Page 76 of A Devilish Element
“I’m not your Jamie. Stop calling me that.” Jem brought his arms up fast to knock Linfield’s out of the way. Unfortunately, instead of freeing himself from Linfield’s caging embrace, he wound up with the whole of his lordship’s body pressed fast to his.
“Oh, my. That is… It’s a lot of excitement.” Linfield made matters considerably worse by wedging his hand inside the fall of Jem’s breeches and giving his irascible member an encouraging squeeze. “You’re more than up to snuff. I do hope it’s thoughts of my arse enveloping you that’s causing that stand and not excitement over my wife.”
“I’m not the slightest bit interested in your wife.” He wasn’t interested in Linfield either, but he was wise enough not to provoke him further by saying that. It just happened that he had particular fantasies about certain acts that his body reacted to, and that and when someone was stroking your cock, it tended to rise to the occasion regardless of what you thought of them.
“No, I’ll concede that point. It’s not my wife’s cunny you wish to dip your wick into, it’s Miss Wakefield’s.”
He was also wise enough to neither deny nor confirm that fact.
“The question is, whose arsehole is it you wish to plunder? Or are you imagining yourself as the piggy in the middle?”
“No. There’s no one.” Even as he said it, he knew it was pointless. Linfield was jealous enough to never believe him.
“Who is he? George? Bell?” It was so like Linfield to only consider what was present in the here and now. At least that meant he didn’t have to obfuscate.
“No. There’s no man here I wish to fuck.”
Linfield made a noise as if he’d been struck. Then his slender fingers caught Jem around the throat and squeezed. “You jest, of course. Ah, Jamie, always such a joker.” He gave Jem a squeeze lower down too, which naturally his traitorous cock responded to by further filling out. “Have I been too demanding of you? Have I not shown you enough affection? If the problem here is that you’re full of pent-up need, I can see about rectifying that.”
“Let go of me.”
That merely prompted Linfield to put more pressure on the pulse points in Jem’s throat, which left him uncomfortably lightheaded.
“Clearly you need a release, tutor mine.” The bastard began circling the head of Jem’s cock with his thumb, spreading the beads of arousal already gathered there and making him whimper despite his annoyance.
The problem was that Linfield knew what he liked and being teased into submission just happened to be one of those things that excited him, even when he really didn’t want that to be the case.
The lack of blood flow to his brain wasn’t helping.
“Stop it.”
“I’ll stop when you spend for me, and not before.”
Linfield was tossing him now with rough and heady strokes, and no amount of hissing through his gritted teeth slowed him.
“For God’s sake, we’re about to dine. Your guests, your wife will be along any moment. Do you really want your perversions broadcast to the nation?”
The monster dug his teeth into his lower lip, mouth still stretched into a malicious smile. “Best let it happen quickly, then, or there are going to be an awful lot of questions asked. Imagine if your preferences became known outside of these walls.”
“You’re the one with his hand inside another man’s breeches.”
“Aye, but you’re the one about to spend because of it.”
He could already hear the tale Linfield would concoct to explain his part in it. Nothing sordid, and even if people questioned the truth of his words, he wouldn’t suffer the same ignominy Jem would. No, Linfield would use his station, and laugh it off exactly as he’d laughed off a woman’s death due to his driving. He’d parade his new bride around a few ballrooms, spin a tale of jealousy and obsession and his tutor’s unnatural desires.“Had to dismiss the poor misguided fellow. Always knew there was something untoward about him. Mind you, I never imagined he’d do anything so disgraceful as that.”
There were footsteps approaching from the hall. The twitter of voices some distance away.
Jem wriggled and tried to shove Linfield off, but there was no moving him. He’d planted himself with roots as firm as a willow tree. Even raking his nails across his bare skin didn’t budge him.
“Do that again, and I’ll turn you about and fuck you, tutor, and I won’t give a damn who sees it, in fact I’ll line them up to watch. Perhaps you think otherwise, but I’ll remind you, there’s not a soul in this household who won’t do exactly as they’re told if I command it. Everyone has their weaknesses, Jem. I know yours. I know George’s… Miss Wakefield’s… Even Bell’s. So, stop with your squirming, and come in my damned hand.”
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Eliza
There was such a thing as arriving in the wrong place at the wrong time. Caught up in her thoughts and determined to demand the truth of Jem the moment an opportunity to do so arose, Eliza didn’t notice the two figures in the antechamber to the dining room until she was already through the double doors to that room. Then, for a moment she wasn’t sure what she was witnessing, a disagreement, a fight? Linfield had Jem pinned. Jem’s utterances made it clear. She had heard him make similar sounds thrice now.
She ought never to have trusted him for a moment.
