Page 56 of A Gentleman's Wager
When Vaughan had come upon them and mocked them in the little parish church, Lucerne had dismissed the remarks as his friend’s desire to seem witty. Now, he knew they spilled from a deeper emotional well.
“Then oughtn’t you to be glad that I am honourable?”
Vaughan blew a sigh from between his lips. “Maybe I’m disappointed to learn your radiant glow in church that day was a result of your sanctity not your sins.”
“We can’t all aspire to your deplorable magnificence.”
“Aspiring is all you can do.”
Lucerne’s lips twitched, his humour returning. This sort of silly banter had always drawn them together. He thought the first words they’d spoken to one another had probably been an exchange of insults.
“And yet you wish me to believe your diversion in the drawing room a lesson in country manners, and not merely an excuse to grope Frederick.”
Frederick, not Louisa.
Vaughan’s tongue swept across his eye-tooth. “There must be some reason for your continuing close association with him, and clearly it isn’t his wit or his wealth.”
Lucerne bit down the urge to defend his friend. There was nothing untoward about his relationship with Frederick. Nothing. “Speaking of wealth? Rumours abound that you left much of yours behind in Italy. Did you work your passage, or did you let the sailors do that for you?”
Vaughan snorted port over his shirt cuff. He carefully put his glass aside and shook off the drips. “All hearsay, Lucerne. I assure you. The voyage was tedious in the extreme, which is why I intend to make up for it now.” He pounced at Lucerne, who luckily had already noticed him tensing ready to spring, and scooted sideways off the chaise, so that Vaughan’s fingers closed on thin air.
“Kiss my arse,” Lucerne snickered.
The marquis pouted. His violet eyes narrowed. “Oh, I intend to.”
“You’ll have to catch me first.”
“That also won’t be a problem.”
Lucerne lurched left and ran from the room. He sprinted across the hall and into the corridor, where he slid on the polish, but somehow managed to right himself before Vaughan got close enough to catch him. He had several options when he reached the other end of the passage: either he could double back and return to the billiards room from across the bottom landing, take the chase upstairs, or head into the dingy east wing. The dark emptiness of the latter appealed most. By the time he reached it through the old morning room, the game had developed into cat and mouse. He couldn’t decide which he feared most, being caught, or never being caught.
Lucerne dived through a set of double doors. Inside, the furniture lay hidden beneath shapeless white shrouds. A huge, tattered cobweb hung from a stack of paintings propped against the wall. The scents of decay and old linen filled the air. He slipped behind a tall, draped object to the left of the door, grateful for a moment to catch his breath, which had grown hot and tight in his chest.
Vaughan followed him into the room quicker than he’d anticipated. He stood poised in the doorway a moment, casting his gaze about, then he pulled the doors to behind him, closing the exit and trapping Lucerne within. Carefully, he began to examine each shapeless lump of furniture. In turn, Lucerne held his breath. The prior exertion and inevitability of what was to come made him tremble so that he disturbed the sheet.
Vaughan tore the cloth from the object between them, revealing an ancient giltwood harp. They stared at one another through the strings. “I have you.”
“Not quite.”
Lucerne feinted left, then stepped right—straight into Vaughan, his move perfectly predicted. The contact caused his heart to thud. They wrestled; Lucerne trying to escape, Vaughan snaking his arms fast around Lucerne’s wriggling form, eager to pull him into an embrace.
“As I said…”
Lucerne’s heart beat wildly against his ribs. Vaughan’s closeness washing desire across his loins. “And as I said…” But the latter was a lie. Vaughan had him caught. Moreover, if he was honest, he was exactly where he wanted to be. Their lips and hips met in a crushing kiss, all teeth and savagery. By the end of it, they were both erect.
Swaying together, they staggered backwards through the inner chamber door. Within this second room, the moon shone pale through bare windows, limning everything in shades of blue. The only furnishings were a darkly curtained bed and a gilt dressing table.
Vaughan steered Lucerne across the bare boards and pushed him between the silken drapes. As he sank into the mattress, Lucerne caught a glimpse of himself in the half-covered tri-fold mirror on the dressing table. His eyes were flecked with sapphire and wide as a China doll’s.
“Is this private enough for you?” Vaughan asked as he worked open the tiny pearl buttons of Lucerne’s waistcoat.
Was it?
There were still people in the house. Guests and servants. Folks who might come upon them and witness what they were about. Create a whole world of trouble by discussing what they observed. However, even though his heart was racing, and he could not remove it from his throat, he didn’t stop Vaughan from undressing him. As Vaughan untied the neck of his shirt, each breath came more rushed than the last. The linen sailed free into the darkness.
Vaughan ran his agile fingers down the centre of Lucerne’s chest to the waistband of his breeches. The muscles of his stomach clenched as Vaughan traced the swell of his erection.
“Will you suck me?”
