Page 128 of A Gentleman's Wager
If he heard, but not as a matter of course. How her heart sank.
“Now, would you like me to stay?”
Bella pushed her maudlin aside. He was here with her, not downstairs with the marquis, and that was something. “I’d like to know if you have on anything at all beneath that banyan?”
Lucerne beamed at her delightedly. “Ah, well the answer to that.” He began unbuttoning the robe from the neck. “Is not a goddamned stitch.”
Vaughan appeared on the threshold right as Lucerne let the robe fall. When he saw them, he quietly turned about and closed the door.
-69-
Lucerne
Lucerne left Bella sprawled out, asleep between the sheets with a satisfied smile on her face. He was not the least bit surprised to find Vaughan sitting in the window bay at the end of the corridor. Moonlight bathed him in a silvery-blue glow making him gleam like a jewel. There were times when Vaughan’s beauty could stop him in his tracks; this was one of those times. Doubled on top of that was the hint of melancholy about him. His expression was settled into neutrality, but his fingers were whitened by the grip he had on the glass of liquor he was nursing.
Lucerne approached and rested his hands upon Vaughan’s shoulders. His lover tilted his head back in greeting and offered up a weak smile. Ghosts swam in the darks of his eyes.
“Why would you sit out here?”
His lips were drawn to an almost bloodless pallor.
“As if you cannot fathom the reason.”
Lucerne slid his hands forward and pressed his chin to the top of Vaughan’s head. “While I’m aware that you’ve always thrived on torment, it’s not normally turned inward.”
“Is that what you think, Lucerne? You don’t think that all these years, of watching you, wanting you, of closeness but never being quite close enough have been at all torturous?”
“You have me now.” There didn’t seem anything else he could say to that. It wasn’t as if he could rewrite their past.
“Ah, but do I?”
“Yes, you do.” Lucerne settled beside him on the footstool and leaned against his legs. Within moments his head lay in Vaughan’s lap, and the other man was combing his quick fingers through the strands. Sometimes he pulled a fraction too hard before releasing his grip. Lucerne bore the discomfort without remark. It seemed to articulate the tension between them when words could not.
“I’ve been thinking that perhaps I ought to leave you awhile.”
“No, Vaughan.”
“My estate almost certainly needs putting in order, and the time apart would give you time to determine how you truly feel about Miss Rushdale.”
Lucerne turned to face him. He took hold of his lover’s hand. “I already know precisely how I feel about the both of you, no parting of ways is necessary. I am not the one whose feelings are muddled here.” He let his emotions bubble to the surface, write themselves into his expression. But, as he softened, Vaughan’s visage grew ever more frozen. After only a few seconds, Vaughan broke eye contact. “What are you suggesting?”
“Precisely what I’ve been advocating all along. I’m not blind, Vaughan. Even before tonight, I’ve been aware. Accept her as part of the equation. Why not? There is clearly chemistry between you.”
Vaughan bit his thumbnail, prompting Lucerne to say more. “If the only interest you had in her was as part of that blasted wager, then you wouldn’t still be toying with her now. She fascinates you. You may tell me, if you wish, that you are simply trying to scare her off, but I know you. If you truly wanted to remove her from the reckoning it would already be done.”
“Perhaps I do not care for what that would do to us.”
He raked his teeth over his lips, then turned towards the window. Lucerne watched their reflections in the glass. Perhaps it was selfish of him to ask two people to indulge his desire to love them both, but he truly couldn’t choose one over the other. They represented different paths, appealed to different aspects of his being. “Vaughan,” he mouthed, reaching for his lover once again. He’d intended for them to spend the night together. Had meant to welcome him back to Lauwine in a way that was meant to entice him never to depart again, instead, here they were after midnight sitting in a corridor, the cold beginning to nip in an uncomfortable way.
“Do you want to go to bed?” he asked.
Vaughan sighed. “I do not think that would be a good idea at this juncture.”
“How so?”
“Because I need time to mull over what you’re asking of me.” He raised a hand to massage his own temples. “It would be all too easy to say yes to yourjolie ménage à trois, Lucerne, but I truly, don’t know if I can reconcile myself to the thought of sharing you permanently. It has been taxing enough these last few months.”
“Vaughan—”
