Lord Loxley's Lover (9 page)

Fitz whined at him, but quickly dissolved into moans as Miles hooked his fingers within him and rubbed against the spot which always made Fitz writhe desperately for more.

“Please?” Fitz begged.

“In my own time,” said Miles, continuing to circle his fingers steadily against that sensitive place as he earned further squirming and pleas from Fitz.

At last he had mercy, withdrawing his fingers and replacing them with his hard prick. Fitz moaned at once, arching beneath him and tangling his fingers into the sheets.

“Miles,” he breathed, languid with pleasure as his partner rocked slowly within him, a little bit deeper with every thrust.

Miles shifted, hovering above him and bracing his arms on either side of Fitz’ head. “You are mine,” he whispered, as his hips pressed deep within his lover. “You are the only one I have ever wanted.”

Breathless with pleasure, Fitz hugged his arms around Miles’ shoulders, savoring each movement of their bodies. There was no haste now, as both of them wanted to linger here as long as possible, being awash in pleasure and love.

When at last Fitz came, first as usual, he cried out with pleasure and Miles echoed it, following him into completion with Fitz’s name on his lips.

They sank into the covers, deeply satisfied, being tangled up in each other in every way. Fitz panted softly against his lips, keeping his eyes closed and his forehead pressed to Miles’. “I love you,” he whispered.

“I love you, too, Fitz.” Miles stroked his hand along Fitz’s spine until they both fell asleep; together forever, at last.

K
atherine Marlowe has
a history degree specializing in LGBTQA+ history, and she can very easily be distracted into lengthy discussions on queer cultures and subcultures in dozens of different historical eras and subcultures. When she isn’t writing novels and novellas about handsome men smooching and living happily ever after, she is usually baking, hiking, or fighting eldritch deities in Arkham.

Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed the book please consider leaving me a review! I’d love to hear from you.

T
he party
, Laurie was informed later, was a great success, which was news to him on account of how he had spent the first half of the party bored senseless and the latter half of party away in the library with a new acquaintance.

Hovering at the edge of the party, Laurie watched the dancing with a regard half filled with longing and half with dread. From across the room, he could see no less than three eligible young women glancing hopefully in his direction and at least five older women frowning at his continued lack of action.

“Do you not dance?”

Laurie startled at the voice, which seemed to appear just behind his right shoulder before it solidified into the form of a tall and slender dark-haired young man his own age who sprawled onto the fine wingback couch which Laurie was most certainly
not
hiding behind. The young man was impeccably dressed in a formal suit of more expensive material than Laurie’s own.

They gazed in silence out across the dance floor. When Laurie did not, at length, respond to the question, the stranger tipped his head back to look at him upside-down.

“I dance,” Laurie responded.

“It seems you do not.”

Flushing indignantly, Laurie drew his stance a little straighter. He was accustomed to being teased, if only by his older sister, but he was certainly not accustomed to being teased at formal evening parties by handsome young men to whom he had not been introduced.

“I am entirely capable of dancing,” Laurie clarified.

His opponent still had his head tilted back against the couch, looking up at Laurie with mirth. “If you are capable of the theory but not the practice, can you indeed be said to dance?”

Now he was definitely being teased.

“I don’t believe we have been introduced,” Laurie reminded him, in hopes of clarifying to this stranger the particular breach of social protocol in question.

Suitably chastised, the young man rose to his feet and offered his hand, even though he did so
over
the couch between them. “I am Gilbert Heckwith, gadabout nephew to our esteemed hostess.”

They were nearly of a height, although Laurie was a couple of inches taller and brown-haired, with a face that he thought unfortunately pointed and his sister called “elfin”, while Gilbert had curling black hair and sinful red lips, as if a statue of Dionysus had taken life and imposed itself upon a fashionable London soiree.

“Laurence Aberforth,” Laurie responded, clasping his hand stiffly as he attempted to mentally negotiate the reckless breaches of social decorum being simultaneously perpetrated by his new acquaintance. “It is a pleasure to meet you.”

“A pleasure somewhat more or less than dancing?” Gilbert asked, causing Laurie to flush and withdraw his hand.

“I enjoy dancing.”

“The evidence suggests otherwise,” Gilbert said, still with the couch between them and his back to the party, two further offenses upon proper social etiquette. “You shall have to furnish proof of your claim.”

In desperation to recover the situation, Laurie sat down upon the couch, which induced Gilbert to join him.

“The trouble,” Laurie explained, “lies not in the dancing but in the matter of the several very marriageable young ladies who are all too aware that I am myself a very marriageable young bachelor.”

“That does indeed seem troublesome,” Gilbert agreed, gazing off across the party at the women in question. The young ladies and their various matronly guardians were regarding Laurie with interest, an interest which had become in various cases more or less pronounced with the introduction of a second eligible bachelor to the far edge of the room. “Do you wish not to be netted in matrimony?”

Drawing up his shoulders in dignified offense, Laurie stammered briefly as he attempted to respond to Gilbert’s continued disregard for social convention. “I do not—I am not—it is my
preference
that were I to marry it would be in the pursuit of love, whereas the young ladies in question wish to marry because they require a husband, any husband, and I do not wish to be husbanded for the mere requirement of husbanding.”

“I can see the difficulty,” Gilbert said, continuing to consider their little audience. There seemed to be some manner of conference going on across the room between two lovely and charming young ladies, which Laurie dreaded might lead to one or both of them taking the initiative of asking the gentlemen to dance. “But a young lady cannot husband you without your consent, and I presume you would not propose marriage without amorous sentiment of your own, so your fear must stem from the possibility that you might love a lady who only pretended love in return. Is that it?”

One of the young ladies had risen to her feet, which had caused the conference between her and her friend to become more urgent.

Laurie stiffened in both offense and alarm.

“Sir, you are
very
forward,” Laurie began.

“And like to be more so.” Gilbert seized Laurie’s arm and pulled him swiftly to his feet. Laurie went, more out of surprise than anything. “Come with me,” Gilbert said, steering Laurie firmly around the couch and into the hallway.

Once they were in the hallway, Gilbert pulled him behind a plant as though they were in some sort of theatrical comedy. Gilbert peered back at the ballroom from behind the cover of the plant.

“We have made a narrow escape. Your admirers—perhaps
our
admirers, depending on whether their need for a husband is greater than their good sense—do not seem inclined to risk following. Let us make good our escape before they invent a pretext upon which to come looking for us.”

That little speech created ever so many questions, none of which managed to form themselves on Laurie’s lips before his arm was seized again and they emerged from the plant in order to essay further into the house. It seemed that Gilbert knew where he was going, and indeed they promptly entered into a well-appointed library which was quiet but dark.

Releasing his arm, Gilbert promptly found a box of Congreves and set upon lighting the lamps around the central part of the room near a welcoming set of leather-bound couches.

Quite befuddled by their sudden escape, Laurie watched him.

“Shall I apologize for kidnapping you?” Gilbert asked, lighting the final lamp and extinguishing the long match. “I assure you, I shall take no offense if you choose to depart from my company.”

“We may give offense to your lady aunt,” Laurie said, remaining uncertainly by the library door as he debated whether it was appropriate to stay, “for avoiding her company.”

“We will not,” Gilbert assured him, sprawling shamelessly across one of the long couches and hooking his legs over the arm of it. “Lady Agatha is quite inured to my nonsense, and we shall neither of us suffer any consequence but my being mildly scolded for removing two eligible bachelors from the room in a party which was already in excess of young ladies. It shall teach her to invite more young men to her parties. Or possibly it shall teach her to disinvite me, which would be the rather more sensible option.”

“Do you do this often?” Laurie asked, enough intrigued by the irreverent mirth of Gilbert’s company that he advanced further into the room.

“Which, the general scandal of my behavior or the specific scandal of kidnapping my aunt Agatha’s party guests?” Gilbert paused only just long enough for Laurie to take a breath to speak, and then forged on ahead regardless. “Either way, I suppose, the answer is yes.”

Laurie laughed, puzzled but amused by his new friend’s comedic nature, and took a seat on a leather chair nearby. “She should indeed disinvite you.”

“Quite true,” Gilbert agreed, giving him a grin in response to Laurie’s display of humor. “Her generosity of nature and familial affection is entirely misplaced. But I am quite interested in your romantic troubles. Let us speak of that.”

“I am entirely certain,” Laurie said, resting his chin in his hand, “that my romantic troubles are none of your concern.”

“That is very unfortunate,” said Gilbert, “for I would very much like us to be friends, whereupon it seems that the romantic troubles of my friends should indeed be my concern, for I very much wish that all of my friends should be happy and as romantically entangled as they themselves so desire.”

“Do your friends appreciate your concern upon their romantic troubles?” Laurie asked.

“I like to think that they do.”

“Naturally,” Laurie agreed, “but do
they
think that they do?”

“If they do not,” Gilbert said, his repartee slowing briefly as he considered the question, “then surely it is my duty as a friend to impress upon them the charitable nature of my concern, and, more importantly, the inevitability of it.”

He said it with such mirthful earnestness that it set Laurie at once to laughing.

“You have a charming laugh,” Gilbert said, getting to his feet and seeking out the crystal bottle of sherry which was laid upon a side table, which presence in the library rather than or in addition to its theoretical presence in the parlor hinted at either a frequency of thirst from one of the members of the household or an allowance toward Gilbert’s habits of abducting party guests. He poured them each a glass. “I should like to hear more of it. Say indeed that we shall be friends.”

“Have I a choice in this matter?”

“Indubitably. Or, at least as much as you have a choice in marrying,” Gilbert said, offering one of the glasses to Laurie and then returning to his comfortable sprawl upon the couch. “Which is to say that much though unaccepted friends and eligible young ladies may prevail upon you, we still require you to affirm at the altar whether you will or will not have us.”

“Is there an altar of friendship?” Laurie asked, pretending alarm. “Had I known, I would have worn my better suit.”

“The altar of friendship is in all our hearts,” Gilbert said, placing a hand solemnly over his own. “Within which, I shall presume, you are wearing your finest suit.”

“That is a relief.”

“And before this altar of friendship,” Gilbert said, with good-humored theatricality, “will you take me for your own?”

“Sir,” Laurie said, suspecting that while he might indeed regret this decision he should at least never be
bored
of it, “I will.”

Gilbert got up and seized his hand at once, clasping it firmly. “And so shall I take you for my friend.” His hand was warm, and lingered a moment longer than it had in the ballroom as his fingertips brushed across the skin of Laurie’s wrist. “There,” Gilbert declared, his eyes locking upon Laurie’s, and for a moment Laurie felt both trapped and electric for no reason at all that he could understand.

“It is done,” Gilbert concluded, releasing his hand and tossing himself back upon the couch. He lifted his glass in toast. “Now you may tell me of your romantic troubles.”

“Christ preserve me,” Laurie groaned, and drank of his own glass.

“Better indeed for the young men and women of England that a sculptor should preserve you in marble, that your form and figure might be remembered for posterity. Tell me, how stands your disposition to be married?”

Laurie snorted. “It is an honor that I dream not of.”

“But you do will that if you should marry, it should be for love.”

“I do.”

“You do, and shall say so again at the altar.”

Laurie sorely wished that he had a pillow at hand which might be tossed at his new friend. “I’m of no mind to be married.”

“Are you of a mind to be loved?”

“Yes.” Laurie sighed, leaning back in his chair and allowing his own legs to dangle over the arm of it in mimicry of Gilbert’s casual posture. “I am very much of a mind to be loved. How does your friendly concern indicate that I should pursue such a thing?”

“Well, should you wish to be loved but not married, I am certain we could secure the address of a brothel.”

Laurie flushed quite red and floundered to sit up. “No, indeed, I do wish to be loved
and
married, one and the same.”

“That is rather more difficult,” Gilbert said, none discouraged by Laurie’s embarrassment.

“Certainly, in point of fact,” Laurie added, “there is no love to be found in brothels, but only lust.”

“There is no love to be found anywhere,” Gilbert said, with such straightforward certainty that Laurie could do nothing but blink at him in shock. “All of it is only lust or dependency.”

“That isn’t true,” Laurie insisted. “Love is real.”

“Have you proof of that?” Gilbert asked, with insouciant challenge.

Laurie frowned in perplexity as he sought for an example. “You cannot prove love. It is an emotion. A concept.”

“Anything that is real can be proven. You might prove the emotions and concepts of fear and hate—if a man fears or hates a certain stimulus, he shall always react with fear or hatred toward the introduction of that stimulus. But anything that a man
loves
is quite variable. What one passionately loves one day may be the object of loathing and derision upon the next. Alcohol, at an example.”

“You may not use
alcohol
as an example on the topic of love,” Laurie objected.

“When a man is drunk,” Gilbert continued unabashed, “he may passionately declare that he loves wine, women, and all the world, but sunrise finds him in sickened loathing of all those things. If love exists at all, then it exists only as the dew: wrought by moonlight and vanished by noon in the sensible light of day.”

“You are wrong.”

“I may indeed be wrong,” Gilbert conceded, “but I will not accept so until you have furnished some proof.”

“And so I shall,” Laurie said, setting down his glass and sitting forward with determination. “Love exists, and I shall find a way to prove it.”

“Shall we make a pact?” Gilbert asked. His dark eyes glittered impishly.

Surprised, Laurie’s determination cooled and he tilted his head in consideration.

“We shall take turns,” Gilbert said, “in the provision of evidence as to whether true, lasting love exists in the world, until one of us has won his case.”

“And what are the stakes of our bet?”