Page 25 of It Takes Two to Tumble
“With me?” It was a hoarse whisper.
“Together.”
Dacre looked at him thoughtfully, as if giving his words the fullest consideration. “It’s private here. We’ll be safe.” Ben knew that. He had locked the door himself, and he knew the servants never bothered their prickly master. “God, Sedgwick, I want to touch you.”
Ben swallowed. “You’ve touched me already.”
“I’d touch you more. Everywhere. If you let me.”
“Yes,” Ben breathed.
“I’d start with your hair,” Dacre said. “I’d get it out of your eyes so you could watch me. I’d want you watching my every move.” As he spoke, he threaded his fingers in Ben’s hair, pushing it off his face and then brushing a too-gentle kiss to Ben’s parted lips. He steered Ben backward, so the backs of his legs hit the desk. Ben took the hint and sat, pulling Dacre forward to stand between his parted legs.
He felt Dacre startle under his touch, but only for the merest moment. Then he wrapped his arms around Ben, like he was welcoming him, accepting him, holding him close. Their lips slid over one another’s, soft and searching.
There was no hesitation. Ben knew what he wanted and he knew Dacre wanted it too. He kissed the captain with perfect conviction that this was good and true and right.
When he felt Dacre’s tongue touch his lips, Ben opened up to let him in. At the first stroke of Dacre’s tongue on his own, Ben felt desire unfurl in his belly, hot as a brand. Deep within him, a fuse had been lit, ready to ignite something fierce and bright and wonderful. “Yes,” he murmured.
Dacre moved his mouth across Ben’s cheek to the underside of his jaw, to the soft place right above his collar. Ben felt the rasp of Dacre’s stubble against his own, then gentle, wet suction. He let out an inarticulate noise. Nothing in his life had prepared him for the idea that his neck was a particularly erotic place, but he guessed there were a lot of things his life hadn’t prepared him for. He lifted his chin to give Dacre room to work. Dacre’s mouth trailed lower, and Ben tried to shove his cravat out of the way, but found his hands weren’t steady.
“Get rid of it,” he pleaded, his voice gravelly and desperate.
“Sedgwick,” Dacre said, pulling back. He threaded his fingers in Ben’s hair, pushing it off his forehead, as if he needed an unimpeded view of Ben’s face.
“I need to hear you say my name,” Ben said. “My Christian name.” He needed to know—he didn’t know what. That they were friends? Friendship seemed a minimum condition for what they were doing, and Ben required it.
But when Dacre spoke it was with what sounded like relief. “Benedict,” he said, and Ben felt the way he had when those strong arms had closed around him. And then his mouth was again on Ben’s, more urgent this time.
Ben tried to press closer, and wound up sliding back and pulling Dacre on top of him. He groaned in pleasure at the weight of the other man on top of him, the promise of friction if he tilted his hips up, the other man’s hardness jutting against his belly.
Ben slid his hands up the captain’s back, feeling in vain for flesh. “Capt—Phillip?”
“Mmm?” he murmured into Ben’s neck.
“Show me. Everything.”
Chapter Twelve
Hearing his name on Sedgwick’s lips did something peculiar to Phillip. It made his heart feel like it was about to crack into pieces, and it made Phillip think that would somehow be a wonderful thing to happen. He could have spent all night and well into tomorrow like this, Sedgwick in his arms, kissing as if they had all the time in the world.
Instead he pushed Sedgwick back onto the desk. Finally, something the desk was good for. He propped himself up on an elbow and looked down at Sedgwick beneath him. “That all right?” he asked. The way they had landed settled their chests flush against one another. Phillip was as hard as an iron rod, and at the sensation of the other man’s answering hardness, Phillip nearly groaned.
Sedgwick buried his face in Phillip’s neck and ground his hips against him. “Yes.” He kissed Phillip’s jaw in much the same way Phillip had done. Phillip nearly mewled. Lord, it had been a long time since he had had an encounter like this, touching and kissing and exploring, rather than an efficient meeting of bodies.
Perhaps the other night in the boathouse had been more, but Phillip hadn’t wanted to admit it then. It had felt safer to cling desperately to the fiction that this was casual, normal, fine. But then he thought of McCarthy, who had gone to the bottom of the sea without knowing how Phillip felt, and without Phillip knowing if his feelings were returned. He never wanted that again. Sedgwick wasn’t letting Phillip hold on to a single convenient pretense; he was giving no quarter. Phillip was at once grateful and terrified, and the sight of Sedgwick open and willing and utterly honest beneath him was almost more than he could take.
Phillip was old enough and sufficiently accustomed to the relief afforded by his own hand to at least pretend something like restraint. He didn’t want to scare the man off. He didn’t want to go too far. He didn’t want—and this was the crux of it—he didn’t want to do this, whateverthisturned out to be, and then discover that it was yet another meaningless encounter, yet another night to be dismissed and brushed aside. “Are you certain you want—”
“Pay me the compliment of trusting that I mean what I say.” If he hadn’t been grinding his cock into Phillip’s, he might have sounded very stern indeed, and Phillip thought he might even like that. “And that I know what I want. This is what I want. You’re what I want. Now.” His voice was low and gravelly, more urgent and commanding than his usual easy tones. Phillip somehow got even harder at the sound.
With that, he began tugging Phillip’s shirt off. Soon they were both bare to the waist, and Phillip was damned grateful for the lamp that sat on his desk. Because here was Sedgwick, half-naked and in his arms, and Phillip would have lit the curtains on fire if that was what he needed to do to get a good look.
“You have freckles on your chest,” Phillip said. He also had a dusting of sandy hair there, and down his belly leading to his breeches. Phillip skimmed a hand over one pale, flat nipple and saw the shudder pass through the vicar’s body. Good. Phillip closed his mouth over the other nipple and Sedgwick bucked beneath him, his hands tangled in Phillip’s hair. Phillip licked lower, feeling hard muscles and coarse hair beneath his lips. He tasted of salt and smelled like summer, like the warm lake, and trees in leaf, andhome.
He had never used his mouth on another man. God, he had wanted to. He had let other men do it to him but had always held back, feeling like it would expose some fragile and secret part of himself to admit that he wanted another man’s cock in his mouth, that he wanted a man beneath him, inside him, panting and needy and hard, and to know that he had done that.
But with Sedgwick he felt almost safe, as if there would be no shame in any way they came together, no embarrassment in their pleasure. He slid lower, so his lips were level with the waistband of the other man’s breeches, where his cock was straining against the fabric. He pressed his face against the hardness and heard Sedgwick’s groan.
