by Ruby Moone
Tristan held him between the shoulders with one hand and grasped his hip with the other and moved. His thrusts were short, tentative almost, and he bent and kissed him a few times, but as Sam cried out for more he let go and fucked him with long hard strokes into the mattress, leaving Sam moaning and writhing desperately. He felt Tristan’s thrusts become shorter, harder, and then he connected with his gland and Sam yelled aloud at the sparks that lit up his already over-sensitive body. He managed to push his hand under himself to grab his desperate cock. All it took was a couple of tugs in time with Tristan and he was coming and howling, and as he did, Tristan cried into his back and emptied himself into him.
They lay together, panting, and Sam tried to pull his senses together but they were gone. He was gone. It was simply incredible. He felt Tristan pull out carefully and then brace himself with both hands on Sam’s back. He was breathing as heavily.
“Did I hurt you?” he whispered, leaning down to kiss his shoulder.
Sam shook his head and licked his lips. “No.”
He felt Tristan move away, and he came back with water and cloths. It took a gargantuan effort for Sam to move and clean himself, but when they were both done they slid back into bed, and Tristan resumed his position on Sam’s chest.
“Are you…” he began.
Sam squeezed him. “Tris, it was the best fuck of my life.” It was the truth. He had never experienced anything like it.
Tristan’s cheek that rested on his chest felt warm. “Oh. Well. There now. That’s good. Better than talking?”
Sam laughed softly. “Much better than talking.”
* * * *
They sat at the table by the window sipping tea and eating toast. Sam dusted the crumbs from his fingers on his napkin, drained his cup, and sat resolute.
“I really do need to talk to you.”
“By all means.” The words were automatic. Polite, ingrained, but what Tristan really wanted to do was scream and say no and refuse to listen, take him back to bed and fuck him senseless again. He had hoped against hope that their activities through the night might have swayed him, might have made him want to stay.
“You have done so much for me; I could never repay you.”
“I am not asking for repayment. I don’t want repayment.”
“I know.” Sam rubbed at a spot on his breeches and kept his eyes down. “If I live here I will be as trapped as when I was in the brothel,” he began.
Had he slapped him Tristan could not have been more shocked. He blinked and tried to process the pain that gripped him.
Sam looked up. “I…I can’t live like this, Tristan. I adore you, but I cannot be a kept man. I cannot simply sit about all day and do nothing. And more to the point, I simply cannot countenance the possibility that you could ever be dragged into this…this cesspool that is my life again. I could ruin you, your entire family, I could get you hung. I cannot do that to you. I will not do it.” Sam’s eyes never left his and the pain in them was unmistakable.
Tristan swallowed, fiddled with his teaspoon for a moment, and then set it down. “I understand that this arrangement may make you uncomfortable,” he said, feeling his way, “but there must be something that we can think of that doesn’t mean you leaving me completely?” He glanced up.
Sam was frowning. “I want to feel like I am your equal. I want…” He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“My equal in what?”
“Everything. I want to be able to stand beside you.” Sam threw his hands up in exasperation.
Tristan hurt. Every part of him hurt. “Well, unless you have found a way for you to become a…a wealthy, landowning member of the aristocracy I would say that is pretty much saying that what was between us is over.”
Sam’s silence said it all. Tristan couldn’t look at him. He would not cry. He would not. “Where will you go?”
“I will look for work. I want to be able to support myself and a family.”
That jerked Tristan’s head up. “A family? Are you considering marriage?”
Sam’s eyes were soft, pained. “No, I am taking the boys and the little girl with me.”
Tristan didn’t think he could hurt anymore but he was wrong. He had imagined keeping the children with him. Made plans for them. Thought he might have a place in their lives if not as a father, then as an uncle of sorts. He had allowed himself to imagine having a family, but Sam intended to not only leave him, but take the children, too. It was too much.
He stood, straightened his waistcoat and cleared his throat a couple of times, buying a little space in which to compose himself enough to speak. “I will leave you to get on. You clearly have a lot do.”
Sam stood up, too, and watched as Tristan walked to the door. “Tristan?”
“Yes?” he paused, one hand on the open door. He stared at it. He couldn’t look at Sam.
“It is for the best.”
Tristan picked at a speck on the woodwork with his thumbnail. “I am sure it is. For you.” He flicked a glance up at Sam and the words tumbled out unbidden. “Am I so fucking unlovable?”
Chapter 19
Sam stared at the closed door, mouth open. Unlovable? Unlovable? Christ, if he loved the man anymore he would die of it. He was leaving him because he loved him…
Sam rubbed awkwardly at the pain in his chest and tried to process what he had said, tried think about it from Tristan’s point of view. Tristan who had no mother, felt rejected by his father, whose struggle with his needs set him apart from the rest of the world, from his peers and his family. Who, it seemed, clearly saw himself as not worthy of love. Sam had given him those words once but they had been a dreadful untruth. A ploy. He remembered the look of unspeakable vulnerability in Tristan’s eyes when he had said it, and the look of pain when he had overheard Gareth say it was a lie. He sank back into the chair and covered his eyes.
* * * *
The comfort and familiarity of White’s wrapped around Tristan and soothed him a little. His club was the one place where he could be alone with his thoughts in a place that did not hold memories of Sam in it. The low hum of conversation, the air, redolent of smoke, brandy, and polish; the clink of crystal and china were all calming and familiar. He shook out a copy of the Times and held it before him like a shield. A silent message about the need for solitude, a barrier against the encroaching world. He couldn’t read a thing, mind; he just hid behind it whilst he thought. He was in a completely impossible situation. If he offered Sam work, paid work, Sam would still feel beholden to him. If he didn’t then he would feel like a kept man and leave. If he offered Sam money to stay and Sam did stay, he would forever wonder if he had simply stayed for the money or because he loved him.
Brutal, really.
He sipped the brandy that had been brought to him. He was stuck in a mess of his own making. He had bought Sam from the beginning. Buying the affections of a man in a brothel, buying the sexual gratification he needed, buying Sam. He had never really thought of the man in the brothel, the man selling himself to others, selling his body, his self-respect, his…Tristan closed his eyes. He thought about those boys locked into the life of trading one’s self for enough money to live, and the little girl that had been poised on the brink. When he had gone to Dante’s it had been only to satisfy a deep and abiding need. He had not thought about Sam other than in terms of his own needs. He needed to be bedded by a man, he needed to have a man in his life, he needed…he needed…he needed. Sam had tried to explain today, but again he had only thought about how that impacted on his own life not that Sam might need, too. He folded the newspaper carefully. He remembered the way that Sam sank into his arms at night and loved to be held.
No wonder he wasn’t loved. He really only considered himself. He thought about his abhorrence for what Dante and Mosely had done but in the end, he was complicit in that world as he had gone and bought into it by paying for Sam. He felt partly hypocritical and partly furious that men like him should be put in the p
osition where they could not love freely. He took another drink and was forced to admit that had Sam been a woman he wouldn’t be much better off because they could never have married because of the class difference. What was it Sam had said to him? That he was more trapped than most? Sitting in White’s, surrounded by comfort and privilege, he had to admit he was trapped. His trappings offered immense wealth, comfort, and pleasure, but, when it denied him what he really needed, it was nothing more than a glorified prison.
Mind you, he thought as he took another sip, even if the world did allow for men to love men openly, he couldn’t make Sam love him. He knew that Sam was fond of him, that he desired him, but when it came down to it there didn’t seem to be much that Tristan could do to make him love him. As grand gestures of love went, killing a man had to stand up there, but it hadn’t had a ha’porth of impact on Sam. He still didn’t love him enough to stay; he still intended to go. He closed his eyes on a sigh.
The sound of someone clearing their throat dragged him from his reverie, and made him peer over the top of his newspaper. Captain Farrington stood there.
“Begging your pardon,” the man said with a small bow. “Might I have a moment of your time, my lord?”
“Of course,” Tristan replied. The words were ingrained politeness. He wanted nothing more than to be left alone, but found he was a little curious about this man who had managed to capture Sam’s cousin’s heart. He was good looking. Tall, fair haired, and serious.
Farrington sat opposite him. “I wondered how you were faring. Harry explained what happened.”
“I am absolutely fine.”
“Shooting a man is…” he looked off towards the window for a moment. “Never easy.”
Tristan shuddered. In all the chaos that had ensued, the pain of possibly losing Sam forever, the fact that he had killed a man as yet stood unexamined in his heart. When he looked at it, it made him feel queasy.
Farrington went on. “I was trained to do it, but it never failed to make me feel ill. I can only imagine how you are feeling right now.”
Tristan smiled sadly. “In fairness, I have been so caught up with trying to figure out how to persuade Sam not to leave I have given it little thought.” He looked at the man opposite him. “Does that make me a dreadful person?”
Farrington smiled. He really was a very good looking man. “Not at all. When Mosely went for Harry I shot him, but only in the arm. I wished I had shot him dead. If I had, you and Sam might have been spared some of this.”
Both men were silent for a moment, each locked in their own thoughts.
Tristan was the first to speak. “Funny, what a man will do for those he loves.”
Farrington nodded. “Do you love him?”
Tristan balked a little at the personal nature of the question, but then capitulated swiftly. There were not many people he could talk to about the position he was in. He nodded and then pinched the bridge of his nose. “I do, but he is hell bent on leaving with you and Harry. Not only that, he intends to take the children with him.” Tristan swallowed.
“We rescued a boy from Dante,” Farrington said. “Julian. Probably the same age as Ollie. He lives with us and Harry acts as his tutor.”
“How did you persuade Harry to stay with you?” Tristan asked. Was there something that he hadn’t thought of, something he could offer that might make a difference?
Farrington looked at his hands for a moment, and then looked up. “I asked him.”
Tristan nodded and smiled. “And he said yes?”
Farrington just smiled.
“So it was that easy?”
“I wasn’t sure he would. I had only known him a day.” Farrington’s eyes took on a faraway look as he remembered. “But it was enough for me to know that I loved him. To know there would never be another for me. Fortunately for me, he loved me, too.”
“You are a lucky man.”
“I know.”
Tristan wanted to be happy for Farrington, but inside he was a seething mass of misery. Why couldn’t Sam just love him back?
“How long will you be staying?” he asked.
“Probably a week or so.”
Tristan wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. Could he spend a week with Sam and then let him go? Could he spend a week with Sam knowing he didn’t love him?
“Might I make a suggestion?”
Tristan looked up at Farrington.
“Stop thinking too much.”
Tristan opened his mouth to speak, but then laughed and shook his head.
* * * *
Sam stood outside Alfie’s townhouse for long moments trying to compose himself. He was still struggling to come to terms with the fact that in his attempts to protect Tristan, and find some kind of self-respect for himself, all he had managed to do was make Tristan feel unlovable. Unlovable. Just the word made his chest ache. He had spent some time talking with Harry, and between them they had come up with some ideas. All he needed was some help from Alfie to try and find a way forward that would suit them all. That would allow him to lead some kind of productive life, love Tristan, and look after the children they had rescued.
He shook himself, straightened his coat, and ran lightly up the stairs to the door and rapped on it. He stretched his neck a little and cleared his throat. The door opened, and he was admitted.
He found Alfie in the drawing room with Gareth, Charlie, and Harry. He smiled at Harry. He had promised to make sure that he and Charlie would be in attendance.
Sam cleared his throat. “I need to speak to you all,” he said, head held high. “I am looking for work.”
Alfie’s eyes glinted. “Really?” he drawled. “What makes you think that we would be interested?”
Sam restrained himself. “Not that kind of work,” he snapped. “Real work.”
“And I repeat, what makes you think that we would be interested?”
Outrageous arse.
Gareth shushed him and Sam felt slightly mollified when Charlie and Harry bade him continue and pay Alfie no heed.
“I want to build some sort of a life with your cousin, but, at the moment, I have nothing to offer him.” He pulled in a breath and stuck out his chin. “I love him.”
Alfie was standing by the fireplace watching him, unblinking.
“You both have estates. You must have estate managers?” he said to Alfie.
Alfie actually laughed and Sam clenched his fists. “Indeed I do, but, my love, you are a whore, what do you know about estate management?”
It all happened very quickly, and then, Sam was nursing bruised knuckles, and Alfie was wagging his jaw and blinking rapidly. The others were talking loudly. Sam shook his hand and wondered if he had broken something, the pain was so intense. “Sorry,” he mumbled, “shouldn’t have done that but…” He shook his head and turned to leave, but Harry and Charlie stood with him and stopped him.
“I think that the boy deserves to be heard,” Charlie said. Sam smiled at him. Charlie was a good man.
Alfie sighed and straightened his coat. “Sam, you have my most heartfelt apology. Sometimes I simply cannot help myself, and you do make it so damnably easy…oof!” Gareth’s elbow connected nicely with his ribs, winding him a little.
Sam bristled, but restrained himself.
Alfie coughed and pouted a little at Gareth, but then turned back to him, and this time is usually taunting eyes were serious, and his customary bored drawl was missing.
“If you would hear me out, I do actually have had something of an idea that might be of interest to you.”
* * * *
“You have a guest, my lord.” Tristan frowned as he handed over his hat and coat to the footman, who had waited for his late return. Who on earth would be calling at this hour? He headed for the library and opened the door to find Sam standing by the fireplace. Tall, manly, and handsome. His heart stopped for a moment and then flung itself against his ribs like a crazed bird. He wondered if he would ever be able to look at him without
that happening. Somehow he doubted it.
“Sam.” It was all he could say. He turned and closed the door behind him and tried to breathe.
“Two things,” Sam said, and paced a little. Tristan could tell he was anxious so he just nodded.
“First. I…I have a proposition for you. I cannot claim credit for it, I had some help, but I think if you will listen you will see that, as an idea, it has merit.”
Tristan swallowed and stared. “I am listening.”
“You have an estate. Not your principal seat, but a small estate not far out of the city. Alfie told me that it is in need of repair and that you were considering selling it.”
Tristan thought for a moment. “Havering? The old abbey?”
“The very one. Alfie tells me that it is in a state of disrepair and in sore need of attention. That the tenant farmers need more from you than they are getting, and…well…and it might need a young, strong steward to manage it, and a team of people to restore it to its former glory.” Sam cleared his throat. “It would also be an excellent home for your newly discovered wards.”
Tristan’s breath caught. “Wards?”
Sam nodded. “Wards. Ollie, Arthur, and Winifred need a home and a family and you did manage to find a branch of the family that was vague enough that we could claim the children sprang from it. You would be their guardian, and we would need a nanny and a housekeeper along with a tutor….”
His heart was thumping. Sheer genius. “Iris, Clara, and Gareth?”
“Yes. And maybe some others from Dante’s. They will need work, and some of them want good, decent work. And the children. There will be more children.”
Tristan was warming to the idea. “Why would I remove them to Havering and not take them to the Park?” Tristan thought of the Earl of Chiltern’s vast principal seat in Surrey with a shudder. He had hated being there as a child.
“Because they need a home of their own, somewhere quiet and not so publicly associated with you. Somewhere that you might eventually bequeath to them? Alfie said it was free of entail?”
“And…I would need to spend a lot of time there?”