Infernal Vices (Resurrectionist #3)

PROLOGUE

Thursday 17th January 1898

Mr.

Troy, my valet, woke me at seven o’clock, furiously beating on my chamber door.

He was unaware that I slept in my secret room behind the bookcase in the arms of my lover, the infamous thief, Sebastian Cavell.

Sebastian and I had basked in our sinful desires for one solitary night after revealing our deepest love for one another.

On extracting myself from his arms, donning my dressing gown, and answering the door, Troy informed that my silver collection had been pillaged, and by the suspicious absence of my house guest Lord Euan Ardmillan, I was sure of whom the blaggard thief was.

The stark reality of my situation was clear to me now.

I was a pious man in my fifth decade and yet, I was far too benevolent, for had been taken for a fool once more by Lord Euan Ardmillan.

And so, on receiving the news of the burglary I dressed hurriedly and retired to my study where I determined to discover what my manservant knew of the happenings in my house while I was a bed.

I had not yet breakfasted and I would not be myself until I’d consumed at least one cup of tea, but that would have to wait.

Euan Ardmillan was an old friend from my university days and my first secret male lover, whose poor treatment of me in my youth had put me on the path to God, celibacy and the denial of my desires for near thirty years.

Euan and I were reintroduced at his late father’s estate sale in Scotland where I’d planned to bid the for a particular artefact of Greek antiquity that the late Lord Ardmillan plundered from the Temple of Athena on the Greek Island of Aegina —the much-prized Staff of Asklepios.

The ancient phallus was of carved obsidian, rumoured to be magical in nature and named after the Greek God of Medicine and Healing.

Euan had sought to rekindle our affair and have me use the phallus on him during a sexual rite to return his flagging manhood to prodigious working order.

It was a wicked manipulation.

On discovering his true plan, I rejected him and avowed never to set eyes on the damnable fool again.

However, there was an angel at my back in the form of Sebastian Cavell.

He half-inched the casket containing the Greek phallus and had given it to me as a gift for my private collection.

And with that act of kindness, I’d submitted to my attraction and opened myself to possibilities that I had never considered could happen to a godly man such as I.

Sebastian wanted me, adored me, and had been looking out for me long before our fateful meeting on the Caledonian sleeper train to Scotland.

Since that frightful winter’s day when Euan’s true plan was revealed, the man himself had wandered so very far from God’s path.

Presently, Lord Ardmillan was a hairs breadth from financial ruin, and a deluded, desperate acolyte of a secret society of sexual deviants, Fratres Seminis .

Due to Euan’s influence, I have unwillingly been dragged into this brotherhood.

The leader of this cabal is an American theosophist using the pseudonym Lawrence Blake.

He too wished to possess the Staff of Asklepios , and Euan was supposed to deliver the sculpted phallus to him.

Blake promised his followers that a sexual rite enacted using phallus and a beloved young man known as the vessel , would enable him to pass into death and be resurrected, returning to life with secrets from beyond the veil.

He’d convinced a handful of powerful, influential men who shared our unlawful proclivity, that they too could learn the secrets of the Staff and seek immortality.

They aimed to be gods among men.

The theft of the object by Sebastian put pay to that plan and now Blake believes Euan betrayed him.

Sebastian and I had become quite the covert thorn in Lawrence Blake’s side.

The young man who was to play the part of the vessel is Baron Leopold Von Liebenstein, the twenty-two-year-old son of Baron Maximillian Von Liebenstein of Thüringia, Germany.

The boy’s hedonism saw him throw himself into sexual sluttony with members of the cabal and then vanish from London society.

Sebastian had been assigned by Von Liebenstein’s retainer to locate him and return Leo to his care.

I assisted in the ruse and passed the drunken young pup to his manservant who boarded a ship bound for Hamburg, removing Leopold from Blake’s Svengali influence.

I’d thought we’d gotten away with our abduction; however, I was now in a bind.

Blake did not know I assisted in the vanishing of the young man he called his vessel.

He also did not know I possessed the sacred phallus or that Euan had found refuge in my home.

And if he did discover my betrayal he would use the influence of the brotherhood to ensure my total ruination.

“If I tell the Police that Euan was my house guest and stole from me, Fratres Seminis will find out I was harbouring him, they’ll know I lied to them,”

I’d complained to Sebastian. We were sitting on the chaise in my secret room, so our voices did not carry. Sebastian placed his arm around my shoulder, drawing me closer.

“I agree. You really cannot risk Lawrence Blake’s wrath at this juncture.”

And Sebastian would know about his wrath more than I would.

As a young man, Sebastian was lured from a Parisian seminary by the wiles of the silver-tongued American, seduced and abused in the most reprehensible way.

Sebastian’s comforting embrace was most welcome, but his words chilled me.

The wave of torment that overtook me at the thought of exposure made a near paralysis stop my thoughts.

I leaned my head onto his bony shoulder for a moment, inhaling the scent of his hair pomade, sweat and our sex.

Gods, it was a heady mixture of sensual alchemy and those familiar scents calmed my nerves.

We both remained lost in our thoughts for several minutes, Sebastian’s comforting hold never wavering.

He broke the silence first,

“Tell the police you believe the theft was carried out by the Dandy Rogue,”

he suggested.

I pulled away and faced him. “No…no, I couldn’t possibly—”

I was flattered he would seek to protect me and also appalled that Sebastian would dare ask me to lie to the police and accuse him of a crime he did not commit.

“You’re innocent. I know exactly where you were all night and would vouch for you!”

I said not considering the ramifications of such an announcement. Memories of delicious debauchery flooded into my mind and my prick twitched.

Sebastian’s brow hitched in amusement. “You would vouch to the police that I spent the night ravishing you until we were so spent neither of us could move?”

“Well…err, no, I suppose I wouldn’t go that far,”

I conceded, heat rushing to burn my face. Sebastian let out a light laugh at seeing my discomfiture.

“The police know the name Sebastian Cavell, but they do not know what I look like. I ensured many years ago that the few photographs of me we’re destroyed.”

“Indeed, I recall that Charles Ashe is having a damnable time pinning down a likeness for the Illustrated Police News!”

“Exactly, here I am Foxford Robins and that name isn’t connected with any crime. I do appreciate the sentiment though, dear heart.”

I gazed into his whisky eyes. My innards wriggled, my mouth was desert dry, and my throat tight with all of the emotion that passed wordlessly between us.

“Why do you want me to give Euan a free pass for such a betrayal? Should he not face the consequences of his crime?”

“—because letting him go protects your reputation, and protecting you my priority. I am sure Euan will eventually meet his fate. He’s tempting it enough!”

he said sagely. “It’s fine. This crime would just be another theft to be added to a long, long list for the Dandy Rogue!”

“Even so, if, God forbid, the authorities ever did catch up with you, I would be horrified to have you tried for a theft you were not guilty of.”

“I assure you, it would not be the first or the last. I have carried out a total of fifteen assignments relating to high society in England, and seven in Europe, yet, the police have fifty-six crimes listed.”

“No!”

I was appalled.

“The Dandy Rogue has been a very useful scapegoat for many an opportunist criminal,”

Sebastian informed. “I’m going to have to leave a calling card in future so they know it was truly me!”

he grinned morosely.

“You are not taking this seriously at all,”

I harrumphed as I elbowed him in the rib.

“I am,”

he laughed and edged away from my elbow. “Ardmillan has stolen from his oldest friend and he is desperate. He knows full-well that you are a good man, a kind man, and you wouldn’t blacken his name and doom his wife and children to banishment from society.”

Honestly, I had quite forgotten about his wife and children, and it appeared Euan had forgotten about them too! The remembrance that Euan had a family made this situation so much worse.

“For a man as lost and needy as Euan, Fratres Seminis is narcotic. I’ve seen it before,”

Sebastian explained. “I know the hold that Lawrence Blake wields over the boys and men in his thrall. They are mere pawns seduced by Blake’s words, and Euan will debase himself further to be welcomed back into the fold.”

Adding another crime to the list made me feel deeply uncomfortable, but I was out of options.

“Look, get dressed and take the details from your valet,”

Sebastian instructed. “Tell him that the thief could not have been Euan as he left early to catch a train,”

he said decisively.

My mind was still sleep dazed but I could not think of a better way to deal with this situation.

“Yes, yes, you are correct,”

I agreed resignedly.

****