The wind is so fair it's as if even Nature knows how much he wants nothing more than to be back London and at liberty. Not that the Panther isn't a perfectly fine fourth rate, everything about her exactly adequate, or that his time away hasn't been kind to him. The crew is solid, the Captain sensible, and (if the Admiralty pays what they should for the French brig captured eight months ago) he is slightly better off financially than he was when he last saw London. But none of that changes how much he wishes to be away from the sea. James watches every scrap of sail for any ripple or variance, happily barking after the men to watch their lines lest they lose even a minute.
Of course getting to anchor is only half the battle. He manages to hand and a note a few shillings through one of the lower gun ports to the crew of a fishing boat whose boy swears he'll run all the way to deliver the message, but otherwise his afternoon is filled with the business of a ship in port. It's torturous hours before he can get into one of the Panther's longboats and finally be rowed to shore.
His note had only said that he was back and at which anchorage the Panther lay. Sensibly he expects nothing and to hire a ride up to the Hamilton house for the consultation he's so desperately overdue. Selfishly, he hopes to see a carriage waiting on the quay accompanied by a lady fine silks with or a man with the spyglass he received as a gift before James left.
Mostly, he gets the first. A familiar carriage and its loyal, discreet driver, the lady and her fine silks within. She may even have the spyglass. The note had reached Thomas first, then sent to Miranda with his apologies - trapped in a meeting - but universe is not so rigid all the time. Today it's malleable and the force of Miranda's willpower has found her husband let out early, hand and hand down the stairs of a state building, Thomas half-whispering laughed devotionals of bright-eyed Athena against her cheek.
"Looking out the window won't make him show up any faster, my love," he says, as if he wouldn't be doing the same damned thing if he were seated inside with a view. (His savior, of course, getting the optimal dock view.) Thomas has already banished his wig and heavy outermost coat, though this may have been a mistake; for politeness' sake he should get out of the carriage and greet Lieutenant McGraw, and doing so in any state of undress will not help rumors about his mental state.
On the other hand, there are merits to pretending not to be here, one among them no-one is going to try and steal him for conversation when all he wants to do is get them - the three of them - home. His home, James's, he doesn't care. It's been too long and they've had so little time to weave this thing together with all of them. He and Miranda have shared lovers before, but they've been fleeting things, like playing with shiny baubles and casting them back after, novelties of eroticism and never anything deeper. Barely anyone can keep up with just one or the other, but both? No one's going to survive that, much less rejoice in it.
Rejoicing in having such an exception and demanding in making one. For them all, she was adamant in making it. Whatever excuse she could think of, would have to do, in her effort to pull him from his offices and affairs. ( If not to spare him them, though this affair she thinks is not have so burdensome ). Particularly inventive, this time, she thought, as he murmured into her cheek such happy things, and she laughed them back as he discarded his coat, and she threaded her fingers in a proper greeting through his hair as the wig was pulled off. where pretense was happily discarded in the close space of the carriage. Little enough barrier as it was, it was just enough to allow this. To be the only one rejoicing in this would be selfishness indeed and not a home coming that James - their dear James, should have. Much rather this shared excitement, this giddiness they both wore in their own way, far too openly.
Because the sea spits forth so many pieces of glass, but seldom does it ever give over its pearls willingly, and never one that was so their own. Coveted and treasured so. That with that just the same spy glass in her hand she puts to her eye again, looking out across the dock yard again, she keeps peering. Steady as a lighthouse. A hum to thought, as she keeps just the same. Peering through the contraption as she scans the dock. "Perhaps not."
He's been good to her, letting her stay at the window, to peer through for them both. "But certainly gives me first warning when I see a longboat departing." The smile light as teasing she gives over to him for it.
It isn't like looking at other ships from a distance. He could name ten of those at anchor about the Panther without being close enough to make out the faces of the men on their decks. Picking out a particular carriage on the shore and assigning it an absolute identity from so far is absolutely impossible. But he suspects. That's enough to both buoy his spirits impossibly and have him rapping an impatient rhythm on his knee for the duration it takes for men to row across the chop to the landing.
This is the first time he knows exactly what he means to do in London. It's the first time he doesn't look back the way he came after climbing from the longboat. It's the first time he has to fight down a grin and measure his stride as he makes his way through the press of humanity to the carriage which, this close, he has no hope of mistaking. There had been a glitter of reflection in the window when he'd still been on the water, hadn't there? It's the middle of the day which makes it all but an impossibility, but some wild part of him believes he'll find them both there.
The driver is familiar, as are the pleasantries -- "Lady Hamilton is far too kind." "Yes sir." --, and the brilliant woman who he can see waiting for him through the window, and the step up into the carriage that's laughably unforgiving on his sea legs. What isn't at all familiar is the feeling that cracks open and pours through him when he spots Thomas in the shadow of his wife. It's been a very long time. He's never missed anyone so much.
Thomas leans in to press a kiss to his wife's lips instead of more volleyed teasing, sitting back after and doing an able job of feigning patience; a long ingrained habit. He lets Miranda be an extension of his excitement-- she looks so much prettier in her expressiveness, anyway, and he delights to look at her. His affectionate study shows the moment she spots James, reading it easily on her face. He huffs out a laugh and squeezes her hand.
They're both hopeless.
Oh. The door opens and James looks at him and Thomas thinks his heart stops for a moment, breath taken away completely by the sight of him. His smile, suddenly, is the kind so brilliant and genuine that he'd never hope to hide it beneath a placid act. The kind probably visible from the moon.
Bless Miranda for forcing him out of that meeting, anyway.
Thomas tries to muster something like-- We thought you might appreciate a ride-- and it just come out, "James," and he's sure he sounds ridiculous.
Hopeless, and happily so. Utterly and completely so, if in different ways. But they are nothing if a study in how different can be the same, when applied to the same end. Her hand settling into Thomas' warmly. A sure fast hold of anchoring, as they wait for James to reach them, like there isn't a doubt he would. Like tide have given him to them with such promise.
A need to be held, as she grips tightly, watching James emerge bright into the dark of the carriage. A trade off, when James looks at them both so struck, first her, then to her shadow, the tide of his navy blues washing into small space. She thinks she could feel that smile of Thomas' all the way down. "Welcome back." Said as one half of the sentence that is there she's sure in her husband's face - as soft a meaning for something that was so much more than simple welcoming.
The random thought that occurs to him - that he's glad he found the time to shave - is so stupid it's laughable. But at least he's no the only one being ridiculous - Thomas radiant there and Miranda, so understated between them that it's hopelessly funny. His own grin his fighting him, mouth pinched so hard to compensate that he must look like he's done nothing but eat limes for the time he's been away.
"I see our government has been characteristically hard at work while I've been away," he says, grappling after being acerbic even if his heart isn't in it. Thank God. Now that reality's given him everything he wanted, the thought that Thomas might have been trapped for hours is intolerable.
Not that Miranda's company isn't enough. Not that her dark eyes and her hand in Thomas's like a tether don't draw his attention like a compass needle North.
But.
He hauls himself up into the darkness of the carriage. When the door snaps shut behind him, James has the presence of mind to check that the curtain is fully drawn behind him before he takes Miranda's free hand then kisses her husband.
"I won't have you diminishing the efforts of my deliverer suggesting I was laying around all day--" pointless, laughing, cut off by that kiss and intentionally so, for as James is checking the curtain Thomas's fingers are already hooking into the waistband of his uniform and propelling him gently, possessively forward into it.
Awestruck at the feel of it, at the way it sends something diamond-shining through every part of him; Thomas doesn't understand how every time he sees James he's more infatuated than the time before, how every time he kisses him it's better, and every time he thinks this is the best it's ever been. This thing they've created, willed into being like God touching clay, is a pool of sunlight and every moment is exploring more, beautiful, incredible. His hand squeezes Miranda's, the three of them connected like a circuit.
He has to let go when the carriage begins to move, an artless shuffle of getting them underway, and Thomas raises both hands to steady James as he sits back slightly so that he can guide him to the space between husband and wife, the bench not long enough for three grown adults without being pressed against each other snugly.
After so many months at sea, the lurch forward of the carriage really isn't so bad that it would stop him. But he lets himself be steadied, all elbows and knees between the three of them as room is made to accommodate the width of his hips and shoulders. He huffs out a laugh, lifting his himself and twisting to pull the waves of Miranda's skirts out from under him--
This is all so ridiculous. Them pressed together on the same side of the carriage, how he can't stop smiling, Thomas's kiss lingering on his mouth like the sweetest wine... (He wants to kiss him again. To press him against the wall of the carriage as it staggers across London. To--)
He's been away too long and has had far too much time to think about what he means to do. Satisfying himself with taking Miranda's hand again and pressing his mouth to her knuckles might be asking too much, but he gives it his best attempt.
"Tell me everything." About them. About what's been done with the state. About the evenings and salons he's missed. About what they intend to do with him.
The material is gathered out of their way, her fingers having to loose their hold on Thomas to accommodate the shift, mourning that loss almost immediately as it goes - but just so, it is in efforts of a good cause, settling him between them.
Something so childlike in this eagerness, so simple for all the complications it might otherwise present. He takes her hand and kisses it, and she lets that warmth express itself so openly, plain on her face as she tilts his hand by the wrist as if it had always been so easy and returns it upon his own knuckle, taste of salt upon them.
Though her eyes slide, so briefly across to Thomas beside him. Nothing, she wants to say, nothing that is half so much as your return to us, as the look in his eyes and the smile on your face. But ventures, mildly, warming that says - rather instead, that they mean to keep him for hours in the retelling of everything he's missed. "Where to begin?"
"Mm, the beginning?" Thomas shifts sideways to face the both of them, long legs angled to be less forcibly folded; he rests one hand on James's shoulder in a comfortable lean, nothing at all like innocence in the way his fingers splay against his neck, tangle in the fall of his auburn hair beneath the ribbon holding it. His other hand settles across James's lap, coaxing Miranda's free one. "I've had three meetings minimum a week since you've been away about lower court budgets, and have spent every single one of them rejecting amendments that would allow two districts to execute loan defaulters on sums under five hundred pounds, which Lord Milner keeps introducing because he is a jackass who hates poor people--" all delivered in his very aloof professional voice, contrasting with the frankness he saves for personal time, rambling on with the full confidence one of them will shut him up before he gets into even more terminally boring detail.
Even with Thomas's hand warm on the back of his neck - every small hair there prickling with interest -, the line of his wrist across his lap and Miranda all coy satisfaction beside him, there's an urge to call Thomas's bluff. 'Really,' he could say. 'But how is Lord Milner finding anyone to still support the damn thing if it keeps getting thrown out?'
But he can't quite manage more than giving Miranda a long suffering look. "Does he torture you like this while I'm away or is it just for the occasion?"
Surely he can trust her to be his partner in this.
"Only when I let him." Is the easy reply back as she leans forward towards James, hooking her fingers across the cravat - enough of that, now Thomas, she did not pry him from duty and deeds just to hear more about them. "Shall we halt him?"
Sure that James will hold her steady, that even if she does not tell him all, he will follow even what she does not indicate - feels his solid warmth from days at sea, all sureness beside her - against the bumps and rolls of the carriage that with the movement make her sway. Leans with him, takes the hold of his jacket to pull James into her. Not so much, all at once, setting her teeth into his lip, then more, that curve of her smile she brushes against his mouth, once and light, then again and former with her eyes lowered as she watches. Demand as she slants her mouth firmly and solidly over his.
Hopelessly, incandescently in love, Thomas finds a whole host of things equally marvelous - the strength of his wife's knee under his hand through layers of fine fabric, the confidence in the corner of her smile and the tangle of her fingers, the things James's eyebrows do when he's fielding whatever nonsense Thomas has thrown him-- verbal sparring and debates volleyed back and forth just as good as wicked smiles and undoing belt clasps, love in every dimension, every texture and temperature.
As soon as that look graces James's face Thomas is laughing, a bright peal of it that continues as Miranda smoothly cuts the corner of his baiting. He leaves his hands where they are as wife and lover connect, fingers stroking along the other man's nape, encouraging.
It does indeed halt him. They are an absolute vision.
He's more than happy to assist her, his hand at her waist the moment she shifts toward him. Does it matter that he's been months at sea? Is that why the edge of her teeth seems so sharp and her kiss so sweet? Or why Thomas's thumb stroking down the back of his neck seems so warm? Or do the circumstances not matter at all? It would be this way regardless of how long it's been since he last found himself between them.
He wants to be back in their home again - to spend as much time in Thomas's study as in their bed. What conversations has he missed at their salon? What is Miranda reading? What news from Nassau is Thomas privy to (as he's heard nothing at all for the duration of his time on at sea)? He wants to teach them the game of cards the Panther's three midshipman had played for the duration of their cruise. He wants--
Somehow despite the length of that list in his head, her kiss and Thomas's gently goading hand are perfectly satisfactory. She's carefully unlaced the last pretense of this with her mouth on his, and it strikes a low heat in his belly so that when he kisses her back he's unrepentant about meeting her demand. Touching her long lovely neck to deepen the kiss, breathing thick and eyes dark when they do finally part.
"What what it were you saying?," he murmurs, turning just that half degree into the warmth of Thomas's hand. "About Lord Milner?"
He turns, and she follows the line he presents as easy to follow. He can do the talking, she has done plenty of it in his absence and she was here, with them both, for too particular a reason as her fingers slide to lock tightly with Thomas' and her head turns to work down against James' neck, that smile still there - but opened slowly, nosing softly at the edge of his collar to find more skin. Her free hand sliding against the inside of his jacket to smooth over the flat of his chest. An imperfect angle, caught together, a twisted rope that tugs and pulls - but held fast, all the same.
"I find it difficult to believe you care what I was saying about lord anyone," Thomas tells him, close enough to nearly brush his face against James's, seeing if he can call his bluff before he gets out one of his own. (They're trying to reform the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland into one monster, most everyone over the age of thirty-five still doesn't respect that any Parliament exists at all in favor of the monarchy and this lurching creature of political nightmares has no idea what it's doing collectively at any given time, do you think anyone is following procedure or isn't trying to weasel counts this way or that--)
Watching Miranda begin to get his jacket undone is momentarily distracting.
"At least right now."
Thomas rubs the back of his neck, wondering distantly at aches and pains from the labor of running around a ship for so long, and then presses a kiss to the side of his mouth. His hand clasped with Miranda's moves both against James's belly, as if threatening the buttons of his uniform.
How long does it take a carriage to force its way from London harbor to the Hamilton house? He's been on largely aimless patrol for five months. Long enough, is maybe not strictly a flattering thought but James suspects it's an honest one. The way his stomach pitches low for the weight of their hands seems to think so. And maybe Miranda can taste his pulse under her lips, feel the hum when he makes a low noise instead of arguing--
"Later," he says across Thomas's mouth and means it as much as he does the kiss that follows. He wants to know. He wants every detail as much as he wants to be reminded of what Thomas tastes like - what's it like to kiss him open mouthed and deceptively languid as his hand shifts from Miranda's waist to gather her skirts by inches (ridiculous; there's so much under them there's almost no point - but the sentiment is there under his fingertips).
This isn't what he's supposed to be doing anymore than this is where they should to be. Thomas ought to be trapped in a state house. Miranda should have sent a carriage for him. They're supposed to have had a dinner to reacquaint themselves over - to talk like adults with more on the mind than how much he's thought about touching them. But putting up a fight is, for once, beyond his capabilities.
She is smiling into his neck as she feels the shudder of Thomas being pulled into James. Her fingers hooking against buttons holes that hook to keep her steady, keep Thomas' hand there on him. Like they need to trap him there, like she isn't absolutely sure that they all don't know how right this feels, having him between them, where they can both pour out their longing into him.
( No point at all but she stretches into him to give him what little help can be afforded, a movement of assisting his hold on those skirts, keep them gathered out of the way she that she can press her knee to the side of his, that she can hook her leg against his. A tap of her toes against the buckle of his, sliding so carefully against the stockings underneath, a warmth of so many layers. )
Thomas kisses him with all the tender adoration he's harbored in his absence, underscored with inevitable, barely-restrained passion. Pretense would be criminal. James is back with them and he deserves to feel and taste and breathe how much they love him, how much they've missed him-- and don't they deserve to have him, too?
(Maybe they were even well-behaved while James was away. Anything is possible.)
The carriage hits a particularly rough patch and Thomas pulls back gently, practiced at not letting jostles result in bitten lips and tongues, and presses an open-mouthed kiss against his jaw. His smile against his skin is tangible, and fingers help Miranda's - undoing buttons plainly. All the way up, pushing aside fabric to get at the softer shirt beneath. He exchanges a glance with his wife, perfectly pleased.
The hook of her leg across his affords what feels like a fraction of space inviting itself to be filled. He takes it, line of his leg jostling pleasantly at her calf as the carriage rattles his teeth and buttons are made irrelevant. Not that he's the only one to take advantage of any trace of room on the crowded side of the carriage; Thomas's hand is shockingly warm as it finds its way between his open waistcoat and shirt.
He huffs out a breath, tries not to think of how he must taste and smell of salt and sweat and brine, and manages to sort the layers of her petticoats only once he puts both hands to the task. Getting them anywhere useful is impossible in the cramped quarters, but he has the great ambition of baring her knee because there's something about just the thought of it that makes Thomas's fingers seem heavier, steadier, and his breath against his neck give rise to the small hairs there.
It both does and doesn't feel like being outnumbered.
A worthy goal that she takes feed of happily, can take it one better as he frustrated push at material that - in direct purpose she meets Thomas' eyes, breathlessly warm, heat in her cheek where otherwise she guides James' hand in the pace of a leisurely stroll not just to her knee, but that inch up, where the high brace of her stockings - neatly tied in military blue. A piece of longing that she kept away from eyes, or rather, away from anyone but the one person who would know
( Some days, she wonders just what they might be without James, now, and then resolves herself to never finding out. )
Her leg settles at the angle, slung in the way that it makes it easy to lean back when the carriage rolls back and she has to catch herself by it instead. Watching them both with a pitched laugh of the sheer ridiculousness that is them, right now. Three grown adults, pawing and playing about in a carriage that does not have space enough for their nonsense to contain it. Which quite probably, what makes it half so tempting.
Lazy warmed eyes as she looks over the figure they cut together and leans back in close. The clock-swing of the drops of earrings that time the rise and fall of the carriage as she goes. Like surf beaten back before it rushes into shore again, pushing James more eagerly into Thomas. An effort to get him where she can pull his vest buttons apart once and for all. At least so that Thomas' hands can find more interesting places to roam whilst she does the work of giving them space.
Thomas knows well the struggle with Miranda's layers (wouldn't she look lovely in James's uniform? perhaps later), but smiles knowing what questing hands will find beneath. He finds James's mouth again with his own, sitting forward enough so none of them are twisted uncomfortably - just pressed close, only fabric between them, and even that diminishing. Less teasing, Thomas undoes every button on his waistcoat, always finding those much easier than lace and ribbons that Miranda prefers he not just snap off. If only he had a sailor's deftness with knots.
The carriage sways and Thomas, sitting sideways as he is, has to loose his hand from pulling James's shirt free from his trousers to press it against the ceiling and keep himself from toppling to the other side-- and from pulling James with him, his other arm still wrapped around his shoulders. He's too tall to be doing this, but just laughs.
"Thomas," he says, and he's breathless and low and laughing. There's another lurch of the carriage that strains the abilities of its springs - bouncing the cabin so dramatically that it's like riding a running tide in a row boat. "For God's sake, you're going to split your head open."
Arriving at their destination half dressed (at best) or with a concussed Lord Hamilton might be perfectly easy to explain away compared to the combination of both.
But he makes no effort to stop him or to resist the way Miranda draws his hand higher toward where he's thought of touching for weeks. He doesn't stop himself from looking when the rock of the carriage affords the opportunity between undone buttons, spying that flash of deep blue and an inch of her pale thigh. Huffing out an incredulous little noise, he fights a grin that threatens an edge of hungry teeth - wets his lips instead and shifts a hand to finish what Thomas had started: pulling his own shirt tails free.
Her smile stays wicked and turned in as she lowers her head where he pulls his shirt tails out - and immediate rolling in, that sets her hands to his hips and slides them up. over the bare skin that she and Thomas work to expose. "Perhaps then he might gain some sense."
It's merciless, to the quiet way she gives when she lowers her head, the soft brush of that elegantly styled of pinned curl, in place - where Thomas in his infinite excitement for all such things, to James' steadily crafted dishevelment, they are stages of something. Caterpillar to butterfly, fawn to stag and in satisfaction of ouroboros biting its own tail, she lowers her lips to the bare skin of Jame's belly, know it will be sea aired stained, and sets her teeth on him. One quick bite, sucked soft. Before her head turns up once more, an easily parted breath - ( that trouble of corsetry, how it makes it so hard to breathe deep with all this jostling, and yet adds to the need, straining against it in a flush of skin, hard up against it, in a swell of her breasts, the shift of collar bones under her skin ) - she pushes up that little further.
"But I think the cart would over turn, and nothing would change that." And there is a satisfaction to her voice, says that she is so proud of her husband for it.
"And to think I never wish for anything but pleasure for the both of you," he chides, the most delicate teasing, as delicate as his touch at the back of her neck as she bends. Torn between watching her and watching James's face, he chooses the latter, entirely too deprived while he's been away. The carriage shakes but he's found his footing well enough by now, and when Miranda lifts his hand travels to her side, automatic. (Stays are wholly baffling and he wishes they would fall out of fashion; what, exactly, is attractive about a woman suffocating.) (Don't answer that, it's a bloody thesis of control.)
Thomas slips his hand from behind James's neck to his chest, pushing open layers of fabric to get his palm on skin, rucking it up and away to one side, exposing the straight line of his clavicle and the warm curve of pectoral.
Don't do that, his brain provides too late to stop Miranda from setting her teeth on him. His face might have seen fresh water this morning, but the rest of him's chalky with salt-- Not that the heat of her mouth doesn't make him start for other reasons, sensation like the small hair at the back of his neck prickling passing down through his belly. Not that objection is why the square of his hand goes firm high at the inside of her thigh or has anything to do with the soft sound that escapes him, attention drawn low by the pull of her breath near his skin and the rise of her breast. Thomas's hand at the curve of her neck for what seems like just a provocative instant.
"You want to ruin me, you mean," he says, crooked grin and breathless and something dark in his face as he catches Thomas by the wrist and meets his eyes. Heat unfolds in his middle for the weight of that hand and the corresponding shape of the carriage seat behind his shoulder. If Thomas wanted to, he could pin him this way. Or lock his elbow and pretend to. James would let him.
(He's so handsome like this, a strange kind of grace to how Thomas weathers the sway of the carriage with his hands at both of them. It's mesmerising. How does anyone look at Thomas Hamilton and not love him entirely?)
( An answer she has yet to find in any book, speech or poem. Rather in all forms, they seem all ever to be as in love with her husband as any being could be. )
( But he'd chide them both, for that. )
For now, she stays grounded, if only because one of them must attempt it. If only slightly. His skin does taste of salt, like a reminder of the long months of his parting from them. But as she walks those kisses up his chest, lighter and lighter, until she can lean forward over him: her only true objection to it, is that it is a reminder of how long they have been in absence of this wholeness. Where she leans forward, that taste of salt on her mouth to give not to James, but is a brush of a kiss that is timed to the swag of the carriage to Thomas' mouth ( like children stealing and sharing sweets, bracing with the strength of the hand upon her leg, the feel of fingers at her throat ), before she is summarily rocked backwards to her seat - she only has one response.
"Just so, we're to scrub these months off of him, the first chance we get."
(They are both ridiculous, and he loves them both eternally.)
He says Mmm, a monosyllabic noise and the look in his eyes to communicate Yes that's correct and also Being ruined is the best state for you, my love, and I know how much you crave it. Thomas presses his hand to James's shoulder, presses him to the back of the carriage, captures that stolen kiss and holds James where he is (where he's very gallantly playing along) as though to have him sit and watch for a moment.
"I think I'd enjoy that very much," he says, of the idea of their lieutenant in a bathtub being attended to by the both of them. Thomas leans in, letting his weight rest where he's pretending to hold James down, and presses a kiss to his mouth. Passing the affection from Miranda, amplifying it with his own. Against his lips: "And we'll have you warm and clean for after. When I'd love to watch you take Miranda." Anchored so against James, he slips his other hand beneath his wife's skirts to join his lover's hand against her soft skin at the height of her thigh. "For a little while. Until I take you at the same time." Thomas's teeth find James's lower lip, indentation barely-there.
He could apologize for his brine skin and the salt stiff edges of his shirt, but it's the reality of the situation the two of them have clearly already opted to embrace almost nearly without comment. And it doesn't matter that he wants to say something anyway - he's learning that they won't accept him making apologies for what he is, salt stain and all. Instead he lets himself sink into this with the same barely restrained eagerness that has him giving under the press of Thomas's hand sturdy at his shoulder and had goaded him to reach the quay so quickly. He'd nearly jumped past the step into the carriage entirely and now he mets himself want to watch them as they kiss, attention razor sharp (fuck, they're lovely). He can feel the pulse of it low in his core, as warm and sure as Thomas's palm on his skin or the inside of Miranda's pale thigh under his fingers.
Thomas's wrist under his thumb feels more solid than it looks. James's touch jumps there, flexing briefly tighter as their hands come together under Miranda's skirt and Thomas starts to say things that narrow the world to the lurch of the carriage and the edge of Thomas's teeth, every fiber of him intimately aware of how long it's been since they left the harbor and how soon they can expect to reach the Hamilton house with its bath and bed and promises of Thomas's hands on him and Miranda slick with sweat and--
'You shouldn't say things like that,' he might have said, low and grinning but somehow still genuine. Quietly uneasy. Instead he breathes out heavy into Thomas's mouth and says, "Please," while he clings to the man's wrist with one hand and presses to the heat between Miranda's legs with the other.
The one joy to her situation is that we'll picked maids aside, if she elected not to wear her draws, it would be her secret.
Or theirs now, a last minute choice like she knew that expendience was foremost in her mind when she dressed for the day. A choice she is glad for making, she means to watch them, surely she does, as she feels the guide of Thomas' grip to James'. Feels the broad set of seaman's hands to the softer letter worn callouses of her husbands as thry slide up and up. Sinking against heat and the roll of the carriage rocks them that little and her eyes fall shut, her head tilted up and back in a brief shudders enjoyment that times far too well. Yes, to have them both, to have James caught between them to know each rocking motion as both of them when she let's James sink over and into -
When her eyes open the heat and the flush is unmistakable and the turn of her hand is purposeful as she sets it to theirs. Guiding up against warmth. A unmistakable heat, slick and wanting, waiting. She has been waiting. A open warn eagerness. She wears it differently, perhaps, but for them she has it nonetheless. Her own Apollo and Poseidon that come like sea and sun, equally parts to each other.
"We will surely be home soon." That either comes as a promise or a warning and impatient in either case.
Please he says and Thomas kisses him claiming and needy, pushes his tongue into his mouth to curl against the other, every restrained inch of passion and God how I've missed you opened into a searing moment. His hand finds the sweet center between Miranda's thighs and the sound he makes against James's mouth is as much approval for her last minute choice as the warm ache tasting his lover so deeply again inspires. Thumb atop their sailor's against her, Thomas rubs over the so-soft skin there before pressing fingers inside her, wasting no time curling them in the way she likes best. Because she is correct.
"But not yet," is breathed out, breaking way from the kiss but not moving at all, his nose and mouth against James's, lips moving against the side of his as he speaks and presses messy kisses there until he has to, has to kiss him fully again, the hand at his shoulder gripping him as though he might vanish from beneath their four hands. He fantasizes sometimes about a world where James lives with them properly, where he is not pulled from them for these stretches of time-- and yet he'd never wish it, knowing how connected to the sea he is (the salt of him, on his skin, on his clothes, down to his marrow Thomas thinks) and finding the idea of asking someone to change or chain themselves so miserable. This is James, elemental and unbound, choosing to be here with them. Perfect-- perfect.
There are people on London given to gossiping over Lord and Lady Hamilton - that one is mad and the other is far more flexible than anyone would desire for a wife. They don't know the half of it, thinks James. And what a loss.
Because Thomas's mouth and tongue are as mesmerizing as the heat between Miranda's legs. His hand under James's there-- he can feel himself jerk as a string plucked when Thomas turns his hand there and presses fingers into her right there. He can feel the answering twitch of Miranda under the line of his thumb and hears himself make a low, thoughtless sound into Thomas's mouth. It's easy to imagine-- anything. Everything. Thomas with his beautiful hands, so astonishingly articulate as he pins him or strips Miranda down.
(That's a ridiculous fantasy; James is so much more adept at taking Miranda out of her clothes than her husband is. The ties fastening stays, the ribbons there, come open under his fingers as easily as any other knot might.)
Still. How easy it is to get swept up by the appeal of them when he's been so far awat. If he had been in London these last months instead of on a ship, he might not be so easily convinced to make a fool of himself in a carriage with a very immediate destination. As it is, he kisses Thomas so fiercely it's as if they're the only ones who know how to; he feels where Thomas's fingers press into Miranda and lingers over the possibility of doing the same. Of pressing a third finger into her. Having Thomas demonstrate exactly how he touches her. James thinks and thinks and thinks and none of it has amything to do with how near they might be to the Hamilton house until the sound of the road under the wheels alters and the horses slow.
"Fuck." Which: yes. That's probably the idea. He balks, hand drawing abruptly out from under Miranda's skirts so he can desperately begin putting himself back together. "The pair of you--"
He doesn't finish the thought, twisting under Thomas to do up rows of unfastened buttons.
"Have been waiting too long." Is the only end to that sentence that matters.
Her eyes open, brief, the sigh she refuses to help. The rock against the set of Thomas' fingers and the steadiness of James' hand. She enjoys it, to the purpose entirely, without shame. Enjoys them, watching - hers and her own, and completely lost in each other, all of a self-evident truth:
The rest is sheer practicality. Something she flicks in practice of the many years managing her husband's lack of it. Loathe as she is to lose their touch, that ease of his fingers inside of her, she shifts - her own cue of following along. She flicks her skirts, smoothes them to neatness again, and with the bulk of that material in hand, shifts herself between her men and the carriage door. Her hands moving up to check the set of brown curls, redraping herself with half the effort as she settles in the bench the other side of the small space to allow her to step out first - whatever it took to give James' the time to rearrange himself.
Thomas is less abrupt removing his hand, so gentle and sensually thoughtful at every opportunity, and he sits back to watch James scramble to button himself back up. Unhelpful in his lack of offered aid, but then-- he smiles, a mischievous self-indulgent one that no one outside this carriage sees for long enough to know the truth of it, and brings the hand that has been against James's fingers under their lady's skirts to the sailor's lips, pressing fingers in, sharing the warm and wet evidence of too long.
His other hand slips from James's shoulder to help tuck the ends of his shirt back into place, but it's far from hurried. He should probably fish his jacket and wig out from wherever he's left them in here, too - his staff are so used to his dislike of those items in particular he can't imagine anyone would so much as blink at the state of him, but it's a kindness to James's nerves.
('Could' be. Thomas still has fingertips mocking the existence of propriety when the handle of the carriage door squeaks, but in in the next heartbeat is innocently arranged.)
London is as dreary outside the Hamilton home as it is directly beside the Thames, but it's warm and comfortable inside, rich colors and dense decor set as if to hold all who enter in an intimate embrace. Thomas's wig is off again as soon as the doors are shut behind them, setting one of the girls in the house to run a bath for the guest room.
The thing is, he isn't bad at this. If he were, all the determination and intellect in the world wouldn't have sustained whatever scrap of Hennessey's attention he'd first captured as a boy. If he were still on a ship (and the odds are high, given his father's profession and that of his grandfather before him, but most especially the Navy's compulsive need to press any man at liberty), he might either spend his scant time ashore in one of the taverns nearest the water or, given a particularly tyrannical captain especially worried about deserters in a familiar port, he might find himself only in observation of London's lights. If he was so incapable of playing this game, there would be no stiff uniform collars, shined brass buttons and buckles; there would be no dances like this one, populated almost entirely by naval officers, unmarried feckless second or third sons, and young ladies of skeptical eligibility. There would have been no commission and he could have never met--
"The Hamiltons. My god," exclaims Lieutenant Maplestone, late of the Woolwich. It's shouted almost directly into James's ear and maybe that's why every part of him goes sharp as a knife's edge and he finds himself choking on a mouthful of wine. The conversation in this small knot of officers dies and every eye of the group pivots to the doorway where, indeed, Lord and Lady Hamilton have appeared as a pair of brilliant gems transported here entirely by accident. Miranda is undeniably stunning, her dark hair turned up high off her long, slender neck and the rich color of her gown in sharp contrast to her pale breast. Her husband beside her is equally vibrant - from this distance, he seems fresh face and delighted in a way that's difficult to miss having become strangely familiar with it in the book-lined study of the Hamilton house (--and over dinner, and long into the night at the demand of conversation that had once been about the Nassau problem and then morphed into a frank argument over Sophocles).
By contrast, if he's as pale as he feels then James McGraw must look like a ghost when viewed across the length of the dance hall among the ruddy, suntanned naval men whose company he's among tonight.
And then, naturally, the attention of the men around him shifts directly from the couple at the doorway to the Lieutenant in their midst who a moment ago had simply been a broad shape lingering at the edge of polite conversation. "Well," --that's the Second Lieutenant of the Defiant, something that sounds very like smugness to James's ear-- "I can't say I'm shocked."
Walking into a party - be it a grand ball or something modest in the countryside - and causing half the heads in the room to turn is an ordinary occurrence. Scandalized pockets of quiet scattered in the colorful tapestry of socializing, equally familiar. Lord Hamilton on more than one occasion has confided in private to his wife that it always feels like they're slacking off when their arrival somewhere doesn't get at least a ripple; tonight he knows one stone thrown into the pond is Lieutenant McGraw somewhere, but larger is simply how radiant Lady Hamilton looks, perfectly polished and adorned, her beaming smile the most beautiful of all. (I don't know why ya'll gagging when they bring it to you everyyyy tiiiiiime.)
They mean well. There are no boundaries for persons of their station, every door opened with shuffling obedience, even ones set lower than certain peers would prefer. Thomas had thought to work on correspondence tonight, but the idea of doing so drifted further and further away from his willpower after Miranda had put the idea in his head-- James complained in passing about these sorts of things (dryly) (once), and Miranda, too vibrant to suffer being cooped up away from the world, wouldn't be able to attend on her own, it would be miserable of Thomas to deny her, and James as well!, and it's supportive of their dear friend.
And anyway, it's not the worst place they've ever shown up.
There are so many people in this dance hall, so many men in identical dark blue, and yet Thomas finds (his) the one he's looking for in the space of a heartbeat. Like a needle pointing north, he thinks, before setting aside that absurd notion not only because he's told himself every notion of that kind is being buried, but because of-- Oh, dear, he thinks.
Idealistic and occasionally accidentally thoughtless, Thomas isn't stupid, and assumed the lieutenant would have a poor reaction at first, as he does to so many things. But Miranda is so good at coaxing him into sweet capitulation, and Thomas - Thomas has made sure they needn't immediately walk towards the officer who looks like he's swallowed his own tongue. Best to give him a few minutes to become a trifle less agitated, and very nearly on cue, Lieutenant Commander Davis greets them with brightly animated pleasure.
It's with a brightly animated pleasure she returns the greeting, as the Lieutenant Commander speaks to Thomas and then herself. The usual bow and scrape of humility of one rank to another. She lends a hand to be kissed, laughs appreciatively to the merry words of a good evening that is wished to them and she chimes it in returned volley.
Because the form begets the purpose, of a well intentioned jaunt on her and Thomas' behalf. He had thrown himself behind the cause, should they not do the same?
To that no, she doesn't lead - of course not, a woman of her position never leads, she politely inquires that when was the last time they spoke with the Commander Phillips? A effort to make the rounds, like perhaps to rally their own soldiers, she knows as many as Thomas to that end. It would be as good a time as any to make returns on those friendships before great undertakings.
Not just because James looks, rather... out of sorts. Like he'd swallowed bilge water, not wine, and was forcing himself to drink it anyway. Oh dear, it would be an effort to cheer him on that humour but she would do it regardless. But she tries keep the gaze only breifly lingering, as they make pleasant with another acquaintance, even if it's done with a casual distraction to the topic. Her hand loosening on Thomas, some for the tug of impatience she does her best to ignore as she waits for James to settle at least some from the surprise. It could surely be no more than that. He was a set man, at times.
His first, most base instinct is to pretend like he hasn't seen them at all. As if the room didn't inhale collectively over their presence (the feeling of it still lodged there under his second rib, stabbing at something so vulnerable from the sight of them that it has him uneasy, certain that someone beside him must have seen some trace of it on her face in some split second before he thought to conceal it). But it's so beyond imagination, particularly given Maplestone's outburst, that he dismisses it and instead faces their tortuously slow approach head on:
"Say, I'm reminded. Mister McGraw, aren't you acquainted with--" the Defiant's man is saying and James interrupts him with a clipped, "Excuse me," and shears off from his apathetically chosen companions to make headway toward the Hamiltons. It's only when he's a few paces away that he realizes his glass is still in hand (and empty), but then it's too late to do away with it on some sideboard so he's left standing there with some new line of curious officers with his bloody hands full as the two of them make pleasant conversation with Phillips and Kearns and Penhale in turns until finally they must turn and find him there next in line to say their hellos to.
In the time it takes, his expression has drawn so utterly flat and featureless that it's like looking into the face of a particularly bland portrait of an otherwise familiar figure. The man beside him - Silcox, of the Chestnut - greets Thomas like an old friend: a happy hand for the Lord Hamilton's elbow and some bright remark about Eton that James only half hears in the moment but will recall with perfect clarity later. James--
nods to the pair of them. "Lord Hamilton. Your wife looks lovely this evening, as ever."
Maybe the stars will align and some fool will strike a match too close to the powder stock on one of the great ships in the harbor. He can imagine then that no one will remember this evening and they can go on their way, happily forgotten.
Thomas gives (privately laughing) consideration to catching the hem of Miranda's skirt under his heel when he feels her hand take a desultory turn. Only lightly. Instead he adjusts and the flat of his own hand at her back says Darling, I know, but-- getting through a deluge of introductions is the price they're going to pay for showing up anywhere, no matter how tedious, no matter how distracting the thought of going to cheer up Lieutenant McGraw is.
Speaking of. ('Oh, dear' for a third time between the two of them.)
"Lieutenant," is warm, the showy edges of his smiled dimmed just-so into something a little more familiar. Thomas reaches out and curls long fingers over the top of his empty glass, pulling it out of his grip and - well, Bennet Silcox is there, whose presence Thomas is actually quite relieved over, "Make yourself useful," he chides, and the dark-haired man laughs and takes the glass to set somewhere convenient while Thomas reaches back to shake James's hand properly. "She knows, I've made absolutely certain. I'm so happy to have caught you tonight, we weren't sure you'd be here."
That dour expression is somewhat concerning. No so un-agitated yet, it seems.
Is it impatience or frustration that returns him to them? ( Them like he was only ever going to love them both, theirs like between them he took new form under moulders hands, it is something, in the coming weeks to think on.) but returns he does. Different to coming back from sea. If only one made of people. Affection wants to believe the former, the look on his face says to the latter.
James, is the breathed implied affection. "Lieutenant McGraw." is what comes out of her mouth. Though she takes no step to him, with Thomas' hand on her back, she does not so much lift a finger. Let it be said they were each other's better influence, always. "It is a pleasure to see you again at last."
Like it was not her that offered a gateway for him to step through, like half the room wasn't listening with baited breath.
The glass is surrendered, swept out of his hand so easily that he could almost resent it. Oh, they are the picture of dignity and politeness aren't they? Upended entirely by the fact that this is the theater they've chosen to play in. There's a young lady at the center of the dance hall being traded off between two midshipman, the three of them laughing loud enough to be heard over the music and even then James is certain he can feel the whole room tipped faintly in this direction. Surely the murmur of conversation has shifted tack to remark on the Hamilton's presence and soon what will follow is 'Isn't Mister McGraw Lord Hamilton's liason with the Admiralty?' from those most familiar with either the naval or political end of things. Then someone else will say 'That's not the liason I've heard so much about--'.
What a stupid thing - handing yourself so directly into the wolf's mouth. In any other conceivable circumstance, it might be charming. Invigorating. What a strange, liberated pair they are (and isn't that appealing?) But this isn't their drawing room in the company of poets, educated wives and liberally minded young men. He's intimately familiar with how this place works, what these young men will say. The reality of it drains the pleasure of their presence from the room.
He manages a smile, mistaken for easily done if only it reached past his mouth. "To what do we owe it?" What the fuck are you two doing here?
That flat delivery is one Thomas knows to be attached to James being genuinely displeased about something, though he hasn't heard it in a while, and never before with such a tangible undercurrent of real tension. It is a little bit attractive - the way his menace can be so cold and even when most men would be shaking and flush-faced. Steady under any pressure.
But this wasn't meant to be particularly crushing pressure, and in the heartbeat of fractionally taken aback silence that meets the blunt knife of his question (Silcox beside him as a strange look on his face), Thomas looks at the situation and accepts that this may have been a bad call. In that same heartbeat is also: too late to do anything about it now.
"The occasion, certainly," is gentle, but in no way placating. James is a grown man who's seen battle, for heaven's sake, he can pull himself together. "It's the off season for things like this, and I'm lucky to have old friends and new present. And, I must say, you have kindled a true interest in our Navy."
It would be easy to take his displeasure personally, some little needle of worry over being present beside Miranda and showing off the bond James can never have with her in public. And maybe it's so, maybe Thomas's presence is what he resents; he doesn't have time for it. Privately lonely as he's been. It'll be a fine evening, Miranda getting to see her lover in his element, and Thomas-- can be happy for her, and catch up with like-minded old friends.
Just as soon as the lieutenant remembers people will talk one way or the other, and looking like he'd rather everyone in the room drop dead won't help. Come now, McGraw, you're the tactician.
She blinks, her smile staying fixed, wide and brilliant. A gaze sliding back across to her husband when he speaks, like James knew his swords and Thomas knows his speeches, she knows her steps, her roles. No souring note would let anything affect that so quickly. Keeping her pace and her presence steady. To the volatile others of life had a habit of inflicting, it seemed a necessity, especially in moments like this. "Just so. After all, you have diligently attended my husband's days in parliament, should we not do the same and pay you a visit in turn?"
Her arm slides fixed, warm, to Thomas, sliding to brace against his wrist. Warm, held, comfortable. As a husband and wife should be. "Besides, it seemed a good excuse as any to revisit acquaintances in this corner that we have not paid respects too for some time." Not so solely him, as they might gossip. There would be men in the navy before James McGraw, and there would be men in the navy afterwards.
The chime of Silcox to his part for the over arching task master that was propriety and a need to smooth along a stilted conversation. ( - And we have been dimmer for it, madam! Good man. )
His smile solidifies, and this time it is sure enough that surely even Silcox mustn't sense anything is amiss. Only of course Silcox hasn't spent long hours in James McGraw's company - among books, in debate, over late dinners, and quiet conversations in corners, in carriages and... elsewhere. "Of course," he says. The season and old friends. Obviously.
He is so staunchly, preemptively angry (for absolutely everything that will come of this) that he can feel it in his hands, his fingers tingling. He needs something to hold - another glass of wine, one of the young ladies being turned around and around on the dance floor. Instead he tucks them behind himself and pinches the skin between his thumb and forefinger.
"I wasn't aware you were so well acquainted with the Lord and Lady Hamilton, Mister Silcox." Which is, mercifully, exactly the thing to say to encourage the other man to jump toward leading the conversation.
Thomas's hand moves to his opposite side, over his wife's, automatic affection. (Sometimes, it makes the rumors worse. How can she, when Lord Hamilton is so docile with her? He hasn't taken up with so much as a maid - maybe he can't? But doesn't she know how lucky she is that he won't raise a hand--) Beside them, Silcox launches into an old yarn about more formative years, prompting Thomas to roll his eyes and threaten, entirely without teeth and all fond exasperation, to never speak to him again if he details any youthful exploits.
"Come now, you never got into any real trouble," the man is saying, "just arguing with instructors."
"I should have tried real trouble, it turns out being in the habit of arguing persists in aggravating people long outside school years."
Silcox laughs brightly and without a trace of reproach; not everyone in London thinks Thomas Hamilton is mad, after all, and not everyone who visits his salon lies about it in the daylight. Bennet hasn't attended in a while, being busy with his career (and trying to find an appropriately uninvested girl to marry) as well as not stunningly intelligent. But he isn't stupid, and he isn't unkind, and he spent at least one summer nursing a broken heart over Thomas. In that respect it's a little classless to court his attentions, but he'll be delighted and Thomas-- Thomas will feel less inert. He just doesn't have the free time Miranda does, these days. Nor the options.
One of which is currently in control of his glower. Thank God. Thomas tries to catch James's gaze and communicate - what? Calm? Something curious? He knows the man well, but not well enough, it seems. Does Miranda? She may well have the key to soothing him, ironing out the edges of his temper, some intimate thing Thomas has no grasp on.
"Are you acquainted with any of the young women out on fishing expeditions tonight?" he asks her, and then at Silcox's faux-scandalized "Thomas!", adds: "Is that not a navy term?"
"Oh certainly," the smile is guileless, as out of turn as her husband with the same lack of venom, taking the conversation in an easy direction. Like knocking over houses of cards, it falls into an easy step by step crumble.
"Young Lady Wyatt is looking quite handsome tonight, isn't she, Silcox?" That chimes to the tune, of the same sort of pattern, "Yes, madam, she does."
It's the same practiced turn of hand that doesn't miss the excuse to entangle her fingers with Thomas as she does direct the conversation away from themselves. It does not matter that Silcox doesn't care for that company, or that she knows that Lady Wyatt has only an interest in books and not so much in husbands, but that it isn't so strictly themselves and so the purpose is served.
Look somewhere else, there is plenty of looking to be done if that is what you worry about. She shouldn't be teaching military men about misdirection, for heaven's sake. "Perhaps you will both like to be introduced, Lieutenant, Silcox?" Her husband, after all, was a happily married man and had the only introduction that served him, despite no one in society understanding the forms that could take. There is a hundred fictions to be composed, and enough to throw society off a scent, as full of themselves as they liked to be.
Of course they aren't the only people of note in attendance - nearly every man of the Navy's officers has some degree of respectable parentage -, but surely they're among the most talked about, the best placed (to do themselves and him some degree of harm). Yes, there are indeed plenty of other places to look but none require such immediate attention.
He can't very well bloody ignore them, now can he?
So Silcox talks and Thomas brandishes his wit and James adopts the most cool expression he's capable of as he ignores Miranda threading her fingers easily with her husband's. It isn't so difficult to do - not thinking as he is of some point ahead of this moment where Miranda and her husband can successfully be bundled away back into whatever carriage they came in and sent home, and how best to arrive there without injury. They'll have to stay long enough to warrant coming in the first place, he thinks. Miranda will likely care to dance, god willing with her husband.
--A thought immediately dashed by Silcox saying, "As a matter of fact, the lovely Lady Wyatt and I are already acquainted. But I'm sure Lieutenant McGraw would be most happy for your introduction." The man clearly intends to keep Thomas in conversation.
James releases his hands from behind his back. He offers her his arm. "Of course. I'd be grateful for it." Maybe they can find something so riveting to talk about that the conversation will last the evening.
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Of course getting to anchor is only half the battle. He manages to hand and a note a few shillings through one of the lower gun ports to the crew of a fishing boat whose boy swears he'll run all the way to deliver the message, but otherwise his afternoon is filled with the business of a ship in port. It's torturous hours before he can get into one of the Panther's longboats and finally be rowed to shore.
His note had only said that he was back and at which anchorage the Panther lay. Sensibly he expects nothing and to hire a ride up to the Hamilton house for the consultation he's so desperately overdue. Selfishly, he hopes to see a carriage waiting on the quay accompanied by a lady fine silks with or a man with the spyglass he received as a gift before James left.
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"Looking out the window won't make him show up any faster, my love," he says, as if he wouldn't be doing the same damned thing if he were seated inside with a view. (His savior, of course, getting the optimal dock view.) Thomas has already banished his wig and heavy outermost coat, though this may have been a mistake; for politeness' sake he should get out of the carriage and greet Lieutenant McGraw, and doing so in any state of undress will not help rumors about his mental state.
On the other hand, there are merits to pretending not to be here, one among them no-one is going to try and steal him for conversation when all he wants to do is get them - the three of them - home. His home, James's, he doesn't care. It's been too long and they've had so little time to weave this thing together with all of them. He and Miranda have shared lovers before, but they've been fleeting things, like playing with shiny baubles and casting them back after, novelties of eroticism and never anything deeper. Barely anyone can keep up with just one or the other, but both? No one's going to survive that, much less rejoice in it.
Except.
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Rejoicing in having such an exception and demanding in making one. For them all, she was adamant in making it. Whatever excuse she could think of, would have to do, in her effort to pull him from his offices and affairs. ( If not to spare him them, though this affair she thinks is not have so burdensome ). Particularly inventive, this time, she thought, as he murmured into her cheek such happy things, and she laughed them back as he discarded his coat, and she threaded her fingers in a proper greeting through his hair as the wig was pulled off. where pretense was happily discarded in the close space of the carriage. Little enough barrier as it was, it was just enough to allow this. To be the only one rejoicing in this would be selfishness indeed and not a home coming that James - their dear James, should have. Much rather this shared excitement, this giddiness they both wore in their own way, far too openly.
Because the sea spits forth so many pieces of glass, but seldom does it ever give over its pearls willingly, and never one that was so their own. Coveted and treasured so. That with that just the same spy glass in her hand she puts to her eye again, looking out across the dock yard again, she keeps peering. Steady as a lighthouse. A hum to thought, as she keeps just the same. Peering through the contraption as she scans the dock. "Perhaps not."
He's been good to her, letting her stay at the window, to peer through for them both. "But certainly gives me first warning when I see a longboat departing." The smile light as teasing she gives over to him for it.
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This is the first time he knows exactly what he means to do in London. It's the first time he doesn't look back the way he came after climbing from the longboat. It's the first time he has to fight down a grin and measure his stride as he makes his way through the press of humanity to the carriage which, this close, he has no hope of mistaking. There had been a glitter of reflection in the window when he'd still been on the water, hadn't there? It's the middle of the day which makes it all but an impossibility, but some wild part of him believes he'll find them both there.
The driver is familiar, as are the pleasantries -- "Lady Hamilton is far too kind." "Yes sir." --, and the brilliant woman who he can see waiting for him through the window, and the step up into the carriage that's laughably unforgiving on his sea legs. What isn't at all familiar is the feeling that cracks open and pours through him when he spots Thomas in the shadow of his wife. It's been a very long time. He's never missed anyone so much.
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They're both hopeless.
Oh. The door opens and James looks at him and Thomas thinks his heart stops for a moment, breath taken away completely by the sight of him. His smile, suddenly, is the kind so brilliant and genuine that he'd never hope to hide it beneath a placid act. The kind probably visible from the moon.
Bless Miranda for forcing him out of that meeting, anyway.
Thomas tries to muster something like-- We thought you might appreciate a ride-- and it just come out, "James," and he's sure he sounds ridiculous.
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A need to be held, as she grips tightly, watching James emerge bright into the dark of the carriage. A trade off, when James looks at them both so struck, first her, then to her shadow, the tide of his navy blues washing into small space. She thinks she could feel that smile of Thomas' all the way down. "Welcome back." Said as one half of the sentence that is there she's sure in her husband's face - as soft a meaning for something that was so much more than simple welcoming.
We have missed you.
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"I see our government has been characteristically hard at work while I've been away," he says, grappling after being acerbic even if his heart isn't in it. Thank God. Now that reality's given him everything he wanted, the thought that Thomas might have been trapped for hours is intolerable.
Not that Miranda's company isn't enough. Not that her dark eyes and her hand in Thomas's like a tether don't draw his attention like a compass needle North.
But.
He hauls himself up into the darkness of the carriage. When the door snaps shut behind him, James has the presence of mind to check that the curtain is fully drawn behind him before he takes Miranda's free hand then kisses her husband.
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Awestruck at the feel of it, at the way it sends something diamond-shining through every part of him; Thomas doesn't understand how every time he sees James he's more infatuated than the time before, how every time he kisses him it's better, and every time he thinks this is the best it's ever been. This thing they've created, willed into being like God touching clay, is a pool of sunlight and every moment is exploring more, beautiful, incredible. His hand squeezes Miranda's, the three of them connected like a circuit.
He has to let go when the carriage begins to move, an artless shuffle of getting them underway, and Thomas raises both hands to steady James as he sits back slightly so that he can guide him to the space between husband and wife, the bench not long enough for three grown adults without being pressed against each other snugly.
As planned.
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This is all so ridiculous. Them pressed together on the same side of the carriage, how he can't stop smiling, Thomas's kiss lingering on his mouth like the sweetest wine... (He wants to kiss him again. To press him against the wall of the carriage as it staggers across London. To--)
He's been away too long and has had far too much time to think about what he means to do. Satisfying himself with taking Miranda's hand again and pressing his mouth to her knuckles might be asking too much, but he gives it his best attempt.
"Tell me everything." About them. About what's been done with the state. About the evenings and salons he's missed. About what they intend to do with him.
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Something so childlike in this eagerness, so simple for all the complications it might otherwise present. He takes her hand and kisses it, and she lets that warmth express itself so openly, plain on her face as she tilts his hand by the wrist as if it had always been so easy and returns it upon his own knuckle, taste of salt upon them.
Though her eyes slide, so briefly across to Thomas beside him. Nothing, she wants to say, nothing that is half so much as your return to us, as the look in his eyes and the smile on your face. But ventures, mildly, warming that says - rather instead, that they mean to keep him for hours in the retelling of everything he's missed. "Where to begin?"
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"Mm, the beginning?" Thomas shifts sideways to face the both of them, long legs angled to be less forcibly folded; he rests one hand on James's shoulder in a comfortable lean, nothing at all like innocence in the way his fingers splay against his neck, tangle in the fall of his auburn hair beneath the ribbon holding it. His other hand settles across James's lap, coaxing Miranda's free one. "I've had three meetings minimum a week since you've been away about lower court budgets, and have spent every single one of them rejecting amendments that would allow two districts to execute loan defaulters on sums under five hundred pounds, which Lord Milner keeps introducing because he is a jackass who hates poor people--" all delivered in his very aloof professional voice, contrasting with the frankness he saves for personal time, rambling on with the full confidence one of them will shut him up before he gets into even more terminally boring detail.
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But he can't quite manage more than giving Miranda a long suffering look. "Does he torture you like this while I'm away or is it just for the occasion?"
Surely he can trust her to be his partner in this.
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Sure that James will hold her steady, that even if she does not tell him all, he will follow even what she does not indicate - feels his solid warmth from days at sea, all sureness beside her - against the bumps and rolls of the carriage that with the movement make her sway. Leans with him, takes the hold of his jacket to pull James into her. Not so much, all at once, setting her teeth into his lip, then more, that curve of her smile she brushes against his mouth, once and light, then again and former with her eyes lowered as she watches. Demand as she slants her mouth firmly and solidly over his.
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As soon as that look graces James's face Thomas is laughing, a bright peal of it that continues as Miranda smoothly cuts the corner of his baiting. He leaves his hands where they are as wife and lover connect, fingers stroking along the other man's nape, encouraging.
It does indeed halt him. They are an absolute vision.
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He wants to be back in their home again - to spend as much time in Thomas's study as in their bed. What conversations has he missed at their salon? What is Miranda reading? What news from Nassau is Thomas privy to (as he's heard nothing at all for the duration of his time on at sea)? He wants to teach them the game of cards the Panther's three midshipman had played for the duration of their cruise. He wants--
Somehow despite the length of that list in his head, her kiss and Thomas's gently goading hand are perfectly satisfactory. She's carefully unlaced the last pretense of this with her mouth on his, and it strikes a low heat in his belly so that when he kisses her back he's unrepentant about meeting her demand. Touching her long lovely neck to deepen the kiss, breathing thick and eyes dark when they do finally part.
"What what it were you saying?," he murmurs, turning just that half degree into the warmth of Thomas's hand. "About Lord Milner?"
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Thomas will catch up, he always does.
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Watching Miranda begin to get his jacket undone is momentarily distracting.
"At least right now."
Thomas rubs the back of his neck, wondering distantly at aches and pains from the labor of running around a ship for so long, and then presses a kiss to the side of his mouth. His hand clasped with Miranda's moves both against James's belly, as if threatening the buttons of his uniform.
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"Later," he says across Thomas's mouth and means it as much as he does the kiss that follows. He wants to know. He wants every detail as much as he wants to be reminded of what Thomas tastes like - what's it like to kiss him open mouthed and deceptively languid as his hand shifts from Miranda's waist to gather her skirts by inches (ridiculous; there's so much under them there's almost no point - but the sentiment is there under his fingertips).
This isn't what he's supposed to be doing anymore than this is where they should to be. Thomas ought to be trapped in a state house. Miranda should have sent a carriage for him. They're supposed to have had a dinner to reacquaint themselves over - to talk like adults with more on the mind than how much he's thought about touching them. But putting up a fight is, for once, beyond his capabilities.
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( No point at all but she stretches into him to give him what little help can be afforded, a movement of assisting his hold on those skirts, keep them gathered out of the way she that she can press her knee to the side of his, that she can hook her leg against his. A tap of her toes against the buckle of his, sliding so carefully against the stockings underneath, a warmth of so many layers. )
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(Maybe they were even well-behaved while James was away. Anything is possible.)
The carriage hits a particularly rough patch and Thomas pulls back gently, practiced at not letting jostles result in bitten lips and tongues, and presses an open-mouthed kiss against his jaw. His smile against his skin is tangible, and fingers help Miranda's - undoing buttons plainly. All the way up, pushing aside fabric to get at the softer shirt beneath. He exchanges a glance with his wife, perfectly pleased.
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He huffs out a breath, tries not to think of how he must taste and smell of salt and sweat and brine, and manages to sort the layers of her petticoats only once he puts both hands to the task. Getting them anywhere useful is impossible in the cramped quarters, but he has the great ambition of baring her knee because there's something about just the thought of it that makes Thomas's fingers seem heavier, steadier, and his breath against his neck give rise to the small hairs there.
It both does and doesn't feel like being outnumbered.
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( Some days, she wonders just what they might be without James, now, and then resolves herself to never finding out. )
Her leg settles at the angle, slung in the way that it makes it easy to lean back when the carriage rolls back and she has to catch herself by it instead. Watching them both with a pitched laugh of the sheer ridiculousness that is them, right now. Three grown adults, pawing and playing about in a carriage that does not have space enough for their nonsense to contain it. Which quite probably, what makes it half so tempting.
Lazy warmed eyes as she looks over the figure they cut together and leans back in close. The clock-swing of the drops of earrings that time the rise and fall of the carriage as she goes. Like surf beaten back before it rushes into shore again, pushing James more eagerly into Thomas. An effort to get him where she can pull his vest buttons apart once and for all. At least so that Thomas' hands can find more interesting places to roam whilst she does the work of giving them space.
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The carriage sways and Thomas, sitting sideways as he is, has to loose his hand from pulling James's shirt free from his trousers to press it against the ceiling and keep himself from toppling to the other side-- and from pulling James with him, his other arm still wrapped around his shoulders. He's too tall to be doing this, but just laughs.
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Arriving at their destination half dressed (at best) or with a concussed Lord Hamilton might be perfectly easy to explain away compared to the combination of both.
But he makes no effort to stop him or to resist the way Miranda draws his hand higher toward where he's thought of touching for weeks. He doesn't stop himself from looking when the rock of the carriage affords the opportunity between undone buttons, spying that flash of deep blue and an inch of her pale thigh. Huffing out an incredulous little noise, he fights a grin that threatens an edge of hungry teeth - wets his lips instead and shifts a hand to finish what Thomas had started: pulling his own shirt tails free.
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It's merciless, to the quiet way she gives when she lowers her head, the soft brush of that elegantly styled of pinned curl, in place - where Thomas in his infinite excitement for all such things, to James' steadily crafted dishevelment, they are stages of something. Caterpillar to butterfly, fawn to stag and in satisfaction of ouroboros biting its own tail, she lowers her lips to the bare skin of Jame's belly, know it will be sea aired stained, and sets her teeth on him. One quick bite, sucked soft. Before her head turns up once more, an easily parted breath - ( that trouble of corsetry, how it makes it so hard to breathe deep with all this jostling, and yet adds to the need, straining against it in a flush of skin, hard up against it, in a swell of her breasts, the shift of collar bones under her skin ) - she pushes up that little further.
"But I think the cart would over turn, and nothing would change that." And there is a satisfaction to her voice, says that she is so proud of her husband for it.
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Thomas slips his hand from behind James's neck to his chest, pushing open layers of fabric to get his palm on skin, rucking it up and away to one side, exposing the straight line of his clavicle and the warm curve of pectoral.
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"You want to ruin me, you mean," he says, crooked grin and breathless and something dark in his face as he catches Thomas by the wrist and meets his eyes. Heat unfolds in his middle for the weight of that hand and the corresponding shape of the carriage seat behind his shoulder. If Thomas wanted to, he could pin him this way. Or lock his elbow and pretend to. James would let him.
(He's so handsome like this, a strange kind of grace to how Thomas weathers the sway of the carriage with his hands at both of them. It's mesmerising. How does anyone look at Thomas Hamilton and not love him entirely?)
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( But he'd chide them both, for that. )
For now, she stays grounded, if only because one of them must attempt it. If only slightly. His skin does taste of salt, like a reminder of the long months of his parting from them. But as she walks those kisses up his chest, lighter and lighter, until she can lean forward over him: her only true objection to it, is that it is a reminder of how long they have been in absence of this wholeness. Where she leans forward, that taste of salt on her mouth to give not to James, but is a brush of a kiss that is timed to the swag of the carriage to Thomas' mouth ( like children stealing and sharing sweets, bracing with the strength of the hand upon her leg, the feel of fingers at her throat ), before she is summarily rocked backwards to her seat - she only has one response.
"Just so, we're to scrub these months off of him, the first chance we get."
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He says Mmm, a monosyllabic noise and the look in his eyes to communicate Yes that's correct and also Being ruined is the best state for you, my love, and I know how much you crave it. Thomas presses his hand to James's shoulder, presses him to the back of the carriage, captures that stolen kiss and holds James where he is (where he's very gallantly playing along) as though to have him sit and watch for a moment.
"I think I'd enjoy that very much," he says, of the idea of their lieutenant in a bathtub being attended to by the both of them. Thomas leans in, letting his weight rest where he's pretending to hold James down, and presses a kiss to his mouth. Passing the affection from Miranda, amplifying it with his own. Against his lips: "And we'll have you warm and clean for after. When I'd love to watch you take Miranda." Anchored so against James, he slips his other hand beneath his wife's skirts to join his lover's hand against her soft skin at the height of her thigh. "For a little while. Until I take you at the same time." Thomas's teeth find James's lower lip, indentation barely-there.
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Thomas's wrist under his thumb feels more solid than it looks. James's touch jumps there, flexing briefly tighter as their hands come together under Miranda's skirt and Thomas starts to say things that narrow the world to the lurch of the carriage and the edge of Thomas's teeth, every fiber of him intimately aware of how long it's been since they left the harbor and how soon they can expect to reach the Hamilton house with its bath and bed and promises of Thomas's hands on him and Miranda slick with sweat and--
'You shouldn't say things like that,' he might have said, low and grinning but somehow still genuine. Quietly uneasy. Instead he breathes out heavy into Thomas's mouth and says, "Please," while he clings to the man's wrist with one hand and presses to the heat between Miranda's legs with the other.
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Or theirs now, a last minute choice like she knew that expendience was foremost in her mind when she dressed for the day. A choice she is glad for making, she means to watch them, surely she does, as she feels the guide of Thomas' grip to James'. Feels the broad set of seaman's hands to the softer letter worn callouses of her husbands as thry slide up and up. Sinking against heat and the roll of the carriage rocks them that little and her eyes fall shut, her head tilted up and back in a brief shudders enjoyment that times far too well. Yes, to have them both, to have James caught between them to know each rocking motion as both of them when she let's James sink over and into -
When her eyes open the heat and the flush is unmistakable and the turn of her hand is purposeful as she sets it to theirs. Guiding up against warmth. A unmistakable heat, slick and wanting, waiting. She has been waiting. A open warn eagerness. She wears it differently, perhaps, but for them she has it nonetheless. Her own Apollo and Poseidon that come like sea and sun, equally parts to each other.
"We will surely be home soon." That either comes as a promise or a warning and impatient in either case.
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"But not yet," is breathed out, breaking way from the kiss but not moving at all, his nose and mouth against James's, lips moving against the side of his as he speaks and presses messy kisses there until he has to, has to kiss him fully again, the hand at his shoulder gripping him as though he might vanish from beneath their four hands. He fantasizes sometimes about a world where James lives with them properly, where he is not pulled from them for these stretches of time-- and yet he'd never wish it, knowing how connected to the sea he is (the salt of him, on his skin, on his clothes, down to his marrow Thomas thinks) and finding the idea of asking someone to change or chain themselves so miserable. This is James, elemental and unbound, choosing to be here with them. Perfect-- perfect.
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Because Thomas's mouth and tongue are as mesmerizing as the heat between Miranda's legs. His hand under James's there-- he can feel himself jerk as a string plucked when Thomas turns his hand there and presses fingers into her right there. He can feel the answering twitch of Miranda under the line of his thumb and hears himself make a low, thoughtless sound into Thomas's mouth. It's easy to imagine-- anything. Everything. Thomas with his beautiful hands, so astonishingly articulate as he pins him or strips Miranda down.
(That's a ridiculous fantasy; James is so much more adept at taking Miranda out of her clothes than her husband is. The ties fastening stays, the ribbons there, come open under his fingers as easily as any other knot might.)
Still. How easy it is to get swept up by the appeal of them when he's been so far awat. If he had been in London these last months instead of on a ship, he might not be so easily convinced to make a fool of himself in a carriage with a very immediate destination. As it is, he kisses Thomas so fiercely it's as if they're the only ones who know how to; he feels where Thomas's fingers press into Miranda and lingers over the possibility of doing the same. Of pressing a third finger into her. Having Thomas demonstrate exactly how he touches her. James thinks and thinks and thinks and none of it has amything to do with how near they might be to the Hamilton house until the sound of the road under the wheels alters and the horses slow.
"Fuck." Which: yes. That's probably the idea. He balks, hand drawing abruptly out from under Miranda's skirts so he can desperately begin putting himself back together. "The pair of you--"
He doesn't finish the thought, twisting under Thomas to do up rows of unfastened buttons.
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Her eyes open, brief, the sigh she refuses to help. The rock against the set of Thomas' fingers and the steadiness of James' hand. She enjoys it, to the purpose entirely, without shame. Enjoys them, watching - hers and her own, and completely lost in each other, all of a self-evident truth:
The rest is sheer practicality. Something she flicks in practice of the many years managing her husband's lack of it. Loathe as she is to lose their touch, that ease of his fingers inside of her, she shifts - her own cue of following along. She flicks her skirts, smoothes them to neatness again, and with the bulk of that material in hand, shifts herself between her men and the carriage door. Her hands moving up to check the set of brown curls, redraping herself with half the effort as she settles in the bench the other side of the small space to allow her to step out first - whatever it took to give James' the time to rearrange himself.
So considerate, they could be.
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His other hand slips from James's shoulder to help tuck the ends of his shirt back into place, but it's far from hurried. He should probably fish his jacket and wig out from wherever he's left them in here, too - his staff are so used to his dislike of those items in particular he can't imagine anyone would so much as blink at the state of him, but it's a kindness to James's nerves.
('Could' be. Thomas still has fingertips mocking the existence of propriety when the handle of the carriage door squeaks, but in in the next heartbeat is innocently arranged.)
London is as dreary outside the Hamilton home as it is directly beside the Thames, but it's warm and comfortable inside, rich colors and dense decor set as if to hold all who enter in an intimate embrace. Thomas's wig is off again as soon as the doors are shut behind them, setting one of the girls in the house to run a bath for the guest room.
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"The Hamiltons. My god," exclaims Lieutenant Maplestone, late of the Woolwich. It's shouted almost directly into James's ear and maybe that's why every part of him goes sharp as a knife's edge and he finds himself choking on a mouthful of wine. The conversation in this small knot of officers dies and every eye of the group pivots to the doorway where, indeed, Lord and Lady Hamilton have appeared as a pair of brilliant gems transported here entirely by accident. Miranda is undeniably stunning, her dark hair turned up high off her long, slender neck and the rich color of her gown in sharp contrast to her pale breast. Her husband beside her is equally vibrant - from this distance, he seems fresh face and delighted in a way that's difficult to miss having become strangely familiar with it in the book-lined study of the Hamilton house (--and over dinner, and long into the night at the demand of conversation that had once been about the Nassau problem and then morphed into a frank argument over Sophocles).
By contrast, if he's as pale as he feels then James McGraw must look like a ghost when viewed across the length of the dance hall among the ruddy, suntanned naval men whose company he's among tonight.
And then, naturally, the attention of the men around him shifts directly from the couple at the doorway to the Lieutenant in their midst who a moment ago had simply been a broad shape lingering at the edge of polite conversation. "Well," --that's the Second Lieutenant of the Defiant, something that sounds very like smugness to James's ear-- "I can't say I'm shocked."
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They mean well. There are no boundaries for persons of their station, every door opened with shuffling obedience, even ones set lower than certain peers would prefer. Thomas had thought to work on correspondence tonight, but the idea of doing so drifted further and further away from his willpower after Miranda had put the idea in his head-- James complained in passing about these sorts of things (dryly) (once), and Miranda, too vibrant to suffer being cooped up away from the world, wouldn't be able to attend on her own, it would be miserable of Thomas to deny her, and James as well!, and it's supportive of their dear friend.
And anyway, it's not the worst place they've ever shown up.
There are so many people in this dance hall, so many men in identical dark blue, and yet Thomas finds (his) the one he's looking for in the space of a heartbeat. Like a needle pointing north, he thinks, before setting aside that absurd notion not only because he's told himself every notion of that kind is being buried, but because of-- Oh, dear, he thinks.
Idealistic and occasionally accidentally thoughtless, Thomas isn't stupid, and assumed the lieutenant would have a poor reaction at first, as he does to so many things. But Miranda is so good at coaxing him into sweet capitulation, and Thomas - Thomas has made sure they needn't immediately walk towards the officer who looks like he's swallowed his own tongue. Best to give him a few minutes to become a trifle less agitated, and very nearly on cue, Lieutenant Commander Davis greets them with brightly animated pleasure.
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Because the form begets the purpose, of a well intentioned jaunt on her and Thomas' behalf. He had thrown himself behind the cause, should they not do the same?
To that no, she doesn't lead - of course not, a woman of her position never leads, she politely inquires that when was the last time they spoke with the Commander Phillips? A effort to make the rounds, like perhaps to rally their own soldiers, she knows as many as Thomas to that end. It would be as good a time as any to make returns on those friendships before great undertakings.
Not just because James looks, rather... out of sorts. Like he'd swallowed bilge water, not wine, and was forcing himself to drink it anyway. Oh dear, it would be an effort to cheer him on that humour but she would do it regardless. But she tries keep the gaze only breifly lingering, as they make pleasant with another acquaintance, even if it's done with a casual distraction to the topic. Her hand loosening on Thomas, some for the tug of impatience she does her best to ignore as she waits for James to settle at least some from the surprise. It could surely be no more than that. He was a set man, at times.
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"Say, I'm reminded. Mister McGraw, aren't you acquainted with--" the Defiant's man is saying and James interrupts him with a clipped, "Excuse me," and shears off from his apathetically chosen companions to make headway toward the Hamiltons. It's only when he's a few paces away that he realizes his glass is still in hand (and empty), but then it's too late to do away with it on some sideboard so he's left standing there with some new line of curious officers with his bloody hands full as the two of them make pleasant conversation with Phillips and Kearns and Penhale in turns until finally they must turn and find him there next in line to say their hellos to.
In the time it takes, his expression has drawn so utterly flat and featureless that it's like looking into the face of a particularly bland portrait of an otherwise familiar figure. The man beside him - Silcox, of the Chestnut - greets Thomas like an old friend: a happy hand for the Lord Hamilton's elbow and some bright remark about Eton that James only half hears in the moment but will recall with perfect clarity later. James--
nods to the pair of them. "Lord Hamilton. Your wife looks lovely this evening, as ever."
Maybe the stars will align and some fool will strike a match too close to the powder stock on one of the great ships in the harbor. He can imagine then that no one will remember this evening and they can go on their way, happily forgotten.
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Speaking of. ('Oh, dear' for a third time between the two of them.)
"Lieutenant," is warm, the showy edges of his smiled dimmed just-so into something a little more familiar. Thomas reaches out and curls long fingers over the top of his empty glass, pulling it out of his grip and - well, Bennet Silcox is there, whose presence Thomas is actually quite relieved over, "Make yourself useful," he chides, and the dark-haired man laughs and takes the glass to set somewhere convenient while Thomas reaches back to shake James's hand properly. "She knows, I've made absolutely certain. I'm so happy to have caught you tonight, we weren't sure you'd be here."
That dour expression is somewhat concerning. No so un-agitated yet, it seems.
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James, is the breathed implied affection. "Lieutenant McGraw." is what comes out of her mouth. Though she takes no step to him, with Thomas' hand on her back, she does not so much lift a finger. Let it be said they were each other's better influence, always. "It is a pleasure to see you again at last."
Like it was not her that offered a gateway for him to step through, like half the room wasn't listening with baited breath.
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What a stupid thing - handing yourself so directly into the wolf's mouth. In any other conceivable circumstance, it might be charming. Invigorating. What a strange, liberated pair they are (and isn't that appealing?) But this isn't their drawing room in the company of poets, educated wives and liberally minded young men. He's intimately familiar with how this place works, what these young men will say. The reality of it drains the pleasure of their presence from the room.
He manages a smile, mistaken for easily done if only it reached past his mouth. "To what do we owe it?" What the fuck are you two doing here?
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But this wasn't meant to be particularly crushing pressure, and in the heartbeat of fractionally taken aback silence that meets the blunt knife of his question (Silcox beside him as a strange look on his face), Thomas looks at the situation and accepts that this may have been a bad call. In that same heartbeat is also: too late to do anything about it now.
"The occasion, certainly," is gentle, but in no way placating. James is a grown man who's seen battle, for heaven's sake, he can pull himself together. "It's the off season for things like this, and I'm lucky to have old friends and new present. And, I must say, you have kindled a true interest in our Navy."
It would be easy to take his displeasure personally, some little needle of worry over being present beside Miranda and showing off the bond James can never have with her in public. And maybe it's so, maybe Thomas's presence is what he resents; he doesn't have time for it. Privately lonely as he's been. It'll be a fine evening, Miranda getting to see her lover in his element, and Thomas-- can be happy for her, and catch up with like-minded old friends.
Just as soon as the lieutenant remembers people will talk one way or the other, and looking like he'd rather everyone in the room drop dead won't help. Come now, McGraw, you're the tactician.
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She blinks, her smile staying fixed, wide and brilliant. A gaze sliding back across to her husband when he speaks, like James knew his swords and Thomas knows his speeches, she knows her steps, her roles. No souring note would let anything affect that so quickly. Keeping her pace and her presence steady. To the volatile others of life had a habit of inflicting, it seemed a necessity, especially in moments like this. "Just so. After all, you have diligently attended my husband's days in parliament, should we not do the same and pay you a visit in turn?"
Her arm slides fixed, warm, to Thomas, sliding to brace against his wrist. Warm, held, comfortable. As a husband and wife should be. "Besides, it seemed a good excuse as any to revisit acquaintances in this corner that we have not paid respects too for some time." Not so solely him, as they might gossip. There would be men in the navy before James McGraw, and there would be men in the navy afterwards.
The chime of Silcox to his part for the over arching task master that was propriety and a need to smooth along a stilted conversation. ( - And we have been dimmer for it, madam! Good man. )
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He is so staunchly, preemptively angry (for absolutely everything that will come of this) that he can feel it in his hands, his fingers tingling. He needs something to hold - another glass of wine, one of the young ladies being turned around and around on the dance floor. Instead he tucks them behind himself and pinches the skin between his thumb and forefinger.
"I wasn't aware you were so well acquainted with the Lord and Lady Hamilton, Mister Silcox." Which is, mercifully, exactly the thing to say to encourage the other man to jump toward leading the conversation.
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"Come now, you never got into any real trouble," the man is saying, "just arguing with instructors."
"I should have tried real trouble, it turns out being in the habit of arguing persists in aggravating people long outside school years."
Silcox laughs brightly and without a trace of reproach; not everyone in London thinks Thomas Hamilton is mad, after all, and not everyone who visits his salon lies about it in the daylight. Bennet hasn't attended in a while, being busy with his career (and trying to find an appropriately uninvested girl to marry) as well as not stunningly intelligent. But he isn't stupid, and he isn't unkind, and he spent at least one summer nursing a broken heart over Thomas. In that respect it's a little classless to court his attentions, but he'll be delighted and Thomas-- Thomas will feel less inert. He just doesn't have the free time Miranda does, these days. Nor the options.
One of which is currently in control of his glower. Thank God. Thomas tries to catch James's gaze and communicate - what? Calm? Something curious? He knows the man well, but not well enough, it seems. Does Miranda? She may well have the key to soothing him, ironing out the edges of his temper, some intimate thing Thomas has no grasp on.
"Are you acquainted with any of the young women out on fishing expeditions tonight?" he asks her, and then at Silcox's faux-scandalized "Thomas!", adds: "Is that not a navy term?"
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"Young Lady Wyatt is looking quite handsome tonight, isn't she, Silcox?" That chimes to the tune, of the same sort of pattern, "Yes, madam, she does."
It's the same practiced turn of hand that doesn't miss the excuse to entangle her fingers with Thomas as she does direct the conversation away from themselves. It does not matter that Silcox doesn't care for that company, or that she knows that Lady Wyatt has only an interest in books and not so much in husbands, but that it isn't so strictly themselves and so the purpose is served.
Look somewhere else, there is plenty of looking to be done if that is what you worry about. She shouldn't be teaching military men about misdirection, for heaven's sake. "Perhaps you will both like to be introduced, Lieutenant, Silcox?" Her husband, after all, was a happily married man and had the only introduction that served him, despite no one in society understanding the forms that could take. There is a hundred fictions to be composed, and enough to throw society off a scent, as full of themselves as they liked to be.
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He can't very well bloody ignore them, now can he?
So Silcox talks and Thomas brandishes his wit and James adopts the most cool expression he's capable of as he ignores Miranda threading her fingers easily with her husband's. It isn't so difficult to do - not thinking as he is of some point ahead of this moment where Miranda and her husband can successfully be bundled away back into whatever carriage they came in and sent home, and how best to arrive there without injury. They'll have to stay long enough to warrant coming in the first place, he thinks. Miranda will likely care to dance, god willing with her husband.
--A thought immediately dashed by Silcox saying, "As a matter of fact, the lovely Lady Wyatt and I are already acquainted. But I'm sure Lieutenant McGraw would be most happy for your introduction." The man clearly intends to keep Thomas in conversation.
James releases his hands from behind his back. He offers her his arm. "Of course. I'd be grateful for it." Maybe they can find something so riveting to talk about that the conversation will last the evening.