Best Laid Plaids (Kilty Pleasures)

by Ella Stainton

  He took a deep breath. “Wondering what to write my next book on. I’ve realized that I do miss research and losing myself in studying.”

  There. He’d said it out loud twice now. No going back.

  The itch was unbearable.

  Out of his peripheral vision, he saw Joachim swallow hard, and he gripped Ainsley’s hand so hard it nearly hurt. “That pleases me to no end. You’ve too fine a brain to allow it to molder away and rot.”

  Bugger, hadn’t he done exactly that? How hadn’t he noticed, and why had everyone allowed it?

  But bless the man; he didn’t ask why, or take him to task, or act bothered by any of it other than he was pleased that perhaps Ainsley was working through it finally.

  “Your hands are gripping that wheel tightly, Dr. Graham. Can I help?”

  I must run and lose this restlessness before I scream.

  “Heavens, man, then pull the car over and do it.” As if it was the only correct answer.

  Bugger—he’d said it out loud? He took a curve too fast and in the rain, the Austin’s tires ran over rocks and broken twigs on the side of the road.

  “Ainsley, stop the car.” Cockburn was firm, but not unkind.

  He found a shoulder and parked. His breathing was too fast for the activity. “I just...” But he was helpless to put into words what he just.

  “Do you wish for company?” Joachim’s eyes were calm. Not bothered. Placid water. No hidden monsters.

  What a fucking relief. But the tightness of his skin was choking him. And he would like the company. He’d like Joachim to tell him what to do so he could breathe again, but that would come off as utterly pathetic.

  “No. But—”

  “I’m fine.” Cockburn motioned his head like a mother goose pushing a gosling into the lake.

  He didn’t think further and slipped from the car. Violet wasn’t a moment behind and he didn’t even bother to shut the door because his feet moved as soon as they hit the ground. Pounded in inappropriate shoes that would be destroyed after this and he couldn’t care less.

  Bugger bugger bugger, what Cockburn must think of him behaving like a feral animal. But he was sometimes, and there was no help for it.

  Damned decent Joachim, who’d give up everything he’d worked toward to help Ainsley regain his reputation—not that it would probably help in the long run. Just destroy another career.

  Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuuuuuuuuuuck.

  Ducking under trees and branches and watching the ground for things that could trip him, he ran for who knows how long. Until he lost some of the itch. Was able to stop thinking about all the decisions he faced. And then there was the river, and he couldn’t run farther, even if he wished to.

  He sat down, right on the grass. The tide came in and he gulped down fresh air, cooled from the river. Was lulled by the tide long enough to stop thinking so hard.

  It was perfect here. No one, no houses, no boats. Only him and Violet and the water and he lay back and watched the clouds blow in the darkening sky after the rain stopped.

  * * *

  And somehow, he fell asleep.

  Fuck fuck fuck.

  It was dark when he reopened his eyes, and he was paralyzed and unable to go back because each minute that passed made it that much more difficult to explain. He was back into a bit of a frenzy, half hoping that Joachim would take the car and leave and he wouldn’t have to find words.

  Violet thumped her tail and stood.

  A torch shone on the sand a few feet ahead. “I wondered if you had a problem with my new aftershave tonic.” There was a laugh in Joachim’s voice. He walked to Ainsley. “Sit up.”

  He did. Was about to stand and search for a way to apologize, but Cockburn sat behind him, legs around his hips and arms tight around his chest.

  “You’re freezing, Dr. Graham.” But it was casual, no reproach.

  Ainsley hadn’t noticed he was shivering until he wasn’t any longer.

  Joachim hummed in his ear until he could find words again. It might have been a minute, or an hour, but the blood stopped pounding so loudly and he fit back inside himself.

  “I beg your pardon,” Ainsley murmured, once he found his voice.

  “For what? I’ve been in your space for days and days and you’re not used to that.”

  He leaned back into Cockburn’s shoulder and nodded. “It’s not that so much as...bugger. Have you ever been too big for your skin?”

  Cockburn sighed, but not like he was annoyed or exasperated, but like he understood. “I’ve not thought of it that way, but yes. To me it’s more like being too heavy for my body; like I’m a misshapen hunk of lead. I suppose it’s the same—or close to it.” He kissed Ainsley’s throat in a casual way. “I wish I could run and get it out of my system, but I can’t. So I get short-tempered and even a bit cruel sometimes. My sister, Elin, sends me away in disgust until I can behave again.”

  “Cruel how?” He tilted his head back to look at Joachim, but he stared out to the sea.

  “I’ll say things that hurt people as if it might make me feel better. It never does.”

  The wool of Cockburn’s jumper scratched his cheek, but it wasn’t like the itch before. That was gone. It was nice to know the older man wasn’t all Battenberg cake and marzipan. “When I was young, my mother would send me out of the house to run if I got too manic.”

  “It’s good that you still do it. I work with weights until I make my muscles ache and I can’t remember how... I felt. But come now. You’re wet and it’s cold and God knows how long it will take me to get back up that blasted hill to the car.” Joachim got to his feet awkwardly and held out his hand to Ainsley to grasp it.

  “Are you cross with me?” For some reason, Ainsley was too raw to have Joachim vexed.

  His companion brushed their lips together. “Not in the slightest, though I hope you don’t make a habit out of it when we’re out driving, because that was dull. Not unbearable, but better if I’d had a book. I’ll bring one next time, in case.” Joachim took a step back, but continued to clutch Ainsley’s hand in his. It was warm and dry and comforting. His voice cracked for some unfathomable reason. “I’m hungry, how about you?”

  Ainsley pressed their fingers together. God, he hadn’t held anyone like that since he was small.

  But it felt right, and he didn’t wish to let go.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Joachim

  They’d hardly pulled into the rounded drive at Rosethorne when the door opened and the impertinent Nelson was down the steps, lifting the boot open.

  “Good evening, Sir. Mr. Cockburn.”

  For the long walk back to the car and throughout the drive back, Ainsley had held his hand. But perhaps once they got to his house where he was comfortable, or perhaps because he didn’t wish to make a show in front of the staff, he dropped it.

  Ugh.

  “Dear Lord, Ainsley—please tell me you’re finally home and that’s not someone coming to remind us we’re packed and ready for Hell, or sell encyclopedias?” It was a woman’s voice from the great room, tinged with humor—and possibly booze—that rang like little tinkling bells.

  “It’s me, and...” Ainsley’s eyes ran up and down Cockburn with a sly smile. “And my dear friend Joachim Cockburn.”

  The way he said it set little flags of pleasure waving all over Joachim’s body, like the launching of a new ship decked out in happiness.

  The lights were dim, low music playing in the corner. A drained cut-glass tumbler sat on the coffee table next to a near-empty decanter. A woman’s slender feet clad in nothing but patterned stockings crossed at the ankle over a sofa arm. At the sight of Joachim, she sat up so quickly she nearly toppled from her seat.

  “Unexpected—I didn’t know you were bringing someone home.” The almost terrifyingly pretty woman with bobbed chestnu
t hair in marcel waves glared at Graham.

  Her face transformed into a huge smile as she took in Joachim. “Please tell me I’m having a lovely dream with a happy ending?” She slunk over the carpet to Joachim, red-varnished hand out. Voice heady. “How do you do? I’m Trixie.”

  Ainsley elbowed his way in between. “Retract your claws, Trix. He’s mine.”

  “Where on earth did you find him, and are there any more?” She walked around Joachim, eyeing him up and down like a Thoroughbred stud. Her fingernails tracked across his shoulder.

  “Draw your teeth back in, darling, you’re not luring him into your web. He likes cock.” Ainsley bowed his chest out like he was about to pounce.

  Joachim squeezed his eyes shut in mortification.

  “Bloody hell, Ainsley—I wish you could follow a metaphor through to its conclusion and not skip all over the place. It breaks my concentration.” Trixie was back to Joachim’s front view and she blinked at him, the same gray eyes but with some sort of paint on her lashes making them even more luminous than Ainsley’s. “You’re a beast.”

  She pinched Ainsley’s cheek, so he growled. “And you’re luckier than you deserve.”

  After slithering back to her semi-recumbent perch on the sofa cushions, she raised her glass. “I need a refill, darling.”

  “I doubt it,” Ainsley mumbled as he did it anyway. Nearly to the brim. “And he’s not a beast—he’s Stuart’s friend from the war.” He winked at Joachim. “Actually, that’s a bit of a lie. Let me leave it at, he’s Stuart’s friend from the war.”

  “Sir, where shall Mr. Cockburn’s things go?” Dear Lord, the butler was listening, too. Joachim had never been so ready to sink into the ground and never reemerge.

  “My mother’s room,” Ainsley said, raising his eyebrows to Joachim with a fresh glass in his hand.

  The red-faced man shook his head.

  Ainsley shut the crystal bottle. “It’s connected to mine.”

  And probably housed a ghost with Joachim’s luck. Good Lord, Ainsley Graham was making him lose all vestiges of sanity.

  “Is there any supper left?” Ainsley asked his sister.

  She gestured toward the decanter. “I made my way through about five courses of it, but you can have my share of dessert.”

  “Generous to a fault, aren’t you?” Ainsley patted the sofa opposite his sister, and after removing his shoes, which still had bits of twig and wet leaf from his trek through the woods, lifted his feet to the coffee table.

  Joachim was half-minded to follow his bag to the bedroom and wait to see if his embarrassment would recede. But, like a bloody moth to a flame, he sat next to Ainsley, who gestured for him to remove his shoes, as well.

  So unorthodox—Elin might die if he ever behaved this way.

  But once he did, Ainsley pulled Joachim’s feet to his lap and started twisting away at the pain in his ankle, and it was so soothing, he forgot to be annoyed.

  As if stung by a bee, Trixie sat up and narrowed her eyes at Joachim. “Stuart’s friend? The one coming to cement your place in history as a complete idiot?”

  Ainsley’s face settled into smugness. “The very one.”

  Trixie pouted. “I was supposed to entertain him, not you.”

  “I’m quite sure he prefers my sort of entertainment, don’t you, Cockburn?” Ainsley’s eyes smoldered.

  Joachim looked from one to the other and would have fled if Ainsley wasn’t making his leg feel...the way it did before it had been mangled.

  “Greedy. Like when you were a child.” Trixie tossed her brother a teasing smile. “Mr. Cockburn, is it? Now I’m sure this is a particularly unsatisfying dream, but I’ll play along. When Ainsley was a child and our mother would bring us each home a bag of sweets, he’d go through and lick each of them so he’d end up with them all. Can you imagine?”

  “I’m sure he can picture it very easily,” purred Ainsley, giving him a pointed look.

  Cockburn swung his feet down. “It’s all too much for me, good night.” He stood.

  Ainsley grabbed his hand and pulled. “Did you hear how he said mooch, Trix? I adore it. You sit back down. I promise we’ll stop teasing you.”

  Trixie rolled to her side, her short, silky skirt dripping over her legs like a waterfall. “We will.” There was a fair bit of contrition in her voice that didn’t match the wicked gleam in her eye.

  Trying to imagine stodgy Stuart Graham sharing Easter breakfast with his pair of siblings was...impossible, frankly.

  But Ainsley had said he adored Joachim’s accent, which gave him a sharp, tight thrill in his gut.

  “Will cottage pie be sufficient, Sir?” asked Nelson from the door.

  Cutting his eyes to Joachim’s, Ainsley nodded and answered for them both. “And we’ll have some lemonade, too. Or ginger beer, if there’s any?”

  Joachim leaned back against the arm of the sofa and shut his eyes, listening to brother and sister chat about the following night’s dinner party, allowing the easing of his ankle to bring him close to sleep.

  He roused himself enough to eat, and then it was past ten and Trixie bid them both an elaborate good-night as she wove unsteadily across the room.

  Only two nights left with his Dr. Graham. Shite. How could he bear it?

  Ainsley licked clotted cream from his finger suggestively. Restored from his catnap and meal, Joachim stood. “Right. I’m going to bed, and you’re coming with me.”

  “At the same time?” Ainsley went from sitting to wrapped around Joachim in less than a heartbeat. A now hammering pulse keeping time with the long clock in the corner.

  “I haven’t decided yet.” Joachim took the younger man’s face in his hands and kissed him in a wash of scones and cream and Ainsley.

  He shivered in his arms. “You’re a bit of a brute, did you know?”

  Nipping at the throat bared for him, Joachim nodded. Reached his hands up the back of Ainsley’s jumper. “And I’m feeling particularly brutish tonight after that hike you took me on.”

  “Promise?” His ginger clung tighter. “I’ll hold you to it.”

  Somehow, they got up the stairs in record time and Ainsley pulled him to a bedroom at the back of the house. A series of windows took up much of the back wall, blue silk draperies that matched the bedclothes covering them.

  Joachim had his jumper off in one movement and tossed it to a chair before lounging longways across the bed, propped up on his elbows.

  Ainsley stood between his knees, head tilted to the side, as if waiting further instruction. Dear Lord, their role-playing was addictive. Intense greedy pleasure flared through Joachim’s pelvis.

  “Take all your clothes off except your flannels, Dr. Graham.” Joachim’s voice was as firm as his cock, which Ainsley eyed hungrily.

  A slight tremble shook Ainsley’s shoulders as he complied. Argyll socks first, followed by his tie and jumper, shirt, and then plus-four trousers. His pants tented slightly, but not like they would. Joachim wanted to run his tongue through all the trails and grooves of those sleek muscles.

  “Now, take my clothes off,” he said, glad his voice didn’t hitch the way his emotions did.

  Ainsley practically fell onto the buttons on Joachim’s neck, popping one off in his haste. He dropped his lips to the Englishman’s neck with a moan.

  “No kissing until I tell you.” His tone wasn’t sharp, but it didn’t need to be.

  Dear Lord those eyes knew how to beg. But the younger man did as told, and took off Joachim’s shirt, folding it with cheeky lethargy, followed by his socks and trousers. So slow, as if he knew it would make Joachim a bit desperate.

  Which it did.

  Ainsley hesitated over Joachim’s pants, but Cockburn lifted his hips to make it an easy removal. His ginger’s fingers trembled when he pulled the fabric off his straining prick. Licked his li
ps at the beads of moisture leaking from the tip. It took an almost insurmountable force of will not to drag Graham onto his cock and fuck until he came, but that wasn’t his intention.

  Not yet.

  He stood and circled Ainsley oh so slowly, his fingertip dragging over the planes of his muscles so the skin underneath peaked and shuddered.

  “Fetch your oil and then on the bed.”

  His ginger opened a drawer in a bedside table and handed him a bottle. He banished any other men who might have used it from his mind as soon as his lover stretched out. Joachim lengthened along his body. “Hands up.”

  Ainsley wriggled with an electric sort of happiness that shone in his eyes and the way he didn’t quite manage to hold back his grin and held one wrist in the other hand’s grip.

  Not ready for the oil, Cockburn pressed two fingers into Ainsley’s mouth, and he licked down the knuckles and calluses as greedily as he’d sucked Joachim’s cock. God in heaven, he could watch for hours and not get bored with the way his cheeks sucked in and the soft rasp of his tongue.

  But he wanted all of Ainsley, and wanted him now. Whilst keeping his hand in his lover’s mouth but scooting lower, Joachim drew hard, open lips up the shaft of Ainsley’s cock, over the fabric. Again and again until Graham’s heels dug into the coverlet to give him purchase to lift his hips. Begging begging begging with those eyes. How was he going to survive without seeing them again? Best not to think of that now.

  Instead, his mouth traced the lines of Ainsley’s abdominal muscles one by one, his hand pumping a wee bit faster. His mouth circled higher and he brushed his tongue along one nipple before pressing it hard between his lips.

  “Christ on a...fuck...can I make noise?”

  Joachim adored the high-pitched pleading the man was reduced to. Adored.

  “Please.” He wanted to hear all the gorgeous misery he was putting his ginger through. Something to think about years from now, if he ever got lonely.

  Each plaintive little whine made it harder for Joachim to restrain himself, but he’d spent two hours sitting in the car dreaming about keeping Ainsley on edge for as long as he could.