Quick, merciless, he sucked and licked with unbridled enthusiasm as Gabriel’s fingers tangled in his hair, wordlessly demonstrating his need. Edward knew need. He could meet it; Lord knew, he’d had enough practice, even if not in this particular act. He quickened his rhythm, looking up at Gabriel’s tightly shut eyes and grimace of pleasure, his hands braced against the man’s thighs as he felt his muscles stiffen with approaching climax.
Come. He willed it with every part of him; he longed to see it from his angle. Come. Please.
“Oh, you.”
The sound of Gabriel’s voice, so raw and vulnerable, was enough to keep Edward exactly where he was, full of the joy of wishes granted. On his knees, tasting, sighing with contentment as he felt Gabriel’s hot seed at the back of his throat once, twice, three times.
He closed his eyes for a moment, slowly breathing out as Gabriel sank down to a sitting position. They sat quietly for some moments, Edward watching Gabriel come back to himself by degrees, wondering vaguely why it all seemed so normal. Not just the acts, the moments between the acts, where they sat close and silent. As if it were something they had been doing every day, for years.
The normality made it frightening. Edward felt it, the familiar tension creeping through him, and tried to concentrate on his lust as a way of drowning out the fear.
Gabriel was looking at him, his dark eyes full of an intimacy that only added to Edward’s anxiety. “How long has it been since you’ve given pleasure like that?”
There was no point lying to Gabriel. “I... I hardly ever have.” Edward shrugged, hoping he looked appropriately arrogant instead of ashamed. “I never had to. People tend to take more pleasure in obeying me. I never saw the point in displeasing them.”
He expected Gabriel to be surprised, given his London reputation. He leaned back as Gabriel moved closer, his voice lowering a little.
“I’m glad. Is it wrong to be glad?”
Edward could only shake his head. Gabriel’s hand traced wonderingly along his jawline, stroking, finding the small spot of pure sensation at the corner of Edward’s mouth.
“Do you see the point of it now? Giving pleasure like that?”
Again, the unusual urge for honesty. There was, to his immense shock, almost nothing that he wanted to hide from the man. “With you. Only with you.”
“Good.” Gabriel’s eyes burned. “Because I want to. To—to give pleasure like that, I mean. To you.”
“Well.” Edward swallowed, wondering if it would be bad form to simply grip the man’s head and guide it downwards. “I... I would certainly have no objections.”
“And I have never performed this particular act.” Gabriel’s voice was very grave. “So I can only imagine that my performance will be...somewhat poor.”
Edward knew that such words were normally meant to be the opposite of an aphrodisiac, but nobody had bothered to inform his cock. If anything, he was harder than ever. “Normally one learns by doing.”
“Yes.” Gabriel nodded. “I suppose.”
Frowning slightly in a way that Edward couldn’t help but find oddly adorable, he put his hands on Edward’s shoulders. Slowly standing, pulling him upward, he gently pressed him against the bookshelf. Kneeling, his dark curls level with Edward’s thighs, he tugged Edward’s breeches downward as Edward tried to control his wildly beating heart.
“My goodness.” The seriousness in Gabriel’s voice only heightened the absurdity. “It’s different from this angle. Larger, certainly.”
“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were trying to delay the inevitable.”
“But that’s quite fun, isn’t it? Delaying the inevitable. I’ve learned that from you, in recent days.” Gabriel smiled, his breath hot and thrilling as he moved his mouth closer to Edward’s stiff, waiting cock. “Or perhaps I’m simply planning my attack.”
“It’s best not to use words like attack in these situations.” Edward smiled. “It makes one think of teeth.”
Gabriel gently kissed the tip of his cock, waves of tingling pleasure flooding through him. “Are you thinking of teeth now?”
Edward gasped. “I’m not thinking of—of anything now.” He strained his hips forward, Gabriel’s laughter rippling through him. “Damn you. Are priests meant to be so tempting?”
“Priests aren’t meant to tempt anyone into anything. Apart from attending church more frequently, perhaps.”
“Of course.” Edward looked down at Gabriel, a tiny seed of doubt flowering in his breast. “I... You don’t have to do this, you know. Or—or any of it. If it means your pact is broken. If we haven’t broken it already.”
“I do.” Gabriel’s face took on a new seriousness. “I do have to.”
Edward didn’t know how to respond. He didn’t know what the look meant. But as he opened his mouth, ready to investigate further, Gabriel’s lips closed over his cock again.
“Oh, Jesus.” Edward threw a steadying hand against the bookshelf, unsure whether he could stay upright. Gabriel’s mouth on him was so good, so magically, powerfully, perfect, that his own release was in danger of coming immediately. “Just like that. Oh, God, yes.”
Had any other mouth been as wet, as hot, as perfectly tight? He dimly remembered being able to give criticism, offer suggestions—hell, he was sure he’d dictated a letter during a particularly forgettable servicing. Yet, just as he’d done before, Gabriel had turned a routine exchange of base wants into something powerful enough to have him gasping.
He gripped Gabriel’s curls tighter, trying desperately not to thrust. Gabriel’s hands rested possessively at his hips, drawing his cock deeper into his mouth, and Edward gripped the wood like a drowning sailor clinging to a mast—moaning with frustration as Gabriel drew away.
“Are rakes normally this loud?” His voice was intimate, hopeful, with a tenderness that had Edward’s heart racing.
He knew that an ironic comment would be expected here. But this was new, and astonishing, and Gabriel—so with a growl so animal it was almost embarrassing, he wordlessly pulled Gabriel’s head back onto his cock.
To hell with not thrusting. He bucked his hips, guiding Gabriel’s head with an urgent, trembling hand, nearly crying out as Gabriel moaned around his cock. The rhythm was clumsy, hasty and desperate and full of raw strength, a clash of will and need that had Edward biting his lip and muttering under his breath. “Oh God. Don’t stop. Please, please don’t—”
“Stop?” Gabriel suddenly drew away, his eyes dancing with wicked delight. He gently licked the tip of Edward’s cock, smiling as Edward twisted and strained his hips. “I don’t know. I’m suddenly tremendously tired.”
Edward had to laugh. “A rake like me would never normally choose someone so damned insubordinate.”
“Goodness.” Gabriel stared at him, deliciously impudent. “And yet, here we are.”
Oh, God. There it was again, the savage spear of sweetness that tore through Edward’s heart, ripping it open, letting all sorts of new emotions in.
His next words came completely unguarded. “Thank God for it.”
Gabriel’s lips closed over his cock again, his eyes never leaving Edward’s face. Another novelty, the constant gaze, another thing that he could only imagine happening with Gabriel rather than anyone else. The rhythm began again, slower and surer this time, Gabriel lavishing attention on Edward’s body with passionate, single-minded dedication. Edward closed his eyes, mutely pleading with his hands and lips, losing himself in sensation.
He couldn’t hold his climax back. He didn’t want to. When it finally came, a swift, savage rush of pleasure that left him weak-kneed and trembling, Gabriel’s stare took in each blissful moment.
For a moment they stayed still, Edward panting harshly, moaning as Gabriel slowly pulled his mouth away. He pressed his lips reverently to the base of Edward’s cock, slowly standing, his hands
never leaving Edward’s hips.
There was a long moment of reflective silence as they sat down beside one another. Edward wondered why his instinct told him to avoid Gabriel’s gaze; there would be too much feeling there, and he didn’t feel ready to encounter it. In the end, though, with the slightly tremulous air of a fisherman heading into a storm, he looked at Gabriel fully.
“You know, you’re an absolutely atrocious rake.” Gabriel smiled smugly. “You didn’t seem bored at all. Quite the opposite, in fact.”
“I thought we could give and take a little pleasure.” Edward lost himself briefly in the man’s warm, honey-flecked eyes. “You need more pleasure in your life.”
Gabriel’s dark curls rested against his shoulder as he exhaled. “You are pleasure. You’re not a rake at all—you’re some sort of sprite.”
“Please send any and all complaints to the Society of Beasts.” Edward smiled, obscurely relieved. “They’ll be shocked at my sudden change of character.”
“Oh, perhaps not. A man can change—can grow, even if circumstances are difficult.” Gabriel spoke slowly, pensively, looking at Edward with a touch of what looked like fear. “I am a man of God. I remain one, despite my inclinations—and my collar doesn’t burn when I step inside a church, and I doubt that snakes will pour out of the font the next time that I perform a baptism. I... I am what I dreamed of being.” He shrugged. “I never thought I could be. But I am. Just as you have money, power, influence...”
“Had.” Edward tried to keep his voice light. “I had all that despite my inclinations. Not because of them. And I’m considerably unlikely to retain any of it after all this mess.”
“You’ll find a way. We’ll find a way. Maurice, Caroline, the Society...” Gabriel’s voice was so calm, so full of sunny innocence, that Edward felt an obscure flash of irritation. “You’ll get all of it back. All of it, and more.”
Edward cast his mind to his palatial, sterile Mayfair house, all cold marble and glittering silver. Always empty, utterly empty, even when full of chattering souls...what sadness would rise after every social engagement, a blackness, a great engulfing darkness that could only be chased away with drink or flesh.
“Maybe I don’t want it.” The words sounded strange to him. “Maybe it’s more trouble than it’s worth.”
“Oh.” Gabriel shifted. The hope in his eyes struck Edward like a blow. “Then what do you want?”
You.
The thought was so strong, it was all Edward could do not to say it. He wanted Gabriel; he wanted him just like this, next to him, resting against him, removed from time itself. Wanted his half-questioning smile, the small line between his brows when he concentrated, those swift strong fingers around his wrist, or his waist, or tangled in his hair...just his skin on his own, like this, and his voice in his ear every waking moment.
Simple. Simple, and impossible. Impossible to go back there, to Hardcote House, and live surrounded by brutal memories. Impossible to watch Gabriel become tainted by it, day by day, until his feelings for the man were unrecognisable.
“I don’t want anything.” Oh, that split second of disappointment that passed over Gabriel’s face, so brief, so shattering. “I’d settle for some fine tobacco and a new cravat.”
“Yes. The twenty you have are nowhere near sufficient.” Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “How else will the Hardcote sheep know you’re a man of impeccable taste?”
“I sincerely hope you’ve been telling them.” Edward turned, staring at the masses of discarded papers. “I must have representation.” He paused for a moment. It was easier to ask the question when he couldn’t see Gabriel’s face, couldn’t see his eyes, reaching into his soul. “What...what do you want?”
Gabriel was silent for a long moment. Edward stayed very still, hardly daring to breathe.
Why was he so damned nervous? He had no right to be, not after the frivolous answer he had given to the very same question. No doubt Gabriel would say something similar: a larger congregation, a roof that didn’t leak...
“A party.”
For a moment, Edward thought he’d misheard—but Gabriel continued. “I’m forever called upon to officiate. Baptisms, and so on...weddings. An awful lot of preparation, and my only enjoyment is vicarious. So, a celebration. A party. With music, and dancing, and—and good friends. Nothing elaborate, but beautiful in its way.”
“A celebration? Well, that could certainly be arranged.” Edward reached out a hand, gently tousling Gabriel’s curls. “What would we all be celebrating?”
The melancholy in Gabriel’s voice stilled his hand. “Well. As I said...baptisms. Wedding. But some things are not meant for us.” He moved his head away, until all Edward could feel under his fingers was the cotton of his shirt. “Some wonderful things.”
“If I were a better rake than I appear to have become, I would make you tell me exactly what we would be celebrating. But I’ve clearly lost my touch.” Edward moved to squeeze Gabriel’s cock in his breeches, delighting in his gasp. “You’re free to leave. I’ve been very disappointing.”
Gabriel’s smile faltered a little. “Am I?”
“Am I what?”
“Well.” Gabriel looked down. “Am...am I completely free to leave?”
Oh. This conversation. He should have known from Gabriel’s look, the way he’d been before the act. He should have known.
But he had been avoiding it, hadn’t he? Losing himself in the unexpected pleasure of it, distracting himself with desire. Forgetting what was at stake—Gabriel’s reputation, his vocation. His own life, which fell into greater danger with every passing day.
He still hadn’t told Gabriel anything about his past. About why he couldn’t get close—close in mind, not flesh. About why nightmares still stalked him through the halls of Hardcote House.
Maybe it was time to tell him at least a few of the facts. To make Gabriel understand why anything more...substantive was impossible. He found himself looking down, oddly ashamed, suddenly fascinated by the whorls in the floorboards.
“Forgive me.” Gabriel’s voice made his heart sink; there was that edge of bitterness again, the one he’d heard during their first conversation after years of estrangement. “I know a thousand inexperienced men like me will have said something similar to you, in one way or another, so I imagine the glib response you’re searching for is no more than a breath away.”
Any desire to tell Gabriel anything vanished. For a priest, the man really knew how to be a bastard. How dare he assume that his silence, his reticence, was due to a lack of interest...even though, really, everything about his London reputation would suggest exactly that.
No. Edward wouldn’t consider that. He would lash out, every time, rather than accept that Gabriel could have a point.
He turned, looking Gabriel straight in the eye, summoning up every ounce of Stanhope cruelty. “Of course you’re free to leave. I don’t keep my fencing sabre with me after an hour spent fencing. One releases the tension, and then one behaves as one wishes.”
He waited, holding his breath, for Gabriel to rear back. To storm out of the room, find the nearest carriage, and never return, to insult him, to throw something, to cry.
Instead, to his immense shock, Gabriel smiled. He chuckled. “On the day we met again, I would have believed you. I really would. And I would have raged and stormed about, and possibly wept, and left. Perhaps I would have sent you a spiteful letter some days later, which you of course would not have read, just as you never read any of the others—and that would have been the end of the matter.” He looked down, briefly examining his nails. “But this is not the day we met. And I have given up so much of who I believed I was, to share these snatched moments—and I have seen you give up more of yourself than you think. Reveal more.”
Edward waited, silent, scared. Revealing anything about himself only put people in danger; couldn’t Gabri
el see it? The exact situation they found themselves in was due to his own greed, his need to reveal his hunger for closeness. For connection.
“I have known you longer than you have known yourself, Edward, and I know you are lying. I don’t believe it—I know it. You need me here, and you like me being here, and soon you are going to tell me why you so desperately try to deny that fact.” Gabriel’s smile faded; the vulnerable look appeared, the one that made Edward want to reach out and run away at the same time. “And it does need to be soon. Not today, but soon.”
Soon. Slippery, imprecise, it could be a week, or a month. A year, perhaps. Soon could almost be a lie; Edward could work with it. Could ignore it, drown it out with the more obvious pleasures that Gabriel could provide.
“Yes.” He bowed his head, unwilling to give Gabriel any more than that. “Soon.”
“Good.” Gabriel’s voice grew lower still. “Because otherwise, I can’t help but—”
He stopped, slowly raising a hand. Edward turned to the door, rearranging his clothes, as the sound of footsteps drew closer.
I’ll look. Gabriel mouthed the words as he reached into Edward’s waistcoat pocket, taking the key. Stay here.
* * *
Gabriel, more frightened than he wanted to admit, crept towards the door. Slowly unlocking it, his hand curling around the heaviest book he saw in case he needed an improvised weapon, he braced himself as he opened the door...and sighed with relief as he saw Ginger a little way down the corridor, shoving a large cream bun in his mouth as he whistled.
“Ginger.” He shook his head. “You frightened me.”
“I’m not frightening.” Ginger grinned, sticky crumbs framing his mouth. “I’d need to get bigger for that.”
“Well it’s nice to see that you’ve made a good start.” Gabriel beckoned. “Come on. A little more searching, and then it’s time to—”
He stopped. As did the tall blond man twenty paces away from Ginger, with a piece of paper in his hand and a look of utter surprise on his face. Surprise, which very quickly turned to anger.
The Vicar and the Rake (Society of Beasts) Page 16