson moved toward the stairs. She followed him with her eyes, trying to hear what was happening, she could hear that he was swearing but that was nothing new. When he hung up the call, she could see how upset he was.
“Wait here a second,” she said to James, putting a hand on his arm, but her eyes remained on Jackson. She looked back at James, just for a second, before walking towards Jackson, not waiting for a response from the man next to him.
“Taverner,” Jackson said as soon as he saw her approach him. “It says a box of files was misplaced, it's something from Lennon classification that shouldn't be here.”
Catherine frowned. “Can Molly misplace some file?”
“That's what I said,” he growled, eating a bite. “Looks like it's not Molly's.”
She sighed, understanding what he meant. “Another Taverner trick”
“I'm not interested, as long as he doesn't fucking hit us again, good for me.”
“What did she ask you to do?” She moved a little closer to him. The rain began to fall harder and they both got closer to hear each other better over the water falling against the pavement.
“Find the box of files and take it with her by dawn.”
"She became crazy?"
A laugh left Jackson's lips, it was funny when Catherine was visually angry. At least enough to not be polite to a superior.
“Does she know how many files she sent here? You won't be able to locate it tonight, especially on your own. Not even the two of us could”
“Yes, well, that's what the lady wants,” he said contemptuously. “So if you'll excuse me, I have fucking work to do” he looked at James for a second, he was still standing on the sidewalk, looking down the street. “You continue with your thing” he began to walk towards the stairs.
“No,” she said immediately, making him stop to look at her. “I'll help you” without letting Jackson answer, he turned to James to let him know that their dinner had to be canceled.
****
Catherine went back up the stairs heavier than usual, holding the keys in one hand and the small bouquet of flowers in the other.
"Who died?" Jackson asked when he saw her arrive. He was waiting for her at the door of her office with his arms crossed, without his jacket or his tie, he only had his shirt rolled up to his elbows, a cigarette hanging from his fingers and his hair a little wet from the rain.
"What are you talking about?" She walked past him and into her office to take off her bag and jacket again.
"The flowers"
“People who go out on dates give flowers” she left the flowers on the desk and took off her jacket.
“You don't like white flowers, they remind you of funerals”
Catherine stopped what she was doing but didn't look at him, she could feel him steps away from her, staring at her, smoking against the frame of her door. Looking smug just because he remembered a detail about her that James didn't know. But how could James do it? How could he know that she had to organize all the white flowers that people sent for Charles's funeral? How could he know that the mere smell of roses made her nauseous?
She decided to ignore him and finished settling down again to work.
“So,” she said finally, turning toward him determinedly, ready to get down to business. “Let's start on this floor and then go down. Under what name is what we are looking for?
It was midnight and they still couldn't find anything, they had gone down to River and Louisa's floor but so far there was no sign of the lost file.
“He doesn't know who the fuck I am”
Catherine looked at him in confusion, poking her head from behind a stack of boxes on Louisa's desk. What was he talking about now?
“When you introduced me, you had to clarify that I was your boss. Your prince charming doesn't know who I am," Jackson explained, sitting across from her, at River's desk, with open boxes around him.
“No, he doesn't know,” she said and went back to check the box that was resting on her lap, hiding behind the boxes again.
"Why?"
“He doesn't talk to me about his boss either, why would I talk to him about you?” her hands shook a little as she pulled out the files and read their names.
“How I am such an extraordinary boss, and not suicidal, I thought you were going to tell him about me.”
“I don't talk about work with him,” she said flatly, to put an end to his questions.
Jackson stood up from the chair and sighed tiredly. “I'll go get a drink, do you want anything?”
"No"
He was leaving when he turned to look at her. “You didn't eat anything” It wasn't a question, it was a fact.
Catherine blinked for a moment. No, she hadn't, she canceled her dinner to do this with Lamb.
“I have the other half of my kebab, I didn't touch it”
“I…” she was hungry, it was true, she had ignored it until now when he reminded her.
Jackson left without waiting for her response, she assumed that he regretted it, or he got hungry on the way and ended up eating it.
Meanwhile she got up from Louisa's desk and walked over to River's to review the files that Jackson had left unattended.
“We're never going to finish,” she said out loud when she heard Jackson's footsteps enter.
“I know, eat something in the meantime.”
She turned around and saw him standing in front of her with a plate in his hand. He had put it in the microwave to make it warm again.
“Come on, take it,” he said, annoyed when she didn't do anything.
Catherine murmured a thank you and sat at the desk eating while Jackson finished his portion of the files.
“Nothing,” he grunted, throwing the box to the ground.
“We still have two more floors left. We have time,” she said before taking a bite.
Catherine started with the boxes that were on the stairs and hallway, while Jackson entered the office and started with those. James sent Catherine a message asking if she was done, but she put her phone away without answering him, she didn't want to talk to him with Jackson so close.
James was nice, and she enjoyed the time they spent together, unlike what Jackson seemed to think, she was not in love with him, she liked spending time with him, she liked going to his house, going for walks, going out to dinner, but she still didn't feel in love, sometimes she believed she never could be.
“Why did you stay?” Jackson asked, breaking her out of her thoughts.
She was sitting on one of the upper steps, and raised her head to look at him. He was on the mezzanine leaning on the stair railing, looking down at her.
“You could have gone with Prince Charming, but you stayed” he put the cigarette in his mouth.
She didn't know why she had stayed. She could have walked away, let Jackson deal with the Taverner problem alone, but she didn't want to.
“Because it's my job,” she lied. “And I like to do my job well. You couldn't do this alone."
“You don't have to care about that, it's not your fucking problem, it's mine” he raised his shoulders.
“It's everyone's problem. We will not be the big one in the jar but we are still part of MI5, we have a reputation to maintain"
“Since when do you care so much about your reputation?”
Catherine sighed and got up, she was tired, they had been searching for files incessantly for more than 5 hours, her body ached and she was sleepy, she didn't feel like participating in the quiz show that Jackson liked to do with her lately.
“I don't know what you want me to tell you” she started walking up the stairs towards him. “Do you want me to leave? because I would do it without any problem”
“So you can run into his arms? No, thank you,” he murmured.
Catherine stopped in front of him, lately it seemed like he couldn't have more than five words with her without bringing it up to James, she was starting to get fed up. "Stop doing that"
"I'm not doing shit"
She looked at him with annoyance, but also with some sadness. “Yes you do, stop bothering me about James. You told me to date other people, you can't be mad at me now for doing what you asked me to do". Finally, she said it.
Jackson looked at her and their eyes met. “That couldn't keep going for much longer and you know it,” he reminded her seriously.
“I know, now I realize that.”
It was a night like this, the first time they did it. Rainy, dark, silent, just the two of them. It was many months ago, too many to count. Catherine knew they were going to end up doing it eventually, the mystery was how long it would take them to get there. It had started with an argument, something Catherine couldn't even remember, but ended with them kissing and having sex on the couch. The next morning they continued as if nothing had happened, until it happened again a few weeks later, also at night and also alone. Finally it started to be a regular thing, there weren't many discussions about it, they did it and then went on with their lives, as if nothing had happened, always in the office, never outside those four walls, always at night, never in the daylight, always a secret, a dirty secret. Until one night Lamb finished it.
“I moved on, like you asked me to. Now stop asking me questions about him, I don't like that” her voice shook a little and she intertwined her fingers, pressing them against her stomach.
“If you are so happy, my questions shouldn't bother you.”
“When did I say I am happy?” she asked, annoyed. She didn't think she was happy, she was content, yes, but happy was too big a word. She was tired of him seeing her as a fool in love because she didn't feel that way.
He laughed mockingly. “Who are you trying to fool? You smile all the fucking time you look at that cell phone” his voice came out harder and more annoying. “Every time he comes to look for you, you do something new, or you put on makeup, or you buy a dress, you run out to meet him like a fool in love and every time you fuck him the satisfaction comes out of your pores, it's fucking disgusting” he spat.
Catherine glared at him, clenching her jaw, she could feel her cheeks turning red but she didn't know if it was from embarrassment or anger.
“You're a stupid sexist pig,” she pointed her finger at him and took another step towards him.
Lamb rolled his eyes, threw the cigarette on the floor and stepped on it with his shoe.“Are you going to say I'm lying?”
She blinked, standing in place. He was right, she couldn't deny that. But he couldn't get angry because she moved on without him. That night he told her that what they had was meaningless, that she had to move on and forget him, find someone better.
“I don't know why I expected anything else from you. I’m doing what you asked!”
“I didn't ask you to go out with a fourth-rate lawyer,” he defended himself. “With his stupid blue suit and his white flowers. With that stupid fucking face he has”
What Catherine didn't know was that Jackson was jealous, but not of James himself, he cared little about the man, but rather that with James she could do all the things she couldn't do with him. While theirs happened in the dark of the night, in secret, James had the privilege of walking with her hand in hand.
She shook her head. “You're being stupid,” she said quietly.
“You're being stupid, I can see from here that he's a good-for-nothing divorcee who doesn't know what to do with his life since his wife left him and found a little pleasure in you, a bored alcoholic with past traumas who doesn't even have the courage to tell him the truth about her past”
Catherine did not bow her head, nor did she look away, she was not going to give him the satisfaction of hurting her, she was not going to let his words hit her heart.
“And what's the problem with that?” her hands loosened and clenched into fists. She moved a little closer, although there was no more space between them. “I have sex with you, didn't I? After that, anything is a victory."
“I didn't make you,” he reminded her, leaning toward her, “you came to me every night we were together, with your stupid puppy eyes, with your stupid excuses for staying after hours, you think I don't know how much you wanted to keep fucking doing it?"
"What do you want?" she said angrily, she was starting to get desperate. “You don't want me to be with you, but you don't want me to be with anyone else either”
They looked at each other for a moment, there was so much anger and sadness in their eyes, and desire, because there was always desire in them, even if they tried to hide it.
“I can't do it, I can't continue with you bothering me about him. What do you want from me, Jackson?”
He interrupted her with a kiss. He placed a hand on the back of her neck, keeping her in place, and his lips crashed into hers. Catherine didn't push him, or kick him, instead she wrapped an arm around his neck and pulled him even closer to her.
Jackson released his hand on her neck and wrapped his arms around her back, hugging her so tightly that he gently lifted her off the ground.
“I want you to think about me when you're with him,” he growled as he released her lips and began kissing her jaw, moving down to her neck.
She pulled her head back to give him better access, at the same time her hand went to the back of his head, grabbing his hair between her fingers.
“I always think about you, Jackson, that's my curse.”
He opened the top of her dress with practiced speed and buried his face between her breasts, leaving red marks that would make her unable to be with James, at least until they disappeared.
“I want you to smell like me when he comes to pick you up tomorrow…” he murmured, kissing her soft skin, She was wearing a black lace bra and the thought that she chose it especially for tonight, for that failed date, for another man who wasn't him, made his blood boil. “I want that when he touches you, you can only think of me fucking you.”
She didn't know if it was his words or his actions but her body shook completely. James was in the deepest place of her mind at that moment, she could only think of Jackson, of his lips, of his hands, of his eyes on her. How her body seemed to know what his next moves were going to be and how she was eagerly awaiting it.
She had missed him, God, how she had missed him. And she knew he had missed her too. He couldn't kiss her the way he did, touch her the way he did, and not feel anything for her.
"Did you miss me?" Catherine asked as her back hit the wall of boxes, some files wobbled and fell into the hallway. They were trying to get to an office, whichever one was closest, but it was difficult when their hands and lips were on each other, like water in the desert.
“What do you think?” he murmured, searching for her lips again. He didn't want her to talk, not now. He couldn't bear to think about feelings right now, not when he had her in his arms again. Not when at least for tonight she was his again.