A Gentleman's Position (Society of Gentlemen) (19 page)

Lord Maltravers had bellowed abuse at him, face red and distorted with rage. He was a big man, and he had struck without restraint, his fists heavy with sharp-edged rings, and then strode over to seize a thick walking stick that could have broken bones. David had run, wrenching at the door handle and taking the stairs three at a time with blood trickling down his face and a savage pain in his ribs, praying that the doorman would not stop him. He had been utterly, physically terrified; it still hurt like hell.

Richard’s fury at his injuries almost made them worthwhile.

Richard sent the gentlemen off with thanks and turned back to him. “Are you hungry?”

“Very.”

“I’ll have them send something up.” He rang the bell over David’s protest and gave the order to a footman, then pulled up a chair to sit by David. “Are you sure you’re able to tackle Skelton tonight? You look shaken.”

“It needs to be done. And I have no intention of tackling him. With luck, he won’t know I’m there.”

Richard nodded. “Good. Nevertheless, I want to come with you.”

“What? My lord—”

“Richard, damn it. And if you are doing this for me, then I should do it with you.”

“Yes, but—”

“I heard yes.”

“But you
can’t
go housebreaking,” David said. “You’re far too big.” Too big, too assertive in his movements, too used to making as much noise as he chose, and a great deal too encumbered by nice notions, no matter what he might think now. Delicate feelings were not a luxury David could afford for himself, and he didn’t need Richard’s getting in his way. “And it’s a job best done by one man.”

“I bow to your experience in these matters,” Richard said, with a touch of dryness, “but I’m sure I can be your…I believe the cant term is
pair of eyes
?”

Lord Richard Vane serving as a thief’s lookout. “That’s a foolish risk.”

Richard lifted a brow. “May I not judge risk for myself?”

“Well, but—” Of course he could. David still wanted to say no. Every instinct screamed it: Richard should not lower himself. He should not take risks that David could take for him.

You wanted to stand equal,
David reminded himself.
You wanted him to be part of this. He’s doing precisely what you asked, so what are you afraid of?

“Oh, very well,” he muttered. “If you must.”

Richard gave a decisive nod. “What if Skelton doesn’t have the letter after all? What if Maltravers did the sensible thing and lodged it at his bank?”

“Then we’ll need to force him to bring it out. How would you feel about kidnapping?”

“I’ll consider anything short of murder, and I might make an exception for my lord Maltravers.” Richard stroked the side of David’s face very gently, the backs of his fingers caressing the skin. “How dare he spoil this. How dare he lay a hand on you.”

“He throws things at his valet.”

“Then it is about time a valet threw something back,” Richard said. “I know very well you can look after yourself, but you’ve made an enemy, David, a cruel one. I did not intend you to put yourself at risk like that.”

“That’s why I didn’t tell you I was doing it.”

“And then you presume to tell me I can’t come crib-cracking with you. Hmph.” He slid his fingers through David’s hair. “I’m quite sure you knew what you were about, but that does not allay my outrage on your behalf. And I claim the right to make Maltravers pay for this, one way or another.”

“As what?” David asked, watching his face. “What particular right is that?”

Richard’s fingers tightened a little. “The right to stand by my friend, and act when he cannot. The right you have always claimed over me.”

David caught Richard’s hand and lifted it to his lips. He ran his lips over the knuckles, nipped the top of a finger, slid his mouth along to tease the skin between finger and thumb with his tongue.

“Dear God.” Richard shut his eyes as David turned his hand over and attended to his palm, swirling his tongue over the thumb pad. “How do you make that feel so?”

“It’s just a touch.”

“It is not just a touch. It never was, over all those years. I have never felt a touch like yours.” David sucked a finger deliberately, with tight lips and a scrape of teeth, and Richard groaned aloud. “In the name of mercy. You torture me.”

“I love you,” David said into the palm he held, and Richard’s eyes snapped open. They stared at each other in the candlelight.

He had not meant to say that.

Richard’s eyes were on him. They were such a very deep blue, almost indigo in the candlelight. “You told me so once before, and it frightened the very life out of me. It frightens me now. David— Ah, hellfire.” Richard jerked his hand away.

David had time for a single pulse of bewildered, horrified loss before he registered the knock at the door.
“Damn.”

“This is my life,” Richard growled. “Constant blasted interruption. Yes, thank you very much. Carry on,” he told the footman with his usual courtesy as the servant came in with David’s dinner. “What was I saying, Cyprian? Agreeing with you, I feel quite sure.”

David made some sort of reply and stood rigid until the man had placed the dishes at one end of the table and left. As the door closed behind him, Richard extended his hand again. David didn’t take it. “Richard—”

Richard took a step closer, running his finger under David’s chin to tilt it up. “Tell me again.”

David set his jaw. “I love you. I have always loved you. But as you have said yourself, that does not change anything.” He saw the confusion darkening Richard’s eyes and wanted to take it away, but this had to be said. “I still don’t know what to do. I had not intended to come back to London for some time. I needed time to think, to see my path well ahead, and I have not had that. And I won’t fall back into your life without thinking just because I want to.”

“I don’t want you to do that either,” Richard said. “I was going to write to you.”

His hand was so warm, running through David’s hair, sending delicious shivers through his scalp. “Were you?”

“Mmm. I intended to leave a few days for you to calm down, make my apologies—again—and ask that you would see me, talk to me, before you took another post. I hoped you would grant me that much.”

“I dare say I would have. It is not easy for me to refuse you.”

“Old habit?” Richard asked, managing a smile that dropped away at whatever he saw in David’s face.

“You whistle, and I come running.” David looked away. This was not pleasant to say. “Silas didn’t strong-arm me to bring me here. I took down my coat the moment I saw him, and I feel quite sure you know that. I would find it very easy to do as you wish, to come back to you whenever you hold out a hand, no matter what you had done to drive me away, because you have been my master a very long time. And if I do that, it will sooner or later bring us back where we started, and I will not let that happen. I
must not.
” His voice was raw.

Richard’s hand had stilled. He gently withdrew it, leaving David’s scalp feeling cold. “I see. I’m sorry. Would you prefer me not to speak of this?”

“Of course not.” David’s mouth twisted. “You reaching for me? It’s everything I ever wanted, except for the parts I can’t bear.”

Richard nodded. “I don’t know what to say, David, except this: I don’t want you to come back to me for any reason but your own wish. Certainly not at my order, or even my plea. And I am well aware that puts the onus on you, again, but I have no idea what I can do about that except wait for you. That I can and will do, for as long as you need. I am not the master here, and anything between us is and will forever be your choice.” He gave David a smile that looked as though it hurt. “I know I earned your distrust. I will do what I must to earn your trust again. I promise you, I don’t expect it.”

David couldn’t find a response. Richard pushed a hand through his own hair, his expression a little rueful. “I may add that I have been more thoroughly talked at in the last weeks than in the total of my life before, and no doubt I shall make many more mistakes, but I intend to avoid repeating the same ones. We both have lessons to learn. You must learn to refuse me, and I must learn not to make it necessary so damned often.” He gave a sudden smile that made David’s heart lurch. “Or, alternatively, I might become even more unreasonable, so that you can rehearse your refusals at leisure. Shall I order a puce coat like that one of Harry’s?”

David narrowed his eyes. “If you wish to destroy a sartorial reputation on which I slaved for years.”

“In that case, I could ask Julius where he has his waistcoats made. What would you say to coquelicot and jonquil stripes? Horizontal, of course. I shall set a new fashion.”

David found himself grinning now, as Richard had clearly intended. “Don’t you dare.”

“You see? You are refusing me to the manner born, and I am quite sure you can do so whenever you like. You’ve walked away from me twice, after all. Will you kiss me now?”

David’s mouth opened. He shut his eyes. “No.”

“Very well done,” Richard said. “I should like to kiss you, David. I should like to taste my way from your lips all the way down your neck—”

“No.” David felt rather strangled.

Richard sounded short of breath himself. “Shall I kneel to you, David? Get my hands on your skin and my mouth on your prick?”

“No.”

“Then—are you fucked ever?”

“Yes,” David said breathlessly. “And no.”

“You said you liked my size. Believe me, you’d feel it if I fucked you. Right here, since you like floors so much, on your hands and knees so I can see your hair, your skin, until my weight bears you down to the carpet and I can hear you cry out under me—”

“I hate you,” David said with strong feeling. He was leaning against the table, gripping its edge with both hands to prevent himself from lying back on it.

“I hate myself.” Richard took a deep breath. “And yet you are not on your knees now, and I am quite sure that you will go about your business tonight and make short work of anyone who stands in your way. You have the strongest will I have ever encountered.”

“You shake it.”

“I know,” Richard said. “I don’t think many others do?”

That could have sounded like a vanity. David knew it was the opposite. “Nobody,” he said softly. “Nobody else.”

Richard’s throat worked. “Nobody else. Just as nobody has brought me to my knees as you do. And I should like to be there begging you to come back to me now, but that’s not the issue, is it?”

“No.”

“No. I wish it were.” Richard sighed. “When you come back to me, my fox, you will do so of your own will. I depend on that.”

“When,” David repeated.

“Allow me to hope for
when,
” Richard said. “I don’t like
if.
And the thought of
not
is unbearable.”

“Richard?” David beckoned. Richard came a step closer, and David took hold of his lapels, pulling him forward so their faces were just a few inches apart, and Richard’s lips parted in anticipation of a kiss that David didn’t grant.

“David?”

“You owe me that fuck. At some point, I shall claim it.” He waited for those deep blue eyes to widen and then hauled hard, pulling Richard toward him and going deliberately backward as their mouths met. They were kissing frantically as David’s back hit the table and Richard’s weight came down on his chest.

“Jesus!” David yelped.
“Fuck!”

Richard shoved himself up onto his arms, taking his weight off. “What the— Are you all right?”

“It’s just bruises,” David muttered, adding a vengeful mark to his tally against Lord Maltravers for the stabbing pain that had exploded across his chest. “He hit me in the ribs. I didn’t think.”

Richard’s brows drew together. “How badly?”

“Nothing broken. It’s all right. It just hurt a little.” It hurt miserably, and if Richard offered an apology for David’s own damned idiocy, he thought he might scream.

“With my weight? I’m not surprised.” Richard dipped his head, kissed him gently, and rubbed the lightest hand over David’s ribs. “Come, your food is cooling, and you need to eat if you are to embark on burglary, or your stomach’s complaints will betray you to the entire house. Up.” He gave David his hand, not heaving him to his feet but simply letting David pull against him. All the support that was needed and no more than was asked.

“I love you,” David said again, his smile so wide it pulled at the cut on his cheek, and Richard smiled back.

House-breaking proved a great deal less dramatic than Richard had probably expected.

They strolled to Mr. Skelton’s lodgings together. Richard carried a heavy stick. He had not said that part of his determination to accompany David had to do with the dangers of London’s streets at night, but David drew his own conclusions.

“How do you intend to break in?” Richard asked as they walked. He sounded curious rather than disapproving. “I didn’t know you had the skills of a burglar as well as everything else.”

“I don’t,” David admitted. “I put Mr. Skelton’s lodgings keeper’s charwoman on the payroll months ago.”

“You— I beg your pardon?”

“I bribe a lot of people with your money. To keep informed, to keep people quiet, to get access. It’s a fair part of the running costs.” Richard had never queried the “running costs” before, so David had never explained. “I tend to grease people who might come in useful.”

Richard digested that. “How many people do we bribe, in the regular way of things?”

David smiled in the darkness at
we.
“About sixty, on and off. We don’t pay most of them very much, of course. Mostly just retainers in case of need.”

“Of course. And this one?”

“Has told me which Skelton’s room is and, I hope, left the back door unbolted.”

“Could she identify you?”

“With luck, there will be nothing to identify me
for,
” David said. “And people don’t like to admit that they took bribes to betray their office. My guess is that even if things go ill, she will be silent. In any case, it must be done.”

“You know your business. Who else do we pay?”