Chapter 8
Abraham
Resisting Jasper has never been a strength of mine. With him all but pleading for me to mount him? I haven’t the will to stay away.
I run my tongue up the length of his shaft, listening to his inhale, taking him into my mouth until he’s fully hard once more. He watches me with trusting eyes, his cheeks rosy in the last of the evening sun.
I’d capture him like this if I could. Draw him for my own so that I’d never forget a single second.
But I am no artist. Nor keeper of time.
So like many things in life, I let myself appreciate the fleeting beauty in front of me before it’s gone.
“Turn over,” I request. “It will be easier for you. This first time.”
Jasper nods, twisting onto his stomach atop the blanket, the sight of his bare cheeks before me nearly as arresting as his smile. I press a kiss to each side of his bottom.
“On your knees,” I whisper .
Jasper hastens to comply, and it’s near impossible to stop myself from touching. So I don’t even try. I map my hands over his backside, down his thighs, brush my fingers up along the insides of his legs as they shake. His prick is hard, his body bared to me.
“Are you ready for my cock, Jasper?”
He inhales a shuddering breath, his audible shock at the improper word causing me to let loose a soft laugh. “ Abe .”
“Have I scandalized you at last?”
Jasper looks back at me as I coat myself in oil. He licks his lips. “No. I’m ready for you. Please.”
It’s a true miracle I’m able to hold myself still as I press against him. His body doesn’t yet know what to do to make this easier, so I ease forward slowly, whispering sweet words I hope will help him to relax.
“You are beautiful, my star. If I could, I would spend eternity here with you, and I wouldn’t want for anything. I would look into your eyes and have everything I need.”
“Abraham.” The hitch in his voice has me running a hand over him soothingly.
“I know, tender heart. Is it manageable?”
He nods quickly, reaching back, searching. I twine my fingers with his, falling over his back, halfway inside of him now. I kiss his hair, his ear, his neck as I work myself further.
“You feel lovely. My cock is in Heaven, if such a place exists. There has never been a home as perfect for me as you.”
Jasper’s breath stutters out of him. “Abe.”
My hips meet his skin, and I press a kiss to his cheek, his jaw, down to the top of his shoulder. “That is all of me.”
“It is a lot.”
“I know,” I say, our joined hands braced together on the ground, my other closing over his prick. He’s softened some, and I stroke him slowly, hoping I can bring his focus back to pleasure. “What does it feel like for you?”
His back rises and falls against my chest, sweat forming between us, the still night air making it all too easy to believe we’re in a world of our own.
“I feel as if I have met your sword at last.” His words stun me into silence and then scattered laughter.
Jasper laughs with me, starting to swell in my grip as I rub my thumb along his sensitive skin.
He moans lowly, a single syllable breathed into the air before his voice turns serious.
“I feel as if we are one, Abraham. That we are meant to be so.”
“We are,” I agree wholeheartedly, shifting my hips slightly. Jasper makes a sound deep in his throat, stoking fire to life within my chest. “Again?”
“Yes.”
I press into him again, over and over, a slow rolling of my hips that seems to suit Jasper.
His fingers dig into the blanket around mine, and I move my other hand up to his chest, holding tight as I fit my lips to his neck, the salt of his sweat on my tongue.
I kiss up and down the side of his throat, his shoulder, Jasper’s small exclamations as I rut into him making me wish I were a poet, if only so I could do justice to the way he sets my soul alight.
“If I could wed you, my heart, I would do so in an instant.”
Jasper pulls in a breath, his answer a whimper.
“I would hold you in our bed at night. Take you like this whenever you pleased. I would kiss every inch of you, swallow down the spend from your cock. I would belong to you happily, Jasper Sinclair. I already do. No matter our fortune in life, I will love you for all of our days and long after.”
“Abraham.” The hoarseness of his voice matches my own.
“I know, my love. Do you need to finish? ”
“ Please .”
I return my hand to Jasper’s cock, tugging in time to my thrusts. His head is bowed, breath leaving him in ragged pants. He says my name—“ Abe ”—again and again, a note of fear there I understand all too well.
“Shh. I’m not going anywhere,” I assure him.
Jasper cries out as he swells in my grip.
It sounds anguished. Lovely and tortured.
I squeeze his hand tight as his body ripples around me, and I let go of all I’ve been holding back.
I flood Jasper as my desire for him consumes me.
As it coalesces into a point so tight in my sternum, I lose my breath.
I remain wrapped around him for long minutes, our skin flushed, our breaths almost as one.
When Jasper finally stirs, I slip carefully back, letting myself fall from his body, my hand guiding him to lie down.
He edges to the side of the blanket, his form more difficult now to make out in the dark.
But the outline of him shines, his eyes glittering as I lie beside him.
I sift my fingers through his hair, untangling the strands without hurry.
Jasper’s voice is soft. “We’re a mess.”
“We’ll wash in the creek before we go.”
He nods, his fingertips trailing along my side, gentle points of contact. “I’m scared, Abraham.”
My chest aches, a fierce thing. I pull Jasper’s head around with my fingers at his cheek, and he meets my kiss eagerly, his grip on me tight. “What can I do to soothe you?”
“Would you tell me more? About the life we’d live?”
I swallow roughly, giving a single nod before continuing the slow passage of my fingers through his hair. “Our home would be small. Enough for the two of us. There would be a hearth, of course, to keep us warm. We’d cook our meals there, bread topped with honey. ”
He turns to rest more fully against my side, wrapped still in my arms. “Where would we get the honey?”
“Our bees, of course.”
“Is that so?” A touch of amusement laces his tone.
“Mm. There would be a bed, made soft by layers and layers of straw and blankets. A chair in the corner where you’d write.”
“Letters?”
“Yes,” I tell him. “And you’d teach me to do the same. We’d have gardens out back. Pigs, perhaps. And not another soul in sight. Except for maybe Catherine and my mother, if they wished to join us.”
Jasper sighs against my chest, his breath a whisper over my skin. “It sounds like a wonderful life.”
I bite the inside of my cheek hard enough to cull back the sound that wants to escape my throat. “Yes,” I say at last. “It does, doesn’t it?”
Jasper lays his head on my arm, looking at me in the dark. Is he picturing it as I am? The future that will never come to pass?
“Are you sore?” I ask quietly.
“Only a little. I would weather it a million times over to be close to you again. Will you do that to me often?”
A smile pulls at my lips. “As often as you’d like.”
He hums, a contented cat with his cream. “I wrote you a letter the other day.”
“Did you?”
“I was missing you.”
He offers himself so readily I have the sudden urge to craft a suit of armor for Jasper so that no one could touch him save for me.
“Will you tell me what you wrote?” I ask .
He makes an almost frustrated sound. “I can’t remember all of it, but… The stars were out, and I could see them from my window. It was a comfort because when I look at the stars, I’m reminded of you. I was imagining you with your sword and how handsome you’d be.”
My chest warms. “Do you find me handsome, Jasper?”
His voice is full of nothing but earnestness. “Very. You make my breath come short and my heart leap. I never felt that for another before you. I didn’t know, at first, what to make of it.”
I run my fingers along his jaw, the skin smooth and warm. “I think you’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever set eyes on,” I tell him seriously. “But even if I didn’t have eyes, I would want you just the same.”
Jasper captures my wandering hand, pulling it over his heart. “What are we to do?”
“Continue as we are,” I answer, the hitch of his breath causing my chest to constrict. “It’s all we can do.”
Jasper nods, his forehead brushing mine before his mouth seeks my own, urgent in its demand.
He pulls me on top of him, and I go easily, settling between his legs, taking from his mouth at a pace matched only by what he’s willing to give me.
He reaches for my cock, coaxing me to hardness, tugging me toward him as if desperate to have me within his body once more.
I slow only long enough to grab the oil, and then I’m sinking inside Jasper a second time.
Our coupling is frantic, Jasper leaving the evidence of his arousal smeared along my stomach as I punch soft grunts and whispered moans from his lips.
His hands tug at me, and I plant my palms on the ground, seeking to imprint myself inside his very being so that he’ll never again be without the memory of my touch .
Jasper throws his head back when I wrap my hand around his prick, his cry of ecstasy one I tuck away inside my heart.
He heaves against me, his spend on our stomachs as I empty inside the tight clasp of his body, grateful to be leaving myself there.
To be giving Jasper evidence of our time together, however brief.
He doesn’t unwind his arms from around me, and I leave soft kisses over his cheeks and chin as he trembles.
“Don’t lose hope,” I beg of him quietly. “Never that. When you feel lost, look at the stars and know I am looking at them with you.”
A tear slips down his cheek, cold against my nose. “My warrior.”
“Forevermore,” I vow.
It’s late when Jasper and I finally move off the cold, blanketed ground. I’ll need to clean the wool again before long, but I leave it for another day, walking half-clothed with Jasper to the creek. We wash under the light of the stars, the moon but a sliver tonight.
Jasper looks like a dream, bare skin glinting, soft laughter leaving his lips as he splashes cold water over himself. “If we must do this in the winter, I’ll freeze.”
“We can use cloths instead,” I assure him. “It will be enough until you can return home and wash properly.”
He hums his agreement, climbing out onto the grass and shaking out his limbs.
“Here,” I say, handing over my shirt. “To dry off.”
“You’ll need it.”
“I’ll be fine.”
He sighs softly, but he accepts the garment, drying perfunctorily before slipping on his clothes.
I pull the damp shirt over my head, not minding the chill.
Jasper finds his stockings in the grass, pulling them on, followed by his shoes.
He stalls once he has his waistcoat buttoned, as if he doesn’t want to go.
“Thank you, Abraham.”
His words are quiet, but I hear them nonetheless.
“What for?”
He lets out a slow breath. “For freeing me.”
I pull Jasper’s hand to my mouth, kissing the back of it lightly. His fingers twist with mine for a moment before he steps away. He’s nearly halfway up the hill when he stops, turning around abruptly.
With a single stutter-step, Jasper runs back my way, not stopping until he’s within the clasp of my arms. He kisses me soundly, a lingering smile on his lips, the shape of him so familiar I’m more than certain I could pick him out in the darkest of nights.
When Jasper finally steps back, the smile on his face never wavers. He turns once more. And then he walks off.
Maybe ruin isn’t the right word for what Jasper has wrought by coming into my life. There’s another that feels far more appropriate.
Rebirth.