The Gentleman and the Rogue (19 page)

“'Of course. And research of the mind. What breaks a man?' he asked me. He wanted to know. He wanted to learn what I'd seen.”

“Gawd. What did you say?”

“I think I made a remark like pain could break any living soul. He nodded and told me that was too easy, especially for a medical man. He said, 'I appreciate subtlety.' I remember I laughed, thinking it a joke. He laughed along with me. The man's usually skilled at behaving like a regular person and only makes an occasional slip.”

Jem pushed the plate away. “No wonder your badger went off like a shot.”

“And why we won't. Better to take a little time and get legal custody of Ann if possible. However, I plan to visit Schivvers tomorrow, check on the girl's condition personally and see if maybe I can convince him to give up his rights without getting the courts involved.”

“Sounds like you've thought it out. 'Course, a gent like that wouldn't like his toys being snatched away, so I don't s'pose you'll get too far with him.”

Alan thought the same but didn't answer. Inside, his growing sense of anxiety threatened to explode. He wanted nothing more than to go to the man's house right now, break down the door, march in, and seize the young girl before Schivvers could do vile, contemptible things to her. Perhaps it was already too late. While at first Alan had mostly been invested in Ann Cutler's fate on Badger's behalf, his own sense of duty had soon become involved. He felt a debt to Private Cutler and to all the men who'd been under his command—the ones he'd tried to save, the ones he'd failed.

Jem gave an exaggerated yawn and stretch. “Lot o' riding and walking today. I'm that done in. Guess it's off to bed now.”

“Yes.” The word “bed” sent a shaft of lust stabbing through Alan, straight down to his cock. He was ashamed of his immediate and primitive reaction, as if he were a dog shown a bone and salivating at the mere sight.

He didn't look at Jem as he rose and left the taproom to lead the way upstairs. The bedchamber had been modified by the housekeeping staff in their absence. A small pallet had been prepared on the floor for the master's valet to sleep on. Both men stared at the pallet, at the bed, and then at each other.

Jem smiled. “I can guess which accommodations are mine.” He took off his jacket and boots and plopped down on the thin mattress with its stingy single blanket. “Quite comfy, this. But if you care to roll me for it, I've brought my dice along.”

Alan had shrugged off his own jacket and stood with his arms folded over his chest. Foolish to continue pretending nothing was going to happen in this room tonight.

“Get up off the floor, Jem,” he growled, “and get into bed.”

“Aye, Captain Sir. Your command is my wish.” The man leaped off the pallet and into the bed faster than a hare. He was already unbuttoning his shirt before Alan could sit to take his boots off.

“You need help with those, sir?” Jem just as quickly abandoned the bed to kneel at Alan's feet and wrestle with his footwear. “Your leg must be bloody throbbing and stiff from riding in a carriage for nigh on three days.”

Alan couldn't argue with that. He caught his breath to keep from gasping when Jem finally slid the boot off his heel. He hadn't had this much pain since immediately after the injury, when it had been touch and go whether he'd keep the leg. If Schivvers had had his way, Alan would be walking with a peg today or, more likely, lying under Spanish soil.

Jem helped him undress, easing him out of his stockings, trousers, and linens, while Alan removed his waistcoat and shirt. Alan slid back onto the bed, propping the pillows against the hard wooden headboard, and watched Jem strip off his clothing.

Aware of being watched, the young peacock made a show of it, humming a tune and tantalizing Alan with each bit of flesh he revealed. Slowly his fingers opened buttons, separated hooks from eyes, slid cloth down narrow hips, revealing a scimitar pair of hip bones. The smooth muscles of his chest, the lean sinew of his arms, and the soft down that feathered his lower stomach were attributes displayed like delicacies for Alan's consideration.

To say Alan was aroused was an understatement. He felt as if all the air had been sucked from the room. His body burned as though his fever had returned, and the aching in his cock far outstripped that in his sore leg. He longed to leap from the bed, seize Jem like a predator attacking its prey, and drag him down onto the mattress to ravish him. Or maybe he'd slam him up against the wall and take him there, pumping furiously between peachy globes into that dark, forbidden spot he craved so fiercely.

As he undressed, Jem never took his gaze from Alan's face. His half-lidded eyes burned with promise, and his seductive stripping showed Alan exactly what he could have. When he was finished unveiling his beautiful form, the youth stood with hands resting lightly on his hips, allowing Alan to feast on the sight for a moment. Then he launched his body back onto the bed and burrowed between Alan's legs, reaching for his upright pole.

“Hold, Jem.” Alan grabbed the lad's shoulder. “I want something different tonight.”

Jem cocked a brow. “How do you want me, sir? I'm up for most anything.”

“All taking, no giving isn't fair. Tonight you'll allow me to service you instead. Lie back.” He pressed his hand against that solid, smooth chest and pushed him back.

“Truly? But your leg is paining you tonight. It'd be easier for you to lie still an' let me—”

“Don't argue. I know what I want.”

It felt good to take control after days of giving Jem the upper hand. Every sexual encounter until now had been initiated by the younger man and had revolved around Alan's pleasure. This time, he'd make sure Jem spent first and hard. He wanted to hear the man groan with delight and see his face transported by ecstasy.

In a trice, they flipped positions. Jem lounged against the pillows like a prince, and Alan wedged his big body awkwardly between the other man's sprawled legs. He was not experienced at this, the only incident being with Jem in his study that first night. Had it only been a few weeks ago? It seemed much longer. The gutter youth was such an incontrovertible fixture in his life now.

Alan glanced up at Jem's face, those heaven blue eyes darkened by lust and fixed on him with avid intensity, moist lips slack. He took hold of Jem's solid penis and glided his hand slowly from base to tip and back again. The foreskin rolled forward then back, revealing the rounded tip already creaming a drop of white.

Alan took a page from Jem's book and made him wait for what he wanted. He leaned to kiss his lightly haired thighs, first one then the other. He lapped delicately with his tongue along his inner thighs, over his hips, and up to his twitching belly, mapping a reconnaissance mission around the target.

Again he flicked a glance at Jem's face. “Do you want more?”

“Don't mind if I do.” His voice cracked, and he swallowed.

“Then ask for it. I want to hear you.” Alan too had to swallow before he could say the erotically charged word “beg.”

“Please, sir. Will you suck me big, fat cock? I'm simply aching for it. I want you to wrap your hot, sweet mouth around me, if you please, sir.”

Even playing submissive, somehow Jem held all the cards. His inflaming words made Alan's rigid cock even harder. He thrust against the bedsheets to relieve the pressure, then lowered his head and took the tip of Jem's cock into his mouth. The loose foreskin moved back, and Alan rolled his tongue over the round head, tasting salt and musk, the essence of Jem.

He swallowed deeper, engulfing more of the long shaft as he grasped the base in his hand and moved his fist up and down. The movement of his hand was well familiar. How many times had he abused his own member that way in the long years of his life? But the sucking was a different matter. It was a strange yet extremely arousing thing to take a man's cock in his mouth. He hoped he was doing it right, thought about how he liked it, and tried to duplicate the moves Jem had performed on him.

Jem seemed to be pleased with what Alan was doing, because it didn't take much pumping or many hard sucks for him to bring Jem to the edge of release. Alan could tell by the increasing raggedness of the other man's breath and the way his hips thrust faster and faster.

He wanted to do something more, something daring, something that would jolt Jem over the edge with a start of surprise. Alan cupped the tight sac of his balls for a moment, then slipped his finger back along the strip of skin that led to Jem's rear opening. He teased his finger around the opening and then, just as Jem was gasping and groaning, he stabbed it inside. The abrupt intrusion sent the man over the wall. He cried out and bucked. If Alan hadn't had both hands busy, he'd have reached up and clapped one over Jem's mouth. The inn's walls weren't built to hold back sound, and he didn't want those in the next room guessing at the intimate relationship between master and servant.

But Jem seemed to gauge this for himself. He flung one forearm over his mouth and muffled his groans of pleasure while he continued to thrust his hips. Alan kept him in a firm grip, milking his cock with rough jerks of his fist and swallowing the creamy emission that jetted onto the back of his tongue.

When Jem at last lay still, Alan released his penis and wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. He remained there another few moments, stroking Jem's quivering leg and gazing at his enraptured face, so entrancingly beautiful he could stare at it for hours. But his leg was hurting and his cock craving release, so Alan crawled up to lie beside Jem and slung his arm across his body.

Jem's eyes flickered open and focused on him. The firelight from the hearth made them glitter like sapphires. “That was lovely, sir. Thank you very much.” He glanced down at Alan's massive erection poking into his hip. “But I imagine you'll be craving some relief of your own now. Am I right?”

He slid out from beneath Alan's arm, went to his valise, and returned with the bottle of oil usually kept in Alan's bedside table. “I had hopes we'd make use of this sometime along the road, so I packed it.”

Alan smiled. “Good foresight. You'd make an excellent supply sergeant for the army.”

“Aye, I could make sure the wheels was greased—and the poles.” Jem poured a puddle of oil onto his hand and massaged Alan's cock until it was all Alan could do to hold back.

Alan grabbed his wrist to stop him. “Enough, lad. I'm more than ready.”

“Then prepare me, Master.” Jem drawled the title so that “master” took on an entirely different connotation that made Alan grit his teeth with desire. The scamp rolled to his side and offered his rear.

Slipping well-lubricated fingers over the taut cheeks and between them, Alan admired the view of shining, oiled skin. He located Jem's tight sphincter and pressed a finger into the ring of muscle. He added another, stretching and widening the passage, and when it could encompass three fingers, he replaced them with the head of his cock.

A grunt and a push, and he was inside, driving up the tight channel. The heat and closeness surrounding him was heavenly—and Jem was an angel. Alan kissed his shoulder and clasped his body tight as he impaled him deeply.

The other man's flesh burned his. Sweat pooled between them as their bodies pushed against one another, struggling like fighters, merging like lovers. Jem's scent was in Alan's nose, his taste in his mouth—the young man filled his senses even as Alan filled him. This union, this joy, was what he'd craved for so long. The act transcended animal sex and became something else, something approaching bliss.

One. Two. Three more hard thrusts, three more clashes of body to body, and Alan released with a shudder. He moaned into Jem's shoulder, bit down on the delicate skin where shoulder met neck.

“Gawd, sir. Right there! Fuck me just like that.”

If Alan hadn't already been in the midst of spending, Jem's hoarse voice and coarse words would have driven him there. As it was, they added an extra boost. He thrust hard once more, then shook as wave after wave of pleasure crashed through him.

When it was over, he continued to lay there, his body wrapped around Jem's, his dick buried deep. They were one being at this moment, and he wanted to remain that way for as long as possible. He didn't want to disengage and break the bond they'd forged together.

But then his growing bond with Jem was about much more than their two bodies locked together. Somehow, in a very short space of time, Jem had managed to work his way into Alan's heart. He couldn't be dislodged; he was like a soldier who'd dug into a trench and refused to surrender ground.

“That was right special,” Jem murmured, and for once there wasn't a trace of teasing in his voice. He stroked his hand lightly over Alan's arm, which was wrapped around his chest.

“You've undone me, Jem.” Alan kissed the spot where he'd bitten the crook of his neck. “You've tricked me, like one of those goblins or leprechauns in your stories.”

“Tricked you how, sir?”

“Made me lose my senses. Made me forget reason whenever I'm with you.”
No good can come of it, yet I don't even care
. “You've cast a spell over me,” he finished.

“Speaking of spells, did I ever tell you about my friend Albert, who—”

Alan covered Jem's mouth before he could go on. “Hush, Jem. No stories right now. Let's just rest here awhile.”

He took his hand away, and Jem remained silent. His chest rose and fell with his breathing beneath Alan's arm. A log on the fire fell, sending a shower of sparks crackling up the chimney.

Alan breathed in. And out. His eyes closed.

Chapter Twelve

When Alan opened his eyes, weak sunlight shone through the small, smeary window. He lay flat on his back, his hurt leg stiff as a board. Jem was curled against his side, face burrowed into Alan's shoulder, one slack hand resting on Alan's belly near his flaccid cock. The droopy thing twitched and began to stiffen just from the proximity of Jem's fingers.

They should get up before some servant arrived to poke up the fire for the morning. True, Alan had locked the door, but no sense in taking a chance.