A Certain Latitude (21 page)

Where Cressid lay that night.”

She whirled around, lost her footing and giggled.

“I’ve never seen you drunk before,” Allen said, emboldened by his own tipsiness to address her directly.

“Not as drunk as this. How very debauched we are.” She leaned against March, rubbing her face against his sleeve, and then danced away again. “Which way is the sea, March? I want to see the moonlight on the water.”

“Come then.” March caught her hand. “Let us take this madwoman to the shore, Pendale. I’ll show you the way I discovered through the mangrove trees when I was a boy.”

They seemed to disappear into the dense thicket of greenery—shadow and silver by moonlight—that edged the lawn. But Allen, when he followed, found a winding narrow path. The air was thick with the scent of honeysuckle. For a fleeting moment he wished he were back in England on a summer’s night, before the path plunged steeply downward into a grove of trees that stood in brackish water. A bird, disturbed by the clumsy humans, gave a harsh call. The oyster shells of the path were long gone—now it was a matter of finding footholds among twisted tree roots as the scent of salt became more evident. A cool breeze arose, welcome after the humidity of the garden, and the slope flattened out into tall grasses interspersed by palm trees. The sea lay ahead, a glimmering track laid upon its surface by the moon.

Clarissa gave an exclamation of delight and ran forward onto the white sand, toward the creamy fringes of breaking waves.

“She is … she is quite remarkable,” March murmured.

The remarkable woman, unsteady on one leg like a drunken stork, peeled off her stocking, and then the other, having kicked her shoes aside. Lifting her skirt to her knees, she ran into the water.

“It’s warm!” She splashed in the shallows and waded forward.

“Do you fancy a swim, Pendale?”

He knew that sardonic tone, the challenge in March’s voice.

“A swim only, my lord.”

“Very well.” March tossed his cheroot aside and unbuttoned his coat. “I wonder if we can persuade Miss Onslowe to divest herself of her garments also. It could make for an interesting night.”

“Certainly, although I’d say that was her choice.” Allen pulled his shirt over his head and turned away to unbutton his breeches. No point in flaunting himself at March, although now he wondered whether March had been merely toying with him, trying to shock him.

March, already stripped, ran past him and plunged into the water, splashing Clarissa, who gave a loud squeal.

Allen raced for the water and, ignoring March and Clarissa, waded in. He dived through breaking waves and out beyond, where the water was smooth and gentle. He’d never swum in water so warm and buoyant. He turned onto his back to float, gazing up at the stars, arms and legs spread wide, drunk and content.

“Don’t fall asleep.” March’s voice tickled his ear.

“I won’t.” He plunged beneath the water, seeing the moon distorted and wavery, and below waving weed and pale sand. A small shoal of fish passed by as he swam down, until pressure in his ears forced him upward again. He rose to the surface, shaking water from his hair, and met March’s gaze.

“Damn you, March.” His breathing was fast, faster than it should have been after the relatively short dive. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?” March, treading water, regarded him gravely.

Allen lunged toward March, not sure of his intent, or the other man’s.
Do it, put an end to the tension, do something, you cannot let this go further or even stay where it is, damn him
—his hand closed on March’s shoulder, their legs tangled together underwater.

The kiss was clumsy and intimate, unexpected in its ferocity: he tasted sea, tobacco, brandy, and a darkly pungent arousal. He was shocked enough that he forgot to keep himself afloat, and the two of them sank, entwined, below the surface, where they writhed briefly before surfacing, both of them spluttering.

“Do you seek to drown me?” March raised a trembling hand to push his hair back from his face.

“I don’t know. It might be simpler.” Their mouths collided again with clumsy force. Allen tasted blood—or maybe it was not so, only the taste of seawater.

March’s hand cupped his head, adjusting the angle so their tongues slowed to a lazy underwater dance. He groaned into Allen’s mouth, as his hand—was it hand or Allen’s own?—closed on his cock.

He withdrew his mouth from Allen’s, but with his lips still against his. “I have dreamed of this.”

“And I have tried not to.”

“May I?” March’s hand slid and grasped. Up and down. Knowing the rhythm, the pressure, strong and sure.

Allen made no answer but clasped his own hand around March’s cock. So strange, to have this part that was like, and unlike himself to handle, to stroke, while the sea lapped around them in a gentle caress. They drifted together linked by the touch of hand and tongue, while a pressure built, as inexorable as the tide that pushed them back to the shore and the woman who waited there for them.

Now he withdrew his mouth from March’s. “I’m going to come,” he muttered, embarrassed and thrilled. His arousal was fast enough to shame him, or would have been so with a woman, but March’s skilful touch urged him to climax soon, very soon. There was no need for extended play here, not with a partner equally frantic to climax—he detected between his own fingers the texture of March’s own excitement.

“Come then,” March said. “Now, damn you.”

And he did—saltwater stinging slightly on the sensitive head of his cock as he spurted in March’s hand and his own salty fluid flowed into the sea.

March groaned, thrust against Allen’s hand and released warm and slippery, silk on his fingers. His head drooped briefly onto Allen’s shoulder, his mouth warm against the skin as he took a deep breath and laughed softly.

“You took me entirely by surprise, Pendale.”

“I took myself by surprise.” He felt warm, relaxed.
Safe
. What an extraordinary thing for a grown man to feel, and after an unnatural act. He dropped his arm around March’s shoulders.

“I still like women,” he added, just in case March thought …Well, he wasn’t quite sure what March thought.

“As do I.” March laughed. “Come, I’ll race you back.” He plunged away from Allen, his body slicing through the water, while Allen followed with his less stylish, powerful stroke.

Clarissa was quite grateful she was drunk. Sober, she might have been shocked or appalled at what she heard, or imagined, or wanted to imagine. The men’s voices carried quite clearly over the water, over the gentle break of the surf.

So she was not mistaken. But Allen? A man who was so very, well, masculine? A man she thought she knew. March was no surprise, not after that helpless, lost way he’d stared at Allen earlier.

A dreadful pang of jealousy made her fists clench.
Look at me like that, damn you. I’m your
mistress!
You’re meant to love me!

And then she giggled at her own absurdity. There was nothing in that contract about love, and while you could persuade someone to bed, you could not persuade their heart; or your own, for that matter.

March emerged from the sea first, wading naked through the surf, handsome enough to break her heart. He was doing that, certainly.

“Oh,” she said. “I know how those silly girls in antiquity felt when a god visited them.” She stepped forward to remove a slick of seaweed from his dripping chest, letting her fingers slide downward. “You’re so beautiful, March. It really isn’t fair.”

He laughed and caught her in his arms. His genitals stirred against her damp skirts. “May I strip you here and now, Miss Onslowe?”

“If you wish.” She placed her palms on his damp back. “How do you intend to dry yourself?”

“Please, do not let me interrupt anything of import.” Allen, strong and dark—a wave of nostalgia washed through her—wandered over to his pile of clothes, and shook his head like a dog. Drops of seawater gleamed like quicksilver.

March grinned. “We’ll dry off eventually. Meanwhile you should avert your eyes, my dear.”

“Whatever for?” Didn’t he know Allen had been her lover? No matter.

She broke their embrace and took March’s hand in hers, reaching for Allen’s with the other. “We must talk, sirs.” She giggled a little at the formality she naturally assumed, particularly with what she was about to announce.

Allen dropped the shirt he was about to pull over his head and took her hand.

Miss Clarissa Onslowe, once an almost respectable housekeeper, then a briefly respectable governess, held the hands of two naked men by the light of the full moon. She glanced at them both: March, lean and muscled like a greyhound, or some other thoroughbred animal: and Allen, stocky and powerful; each beautiful in their own way. They could represent air and earth, and she the fire that would ignite them, here, with water as witness.

“We three are shackled together like your slaves. I to you, March, Allen to me, and you to Allen. It is such a pity we are each in love with the one who cannot reciprocate.”

March stared at her. “Clarissa, I—”

“Do not you dare to feel pity for me, March!”

He shook his head. “I was about to say you are the bravest woman I know, to openly state such a thing.”

She laughed with a note of hysteria that she did her best to suppress. “Well, it’s a pity I don’t have a cock, March.”

“I’m quite glad you don’t,” Allen said. His own stirred, very gently as he smiled at her. “And I can only agree with March.” Very slowly, he reached out his hand to March, who, with the slightest hesitation, closed his own hand around it.

“So,” Allen said. “I’m sorry, March.”

“Ah, don’t be maudlin. We are all three of us sorry, and what I have to suggest may make us sorrier yet, but I see no alternative.” Clarissa smiled at them both. “I think we should all go to bed together.”

“Absolutely not!” Allen broke his hands free, backed away, and reached for his clothes. His stride, as he walked away, approximated a drunken attempt to retreat with dignity on uneven sand.

“He has such a lovely arse,” Clarissa commented, too much claret and brandy making her feel quite tragic at his retreat.

March cleared his throat. “Indeed. Well, I’m afraid your idea, although extraordinarily arousing, has fallen on deaf ears.”

“Possibly we can persuade him otherwise.” She stroked her hand down his chest and belly.

March’s cock, eager as he might be for another man, lifted slightly.

“Ah…the sand…” So this wasn’t the first time he’d fornicated on a beach.

“We’ll use my gown and petticoat.”

“You’re so practical, my dear.” He unbuttoned her gown as he spoke, bending his head to kiss her. He whispered into her mouth, “Can you see him?”

“He’s stopped. I think he thinks we can’t see him. He’s in the shadows.”

They made short work of her petticoat, stays, and shift, spreading the cotton garments onto the sand, but remained standing.

She cupped March’s cock in the palm of her hand. “He’s watching.”

“Capital.” He weighed her breasts in his hands, his thumbs chafing her swollen nipples. He raised his voice slightly. “If there were another man present, Clarissa, what would you like him to do?”

“I think I’d like him to lick me while you do that.”

“Anything else?” He nipped her ear, whispering, “Is he still there?”

“Yes. His cock is hard now.”

“And…?”

“He looks a little…exasperated. He’s scratching his ballocks.”

“Turn so I can see.” He raised his voice. “So, as I touch you here…you would like it to be another man’s tongue? You’re exceedingly wet. I think you’d drench his face.”

She gave a lustful groan that was not entirely feigned, her hand sliding on March’s cock. He had hardened considerably. With her free hand, she took March’s hand and slid his fingers, one by one, into her mouth.

From the shadows she heard a muffled curse.

“Oh, very well.” A spray of sand announced Allen’s arrival. He flung his clothes onto the sand and scowled at them both.

“A little enthusiasm might be in order,” Clarissa commented. “March, please stop laughing. It is not helping.”

“Don’t think you’ll get up my arse,” Allen said.

“I wouldn’t dream of it. I’m not even sure how I’d do it.” She tried to look shocked at his suggestion.

“Not you, you ninny. March.” With the expression of a man about to face his execution, he dropped to his knees and moaned. “Open your quim, for the love of God. I want to taste you.”

It was March who held her open, whose hand dropped to Allen’s head in a brief caress.

Allen’s tongue flicked right where she wanted him, causing her to moan aloud and clutch at March’s arms for support. March smiled as he stroked and kneaded her breasts, her legs quivering.

“I—I—can’t…” She wanted to say that she could stand no more, that her impending orgasm robbed her of all strength elsewhere, but March scooped her into his arms.

“Now,” he said. He laid her on the pile of crumpled linen, spreading her legs wide, and knelt before her. His cock hovered, rubbed against her, pushed inside her and she clenched on him, hard.

“Take me in your mouth.” Allen, his voice rough with lust, knelt over her, facing March. His hands pinched and stroked her nipples.

She took him, choking a little at his eagerness, the avidity with which he invaded her mouth, his sheer girth and weight, salty from the sea. Wiry hair tickled her nose, his belly close to her face. She wanted to see more; she wanted more of everything, the plunge of March inside her, the urgent thrusts and fierce caresses of both men.

With an effort she disengaged her mouth from Allen. “Kneel beside me,” she gasped. “I want to see what you do.”

He obliged, swaying gently on his knees as he stroked his cock into her mouth.

March moved forward, kissing her breasts, her shoulders. “I’ll take him.”

Allen groaned as his cock slid from her mouth and into March’s. Both men’s bellies were taut, poised, both of them groaning deep in their throats—and she joined them as she came, clenching again and again on March’s cock, helpless, drowning.