CHAPTER SIX

WHEN DAVID WOKE UP, MURDO had rolled away to the other side of the bed and a grey, tentative dawn was poking through the drapes, reminding him of the world outside.

He propped himself up on one elbow and watched as Murdo—or was he Balfour again this morning?—slept. He knew he should rise and dress but there was something fascinating about Murdo Balfour, even in repose. In sleep, the urbane mask entirely fell away. In sleep, his expression gentled, and the tender skin of his eyelids gave him a vulnerable look.

Murdo’s temples were sprinkled with a few silver hairs. David wondered how old he was. He’d never said. He couldn’t be more than six or seven years older than David, but he might be all of that. Perhaps two- or three-and-thirty. And unmarried still, it seemed. His dynastically minded father must find him a vexation.

He’d done his father’s bidding in coming up for the King’s visit, though. Playing the part of the Balfour clan chief’s son for King and country. Had he felt silly, David wondered, parading up the High Street in with tartan paraphernalia? Murdo Balfour was the sort of man who usually dressed with severe, modern elegance—all dark superfine and snowy-white linen—David would never have thought he’d have put up with being dressed up like one of Walter Scott’s fictional creations. Though it had to be said, he’d looked very well in dark-blue-and-green tartan.

Like Young Lochinvar.

He suppressed a smile at the thought. Unlike Young Lochinvar, Murdo was unlikely to be stealing anyone’s bride.

Murdo.

Already David found it impossible to think of him as Balfour.

David glanced at the clock on the mantel. Half past six. Definitely time to leave. He shouldn’t have stopped the night—the servants would be moving about the house soon, if they weren’t already. The magic of the night was well and truly over.

For some strange reason, though, he felt no regret, no panic—not like last time, when his encounter with Balfour had sent him running off, out into the night, seeking some kind of oblivion. In fact, he felt more at peace than he normally did, as though all the jumbled parts of himself had been set right overnight.

What fanciful thoughts.

Sitting up, David extricated himself from the tangled bedcovers, moving carefully so as not to wake the other man. His efforts at silence were for nothing, though—the sounds of fabric brushing as he began to dress, along with the protests of the floorboards beneath his feet, were apparently enough to pull Balfour out of his dreams. The man stirred and opened his eyes just as David was buttoning up his breeches.

“You’re leaving?” He yawned.

“I should go before one of your servants comes in.”

Balfour sat up, rubbing a hand over his eyes. Boyishly rumpled, he was a different man from the elegant peer of last night—messier and altogether more human. And when he looked David up and down as he was doing now, the corner of his mouth kicking up in appreciation, he was so appealing he made David’s mouth run dry.

“Don’t worry about the servants,” he said. “I brought some of my London staff with me. They’re more discreet—they know never to enter my private rooms in the morning till I call for them. Besides”—he leaned back on his elbows and gave one of his half-hitch smiles—“it’s Saturday. Spend the morning with me.”

“Don’t you have duties to perform?” David replied. His voice came out lower than he’d intended, rough with desire. He cleared his throat, adding, “I thought you were on the King’s retinue.”

“Not quite. I’m more one of the outer circle. As for today, I’ve no commitments other than the Levee this afternoon.” He consulted the clock on the wall. “And it’s not even seven. I’ve got a few hours before I go anywhere. Enough for a decent breakfast, at least. Join me.”

“I should really—” David began automatically, then he broke off.

Why not just do as Balfour asked? Why not let himself enjoy the man’s company for a few more hours? It was a pleasurable diversion from normal life, wasn’t it? One that was safe from any fear of discovery and ruin, unlike his usual encounters. He’d already crossed the line by coming here, so why not enjoy the fruits of his recklessness to the full?

“All right,” he said. “I’ll stay a bit longer.”

When Murdo grinned at him and flipped the bedcovers back, he felt a rush of joy that should have been alarming. But he didn’t even let himself think about it. Instead he let himself have the moment, let the joy of it brighten him.

He stripped his breeches and drawers off again—the work of a moment—and impulsively leapt at Murdo, landing on top of him and knocking a surprised shout of laughter out of him. Murdo twisted, rolling David onto his back and under him, and they wrestled for a minute, muscles straining, bodies pressing and sliding, a brief tussle for dominance.

Bested, David stopped struggling, gasping with laughter, and Murdo stilled over him. Their gazes locked for the longest time, and David felt a queer ache in his chest. He had to close his eyes to gain control of himself.

When he opened them again, Murdo’s gaze had shifted downwards. He laid his hand on David’s chest, letting his fingertips drift over David’s nipples, the flat planes of his chest, and the ridges of muscle below. His dark eyes were appreciative.

“You look slender in your clothes, but you’re strong.” He ran his hands up David’s arms, testing the muscles there. “How do you manage it? Bookish fellows are usually softer.”

“I walk a lot—I love to be outside, in the country. I like to climb too.”

“Climb? What do you mean?”

David laughed, a little embarrassed. “Oh, you know. Hills, rock faces sometimes. Last month I climbed a bit of Salisbury Crags.”

Murdo’s eyebrows rose. “How very odd. Isn’t that dangerous?”

“Well—yes.”

Murdo laughed, delight sparkling in those pitch-dark eyes at David’s artless response. “I’d love to see you climb. Perhaps you could take me, one day.”

“Perhaps,” David agreed, smiling, liking the thought of showing off to Murdo, for all the childish absurdity of it.

Murdo lowered his head, capturing David’s lips with his own. His hand, caught between their bodies, coasted down David’s chest, belly, flank. Those strong, determined fingers sought and found David’s prick, rubbed it in long, luxurious strokes.

Grinding his hips, Murdo pushed his own cock forward, opening his grip so the blunt head pushed against David’s, rude and insistent. Then his big hand was closing about both of them, pressing and rubbing them together, making David helplessly groan.

“You too,” he breathed against David’s mouth. “Put your hand over mine.” David fumbled his hand down between them, his fingers interlacing with Murdo’s to make a clumsy cage of flesh that began to move in exquisite, dragging counterpoint to the slide and grind of their shafts. Murdo’s hips jerked against David’s as they worked together, kissing as they went, nearly devouring each other. David was so beyond thought, he could do little more than let Murdo steer their joined hands while he lay, moaning incoherent encouragement, until they went over the edge together, their mingled seed spilling over their fingers and dripping onto David’s belly.

They lay there together, sticky and sated, and David let his mind empty, let himself enjoy the languorous aftermath of orgasm.

“Do you remember that first time we were together here, like this?” Murdo asked after a while.

David was staring up at the intricate petals of the ceiling rose. Murdo’s voice in his ear was a surprise, but he didn’t shift his gaze, just nodded. The truth was, he remembered that night as though it was yesterday; the impossible, unprecedented intimacy of it burned in his memory. Murdo’s mouth on the entrance to David’s body, his long fingers breaching, then moving inside David.

That night had undone him entirely. Changed him. There was no going back from something like that, something that had scuppered so many of his personal limits. Later, when Murdo was gone, returned to London, the memory of it had tormented him. Yet it had fortified him too somehow. Sometimes he hated that he’d done it, and other times, it felt like the only sane thing he’d ever done in all his life.

“I couldn’t stop thinking about you after I went back to London,” Murdo said roughly.

Astonished, David turned his head on the pillow to meet the other man’s gaze. That face. So familiar, on such little acquaintance. As though he’d absorbed every detail about Murdo Balfour without realising it.

“Nor I you,” he murmured before he could censor himself.

Murdo grew still. Watchful. “Really?”

The heat of an infuriating blush was on David’s cheeks. “Yes, really.”

“Why?”

Discomfited, David turned his head to look back up at the perfect plasterwork on the ceiling. “I don’t know. I just—never knew it could be like that, between two men.”

“Neither did I.”

There was a long silence during which David tried hard not to swallow against the curious obstruction in his throat.

Then Murdo flung the covers aside and got out of bed. “Time for a bath,” he announced briskly, reaching for the bell pull.

They ate breakfast at the small table in Murdo’s private sitting room. Smoked haddock, eggs and potato cakes, a basket of warm, toasted muffins and a dish of fruit conserves. Everything served on fine, white porcelain dishes, with silver cutlery and white damask napkins. There was tea served in a silver teapot with milk and sugar presented in a matching silver jug and bowl. There were even tiny little silver tongs to pick up the sugar lumps.

David found he was unusually hungry. The food was excellent, the fish sweet and flaky, the eggs just done, with runny yolks that were heavenly spread on the potato cakes. He ate everything on his plate, then helped himself to a toasted muffin, spreading it thickly with cold butter that tasted almost as good as the stuff his mother made. He added a spoonful of crimson jam that gleamed like a pile of rubies and bit into the muffin with relish, catching Murdo’s eye as he did so and noting his amused smile.

“What is it?” he said, after he’d swallowed the mouthful down. “Do I have something on my face?” He explored the side of his mouth with his fingertips.

“No, it’s just that you’re eating so…heartily.”

David frowned. “So?”

Murdo shrugged, still smiling. “You never struck me as a man who enjoyed his food. In fact, I distinctly remember you telling me that sometimes you forget to eat.”

“That doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy my food when I do eat,” David retorted, but even as he spoke the words, it occurred to him that he couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed a meal as well as this one.

“Well, you must still forget too often. You’re a bit on the thin side.”

David’s jaw tightened at the implied criticism. “You seemed to like the look of me well enough earlier.”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” Murdo laughed. “You must know how much you appeal to me by now! You’re as handsome as anyone could wish. There, will that do?”

David scowled, resenting the implication he’d been fishing for compliments and embarrassed by the one he’d been given. Uncomfortable with the turn in the conversation, he tried to steer it back to where it had begun. “I eat well enough,” he muttered.

“You’re a healthy enough specimen,” Balfour agreed, leaning back in his chair and looking David over with an appreciative gaze. “But eating to live is one thing; eating for pleasure is quite another. You enjoyed that muffin. And I enjoyed watching you when you tasted it.” He acted it out for David, biting into an imaginary muffin, his eyes closing with pleasure, lips curving upwards.

Reluctantly charmed by Murdo’s playacting, David huffed out a laugh. “I didn’t look like that.”

Murdo opened his eyes again, quirking one dark brow. “Oh, you did. And it’s how you were last night too. You surrendered to the pleasure. Was that the first time you’ve done that, David? It wasn’t how you were the first time we were together.”

That statement rocked David back on his heels. Over the past two years, whenever he had recalled his night with Murdo, his memory had been one of shocking, uncontrollable passion. Was it possible Murdo remembered it differently? Had he thought of David as inhibited? Reluctant?

“I think I showed how much I enjoyed myself that night—in the usual way,” David replied, hating the defensive tone in his voice.

“You mean when you came for me?”

David squirmed, and Murdo smiled at his obvious embarrassment.

“I knew that you enjoyed it in the end,” Murdo continued. “My point is that you didn’t want to. You resisted it.”

“I don’t know why we’re talking about this now,” David said. He saw no point in this conversation, going over old ground that should be left well alone.

Murdo ignored that comment. “The last time you were in this house, part of you didn’t want to be here at all. Part of you resisted everything we did together. I had to make you face up to what you wanted. Last night was different. You were different.”

David met Murdo’s dark gaze. Murdo was smiling in that bland, pleasant way he did sometimes that made him impossible to read. David wanted to tear that mask away and expose what was underneath, just as Murdo was exposing him.

“You were different last time too,” he retorted.

Murdo’s eyebrow rose. “Whatever do you mean?” There was amusement in his voice. The mask was still firmly in place.

“You pushed me,” David said. “You did things to me you knew I’d never have permitted in my right mind.”

He paused then, remembering. Considering, perhaps for the first time, what might have been going through Murdo’s head that night. “I think you deliberately set out to provoke me,” he said slowly. “Perhaps you wanted to see just how far you could push me.”

Murdo’s mask stayed in place, but the amusement had faded. After a long moment of silence, he said softly, “Is that what you think?”

David considered. “I think you enjoyed shocking me.”

A flash in Murdo’s dark eyes. He didn’t like that.

“You make it sound like I was playing with you,” he said.

“Weren’t you?”

“No. I admit I wanted to shake you up—wake you up. But I just wanted you to see yourself!”

David gave a harsh laugh. “You assumed I didn’t see myself already?”

“I knew you didn’t,” Murdo shot back. “Not as you are.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. I already knew I preferred men. I’d known for—”

“You saw yourself as an abomination,” Murdo interrupted flatly. “I wanted you to see you as I see you.”

“And how exactly is that?”

“As someone—” Murdo broke off and looked away, nostrils flaring as he breathed out his anger. “You’re not an abomination, David. You’re—beautiful.”

David’s throat closed up for a moment, but he forced himself to speak, his voice thick with emotion. “I’m a man, Murdo, not a woman to be courted.”

“A man can’t be beautiful?”

“I don’t think—” David began, faltering when he remembered Murdo standing naked in the candlelight last night.

Beautiful.

“You still think this is wrong,” Murdo accused, interrupting his wayward thoughts. “Even now, after what we shared last night. You think you are wrong.” He stood abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor.

For a moment, he stared down at David; then he gave a huff of exasperation and turned away, crossing the room to stand before the window and look down at the gardens below.

You think you are wrong.

David racked his brains trying to find words to respond to that accusation. The truth was, he’d changed quite a lot since that first time with Murdo. In the months that had followed, he hadn’t been able to get what had happened between them out of his mind. The memories had been both a torment and a comfort, nipping at him, agitating him, making him consider things he’d once have deemed unthinkable. The possibility of tenderness and affection. The possibility of honesty, of being known by another. Things he’d ruled out for himself. Things that were too painful to hope for.

Those memories had been something to cherish too, a treasure he could take out and examine in his darkest moments. A remembrance that, for all his regrets, was rich with unexpected sweetness.

Slowly, David stood up from his own chair and crossed the room, coming to a halt behind the other man. Murdo had to hear his approach, but the only sign of awareness he gave was a slight tensing of his shoulders.

“I may not think I’m beautiful,” David said at last. “But I don’t think I’m precisely wrong either. Not anymore. Not since…you.”

Murdo went very still. David felt like Murdo’s whole body was listening to him.

“If I’m honest,” David continued slowly, “I’m not sure what I think of myself now. But it’s different to how I used to feel. Better, I mean.”

Murdo turned slowly. “How did you used to feel?” A wary curiosity filled his gaze.

“Like I was—like I was damned to hell. Just for thinking about the sorts of things you and I did together last night.” The words tumbled out of David in a torrent. He took a ragged breath, forcing himself to keep his eyes on Murdo.

“Don’t you feel like that anymore?”

David shook his head, unable to say more.

Murdo gave a rough laugh. “It’s not the most ringing endorsement I’ve ever received,” he said.

“No?” David smiled weakly. “Well, you’ve no idea how far I’ve come.”

“Oh, I’ve an idea.” Murdo raised a hand and touched David’s jaw, an impossibly gentle brush of his fingers.

Time hung, silent, between them for a moment. Then Murdo said, like someone admitting an uncomfortable truth, “I’d like to see you again, while I’m here.”

David stared into those intense, unsettling eyes. It was a bad idea. A terrible idea. He would pay if he gave in and let himself have this, because much as the last time had been a treasure, it had been a bittersweet one. There would be a price to pay for more memories like this. A black descent.

But there would be this too. This excited temporary joy. This pleasure.

When all was said and done, he couldn’t bring himself to say no.

“I’d like that too,” he murmured.

He was rewarded with a smile, an unguarded, happy one that made Murdo’s dimple flash in his cheek. “When?”

“I don’t know—aren’t you going to be busy? With the King, I mean?”

Murdo sighed. “Quite a bit of the time, yes. Are you going to any of the events Sir Walter’s organised?”

“Just to Holyrood on Monday, with some others from the faculty.”

“Hmm. Is that when the good burghers of Edinburgh are to take turns at droning on about themselves while His Majesty smiles and nods?”

“The same,” David agreed, a small smile twitching at his lips.

“I’ll be there too. Can I see you after?”

David thought of how many people there would be at Holyrood. How chaotic it would be. How impossible.

How very unwise this was.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, I’d like that.”