Indulgence 2: One Glimpse (33 page)

“Perfect skin,” John murmured, placing kisses down Sam’s spine. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I don’t want to be gentle tonight either.”

Yes
. “You’ve been less than gentle before, as I recall. I’m not made of glass.”

John squeezed the muscles at the top of Sam’s back. “Oh, I know.” John’s heat disappeared from Sam’s back, but he could still feel John’s hands on his hips. Moments passed, and Sam was about to look behind him when he felt a soft, openmouthed kiss on his arse. He froze, and when John followed it with a teasing bite, he nearly jumped out of his skin.

“All right?” John whispered, kneading Sam’s cheeks as he kissed him again, this time a few inches closer to his entrance.

“Hm-hm.” Sam closed his eyes. There was no way John was going to do what Sam imagined—no one had ever done that for him—but the ache growing deep inside him begged for it. Then wet heat lapped at his core, and the press of John’s tongue at his entrance sent him tumbling.

“God!” Sam collapsed to his elbows, the angle lifting his arse farther. Another long, hard lick, and Sam pressed back, searching. John gripped Sam’s thighs and drove his tongue inside him, sucking and working his lips as John groaned. Sam felt the vibration in his spine.

“God, John! I didn’t think—ah!” Sam shook his head and chewed the inside of his cheek, trying to keep himself quiet.

John must have realized what Sam was doing, or trying to do, because his deep laugh rumbled against Sam’s skin. “I love it when you try to be quiet.”

“Y-you do?” Sam panted.

“Mm-mm.” John fumbled with something on the mattress beneath him. “Because you aren’t very good at it.”

Sam’s reply caught in his throat when John rubbed his oil-slicked hand over Sam’s cock. John kept stroking him, and when he added his tongue at Sam’s entrance once more, Sam buried his face against his arm and fell to pieces. He moaned, whimpered, begged. He was getting so close. John stroked Sam’s whole length, with that delicious twist just over the head.

“I want to see you spend just like this,” John said, his voice strained. “But I can’t.”

Sam felt the loss of John’s hand and tongue and could have cried but just as quickly felt John’s fingers at this entrance. Sam sucked in a breath. John wasn’t being gentle this time, and Sam loved it.

“I’m not going to last long,” John warned.

Sam felt blunt flesh pressing against the ring of muscle already softened by John’s tongue. He sank into Sam, forcing the breath from his lungs as he was filled. Then John wrapped his arms under Sam’s chest, gripped his shoulders, and slammed into him.

Stars danced before his eyes, and hot pleasure pooled in his groin. “John!”

He froze. “Did I hurt you?”

“Don’t you dare stop now!” Sam extended his arms in front of him, lowering himself until his head grazed the sheets. When John still didn’t move, he whimpered, “Please.”

John drove into Sam again. Clutching his shoulders, John set a hard, punishing rhythm that set sparks dancing in Sam’s vision. John seemed just as lost. He grunted and moaned in turns, flying back and forth between bruising grips and sensual kisses along Sam’s shoulders. Time vanished. Sam feared it would be over too soon, then marveled at how John’s stamina seemed to know no end.

And the words that spilled from him!

“Mine. Fuck! I knew you were mine.” John paused long enough to lift one of his feet onto the mattress, changing his angle, and when he thrust into Sam again, the sparks became a riot of bursting stars.

“There, there! God, John,
please
.” Sam clawed at the mattress in front of him as John worked over that wonderful spot deep inside. He was so hard he hurt. Any moment now, now…

“So good! So…good Samnowlovenow!” The last words crashed together in a groan as John thrust deep into Sam and stilled.

Sam felt the hot spread of seed inside him, but it was John’s words that pushed him over the edge. Tingling spread through his limbs; the arches of his feet grew hot, and a dozen other sensations attacked him until he was lost. He spent on the sheets, the tremors of pleasure racking him as John shifted, wringing every last drop from him.

Sam’s hearing returned; the stars faded away, and he realized he had collapsed on his belly. John lay over him, still inside him, his arms over Sam’s, caressing his wrists. John was kissing him, or rather dragging his lips across Sam’s back as if he could not find the energy to do more.

He called me love.
It was the only thought Sam could manage, over and over, as John rolled to his side and pulled a sheet over them.

* * * *

John shot up from a dead sleep, his heart pounding. A split second of confusion, and then he was sure a sound had woken him. He crouched at the edge of the mattress, instinctively covering Sam as he looked to the front windows. It was still dark as pitch outside, well before dawn.

“What is it?” Sam cried as he too was startled awake.

Three sharp bangs echoed through the house.

“Fucking hell! Is that someone at the door?” John sprang to his feet and grabbed his trousers. Sam followed, stumbling and falling onto the chaise where most of his clothes lay.

“Who the devil knows we’re here?” John demanded, his stomach twisting.

“No one. It must be a mistake.” Sam finished fastening his breeches and pulled his shirt over his head.

“Mistake?” John cursed as another triplet of bangs filled the air.

“It could be some drunkard knocking on the wrong door.” Sam leaned over the chaise to find his shoe. “Or vandals checking to see the house is empty before they break in.”

John practically snarled as he tucked in his shirt and searched for his coat. It was a damn poor state of things when a meeting with trespassers, possibly armed and violent, was the preferred possibility. The worst, of course, would be someone who knew—

“Sir? Sir Samuel?”

They both froze. Then Sam cupped a hand over his mouth, and his wide eyes moved frantically.

“What are you thinking?” John said, growing worried. Growing scared.

“My secretary. He knew about this place. He made the arrangement with the furnishings and the door lock and…” Sam shook his head. “Something must be wrong.”

“Your secretary knew you would be here tonight?” John balked.

“No, of course not.” Sam crossed to John and took one of his hands between his. “Stay here. Don’t let anyone see you. I have to go to the door.”

“The devil!” John imagined a whole series of harms that could come to Sam at the door facing that black alley. But what other choice was there? If anyone saw John, there would be no story they could conjure to justify it. Two gentlemen, hastily dressed, alone in a boarded-up building.

“Sir Samuel? Please, sir, if you are there!” came the voice again.

“Ben?” Sam snapped his gaze toward the stairs.

“Who is Ben?”

“A footman in my house. I’m sure something’s wrong. Please stay out of sight. He’s smart enough to guess something is going on, but he will assume I have a woman here.”

Before John could utter another futile objection, Sam disappeared down the stairs. John pulled on his waistcoat, not bothering to button it, and stopped at the edge of the steps. He hated that this was happening, hated that he had been ripped away from a deep sleep and the heaven of Sam’s arms. The night had been so perfect.

He leaned against the wall, slipping on his shoes as he listened.

There were muffled voices, though Sam’s was the louder of the two. John could only make out a few words here and there, but his attention piqued when he heard Sam order the man to retrieve a cab for him at once. He heard the door close, then Sam coming up again.

His face was gray. John took hold of him and cupped his clammy cheek. “What is it? Tell me.”

“She’s gone,” Sam said in a strangled voice. “She walked out of the party and no one can find her.”

John didn’t bother to ask who Sam talking about. He was sure he knew. “Do you think…?”

“I don’t have to think.” Sam’s voice was shaking now. He met John’s eyes. “It would seem that I wasn’t the only one making
arrangements
these last few days. Flor has run off with Evers, and everyone already knows.”

Chapter Seventeen

Ruined

It always amazed Sam how easy it was for entire reputations to be built on nothing. Sam had never raised a hand or even his voice to a servant in his life, but that did not keep them from scattering the moment he stormed into his sister’s house. Sir Samuel, the hotheaded baronet, had arrived.

The front hall was dark, but light filtered from the cracked door of the drawing room. The butler tried to reach it before Sam but could not before Sam shoved it open and sent a handful of the room’s occupants jumping to their feet. He scowled. He had expected to find Kat alone, but was instead faced with Kat, her paid companion, his Aunt Margaret, and her sour-faced husband.

“Kat? This is hardly the time for callers,” Sam said through his teeth.

“Don’t be absurd, Sam,” she said, her voice shaky. “Aunt Margie is here to help.”

“Help? With what? Does she have Flor stuffed in her reticule?”

“Now see here, lad.” Sir Charles, Aunt Margaret’s hawk-eyed husband pointed at him. “This business affects the whole family. How is it going to reflect on our poor Agnes when every potential suitor will know she’s related to a trollop? We have to distance ourselves as soon as possible. If the right people know soon enough that we have cut connection with that wretched girl, we may keep this from tarnishing the rest of the family.”

Sam’s vision went red. “I think you had better go.”

“Sam!” Kat cried, giving him a speaking look. Aunt Margaret’s opinion had a great deal of clout in the ton, but if Kat thought he would give one inch to that cruel old busybody, she was mistaken.

“Have a care for your family, Samuel,” Aunt Margaret whined, the ostrich feathers in her hair bobbing. “You may have no daughters of your own, but think of Agnes. And what of your other cousins? It will be a fine thing if we are to always hear mention of Fl—that girl from here on out. You know how vicious the ton is. They will see that her shame covers us all.”

Sam stiffened with rage and used his last bit of restraint to keep from throttling the old bird. “I am seeing the viciousness of the ton right now, my dear aunt! You expect me to throw my sister away as if she were trash? God forbid Agnes ever allow her heart to guide her down the wrong path. She may very well find herself on the side of the road with a slapped face and some coins at her feet with you for a mother!”

Aunt Margaret gasped and stumbled back into one of her affected swooning spells. Sir Charles was there to catch her like a dutiful prop.

“So be it. If you wish to ruin your side of the family, I can’t stop you.” Sir Charles glared at Sam as he moved past him; Aunt Margaret seeming to have no trouble moving with him as she rolled her head and moaned. He turned back at the door. “But know this. That girl played out her plot this evening without a care for you or anyone else. You can ask anyone who was there, and they will tell you that she walked right out the front door, pretty as you please, past a dozen guests, and stepped right up into Evers’s carriage. The blackguard even had the nerve to show his face and make greetings like it was a day in the park. Cast her off is what I say!”

“Get. Out.”

Good breeding kept them from slamming the door but did nothing to lessen Aunt Margaret’s wails as they left the house. Sam turned back to his sister, his rage suddenly draining out of him and leaving nothing but exhaustion. He eyed the younger woman who served as Kat’s companion, but she appeared to be making an effort to look interested in some needlework.

“Kat, tell me he was lying. Tell me she didn’t just walk out.”

His sister, who had always played the statue in the storm, covered her mouth with a shaking hand.

“I’m sorry, Sam.” She gasped. “One moment she was going to fetch punch with one of the Donaldson girls, and the next Lady Culfrey was pulling me away and telling me she saw Florence leave in Mr. Evers’s carriage.” She turned in a circle, then fell into a chair.

“Kat. Kat?” He laid a hand on her shoulder.

“All is not lost, though,” she said. “There will be a scandal, yes, and she will have to live in the country for a time while people forget, but she will at least be married. The ton will forgive everything after that.”

Sam paused. “Married?”

She looked up. “Well, he’s taken Florence off to Gretna Green, we have to assume. Lady Culfrey said he was in a traveling carriage, and she saw luggage strapped to the roof.”

In hindsight, Sam could not believe he hadn’t seen this coming. But that was being unfair, surely. Who could have guessed such a turn?

“But why he would do this is beyond me!” Kat threw up her hands. “It is not as if he was a poor match. Why did he not just ask for her hand and wait for a proper wedding?”

Because he’s calling my bluff.
“Because I refused him.”

“What?” Kat stared at him. “Why? His father is an earl, there is not a single member of his family that isn’t received.”

“He doesn’t love her,” Sam said, then cringed.

“Love!” Kat’s pretty face twisted. “Are you mad? You know as well as I what this season was for Florence. She had no expectations of a love match. Why on earth would you do such a thing?”

“It is more than that. He…he is purely mercenary. When I told him that I would not allow Flor to go with him with her dowry, he was livid.”

“You told him you would rescind her dowry!” Kat shrieked, her mouth agape.

“I did it to see his reaction, and he showed it to me. I was right,” he insisted.

“How can you say that when he has taken Florence off to marry
without
a dowry? I think it’s clear that he really loves her. He loves her enough to steal her away when he could not have her in the proper manner.” Her last words were flung as an accusation, and Sam’s heart plummeted.

He wanted to tell her this was nothing more than Evers’s game. Evers was betting that Sam would not go through with leaving his little sister penniless, and in marrying a younger son with no profession and only a bachelor’s allowance, that was precisely what would happen if Sam refused to issue the dowry. He could never do that to Flor, and that bastard Evers knew it.