Rite of Summer: Treading the Boards, Book 1 (16 page)

Beaufort stood and watched him, hands clasped behind his back, his spine straight and formal as any parading soldier.

“Good day to you,” Stephen said loudly enough for any passing observer.

“And to you.” Beaufort nodded, and as Stephen got closer, he could see Beaufort’s eyes without shadows to block them. They were dark, a sea during a thunderstorm, with bags underneath as though he had not slept. Was he also afflicted by nightmares and dreams of faces he might never see again? “On your way somewhere?” he asked politely, his eyes flickering to Stephen’s hat, his coat and the provisions in his hands.

Drawing within arm’s reach, Stephen glanced at the house. No curtain twitched to suggest a hidden observer. “I am off to wander the woods in search of peace of mind,” he admitted candidly. “Will you take a turn with me?”

Beaufort hesitated, his lower lip curling to sit between his teeth. “I cannot,” he said after a minute, his rejection sounding reluctant. That was a foolish thing to pin his hopes on—a sound in a voice—but it was something. “I am to meet Lady Chalcroft soon to discuss plans for a portrait of her daughter. Work, you understand.”

“Of course.”
No,
he wanted to say.
No, I need you, your company, your advice. I need to know that the world will make sense once we leave this place. We are all bleeding and pretending that we are whole.
“I understand completely.” He mouthed the polite words instead, and something inside him curdled, curled small and died. “I’ll not take more of your time.”

He walked away quickly, before Beaufort could call out to him, if he even cared to, and refused with all his strength to take even the smallest look back. Birds sang high in the treetops and the grass was green underfoot, a verdant lawn that gave way to twigs and a compressed dirt path as the thicket grew thicker and the forest enveloped him.

Honestly! He was being a child. They had another fortnight in the house, by Coventry’s original invitation, and anything at all could be survived for two measly weeks. Then they would be out from under the watchful eye of society matrons and lords, and Evander would relax. Perhaps they could even keep correspondence with Beaufort and arrange to see him again at some later date, when they would not be so closely observed.

Yes, that was the way to think about it—a temporary inconvenience. He and Evander had faced obstacles greater than this in their lives together so far. This would go down in their shared memories as a summer of tragedy and almost-tragedy.

Because—and this was where his breath caught and his heart ached desperately—if they had not come to the country house, then the chances were very good that they would have been there, at the Swan, with the others. Their friends who had
died
, or who now languished in cells, while he and Evander sat in luxury, their only concern not being discovered by the chambermaids.

A wave of nausea swept up and over him again. Stephen dropped down to sit on a fallen log and put his head between his knees, breathing deeply. He kept his bread and cheese in his stomach, this time, but it was a near thing.
Foolish, weak boy! You are safe. What have
you
got to be upset about?

Feet crunching through leaves made him sit upright again and run his hands through his hair to try and remove any evidence of his failure of nerves. His sour face and the dark circles beneath his eyes he could do little about. Who was it? Coventry or Downe? One of the servants? Armand, perhaps, come to threaten him again for endangering Beaufort’s reputation and forcing her to put her own on the line.

It was none of those.

Beaufort himself appeared from behind a tree, trudging up the path and casting about in both directions as though looking for something. Or someone. Not discovered yet, Stephen stood, and Beaufort’s hesitant smile when he caught sight of him was enough to dispel some of the anger and pain.

“You found time for a walk after all,” Stephen called out, hands in his pockets, and he waited for Beaufort to come abreast with him along the narrow trail.

“I did.” Beaufort spread his arms, a sketchbook tucked beneath one and a roll of pencils in his back pocket. “As you see, it occurred to me that the weather might turn in the next few days, and I should make sure to get all my outdoors sketching done before any rains begin.”

“Clever.”

“I thought so.” Beaufort spread out his coattails and perched himself on Stephen’s fallen log, his sketch pad on his knee. “And if I happen to come upon an amiable companion and engage him in conversation while I do so, well…” he hesitated, as though convincing himself more than anyone else, “…so be it.”

Stephen sat again, keeping a foot of distance or so between them. Beaufort’s hands played over the page when he opened his book, charcoal-smudged fingers tracing the grain of the paper. Beaufort looked down, his hair too short to do anything but curl forward slightly around the shells of his ears, and it would be so simple to reach out, reach out and run his own finger—or the tip of his tongue—along that same pink edge, brush his hair back, taste the heady musk of his throat and mouth.

Beaufort drew out his pencils and began to sharpen one, casting a sidelong glance at Stephen. His lips parted, full, fair and fine, but he said nothing. He dropped his head and looked back down at his carving.

“Armand is an interesting girl,” Stephen said, because if he stared at Beaufort’s clever hands much longer without other distraction, he was going to end up on his knees, drawing Beaufort’s fingers into his mouth and suckling as though they were his cock. Not so helpful in present circumstances.

“That she is,” Beaufort replied neutrally, but his eyes dropped to Stephen’s mouth and lingered there, his gaze burning, for three seconds longer than Stephen could bear.

“
Are
you and she…?” he asked the question, more to distract himself than anything else, with visions of Beaufort bedding another.
Perhaps that would be enough to slice you out of my mind.

Beaufort, much to his regret and joy, shook his head. “No.” He followed Stephen’s gaze, then shrugged lightly. “There are many who take pleasure in both the male and female of the species. I am not one of them, except on purely aesthetic grounds. Women’s curves do very well for gathering light and shadow in interesting ways.”

He sketched as he spoke, the trees resolving themselves into columns that twisted and marched across the page. A few quick marks outlined the squirrel, now sitting on a high branch and telling them off with faint chitters and squeaks. “Have you ever?”

“Bedded a girl?” In any other company Stephen would have had to laugh, make some sly and knowing remark that would paint him as more experienced than he was. “There’s nothing wrong with girls; I’ve known one or two. The risks are different, of course, and I’ve no interest in being a father. Though I suppose,” he laughed, “better that than imprisonment.”

“Jail may only last a fortnight,” Beaufort said, and his wide mouth quirked up at the corners. “Fatherhood is a life sentence.”

“Indeed. One that some men are better suited for than others.” What next? Tell Beaufort how, these days, his thoughts only turned to him? That his heart leapt at the sight of him coming through the trees? Where had his sense of self-preservation gone? It had flown free the moment Beaufort had appeared again, seeking him out above all others.
Him.
“Though while I’ve shared pleasure with their bodies, I’ve never felt for any girl the way my heart beats for—”

“For Cade,” Beaufort interrupted.

Yes,
Stephen would have said if Beaufort had asked that only four weeks ago. Now he paused, tasted around the edges of the thought. The shadows played over Beaufort’s face, the hints of red the light brought out in his strawberry-blond hair, the spot at the back of his neck that made him harder than iron when Stephen bit and licked at it.

He finished his sentence a different way. “For the solemn beauty of men.”

When Beaufort looked at him, when his mouth and eyes smiled together and his eyes were the soft gray of a cloudy, early morning sky, it only added more proof to something that he already knew.

When Stephen checked to be sure they were alone, then leaned in and kissed him, he was sure. The words bounced around in his fevered brain as Beaufort’s lips—soft, dry, an addiction sweeter than strong drink or laudanum—played under his.

I need you.

And oh God,
thank
God that Evander liked him too.

It would be a good thing for all of them, Stephen decided, staring at his own face in his mirror as he attempted to tie his cravat, if they went to bed together again. It had been more than a week since the news had broken about the raid at the White Swan, since Evander had stormed out of bed unsatisfied. Let them have one more night, to sate themselves on each other. A chance to release a little tension would do everyone a world of good.

Assuming, of course, that Evander would speak to him for long enough to hear him out. He had developed the habit of having something else pressing to do at any given moment, and, frankly, it was getting ridiculous. One would think they really were only colleagues, and newly acquainted ones at that, rather than men who had first sucked and fucked each other when they were barely out of school.

The house hovered in that odd state between silence and chaos, in the gloaming after the day’s activities and before the bell rang to call them all to table. The women would be off primping and preparing, pinching their cheeks and setting their curls. Coventry would be closed in his study with his letters, as he always was this time of day. Servants bustled around through the back stairs and in and out of empty rooms, giving the place the impression of a beehive, but one in which the bees had only left the room moments before you entered.

Evander had not been in his chamber, nor was he in the conservatory.

The gallery remained empty, with no Beaufort to fill it, and he paused only briefly to pay his respects to Beaufort’s portrait. Those knowing gray eyes stared at him solemnly now, some trick of the light taking away the amused twinkle in his painted expression. He could trace the brushstrokes with his eyes, map out the places where his hands and lips had been, imagine the taste of Beaufort’s skin, his mouth, the salt of his sweat.

Enough—the hunt was on if he wanted to catch Evander before dinner. If all went according to plan, he would have both of his men in his bed again in less than six hours, and fantasy would be unnecessary.

A low murmur of voices sounded from the door that led into the library, the door propped open to allow some semblance of a breeze through the south-facing rooms. One sounded like Evander’s—what luck! The other was female, alas. So much for hoping that he might find Evander and Beaufort together and deliver his messages all at once.

Stephen opened the door.

Evander stood by the fireplace, and he was most definitely not speaking to Beaufort. He bent his head over another blonde one, two pairs of lips moving too lushly and too intimately to be anything but the conversation of lovers. Evander had one finger coiled in a curl of Lady Charlotte’s hair, his thumb pressed against the bare skin below her collarbone. She stared up at him, her chest and cheeks rose flushed, her lips parted and pink swollen from kissing.

“…are my muse,” Evander was saying, “my love, all in all to me…”

“All in all to me. The reason I hear music at night and wake with songs on my lips.”

Stephen knew that speech very well. His pulse thrummed in his ears, his breath catching in his throat.

There would be an explanation. Evander always had a reason.

The door slipped from Stephen’s fingers. It slammed shut with a sudden bang that echoed in the long chamber. Evander and Charlotte jumped, turned to see him standing there.

She relaxed, oddly enough, and Evander lifted his chin, unabashed, to stare Stephen down. “Ashbrook? What do you want?”

His cravat was partially untied—Stephen noticed that. His hair was mussed, and he wore a jewel on his watch fob that Stephen had never seen before. It glinted gold in the sunlight, gold like Evander’s hair. And Lady Charlotte’s.

Why,
he wanted to yell. And,
what are you doing?
Evander had never shown interest in women! He flirted, obviously; it was all innocence. All part of his grand games. He occasionally encouraged Stephen to pursue his own entertainments, but Stephen had taken no lover that Evander had not known about beforehand, had not helped him choose, come to bed with, petted and stroked and claimed for his own as well.

Was that not our agreement?
Never said in so many words, but implied in every jealous glance and murmured assent, in every evening at the Swan or Boar that saw Stephen glued to Evander’s side while he stalked their game for the evening’s
mutual
pleasures.

And now this—professions of love, sweet words that Evander had whispered in Stephen’s ear so many times before.

That was supposed to be his reward for the arguments and the silent nights. The one promise that he had been able to rely on through every indignity, each subtle insult and deliberate misunderstanding.

Evander beds other men, but he loves only me.

He could say none of this here. He was no jilted lover in front of Lady Charlotte, had to struggle to swallow against the bile that rose up, stinging and thick, to burn his throat.

“My apologies,” he managed to get out, every syllable dropping into silence that rippled like the surface of the pond. “I did not mean to disturb you.”

“Think nothing of it,” Lady Charlotte said, her voice a silken serpent.

Evander said nothing.

The door—he had to leave. A million words slammed against the inside of his skull, none of them wise, all of them important. The handle slipped in his fingers, twisted like some living thing that he could not get a grip on. He grabbed for it one last time before flinging himself out of the window began to seem like a viable escape route, and this time it turned. He ran.