Chapter Text
For the third time since they’d closed Sandbrook, Ellie was in his office, arms crossed over her chest, demanding to know why he was in such a foul mood. For the third time that week, he wondered why he hadn’t quite been able to take the plunge and move back north to fix his family as he’d initially intended. Medical clearance had allowed him to come back as Broadchurch DI, but it was his old position back home he had his eye on. Trying to repair broken relationships from afar was proving to be excruciating. Unfortunately, he was waiting for a retirement at the end of the year before his transfer back to South Mercia CID could be finalized.
“Tess and I had dinner together last night,” Alec leaned forward over his desk. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. They’d fought again, and he’d driven back to Broadchurch late. Alec spent the rest of the night sitting on the front step of his house, thinking about what she’d said.
Alec’s eyes suddenly went wide. Ellie was reaching across his desk. She had him by the shoulders and was shaking him.
“You need to stop letting her torment you like this and get over it. You don’t bloody deserve this, not even you, you absolute bellend!”
“What?” Alec sputtered. He made a series of high-pitched noises. Ellie had registered her distaste for Tess before, but never so aggressively. She told him she was tired of seeing him pining for someone who didn’t return his feelings. He sighed. It did seem pathetic when she put it that way. Ellie’s straight-forward nature was one of his favorite things about her. Additionally, he felt his heart rate speeding up as he tried to ignore the angle as she kept a tight grip on his shoulders. The cut of the blouse she’d chosen to wear to work that day was low enough for him to catch a glimpse of her bra. He quickly looked away.
“Let go of me,” he grumbled, wheeling back in his chair.
“I don’t know why you don’t just stay here,” Ellie threw up her hands in exasperation.
“It’ll be easier once I’m back there,” he shook his head.
“Maybe easier for you and your daughter, but until you accept the divorce, that you presumably signed, she’s just going to keep hurting you, and you’re such a glutton for punishment you’re going to let her do it,” Ellie slammed the door as she left. The peek into his personal life that the past several months had given her never felt more incongruous to what he was like at work than it did the day after he’d returned from Sandbrook. Ellie huffed, reminding herself that at least he was able to drive himself now rather than demanding her taxiing services.
Alec picked up a folder on his desk, immediately tossing it back down. He did need to do something. Fighting with Tess in Sandbrook, bickering with Miller in Broadchurch, one of those things did need to go. The clear answer had been Broadchurch. That still felt obvious to him. Moving back home meant getting to see more of Daisy growing up, which had always been his top priority. He’d already missed so much; she was already so grown. Alec leaned back in his chair, rubbing his hands over his face. The one silver lining was that he was no longer dealing with Claire and her manipulations. The rest of the women in his life, though, could still be the death of him.
***
Ellie jumped, hearing the loud knock. She cursed whoever was out there, banging on her door at this hour. She was glad the boys were staying with her father for the night in preparation to help him move in with her once the house was sold, but the person on the other side of that door didn’t know that. Ellie turned the knob, gearing up to launch into a bollocking of legendary proportions.
Alec was standing on her front step, looking considerably worse for wear.
“Alec? Are you, have you been drinking?”
“Aye,” he gave her a curt nod. “You’re right, she’s no good for me,” the words came out clipped and short. He bounced once on his heels, swaying in her doorway for a moment before barging into the house.
Ellie ducked out of his way. “Come in, sit down,” she rolled her eyes as he stumbled past her, falling onto the sofa.
“God, you’re in a state, did you drive like this?” her upper lip curled in horror as he made himself at home. She watched as he stretched out his legs, leaning his head in the hand propped up on the armrest. Mixed in with a drunken defeat was a restless energy usually reserved for significant breaks in a case. He had a wild look to him, not quite the disheveled one she’d become accustomed to, but of a vague attempt to clean himself up gone awry. Ellie hoped he wasn’t there to tell her that he’d had sex with Tess and was now regretting it. Pacemaker or not, she didn’t think his heart could take that level of game being played with him.
Alec sat up, shaking his head, assuring her that he’d stopped on the way home to pick up a bottle of whiskey, taking a couple shots at the house before walking over to hers. He ignored her question as to how many shots was a couple. “I should have known it was over. She doesn’t love me, she thinks I’m in love with someone else,” he squirmed, grimacing. “But she’s doing this, almost possessive thing, keeping me at arm’s length with these dinners, playing with me, I don’t like it, but I think maybe she’s right.” He ruffled his hand through the hair on the back of his head, leaning his elbows on his knees. For a moment, he looked as though he might pitch forward, face first into her coffee table.
“I’ve been telling you to stop going there. Just slow down, you’re awfully worked up. What did she tell you?” Ellie sat down next to him.
“It’s you, Miller,” he garbled his words, explaining that according to Tess, she’d seen enough between them while they’d worked together to solve Sandbrook that sealed it for her. She’d gone as far as to claim that the only reason Ellie would have put up with him while working on a case, that case, for free, had to be because they were either sleeping together, or at minimum she wanted to sleep with him. Ellie interrupted momentarily to push back at that. Alec sped through a version of their latest row with an uncharacteristic openness that let Ellie know he really must be intoxicated. It wasn’t easy to follow, and several times she found it hard to understand him. She was more than used to his accent, even when exhaustion and stress made it more pronounced. But he was slurring from the booze, mumbling through the parts that made him feel vulnerable.
“You’re not thinking clearly right now,” Ellie shook her head. The nervous look on her face told him he should stop now before he made things more awkward. That had never been one of his better skills sober, and it certainly wasn’t improved after the whiskey.
“I am,” he swallowed hard, hiccuping. “About this.”
“No, you’re not,” Ellie patted his knee. Alec tensed, a warmth creeping up his body, likely reddening his ears and cheeks. She gave him a gentle squeeze, seemingly not noticing his reaction. Despite there being nothing sexual to the contact, his body wasn’t interpreting it that way..
“Sorry,” he stood up, pacing back and forth before his unexpected arousal turned into something he couldn’t hide. “You’re right. Best keep it professional. I shouldn’t have said, I’m no good at this, Ellie,” he sputtered, rubbing his face. During his long drive back to Broadchurch, he’d cycled through a myriad of emotions, mostly anger with Tess, but also coming to terms with what she’d said. When he’d first arrived in Broadchurch, he’d dismissed a lot of those feelings as they began to crop up. Ellie was happily married. He was just lonely. The second Becca Fisher had shown him any kindness, he was asking her to bed in an effort to not be so alone, and he could hardly say he fancied her. She’d been right, of course, his heart couldn’t have handled it at the time. And that went doubly so for how sick he’d been that awkward night he and Ellie had shared a bed in a hotel so comically incompetent that they’d lost her booking. Even though Ellie was no longer so happily married and just as lonely as he was, the idea that they’d have done anything was laughable. If he’d woken her up when he’d had a nightmare, she hadn’t even acknowledged it, let alone done anything to comfort him that involved touching him.
“Presumably, we won’t be working together anymore though,” she reminded him, hinting at the question as to whether this meant he was planning on staying, without outright asking him. “And who does she think she is, it’s bad enough her telling you how you feel. Where does she get off trying to tell you how I feel?” Ellie was fuming.
Alec stood frozen in place, waiting for any hint that she was even close to feeling the same as he did. If she offered one, he didn’t pick up on it. He balled his hands at his sides, wishing he hadn’t stopped to take stock of her physical appearance so thoroughly. Ellie was dressed for bed in pyjama pants, baggy t-shirt and no bra. Alec swallowed hard, trying not to linger too long on the buds of her nipples showing ever so slightly through her shirt. Maybe Ellie wasn’t conventionally attractive, but in the moment, Alec would have vehemently disagreed. He wanted nothing more to shag her right there on her sofa. The quick, messy relief of a desperate shag would be enough for him, but it wouldn’t do much for her. She also wasn’t giving him any real indication that it was something she was equally interested in.
“You’re going to sleep it off, upstairs,” she spun him around and began shoving him toward the hallway. “And if you still feel like this tomorrow, I suppose we’ll have to talk about it. That sofa is murder on my back, it’ll destroy yours. You’ll be hungover as it is, no sense in making it worse.” Ellie walked behind him as he trudged up to her bedroom.
“Sofa’s fine,” he bit his tongue, trying to sort through whether she was expressly putting him in her bed because he stood a chance, or because she really meant what she said about the sofa. He winced at the flip his stomach did as his brain tried to convince him that she was just being noble, not wanting to take advantage of him. Or that she doubted his current ability to sustain an erection. Alec snorted to himself. He remembered well how real whiskey dick could be.
“Just be glad the boys are with my dad, and I don’t have to explain to Fred what a wanker is and why Uncle Alec is being one,” she grumbled at him, directing him to sit so he could remove his shoes.
Alec smiled, snickering a little at her choice of the word ‘wanker.’ He almost made a joke, but thought better of it. Ellie got under the quilt, instructing him on top of it, just as she had the other time they’d shared a bed.
“Bloody told Tess,” he hiccupped again. “About the motel,” he scrunched up his face, waving his arm in the air. He felt far more intoxicated lying down. “Just sort of came out, told her I slept in my suit,” he snorted.
“Just undo a couple buttons so you don’t choke to death,” Ellie told him as she turned out the light.
“Quite,” Alec grunted, hands fumbling with his shirt. Even with his eyes closed, the room was still spinning.
Ellie shook her head, settling in to think.