The Price of Temptation

by M. J. Pearson

  “Over here!” The voice belonged to Charles. They followed him to the hallway with the locked doors, and the stairway that led down to the dungeons.

  “Cosgrove is here,” Rebecca said, whooping for breath. “But we have the key.”

  “He’s here? With Jamie?” Stephen turned and hurtled toward the stairs.

  “Wait!” Charles called softly. “We should plan this—he could have a pistol.”

  “Then he can bloody well shoot me.”

  There were seven of them crowded around the door in the dim stone corridor: Sam, Charles, Abby, Maisie, Rebecca, Mr. Symmons, and Stephen. With shaking fingers, Stephen extended the key to the lock, only to snatch it back when he heard a noise from one of the other staircases. The torches on the wall flickered in the air disturbed by someone’s approach.

  They stared at each other mutely. So many of them. Where could they hide?

  “Get the door open,” Sam said, retrieving his rolling pin from where he’d stashed it in the small of his back. “If there’s trouble, we’ll deal with it.”

  Stephen turned back to the door.

  “Lady Matilda?” someone said.

  He dropped the key.

  “Nice little army you’ve got here,” Aunt Matilda said. “And thank God for it—not that my cane isn’t a handy weapon. No, don’t bother with the key, that’s the wrong door. You want Number Three.”

  Mr. Symmons looked stricken. “It was a three, after all?”

  “Yes. We had a nice talk with the fellow that brought your Jamie here, and he delivered him to Three a few hours back. But there should be time—Cosgrove isn’t expected until—”

  “Cosgrove is here,” Stephen said, his eyes full of misery. “And we don’t have the key to that door.”

  “Maisie—are they interchangeable?” Charles asked. “One fitting another door?”

  She shook her head. “Not supposed to be. But we can give it a try.”

  Stephen grabbed the key from the floor and hurried over to Number Three. He eased it into the lock, wary of warning the inhabitants of the room inside. Some of the dungeons open into the river… He shivered at the thought of Cosgrove goading into disposing of Jamie at the first sign of trouble. The key wouldn’t turn.

  “We need the other key. Maisie!”

  “I’ll try.” She turned and ran for the servants’ stairs, the most direct way back to the kitchens.

  In the meantime, Mr. Hammond stepped up. “If any of you ladies have hairpins or broaches, I’ll try to pick the lock. It’s big and solid, but probably not too complex.”

  With trembling fingers, Rebecca pulled some pins from her hair and handed them over. “Hurry!” she urged, as he bent to the task. “Jamie could be...”

  They all knew what Jamie could be, and there was breathless silence as they watched Mr. Hammond at the lock. After a moment Abby Sawtell stepped forward and loomed over him, examining the door, running her large, capable hands around the frame.

  Hammond looked up. “Please don’t block my light. As I said, this is a good lock, and—”

  “Good lock,” Abby agreed. “Good door.” Her hands reached a spongy spot of wood on the doorframe, and she reached out and toppled Mr. Hammond out of her way. “Bad jamb.” Her long, booted leg came up, aiming squarely for the center of the door.

  “Don’t. Touch. Me.” Jamie welcomed the rage he felt as Julian approached him, so godlike of form and animalistic of mind. It took his mind off the fear of what was still to come, if he couldn’t find some way of getting through to Cosgrove.

  “You’re not exactly in a position to make demands, are you?” The green eyes glittered. “Poor little Jamie.”

  Cosgrove stirred. “Get on with it, Jeffries, or I swear I’ll chain you up next.”

  The actor complied, pitting his long years worth of sexual skill against Jamie’s resistance to allow this monster the satisfaction of wringing a response out of him. Jamie’s mindset was such that at first he thought the crash of the door was that of his world coming to pieces about him, as Julian’s wretched attentions began to have their effect. He opened his eyes to find the cause quite different, as person after person tumbled into the room in a cacophony of sound, including, incredibly, Stephen’s Aunt Matilda. Julian rose from his knees, swearing, looking for another way out of the dungeon. But Jamie’s rescuers blocked the door.

  “Julian!” It was Stephen’s shout, shocked.

  “Let me.” A figure he thought was Sam dashed forward, waving something club-like. Julian, raised in the worst parts of London, fought back like a cornered cur, snarling and clawing at anyone within reach.

  “Stephen! Hammond!” Matilda called to her nephew and another man Jamie didn’t know. “Don’t let Cosgrove get away!”

  Away? How? Jamie turned his head, for the first time noting the presence of a second door, barely visible in the wall further down from where he was chained. Cosgrove had nearly reached it by the time Stephen tackled him, Aunt Matilda’s companion just behind. There were grunts, and the thwack of fists on flesh. A sharp cry, from the man Matilda had called Hammond. “Damn it! He has a knife!”

  Hammond clutched at his thigh and fell back, knocking into Stephen. Cosgrove reached the door, and Jamie heard the rush of water as the merchant opened it and was gone.

  And then Stephen reached him at last, stripping off his coat and wrapping around Jamie’s naked body, tears of anger and relief in his dark brown eyes. “Jamie. Oh God, Jamie.” Stephen turned to the room behind him. “I need the key to these chains!”

  “Here, my lord.” Hammond limped forward, with what looked like hairpins in his hands. “Let me.”

  It took just a few seconds for him to release the manacles, and Jamie stumbled to the floor, dragging Stephen with him. There was another cry, and a third body toppled into them. It was Julian, stone-cold unconscious. Jamie looked up to see Sam standing over him with a rolling pin and a look of satisfaction on his face. Aunt Matilda came into view. She stared down at the actor’s naked form, prodding him about the crotch with her cane.

  “Hmph,” she said. “So that’s why you kept him for so long. But you know,” and a smile lit her up from the inside, “I should think this about takes care of that exclusivity clause.”

  Stephen pulled them both to their feet, unable to resist a small kick into Julian’s ribs. “We should chain him up to the wall and see how he likes it.”

  “Not a bad idea,” Charles said, eyes narrowing in distaste. “The staff won’t come down here until the week’s up. That’s not long enough for the bastard to die of hunger, is it?”

  Jamie, one arm wrapped around Stephen and the other holding the coat in place around him, stared down at the man who had wanted him dead. “Probably not—he’s healthy enough.”

  Rebecca, cuddled against her Chris, sighed. “Yes, but Cosgrove might decide to come back, and if he finds Julian there...”

  “What do we care?” Stephen’s voice was raw. “Let him tear him to pieces, the way—the way he—” He buried his face against Jamie’s hair.

  Just then, someone else rushed into the room. “I’ve got the key! Oh.” The person was too far away to make out, but the voice belonged to Maisie. She looked around. “Where’s Cosgrove? Where’s the bastard that killed my Laurie?”

  There was obviously more to this story than Jamie could figure out just now, but he did have the answer to this one. “He’s gone, and I don’t expect he’ll be back.” He looked down at Julian, on the floor, and made a decision. “But Julian doesn’t know that. Chain him to the block, not the wall, and let him spend the night thinking that Cosgrove might come back for him, or that he’ll be lying there, alone in the dark for an entire week. But we’ll tell someone here to let him out in the morning.”

  “If you say so,” Stephen said, and Jamie held Stephen’s face in his hands.

  “We’re not animals, Stephen.” He watched as his beloved’s eyes slowly cleared of madness.

  “No. We’re not. There is a
chance, though, however small, that Cosgrove might come back before Julian is released. You understand that?”

  Jamie shrugged his aching shoulders, and found that there was still a remaining spot of coldness in his soul. Perhaps it was permanent, and if so, that would be a pity. “There’s always a certain amount of uncertainty in life, isn’t there?” He reached for the actor’s discarded clothing. “Give me a second to put these on, and then let’s get out of here.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  What do you do once you’ve been snatched from the very jaws of mutilation and death? Why, you have some tea, of course, and then go to bed. Jamie allowed his friends to fuss over him and replay their roles in his rescue for exactly the space of one cup, then held his hands mutely out to Stephen to be rescued again.

  “I’m hoping…will you come upstairs with me?” Stephen asked once they reached the quiet of the hall, the noise and laughter in the kitchen muted by the thick door. He had seemed uncharacteristically shy and uncertain to Jamie since they’d returned to St. Joseph House, perhaps because there was still so much to talk about.

  Jamie nodded now, and let Stephen take his arm and lead him up to the Earl’s suite. His dimple appeared at the first sight of the Egyptian décor. “Goodness,” he said, touching one finger to a lamp in the shape of the Sphinx. “If I move in here, we might need to redecorate.”

  Stephen wrapped his arms around Jamie from behind, resting his cheek on the top of Jamie’s head. “If?”

  “I did leave for a reason, you know.”

  A sigh stirred his hair. “It was a mistake, a misunderstanding. I wasn’t trying to pay you with that Book of Hours. I swear I thought the package contained the book of poetry you wanted.”

  “Oh.” Jamie squeezed his eyes closed, thinking about the last weeks of misery. “It hurt so badly, Stephen. My mother...”

  “I know. Aunt Matilda told me. I was a fool to try to buy you, but I didn’t know about your mother then. And I wanted to spoil you. God help me, I still do. Jamie.” Stephen swallowed. “I love you.”

  But Jamie was tired, and his arms hurt from the chains, and it wasn’t enough. Not yet. “So I heard,” he said, turning to look up at Stephen, “although I could have found out under more favorable circumstances. But what I need to know is, what does that mean to you? A wardrobe allowance and the house on Floral Street?”

  “No! I need you here with me, Jamie. Please. Will you stay with me? Will you share my life?” Stephen’s eyes were huge and dark. “I need you. You…you’re the only person who’s ever expected anything from me, and I’m—I’m trying to live up to it. I’m trying to be a better man, and a better master, and—”

  “You fraternize with the servants something dreadful,” Jamie said, dimple flickering.

  “Well, don’t expect that to stop anytime soon. Especially with regards to you.” His brows flew up. “Unless you don’t think you should resume working for me? I mean, if we’re going to be together.”

  “Of course I will. I don’t care whether you call me your secretary, or your steward, or your family historian, as long as the boundaries are clearly drawn between what you’re paying me for and what you’re not. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.” But Stephen’s lower lip jutted out. “And you will understand that if I supply you with new clothing, or treat you to a new book, that I am not putting a price on your affection. Clear?”

  “I won’t take—”

  “Mouse. What’s mine is yours. We can’t build a life together unless that is true.” He held the other man’s eyes steadily, until Jamie finally nodded agreement, then let out a sigh of relief. Besides,” Stephen smiled crookedly, “what’s mine won’t even be mine until you get me out of debt. And now that I appreciate how much work that is, I’m going to do everything I can to help.”

  “Then I think that’s all I need.”

  “Shall we go to bed, then?”

  Jamie had been worried that the degradation of the dungeon would kill desire for some time to come, but looking into Stephen’s eyes, warm with longing, he felt passion kindle within him. “Yes,” he said. “I need that. I need you to touch me.”

  Oh, it was different this time. Jamie had always found Stephen’s kisses exciting, but the confusion they used to cause was gone, along with the hesitation, the fear. In the security that there would be a tomorrow, and a next day, and by God, if he could help it a next year and a next decade, Jamie relaxed into his lover’s arms. Within a very few minutes he was able to compare the very real desire he was feeling for the man he loved, with the shameful, purely physical reaction Julian had forced upon him earlier, and the sickening humiliation of that moment was gone.

  Jamie moaned, in relief as much as pleasure, encouraging Stephen to begin unbuttoning his—Julian’s—shirt. He’d almost forgotten he was wearing the actor’s clothes. Well, they could burn those tomorrow, too. He helped shrug himself out of them, then reached to undress Stephen.

  “Mouse—are we going too fast? Is this—?”

  Jamie rolled atop him, kissing him soundly. “This is exactly what I need.” And slowly, he coaxed Stephen into forgetting to be careful, touching him with a new-found confidence born of his exile in the harsh streets of London. He knew what he wanted, and he knew how easily it could be lost, or taken from him. But by God, he also knew that he would fight for it to the last breath in his body, with a strength he’d never dreamed he possessed.

  And he also realized that he had forgotten to say it. “Stephen. Oh, God.” Jamie had chosen a bad time for speech. His lover had slicked himself with saliva, and was now entering him, and the raw pleasure of their joining was making it hard to think, much less form words. Jamie had lived so much of his life in his head, considering himself a creature of intellect. Tonight, after having tasted primal terror, and hatred, and the will to survive, he was all emotions. Now, he shared the passion for life, taking and giving without thought, without reason.

  What was it he had wanted to say? They were moving together in a fierce rhythm, Stephen driving into him with long, powerful thrusts. Mine. Or perhaps yours. Jamie cried out, coming, the force of his release dislodging the words at last. “I love you, Stephen!” It was half-sob, half-laugh, all joy. “I love you.”

  And Stephen was crying out, too, his body taut and trembling for a long moment before collapsing on Jamie. And then there was peace, and warmth, and the crackle of the fire. And Jamie was home, at last.