Wonderstruck
Page 27
Frankly at a loss, Joachim reached for the whiskey, risking a second swallow. And then a third.
“Joachim.” He said it without clenching his teeth, thanks to the silky warmth trailing down his throat.
Graham’s hand inched nearer to the nape of Joachim’s neck, causing his skin to quiver. “What an appalling burden. Were your parents Puritans? Please tell me your friends call you something else.” For the first time there was a hint of Scots under the well-modulated boys’ school drawl.
The whiskey’s headiness played off Joachim’s empty stomach and he almost laughed at the sincere rudeness of the question. “My father was a minister, my mother was Belgian. I’m named for my maternal grandfather. How about you call me Cockburn?”
“Perhaps, if you play your cards right.” Ainsley Graham was most definitely staring at Joachim’s mouth. He unconsciously rubbed his lips together and flushed at the dazzling light that brightened Ainsley’s face when he laughed. “Our rascal Barley set me up, hasn’t he?”
“Pardon?” Joachim tilted his head to the side, confused. Perhaps Stuart’s family called him Barley? It made no sense, but nicknames rarely did. His stomach growled and he coughed to cover it up.
Ainsley lifted his glass and then set it back down without a drink, tapping his chin. “I’m sure Barley said your name was something less provocative, but I’m a good sport.” He stood and stretched his lean body like a cat before he pulled the servants’ bell. At least, Joachim assumed it was to alert servants—he’d never seen one before. But in a house this size, there must be a better method than shouting to fetch someone.
“I sent everyone—including my mother—away aside from Nelson, and he’ll be serving supper before he leaves, too. Nothing fancy, but I don’t think you came for the food, did you?” Ainsley winked and refilled Joachim’s glass, clinking it against the side of his before settling back down on the sofa. Any closer, and he’ll be in my lap.
Bloody hell, the room was over-warm, matching his host’s gaze. “I didn’t, and I’m not particular about what I eat. I came to mine your brain for research, didn’t I?” Because it was best to discuss his purpose for coming such a long way. He had a doctoral thesis to write, after all: the manifestation of delusions in those otherwise accounted as sane.
From what he’d read, Ainsley Graham fit the bill.
After a lecture two weeks earlier, Stuart Graham had found Joachim at a pub reading one of Ainsley’s books. Once Stuart finished his drink, he sheepishly admitted to their being brothers and offered to wrangle an introduction. Assured Joachim that he would be welcomed for a visit to see the haunted sites Ainsley had publicly verified to the chagrin of his university colleagues.
“Is he sane?” Joachim’s stomach had lurched at the idea of spending a week with a madman. He’d spent countless hours working at the asylum near his university, but those were patients and Joachim wasn’t alone with any of the truly dangerous ones.
Stuart had flushed with what may have been relief, or perhaps his third gin, nodding. “Er, yes. Let’s say he’s an eccentric. Ainsley’s a certified genius with no sense of self-preservation, whatsoever.” He excused it with the comment that Ainsley was the result of a second marriage to a flighty woman who’d indulged her own three children to the point of criminality. And if Ainsley Graham was a bit of a crank, that was all her doing.
And now, Joachim was in Scotland with a gorgeous—and he must remember, potential—madman, utterly unsure of how to proceed.
Stuart’s brother resumed his position with his foot on the log and dug into the fire once more. “Research.” He tossed Joachim another grin over his shoulder. A perfectly squared shoulder for all its slenderness. It matched the proportions of the rest of his shape—long, lean muscles that would likely not thicken as he aged.
The man Nelson wheeled in a trolley laden with covered salvers and spread a crisp tablecloth over a small table he dragged in front of the sofa. He arranged plates and silverware with an almost magical speed, and had all the dishes uncovered in under a minute. Violet circled it once, her nostrils flaring appreciatively.
“Sir?” He repeated it twice more before Ainsley revived from an almost trancelike state and faced Joachim.
“Lovely. Please, tuck in Cockburn.” He snickered and so did bloody Nelson. At Ainsley’s prompting, Joachim filled his plate with cold chicken and spring peas. He slathered butter on his bread, still warm in the middle.
“And will you need me for anything else, Sir?” Nelson asked, pouring dark red wine into two goblets.
“You’ve readied his room?” Ainsley tossed a piece of chicken to the dog, who caught it with a snap of her jaws.
“Indeed.” The servant nodded at Joachim. “I’ve unpacked his valise upstairs.”
Joachim murmured his thanks.
Twirling the stem of the glassware in his fingers, Ainsley gestured for Nelson to leave. “I won’t need you back until eleven tomorrow morning. I plan on keeping Cockburn up until dawn.” He waggled his groomed eyebrows.
Mind out of the gutter, Cockburn. The Scotsman must have meant that he had some amazing stories to tell. Just last week, Joachim had stayed up all night reading one of Ainsley’s books, Historical Roots of Scottish Fey. The small bookshelf in his bedroom also boasted the other five books the dishonored academic had written. Prolific for one who couldn’t be more than twenty-six or twenty-seven.
Joachim had hoped to get a clue about the workings of Graham’s mental instability. Instead, he’d found himself enchanted by the combination of in-depth research and pictorial word choice and had gobbled all the books up in a single fortnight.
Yet, that immersion into fairy tales must have played tricks on the poor man’s mind, inducing him to believe in what all rational people knew to be mere children’s stories. It was good for Joachim to remember exactly why he was here.
“You’re much better-looking than Barley intimated.” Under the table, Ainsley dropped his hand to right above Joachim’s knee.
Cockburn stopped chewing mid-mouthful. Surely he was merely making a point to be welcoming?
“Skittish, are we? Don’t tell me he sent over a virgin?” Ainsley’s hand drifted higher, paralyzing Joachim with shock. He needed to put an end to this, this, seduction or proposition or whatever it was now.
But good Lord—the blaze of heat that shot throughout his extremities was electric.
“I’ll be most put out.” Ainsley Graham pouted and fingered the button right above Joachim’s navel. “I’ve been picturing my cock in your luscious mouth since you walked in the door, and I do so hate to be disappointed.”
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ISBN-13: 9781488055232
Wonderstruck
Copyright © 2021 by Allie Therin
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