Chapter 14
Sebastian thoroughly enjoyed dinner, especially seeing Earnest pick away at Maurice’s defences. He could imagine his three friends and himself having dinner here with Maurice, and the Duke finally learning to relax and smile. What a dangerous, dangerous dream.
“I think I’ll have a nightcap and leave you two alone.
” Earnest leaped up from the table—he was like a sprightly yearling colt, all legs and energy—and bowed low before waltzing out of the room.
Maurice sent a footman after Earnest to guide him to his room, and he dismissed the rest of them for the evening.
Now it was just the two of them and a lovely silence descended on the room.
Sebastian leaned back in his chair. He’d eaten and drunk just the right amount and was nicely satisfied.
“Your friend is...” Maurice paused.
“Intense. He lives life to its fullest and has boundless energy.”
“Boundless. Yes. I can’t imagine living with such freedom to just say things without thought of the consequences. How does he dare it?”
Sebastian grinned. “From the day I met him, he’s been like that. As if every bad thing that happens to him becomes another reason to find joy in the smallest things.”
“How delightful.”
“In small doses.”
Maurice sighed. “Yes. Yes, I can see how that would be the case.” After another long pause, Maurice stood up. “I’m not certain I have the right to ask this, but will you do the honour of coming to my bed tonight?”
“Yes. Why the doubt?”
“Sir Pashley said that I should—”
Sebastian shook his head. “I’ve known you a long time, Maurice, and you are as good as your word.
If you say you will set out to achieve something, I know you will.
That’s enough promise for me.” Besides, it’d been six long weeks since he’d kissed Maurice, and if anything, Earnest’s visit had reminded him that life was short and chances should be taken.
He was the one to push Maurice away and now he’d be the one to pull him back.
“Thank you.”
“Take me to your bed.” He needed the reminder; was this as good as he remembered?
Maurice grabbed him by the hand and together they walked as fast as they could to Maurice’s rooms. Sebastian wouldn’t normally allow himself to be commanded like this, not in this realm, but there was something special about knowing Maurice couldn’t wait to be with him.
As soon as the heavy oak door to Maurice’s rooms closed, Sebastian took charge.
He grabbed Maurice by the shoulders and slammed him up against the wall and kissed him.
The first touch of their lips was heaven.
Home. Damn it, it was better than he’d remembered, and oh God, he wanted so much.
He gave everything to the kiss, cradling Maurice’s head and using his body to push against him as their tongues danced and Maurice’s moans vibrated through him.
“It’s been so long.”
“I never want to be apart from you again.” Maurice’s plea sent heat rushing through him, crackling like wood on a fire, all sparks and noise and intensity.
“Do you want me to fuck you like before?”
Maurice groaned and thrust his cock hard against Sebastian’s. Hell. “I want everything.”
“Now?”
“Every night, every morning. I want to wake up beside you.”
Sebastian’s instinct was to tense and leave, but he stayed because maybe, just maybe, this could work. “Is that the benefit of being a Duke?”
“What?”
“Announcing what will happen, no matter how unlikely and knowing that the world will move to make it happen.”
“Yes.” Maurice kissed him again, and Sebastian’s mouth was too busy to say anything.
Not that there was much to say when Maurice was so confident.
Oh to be a Duke. He kissed like a Duke too—not that Sebastian had kissed any other Dukes—except Maurice kissed with that certainty that he was all powerful.
Incredulously, Maurice behaved as if he thought Sebastian was his equal.
Laughter bubbled up from low in his chest, threatening to overwhelm their kiss.
Look how far he’d come; from being dumped on the doorstep of an orphanage as a toddler to kissing a Duke.
He held Maurice by the waist and walked backwards until his own spine hit the post of the bed.
“Get on your knees for me, your Grace.”
Maurice’s guttural moan sent shivers up and down Sebastian’s spine, and then the slow way he sank to his knees dragging his hands and mouth over Sebastian, undoing Sebastian’s shirt buttons as he slid down his body was heavenly.
Together they fumbled over Sebastian’s clothes, until Maurice knelt on the floor and lifted Sebastian’s feet one at the time to tug off his trousers.
He stood there, leaning against the bedpost, naked with Maurice—fully clothed—gazing up at him.
“Look at how beautiful you are.” Maurice licked his lips, then drew soft circles around Sebastian’s ankles with his fingers.
“Don’t be silly. Men can’t be beautiful.”
“Anything can be beautiful. Beauty doesn’t have a gender or a face or a name. It is that indescribable, pulchritudinous view that attracts attention and holds it. And you, my Sebastian, have all my attention.”
Sebastian gulped. “One day with a poet—” But then Maurice slipped his lips over the end of Sebastian’s cock and all he could do was gasp.
The tight wet heat of Maurice’s mouth, and oh god, his tongue, as he licked and sucked Sebastian’s cock stole every word from him.
All he had left was sensation and moans.
Maurice cupped his balls, and holy fucking mother of goodness, Sebastian thrust hard, unable to stop himself.
He almost apologised, but Maurice groaned around his cock.
He couldn’t look away, at Maurice’s brown hair flopping as his head bobbed enthusiastically and skilfully on Sebastian’s cock.
Pressure built and built and he clutched Maurice’s hair, pulling him up.
“Maurice. Come here.” Maurice staggered to his feet and Sebastian kissed him again, tasting that little bit of salt from his own pre-come.
“You have too many clothes.” He tore at Maurice’s clothes, like a rabbit running from a fox, desperate to have his hands on Maurice’s flesh.
Need thumped in his chest, a beating drum of desire, like the rumble of galloping hooves over the turf, surging towards the winning post.
“Please fuck me like last time.” Maurice’s plea was fire to his spark, sending flashes of heat curling around his torso and making his balls throb tight.
Sebastian finished undressing Maurice, taking his time to appreciate his finely honed body.
If teasing was what Maurice did to him, he’d give it back in spades.
He spread his hands all over his shoulders and chest, and teased him with his touch, until Maurice begged again.
“You could lie down and prepare yourself for me.”
“Or you could push me down and take me.”
Sebastian didn’t think he could get any hotter, or any closer to coming, but he growled and did as Maurice asked.
The juxtaposition between a Duke wanting to be fucked, and the same Duke commanding that he do it—hearing him beg for it—was astonishing.
Maurice fell back on the bed, then shuffled so he was spread-eagled for Sebastian, and then Maurice stroked himself, his cock hard and leaking.
Sebastian grabbed his ankles and lifted them onto the bed, so Maurice was wide open for him.
“Open yourself up for me.” Sebastian stepped away to get one of the little bottles of oil from the same drawer as last time; this time selecting rosehip.
He dribbled some oil onto the base of Maurice’s cock, watching it slide down around his balls, and onto Maurice’s fingers, and then he coated his own cock, before pressing his knee against the bed and lining himself up.
He corked the bottle and tossed it aside.
“You want this?”
“Now. Please. Impale me.”
Sebastian shivered, loving the desperate roughness in Maurice’s plea, and guided himself in with Maurice’s tight body enveloping him.
He took his time, mostly because he was breathing roughly, trying to maintain control.
It’d been weeks since he’d been here with Maurice and one thrust into his body was going to end him, especially as Maurice was lying back on the bed, staring at him with an intense expression.
Maurice had one hand on his cock, loosely stroking himself, and the other was tucked behind his head.
If it wasn’t for the gasp, he’d let out when Sebastian had entered him, Sebastian might have thought Maurice was unaffected.
“Do you want hard or slow?”
A flush spread across Maurice’s face, neck, and chest. “As hard as you can. I want to feel you afterwards.”
Sebastian grabbed Maurice’s hips and pounded into him, glad that he laboured with his body all day because he was fit and strong and with every thrust, Maurice panted and moaned and begged, making Sebastian feel like a God. A King to his Duke.
“More.”
He slammed in harder, bliss surrounding him, and holy ... “No.” He didn’t want to come first, so he wrapped one hand around Maurice’s hand, still lightly holding his cock, and stroked him in time with his thrusts.
“Yes.” Maurice cried out. “Sebastian. I love you.” And with that, Maurice came in long streaks over his belly and chest, and Sebastian leaned forward to kiss him hard as he came in a blinding flash of light, sensation blazing inside him as he emptied himself into Maurice’s welcoming body.
He would’ve collapsed onto Maurice, sated and heavy, except he wanted to see one thing.
So he raised himself up on his elbows, hands cradling Maurice’s face, and yes.
.. there it was. Maurice completely relaxed.
To be gifted with such an honour—a Duke without the ducal mask—was more than Sebastian could deal with, and so he kissed him.
Everywhere that he could reach from his forehead over his cheeks and jaw, and throat and shoulders.
“Thank you.”
He should be the one thanking Maurice. “Stay like this, Maurice. I love it when you finally relax for me.”
A little smile curled the corners of Maurice’s mouth, and the edges of his eyes crinkled up.
Sebastian kissed that rare smile, wanting to taste it and keep it all for himself.
He could lie here forever, with his cock softening inside his lover who was smiling up at him.
Maurice’s hair was a mess, and his gaze was content.
This was the man behind the ducal facade, and Sebastian knew he was the only person to ever see Maurice like this. It made him want impossible things.
“Once I’m married, I want you in my bed every night. Move out of the cottage and into this room.”
“Is that an order, your Grace?”
“No. As tempting as it is to command that you stay with me forever, I want to know that you choose me.”
Sebastian instinctually held his breath. He couldn’t. Or he could. If Maurice looked at him like this every day, as if the impossible were possible, then perhaps he could.
“I’d been planning on moving out of my cottage once Barry and Jane’s baby arrived to give them more space, so I suppose it would be just as easy to move in with you as it would to move into the stable loft.”
Maurice gasped, losing that soft relaxed appearance, which made Sebastian want to chase it. “Don’t you dare!”
“Don’t I dare do what?”
“I can’t have my stable master living with the lads above the horses.
If you don’t want to be with me, I’ll build you a new cottage.
” Maurice’s body stiffened underneath Sebastian and he finally understood what it meant to stop protesting about class and all the reasons why this shouldn’t work, and embrace why it might.
“No. I don’t need a cottage. A small room near you will suffice.”
“Perfect. Welcome to your new home, Sebastian Wildgoose. Be my lover, the love of my life, the only man who ever dared see beyond the Duke to the real me.”
Sebastian gulped. “Thank you. I’m sorry for pushing you away.”
“I think I needed it. The world is designed for me and I’m accustomed to getting anything I want. It did me good to have to prove myself for you, and I want to keep doing that.”
His friends were going to be insufferable once this was all done. “Maurice, I ...” He paused, drawing in a deep breath. “I can’t believe I fell in love with a Duke. God has a strange sense of humour.”
“You love me?”
“I tried so hard not to. For years, I studied everything about pedigrees and breeding theories just so I could prove I was equal to you in knowledge, not understanding that I wanted to be equal to you on all fronts.”
“Sebastian, you are more than my equal. You are my everything.”
“Don’t say that. I could never live up to that standard.”
Maurice kissed him hard. “Stop that. I don’t want you to change.
I’m in love with you, brazen, sarcastic, handsome, you.
My orphan stable master, the greatest horseman in England.
Do you know what an honour it is to have you willingly share my bed?
Every week, I get letters with obscene offers for you. ”
Sebastian laughed, knowing Maurice meant money and the double entendre was probably unintended. “And you just couldn’t let me go?”
“Never.” Maurice wrapped his arms around Sebastian, holding him tight.
There was nothing for it, but to kiss Maurice and pour all his love and anxiety about the future into the kiss.
Eventually, they would have to get up and get cleaned before going to sleep, but until then, Sebastian would shower Maurice in kisses, saying all the things he wasn’t quite able to say.