by Pam Godwin
He whipped his face back to mine, his blue eyes stark with disbelief. “Truly? You can hear?”
“As of five minutes ago, it would seem.”
He prowled toward me, his gaze roving up and down, taking me in. Moonlight from the windows dashed across his striking features, highlighting his relief at my healthy appearance. He was so beautiful, especially when he stared at me like that, like I was his favorite view, his only destination.
“Look at you.” He stepped into my space, his hands finding and inspecting the condition of my injuries. “So bloody beautiful. Strong. Glowing. I knew you were out of bed and pushing yourself. Priest sent letters every few days, boasting about your progress.”
I shot Priest a startled look. He narrowed his eyes.
“I wished I would’ve been here, supporting you.” A spark of regret lit Ashley’s eyes. “Of course, you managed just fine. Extraordinarily so.” His hands slid to my face, framing it. “Your strength of will astounds. Truly an intimidating woman, and God help me, I’ve gone mad without you.”
He cupped the back of my head and drew my mouth toward his. And froze.
I leaned back to find a blade poised across his throat.
“Priest.” I gritted my teeth and met his angry eyes over Ashley’s shoulder. “You’re not going to cut him.”
He bent in, setting his mouth at Ashley’s ear. “Tell her.”
“Tell me what? About your history together? Your relationship with Arabella?” My pulse accelerated as I backed up and lowered into the armchair, glaring at Priest. “Is that how you and Ashley met? Is she the one you…you betrayed me with?”
Ashley sucked in a hard breath, his mouth a grim slash of pain. I’d never asked when she died. I only knew it had happened during childbirth.
“I can smell your shame, my lord. It sickens me.” Priest stepped away and tossed the blade toward the fireplace. “You’ve let it rule you your entire life. I’ve stood by you, honored your wishes, and protected your secrets at the cost of ruining my marriage!” His accent thickened, rising in volume with the force of his rage. Then he pounced, grabbing Ashley by the collar and hurling him to his knees before me. “Do you know that I have not made love to my wife in over two years?” With a hand in Ashley’s hair, he leaned in and snarled, “Tell her now or so help me God, I will break my vow and tell her myself.”
As Priest released him, my mind swam to keep up, creating and rejecting assumptions with the rapid beat of my heart.
“All right.” Ashley bent over my lap and gripped my hips, his muscles hot and coiled with tension. “Christ, I don’t know where to start.”
A flash of sympathy softened Priest’s features. “Tell her who I was with in Nassau two years ago.”
Everything inside me stilled. The room melted away until all that existed was Ashley’s strong, stern, beautiful face as he lifted it to mine and said, “Me. Priest was with me.”
My head jerked back, ice in my veins. “What? No, that’s not—”
“I wrote the letter, Bennett.” Ashley straightened on his knees, forcing his way between my legs. “Priest told me you memorized it. The one you found that morning.”
“Why?” I pressed my back against the chair, seeking distance, not understanding. “That letter confessed intimacy. Love. Passion. Orgasms. Why would you…write…that…?”
My gaze flitted between him and Priest, back and forth, over and over, as I tried to imagine them together. Naked. Fucking.
The concept of two men having relations didn’t shock or offend me. I lived on a ship with a hundred lusty pirates. I witnessed all sorts of bawdy, creative, man-on-man action, especially during long months at sea.
But Priest and Ashley? No. I couldn’t fathom it.
Except only minutes ago, there had been a moment, a seed of suspicion…
Priest lowered into the chair across from me, sprawling like a watchful predatory cat. “Get to the part where I swore on my life to be your dirty, shameful secret.”
“I think she can figure it out.” Agitated, Ashley rose and shrugged out of his coat, tossing it over the couch. “I’m betrothed. I have a career and a family name to protect. Duty, honor, heirs, obligations, expectations—my entire life was put before me the moment I drew my first breath. I didn’t choose this path. I was born into it. Bred to serve and thrive as a peer of the realm.” He flicked a hand at Priest. “If he and I were discovered…”
“You would both be executed,” I said on a dazed whisper.
Priest was a commoner and a criminal. Not only did he lack the required wealth and status, but he was an enemy of England. A relationship between him and Ashley was forbidden for all those reasons. But there was a far greater danger.
Romantic attraction between two men was considered a serious offense. If they were discovered, they would be hanged for sodomy.
“So you ended things with Priest in Nassau two years ago.” My head throbbed, mind blown. “You spent the night with him, wrote him a letter, and left before he woke.”
Priest watched us quietly from beneath dark brooding brows.
“Yes.” Ashley stared at his hands, his sculpted nostrils pulsing. “One of the many reasons Priest wishes to cut out my liver.” He paced to the unlit fireplace and braced his forearms against the mantle, his gaze on the floor. “That night in Nassau, I saw him in the tavern. You weren’t with him.”
“She went back to the ship to check on the crew,” Priest said. “While I waited for her ashore, I had a dram of rum. It was a stroke of luck that you spotted me.”
“A coincidence I can’t bring myself to regret.” Ashley’s broad, powerful shoulders rose and fell. “It had been two years since we last saw each other.”
“I remember.”
Ashley turned back to me. “Since he was a known pirate and I was a naval officer, we couldn’t be seen together. I discreetly told him where I was staying so we could have a private visit.”
“A private visit?” I blew a harsh sound through my nose. “You mean a visit of flesh.”
“No.” Priest leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and met my eyes. “Ashley and I have been close mates since childhood. Our relationship isn’t carnal at its foundation. When I went to him that night, I did it in secrecy out of concern for his association with me—an outlaw. Not because I intended to bed him.”
“You could’ve told me.” I straightened, frustration rising. “We were married. You should have trusted me enough to say where you were going and who you were with.”
“I gave him my word, Bennett. Long before I met you, I vowed to him that I would never tell a soul about our relationship. Same vow I made to you. I kept our marriage a secret, protecting you, just like we agreed.” A muscle bounced in his cheek. “Then I broke that vow on Eleuthera when I told Ashley you’re my wife.”
Fine. I was a reasonable woman. Reasonable enough to appreciate, albeit angrily, his reasons for the secrecy. He hadn’t tried to be malicious or deceitful. He’d only meant to keep Ashley and me safe.
“But,” I said, “you broke your marriage vow when you bedded Ashley in Nassau. Do you not see it that way?”
“Aye. I do.” Guilt drew up his shoulders as he glanced at Ashley and returned to me. “He and I spent hours talking that night, catching up. Like he said, two years had separated us. But when the conversation ended, I walked to the door, prepared to leave…”
“I told you to go.” Ashley leaned against the mantle with his arms crossed, the hint of a frown bleeding through his stoicism.
“You didn’t mean it.”
“No. Of course, I didn’t want you to leave. I missed you terribly and had no idea you were married. Regardless, what we did was reckless. It’s still reckless.”
“Reckless and indecent.” Priest’s eyes flared. “I was always the one thing in your life you couldn’t polish or beat into obedience. So you ended two decades of friendship like a coward in a letter.”
A letter that destroyed Priest’s marriage. I’d le
ft Priest that same day, crushing him beneath a double layer of pain.
“Two decades…” I did the calculation in my head. “You’ve known him since you were twelve?” I turned to Ashley. “And you were fourteen?” Good God, I would’ve only been a year old. I rubbed my head, overwhelmed, uncertain. “How did you meet?”
“Here at Ashley’s childhood home.” Priest gestured around us. “This was his bedchamber until he joined the Royal Navy at age twenty. When my whore of a mother sent me to England for work, the first Viscount Warshire, hired me as a hall boy.”
“Ashley’s father.”
Priest nodded. “As I showed steady ambition, I worked my way up to a footman and ultimately secured my position as the Groom of the Chamber. I was Lord Ashley Cutler’s personal valet and whipping boy for six years.”
Tingles of shock swept through me. I knew Priest had held various jobs as a boy, doing this and that for the gentry. It wasn’t until he was eighteen that he found Reynolds and joined the ranks of the Brethren of the Black Flag. So hearing he’d been a male servant was no surprise.
But Ashley’s servant? Here? That was difficult to process. By God, was that why the household staff knew Priest so well? Because they’d worked together?
“He’s twisting the truth,” Ashley said to me, his bearing stiff and severe. “Priest was my companion.”
“The companion of the master of the house. I saw to your every personal need.” Priest cocked his head, idly rubbing his chin without a trace of resentment in his gravelly accent. “I dressed you and styled you, accompanied you to every tedious formal engagement, and attended to your private arrangements. All your private affairs. How many times, my lord, did I personally wash that sizable cock between your legs?”
My indecent mind hungrily grasped at the sensual image he evoked, my insides fluttering and knotting.
“It wasn’t like that, and you damn well know it.” Ashley prowled toward him, seemingly unmoved, save for flexing of his hands at his sides. “You were my best friend. My only confidant. Because of you, I learned how to laugh and play and take risks. You understood me like no one else could. Because you valued me as something other than a rank or a title.” He towered over Priest’s chair, glowering down at him. “You can talk about my cock and try to degrade our relationship, but I know that everything I just said… You felt the same about me. It went both ways, my friend. When we were together, in any capacity, we were well-matched. A perfect pair on level ground. Always equal.”
“Aye,” Priest whispered. “I know.”
They stared at each other, eyes hard and unblinking, and within the poignant, private space between them, I felt their conflict, their longing, their tortured breaths. I imagined they were thinking about the moments they’d shared. All the time that they’d lost. The rules of society that undoubtedly forced them apart.
My heart wept for them. At the same time, I felt sick with dread.
Where did I fit in? Priest was my husband, and he cheated on me with my lover. But cheated didn’t sound right. It didn’t make sense in my head or my heart.
All that mattered was that I loved them, and they loved me.
Except what they had together, the history they shared, the fraternal companionship… That was something else entirely. It didn’t include me.
I struggled to reckon all the strange, intense reactions I had to this. I was positively blindsided.
And terrified.
My chest squeezed as Priest and Ashley stared at each other in a way I’d never seen them look at anyone else. What radiated from them was more than desire and masculine heat. It went beyond the habits of possessiveness and dominance. I saw it in their eyes—their unconditional love. It blazed with a magnetic force that was too powerful to be controlled or ignored.
I clutched my throat, breathing through the terrible tightness. I was jealous. But also aghast with awe and envy. I coveted what they shared. I wanted that history with them. That brotherly bond. Without it, I felt like an outsider looking in.
With each passing second, the emotions that Ashley kept so well hidden began to surface. Muscles twitched in his clenched jaw. The hands at his sides opened and closed. His entire body seemed to lean toward Priest, his strength visibly contracting, fighting against the pull.
As his control unraveled, I tried to embrace my conflicting feelings about their relationship. I wanted them together. They would never be truly happy apart. But I yearned to be part of it, of them, of whatever they were within the walls of their stolen, private moments.
“Stop looking at me like that.” Priest’s eyes didn’t waver from Ashley’s as he rose from the chair and leaned into Ashley’s face. “Unless you intend on sticking around this time.”
“That was low, even for you.” Standing an inch taller than Priest, Ashley pivoted and strolled aft toward the bathing chamber. “I’m drawing a bath.”
A bath? At this hour?
The moonlight, skittish now beyond the windows, wouldn’t be returning tonight. Dawn was approaching. None of us were going to sleep.
Ashley moved through the bedchamber with natural grace and balance—the gait of a man accustomed to the rolling decks of a ship. But I marked the fatigue in his broad shoulders and the sheen of dust on his white breeches. He’d just arrived from London and probably made the multi-day journey astride a horse to get here quicker.
A bath was exactly what he needed.
“You can hear.” Priest appeared before me, crouching at eye level, his hand soft against my cheek. “Every word?”
“My hearing’s returned to normal.” My brows furrowed, my thoughts elsewhere.
“Talk to me.” Elbows braced on the arms of my chair, he let his hands dangle on my lap, trickling light caresses against my thighs. “Tell me every thought in that beautiful head.”
“All right.” I cleared the scratch in my voice. “I want to understand. I’m trying. But I feel like I don’t know either of you. I’m in love with two men who are living this whole other life.”
“That’s not—”
“Be quiet and let me speak.” I breathed in slowly and released my lungs. “For two years, I believed the author of that letter was a gorgeous, intriguing noblewoman, who was torn between her duty and her heart.”
“You weren’t entirely wrong. The noblewoman just happens to be a nobleman.”
“The same nobleman I fell in love with.” What were the odds?
The sound of water pumping from cisterns drifted from the bathing chamber.
I dragged my fingers over my hair, unable to find my bearings in this new reality. “I have so many questions.”
“Ask them.” His hand found mine.
I met his adoring eyes and steeled my spine. “Have you been with other men?”
“No. Neither has Ashley. The physical aspect of our relationship didn’t surface until he joined the Royal Navy. As we grew older, time and distance separated us, and within that loneliness, our longing evolved into something more primal.” His dark eyebrows crept together. “Perhaps lust is a symptom of the trust we built together as boys. But it’s never been a driving force between us. Nor have we ever sought sexual relations with other men.”
I nodded. Then shook my head. “I don’t know how I fit into that.”
“Well, Ashley and I prefer the softer, lovelier, fiercer sex… As it happens, we prefer one woman in particular, who is eager to do more with her life than breed heirs and attend society dinners.” He smiled softly. “You’re the glue, Bennett. The reason we’re here. Think about it. Ashley and I fell in love with the same woman. Was that coincidence? Or something more profound? You know what I think?” He traced his thumb along my bottom lip. “You’re the overruling destiny that he and I have been traveling toward our whole lives. Our paths forked, veered, crossed, and forked again a dozen times. And here we are, right where we started. With you.”
I loved the sound of that. So much. My hand went to my mouth as a hot rush of tears swelled.
/> “Damn you.” I slapped at the trickle of moisture that leaked from my eyes. “I don’t want to cry anymore.”
“They’re bold tears. Dauntless. God knows you’ve earned them.” He slipped the backs of his fingers along my cheek. “So resilient and tough, yet at the same time, beautifully delicate.”
“I’m none of those things, Priest. I’m scared. I remember the devastation on your face in Nassau when Ashley left you. Losing him ruined you so completely you drowned yourself in drink. I knew then that I couldn’t compete with your lover. And I know it now, seeing the way you look at each other. I’m so afraid of being shut out.”
“The night I stole your compass, we were in your private cabin, and you asked me why I was there. Do you remember what I said?”
“Why are you here?”
“You know why.”
“You want to fuck me.”
“That’s a given, but not nearly the heart of it.”
“What, pray tell, could be the heart of your intentions, if not to wet your cock?”
“It’s really quite simple. I want to take care of you.”
I leaned into the hand he held on my cheek. “You want to take care of me.”
“More than anything. I want to spend the rest of my life protecting and worshiping you.” His fingers shifted to my hair and clenched with shocking assertiveness. “I want to make love to my wife. It’s been two years, Bennett.”
A flame of desire, that which lay dormant for so long, stirred between my legs.
I glanced toward the bathing chamber, searching for Ashley, and there he was. Leaning near the doorway, wearing only his breeches, he watched us with a dark, heated look that spiked the temperature of my blood to dizzying heights.
“The bath is ready.” He pushed away from the wall and vanished inside the chamber.
Priest slid his arms beneath me and drew me to his chest as he stood.
I’d put in an ungodly amount of work over the past three weeks into ensuring I could walk on my own two feet. But he wanted this. He wants to take care of me.