A Fashionable Indulgence (Society of Gentlemen #1) (10 page)

He would probably rather have been caught with pornographic literature than this.

But Ballard had warned him. Ballard was making himself a useful ally, one who might even know what was going on in Gideon’s curious mind.

Ballard was, in fact, a stroke of luck, and Harry intended to make the most of him.

Harry set off for Gideon’s house on New Burlington Street, wondering about weddings. Of course Gideon had already made his expectations clear, but still, Harry had thought he might have more time to enjoy his bachelorhood. He’d thought that marriage would come later.

Soon or late, though, it made no difference. He would have to give up Julius, his moon-pale skin and frosty eyes, and Julius would probably be relieved to hear it, the peculiar, solitary fellow that he was.

Or perhaps he wouldn’t. Julius needed fucking, in Harry’s opinion, and a lot of it. Biting Harry’s shoulder, gasping into his ear, whimpering under his hands and mouth—no wonder he shielded himself against passion, when it undid him so completely. Undid him and made him. It gave him the look he sometimes had out riding, free and alive, and Harry wished he could see that look on his face more often. He wished Julius was happier.

He was distracted by a shout of greeting. It was Higham, walking with a young lady in a dashing bonnet: his fiancée, with her maidservant two discreet paces behind. The sight was a reminder that he was supposed to be thinking about Verona. Not, definitely
not,
Julius.

Verona seemed a forceful young lady even under the extinguishing black, but Harry would rather have a dashing wife than a mousy one. The young matrons of the previous king’s reign who raced phaetons and gambled at the tables would have been very much to his taste. And Verona would surely like a husband who wanted her to enjoy herself. There was no reason that they could not be happy together, as joint heirs to Gideon’s wealth.

He’d be rich, secure, safe. It was more than he’d dreamed possible a few months ago, and if embracing that future meant embracing Verona rather than Julius, well, that was the way of things.

He was sure he’d summon up more enthusiasm when he next met her.

Harry had talked himself into a reasonably positive mood by the time he was ushered into Gideon’s gloomy parlor. Verona was seated there alone. Her high-necked dress was raven black, fringed with jet beads, a black veil pushed back over her chestnut ringlets, and there was a look of some tension on her heart-shaped face. She turned sharply as he was announced, and her eyes widened.

“Harry? Good heavens, you look quite gentlemanly.” She rose and gave him her hand. Harry wondered whether to kiss it, lost his nerve, and shook it instead. “What are you doing here? I thought you were staying with Cousin Richard.”

“Gideon asked me to call. Good afternoon, cousin. You look very well.”

“No, I don’t.” Verona sat with an irritable rustle of crepe. “I look like a paper mask in a coal cellar. I am so
tired
of black.”

Harry seated himself at one end of the settle, a little self-consciously. He wasn’t sure if they should be chaperoned, but Verona doubtless knew. Or, a nasty little voice suggested, perhaps she didn’t consider him worth the effort.

“When will you go into half-mourning?” he asked. “It’s been long enough, has it not?” He couldn’t understand why she hadn’t. The pale grays and purples of half-mourning would not particularly suit her rich hair and deep blue eyes, but anything would be better than unrelieved black.

“At least a year of full mourning is considered appropriate.” Verona’s voice was tight. Harry could feel the suppressed anger, hoped it wasn’t at him.

“Do you go out?” he asked. “Not parties, of course, but if there was anywhere appropriate for which you might need an escort…”

Verona shot him a swift look but had not the opportunity to reply before the door opened and Gideon made his way in.

“Having a comfortable cose?” the old man asked, gaze flickering over them. “Kissing cousins, eh?”

Verona gave him a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Harry has just asked if he might be my escort, Grandfather. Of course, there is my mourning…”

“Ah, yes.” Gideon sat heavily on one of the uncomfortable embroidered chairs, watching them. “Of course. You’re young, you want to forget the dead as quickly as possible.”

“I haven’t forgotten the dead, Grandfather.” There was a little tension in Verona’s voice. “I have been in mourning for a year.”

“You mourn, and life goes on.” Gideon linked his rheumatic hands over the knob of his stick. “Life goes on. My wife gave me four boys, you know. Lost two in the cradle, but I still had two sons near grown before my brother even started his nursery. I should have a brood of grandsons to my name now.
Great-
grandsons.” His fingers tightened. “And what have my fine strong sons left to me? A halfbreed from the gutter and a girl. Damn them both.
Damn
them.”

Harry stared at the carpet. He could hear Verona breathing evenly next to him.

“It’s not too late to mend matters.” Gideon thumped the ferrule of his stick on the floor. “I shan’t beat about the bush: I want you two to marry. Keep my name alive, put what was ill done”—he nodded at Harry—“to rights. A new generation of Vanes, with Verona’s blood making up for yours, boy. Let the pair of you marry, and you shall have my blessing and my fortune with it. What do you say?”

“Marry…” Verona appeared to search for words. “…
each other
?”

Harry cleared his throat, launched into prepared words. “I’d be most gratified. If Cousin Verona would care to, that is, if you’d do me the, uh, the great…” He could feel his voice losing strength in the face of her stony countenance.

“Grandfather,” Verona said when he’d faltered to a stop. “I will of course obey you in all things. But my period of mourning—”

“It’s been a year. You can go into half-mourning.”

“Not with a ring on my finger.” Verona spoke with startling feeling. “I will not come out of mourning to buy a trousseau. I
could
not.”

“I don’t say you must marry at once,” Gideon granted. “But I’m an old man. I want it done soon.”

Verona looked down at her hands, then up again. “I should like to observe half-mourning. Six months. I should rather wait—”

“No,” Gideon rasped. “Six months? Are you waiting for me to die?” His bald scalp flushed puce. “I will not have it. You are my granddaughter,
I
direct your actions. This is my will and by God you will abide by it.”

“You cannot command me to marry on your whim.” Verona’s voice was level but her eyes were bright.

“Perhaps not.” Gideon’s volume dropped, but his white clenched knuckles betrayed his rage. “I cannot make you wed, but by God, I can make you sorry to be unwed. While you live on my charity, you’ll do as I say. And if you throw your cap over the windmill, girl, I shall cut you off without a penny, and don’t you dare doubt it.”

Verona took a deep breath. “There is no need for anger, Grandfather. I shall obey you. But I’m sure Harry will respect my natural scruples, won’t you, Harry?”

“Uh—of course,” Harry mumbled, trapped.

Gideon turned faded, furious eyes on him, but Verona went on smoothly, “So I propose that we become engaged now as a private matter.”

“Private?” Gideon repeated.

“We shall not make it public. We shall use the time to become better acquainted with each other. Then we can announce the engagement when I have seen out my mourning period, once I have returned to normal life.” Verona gave Harry a bright smile. “A spring engagement and a summer wedding, cousin?”

“That sounds delightful,” Harry said. “So we will be engaged as of this moment?”

“But privately, with respect for my blacks. And then, when I am out of mourning…” Verona clasped her hands together and looked at Gideon. “Would I have…do you suppose…an engagement ball?”

“Oh-ho. That’s it, is it?” Gideon gave a harsh laugh. “Yes, very well. You shall have a fine party, if you wish it, and a fine wedding too.”

“I do wish it, Grandfather. I couldn’t in mourning, or half-mourning, but, well, I have missed so much. It would be the beginning of my new life.” Her eyes widened. “I could wear pastels. I could wear
white.
”

“Gold,” Harry said without thinking.

Verona flashed him a look, turned it into a laugh. “Oh, Harry, you are sweet. Well, we have six months to discuss it.” She patted his hand. “So is it a bargain?”

Harry wasn’t sure what the devil it was, because he couldn’t quite match the smiling young lady now with her tense appearance when he’d entered the room, but there was a point he needed to get absolutely clear. “It’s a private engagement. The three of us. Not to be announced even to the family?”

Gideon frowned. Verona chimed in. “Oh, yes. We have so much family, it would be telling half the
ton.
”

“Exactly,” Harry agreed. “And I understand your reservations, cousin. Absolutely private it shall be.” Which gave him six months before Julius had to know of it. Six months to live as a bachelor and enjoy every moment he could steal with his lover. Nothing could be better.

He smiled at his future wife, guilelessly, and she smiled back.

Harry was hiding something. Julius was quite sure of it. He’d been hiding something for a week or more, and whatever it was, it was eating at him.

He seemed happy enough on the surface, of course. Very good at losing himself in the moment, Harry Vane. Yesterday evening he’d been sprawled at ease in the louche surroundings of the Royal Saloon; he, Ash, and Freddy, each with a fair demi-rep on his knee. Harry liked talking to ladies of pleasure, with their generously displayed bosoms and skirts hitched up to reveal plump calves. He’d been comfortable there; a damned sight more comfortable than he was now.

They were gathered in Quex’s, downstairs, but the rooms were thin of company. It was a late-September evening, unseasonably warm. Heat lay over London like wet washing, and the mood of the city was just as uncomfortable. While he and Francis threw dice at a table, with no stakes, Dominic, Richard, and Sir Absalom Lockwood were deep in conversation about, of course, Peterloo, and Ash perched on the arm of Harry’s chair, looking from face to face. It would have been an evening like any other, except for Harry’s wary expression.

“The magistrates have been attacked too often,” Dominic said. “Accused of exceeding their authority, of everything short of murder. Sidmouth had to speak.”

“Sidmouth has grossly inflamed the situation,” retorted Absalom, as fervent a Whig as Dominic was a Tory. “The Home Secretary should not applaud the deaths of unarmed Britons. The magistrates should be called to account.”

“I cannot agree they exceeded their authority, no matter how awful the results,” Richard commented. “If they feared for the safety of the city, they were obliged to take action.”

“The crowd was peaceful,” Harry said to the floor.

“Fifty thousand people can’t be peaceful,” Francis put in. “Fifty thousand people making demands is a riot
in potentia.
”

“Certainly, it is if you send in armed troops,” Julius said. “Though I was not aware that a gathering of women and children constitutes a riot. Do we quail at the sight of a nursery now?”

Dominic gave a pointed sigh. “Cutting, but unhelpful. I grant you the yeomanry reacted too strongly—”

“Panicked.”

“—but there is too much unrest in Manchester. I cannot see there was any choice but to stamp it out. Now Sidmouth has shown he’s firmly behind the magistrates’ decision, and that gives a necessary warning to agitators.”

“I don’t like it,” Absalom said. “A route of conciliation would be wiser.”

“You can’t conciliate with rioters and Luddites,” Francis snapped. “Their demands would bring this country’s industry to a halt.”

“If you ask me, the yeomanry did a good job in bad circumstances,” Ash said. “We’d see an end to this nonsense if more magistrates took the same tack.”

Harry’s face was set, a little red. He was staring at his hands.

“You can hardly deny the need for Parliamentary reform, though,” Absalom was saying. “It is a ludicrous anomaly that Manchester goes unrepresented in Parliament, while Old Sarum returns a member at the whim of eleven voters.” He was a large, older man, a pleasant enough fellow when he wasn’t talking politics, with an embarrassing tendency to cast longing looks at Ash. Julius felt a certain warmth for the man now. Harry needed someone else on his side.

“It is not ludicrous.” Dominic ran his hands through his hair. “It is the tradition on which this country is built. All very well to cry reform, but when you hack away at the root of the old order the whole tree comes tumbling down. Have we not seen where that leads?”

“Where a refusal to listen to the people leads, yes,” Absalom said. “The French king clung to his power and lost his head.”

Richard frowned. “That is to say, if a man holds a knife to your throat, you are to blame if he cuts your throat when you do not hand over your purse. The country cannot be run on the basis of mob violence—”

“The violence was done to the protestors!” Harry burst out. “Hunt even predicted it! He said they had to be peaceful because
our enemies will seek every opportunity to excite a riot.
How can you—”

Julius moved to his side, putting a warning hand on his shoulder. “I quite agree, but to tell the truth I am bored of this cursed dull subject. Take a stroll with me.”

Harry was rigid under his hand but he mumbled, “Very well,” and made his excuses with reasonable grace. He even managed to stay quiet as they set off, on foot and in silence, down St. James’s, until Julius said, “This is hard for you.”

“It’s awful,” Harry burst out. “Why can’t they see—”

“Shhh. Quieter.”

“People
died
at St. Peter’s Fields. Why don’t they care? How can they say those things?”

“Manchester is as far as the moon. And the people who died there are not our people, and what they wanted is in direct opposition to the interests of every man in that room. Richard’s maternal grandmother was French; he lost half a dozen relatives to the guillotine. You can hardly expect him to welcome popular uprising here.”

“Perhaps there wouldn’t be an uprising if they treated the poor as men rather than beasts,” Harry said through his teeth. “If they thought about us rather than themselves for once.”

“
Us?
The cloth you wear was woven by industrial looms. You were not among those shouting for reform in Manchester.”

“I could have been,” Harry said. “My mother was from there. It could have been me. Armed soldiers riding on a crowd of Englishmen—”

“If it helps, the yeomanry were probably terrified. From the vantage point of a horse’s back, a crowd of fifty thousand must have looked like an unimaginable mob.”

“Yes,” Harry said. “I wonder what a mounted man with a sabre looked like from the vantage point of a woman trampled on the ground.”

They walked on for a moment until Harry said, more quietly, “You keep telling me to be silent. I know I should.”

“You must.”

“It’s hard.” Harry looked rather sick. “I’m trying to do what you want, Julius, to be a gentleman. And I’m trying to do what Gideon wants. I went with him to White’s the other day, you know. He presented me to his cronies, to the old men, and they sat there and croaked about radicals and rebellion and hang them all, and he
looked
at me, Julius. Stared at me as though he was daring me to say anything. And I didn’t.”

“Good.”

“Is it?” Harry demanded. “I’m doing what Gideon wants. What about what my parents wanted, what they sacrificed my future for?” He kicked viciously at a pebble. “What about what
I
want?”

“What do you want?”

“I don’t know!” Harry yelped. “I want to be a gentleman but I can’t help feeling like a radical. I want to please my grandfather, but the things he says make me wretched. I want to be loyal to Silas, God knows he was to me, but I don’t want to be dirty and hungry and poor ever again. I don’t know
what
I want, and I can’t possibly do what everyone wants of me.”

“Be damned to everyone. Your parents wanted a little seditionist in their own stamp, Gideon wants a good grandson, Richard an acceptable cousin. If you care what they all want you will go mad for trying to please them.”

“What about you?” Harry burst out. “What do you want of me?
Do
you want me?”

“Of course I do.”

“Really? Because”—Harry dropped his volume—“because mostly you don’t even want to kiss me, and sometimes I think you’ll be relieved when I leave you on your own again. Won’t you?”

Julius walked a few paces in silence, the words aching through him, because they were painfully true, and painfully wrong.

“You asked what I want of you,” he said at last. “I want you not to lose that joy of yours. I have rarely met anyone with such capacity for it. And I should like you to be secure. I don’t know how that can be achieved except by bowing to your grandfather’s whim, but I hope you can find a way to do that happily.”

Harry was staring at his boots. “But you don’t want us to be together.”

“We spoke of this. I am too fond of you to stand in your way.”

“If I didn’t marry.” Harry’s voice ached. “I mean, if I didn’t have to. If you and I could have more time. Would you want it?”

They turned the corner, footfalls in unison, clapping on the pavement.

“When my namesake, the great Caesar, rode in triumph,” Julius said, “he was accompanied by a slave whose role was to whisper to him,
You are but mortal.
To remind him he was merely a man who would one day die like any other. If I could, I should have you at my side to remind me that I am alive, because I have not felt alive in so damned long, and with you, I do. No, I don’t want you to marry, any more than I want you to return to your dirty democrats. I want to show you the world, and see you smile, and keep you with me while my soul grows back. Don’t gape like that.”

Harry shut his mouth with an audible click.

“I can’t have that,” Julius said, more moderately. “So I don’t ask. But my God, Harry, if I could I would, and since I cannot, I will see you happy. And that is all we shall say on this.”

Harry walked a few more steps. “Let’s go to your rooms.”

It was only a few minutes to Great Ryder Street but it felt longer until they were alone. Julius dismissed his waiting valet and came to sit beside Harry, looking into those deep blue eyes that shone with moisture in the candlelight. He looked too worried, too tired, too lonely.

“You think a great deal about what people want of you,” Julius murmured. “What would you like of me?”

Harry’s lips moved a little. He said, quietly, “I wish you’d kiss me.”

Julius slid his hand around Harry’s skull, to the back of his head. Ran his other hand down, over the slightly prickly cheek, stroking it, to rest on Harry’s shoulder. Leaned in a little. Put his lips to Harry’s, and kissed him.

Lips against lips, always surprising in their softness. Noses bumping, because Julius had apparently forgotten how to angle his face properly, until Harry shifted just a little to make it work. The taste of brandy, and of Harry.

They both had their lips closed. Julius opened his mouth, just a little, felt Harry respond but not lead. Apparently this was his kiss to give, or to take. He opened a little wider, gave a tiny tentative lick, heard Harry grunt in response and felt an answering warm, wet flicker against his tongue.

You kiss like a virgin, Norreys.

He opened wider, for Harry. Harry’s hands came up, clutching his hair, and then…

Julius grabbed him. Pulled Harry closer, shoving his tongue deeper, needing to do this. Harry made a startled noise, rocking backward, hand clamping on Julius’s arse. Then they were ravening each other. Deep, wet, intimate kisses with teeth and tongues and lips, bumping and biting, Harry so open, gasping with such glorious happy pleasure—oh God, how he wanted Harry’s happiness, how much he loved that he could cause it. He had Harry between his thighs, the pair of them half-kneeling, half-sprawling, between settle and floor, holding each other up by sheer force of kissing. Harry’s prick pressed against his own, and Julius did not want to break this to ask, not now, perhaps not ever. He didn’t need to come. He needed to kiss.

And everything he hated, the saliva, the fleshiness, the taste of other people’s food and breath and teeth and sweat, was here. Harry’s skin was as flawed as anyone’s close up. He had wide pores and what looked like red pinpricks, hairs in his nostrils and the sharp brown points of stubble, the first hints of what would be wrinkles when he aged, and stray hairs under his thick brows that could have been plucked away. He was imperfect flesh, like any man, and Julius buried himself in that imperfection because it was alive.

“Mmph.” Harry was trying to speak, with difficulty because Julius had him in something not unlike a wrestling hold. Reluctantly, he released Harry’s lips, moving his own a fraction away.

“God.” Harry’s mouth stretched into a wide, disbelieving grin. “It’s a good thing you don’t kiss much, if that’s how you do it, or I might not recover. Are we going to fuck?”

Julius fumbled for buttons. Harry was wearing trousers: unflattering things, all loose around the legs, but at least they came off more easily than well-fitted breeches. Harry’s arms looped round his neck. “Naked. Both of us.” He hesitated, as though he were going to ask something else, but didn’t.

Not assailing him with demands. Not saying what he wanted. Not even asking. Julius’s heart twisted.

He stood, for ease of undressing. Harry gazed up, mouth red and wet and a little open. Julius struggled out of his nip-waisted coat and dropped it on a chair behind him, not without a tiny qualm for its perfection. He unbuttoned his waistcoat, and as the last button came open, Harry took a sharp little breath and shifted his hips.

It seemed he wanted to watch.

Julius pulled the waistcoat off, taking his time, and placed it over the chair. He moved one hand to the front fall of his breeches, where his cock strained for release, and watched Harry’s chest rise and fall faster. One button. Another. Harry groaned aloud, bucking upward, moving a hand to his own stiff prick. Julius released himself, ran his fingers over the length of his cock.

“Oh, God,” Harry muttered. “I’ll suck it for you, if you’ll just take your clothes off, please…”

“Patience,” Julius said. That was hardly something that had marked their encounters until now. Fast, frantic, usually drunken rutting, and that was all very well in its way, but there was something about Harry’s worshipful gaze that made him want to stretch this one out. He thumbed the tip of his prick, for the pulse of pleasure and for Harry’s wild-eyed response, then let go and pulled his shirt over his head.

Harry’s breath rasped. Julius shook the linen off, threw it down. Harry was staring at his bare chest and Julius ran one hand over it, over a pectoral muscle and its tight nipple, just to see what he’d do.

“Touch it.” Harry sounded strangled. “Pinch it.”

Julius obeyed. Anything to see the look on Harry’s face. His flesh tingled under his own touch. He pinched again, harder, and gasped at the snap of pleasure. He wanted Harry doing that.

“Take your shoes off.”