by Cooper Davis
Marcus’s freckled face turned a russet color that rivaled his hair. “Come now,” Alistair rumbled, extending a hand. “You’ve not a shy bone in your rangy body. You pursued me across Lady Elsevier’s ballroom and right onto that bloody mounting block outside. Why hold yourself in check now?”
“I don’t have nearly the experience you’ve imagined me owning.” Blue-green eyes lifted, pinning Alistair, arresting him. “It’s not easy for a duke’s son with my inclinations. And you’re. . . .”
“Older?” Alistair offered.
“Powerful.” Marcus breathed out the word. “Intimidating. And the king’s closest confidant, plus let’s not forget, most of all, the object of my two-year fascination. Of course I’m shy, alone with you now in the royal carriage,” Marcus cried. “I was shy all along, else I’d have approached you two seasons ago. I forcefully gathered my nerve, ’twas all.”
Marcus stared at his gloved hands, seeming to struggle with a further admission. “My papa threatened—well, intimated—the marriage mart for me if I were not finally willing to press a suit with you this season.” Marcus glanced up, searching Alistair’s face. “I found my bravery as I had no other choice.”
“Because you feared the mart?” Alistair couldn’t help a mild chuckle, even as he battled a sharp flare of possessiveness.
“Oh, no.” Marcus shook his head, his expression fierce. “I did not want to . . . lose my moment. The barest hope of being allowed to court you before my family forced a match upon me next season.”
Alistair’s heart practically stopped. For in that one moment he imagined Marcus, courting and being waltzed about, ball after ball—or at the very least, at Lady Elsevier’s. Picturing his Marcus on the arm of some preening peer, proud to have plucked Marcus from the society coffers.
“I don’t like that image very well.” Alistair swallowed. “A match forced upon you . . .”
“I didn’t, either, but chiefly, I was determined not to let you escape my pursuit.”
Alistair leaned forward in his seat. “Allow me to end our mutual reticence, here and now.” Finley studied him, certain his lust and need were obvious in Alistair’s own eyes. “I’m a bit loosened from our lunchtime indulgences, so let’s act from that motive, shall we?” Alistair patted the open place beside him again, then waggled his fingers, beckoning Marcus toward his own side of the coach.
Marcus nodded, then bent gracefully forward, and made his move across the tight space. He fought the coach’s jostling motion, and in one unbalanced surge practically landed on Alistair’s lap. Without thinking, he grasped Marcus’s hip, guiding him to the seat with what he hoped played as gentlemanly concern. Of course, he burned to maintain hold upon that hip, to stroke it, and the length of leg below it with lingering attention. But, as he truly was a gentleman, even if slightly foxed, Alistair forced himself to let go.
The narrow seat wedged them intimately close, and had it been evening, things between them might well have advanced very quickly. And provocatively. Alistair was just intoxicated enough to cast a glance at the window shade.
Beside him, Marcus drew in a shaky breath, staring directly ahead. “You have me now, Mr. Finley. Whatever do you intend to do with me?”
Alistair leaned closer, nudging Marcus with his shoulder. “Savage your knuckles with my lips and tongue. May I?”
Marcus turned abruptly and at once their faces were mere inches apart. Alistair glanced past him toward the shade again; he wanted to cinch the bloody thing down, enclosing them in privacy. Alistair’s gaze roved to the lord’s rosebud lips. “We are two gentlemen, mature enough for a daring kiss upon a hand, are we not?”
“Aye.”
Marcus bowed his head, and very carefully began to remove one glove. He took so long with it, both hands visibly trembling, that Alistair drew them within his own ungloved ones. “Here, my lord,” he murmured gently, stroking a reassuring thumb over Marcus’s gloved knuckles. “Allow me. Please?”
Marcus swallowed hard, then nodded once.
Cradling Marcus’s right hand first, he realized that a neat row of three buttons fastened the glove at the man’s pulse point. No wonder Marcus had been so addled and unable to dislodge the article. Alistair popped the buttons loose, and drawing the hand to his lips, pressed a chaste kiss right at that pulse point. Then, with his teeth, he drew the kidskin back, exposing warm flesh—and a hand that trembled even harder against his own full lips.
He closed his eyes and drank in the earthy scent of the younger man’s hand, radiating a caress with his own big thumb across the center of the palm as he worked that glove upward and off the man’s fingertips. The glove tumbled loose, landing on Alistair’s boot as he drew Marcus’s palm first to his lips, where he pressed a scalding, attentive kiss to the center of it. Alistair jolted when Marcus slid his thumb between Alistair’s parted lips.
The invitation was delectable, that masculine finger sliding against Alistair’s lower lip with a pressure that called to mind something else entirely. Closing his eyes tightly with a groan, Alistair suckled and worked a pressure on the thumb, aware that he was losing a certain amount of control. And that they were in a carriage.
With a helpless whimper, Alistair allowed that delicious thumb to fall from between his lips, then folded each of Marcus’s fingers inward. As if refastening a dangerous, priceless parcel. “That was . . . enlightening,” he managed tightly, pressing the young man’s hand against his own thigh. Too late, Alistair realized that he had pinioned Marcus’s hand within inches of a risqué, damning bulge he now sported across the front of his trousers. He would have sworn one of Marcus’s eager fingers twitched, as if it were drawn, steel to the magnet of Finley’s own arousal.
Alistair was barely able to breathe, his waistcoat tight and his bloody undergarments even tighter—as if they’d managed to cinch about his perilously erect cock, sending flooding heat to his nether regions.
“I’ve never had a kiss delivered to my person quite like that one,” Marcus said in a voice that Alistair hardly recognized. “I wish you’d not . . .” Marcus closed his eyes, drawing in a tight breath.
Alistair glanced sideways sharply. Had his performance been a disappointment?
Marcus blew out that breath, murmuring, “I wish, Mr. Finley, that you’d not stopped kissing me. I wish—oh, dear heavens above—that you’d sought greater liberties from me.”
“In this day-lit coach?”
“I don’t care who would see.” Marcus’s chest was rising and falling quickly, his pupils dark with arousal, as he gazed up at Alistair.
That one dreamy look was enough to embolden Alistair further. “I should like to endeavor more than simply kissing your wrist, Lord Marcus.”
“You suckled on my thumb, as well.”
Alistair nuzzled Marcus’s jaw, feeling the heat on those flushed cheeks. “I would suckle something much plumper and harder than your thumb, my winsome man.” Bloody hell, but he was more foxed than he’d realized if he’d just murmured that in Marcus Avenleigh’s ear.
Marcus laughed giddily. “Crikey, but my straitlaced secretary is an outrageous flirt and seducer of men. Whoever would have guessed? Actually, I would,” the young lord declared, answering his own question as he bent down to retrieve his glove where it had attached to the instep of Alistair’s boot. Marcus shook it out, then began to wriggle his hand within the blasted article as the carriage made the final turn to the office.
“I would have liked a much longer drive back,” Alistair admitted, neatening his greatcoat circumspectly across his lap. It would not do to descend from the king’s carriage and give the footman an eyeful of prominent arousal. “And to kiss you in earnest, my lord. I might have ventured to lower the carriage’s shades, had we been given ample time today.”
Bright eyes met his own, a bit devouring in their intensity. Adorable in their innocent beauty. Dangerous in their absolute
measure of the moment. “I shall endeavor to arrange that very thing next Thursday,” Marcus told him. “Perhaps next week I shall take you for a drive to the park?”
Alistair stared out the carriage window. “Rain soon,” he said, trying to find his equilibrium. “You’d best be on the road quickly. Perhaps your driver can get ahead of it.” And then, wresting his nerve back anew, he whispered, “Yes, I should favor another outing with you, Lord Marcus. Very much.”
“Marcus.”
Alistair glanced at the lord in surprise. “Pardon?”
“Please call me Marcus—no need for titles, not when we’ve now become acquainted and are perhaps on our way to becoming friends,” Marcus said, his brogue thick. The simple words turned seductive beneath that silken burr.
“Oh, yes, Marcus.” The affirmation all but purred right out of him, and he had to avert his eyes, shyly fingering the brim of his hat. “Quite friends.”
“Perhaps even on our way to becoming more than friends?” Marcus suggested, staring up into Alistair’s eyes.
Alistair inclined his head forward and whispered, “I don’t believe I’ve ever lavished a kiss upon the hand of any male I deemed mere friend, sir. Nor had him tup me with his violin in utterly seductive fashion.”
He could feel the warmth of Marcus’s breath against his cheek, and in reaction, his own fingertips brushed the wool of Avenleigh’s greatcoat. The young man moved nearer, taking hold of Alistair’s own coat, clutching it until the wool parted over Alistair’s thighs. Lord Marcus pressed closer, fingertips grazing over Alistair’s inner thigh, edging scandalously closer to his erect prick.
“My lord . . . not wise.” Alistair swallowed, hard, trying to breathe through the arousal that jolted him the moment Marcus’s fingertips skated so close to his own cock.
“Hmm. I’d say it’s very wise, given what I want.”
“To play with fire.” Alistair sucked in a breath. “You’ll turn me into a wanton. I was certain of it from the first.” The words were tight, almost pained as Alistair murmured them.
“I’m merely making you come alive.”
“Which is playing with fire, if you’ve even considered my nature.”
“No, I’m very wise. And that’s why I shan’t ever desist in my pursuit of you. Not lest you ask me.”
Alistair covered Marcus’s hand on his thigh, squeezing the other man’s fingers. “You’re assuming that I’d ask. That I even could,” he said, opening the carriage door.
And that I’m not too far gone already.
Chapter Eight
Alistair cursed himself an arse. Why had he imagined that storming the royal apartments, somewhat out of his mind, would prove a capital idea? Especially as he subsequently blurted news of the strangely budding courtship with Lord Marcus. It was hardly as if King Arend and Prince Julian—his only real family—would idly absorb such revelations. Julian owned no match when it came to both determination and desire to see Alistair happy. Their friendship, from the start, had been hallmarked by both things. At least, for now, the prince was absent from the royal apartments, even if the news wouldn’t remain secret from him much longer.
Arend? Well, his foster brother had griped for years about Alistair and his loneliness and solitude. At present, said brother was settled back in his chair, looking entirely too pleased with himself.
Alistair was only barely listening as Arend drawled, “I’ve long mentioned that Lady Elsevier’s is a stellar place to find a gentlemanly match.”
Alistair planted both hands on his hips, shaking his head. He’d entered the apartment and first wandered to the balcony, then wandered back in—finding a perplexed expression on Arend’s face. Then finally Alistair had dribbled out the beginning of a confession. “He’s a nobleman’s son,” he’d blurted, without much embroidery as to what he was on about. “I am potently muddled; my mind is a tempest.”
“About what?” Arend’s question trailed after him as, yet again, Alistair wandered back onto the balcony. The briny air whipped at his linen shirtsleeves—he’d not even donned a morning coat before storming into his brother’s domain. The sound of Arend’s bootsteps echoed on the marble balustrade behind him.
Quietly, Alistair wondered aloud, “Why should a duke’s son wish to consort with a gentleman like me?”
“A ‘gentleman like you’?” Arend repeated, coming up behind Alistair. “Whatever’s that meant to imply?”
Alistair shivered in his shirtsleeves, uncaring that he was hardly clothed for such cold, windy conditions. Hopeful the bracing wind would reacquaint him with decent sense. Arend cleared his throat. “Whatever,” his king repeated, “did you mean by a gentleman like you? Alistair?”
“Oh, right.” He’d lost that thread, consumed with thoughts of Marcus and the ocean and the unknown depths. Murk and darkness, gloom and unknown—yet a hint of sunlight arcing the horizon. “You’re aware of what Samuel always calls me? His favorite moniker for this palace foundling?”
“Fin, that doesn’t signify. It’s naught to do with your courtships.”
“My nonexistent ones. I daresay it’s everything, as your cousin is quite right. I am, as he deems me, a large-arsed spinster.”
“You can’t give that any heed. Surely you realize that Sam’s a bit secretly infatuated with you. Always has been, since we were barely more than lads.”
Alistair had to turn and stare. Only the knowing expression on Arend’s face told him that his king wasn’t jesting. “That’s not . . . can’t be possible. He’s in love with Lucy.”
And perhaps Viscount Colchester, as well. On the sly.
“I’m not saying he wishes to hie away with you like purloined pirate booty. But neither is the fellow subtle. You surely trust me on that count.”
Samuel Tollemach was, in fact, the least subtle gentleman Alistair had ever met.
“He’s needled me for years.”
Arend clapped a hand on his arm, squeezing. “He’s fond of you. And jealous as the devil that you’re more my brother than he can ever be.”
Alistair suddenly recalled Samuel’s remarks at Arend and Julian’s recent wedding. After finding Alistair cloistered in the palace library during the ball, he’d admonished Alistair. “Some of us actually like large-arsed spinster types.”
This, after Lord Marcus had sought Alistair’s dance card, unaware that he’d fled the gala.
Alistair bent over the railing, settling his elbows there. Arend moved closer, leaning back against the railing. For long moments, he was aware of his king simply eyeing him, waiting him out.
Alistair finally looked away, gazing out over the ocean’s murky depths. “What in bloody fucking hell am I even thinking?”
Arend laughed, settling into a languid position against the railing. “I suspect,” he said, “you’re not thinking at all. You’re feeling. It’s generally what happens when one falls in love.”
Alistair buried his face in both hands. “How did you manage to muck your way through such torturous madness with Julian?”
Arend covered Alistair’s hand where it rested on the railing. “I think it best you come inside and have a drink with me. Expand on the situation in . . . uh, greater detail.” The words were chosen carefully, and were all the kinder for disregarding the serpentine nature of Alistair’s ramblings. “And allow me to render something you’re clearly in desperate need of. Counsel.”
* * *
* * *
“He’s a duke’s son?” Jules drew his chair closer to the damask loveseat that Alistair sat upon. The prince had walked in only a moment after Arend lured Alistair back into the apartment. Jules’s lovely eyes were dancing with joy and enthrallment.
“I have said too much already.” Alistair glanced toward the sideboard, where Arend was busily pouring him a glass of wine.
“No, you’ve not said nearly enough.” Jules moved his chair even
closer, his golden eyes alight with excitement. “Oh, darling Fin, do spill all pertinent details, won’t you?” Julian rubbed his hands together. “I am sure he must be quite handsome and charming.” One breath and then, “He is, isn’t he?”
“Prince Julian.” Alistair aimed for that tone that Marcus had deemed his “palace” voice. His steely aloof tone, meant to engender complete and total yielding. Unquestioning acquiescence.
“Formal titles won’t allow you to cagily escape. I expect information.” Jules watched Arend press the wineglass into Alistair’s hand, then bobbed his head encouragingly. “Don’t you agree, Arend?”
Arend only laughed, settling down in the chair beside Julian’s. “Leave poor Fin be, my love. He’ll share if he wishes.”
“He won’t say a word.” Julian poked at his husband. “You know that. Push him, won’t you?”
“No, I shan’t,” Arend said gently, reaching out to touch Julian’s cheek tenderly.
Julian dodged the caress with a playfully vexed expression. “Fine. Which duke, then?” Julian leaned forward, elbows on knees, all but crawling out of his chair and planting himself at Alistair’s feet in supplication.
Dear, loving Jules. From the beginning, Alistair had been so enormously fond of the man, and he had quickly become one of Alistair’s most cherished friends.
Julian encouraged him with a warm smile, then turned to Arend. “We must host a house party, darling. Encourage Fin’s suit, at least a little. That’s not pushing, it’s hosting.”
“No, no. No!” Alistair stalked to the far window, feeling the tips of his ears burn with embarrassment. He spun and leaned back against the edge, folding his arms over his chest as he stared the other men down. “Julian, this is not the situation here, not in the slightest. I’m sure I’ve been overzealous in my estimation of the thing.”
“The thing. Really, Alistair. My God.” Arend rumbled a laugh, leaning back in his chair. He reached for Julian’s hand, and they twined their fingers absently. “In my experience, if one is asking questions such as, ‘Whatever could he see in a man like me?’ it’s because he’s found a fine male who might well make an equally fine husband.” Arend lifted Julian’s fingertips to his mouth, and kissed them lightly, but not before delivering a bedroom glance to his prince. “As always, Julian is absolutely right. A house party is a splendid idea.”