by Merry Farmer
“Let me show you,” he murmured, moving from Patrick’s mouth to kiss the pulse that throbbed at his neck and the unassuming place where his neck curved into his shoulder. “Let me show you what it means to love a man. Let me show you all the things I want you to do to me.” He tugged the hem of Patrick’s shirt out of his trousers as he spoke.
Patrick answered with a tight nod, moving his hands around Everett’s sides to rest on his chest. For one, terrifying moment, Everett thought Patrick would push him away. He didn’t, he brushed his trembling hands to the buttons of Everett’s jacket, undoing them with deliberateness. The awkward action was a declaration that could have been painted across the sky in vibrant colors, for all Everett was concerned. Patrick wanted him, and he wasn’t going to hold back this time.
They shed their clothes with unsteady hands while moving gracelessly through the front rooms of Everett’s too-large flat to the lavish bedroom whose windows looked out at the starry sky. Patrick’s face flushed and his eyes hazed over as they removed the last of their clothes, tumbling onto the bed in a tangle of limbs and overheated flesh.
“We’ll go slowly,” Everett whispered against his ear, rolling Patrick to his back. He wanted to touch the man all over, from the width of his broad shoulders to the chiseled planes of his chest and stomach, to the hard thickness of his cock as it jutted between them. God, the man’s cock was the stuff of erotic poetry. A far more careless version of himself would have wrenched Patrick’s legs apart and gone straight to swallowing that cock until Patrick exploded. But it felt almost obscene to speed toward the end when the journey was about to be so wonderful.
Everett nestled himself between Patrick’s thighs, bracing one arm on the bed to give himself some leverage, and bent down, intent on kissing Patrick until they were both in danger of passing out.
“I don’t want to do anything wrong,” Patrick stopped him in a voice that made him sound more like a boy than a man.
It was killing Everett. His heart was ready to rip itself into pieces with sentimentality. “Love, you couldn’t possibly do anything wrong,” he whispered endearingly, stroking Patrick’s tousled hair and stubbly cheek. “Let me do everything tonight. Your only job is to enjoy it.” He captured Patrick’s lips in a soft kiss, but jerked up again and added, with one eyebrow arched, “And to learn, of course. Because everything I am about to do to you tonight, I want you to do to me at some point. And more.”
He dipped down to suck another, heady kiss from Patrick’s mouth, grinding his hips against Patrick’s in a way that rubbed their pricks together. But again, he jerked up.
“I’ll let you in on a carefully-kept secret,” he said, barely able to stop from giggling at the intimacy of what he was about to reveal. “I actually prefer to take the submissive role when I’m with a man. Most of the lovers I’ve had assume it’s the other way around. It isn’t.”
Patrick nodded slightly, and Everett lowered his mouth to Patrick’s once more. He reveled in the way Patrick relaxed and imitated the way he kissed, growing bolder by the moment. He really would be the most amazing kisser, with enough practice.
Everett stopped, pulling up again.
“Just to put your mind at ease,” he said, feigning seriousness when he felt as though he might burst apart with joy, “I’m not going to fuck you in the arse tonight. If you’re under the impression that that’s all men do together, you’re wrong. It takes some working up to, at any rate.”
He moved to resume their kiss, but stopped himself.
“I want you to be comfortable, after all, since I fully intend—”
“For the love of God, Everett. Get on with it,” Patrick growled. He grabbed a handful of Everett’s arse with one hand, sliding the other hand up his side to dig into his back. “You talk too much.”
“I know I—”
Patrick pushed up, slanting his mouth against Everett’s and thoroughly shutting him up. Everett didn’t know whether to laugh or moan at the sudden aggression. He wanted to encourage it, nurture it, until Patrick was confident enough to turn the tables and master him. The thought of Patrick with enough self-assurance to have his way with him left Everett so aroused he jerked his hips against Patrick’s, worried he might come long before either of them were ready.
He moved his hands so that he could thread his fingers through Patrick’s hair, mussing it to the point where Patrick looked ready to be debauched. He broke away from Patrick’s mouth, but only received a moment of protest as he trailed kissed across Patrick’s shoulder to his chest.
“Remember this,” he said, planting a light kiss over Patrick’s heart before shifting to one of his nipples. “I will insist you do this to me later.”
He brushed his tongue over Patrick’s nipple, earning a gasp and sigh of enlightenment as Patrick realized all of the things that were possible between two lovers. Everett caressed his sides and hips with gentle, insistent strokes, taking his time and worshipping the man’s body before continuing to rain kisses across his abdomen. He stole a peek at Patrick’s face and found him deliciously transported by his introduction to pleasure. His eyes were half-closed, but not for long.
Everett slipped a hand between Patrick’s thighs, teasing his fingers toward his arsehole for a moment before cupping his balls. Patrick’s eyes flew wide open, then fluttered closed again with a moan as Everett stroked the length of his cock. Patrick’s hips jerked as Everett learned his length and girth with as gentle a touch as he could. Patrick’s tip was already shining with pre-cum, and Everett instinctively knew the darling wouldn’t last long. Only the most stubborn man had the power to hold out long during his first time, and Patrick wasn’t half as stubborn as he made himself out to be.
“This,” Everett said, heat and urgency in his voice. “I most certainly want you to do this to me at some point.”
He closed his mouth over the head of Patrick’s cock, raking it with his tongue. He moved deeper, teasing just the right spot at the base of Patrick’s head and drawing the most delicious moan of pleasure from the man that he’d ever heard.
“I can’t—” Patrick gasped.
It wasn’t a fearful insistence that he couldn’t move forward, it was a frantic warning that he couldn’t hold back.
Everett tensed in anticipation, bearing down on him and taking as much of Patrick into his mouth as he could. And he could manage far more than most. He set a fast pace, but it didn’t last long. Patrick’s thighs and groin tensed under Everett’s hands, a guttural cry erupted from him, and warmth hit the back of Everett’s throat. He swallowed reflexively, slowed his pace, and did his best to prolong the experience to the fullest for Patrick.
As Patrick’s body loosened into a puddle of satisfaction, Everett pulled back, catching his breath. “That was beautiful, my love,” he panted, shifting so that his body covered Patrick’s.
It didn’t take him long to find a position that would provide the friction he needed as he rocked against Patrick. He was so aroused from watching the darling man in his arms come undone and from feeling the power of his orgasm that what would have usually taken a strong hand, a mouth, or a tight arse, only needed the crook of Patrick’s thigh where it met his hip. Everett came with a cry of satisfaction, spilling himself across Patrick’s hip. He was enough of a cocky bastard to feel as though he’d marked his territory with his seed, and a wicked grin spread across his face.
“That was….” Patrick failed to form his thoughts into words as Everett shifted them to their sides so that they could curl into each other’s embrace.
“I know,” he said with a sly grin. “And would you believe that’s barely scratching the surface of all the things we can do?”
Patrick looked at him with sated amazement, his brow inching up. The response was so typically, beautifully Patrick that Everett burst into laughter. He spent the next several minutes kissing Patrick, their arms and legs wrapped around each other, making bets with himself about whether they would fall asleep or get hard again first.
Surprisingly, sleep won, though after the day they’d had, it was no surprise. For once, Everett didn’t dread the demons that would circle in on him in the night. They wouldn’t dare, not with Patrick there to protect him. For perhaps the first time in decades, Everett fell asleep with a smile on his lips and peace in his heart.
Chapter 12
Patrick awoke in a panic the next morning. He sat bolt-upright, causing a still-sleeping Everett to spill to the side. A wave of tenderness passed through Patrick’s gut at the sight of Everett, relaxed and sleep-tousled, as he stirred awake. Patrick still felt the warmth of Everett’s body where they had entwined in sleep as the cool, morning air hit him. His heart hiccupped in his chest at the memory of everything they’d done. But the joy and the sweetness was short-lived.
He threw the bedcovers aside, leaping out of bed and rushing to the sitting room outside Everett’s bedroom, where half of their clothes were strewn from the night before. He spotted the pouch he always carried on his belt and practically dove for it. Only when he opened it with shaking hands to see that the sausage and heel of bread were still there, unmolested, did the panic subside.
Shame rushed in to take the place of panic. Patrick slumped onto an overly-ornate, peacock blue settee. He wanted to throw the damn pouch aside, but he couldn’t let go of it to save his life, like it was a vital organ he would die without. He hunched his shoulders, rubbing a hand over his face, and fought to remind himself for the umpteenth time that he wasn’t about to starve, he had steady employment in a respectable position, and now he had a wealthy and famous lover who took food for granted to the point of throwing it out on a whim. Everett wouldn’t let him starve.
Unless he grew tired of him.
“Was it something I said?” Everett asked from the doorway to the bedroom.
Patrick flinched, twisting to face him. His heart dropped hard into his stomach at the sight of Everett wrapped in a black kimono decorated with blue, pink, and green birds. His dark hair was a mess, his face slightly puffy from sleep, and a day’s growth of scruff around his usually impeccably trimmed beard had him looking debauched and glorious. But genuine fear hovered just behind the light of his violet-blue eyes.
“No.” Patrick rose, forcing himself to set his pouch aside. “It was something….” He didn’t know how to explain, so he made a useless and awkward gesture.
Everett’s gaze fell on his pouch for a moment before sliding across his body. The corners of his mouth tipped up in a wicked grin. Only then did Patrick realize he was stark naked. Self-consciousness lashed him, but there was nothing he could do, nowhere he could hide.
“You’re forgiven, then.” Everett sidled closer, hips swaying, grinning at him with a cockiness that would have been better suited for gloating over a prize he’d won.
Patrick couldn’t figure out what to do or how to move fast enough. Everett swayed right up to him, looping an arm around his waist, and pulling him close for a kiss. There was no reason why Patrick should have been surprised by the action, but he was. He was shocked. It made no sense that a man like Everett could want someone as pathetic as him, but there he was, kissing him with tongue and dropping his hand to caress Patrick’s backside. And, God help him, Patrick responded enthusiastically. In spite of the voice in the back of his head that warned him to protect himself.
“Shall we go back to bed?” Everett asked, a rakish gleam in his eyes. “I still have so much I want to teach you.”
Patrick wanted to say yes more than anything in his life, but his gaze shifted to the clock on the mantle behind Everett. “It’s already half eleven,” he said, hoarse with desire.
Everett reacted as though someone had doused him with cold water. “Half eleven?” He stepped away from Patrick, staring at the clock with wide eyes. “We slept all morning?”
“We needed the sleep,” Patrick said, though he had the feeling the real shock was not in how long they’d slept, but how peaceful that slumber had been.
“Fuck.” Everett marched toward his bedroom. “God damn Lionel Mercer and his mad plan to meet Cristofori at the club for luncheon.”
They washed and dressed as fast as they could. The intimacy of sharing a washstand with Everett and borrowing his razor wasn’t lost on Patrick. Nor was the significance of Everett picking out one of his own clean shirts and a pair of his drawers for him. It was mad to think that wearing Everett’s drawers felt more intimate than the way their sweating bodies had slid together the night before, but it did. His shoulders were broader than Everett’s, so the shirt was tight across his chest. The emotions that accompanied everything were just as ill-fitting.
“I do love a man in a copper’s uniform,” Everett sighed happily as they finished their ablutions. He stood in front of Patrick, straightening his uniform collar and brushing his shoulders with a delighted grin. “You are the picture of dignity, my darling,” he said, then stole a quick kiss from Patrick’s lips before marching out of the bedroom.
Patrick followed, feeling as though he’d stepped into a whirlwind. Everett had dressed in a colorful, fashionable suit of dark blue that set off the color of his eyes. He’d outlined those eyes with kohl as Patrick shaved, and now he looked as though the world was a stage and he was about to make a grand entrance. Patrick could only scoop up his pouch from the settee, fasten it to his belt, and follow.
Whether Everett planned it deliberately or not, using the excuse that Patrick was a bodyguard hired to protect him from his legion of admirers made it so that not a single soul questioned the two of them walking out together. The ruse proved especially helpful when they left Everett’s building only to find a particularly passionate young man, dressed in imitation of Everett’s costume from his current show, brandishing a poster from said show and begging Everett to sign it. Patrick played his role as expertly as any actor, keeping the young man at bay while Everett scrawled his signature across the poster with the pencil he kept tucked in his inside jacket pocket.
“I was serious the other day when I said I would hire you as my personal copper,” Everett said as they walked on, Everett waving at a handsome cab waiting on the corner.
“You never said such a thing.” Patrick tried to keep the thrill in his chest from exploding onto his face.
“I implied it.” Everett fixed him with a teasing look. “Strongly.”
He had, but Patrick wasn’t quite ready to contemplate the cataclysmic shift in his life that leaving Scotland Yard to work for Patrick would mean. He bristled at the idea of being a kept man. As beautiful as the last few days had been, Patrick still found it all unbelievable. As in, he didn’t believe any of it. He couldn’t. Having Everett open the Pandora’s Box of his sexuality meant one thing to him, but he was certain it meant something vastly different to Everett—something less meaningful.
“Stop scowling,” Everett told him as they climbed into the hired carriage. Everett gave the driver the address of The Chameleon Club, and as soon as they were moving, he went on. “You’ve nothing to scowl about. We’re working together on a mission of utmost importance, and we will succeed in this endeavor. And then we will succeed in a great many exotic endeavors that will put a smile on that handsome face of yours you won’t ever be able to wipe away.”
Patrick glanced sideways at him, all of his clothes uncomfortably tight. Success wasn’t a word he would ever have applied to himself.
“Have I ever told you about the time I performed for the queen?” Everett asked, stretching and settling into his seat.
“You have not,” Patrick answered.
“It was a special performance at Buckingham Palace for Princess Vicky’s birthday. She’d come over from dreadful Germany for a visit, and would you believe it, the darling thing asked for me specifically.”
Everett blathered on, telling a story about Victoria and Vicky that Patrick was reasonably certain he’d completely made up. He let Everett talk without interrupting him, though. The man soothed himself with the sound of his own voice, and who was
he to deny him that pleasure? Besides, he rather liked listening to Everett spout shit with a smile.
By the time they reached The Chameleon Club, Patrick was actually smiling. That smile was short-lived, though.
“I don’t care how viciously you harangue me, Lionel, I’m not doing it,” Niall Cristofori was in the middle of saying as Patrick and Everett strode into the club’s dining room.
Lionel’s pale face was splotched pink, and he practically vibrated with frustration. Patrick had never seen the powerful man in such a state.
“For God’s sake, man. You know what is at stake here,” Lionel seethed, glaring at Cristofori. “You would see the lives of children put in danger because you don’t have the balls to face a former lover?”
“Lionel,” David warned him, raising a hand. David stood between Lionel and Cristofori beside a table strewn with Cristofori’s papers and scribblings.
Lionel wasn’t the only one beside himself with irritation. Cristofori was flushed, all of the composure Patrick usually admired about the man gone. “You know full well it’s not as simple as that,” he argued.
“How complicated could it be?” Lionel threw his arms out. “You wanted him, he left you. That’s hardly a cause for cowardice when young lives are in danger.”
“What is this?” Everett barged forward, a deadly light in his eyes as he stared hard at Lionel. “Is that the pot calling the kettle black that I hear?”
Dread swooped through Patrick’s stomach so fast he thought he might be sick. He nodded to David in greeting, but neither of them had time for more.
“Bloody hell, Everett. Not now,” Lionel snapped, attempting to turn back to Cristofori.
“You’re accusing this man of being a coward because he doesn’t want to step back into the morass of a failed love affair, if the little I heard upon entering the room is correct.”
