The Gentleman and the Rogue (3 page)

Alan glanced at the map he studied every day, the battles marked, the troop movements noted, and then he turned his back on it. “I don't want to talk about that.”

“Fair enough.” Jem nodded. “There's more interesting things to do.”

With that, he slipped his open shirt down his arms and let it drop to the floor. Alan caught his breath. The fading glow of the fire burnished his pale body, turning it golden. The muscles of his shoulders, arms, and chest were delineated by shadows that sculpted him and turned him into a living statue—almost too perfect to be real.

“More?” Jem didn't wait for a reply, but reached for the fly of his trousers. In a trice, he'd kicked off his shoes and stripped off the rest of his clothes.

Alan remained frozen, content to merely gaze at his body for the moment. Soon he'd be touching every bit of that handsome flesh, but anticipation was enough for now.

“Like what you see?” Jem's smile was smug, as if he knew he looked good and wasn't the least ashamed to be nude.

“You going to drink that?” He indicated the glass of brandy which Alan had carried upstairs with him. Jem had left his behind in the study, untouched. Now he crossed the room and took the goblet from Alan's hand to sip the amber liquid. His eyes widened at the taste. “Very nice. Better than gin.”

The understatement startled a laugh from Alan. “Yes, it is.” He accepted the glass back and took a large sip to settle his giddy nerves. Placing the brandy on the mantel, he turned to his naked guest once more.

Jem was about half a head shorter than him, so he had to look up to meet Alan's eyes. The young man studied his face, and for a moment, Alan thought he was going to lean in and kiss him. Instead Jem reached for the buttons on the front of Alan's shirt and began to unfasten them.

Alan stood silent, as compliant as a child being changed by its nursemaid, while the other man removed his shirt. Calloused palms slid over his bare shoulders and stroked his arms. They roamed across his chest, grazing his nipples and making him hiss with pleasure. Jem touched every inch of flesh as it was revealed, first with his hands, then with his mouth. His lips and tongue skated over the icy layer Alan had worn for so long and melted it. Skin tingling, heart pounding, and dark despair abated, Alan felt as energized as he had the minutes prior to combat, but with none of the anxious trepidation. Excitement filled him, and he clenched and released his fists by his sides while he submitted in restive stillness to Jem's exploration.

The young man traced the pale, jagged scar on his biceps with a light touch of his fingertips, then leaned to kiss it. He spent some time examining the larger gash on Alan's side, where a musket ball had taken a chunk of flesh. He carefully touched the horrible puckered scar before bending to kiss that wound too.

Alan bit down, clenching his jaw tight and blinking away the sudden stinging in his eyes. The emotions that simple act evoked were too powerful. He wanted to push Jem away, but just then, the lad moved lower, away from the scar.

His clever hands slipped down Alan's twitching stomach to his trousers and began their work there. Soon he'd stripped off his shoes, trousers, and drawers, leaving Alan standing naked and exposed in front of him.

Kneeling, Jem stroked his hands up Alan's legs from ankles to hips, making his legs tremble. He paused at the nearly healed scar on Alan's thigh—the wound which would've cost him his leg had the army surgeon, Schivvers, had his way. Jem kissed that awful red mark too before pressing his lips to Alan's hip bone.

He kissed and licked a path across his groin but navigated around the erect cock thrusting toward him. His teasing avoidance continued until Alan was nearly shaking with need.

At last his persecutor took his penis in hand, gripping it in a strong fist as he looked up into Alan's face. Jem guided the head slowly to his lips, stuck out his pink tongue, and flicked it over the flushed tip.

Alan groaned. He reached toward Jem's tousled brown hair, wanting to hold the man's head while he drove into his mouth. But he held back, digging his fingernails hard into his palms instead, afraid to take what he wanted. His hips, however, thrust of their own volition, reaching for what he still denied he needed.

The heat and wetness surrounding him, the hard sucking that threatened to draw the very life from him, and the steady rhythm of Jem's hand gliding up and down his shaft quickly brought Alan to the precipice. His pent desire would not allow him to hold out long, he knew, and he wanted more than Jem's mouth on his cock. Giving another groan, he pulled away.

The youth rose to face him and take his hand. “Come on, then.” He pulled him toward the bed, drew back the counterpane, and lay on the mattress, bringing Alan down with him.

“How do you want it? Front, side, or back?” The husky voice was nearly enough to make Alan climax right then. To be asked that question so casually—as if buggery weren't a punishable crime by law, as if people wouldn't revile a man if he admitted to it, as if the act were perfectly normal—took his breath away.

He hadn't even known the front was possible. The few times he'd indulged his urge it had been standing up, a rushed grappling in an alley, and later, the back room of some tavern. “From behind” had been assumed. That's how he wanted it now. He wasn't ready to look into Jem's face while he fucked him.

Guessing his answer, Jem flipped over. Alan could barely swallow, his throat was so dry. He reached out a tentative hand and stroked the long stretch of the man's back from between his shoulder blades down to his softly rounded bum. His skin was velvety smooth despite a few light scars. How could this youth live the rough life he did and be so unblemished? And Alan didn't mean that in a purely physical way. There was a lightness, a sense of a soul untouched by the vagaries of life, that imbued Jem's very being. Cheerful. Buoyant. As if his terrible circumstances hadn't stolen his hope yet. What was his secret?

Alan stopped worrying about it as he indulged in exploring the young man's backside. He slipped a finger between the globes of his buttocks and traced the rim of the puckered hole there. His cock twitched with the desire to be buried inside it. The head was weeping drops, so ready to release Alan thought he might explode any second.

He reached for the drawer of the table by his bed, where he kept the oil he used when frigging himself on many a solitary night. He dropped a dollop of the slippery ointment in his palm and slid it down his shaft, gritting his teeth at even that slight friction. Moving onto his knees between the man's spread legs, he reached for Jem's bottom again and massaged his fingers into the tight opening between his cheeks.

He stretched and probed with one finger, then two. The other man raised his bum, pushing back onto his fingers and groaning in pleasure. “Deeper,” he murmured.

Alan couldn't take another moment. He had to be inside. Guiding his slick cock to the widened opening, he pressed the tip inside then pushed, grunting as the resistant ring of muscle clenched around him.

“That's it, sir. Fuck me. Bugger me good,” Jem growled.

The filthy words were like a riding crop to a horse's flank. Alan groaned and thrust harder, impaling himself deeply in the tight heat that surrounded him. The sound of the other man's quiet moan was another spur urging him on.

Pressing a hand between Jem's shoulder blades, he pinned him to the bed and pulled his cock from the sweet fire of his body before plunging in again. His groin slapped against the other man's rear, and sweat built between their heaving bodies as they clashed together, both striving toward ecstasy.

Alan angled his body lower, bracing himself against his hands, now on either side of Jem's shoulders. He wanted to feel the slide of flesh on flesh, his chest against the other man's back, softly curling brown hair mere inches from his face. Only a sliver of Jem's profile was visible to him, but he could see thick lashes resting against his cheek and the slight parting of his lips.

“Harder now,” Jem urged. “Finish it.”

Once more the whip nipped his flank, and Alan thrust deeper yet, surrounding himself in solid flesh. The friction of their two bodies created a nearly unbearable heat. He could no longer hold back the rolling thunder inside him. Like the approaching hoofbeats of an attacking army, the growing sensations pounded through his defenses and exploded in a powerful climax. He thrust once more, cried out, and orgasmed with a shudder.

Beneath him, Jem bucked and twisted, either trying to unseat him or experiencing a release of his own. Then both men lay still, breathing hard and meshed together like fighters winded from a long combat in which neither would yield.

Alan reveled in the feeling of the warm, sweating body fused to his own—the muscle and bone and coursing blood, the smell and taste and feel of another person in his arms. This nearness was what he'd craved for so long, and for a few precious moments, he was content, at peace.

But the dark creature dwelling deep within him rolled over and raised its monstrous head. Already his bliss was evaporating. It couldn't last. Jem wasn't his lover. He was merely a whore from the streets. Soon he'd be gone, and Alan would be alone with his ghosts.

Alan pulled himself apart from the other man and rolled onto his back. He was sticky and sweaty and felt filthy. What they'd done wasn't beautiful. It no longer felt like a revelation, but the dirty, animalistic act it was—unwholesome and impure.

He laid an arm over his eyes and wished the man sighing and stretching beside him would disappear so he could get on with the next part of his evening. This had been his last bit of pleasure on earth. Now let him inflict the last bit of pain and be done with it.

Chapter Three

His lordship appeared to have fallen asleep. Jem watched the man's unmoving form, one arm shielding his eyes, and wondered if he should poke him awake so he could get paid and get on his way.
Should've taken the money first
. And he would have if it'd been a regular job with the hand or the mouth in an alley. But since Lord Melancholy had been intent on having a full ride, the rules changed. It wasn't the thing to demand money up front when the customer wanted the illusion he was bedding a lover.

Maybe he wanted to have another go in a bit before he sent Jem away. If so, this could turn out to be a more lucrative night than anticipated. He simply had to be patient. But it grated on his nerves, not knowing how much he was being paid or when. Some of these rich gents could get suddenly stingy when the act was over, or even refuse to pay at all. Fucked if he'd let
that
happen. No way was he walking out of here empty-handed.

Jem glanced around the room, considering what he could easily nick if given the opportunity. His stomach grumbled. Too bad his lordship didn't keep a plate of biscuits in his bed chamber. The man could use some fattening up.

Jem examined the gent. His lean, concave belly rose and fell slowly enough he might be asleep, sprawled on the elegant bed. Not so elegant now that Jem had spilled on those fine sheets. He grinned remembering that pleasure. The lordship might be untutored in fucking, but he had passion enough to stir a dead man, and Jem wasn't close to dead—although if he didn't get some coins and eventually some food, he'd be flirting with the grave. That candlestick would fetch a few shillings, but it would show no matter where he tried to hide it on his person. Another grin at the thought of stuffing it down the front of his trousers. He padded over to the mantel. Nothing that would fit in his pockets. Besides, Badger would search him, no doubt about that.

Right then, the shillings he'd rightfully earned.

Still naked, he moved back to the bed and shuffled across the vast expanse on his hands and knees. Softer linen than any he'd touched in all his years, he thought, and he stopped for a moment to run a hand over the material. Maybe he could nick the counterpane as payment, although he'd be sad to part with it if he managed to smuggle it out of the place. Naw. He'd wake the gent, sweetly.

Jem stared down at the body, which seemed frozen stiff by some tension. If Jem leaned in to lick that delicious dip at the base of milord's throat, he'd likely get the man's hands wrapped around his neck and none too gently.

“Hoy,” he whispered instead.

Nothing.

He reached out and prodded the man with a forefinger. Sure enough, the gent's hand flew to grab his finger. Fast and strong.

“Ow,” Jem said, though he wasn't in pain.

“What do you want?” The man's voice was low, dangerous. He hadn't been sleeping after all—hadn't slept in some time if those shadows under his dark eyes meant anything.

Jem sat back on his heels. He could say “a sixpence at minimum, sir” and likely be on his way, but that would be too easy. This gentleman's hooded, bleak eyes challenged him to leave be, and that just made him want to prod some more. No matter how many times his mum had told him about curiosity and the cat, he never could get the lesson through his thick head.

“Why sir, what does any man want? A pot to piss in. Warmth in winter. Cool in summer.” He waved a hand in a circle, as if conjuring the answer. “Laughs, of course. A hundred pounds a year. No, make it three thousand. Pray tell, what do
you
want?”

“Nothing.”

“True enough, you want for nothing.”

For a moment, a corner of the man's tight mouth twitched. Humor? Anger? “You mistake me, Jem. I crave nothing.” No mistaking that tone. Jem heard bleak anguish. And the man confirmed it with a faint breath of the word “oblivion.”

And somehow lying in this chamber finer than any Jem had ever beheld, a fire to take the chill from the air, probably more food than he could eat in a month, this man had allowed despair to seize him. What an arsehole.

Jem's breath stuttered with rage. He pushed close, one knee on the bed, and leaned over the man. Let the bigger, stronger attack. He drawled. “Ah, yes. Must be quite dull as can be, well fed, fine garments to wear. Heigh-ho with no fight left in you. Nothing to fight for, Lord Cowardly.” He was so close at that moment, he could smell the brandy on the other man and the scent of sex and sweat. That mix, along with the surge of anger, set off the swirl of lust deep in his gut. Almost as strong as the hunger.