A Private Gentleman

by Heidi Cullinan

  Michael didn’t know if Rodger was right or not. He didn’t know if he’d fallen in love with Albert, or if he was simply losing his grip on reason and sense. He also didn’t know what to say, how to calm him.

  And so he calmed him the only way he knew to calm a man.

  Smiling the smile he had smiled for so many gentlemen, a smile part seduction, part gentling, part distraction, he placed his hand on Albert’s thigh. “Be still, my lord,” he whispered, and as his hand slid higher, he bent and placed his lips on his patron’s own.

  However, there the whore’s game ended and something else began. His lips brushed Albert’s once, twice, lingering before drawing on the soft flesh, meaning to steal his tongue inside and brush Albert’s teeth. He meant it to be a practiced move, calculated and controlled. When he should have drawn back, he found himself hesitating. Instead of executing his carefully thought-out kiss, he found himself leaning forward and pressing his forehead to Albert’s own.

  He could not say how they ended up how they did, with himself on Albert’s lap, knees straddled on either side of him, their chests pressed together as he took Albert’s face in his hands and kissed him deeply. There was no art to it, no careful seduction, only a sudden flare of need that had little to do with sex and so much more to do with…something. Michael didn’t know what it was, but Albert had it and he needed it, needed it desperately.

  “Albert,” he whispered against his lips, and when Albert’s arms closed around him, drawing him closer as he kissed back, Michael shuddered and let go.

  “Albert,” he whispered again, his voice straining with need. His hands trembled on Albert’s ears, and he tipped his head back as lips trailed down his throat. Albert.

  When the coach stopped, Michael startled as if waking from a dream. Disorientation quickly morphed into awkwardness, and as he realized what he was doing, how he had thrown himself not artfully at Albert but as some lovesick schoolgirl, he felt his cheeks burn, and he tried to withdraw.

  Albert stopped him, gently but firmly, keeping him trapped with one arm on his waist. With his other hand he shifted the curtain away from the window and peered out into the street. He glanced at Michael with a curious frown. “B-Bakery?”

  Michael’s flush deepened. “Well, I’m quite hungry.”

  Albert’s grin did devilish things to Michael’s insides. “Ah.” Keeping Michael captive on his lap, he fumbled on the seat for his pad and pencil. “What-What w-would you l-l-like?”

  It took Michael a moment to realize Albert was asking what he wanted to eat. “Oh. Ah—a couple of meat pies would do quite nicely.” He cleared his throat. “Please.”

  Albert brushed a kiss against Michael’s lips and adjusted Michael on his lap in order to first scribble onto the pad. Rising enough to knock on the trap door, he shoved the paper through, which presumably had instructions for the driver to go into the bakery and get them food. When he returned his full attention to Michael, he seemed remarkably calm.

  “No longer nervous, my lord?” he tried to quip, but the words came out breathless and uncertain. No, Albert wasn’t nervous. Michael was.

  Albert smiled softly, almost wryly as he stroked Michael’s face. “Y-Your kiss-kisses are g-good med-medicine.” Michael averted his eyes, and Albert’s hand fell away. He didn’t look nervous, but he did look resigned. “D-Does m-my con-con-con-condition d-d-disgust you?”

  Michael frowned. Condition? Oh—the stammer. He touched Albert’s chest reassuringly, but butterflies flew up in his stomach and made his hand tremble. “To be blunt, my lord, I’m too busy worrying about my own condition to bother with yours.” When Albert raised a questioning eyebrow at him, Michael gave in and confessed the whole. “I don’t understand my reaction to you. It upsets me. I’m accustomed to being in control. And—”

  And I find I don’t want to be in control when I’m with you.

  He froze. The words had stopped behind his lips, but he’d heard them in his head, and they terrified him. Despite his cutting them off, somehow it seemed Albert had heard them too.

  The knock on the door made them both jump, but Albert recovered quickly, gently displacing Michael onto the seat before leaning forward to open the door and take the wrapped package the servant offered. He stammered instructions as well, too quietly for Michael to hear. Then he sat back on the seat, opened the package and handed a meat pie wordlessly to Michael.

  “Th-Thank you,” Michael replied, but he didn’t eat it, not at first.

  Albert smiled, watching patiently until Michael took a bite. Then he smiled again and kept smiling as the coach pulled back onto the street, and eventually Michael gave in, relaxed and simply ate as they rode on.

  Chapter Seven

  They did nothing more that first day than drive around London.

  While Michael ate, occasionally foisting some of the food on Albert, they circled aimlessly, but eventually the carriage stopped. When Michael pushed back the curtain, he saw they were in Hyde Park. It was a cold, dreary day, not quite raining as much as it was spitting in fits and starts, and so the park was not as full as it might have been. Still, a fair number of coaches circled the paths, and a few brave souls rode.

  Michael, who had been to the park, had never done so in a carriage—not, that was, sitting on the seat. A gentleman he’d seen regularly a few years before had been fond of riding across the green, waving to his friends while Michael serviced him below. It made him feel a bit grand to sit in a fancy carriage with the curtain pulled back, watching London’s finest promenade. He couldn’t see much, just blurry blobs of color, and he longed to don his spectacles and see them better. In a moment of self-consciousness, he glanced across at Albert and found his patron watching out the opposite window, looking away from the carriages. Looking up, in fact. Quite intently.

  Michael did the same, but he saw nothing but a sky full of gray clouds. Trying to be surreptitious, he leaned over and attempted to repeat the gesture through Albert’s window, but it was more of the same. Frowning, he looked again, and when he realized what had captured the attention of his host, he laughed.

  “Trees. That’s what you’re looking at, aren’t you? I’m ogling the ton, and you’re inspecting the trees.”

  Albert’s quiet smile did dangerous things to Michael’s insides. “M-Moss,” he said, and pointed at a tall tree they were heading past. “On the b-b-bark.”

  Michael leaned forward and squinted, but of course he could only see the dark skeleton of the tree. “Ah. Is it good moss, or bad moss?”

  He could hear the smile in Albert’s voice. “Just m-moss.” His arm extended before Michael’s face, pointing to the south. “Th-That yew is d-dying. Every y-year it h-hollows out more. A sh-shame. P-Pruning would have s-saved it.”

  Michael had a suspicion he wouldn’t have been able to tell anything about the yew even with his spectacles on, but he nodded and pretended he understood. “What else do you see when you look out your window, Albert?”

  That was all they did that first day. The whole first week, in fact, was nothing but Albert taking Michael on rides around London, through every park and borough, never looking at buildings or other carriages but always at trees and plants. In a gesture that touched Michael, Albert always brought along a fresh meat pie for Michael as well.

  Michael of course never put on his glasses, but he thought he was beginning to identify a few things by their shape and hue.

  Though they toured every day, spending hours and hours together, not once more after that first day did they even skirt close to anything remotely like sex. At best their hands would touch, but since he had climbed onto Albert’s lap, Michael hadn’t received so much as a kiss. He couldn’t decide if this was good or bad. It was nice, in a way, to simply be with the man, and yes, it flattered him that Albert wanted to share his passion for plants with him. Indeed, he found himself interested despite himself. Michael noticed plants more when he was out on his own. After a week with Albert, he realized life was everywhere,
even in the dingiest parts of London.

  Still, he wouldn’t have minded a little more personal “life”. He had stopped dreaming of Daventry—he was too busy now dreaming of all the carnal things he wanted to do with Daventry’s son, but in real life he received nothing at all, and it was driving him mad. He didn’t know if this was some game or if Albert had truly lost interest in him sexually. Every brush of hands, every glance, became a tease, a torment. Every day Michael told himself he would kiss Albert again, that he would end this strange standoff, but every day he waited for Albert to make the first move, or at least to give him a sign. Michael began to wonder if he would need to be a plant to get more attention, and found himself constantly reaching for anything green in his wardrobe. It was sad, to be honest. But he couldn’t stop.

  On the sixth day of their meeting, Albert took Michael to the Regent’s Park gardens.

  Michael could tell even before they arrived that this tour was different. There was an eagerness about Albert that outstripped his usual mood. He pointed out trees and shrubs as he always did, but he kept glancing forward, as if he could not wait to arrive.

  It was with some irony that Albert had chosen to show him something special, because today Michael was tired and had a headache. Rodger had made him a present of the newest installment from Dickens, presenting it at night when the only place available to read with gaslight was in Rodger’s office. As he’d read, Michael could hear the sounds of other people’s pleasure. Normally he would have ignored it, but it only made him think of how he received none, and so he’d gone to bed to read by candlelight. Which had strained his eyes. He should be wearing his glasses, and he had been wearing them, right up until Albert had come into the parlor to fetch him. Without them his vision this afternoon was beyond horrible.

  Well, he would pretend he could share in Albert’s delight, as always.

  They came to a large, half-finished glass structure, and they were the only carriage pulling up to the door. Every other vehicle was a wagon clearly designed for service, mostly builders’ carts. Also interesting was that while the scene outside was pure chaos, it didn’t seem to upset Albert in the slightest. In fact, he was beaming as he lightly touched Michael’s elbow and motioned him on to the door. Once there, a workman doffed his cap and bowed as he held the door open for them.

  “Good afternoon, Lord George.”

  Michael glanced at Albert, saw the eagerness blooming brighter and brighter, saw his eyes light up, saw all the nervousness slip away, and even without being told, Michael knew. This place, however much it might belong to the crown, was Albert’s. These were his gardens.

  “The R-Royal So-So-So-Society overs-s-sees these gardens,” Albert explained as he led Michael past builders and toward another door leading into a greenhouse. “It sh-should be open to the p-p-public s-soon.” He glanced at Michael, eyes dancing. “I th-thought you mi-mi-mi-might like an early t-t-t-tour.”

  Michael smiled back. “Of course. Thank you.”

  Albert briefly clasped Michael’s hand. Then he nodded toward the door, let go and led the way. Michael followed.

  The small door was clumsily made, clearly there for temporary purposes only during construction, but it opened into a huge conservatory made entirely of glass and filled, Michael surmised from the loam-and-floral scent that assailed his senses, with plants and flowers. The air was hot and moist, a stark contrast to the cold out of doors. The room was filled with sound as well, a sonorous symphony of hisses and clicks and whirrs, of drips and drops of water and chatters of metal as pipes shifted and banged against glass and pots.

  And color—Michael was blind to detail, but everywhere around him was color, in bright patches and in quick slashes that swayed in the breeze they’d made by opening and closing the door. Reds and oranges that glowed against more shades of green than Michael had known existed.

  Among them moved the tall, well-shaped dark figure that was Albert, whose face, when it came into the partial focus that was the best Michael could do today, looked at him with wicked delight.

  “B-beautiful, isn’t it?” Albert’s voice was hungry and delightfully rough.

  Michael wrapped his arms around himself, blinking against the light and his headache. “Do you work here as well? I mean,” he amended quickly, “do you work with the plants?”

  “Y-yes. I h-help with acqu-qu-qu—” Albert sighed, then shook his head.

  “Acquisitions?” Michael offered helpfully. He tried to ignore the way his heart beat faster when Albert smiled at him and nodded.

  “I h-h-elp with scheduling m-m-m-maintenance too.” His attention had begun to wander back to the greenhouse, and as he led them deeper into the building, he paused to adjust levers or knobs and sometimes stopped for several minutes to record notes in leather journals kept near the plants. When they came to another door to a smaller section of the greenhouse, he grinned devilishly at Michael as he withdrew a key from his pocket.

  “We k-keep the orchids here,” he said, his stammer almost invisible in his excitement. As they stepped forward, he took Michael’s hand, his grip strong and sure.

  Given the build-up, Michael was disappointed. The room was actually quite sparse, housing only a few plants on three shelves off to one side, and between the distance and the glass which covered them—glass misty with condensation—Michael couldn’t understand what the fuss was about. He tried to cover up his reaction. “Rare, are they? Prized flowers?”

  Even without his spectacles, Michael could read the censure in Albert’s countenance. “In f-fact, orchids g-grow on every c-continent in the w-world. B-but without soil.” He crossed to one of the glass jars, stroking it reverently. “And w-we think they m-may be c-crossbred l-like n-no other fl-flower.” He turned back to Michael, his own disappointment clear in his tone. “Y-you d-don’t find them b-beautiful?”

  Michael opened his mouth, ready to lie, to wax rhapsodic on the beauty of the fuzzy pink and white blobs in front of him. He had done well enough all week, feigning that he could see the wonders Albert described. But as he stared at the orchids, the words stuck in his throat. He tried to lean forward, tried to get close enough to actually see. Any other day it would have worked, but today the blooms faded in and out of focus, overlapping one another, aggravating his headache.

  He was tired of it, tired of lying, tired of being surrounded by Albert’s joys and not being able to share. Which was why, his judgment repressed by a pounding head and a foul mood, he confessed the truth.

  “I can’t see them,” he said.

  He could see, just, Albert’s frown. “Wh-Wh-What do you m-m-m-mean?”

  “I mean that I can’t see them.” He gestured vaguely at the jars. “I’m horribly nearsighted on the best of days, and today I have a headache that keeps me even from pretending. I should very much like to see your flowers, my lord, but I can’t. I don’t like to advertise it, but I see so poorly I am practically blind. I can barely see where you are, let alone your flowers.”

  He averted his eyes. He felt empty and very foolish and more exposed than if he’d stood there naked with half the ton looking on.

  A brush at his elbow made him startle, but the tender touch that followed gentled him again.

  “Y-Y-You need sp-sp-sp-spectacles,” Albert said, his voice further gentling.

  Michael felt himself blush. “I have spectacles.” Without thinking, he touched his vest pocket where they lay hidden. “But I look ridiculous in them.”

  Albert laughed, and the sound combined with the soft massage of his thumb against his arm made Michael’s knees go weak. “P-P-Put them on, M-M-Michael.”

  Michael tried to pull away from Albert’s touch but ended up leaning into him slightly instead. “No. I don’t want to look ridiculous, not today.” Not with you.

  Albert stepped closer. Michael shut his eyes as he inhaled the sweet, familiar scent of Albert and shaving soap.

  “Please.”

  Michael started to tell him no but said instead, �
�Kiss me.”

  Neither of them moved. Both Albert and Michael looked at each other in complete surprise, though at least in Michael’s case, there was a bit of terror as well. The words hung between them, impossible to take back. What was wrong with him? Why had he said that? That wasn’t what he meant.

  Except he had. He wanted a kiss. He wanted a kiss desperately, and if he put on his spectacles, certainly Albert would never think of kissing him again.

  Kiss me. Kiss me.

  “Kiss me.” He meant to speak the words this time, but they still startled him, terrified him. He tried to look alluring, tried to play coy lover, but he felt for all the world as he had that first time at school he’d looked at one of the older boys and longed for just this sort of thing. His hands were sweaty, and he couldn’t make himself move, could only grip the edge of the shelf behind him and wait, barely breathing, to see what happened next.

  What happened was that Albert placed his hands on top of Michael’s and bent toward his lips.

  Michael shut his eyes and leaned in to meet him.

  Soft. Albert’s lips were so soft, and the breath of his gentle exhale so hot and full of his spice. Such a sweet, almost innocent kiss, much more innocent than either of them deserved, and it made Michael ache and his head spin. When Albert’s hands traveled up his arms to his neck, Michael tipped his head to the side and tried to deepen the kiss, opening his mouth, but Albert only nipped gently, at first his top lip, then his bottom. Michael whimpered, and he felt Albert smile, brushing their lips again briefly before his tongue stole out and tickled his skin, and then his teeth. Michael’s knees gave out, and Albert held him in place by pressing their pelvises together as his hands slid from Michael’s neck onto his waistcoat…and into his pocket, where they found his glasses, plucked them out and whisked them away. When Michael cried out and tried to reclaim them, Albert stepped back out of his reach.

  Still dizzy, Michael righted himself and aimed an angry finger at Albert. “That was a devil’s trick,” he whispered.