Clockwork Heart: Clockwork Love, Book 1

by Heidi Cullinan

  “I want to fuck you. You wicked man who licks my ass. I want to fuck yours.”

  Yes. But not yet. “Open me. Dip your fingers in the grease beside the bed, and open me.” He watched as Johann reached for the tin, then gave in to request what he craved the most. “No. Use your other hand.”

  He loved how Johann’s gaze darkened as he raised his clockwork hand. “You want this inside you?”

  Oh, yes, Conny wanted that, all of it, but he had to study a lot more about clockwork before he could engineer a hand for that task. Though it occurred to him he could give Johann a narrower, less articulated hand, or an entirely different appendage, just for lovemaking…

  Swallowing a whimper, Conny nodded at the tin. “First one finger, then two, if you like. Coat them in the grease. Then yes. Put your clockwork inside me, Johann. Fuck me with it.”

  He worried Johann would hesitate, fussing about hurting him, but God bless, this time he eagerly complied with the order. When Johann’s clockwork index finger slipped inside, Conny gasped and arched, partly from the thrill of knowing what this was inside him, mostly because the little knobs and articulations of the metal digit felt so very intense against his most sensitive space.

  “Du bist ein perverser Mann.” Johann’s roughly stubbled cheek rubbed against Conny’s knee as he thrust. “I don’t know it in French or English. Wicked. Naughty. Twisted desires.”

  Conny tried to laugh, but he could only moan. “Un pervers. Je suis un pervers. I am perverted. And I am, darling.” He forced his eyes open, though he could only manage halfway. “Are you sorry I’ve corrupted you?”

  “Non.” Johann kissed Conny’s knee as he thrust a second finger alongside the first. But when Conny’s cries became too much for him, Johann withdrew his fingers and replaced them with his cock.

  They came together with sudden fever, with enough noise anyone in the hall or, to be honest, a nearby room, would have no doubt two men were fucking nearby. When they were finished, they collapsed into the mattress together, Johann rolling off of Conny as if all his clockwork parts had turned to lead.

  Johann nuzzled Conny’s hair, and when Conny met him for a weary kiss, he found Johann gazing at him with heavy-lidded tenderness. For several moments they only gazed at one another, Johann looking as if he wanted very much to say something meaningful. But as if he’d lost his courage, he let out a sad sigh and lightly kissed Cornelius’s lips.

  “I would stay with you, always,” he said in timid French.

  Conny’s heart melted, and he kissed Johann back. “I want that too.” He traced a gentle touch down Johann’s cheek. “And I think it’s well past time I learned some German. More than the odd word and phrase.”

  Johann smiled a little shyly, but a little wickedly too. “I will teach you the dirty things first.”

  “Naturally.” Conny ran his thumb over Johann’s lips, gathered his courage and let his heart lead him. “Perhaps teach me some tender things too?”

  Oh, risk was worth it and the moon, for the way it made Johann melt and capture Conny’s fingers and press a long, lingering kiss against them. “Yes. The tender things too.”

  * * * * *

  To his surprise, Johann did nap, though not terribly long. He woke with afternoon sun streaming onto his face and with Cornelius wrapped around his body. Johann would have lingered in bed, enjoying the decadent feeling of lying on a soft mattress in the sunshine with his lover close by, but he had to piss, and he reluctantly rose to find a chamber pot. Cornelius moaned softly, rolled into the place where Johann had been and continued sleeping.

  There was no chamber pot, though Johann did find a water closet in the hallway, a fancier one than the one in Cornelius’s apartment. Since he was up and dressed, he wandered the hallways instead of returning to his room, wondering if he could find the others.

  A distant, familiar whirring of a tinker-enhanced aether engine lured Johann down the stairs and out a side door just in time to watch The Brass Farthing land on the grounds near a large shed. Crawley and the others were there—to Johann’s surprise, Valentin was present, helping Olivia set the moorings.

  She waved a greeting as Johann approached. “Ahoy, sailor. All rested from your nap?”

  Johann ignored the sniggers this comment elicited and nodded at the Farthing. “Are we settling in, then?”

  Heng emerged from the gondola with a shrug, wiping grease from his hands. “We could use the chance to better outfit the ship, and Crawley has it in mind to make some Italian contacts. Besides, we figured the tinkers wanted to play with you a bit.” He gestured vaguely at Johann’s chest.

  While Heng’s remark was likely true, Johann wasn’t certain he wanted anyone but Conny seeing to his clockwork. He kept that to himself, however, squinting into the afternoon sun as he pondered how to best address the other issue on his mind.

  “Do you think it’s safe to stay here long?” The three of them stood near a crumbling stone wall off to the side. Olivia sat on it, Heng leaned on it, and Johann paced idly back and forth in front of it as he continued. “There’s no way they aren’t looking for us. Possibly both armies.”

  Heng sighed. “I admit, I was dismayed to hear Félix’s association with this Italian tinker is long established. They’ll certainly look here eventually.”

  “We’re repainting the Farthing, and we have a few false names and identification numbers ready for the hull. This and the new decorations from Calais will help change our look. Though if we sold a bit of scrap, we could plate her and alter her look radically. Though of course that would take even more time.” Olivia indicated the main house with a grim nod. “I’ll be frank. I’m not sure if I trust this Rodrigo.”

  Johann wasn’t sure he did either, but he could admit some of that was he thought he’d caught the tinker eyeing Conny with more than professional admiration. “If we’re truly on the run from the armies, where do we go?”

  “I wouldn’t object to Morocco.” Heng scratched the back of his head and waggled his eyebrows at Olivia. “I think you might like it quite a bit. A few places I know of, at the very least.”

  Olivia waved him idly away with a quiet smile. “I say we focus on smuggling in Germany and east Austria. We’re faster now, and Cornelius can help us rig the ship for more cargo. There’s no point in hiding out. I came on this ship to make my fortune, and we’re better positioned to do this than we’ve ever been. Let’s not waste the opportunity.”

  Johann liked this idea, but he worried wherever they hid, the armies would find them. “Perhaps you should convince Crawley to break our contracts. If Conny and I were on our own, we could move more quickly, and it would take the heat off the Farthing crew.”

  “You think Frenchie would let you leave him behind?” Heng put his hands behind his head and stared across the grounds to a grove of olive trees. “You’ll be too easy pickings on land, and you’re better with a team. What if your ticker clunks again? You’d die in his arms, and then what? Besides, Crawley won’t ever hear of it.”

  The statement made Johann feel both comforted and uneasy. “I don’t know why he’s so determined to help.”

  Heng lowered his arms and gave Johann an incredulous look. “You’re serious when you say that, aren’t you?” He swore in Chinese, shaking his head as he turned to face Johann with hands on his hips. “It nearly killed him to leave you behind that night we lost you, and it did cost him his ship. He tried to play it in his head that you ran off, but to find out you ended up back in the army and in pieces on a tinker’s table has undone him. He doesn’t abandon crew, but he did you. He didn’t want to put you back under contract because he didn’t want to face that, but now that he has your ink? He’s going to spend the rest of your charter proving himself. So stop trying to give him an out he doesn’t want.”

  Johann had no idea what to say to all that, and as Molly called the quartermaster over, Johann stared after
Heng, blinking.

  Olivia patted him on his shoulder with a wry smile. “Come on. You look like someone who needs to be put to work, and I have some jobs for you.”

  This statement was no lie. They’d been sorting and cataloging the spoils from Calais since they left France, and they weren’t even through the half of it. Johann followed Olivia into the crowded hold, where he worked for hours hauling crates, shifting piles and carting barrels of spare parts to the tarpaulin Molly had spread on the grass. As he often did, he lost himself in the work. It dawned on him this was the first time since he’d been separated from the pirates and rediscovered by the army that he’d worked in any kind of peace. He wasn’t angry at Cornelius any longer, wasn’t running from fake soldiers, wasn’t fleeing a town or trying not to let his family see how deeply he felt for his good friend. It felt good to lose himself to his task. To work his muscles, to dampen his shirt with sweat.

  It felt better, though, to watch Cornelius’s gaze darken with sensual approval when he came outside after he finally woke from his riposo. To have that sly smile remind Johann of all the forbidden things they’d done together in bed, and all they would do yet again.

  Perhaps it would be good to stay in Italy for a while.

  Chapter Thirteen

  For the first few days in Naples, Johann and Cornelius did what they could to keep their relationship a secret from their host and his wife. They were careful not to mess the sheets when they had sex, and tried to keep quiet. Since Conny couldn’t help moaning, this meant Johann gagged him during their amorous encounters, and oh, but Conny loved it when Johann fucked him that way. All in all, they thought they were doing a fairly decent job keeping their affair a secret from their hosts.

  Then one day Conny gave himself a tour of the villa and discovered all their discretion had been entirely unnecessary.

  He’d thought he was exiting into a side garden, but he stumbled instead into a kind of bathhouse, and Rodrigo was inside. Through the steam Cornelius could see him, seated on a wooden bench wearing only a towel—or rather, with a towel draped casually over one thigh. The other leg, furry and meaty, was being kneaded by the right hand of a young man, who was naked and kneeling, his head bobbing enthusiastically over the Italian tinker’s cock. Another young man, slightly larger than the kneeling one, sat beside Rodrigo, mewling into Rodrigo’s mouth as the older man roughly pumped his cock and pinched his nipple.

  Cornelius tried to back out quietly the way he’d come, but Rodrigo spotted him. Unconcerned, he stopped twisting the young man’s nipple and waved him in. “Come, join us, Cornelius.” He tugged on the hair of the boy still eagerly sucking his cock. “Aldo. Celio. Date il benvenuto al mio ospite.”

  “Wait.” Cornelius held up his hands and backed farther into the hallway. “Grazie, truly, but I already have a lover.”

  Rodrigo raised an eyebrow. “Sì, your soldier friend, but this is of no consequence. I have a wife, and a mistress. Love of men is for sharing.” He gestured to Cornelius’s crotch. “You cannot tell me you disagree.”

  Under normal circumstances Cornelius would not disagree, this scene being one right out of his personal fantasies, but every instinct told him Johann wouldn’t approve. “Please, Signor Rodrigo—I’m flattered, but I cannot.”

  With a resigned sigh, Rodrigo spoke brusquely to the young men in Italian. As he put his towel back in place around his hips, one man rushed to fetch a box of cigars and the other a bottle of wine and two wooden cups. “Then we will smoke and drink, and you will tell me all about the exquisite clockwork you’ve given your friend.”

  Cornelius hesitated as he accepted a cup of wine. How much of Johann’s history should he reveal? He and Félix had given Johann another, more rigorous checkup in the Farthing’s new surgery, but Rodrigo had not been present. “He had been in the army, and he was gravely injured. His clockwork was necessary for his survival and remains so today.”

  Rodrigo hesitated, then spoke to the young men again. Once they left the room, closing the door behind them, he leaned forward with his elbow on his knee, a glint in his eye. “Tell me about the heart. You put it inside him, yes?” When Cornelius froze, he winked and waved a hand as if Conny were very funny. “Look at you. Such a babe in the woods, for all your mother is the greatest spy in Europe, to say nothing of your master.”

  Cornelius blinked. “Master Félix is a spy?”

  He laughed. “Of course he’s a spy. You think your mother would let you apprentice to any tinker? But we are all spies, practically, anymore.”

  Cornelius sat down heavily, clutching the wine like a lifeline. He couldn’t accept that Master Félix was a spy. Yes, he’d been a contact, but a full-fledged spy? All he ever cared about was his clockwork. Though he’d always had a meeting with someone in Calais. Cornelius had assumed that was for clients.

  Rodrigo must be lying. Trying to lure information out of him.

  Rodrigo must be a spy too.

  The Italian tinker drew a deep toke on the cigar, offering it to Cornelius before resting it on his knee after his refusal. “You don’t have to be shy about the heart to me. My father helped design it.”

  Cornelius sipped his wine instead of answering. “I don’t wish to discuss this further.” Not until I give Félix a stern talking-to.

  Rodrigo sighed, but he didn’t seem particularly upset. “Here you are like your mother. Never wanting to give anything away. Very well. We will simply speak of clockwork in general, then. Let me tell you about the clockwork tibia I set for a dear grandmother the other day.”

  Rodrigo was full of stories about his work, and he lured several out of Cornelius as well, ones that didn’t involve Johann. Cornelius was almost able to forget the man’s wild accusations as he spoke at length about a replacement hand he’d made for a merchant who’d learned the hard way what a Turkish prince would take as punishment for touching things he’d warned the man to leave alone. They discussed techniques, materials, philosophy of design. They drained a bottle of wine and Rodrigo finished the entirety of his cigar before a knock sounded at the door. A female servant called out in Italian, and Rodrigo answered happily, rising. He spoke with her for a moment, then nodded at Conny.

  “I must leave to attend to some business. Feel free to undress and enjoy the baths. If you like, you may bring your lover, or ring for the boys.” He winked. “Though I do hope if you let them entertain you, you allow me to watch.”

  Conny did not ring for the boys or seek out Johann. As soon as Rodrigo left, Conny hunted down Félix and grilled him about Rodrigo’s accusations.

  “Is it true? Are you a spy?”

  Félix sighed and sank back in his chair, gesturing for Conny to take a seat across from him. “Rodrigo has you in a lather, I see. Sit down, and let me settle you.”

  Conny sat stiffly. “So it’s true. You are an agent.”

  “Yes, but you needn’t look so alarmed. I don’t work for your father. I work for your mother. I’m not entirely sure who she’s serving at the moment—I don’t ask. I only do what I can to aid her and protect you.”

  Conny’s head spun. “What is my mother thinking? She told me she was through with this, but you say she’s not just dabbling, she’s in deeper than ever? And what do you mean, you’re protecting me?”

  “Your mother will retire from espionage when she’s dead.” Félix poured some tea from the pot he’d been brewing and gestured to a cupboard for Conny to fetch himself a cup as well. “Frankly, I’m glad for it. Whoever she’s serving, I know it’s with an aim to end this eternal war and return Europe to a more prosperous path. Your father’s war is crippling the continent and England by extension. The Americans have stopped being backwater upstarts and are a force to contend with. Asia is thriving, rich off the smuggling trade. Russia continues to be complicated, but even they will outpace us soon. You’ve seen the difference between Naples and anywhere in Paris, and this is only
the beginning. This war must end. Your father dreams of uniting the continent, but Europe needn’t be ruled as a single empire to be influential.”

  “But how can France be stopped?”

  Félix sipped his tea and shook his head. “There are some, I know, who dream of a neutral trade alliance, a union between individual nations of some sort. I’ve heard there’s a secret union across nations and social classes working to make this a reality. Perhaps that’s who your mother works for. I have my doubts about true prosperity happening for France in my lifetime, but what I long to see is an end to war. I want a rail line from Calais to Messina, to Vienna, Berlin, Madrid. I want to see if the madmen really can dig a rail tunnel beneath the English Channel between Dover and Calais. But none of this will happen if we cannot stop this war.”

  It was a lovely idea, to be sure. “How does the clockwork heart fit into all of this? And did Rodrigo’s father truly help you build it?”

  Félix waved this away with a huff. “Oh, he suggested a few valves and gave me some titanium gears. As for how the heart affects the war—well, you know what your father would love to do with it.”

  “But does he have the capability to turn corpses into soldiers?”

  “I doubt it, but he’d long to learn.” He sighed and ran his gnarled finger along the handle of his teacup. “Such a perfect bit of clockwork. Such art, such possibility. This is all my fault, for not moving it when I knew I needed to, for not destroying it. But I could no sooner dismantle you than it.”

  “Well, I’m quite glad you never managed.” Conny set his tea down, letting all these thoughts swirl in his head. “What will you do now? Why did you come here?”

  “I’ve come to do exactly what I told you. Relax in retirement in a warm climate with my wealthy friend and his luxurious workshop.” He gestured in annoyance to the north. “Your father can play his games. I’m done with them. If he succeeds in conquering Italy, I’ll emigrate to the Americas. They have embraced rail. And some madman has developed a steam-powered carriage. No rail, no horses. Did you know there’s an airship traveling from Lisbon to New York? A huge balloon and the fastest aether engine in the world.”