Had Worthington finally decided to try to kill him?
He shrugged into his dressing robe, determined to meet his possible demise with some small amount of dignity. The door creaked as he opened it slowly.
He faltered. Breathed in deeply. Thought he could smell the faintest trace of peat and brine, but maybe he was imagining that.
Ian stood in his doorway, hair wind-tousled, expression solemn.
Was he dreaming? He was used to dreams of Ian by now, when he’d wake with an ache in his heart and his seed staining the bedsheets.
Robert peered at him without moving. “Are you…” He just stopped himself from asking Ian if he was real, because that was stupid. Of course he was real—Robert was quite awake. So he settled for something mundane, the only thing he could think of. “What time is it?”
“Early.”
Robert stepped back to let him in, and after checking that no one was watching from the hall, locked the door (again) behind him. When he turned, Ian was sitting at the edge of his bed. In the soft yellow light, his hair was the color of cinnamon.
Robert swallowed, throat thick. He wanted nothing more than to touch him, to reach for him, to feel muscle and skin against his fingertips. But he didn’t know if Ian wanted the same. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m going to take some time away. I havena had any time off since Lord Arden came here, so I don’t think he’ll mind.”
Robert’s stomach clenched. “Why?”
“I’m going to visit my family. See if they’re still there.” He looked at something, some point on the far wall. “I don’t even know if they’re still alive.”
Through his pain, worry for Ian emerged, bitter and sharp. “What I said before…I was angry—”
“I know, but you had a point.” Ian’s mouth tilted wryly. “I want to see them. I think it’s time.”
“Will you be all right? Even if…even if they’re there and they don’t want to see you?”
“Even then.”
“That’s good.”
Ian reached for him then, hand out, and open. Robert stared at it dazedly for a moment, and then he did the only thing he could do—he took it. Ian’s rough, warm fingers wrapped around his own, tightened, drew Robert down to sit beside him on the bed.
“I’m sorry,” Ian said quietly.
Robert stilled.
“I’m sorry,” Ian repeated, “for the things I said to ye. I like that you weaseled your way into my life. You’ve made me stronger. Better.” He didn’t look at Robert when he talked, and if Robert wasn’t mistaken, there was a slight flush to his cheeks. “When you said you wanted to tell your siblings about us, I told myself that you were foolish. That I should protect you from yourself. But a big part of that was my own fear. If they did turn their backs on you, I didna want you to resent me for it. If ye had to choose between us, I thought…I thought, at some point, you’d decide I wasn’t worth the sacrifice.”
In his lap, Ian’s free hand curled into a fist; his other hand was still wrapped around Robert’s. His voice was not quite steady as he spoke, there was a sheen of sweat on his forehead, and his gaze remained fixed on a random point on the far wall. Robert realized Ian had never looked so scared or so vulnerable before, even at the height of intimacy. He watched him, barely breathing.
“But I need to trust that you know your own heart. You might be younger than me in some ways. But you’re older than me in others. Stronger than me, in others.” He took a deep, deep breath. “And maybe I could borrow a little of your faith.”
He stopped.
Robert stared.
Finally, Robert said, “I don’t…Ian…what exactly are you saying?”
Ian closed his eyes. “I don’t just want to fuck you, I want to be your friend,” he said, voice shaking. “Your best friend. The one you talk to when you’re happy and when you’re angry and the one you go to when you don’t want to talk at all. I want to be the one you turn to. I won’t settle for less.”
Robert felt like he couldn’t breathe. Ian had remembered, almost word for word, what he’d told him that starry night. And he must have kept those words tucked away, close to his heart.
“And I don’t want ye to get married. I know you’re too honorable to call it off, but there has to be a way. I want ye to myself. We can do our best to persuade Hale. But if he doesna work up the courage on his own, I’m willing to do anything. Threaten. Blackmail. I’ll be dishonorable for you. Anything for you—”
“Oh,” Robert said stupidly. “Oh.” He leaned over Ian to reach the letter on the nightstand. “That won’t be a problem.”
Robert waited while Ian read the letter silently. He noticed the other man’s hands were trembling.
A few minutes later, Ian crumpled the letter in his fists, looking mortified. “Maybe ye should have showed me this first.”
“Well, yes,” Robert said, a little embarrassed himself. “But in my defense, you startled me. And…I…” Now it was his turn to feel vulnerable. “And it was nice, to hear it. More than nice.”
Ian slumped back onto the headboard, as if, after his declaration, his words had all been used up for the day. And Robert laughed, a bright, fierce joy filling his chest, as though he’d swallowed the sun.
Robert thought he’d never experienced a more perfect moment. He tangled his fingers with Ian’s, rested against him, arms entwined, shoulder to shoulder.
“What did you say to him?” Ian asked after he’d had some time to recover.
“Something about love not being quite like it is in poems. How it’s deep and enduring and made up of a thousand little moments.” His hand tightened around Ian’s. “Just like this one.” After a moment, he added, “I’m sorry, too.”
“For what?”
“I thought it was my responsibility to save Alice’s reputation. Even at the expense of my happiness. Even at the expense of yours. And that’s not the way things should have been. You must have felt…abandoned. And I don’t ever want you to feel that way again.”
Ian pulled on his arm, and Robert crashed into him. Their lips collided in a hot, languid kiss as Ian’s hands trailed down his back, calluses rasping along his skin, making him shiver.
“The door is locked,” he said into Ian’s mouth.
“Aye.”
“But we’ll have to be quiet.”
“Aye.”
“Are we done with talking?”
“Obviously.”
He laughed.
Ian huffed and pressed him down into the mattress, and Robert accepted his weight, helped unfurl him from the wool of his kilt until there was nothing between them. Ian’s body was as hot as a furnace, as though it blazed with its own fire, and Robert held him close, wanting to feel that heat all down his length.
He broke away from their kissing only to latch his lips on to Ian’s throat, biting and sucking and licking. He tasted salt, and skin, and the heartbeat that trembled at the hollow of Ian’s collarbone. He didn’t worry about leaving a mark. Some part of him wanted to. Wanted to claim this fierce Scotsman as his own with a physical brand.
Mine. Mine. Mine.
It was only fair. Robert was Ian’s, too. Had been even before unwanted guests and peculiar cats had forced them together. That pulse of attraction had always been there, even if he’d done his best to ignore it.
He shifted underneath Ian, brought their hips together. Their hard cocks came into contact, and Robert thrust upward so they slid against each other, reveling in the heat and smoothness.
Ian sat back on his knees, wrapped his hand around both of them and lightly stroked.
But even that light touch…it had been too long…and Robert hadn’t been sure they’d ever be together like this again…he was close. Too close. And he was not about to come less than five minutes into their reunion.
It would be embarrassing.
“Stop.”
Ian halted. He’d been looking down at his fist pumping their cocks; now he looked up at Robert. Gray eyes met dark brown.
“Fuck me,” he said hoarsely.
Ian did not have to be asked twice.