A Private Gentleman
Page 29
Marsh studied the photo. “Lovely girls.” He glanced up at Court. “If I forgot to say it last night, I’m dreadfully sorry for your loss. A death in the family is hard enough, but murder…”
“Yes. Thank you.” Court cut him short. “So, will that help? Can you begin now?”
Marsh set the photo on the table beside the candle. He nodded at Court’s teacup. “Could you set that on the side table, please, and then take my hands.”
Court obeyed, removing the cup and hesitating only a moment before grasping the other man’s hands. They were warm and dry and slender in his grip. Long fingers wrapped around the backs of his hands, palm slid over palm, and Court fought back the tingle of excited anticipation that shot through him. His body reacted beyond his control, imagining he was there for some other purpose. He steadied his breathing and concentrated. “Now what?”
Marsh’s lashes shielded his eyes. “We wait,” he murmured.
Is there room for love in a heart full of secrets?
Scrap Metal
© 2012 Harper Fox
One year ago, before Fate took a wrecking ball to his life, Nichol was happily working on his doctorate in linguistics. Now he’s hip deep in sheep, mud and collies. His late brother and mother had been well suited to life on Seacliff Farm. Nichol? Not so much.
As lambing season progresses in the teeth of an icy north wind, the last straw is the intruder Nichol catches in the barn. He says his name is Cam, and he’s on the run from a Glasgow gang. Something about the young man’s tired resignation touches Nichol deeply, and instead of giving him the business end of a shotgun, he offers Cam a blanket and a place to stay.
Somehow, Cam quickly charms his way through Nichol’s defenses and into his heart. Even his grandfather takes to the cheeky city boy, whose hard work and good head for figures help set the farm back on its feet.
As the cold Scottish springtime melts into summer, Nichol finds himself falling in love. When tragedy strikes, Cam’s resolutely held secret is finally revealed and Nichol must face the truth. He’s given his heart away, and it’s time to pay the price.
Warning: Contains explicit M/M sex and the disruption of a quiet Scottish town by a fistfight and some tight designer jeans.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Scrap Metal:
It was almost dark by the time we set off, the only light left in the sky a serpent of rose gold across the sea. Our famed Arran sunsets had been wiped out by rain for so long that I was reluctant to spoil it, but I flicked the quad bike’s beams to full as we left the track and struck out over the fields.
I took it easy in deference to my passenger. It was a long time since Archie had deigned to hell around on a bike with me, but I knew it was a rough ride. The quads were single-seaters technically, one and a half at a stretch—or a crush, more like it. The pillion either hung on to the back of the saddle, or…
I hit a tussock and bounced the bike hard. Cameron gave a startled yelp then burst into wild laughter. I pulled up, grinning too. God, what a sound—unfettered, like a kid’s. “Sorry. You okay?”
“Aye. Nearly went crack over nips into yon bloody bush, but I’m fine.”
“Crack over nips, eh? What a nice Larkhall lad.” I let the engine idle. “I know we’ve barely met and all, but if you hang on to me, you’ll be safer.”
“You don’t mind?”
“Course not.”
He put his arms around me tentatively. I gave his hand an encouraging pat—it was only a business arrangement after all, never sparking the slightest frisson in me when Kenzie was hitching a ride—and he closed his grip.
That was better. We had a lot of ground to cover, and now I could give it some welly. After the first good bump or two, he got the idea and hung on properly. I picked up speed and felt him duck his head against my shoulder to shelter from the wind. “All right back there?”
“Yes. Go faster if you like.”
I chuckled. “Fun, is it?”
“Hell, yeah.”
I closed my fist on the throttle and took off. His grip was powerful. Whatever the reasons for his loss of weight, they hadn’t yet impinged on the essential inner force of him. I could take a lot of his skinny warmth at my back, I decided, gunning the quad up to the last crest before the long slope towards the cliff’s edge and the sea. From there I’d get an idea of the task ahead, how far the flock had scattered, if any looked like they had new lambs at foot. Fill up the bale feeders, see to any casualties, begin the endless round of fence checks…
“God almighty. Stop.”
I braked so hard he nearly went over my shoulder. “What? Did I hit something?”
“No. I just want to see… It’s so beautiful.”
“Jesus.” I snapped off the engine. “You scared me.”
“Sorry. But look at it.”
I was looking. I looked at this landscape every day, through sea frets, rain, or just the mists of my exhaustion. I didn’t need him to tell me it was lovely, on those rare days when it cracked open its casket of jewels.
Or did I? That serpent band of light had found its reflection, its shimmering twin, in the sea. The air between them was on fire, casting the cliffs in bronze, throwing a weird burnished radiance right into the zenith. Ailsa Craig island burned on the horizon, its sugarloaf turned into a pyramid, as if Giza had set sail from its sands and paused here on some unimaginable journey, to Atlantis maybe. Yes, I’d been looking. But I hadn’t seen it in months.
Cam dismounted from the bike and came to stand beside me. “Incredible place,” he said softly. “What’s it called?”
“Just Seacliff, as far as I know—like the family. Seacliff Farm.”
“Seriously? That’s wild. Crazy romantic.”
I stole a glance at him. The transfiguring light had caught him too. If anything deserved to be on the cover of a book…
“Not really,” I said, gruff in proportion with my desire to tell him so. To undo my grip on the quad’s handlebars and reach for him. I did let go with one hand, but only to point at the glittering water then the towering faces of rock that lined the shore. “It’s pretty basic really. Sea. Cliff.” I turned in the saddle and gestured back the way we’d come, where Harry’s windows had taken the sunset, almost as if he’d put on all the lights and kindled a comfortable fire. “Farm.”
“Nichol, did you ever see…?” Cam paused, and I frowned at the unsteady hitch in his voice. I couldn’t have upset him, could I? “Did you ever see a film called Young Frankenstein?”
“Yeah, of course. It’s one of my favourites.”
“Do you remember when Igor’s driving Professor Frankenstein home to the castle, and they hear something howling, and the girl says, ‘Werewolf!’? And Frankenstein says, ‘Werewolf?’, and…”
“And Igor starts pointing and says, ‘There, wolf. There, castle.’ Okay, okay, I get it.” I shook my head, helplessly mirroring his smile. “Fair enough. I don’t know how I got so blind to it all. Or so grumpy about it, for that matter.”
“Are you kidding me? You must have been through hell.”
His voice had changed completely. Now its huskiness was something else—a sympathy that passed like a blade through my hard-won defences. God, and I wasn’t going to have to reach for him—he had put out a hand to me, careful but unafraid. I held very still while he brushed his fingertips across my fringe.
“Were you very lonely?”
Desolate. I hadn’t known till now. I didn’t bloody want to know. If I let that come to surface, he would see it. He was a stranger, a runaway. A criminal, to take the view that Archie Drummond would, an unknown who had broken into my life and would like as not be gone in the morning.
“Sometimes,” I managed. I couldn’t say more. If I opened my mouth again, he would see how badly I wanted him to kiss it.
Oh, God. He saw anyway. A sweet concentration gathered in his eyes. He leaned a little towards me. I heard the wind in the gorse, the whisper of the sea far below us then nothing but the pulse of
my own blood.
A Private Gentleman
Heidi Cullinan
To seal their bond, they must break the ties that bind.
Painfully introverted and rendered nearly mute by a heavy stammer, Lord George Albert Westin rarely ventures any farther than the club or his beloved gardens. When he hears rumors of an exotic new orchid sighted at a local hobbyist’s house, though, he girds himself with opiates and determination to attend a house party, hoping to sneak a peek.
He finds the orchid, yes…but he finds something else even more rare and exquisite: Michael Vallant. Professional sodomite.
Michael climbed out of an adolescent hell as a courtesan’s bastard to become successful and independent-minded, seeing men on his own terms, protected by a powerful friend. He is master of his own world—until Wes. Not only because, for once, the sex is for pleasure and not for profit. They are joined by tendrils of a shameful, unspoken history. The closer his shy, poppy-addicted lover lures him to the light of love, the harder his past works to drag him back into the dark.
There’s only one way out of this tangle. Help Wes face the fears that cripple him—right after Michael finds the courage to reveal the devastating truth that binds them.
Warning: Contains wounded heroes, bibliophilic tendencies, orchid obsessions, a right bastard of a marquis, and gay men who get happily-ever-afters.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
A Private Gentleman
Copyright © 2012 by Heidi Cullinan
ISBN: 978-1-60928-852-5
Edited by Sasha Knight
Cover by Lyn Taylor
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: February 2012
www.samhainpublishing.com
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
About the Author
Also Available from Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
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