THE GRUDGING CONSORT

ten

I want you to stay. The words echoed heavily in Owen’s ears. Drake sucked in a breath and leaned in until his mouth was only a whisper away from Owen’s. “Don’t be afraid,” Drake said, and then he lowered his mouth that last fraction of an inch. The kiss Drake had taken the day they agreed to wed was a blur in Owen’s mind; he had been too distressed, too overwhelmed, to take in more than a half-formed impression of heat and strength. This kiss — this he would never forget. Drake’s mouth moved over his with precise, controlled force, opening him and tasting him. Owen’s eyes dropped closed, and the rest of the world fell away. There was only the slick heat of Drake’s tongue exploring him in a way that sent shivers down his spine and made his limbs weak, and the faint taste of brandy and another, sharper flavor that could only be desire. He swayed against Drake’s chest, needing something he couldn’t even begin to describe. Some port away from the storm raging in his breast; shelter from the white-hot arousal growing in the pit of his stomach, and the bright spark of pain flaring right beside it as a memory of Tom’s kisses flashed into his mind. No, no, he couldn’t think of Tom, not now, not when he was about to betray the love he’d promised by lying with Tom’s own brother. Owen pressed himself fully against Drake and tilted his head to deepen the kiss. Drake’s body was all hard, muscled strength, almost too unyielding. He parted his lips and tentatively teased Drake’s tongue with his. He might be clumsy and out of his depth, but he had to feel, rather than think. Drake groaned into his mouth, and then he went wild, devouring Owen with single-minded ferocity. He let go of the bureau and wrapped Owen in his arms, his hands roaming over Owen’s back, his flanks, the nape of his neck, and then down, to grip his arse and squeeze. He had never been touched there, and Owen yelped and pulled back, blinking up at Drake in shock. Drake swallowed hard, and his hands smoothed up, coming to rest around Owen’s waist, where they nearly spanned its circumference. Owen felt fragile, in his grasp; he hadn’t felt like that with Tom, had known they were more evenly matched in strength. Or perhaps it was something fundamental to Drake’s being, not just his body — a physical expression of the intensity of his nature. Their eyes met and held. Drake’s were so dark, so unlike Tom’s bright, merry blue. Owen bit his lip against the sudden pain of that, the hopeless longing for the man he should have married, who should have been here to lovingly show him how sweet the marriage bed could be. Owen didn’t know what part of his thoughts he showed in his own gaze, but it was clearly enough. Drake’s expression hardened and his hands tightened convulsively. “You won’t be thinking of him when I’m done with you,” he said roughly. He yanked Owen back into his arms and into another kiss. Drake moved, and Owen stumbled with him until the backs of his legs hit the bed. They tumbled down together, Drake’s heavy weight landing on top of him. Drake’s lips moved from Owen’s mouth to the angle of his jaw, sucking a mark there and making Owen cry out; he kissed his way down his throat and bit at his collarbone, while Owen writhed beneath him, too many new sensations assaulting him all at once. Drake had one arm wrapped about his middle, and the other hand tangled in Owen’s hair, tipping his head back to bare his neck for little nips and flickers of his tongue. “Oh goddess,” Owen moaned. His whole body was aflame, his c**k so hard it almost hurt, and his mind spun like a skiff caught in a whirlpool. “Drake — wait, please, I can’t…” “Arthur,” was the reply, muttered fiercely against the sensitive skin just below Owen’s ear. “My name is Arthur.” “Arthur, then,” Owen managed. He brought his hands up to brace himself, to gain a little breathing room, but instead he found himself clinging to Drake’s — Arthur’s — broad shoulders, his fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. “Arthur, please.” He hardly knew what he was begging for, but Arthur paused, his breaths hot and fast against Owen’s neck. “What’s the matter?” He sounded as wrecked as Owen felt. “It’s too much,” Owen gasped out. He turned his head just as Arthur lifted his, and their lips brushed, that slight touch enough to overwhelm him afresh. “Please,” he said again. Without Owen even noticing how, Arthur had moved to lie between his spread legs; he shifted his hips just a little, and his erection rubbed against Owen’s, the friction exquisite despite the layers of clothing between them. “Oh,” Owen said, and then, “ohhhh,” as Arthur moved again with more purpose this time, dragging his hard, heavy c**k over Owen’s. Arthur pulled his arm out from under Owen’s body and propped himself on his hands, the muscles in his arms flexing. He looked down at him, his face flushed and his lips parted. He was both more and less intimidating, like that — all masculine strength, but nearly undone, just for him. Owen couldn’t help pushing up, just a little, pressing them together again. A shudder went through Arthur’s body. “It’s supposed to be like this,” Arthur said, quick and low. “To be too much. It’s that for me too — Owen, I won’t hurt you. I give you my word. Will you trust me?” Even through the haze of arousal and confusion, Owen knew this was a pivotal moment in his new marriage. He could choose to trust, to put his faith in this man he hardly knew and hope that it would be justified — or he could give in to his fear of the unknown and push Arthur away, and lose any chance he had of being happy in the life he now must live. Almost overcome with shyness, he stroked his hands down from Arthur’s shoulders and along the bunching muscles in his upper arms. They were just the sort of arms Owen imagined around him when he daydreamed. He could be safe, wrapped in arms like that. He looked up into Arthur’s eyes. “I trust you.” He would, anyway. He would. Arthur leaned down and stole a kiss, quick but demanding. “I don’t believe you, but you will,” he said, reading Owen’s thoughts far too precisely for comfort. “Now lie back, and let me show you how perfect too much can be. And tell me if you don’t like something. I’ll stop if you do.” He shifted down, mouthing over Owen’s torso through the thin linen. Each touch made Owen squirm, and his c**k stood straight up now, tenting the nightshirt too obviously to miss. Arthur moved around it, nibbled at Owen’s hipbone, and then glanced up; he smiled at the look on Owen’s face, and went further down. When he pushed the nightshirt up to bare one creamy thigh, Owen had to clench his fists in the coverlet to keep from pulling it back down again. Arthur’s first soft kiss to that tender skin had Owen bucking up, gasping. And then Arthur lifted the nightshirt’s hem and Owen couldn’t move, could hardly breathe, as Arthur bared his c**k and smoothed the shirt down over Owen’s abdomen. Without hesitation, Arthur lowered his head and took the head of Owen’s c**k into his mouth, flicking his tongue against the slit. That had to be a figment of Owen’s imagination, because a man like Arthur, servicing him like that? “Goddess, are you really going to…?” Arthur lifted his head enough to shoot him a purely wicked grin. “Would you rather I not?” “No! But I thought…” Owen swallowed, feeling so very foolish in the face of Arthur’s laughter. “I thought that you would want me to, that you wouldn’t want to.” “That I wouldn’t want to give you the same pleasure I would want from you?” Arthur shook his head. “I intend to taste every part of you.” Every part? Before Owen could even begin to wrap his mind around the implications of that, Arthur bent and swallowed his c**k all the way to the root. Owen’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he moaned, lost in the sensation of tight, hot suction, of the clever movements of Arthur’s tongue, of the most overwhelming delight he had ever known. Clearly Arthur had done this before, and often. He drew Owen nearly to his peak almost at once, but then pulled back, letting just the head of Owen’s c**k slide through his lips. Panting, he tried to find some self-control; he couldn’t spend so soon — Arthur would laugh at him. Wouldn’t he? Oh goddess, but he was so very, very close, all of his nerves singing, the aching need for release near-maddening. Just then, Arthur slid one hand up Owen’s inner thigh and pressed two fingers against that tender spot just behind his bollocks. One finger slid even further and pushed, just a little, inside Owen’s body, while Arthur took all of Owen’s length quite suddenly into his mouth. Owen’s climax struck like lightning, and he distantly heard a keening cry, his own voice all but unrecognizable. He pulsed and pulsed, Arthur swallowing around him, and yet he felt nothing so much as that one callused fingertip lodged within him, the center around which the storm in his body raged. After long, long moments, he could hear his own breaths loud in his ears. He opened his eyes, and the blue watered silk of the bed canopy caught the candlelight in little ripples. His whole being felt turned inside-out. Arthur pulled himself up so that his face hovered just above Owen’s. He left his hand where it was, though, and Owen shifted slightly and clenched his muscles experimentally. “Oh gods, Owen,” Arthur groaned, and he dropped his head to Owen’s chest. “You’re going to be the death of me.” He kissed the triangle of skin bared just between Owen’s collarbones, the touch of his lips almost feverish. Perhaps Owen ought to be embarrassed, or horrified, by what he had allowed and enjoyed from the man whose brother he had meant to marry. But he had passed beyond that; the night had taken on a dreamlike quality. He had just spent in Arthur’s mouth, and he lay beneath him now, with one of the man’s fingers penetrating him so intimately he couldn’t have thought of it without blushing just an hour before. Now, he tightened his muscles again, thrilling when Arthur pressed his finger deeper. He brought his hands up to bury them in the dark mane of Arthur’s hair that tumbled down onto Owen’s breast. His heart pounded, and he licked his dry lips. He knew how he must look, sprawled half-naked beneath Arthur’s much larger body, his legs spread and his face flushed and shiny. It was as if it were happening to someone else, someone who had no need to feel shame. “Arthur,” Owen said, and he heard the word as if another had spoken it. Black eyes met his as Arthur raised his head. “I’m going to have you now, sweetheart,” Arthur said, voice even deeper and raspier than usual — from taking Owen in his mouth, into his throat. Owen shivered. “I’m going to make you mine.” Before he could respond, Arthur captured his mouth in a deep, consuming kiss, flavored with bitter salt and with passion. Lost in the kiss, Owen barely registered Arthur pulling the nightshirt up; Arthur broke the kiss for a moment to whip it over Owen’s head, where it tangled in his arms. He writhed about, the feeling of being held down, his movement restricted, sending a fresh surge of arousal straight to his c**k. That seemed wrong, but when Arthur kissed him again he was left with only a thrumming, impatient desire, all doubts swept away. With one final toe-curling kiss, Arthur sat up, took Owen by the shoulders, and deftly flipped him onto his stomach, pressing his thighs apart and settling between them. Owen let himself be manhandled. If this was done to him, he could not be to blame; it was all Arthur’s doing, and Owen only the object of his desire. Perhaps that made him a coward, betraying his purer feelings and taking the pleasure from it without responsibility. That didn’t matter when he felt a kiss pressed to the base of his spine, and then lower, and lower still, and — oh goddess, but Arthur’s tongue traced between the cheeks of his arse and found the center of him, flicking against that too-sensitive flesh and striking sparks in Owen’s very core. Owen cried out sharply and then moaned, long and low, his arms still tangled above his head, the pillow cool against his overheated forehead, knees sliding in the bedclothes, and that hot tongue pressing in, with Arthur’s strong hands braced against his inner thighs. “Gods, but you’re sweet,” Arthur muttered, the words felt as much as heard, vibrating inside him. How long it went on, Owen never knew, but a pressure built and built inside him with each circle of Arthur’s tongue and each caress of his rough fingers. He bit the pillow, and his hands clawed at the bed. Suddenly Arthur’s mouth was gone, and Owen whimpered at the loss. He needed, he craved something, he couldn’t think what, he couldn’t think. There was a rustle, and the bed shifted beneath him. Then Arthur was back again, his lips at the nape of Owen’s neck and his hard, masculine body against Owen’s arse and back, all smooth skin and rough hair, a tantalizing contrast. Arthur’s c**k dragged over his skin, silky but hard as steel. He slid his fingers between Owen’s cheeks, and now they were slick with something that made their passage into Owen’s body easy. First one, and then two, and the stretch of it brought pain and a bright, searing pleasure unlike anything Owen had ever imagined. “Please,” he moaned. “Please, I need —” “I know. I know,” Arthur said, pushing his fingers deeper. “And I will, when you’re ready, I won’t hurt you…” He went on, murmuring reassurances, kissing, stroking, stoking the fire inside him until Owen feared he might combust. At last Arthur slid his fingers out, leaving a painful emptiness in their wake. Owen clenched around nothing and tilted his arse up for the taking. Arthur let out a sound that was barely human, a predatory growl of desire that made all the hair on Owen’s neck stand up. He panted, tense and desperate, caught in some liminal state between abject terror and helpless want. Big hands settled on his hips. Arthur shifted, pushing Owen’s legs apart with his knees, and the head of his c**k pushed against Owen’s entrance. And then he moved, inexorably breaching Owen’s defenses, pressing inside slowly but without pause. It was like being pulled in two, his legs parting impossibly wide and his whole body opening to accommodate something that must be too large to fit. But Arthur moved forward all the same, until Owen was fully impaled on his length, almost too full to breathe. A moment passed, and then another, as Arthur held himself perfectly still. “Tell me when I can move,” Arthur said, his breath coming hot against Owen’s shoulder blades. He tried to reply, but his mouth opened and nothing came out but a gasp. “Am I hurting you?” The strain showed in Arthur’s voice, and Owen forced himself to answer. “No,” he whispered. He squeezed his eyes shut. “You can — please —” Thank the goddess, Arthur understood what Owen couldn’t articulate, could hardly even admit: that he needed Arthur to take charge, to make the decisions for both of them. Arthur pulled his hips back, and then he thrust. The air rushed from Owen’s lungs; he cried out, a keening wail that repeated, again and again, as Arthur moved like a piston, steady and unflagging, withdrawing and leaving Owen almost empty and then filling him to bursting again. His c**k had hardened again, and it dragged against the sheets and drove Owen to the brink. Without warning, Arthur tugged his hips and dragged Owen up onto his knees and half into Arthur’s lap. When he drove back in, his c**k struck directly on a spot that sent stars exploding behind Owen’s eyelids; pure white heat rushed through him from head to toe, his back arched, and he screamed out something that could have been Arthur’s name. He spun into blackness, lost to anything but his own climax. Dimly, he felt the rush of Arthur’s release, hot within him, and then he fell down onto the bed, utterly wrecked. There was movement, a kiss to his shoulder, a murmur of praise; Owen smiled a little, and then sighed as a cloth wiped away some of the sweat and semen from his skin and the coverlet settled over his exhausted body like a cloud. That was the last thing he remembered before morning.