“I beg your pardon?”
“Just let me be sure I have this right. That was what you were angry about? Being edged out of the action? I gathered that your pride was at stake—”
Curtis knew he owed the fellow honesty. “I’m half-crippled. I don’t need reminding of that. I don’t find it easy to live with, and I don’t like reminders that I’m less than I was.”
“Well, God knows what you used to be, then, because you’re built like a brick shithouse and hung like a horse.”
Curtis blinked at that startling vulgarity. Da Silva gave him a wry half-smile. “But far be it from me to comment. Just tell me, are you, or were you, angry with me because I forced myself on you last night?”
Curtis groped for an answer and settled on, “No.”
“Ri-i-ight.” Da Silva drew the sound out.
“No,” Curtis repeated. “Well, if I was angry, why would I have wanted you to do it again? It was, er, very decent of you,” he added, feeling his cheeks redden.
Da Silva began to massage the bridge of his nose, as if staving off a headache. “Mmm. You’re actually quite a straightforward sort of fellow, aren’t you? I assumed—well, more fool me. I see. I do, in fact, see.”
“See what?”
“What’s in front of my face. With all that entails.” Da Silva exhaled heavily. “Well. To begin with, I had no intention of questioning your physical abilities. I’m in no position to do that, and more to the point, I doubt violence will be useful here. Deception is what’s required, and that’s my area, not yours, which brings me to my second point. Quite frankly, not to beat about the bush, the reason I feel more qualified to handle this business than you—ah, this is embarrassing. I wasn’t planning to tell you this.”
“Tell me what?”
“Well, the thing is, when I implied—or said, really—that I was carrying out an amateur investigation, that wasn’t quite accurate. I’m here professionally.”
“Professionally? To do what, write sonnets?”
“No, my other profession.” Da Silva looked as close to shamefaced as Curtis could imagine. “I work for the Foreign Office Private Bureau. For your Uncle Maurice, in fact. As one of his, er, special recruits.”
The words made sense, but the meaning did not. “You work for the Private Bureau?” Curtis repeated.
“As I said.”
“You’re a secret agent?”
“I loathe that term. It’s so violent, somehow.”
“You?”
Da Silva rolled his eyes. “I suppose I should find your incredulity flattering. It would be lowering to learn I looked like a tool of the State.”
“But— Why didn’t you say?”
“Secret agent. Secret.”
Curtis gaped, trying to imagine his uncompromisingly strict uncle recruiting this willowy decadent, then was hit by an abrupt, horrifying thought.
It was a pose. It was all a bloody pose. Da Silva was a government agent, deflecting suspicion with this brilliant, outrageous facade. He had sucked Curtis off last night for no more reason than to ensure they could bring home the information they needed, and today he, Curtis, he had—
He had forced the man to his knees and done that to him, used his mouth, not because da Silva wanted it, but because he did.
Curtis stared at him, appalled.
“Are you all right?” Da Silva’s voice seemed to come from a long way away. “Curtis?”
“Oh dear God,” Curtis mumbled, overwhelmed by shame. “I’m so sorry. Christ. I—I can’t apologise enough.”
“For…?”
This was intolerable, and he deserved every bit of it. “You must think I need horsewhipping.”
“I really don’t think that’s what you need. What are you agonising about?”
“Good God, man, I just made you—” Curtis gestured at the floor where da Silva had knelt. “That. I made you. It was all my fault. I’m so sorry.”
Da Silva looked down, then up, a peculiar expression on his face. “Is this flood of remorse because you’ve concluded I’m a government agent masquerading as a shameless invert?”
Curtis made himself meet his eyes. “I can only apologise. I had no idea.”
“Dear fellow, you’ve missed it by a mile.” Da Silva patted his arm comfortingly. “I’m a government agent and a shameless invert. Which is not to say I’ll suck you off on demand, but if you think you’ve been ravaging my virgin mouth, you’re about fifteen years and quite a lot of pricks too late.”
“Oh, thank God,” Curtis blurted out on a wave of sheer relief, and da Silva’s composure cracked. He doubled over with laughter. Curtis shot him a furious look. “It’s not bloody funny!”
“Yes, it is.” Da Silva’s eyes brimmed with amusement. His lips were reddened, hair dishevelled, and he looked so unbearably handsome it made Curtis’s chest tighten.
He sat on the floor and put his head in his hands.
Da Silva made a good effort to regain control, though his voice was shaky as he said, “Come on, it’s not that bad.”
Curtis didn’t reply. There was a short silence.