“I can’t stay away,” he murmured against Andrew’s lips.
Neither could he. Andrew would treasure the memory of their night together in Dover forever, and the two they had spent lingering on the road on the way home. How could anyone condemn such sweet loving? But they did. Their love was as forbidden as ever, as condemned as it always would be. They could be hanged for what they did.
Even that did not cool his ardor. Nothing ever would.
He returned Darius’s embrace with enthusiasm before he stepped back to ring the bell. Darius stayed his hand. “We are summoned to General Court’s.” He glanced down. “I see you have his note. I think we should go now. I have signed statements from Ivan, Smith, and Bull in my pocket. We will tell the truth.”
That relieved Andrew mightily. “Thank you.” He stole another kiss. If anyone had told him he would take quite so much pleasure from feeling a man’s hard lips against his own he’d have called him deluded. He had never kissed another man before Darius.
To him, the act of sexual congress had been mere relief to a mind and body under strain. Get it done. Get it over with. That notion had dissipated into thin air. They had come back to London in better heart, Darius insisting that Andrew take Ivan’s mount while his cousin languished in the carriage.
“I want you comfortable on a horse. When I invite you and Elizabeth to our country home, you should be easy enough to ride around the estate.” He’d only laughed when Andrew expressed doubts. “Haxby is a large establishment with plenty of spare bedrooms. Some of them are close to mine.” He’d waggled his brows suggestively, pulling a reluctant laugh from Andrew.
He still doubted he would ever see the place. Surely a visit there would appear too particular.
Although he had let Darius into his life, they had to keep their affair clandestine. He could see no other way. He had claimed some happiness for himself. That had to be enough.
Darius stepped back, taking in Andrew’s appearance in a comprehensive visual sweep. As always, Andrew had dressed with neatness and propriety. Next to Darius’s expensive, understated luxury, he would pass well enough. He did not want to appear as something he was not. “General Court will take me as I am,” he said.
“You look marvelous,” Darius said softly. “You’re my marvel, at any rate.”
Unaccountably, tears pricked at Andrew’s eyes. He was not a man given to weeping. Hastily he turned away, pretending to shuffle papers on his desk. “We should go.”
“I’ve brought the carriage.”
“Are we traveling in state, then?”
Darius laughed. “Oh, yes.”
The berlin that had taken Andrew to Dover waited outside, but this time liveried footmen waited for them. A team of high-steppers stamped impatiently. The golden crest of the Shaw family was on full display. As they left Andrew’s modest house, a footman opened the door and let the steps down to reveal the luxurious interior.
Andrew took his seat. “Whitehall is not far away.”
Darius swung into the one next to him. “The nobility has a position to uphold. We are not summoned, ever. We arrive of our own free will, graciously answering a request from the general.”
Andrew grinned. “And I am to expect this in the future?”
Darius smiled. “Only when necessary. The berlin has not seen such activity for a month, since we arrived in London. It will take my family to Haxby in time for Christmas.”
“And you?” Of course Darius would go to his family’s house for Christmas. He might not return to London until the beginning of the season, after Easter. While they were lovers, they still had their own lives to pursue. A cloud surrounded Andrew’s heart at the thought.
“That depends entirely on you,” Darius said. “I want you there, too.”
“Darius—”
He broke off when Darius lifted a finger of admonition.
“We will discuss the matter later, if you please. We need to bend our thoughts to the meeting ahead. You proposed we keep to the truth, so we will do that.”
He was right. They did not have much time before the meeting. “Yes.” Andrew frowned. “The general will know how matters went forth. The two men who escaped the scene will have told him what they saw. We will tell the events as they unfolded. I shot the general’s son. He will be grieved, probably looking for someone to blame.”
“Do you blame yourself?”
Andrew shook his head slowly. “I waited for guilt to come, but it did not. My conscience is clear. He would have shot me had I not acted faster than he did. I intended to break away, assuming he would shoot anyway, whether I resisted or not.” He touched his finger to his lips. “Do we know if the general colluded in this illicit release of information? Is he a traitor too?”
“Ah.” Darius lost his easy smile. “If he is, we will cut the meeting short and go directly to my father. If we even suspect it, we should do that. But my father has researched, as much as he can without arousing suspicion, and I have similarly looked into the matter. While he does not like the general, my father doesn’t believe he is a traitor. The secret the general is in possession of, one far more explosive than a list of spies, has never been divulged to anyone.”
“I don’t think he is either. And like your father, I do not believe it either.” Andrew folded his hands, tightening them into a tightly clenched ball. “I feel for him. However inadequate Court was, he was his son.”
Darius covered Andrew’s hands. His warmth seeped through Andrew, and memories of their night together returned, as vivid as ever. His shaft stirred in his breeches, but he didn’t fight it. He would always feel this way when Darius was near. The seductive emotion warmed him, made him want more. “We know what we’re doing, don’t we?”
Darius slid his hand away, but his warm expression didn’t disappear. “Yes, we do.”
“We cannot be anything other than what we are now.”
“That’s true.” But Darius meant more, not less. The glow in his eyes said that.
Andrew tried again. “We have separate lives, and we cannot bring them together. We have to snatch our happiness while we can.”
This time Darius’s smile did melt away. “We’re here. We will speak of this again, Andrew. While you’ve been attending to your business, so have I.”
Before the footman arrived, Andrew had a bare few seconds to try to make him understand. “You are what you are, Darius, the son of a powerful man, a member of a powerful family. You are protected. I am not. I have my living to make and a daughter to rear the best way I can. If you took me under your wing, I would be forever your pet, your creature.”
When Darius opened his mouth to speak, Andrew held up his hand.
“I will not do that. I have more pride than that, and I will not subject my daughter to that kind of opprobrium. But I am man enough to admit that I cannot deny you. I cannot deny the way I feel about you.”
Darius turned around, effectively blocking the footman’s view inside the carriage. “How do you feel about me?”