“Put your hands over your head, and grasp one wrist in the other,” said Joachim, half expecting a haughty sneer.
“Over my head?” Ainsley’s voice was cloudy with sleep or confusion or lust.
“Over your head.” Joachim took Ainsley’s wrists in one hand and held them toward the headboard. He kicked off the blankets with his foot so he could see what the beautiful man looked like stretched and compliant in the shadow of the morning’s light.
“Don’t move them,” he said, his lips grazing Ainsley’s mouth. The ginger opened his lips and murmured for Joachim to kiss deeper, but he wasn’t going to let Graham be in charge.
Because he didn’t want this to be over in ten minutes or an hour. Not when the last time in the tent was the most enjoyable experience he’d ever had. When he went back to Durham and was offered the professorship, he’d have to be extremely careful for the rest of his life, so he might as well enjoy the here and now.
He sucked Ainsley’s lower lip past his teeth and tugged so Ainsley raised his chest and then hips in a fluid motion. Cockburn put his mouth to his lover’s ear. “You don’t get to move at all.”
The sharp intake of breath went straight to the older man’s prick.
“Not at all?”
Using his forehead to turn Ainsley’s head to the side, Joachim dropped his mouth to those sharp, peaked nipples. “Not at all. And no noise.” He licked one and then the other and then chose one to roll between his teeth. Ainsley moaned, chest heaving as though he needed to arch his back.
Breathtaking. But he couldn’t obviously relish it.
Joachim lifted his head. “What did I say about noise?”
A hint of an outraged squeak and then nothing but heavy breathing as Joachim’s kisses kept Ainsley taut as a bowstring. He nipped a trail down the soft hair from the ginger’s navel to his cock, hard as iron, begging for attention.
Which it didn’t get.
Joachim behaved as though it wasn’t there, laving his tongue in the hollows of Ainsley’s hipbones and the soft skin of his thighs.
“Spread your legs,” he said, not lifting his mouth. Immediately, the legs widened. “I’m going to ask one thing, and you may answer that, but nothing else, do you understand?” Joachim flicked his tongue over the head of Ainsley’s prick, once.
Ainsley nodded, his smile twisting up his cheek.
“Do you have any oils? Any lubricant, or will I have to use what I have on hand?”
Ainsley’s hips bucked up at that, but Joachim pressed them down with his forearm. This game was wicked in a way he’d not have imagined. Good Lord, Graham liked to be told what to do.
The ache in his balls proved he enjoyed giving the orders just as much.
“In the bag.” There was an aching desperation in the younger man’s voice that hardened Joachim’s own resolve. Though it was amazingly hard already.
Joachim padded over to the rucksack, reveling in Ainsley’s eyes trained on him. He’d started working with the weights as part of his PT after the war, and found that the exertion fed him endorphins that kept him from despair. Ainsley openly stared in a heartening way, and Joachim tensed his muscles to make them even more noticeable.
It was nice being the one looked at with obvious desire. Thank God his brief moment of tenderness the previous evening hadn’t turned the ginger off.
Joachim milked his performance for the rapt man on the bed and took his time, unclasping the latch, rummaging through for the small bottle of viscous fluid. He turned back and allowed the hungry eyes to sweep over his body. Appreciated the hint of alarm when they dropped to his half-mast erection, which had made some men timid in the past.
Settling back between his lover’s thighs, spread too wide to be comfortable for the poor young man, he unscrewed the lid with his teeth. Joachim pillowed his head on one hard leg, as if he couldn’t be bothered that there was a fully erect cock in his peripheral vision.
Joachim slicked oil on the fingers of one hand. “Do men fuck you, my beautiful Dr. Graham?”
Ainsley blinked, face wary as if unsure if he was allowed to speak. He nodded, once.
“Do you enjoy that?”
Delicate nostrils flared. But then his gray eyes glittered, and that saucy smile unfurled across his lips. He lifted one shoulder and his eyebrows.
Ainsley exposed his tight hole by spreading his legs. Joachim ran his oiled finger against it, pressing to see how much give there was. Enough to not feel guilty and snug enough that he needed to imagine something besides the growing need to bury himself there, or he’d lose his chance all over the sheets.
Graham’s chest glistened with a sheen of sweat and rose and fell with a quicker rhythm than before. Joachim pushed his finger past the knuckle to the V where his next began.
“Will you enjoy it if I fuck you?” Ainsley’s prick was perched on his bottom lip. Joachim reached his tongue out for a broad lick so his saliva mingled with the precum that began to drip as soon as he fingered Ainsley’s arse. “You may answer that, by the way.”
Ainsley expelled a deep breath. “God, yes.”
Joachim pressed a second finger into Ainsley and scissored them before curling up his finger and stroking his prostate.
A deep groan shook through the slender body under his control. “I don’t want your fingers.” Ainsley’s eyes squeezed shut and his shoulders rose from the bed. “Please?”
“Shh.” Joachim’s teeth clamped down on the soft skin of the younger man’s abdomen. “The only thing you’ll decide is how much oil goes on my prick to make it easier for me to fuck you, and then you’ll raise your hands back again, do you understand?”
Unclenching his hands, Ainsley nodded and with shaking fingers slathered oil on Joachim’s erection. Blessedly, he was allowed to make noise because he couldn’t have controlled the low growl that burbled up from the pit of his belly.
Task complete, Ainsley rolled halfway and set the bottle on the side table, his hand shaking so hard it tipped over the oil and Joachim had to lunge and catch it before it hit the floor.
Affected, are we? It was good to know that Joachim wasn’t the only one.
“Hands back up, and no noise, right?” Had anyone asked last week if Joachim could find the will to be so dictatorial to a godlike man in his bed, he’d have hidden his face in mortification.
It was surprisingly easy now that he had the chance to try it out.
Ainsley gripped his wrist with the circle of his other hand. Scooting to his knees, Joachim pushed Graham’s trim thighs up and back, canting his hole to be accessible. He continued the leisurely slip of his fingers in and out and bit down on one thigh, scratching his beard across the ginger’s skin. Then he dropped one hand to the side of Ainsley’s shoulder, the other grasping his lubricated prick and swiping it across the tight ring.
Ainsley whimpered in the back of his throat when Joachim pushed the head of his cock inside his lover. “Am I hurting you?” he asked, lips hovering over lips.
The reply was a farther tilt backward of Ainsley’s hips to accommodate Joachim’s cock.
All he wanted to do was press all the way in, but the white lines radiating from Ainsley’s pinched mouth held him back until he could ease in without causing pain.
Fucking hell, he was so tight and warm and perfect.
But even silenced and self-shackled, Ainsley took some control. Ankles hitched around the backs of Joachim’s thighs and pulled him all the way to the hilt. His back arched off the bed and he chewed on his lower lip so hard he might draw blood.
“Again,” begged Ainsley, his arms going to Joachim’s back and scratching.
“Put your hands back where I told you.” Joachim stopped moving until Ainsley obeyed, shooting Cockburn a heavy scowl. But he did exactly that.
Bracing an arm under Ainsley’s hips, Joachim went to his knees and thrust into
the trembling redhead at the perfect angle so his eyes literally rolled to the back of his head. It was all Joachim could do to keep from unloading right then.
But he could hold back until Ainsley pleaded with him for release because holy hell—there was no prettier sight on earth than watching that high-and-mighty man fall apart in his arms.
Chapter Fourteen
Ainsley
If Joachim’s enormous cock split him in two, he’d spend the rest of eternity haunting the bugger.
Instead of Cockburn rutting, thrusting, fucking, he pushed and pulled Ainsley’s thighs up and down the bed like he was a plaything. God, wasn’t the fucking truth of that name no joke?
Fuuuuuuuuuck.
He.
Couldn’t.
Even.
Think.
Wouldn’t be able to walk for a week after this. Never wanted to get out of this bed. Never ever.
“You’re allowed to move your hands, Dr. Graham.” Joachim lifted him off the bed and twisted so he rammed his prick...fuck fuck fuck...right there.
God, he was a bastard, wasn’t he? In the best way. Because perhaps Ainsley could move his hands, but the only thing he could touch was himself.
Which he did as soon as he realized it. But no use, really, because every time he found his rhythm, Joachim changed the speed, and he was too full of the man’s prick to even try to keep up.
Joachim clenched his bottom lip in his teeth and still managed to leer down with the most wolfish look he’d ever seen in his life. “Kiss me.”
Ainsley panted like he’d run a marathon, even though Cockburn was the one exerting all the energy. He was getting the cotton bedclothes equivalent of rug burn and a stretched-to-the-limits arsehole.
How old was Cockburn? Thirty? Thirty-one? He was so fucking fit: all glistening muscles curving hard under that luxurious pelt over his pectorals. Whatever—he let go of Ainsley’s thighs and dropped his weight onto the chest of the heaving man under him. His hands dragged through Ainsley’s hair and gripped as hard as everything else the man gave him.
His tongue was as domineering as his cock and Ainsley gave up. Allowed himself to be utterly used for Cockburn’s pleasure, which was the most delicious sensation he’d ever had.
All he could do was cling to Joachim’s neck, legs circling his waist, and pray the fucking bed didn’t break.
Finally...lifetimes later...he gave one long, last, shuddering groan and came as powerfully as all the rest of it. Joachim’s head hung low, as if he no longer had a lick of energy. From the sticky feel of his bum, the bugger had spurted every last ounce of it out, so no wonder.
But when he lifted his head, and gently pulled out—as though belatedly worried that he might hurt Ainsley—he stroked his face with that tender expression that made Ainsley’s belly curdle.
Or at least, he was sure he’d seen that sentimental look that he despised. But when he blinked, it had disappeared, and Sergeant Major Blowhard was back, fisting Ainsley’s cock once or twice before standing and stretching.
“We’d best go back and get the tent. You don’t imagine anyone’s stolen it, do you?”
What about me? Ainsley’s mouth dropped open, too outraged to even splutter.
Joachim splashed water from the basin over his face and neck. Found a towel and cleaned off his prick and began to dress without even giving Ainsley a backward fucking glance.
He pounded the bed.
Cockburn turned, grinning so his back teeth showed, and tossed Ainsley a wet rag. He winked, like that slight bit of charm would make up for the damned fury Ainsley was about to unleash. As soon as he could muster the fucking energy.
“Will we search out more ghosts in the Highlands, Dr. Graham, or will we motor back south?”
“You’re a bastard,” he managed.
“My mother’d have your neck for that, sir. Their marriage was recorded at the parish office years before I came onto the scene.” He walked back to the bed and dropped to his knees. Crawled across to Ainsley and kissed him once more. Gave another twist and tug to his cock.
And then he stood.
“I hope you’ll not mind my experiment? I’ve a strong suspicion you’ll be able to focus better today because the back of your mind will be occupied with that swell of frustration.” He got the key from the bureau and unlocked the door. “Shall I have them save your breakfast?”
God, why wasn’t there anything to fucking throw at the smug bugger? And he did fucking mind, thank you very much.
He stuck out his tongue at the closed door like he had when he was a boy and was sent to his room.
Reduced to that.
Fucking hell.
* * *
A few hours later, there was an unusual spring in Ainsley’s step considering his arse was on fire. But Joachim singing Let’s Misbehave twice through on the way to Barley’s rather seedy little shop off a side street in Edinburgh’s Old Town had put a grin back on his face.
The man’s voice was much better than the one singing on Ainsley’s gramophone record. And conveniently, he could take Joachim in the motorcar. The Geordie needed to learn a whole repertoire of songs and Ainsley could cart him around anytime he needed to drive somewhere and be quite content.
Only their fling would be over, because once Joachim witnessed the next ghost, the Englishman couldn’t pretend they weren’t real. Joachim could head back to his dreary life after tomorrow, and that was fine by him.
It was, indeed. After the fiasco with the lecture, and losing his position...and earning the contempt of bloody Campbell...well, he’d never entertain the idea of any man in his bed more than once.
It was adorable the way Joachim waggled his eyebrows and winked at Ainsley over some of the more provocative lyrics, as though he wasn’t entirely too sensible to sing on a city street.
Perhaps Ainsley could amend his new rules about solitary encounters a wee bit. Men as fuckable as Cockburn could have a few extra sessions.
“What sorts of things does your friend Alec Barley sell in his shop?” asked Joachim as they made the last bit of the trip on foot. Ainsley never found a place to park closer than Grassmarket. Cockburn kept speed over the cobblestones even though his stick caught once or twice. Ainsley slowed down. There was no need to walk at such a brisk pace, after all.
“He sells himself.”
The hulk stopped in his tracks. “Pardon?”
“You’ll see.” Ainsley inclined his head toward the thoroughfare. “That’s where they used to burn witches. I almost thought they were going to cart my scrawny arse up here and lash me to a pyre when I gave that lecture.” He did his best to laugh.
“I’m selfishly grateful that they didn’t.” Joachim leaned his head in so his voice tickled Ainsley’s eardrum. “And your arse isn’t scrawny, I promise.”
A strange tingle glimmered from the base of Ainsley’s skull all down his spine.
Perhaps he’d let him stay an extra day.
Barley’s shop was tucked between a greengrocer’s and a tobacconist’s; which was a coincidence since Barley smoked and was a vegetarian. He smoked because he was restless. He was a vegetarian because he could hear dogs and cats, and probably budgies, though they must have been rotten to listen to because their brains were quite small, weren’t they? Violet always gave Ainsley somewhat affronted looks after she’d met with Barley, as though Ainsley wasn’t listening to her views on what the king said in his speech to Parliament.
He watched Joachim’s reaction to the shop with guarded curiosity. Barley was his very dearest friend and the person he loved best in the world after Trixie. And Freddy, his nephew, he supposed, but if Ainsley were in a tragic boat sinking like the Titanic and he had room for only one more on his life raft and had to choose between Barley and Freddy...well, Trixie would likely never speak to him again. But Freddy was eleven and rather
horrid, so it was his own fault if he drowned.
Dear Lord, was that how Stuart thought of Ainsley? That he’d be the one left in the icy water to drown?
He’d never take any sort of excursion with Stuart or Freddy, so he’d never be put into such a dreadful situation and find out.
“Hermetica?” Joachim shifted his weight and pursed his lips. “Is that an actual word?”
Ainsley shrugged. He’d never asked. The block letters on the window had been a bright gold leaf five years back when Barley had first opened, now they were flat and worn down. In the corner, however, was a sign in beautiful script that read: Divination by appointment, with the hours listed next to each day of the week, barring Sundays. Though Barley was not a churchgoer, palm-reading on Sundays wouldn’t sit well with his neighbors.
A bell tinkled when they opened the red-painted door that matched the garish red carpet. Well, maybe not garish. His trousers featured the same bright scarlet and they were...perhaps a bit over the top, but he liked plaid. It was one of his signatures.
To be known as a crank was one thing, but no one could say he didn’t have panache.
“Barley, are you back there?” he shouted, running his finger along the edge of the gold tablecloth. It covered the clichéd round table that Barley said was strictly unnecessary for a real psychic but was expected by the clientele. His gran’s antique crystal ball was not there, which was good because anyone could come in off the street and pinch it with Barley nowhere in attendance.
But he flew in from the back room when he heard the bell, or them calling out. “Heavens, what a terrific shock, Ainsley. What are you doing in town?”
Thank goodness Barley was there. The ever-present gnawing in the back of Ainsley’s mind was beginning to grow louder. Visits to the cozy shop—or specifically chats with his dear friend—were a pleasant way to soothe him.
Barley set down the teacup in his hand with a worrisome clink and grasped Ainsley’s hand and arm as he always did, and like always; it wrapped a warm, fuzzy rug around his heart.
Best Laid Plaids (Kilty Pleasures) Page 10
