After all … Mother Morton’s was where they’d shared their first kiss. As they awaited their dinner, Alex leaned back in his chair and remembered it with fondness and longing tightening his chest.
Chapter 6
“That noxious creature, the so-called ‘Ravishing Widow D’, is hosting another of her exclusive parties this coming Tuesday. This writer has heard rumors of the arrangements being made … the likes of which are too scandalous for the eyes of my esteemed readers. Suffice it to say that Lady D has proven yet again that you may take the woman out of the gutter, but you cannot remove the stains she left it with.”
-The London Gossip, 27 January 1820
Benedict hung close to Alex as they stood at the bar waiting for their drinks, afforded a bird’s-eye view of the entire front room of what he now knew to be a molly house. He had accepted Alex’s invitation to accompany him to London for Christmas, not wishing to spend the break with his family before heading off to Cambridge. His mother’s death the year before had been a stunning blow, one he couldn’t have endured if not for the friendship of Alex—who seemed determined to brighten his days when he required it, or simply sit in silent grief with him when it was what he preferred. To return to a home devoid of her sparkling presence would make tolerating his father and brothers even more unbearable.
He had not known what to expect as a guest in the Vautrey family townhouse, but he’d never fathomed being welcomed by the earl and countess and treated like a son. Benedict and Alex spent their days roaming London, attending plays at the theater, dining in coffee-houses, and exploring museums. They played cards before the fire in the drawing room some evenings, a thick, heated tension swelling between them.
It had been this way for the entirety of their friendship, with Benedict hovering on the cusp of a monumental decision. As they came to know one another, Benedict had mustered the courage to ask Alex why he always stared at him with those secretive eyes of his.
Alex had stunned him by replying, “It’s only that find you beautiful. I cannot help myself.”
That had been the first real insight into Alex’s nature. Benedict’s first instinct had been to place distance between them, for surely such feelings were sinful. They were young men, and the natural thing to do was join forces to gain the attention of the ladies they would one day court for marriage. Only, every time that thought crept into his mind, he was besieged with the memory of standing before a naked Jemima. His disinterest in her wasn’t a singular event. No woman had ever provoked him to the sort of lust the other lads were afflicted with.
Alex, however, filled him with queer feelings he would rather not examine too closely. Only, as time went on, Benedict was forced to admit that what he felt for the other man was something beyond friendship.
“You do it, too, you know,” Alex had said after Benedict confronted him for staring. “You look at me when you think I’m not paying attention. Care to explain?”
Despite Alex’s teasing tone, Benedict had been overcome with sickening dread. Alex was right; he did spend an unhealthy amount of time observing Alex from the corner of his eye. He couldn’t seem to help himself either, and eventually decided to stop fighting whatever was happening to him. Benedict could hardly help that the sight of Alex’s bare throat or exposed forearms made his face heat, or that the sight of him in dishabille in the privacy of their bedchamber made a knot form in his throat.
There was nothing to be done about such inclinations but to fight them. But it didn’t stop him from wondering about kissing those plush lips, or slipping his hands into the opening of Alex’s shirt to experience the feel of that smooth, firm chest.
One evening, they had sat awake later than the other boys, huddled close to the hearth in which they’d just lit a fire. Alex had stared at him in silence for a long while, with Benedict helpless to do anything other than gaze back at him, paralyzed by fear and curiosity. Finally, Alex had moved, one hand creeping across the rug toward Benedict’s. Benedict didn’t resist when their fingertips brushed, or when Alex turned his palm over and rested his own atop it. Fingers intertwined as if by instinct, and Benedict was stunned by how right it felt, how pure and perfect. While he gaped in astonishment, Alex had merely smiled knowingly at him—as if nursing a secret Benedict wasn’t yet aware of.
Benedict had wrestled with the slow but significant changes developing between them, until they’d come to a head on a spring evening. Alex had coaxed him to take a walk into town for dinner, after which they’d ambled down darkened streets, companionable silence stretching between them. Suddenly, Alex took Benedict’s hand and pulled him into a narrow alley between a tavern and a haberdasher’s that had closed for the day. Taking Benedict’s face in both hands, Alex had leaned in until their lips brushed.
Stunned, Benedict had reared away from Alex, heart thundering in his chest. “What the devil are you doing? Are you mad?”
Leaning against the wall of the tavern, Alex had sighed. “Yes, and it would seem you are the cause. Haven’t you ever wondered why there always seems to be this … connection between us? And I don’t mean the friendly sort. You feel it when I hold your hand, or when I look at you. I know you do, because it’s how I feel.”
Benedict shook his head, though recognition niggled the back of his mind. His body had lit up like a struck match at the slight touch of Alex’s lips, and tendrils of heat now snaked through him.
“No, I don’t wonder,” he protested. “It isn’t right for us to wonder, Alex. This can’t happen. We can’t …”
Alex had lowered his eyes, shoulders slumped. “Of course. Forgive me, I … I thought perhaps you … well, it doesn’t matter. I’ve known the truth about myself for a long time. Perhaps you are yet to discover your own truth.”
Benedict clenched his teeth around a vehement denial, knowing it would be a lie. He reached up to wipe the remnants of the brief kiss from his mouth but found his fingertips lingering along the edge of his lower lip instead. He didn’t want to obliterate those small traces of Alex, despite his protestations.
“Can we forget this ever happened?” Alex pleaded. “I couldn’t bear to lose you as my friend.”
Benedict had agreed and they hadn’t spoken of it again. Yet, Alex’s overture had changed everything. Benedict’s curiosity over his burgeoning appetites had been stoked and he found it difficult to turn his mind toward the more acceptable pursuit of the female sex. He didn’t want any woman; he wanted Alex.
Alex seemed to sense this, even as he pretended not to. Now that Benedict had put a stop to what Alex began with his fleeting kiss, it was up to him to make the next overture … if ever there was to be one.
While ruminating over the possibilities and pitfalls, Benedict had made another surprising discovery. While searching for a book to borrow among Alex’s trunks, he uncovered literature and tomes filled with drawings of a scandalous nature. His mouth had fallen open as he thumbed through depictions of men with other men—kissing and lying together undressed, holding one another’s cocks, and even taking each other’s pricks into their mouths. His throat tightened at a particularly frightening image of one man on his hands and knees while another knelt behind him, his cock buried in the other man’s arsehole.
Slamming the book of drawings shut, he was then startled by footsteps. His anxiety eased as he realized it was only Alex. They were thankfully alone in the room, though the threat of discovery had been very real. His recklessness had nearly gotten them both in serious trouble.
Gaze roaming to the cover of the book Benedict held against his chest like a hidden treasure, Alex’s lips quivered with amusement.
“Keep it for as long as you like,” he said. “Perhaps you’ll find it as diverting as I do.”
Benedict had stashed that book beneath his bed, along with an erotic novel telling the story of a young man learning of forbidden pleasures with his school’s headmaster. While poring over them both, Benedict had been unable to fight his bodily reactions, the arousal that such lur
id descriptions inspired. It had shamed him to frig himself to the imaginings of a mind that was now enlightened, his body awakened into a fury of need now that he knew what he truly wanted.
Now, as they took their final break before beginning their time at Cambridge, Benedict faced the possibility of knowing what it was like to give in to his needs. He could hardly believe it had come to this, but what he felt seemed as natural as drawing breath. This was who he was, and Benedict wasn’t certain he could fight it much longer.
Apparently, Alex harbored similar hopes for their time away from school, as he had brought Benedict to Mother Morton’s—a coffee-house and tavern that became an exclusive club in the evening, a place for men who desired other men to congregate.
Benedict goggled at the scene before him, stunned at the uninhibited display of men dressed as they otherwise wouldn’t have in society. Most were dressed like him, in waistcoats and breeches, though a few were as dandified as Alex in bright colors and heavy adornments. Others dressed as women, or in some odd combination of male and female attire, walking about as if they didn’t care what anyone thought of them. And perhaps they needn’t care, as it seemed Benedict was the only one staring at these men in disbelief.
Alex’s lips brushed his ear, and Benedict nearly leaped out of his skin.
“Calm down,” he whispered, his breath tickling the side of Benedict’s neck. “Being a man who prefers other men doesn’t mean you have to start wearing corsets and gowns.”
Benedict reared back to find Alex grinning, shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter. “I never said—”
“I’m only joking,” Alex crooned, giving his shoulder a light squeeze. “Being who you are is as simple as what you see in this room. We are different in many ways, but in others, we are the same. You can be whoever you want to be, but still love who you love. And, in a place like this, you needn’t be afraid to show it.”
To illustrate his point, Alex slid his hand down Benedict’s arm, then took hold of his hand. Benedict stiffened as their fingers locked together, but a quick glance around the room revealed that no one had noticed. In fact, other men could be found behaving in the same way—holding hands, kissing, leaning close to one another. Benedict had never seen anything like it. However, it came as second nature to stand there holding Alex’s hand as they waited for their ale, knowing they wouldn’t have to pull apart unless they wanted to.
As the night went on, Benedict found it easier to enjoy himself, the ale going a long way in that regard. They drank and had dinner at a table filled with friends of Alex—other young men who frequented Mother Morton’s when time permitted. They were like any other males Benedict knew, except for their natures, which were clear based on their presence in a molly-house. They came and went from the table to dance with one another, prompting Alex to turn to him with an outstretched hand.
“Well?” he urged when Benedict merely gaped at him. “I am a horrible dancer, but am willing to embarrass myself for you.”
Accepting Alex’s hand, Benedict allowed himself to be led to the edge of the dance floor, which overflowed with men twirling and spinning and clutching at one another while laughing. The song was a waltz, played at a dizzying rhythm that made Benedict’s head spin as Alex guided him through the steps.
He grunted when a heavy foot came down on his, jerked off balance by Alex’s graceless steps.
“Christ, I thought you were joking,” he yelled to be heard above the music. “You really are terrible.”
Alex shrugged. “Alas, I am good at many things, but dancing isn’t one of them.”
Benedict winced when Alex crushed his toes again, adjusting their positions so he was the dominant partner. “For the love of … Let me lead before you break every bone in my foot.”
Alex threw his head back and laughed, but seemed to follow the steps better with Benedict holding him tight, guiding him through every turn. They were closer now than they’d ever been, mashed together from chest to thighs and breathing the same air. Alex grew suddenly serious, his fingers tightening around Benedict’s. Benedict had become a bundle of exposed nerves, new sensations overwhelming him all at once.
Alex smelled like the peppermint stick he’d eaten after dinner, and honeyed ale. He was solid and warm in Benedict’s hold, his chest firm and broad, his thighs taut and sinewy. His face flushed at the feel of Alex growing hard against him, the pulse of blood in his cock in tandem with Benedict’s own. With each step and turn, they brushed against one another, further inflaming the unmistakable surge of desire growing between them.
They came to a stop almost at once, though the music continued. Alex had grown two inches in the past year and now looked down at Benedict with heavy-lidded eyes, his lips parted on panting breaths. Benedict was having trouble breathing as well, the feelings he’d tried to repress bursting from him in a sudden rush. Before he could talk himself out of it, he lunged, seeking Alex’s mouth with his own. This kiss was clumsy and unskilled, Benedict’s hunger driving him to mash his mouth against Alex’s, clutching at his shoulders for dear life.
Alex pulled away, framing Benedict’s face in his hands. He was smiling, his lips reddened and his eyes bright. Benedict shook with the force of his fear that Alex would reject him. It would serve him right after that night in the alley, but hope made him lean in, yearning and waiting, desperate where before he had been reticent.
Long, dark lashes lowered over Alex’s eyes as he met Benedict in the middle, his lips soft and seeking. Benedict sighed against his mouth, leaning in to accept the kiss. Alex was methodical and controlled, slowly accustoming Benedict to the invasion of the kiss. He nibbled at Benedict’s lower lip, stroked his tongue into the seam of Benedict’s mouth. Threading his fingers through Benedict’s hair, Alex tilted his head and delved deeper with his tongue. Benedict’s palate was overwhelmed by the sugary sweet taste of Alex, drunk on the need for more, and then more. An entire world of possibility had just been opened to him, and he hardly knew where to begin now that he’d decided to stop fighting it.
One thing was clear, as he and Alex stood drinking from each other’s mouths as if starved—he didn’t have to figure it out alone. He had Alex and hoped to God that wouldn’t change any time soon.
“Ben!”
With a blink, Benedict ascended from a drugging haze of memory, his head swimming and his limbs heavy yet somehow weightless. His beefsteak sat before him untouched, and he’d been so lost in recollections of the past that the waiter returning to deliver it had escaped him. His stomach had tied itself in knots, so the sight of the food only made him feel sick.
Alex seemed to have suffered no such debilitation. His plate was clean, his wineglass emptied. It was his voice raised over the music that had snatched Benedict out of his musings—his mind chasing the wisps of memory that filled this place like a heavy fog.
What had he been thinking, agreeing to step foot inside Mother Morton’s? After Alex’s departure from London, Benedict had avoided what had once been one of his favorite haunts like the plague. Alex, the crafty bastard, had to know how difficult it was for Benedict to maintain his apathy within these walls. Sitting across from him at a table he was certain they had shared before, Benedict found it far too easy to forget where they stood now. Against the backdrop of Mother Morton’s, they were young men again—free from the burdens they now carried, and discovering what it meant to be in love.
Alex was watching him with a pensive expression, fingers toying with the stem of his glass. Benedict returned his gaze as if meeting an unspoken challenge. Alex could bring him here and make Benedict feel things he didn’t wish to feel … but in the end, it would change nothing. Trying to find the words to express those thoughts, Benedict ground his teeth, annoyed that they wouldn’t leap off his tongue as easily as before. It was this tavern, the place where he and Alex had experienced so many firsts together. It was Alex himself—too perfect to be real, too close to be ignored.
The music changed from a dizzying tempo
to a slow, swelling one that made Benedict’s chest constrict around his lungs. With a soft smile, Alex inclined his head toward the dance floor, crowded with men drawing close to one another for a waltz.
“Dance?”
No. No, he didn’t care to dance with Alex. A waltz was too intimate. He hadn’t danced with another man since Alex left him, hadn’t wanted to spoil his coveted memories with a different partner. It didn’t make sense, considering the hatred Benedict had fostered for his former lover over the years, but there you had it. There were some things he was simply unwilling to taint by drawing one of his temporary lovers into them, regardless of how he’d come to feel about Alex.
Despite himself, Benedict spit out the first answer that came to mind. “Are you still terrible at it?”
Shrugging one shoulder, Alex’s grin widened. “No better than the last time we danced, but certainly no worse.”
With a labored sigh, Benedict came to his feet. “Then, I’m leading.”
Alex rushed to follow Benedict into the crowd of dancers like an eager puppy, his smile both charming and infuriating. This wasn’t some romantic gesture or olive branch; it was a test. Benedict needed to remind himself that being near Alex again wasn’t enough to change him, or heal his festering internal wounds. It would be a way to prove that he could survive this arrangement without losing himself in the process. He was in this for the promised money, nothing more.
They drew into each other with an ease born from years of practice, Alex submitting to Benedict’s dominant hold with satisfying pliancy. Hands clasped and arms around one another, they fell into the dip and sway of the waltz, Benedict’s controlled movements guiding Alex’s. There was much raucous laughter and jostling on the dance floor, but the drunken revelry seemed far removed from them. Benedict refused to break Alex’s stare, taking the other man’s probing gaze as a challenge.
Chasing Benedict (The Gentleman Courtesans Book 5) Page 12