Chasing Benedict (The Gentleman Courtesans Book 5)

by Victoria Vale

  Other times, Osborne would offer a smile. Just the slightest tilt of his mouth in one corner. It disturbed Benedict to find his eyes drawn to those lips every time, an odd sort of fascination making him hot with embarrassment.

  The same sensation overcame him now as he noticed Osborne wore another of his banyans—this one yellow, embroidered with green and blue thread. Beneath it was a half-open shirt. He knelt at Benedict’s bedside, a lamp resting on the floor beside him and a bowl held in one hand. His thick, dark eyebrows were knit with concern as his gaze swept over Benedict’s bared back.

  Benedict didn’t care for the pity in Osborne’s eyes. “What the devil do you want?” he snapped, lifting up on one elbow.

  A sharp sting flared in his back, increasing to a burning throb. He fell back onto his belly, issuing a pained groan into his pillow.

  Osborne clicked his tongue, giving Benedict a stern look when he raised his head from the cushion. “If you keep that up, you’ll wake the others. Does it hurt very badly?”

  Benedict scowled. “Does it look like it hurts?”

  There was that smile again, coy and teasing, as if he were in on a secret Benedict hadn’t yet discovered. “It does, and I am sorry for it. It wasn’t well done of Blackburn to set the headmaster on you that way.”

  “I ought to break his nose again,” Benedict said with a dry snort. “Apparently once wasn’t enough.”

  “Ah, yes,” Osborne replied with a low chuckle. “I did hear talk of what led you to thrash him. I must say, I wouldn’t have done any less. He deserved it.”

  “I know.” Benedict paused, furrowing his brow. “I’m still waiting for you to tell me why you’re kneeling beside my bed in the middle of the night.”

  Osborne raised his bowl. “I heard you tossing and turning, and felt sorry for you. If you’ll let me … my valet has a remedy for such injuries. It might help.”

  Before Benedict could protest, Osborne had reached into his bowl, lifting a piece of linen dripping with some sort of solution. The scents of peppermint and witch hazel wafted up Benedict’s nostrils as Osborne draped the wet linen over one shoulder. A cooling sensation permeated his skin, taking some of the heat from his lash marks. He sighed in relief, the tincture too soothing for him to pretend it didn’t feel sublime.

  “There, you see?” Osborne crooned, going back into the bowl. “It won’t heal you overnight, but it will ease the pain so you can sleep. And if that doesn’t work, I have some whiskey stashed in one of my trunks. I only ask that you not tell anyone.”

  Benedict grunted as another strip of linen was laid over his opposite shoulder. “I think I’d like that drink regardless. And mum’s the word.”

  Osborne laughed again, though he seemed to do his best to keep the sound from traveling across the room. Yet, Benedict felt the laugh more than he heard it, like a deep vibration rippling through him. It made him shift on the bed, a sudden discomfort overtaking him. He wasn’t certain he liked the way this boy made him feel.

  “What do you care that I’m in pain?” he asked, hoping that by being prickly, he could maintain some sort of distance between them. The last thing Benedict needed was the blow to his reputation if someone thought he had a friendly bone in his body.

  Osborne shrugged, his dark eyes fixed on Benedict’s back as he applied more of his strips, covering every inch before starting a second layer to cover the first. “Why shouldn’t I care? You are a person with feelings like anyone else. It is difficult for me to see someone in pain and not want to do something to help.”

  Benedict snorted. “No one is that kind.”

  “That isn’t true,” Osborne argued. “I left my bed to mix this tincture for you, and I would hope you might do the same for me.”

  He might not have before tonight. Benedict suffered enough of his own pain to think of anyone else’s. But the thought of Osborne in his place made him feel a prick of guilt. Yes … yes, he would do the same were it within his power. Osborne had never done him a harsh turn. What did it matter that he stared as if glimpsing a circus attraction? Perhaps he was merely a curious person by nature.

  As Osborne continued his task, the tightness in Benedict’s muscles began to ease, and lethargy stole over him. Through heavy-lidded eyes he observed Osborne, startled to realize he thought the boy handsome. Osborne was tall and wide in the shoulders, though a bit thin.

  A queer feeling erupted in Benedict’s belly as his gaze locked on Osborne’s chest, and he wondered at the difference between the other lad and himself. He’d grown his first chest hairs at the age of twelve, and they seemed to increase by the dozen each year. He hardly ever noticed Osborne shaving at the washstand, and it seemed he was as smooth beneath his clothes as he was on his face. As he leaned in to reach Benedict’s lower back, his shirt gaped wider, revealing even more of that smooth, unblemished skin.

  Benedict swallowed and squeezed his eyes shut. He was hot from his scalp to his toes, a sudden restlessness writhing in his belly like a pit of snakes. What the devil was wrong with him? He had seen other boys half-dressed and all but naked over his time at Eton and had never felt the urge to linger. Osborne was made no different than him, lack of body hair notwithstanding. There was nothing fascinating about his chest, his mouth, or the nimble fingers applying the tincture-soaked linen to his back.

  Shame flooded Benedict as he forced the unbidden thoughts from his mind. They were backwards and wrong—sinful, just like him. This was the sort of thing that set him apart, and others could see it. His father certainly could, and it was why he’d been trying to crush such oddities out of him.

  A warm current of air brushed his ear, and Benedict’s eyes flew open just as Osborne whispered, “All better?”

  Osborne was close now … too close. Near enough that Benedict could smell a hint of sandalwood soap and sugar. He ought to put some space between them, his injured back be damned, but Benedict found himself trapped and frozen. Osborne had ridiculously long eyelashes, and with the lamplight just so, they cast shadows on his high cheekbones.

  Clearing his throat, Benedict blinked and set his gaze elsewhere. “Yes. Thank you, Osborne.”

  The bright, full smile crossing Osborne’s face drew Benedict’s eye right back. He reached out to place a warm hand on Benedict’s bare arm.

  “Call me Alex.”

  Benedict was jolted awake by what sounded like the screams of a banshee. Jerking his head from a pile of lumpy pillows, he pried open an eye to find the bleary form of his valet at the bedside. He tried to swallow but felt as if his dry tongue had swollen to twice its normal size. Meanwhile, a woodpecker seemed to have taken up residence inside his skull.

  “Blast it, Simmons,” he rasped. “Must you come in here braying like an ass?”

  “I spoke no louder than a whisper, sir,” Simmons said drolly, hands folded behind his back.

  Benedict blinked, and the outline of his body servant became clear. “Insolence first thing in the morning?”

  Humor twinkled in the man’s eyes, but his expression was as neutral as his stark attire. “Never, sir.”

  “What the devil do you want?” he snapped, levering up onto his elbows and shaking his head to clear it. “I asked not to be awakened before noon.”

  At least, Benedict was certain he had drunkenly slurred that particular order before falling face-down into bed after shedding only his coat.

  “It’s fifteen minutes after one in the afternoon, sir,” Simmons replied with an arch of one ruddy eyebrow. “And I would have left you to rest, but thought you’d wish to know … a visitor arrived this morning.”

  “Alex,” Benedict ground out as he rolled over to sit up, wincing at the tingle of his blood rushing to his extremities. Of course Alex was here. He had always been annoyingly stubborn and unwilling to accept an answer he did not like. Still, Benedict would have expected at least a day of peace before being forced to face his past again.

  “Tell Vautrey I am not at home,” Benedict grumbled, yanking off his
shoes and tossing them over the side of the bed.

  Simmons bent to pick up the shoes without batting an eyelash, but then stood there holding them and watching Benedict shrug out of his sweat-stained waistcoat. “The visitor isn’t the earl, sir. I wouldn’t have awakened you otherwise, but Ambrose was certain you would wish to know right away.”

  “Know what, Simmons?” Benedict snapped, impatience worsening his pounding headache. It was his fault for over-imbibing last night, and he’d only made matters worse by going to that ridiculous melee. He would pay for it when he resumed training with his pugilism master.

  “Your father,” Simmons said with pursed lips. “He arrived this morning.”

  “Fucking hell,” Benedict groaned, pressing the heel of his hand against his eye. It felt as if the blasted thing would pulse right out of the socket. A slight swelling in the lid told him he’d taken more hits last night than he remembered.

  “I expected such a reaction, sir. Will you take breakfast and dress before greeting him?”

  Benedict met Simmons’s gaze, noting the slight curve of his valet’s mouth. They seemed to share the same thought, prompting a chuckle from Benedict.

  “No, Simmons, I don’t think I will. The viscount will want to see me straightaway, and I have kept him waiting long enough.”

  “Of course.”

  Benedict was on his feet then, suddenly filled with energy. He didn’t particularly desire his father’s presence, but wouldn’t resist a chance to needle the man. There would be no ejecting him from the premises, as this townhouse belonged to the viscount. Benedict merely chose to reside here to annoy his father, knowing that news of his debauched lifestyle and the bevy of colorful people coming and going from the house would reach him in Norfolk. Perhaps if Benedict acted enough the ass, his father would grow irritated and return to the country.

  Neglecting to accept his shoes from Simmons, he trudged to the washstand. The face that greeted him in the mirror was haggard and drawn, the jaw riddled with more than a days’ worth of beard. His side-whiskers were untamed, his blond locks tousled and standing on end. The swollen eye was marred with a black and red bruise, the corner of his mouth reddened. Flecks of dried blood stained the linen he used to wash his face. He smelled like a distillery and looked like hell.

  Perfect.

  Padding down the stairs, he followed the rumbling tones of the viscount’s familiar voice to the drawing room. The doors hung open to reveal a pair of footmen working together to remove a portrait from over the mantelpiece, while his father looked on. Hands on hips, he shook his head in disgust at the pockmarks and gouges riddling the portrait of himself. Benedict’s stiletto was still embedded in his father’s right eye, straight through the pupil.

  “Pardon me,” Benedict murmured, yanking his stiletto free of the canvas as the footmen passed by. “I believe this is mine.”

  The servants moved on without a word, though a palpable tension had settled over the household. The entire staff was in Benedict’s employ, to prevent the spread of gossip about his proclivities. They were all well aware of the animosity between him and the viscount.

  Leaning against the door frame, Benedict pressed the pad of one finger lightly against the tip of his knife. “My lord.”

  Lord Malcolm Sterling narrowed ice-blue eyes at Benedict, his anvil of a jaw thrusting forward when his lips pursed in disdain. “Benedict.”

  The crisp diction of the single word did nothing to mask the fact that his voice was nearly identical to Benedict’s. Standing before his sire was like looking into a mirror—one that showed Benedict an unwelcome future. It had taken Benedict years to stop hating himself when his face and voice had been inherited directly from someone he despised. For, if he could look so much like his father and someday be forced to take on the title of viscount, Benedict was in danger of becoming just like him. It was the one thing he feared and avoided with every fiber of his being.

  “You sent no word of your impending arrival,” Benedict challenged, refusing to break his father’s stern stare. The man had a way of stripping a person to the bone with his eyes, showing in his expression that he could see all of Benedict’s secrets and found him lacking in every respect.

  “This house belongs to me,” his father retorted. “I am not obligated to announce my arrival to anyone, least of all you.”

  Benedict entered the room, dropping into the nearest chair and slouching with the stiletto clenched in his fist. The viscount scowled, raking Benedict from head to toe with clear disapproval written all over his face. He could feel his father assessing every aspect of his appearance that didn’t align with that of a gentleman.

  It had been this way between them since Benedict was a boy—the youngest of three sons, contrary in every possible way. For the viscount, Benedict’s constant refusal to conform to some lofty aspiration of nobility was the thing that made him a disappointment. It was the reason his father had spent years stewing over the fact that the son he hated would inherit everything he owned.

  The deaths of his brothers had ruined the Sterling legacy, and for reasons beyond Benedict’s comprehension, his father chose to place the blame for that squarely on his shoulders. It didn’t matter that he’d been hundreds of miles away at Cambridge when a carriage accident had taken both Esmond and Francis in one fell swoop. Benedict hadn’t been driving the carriage which, traveling in the dark and fog, had overturned on an old and notoriously dangerous bridge—sending the footman, four horses, and his brothers to the bottom of a river. Only the coachman had survived, and he had nearly drowned trying to save the others. None of that mattered to the viscount. All he knew was that his favored sons were gone, and Benedict was all he had left.

  “How long do you intend to remain?” Benedict asked, partly to annoy his father, but mostly for his own peace of mind.

  The viscount’s appearance in London would draw added scrutiny to Benedict’s already salacious reputation—something he usually welcomed but didn’t need just now.

  “Until the matter of your public disgrace has been dealt with to my satisfaction.”

  The viscount held up a folded broadsheet in one hand, making Benedict aware of it for the first time. The fight against his own curiosity was lost, as it seemed his father didn’t intend to explain without prompting.

  “What is that?”

  The viscount cleared his throat and looked to the page. “I have here a copy of The London Gossip, released only today. The author has dedicated an entire section of her paper to you. It reads, ‘rumor has it that the Honourable Mr. S has been seen about Town debauching himself with a vigor most unusual—even for him. He has been spotted at several gentleman’s clubs, soused beyond coherence. A rather diverting scene was reported to have taken place at Boodles some weeks past, during which Mr. S left destruction in his wake in the form of broken furniture and overturned glasses. One cannot help but wonder where Viscount S is and why he has yet to take his wayward son in hand. Such unseemly behavior does not reflect well upon the family name, which was once highly respected. It would seem Mr. S is determined to rip his father’s legacy to tatters. This writer wonders why.’”

  The viscount hurled the paper at Benedict with a snarl once he’d finished reading. Benedict bit back a string of curses, not because he wanted to avoid his father’s censure, but because he didn’t want the man to know how deep his dread went at the revelation that The London Gossip had resumed delivering her daily papers. He had gone to great lengths to cut off the popular publication's circulation, but true to form, the wily woman known to the public only as The London Gossip had outwitted him. Again.

  He pushed the paper off his lap in a show of childish defiance, taking great pleasure in the way his father’s nostrils flared, lips pinching in disapproval. “I hadn’t realized you devoured gossip sheets like some nosy society matron. Has country life grown so boring, then?”

  The viscount’s face reddened as he pointed an accusing finger at Benedict. “When such publications mak
e note of your ridiculous behavior and cast aspersions on my good name, I take an interest. Did you not think word of your exploits wouldn’t reach Norfolk?”

  “Of course not. I merely thought you had come to understand by now that I will do as I please. Your trip is wasted.”

  “I think not,” his father said, hands folded behind his back as he moved toward a window overlooking the street. “I have given you ample time to weary of your own destructive habits. As you have clearly become a slave to your vices, it falls to me to ensure your future, as well as that of the Sterling name.”

  Benedict stiffened, his stomach churning as he anticipated what was coming next. This wasn’t the first time he and his father had clashed on this subject, and it seemed the viscount was not to be swayed.

  “If I wanted your assistance, I would ask for it,” Benedict said. “My life is arranged to suit my needs, not to fulfill your expectations. You have made it clear that I will never be good enough to fill your shoes, so why should I exert myself trying?”

  “As distasteful as it is for us both, you are my heir. The time has come for you to act as such.”

  “I am not Esmond, and you cannot make me in his image no matter how much you might wish to.”

  “You aren’t half the man your brother was, on that we agree.”

  Benedict’s jaw ached from the hard clench of his teeth, his gut roiling with intense wrath. It didn’t matter how far he distanced himself from caring about his father’s opinion; being compared to his eldest brother never stopped putting his teeth on edge. Benedict hadn’t stood a chance of gaining the viscount’s approval when the heir had been living. Esmond’s death had only cemented his place as the favorite, the perfect son, a saint. Francis was just a step beneath him—by no means as perfect as his elder brother but still a Sterling to be respected, worthy.