familiar landmark and he was flung back into the bittersweet memory of the first time he had
accompanied Nicky home to Carleigh. Nicky had wagered his skill at satisfying Ian against the speed of the coach and four.
Certain he could outlast the final few furlongs, he had taunted, “I can see barns, Nicky, and yet—”
Nicky had shockingly, devastatingly put his mouth to the same use as his hand, an obscene and
wonderful kiss, warm and wet around the head of Ian’s prick. A rut jolted Ian deeper into the slick suction and there was no further need to mark furlongs, or even a yard. The heat of Nicky’s mouth, the movement of his tongue, drew the sweet aching fire from Ian’s spine, brought it boiling from his stones and out his prick—and into Nicky’s mouth.
It should have been horrifying, but the notion that he had spilled between those wide, quick-to-smile
lips only made his body clench again and again with pleasure. He had scarcely even cared when Nicky had wiped his face on Ian’s formerly immaculate trousers.
With that fresh in mind, he had been nearly unaware of the present-day coach coming to a stop and
unable to halt his sister’s unladylike vault from the coach step. Intent on executing his chaperonage with a greater deal of success, he scanned the room, located her by dint of the towering yellow feather which graced her bonnet—easily recalled after the constant tickle against his nose as the coach jolted along—and cut a swath to her side like Major-General Picton into Ciudad Rodrigo.
Ian wished he could ply his saber for safe passage here. The manse in Norwich, the Stanton manor in
Oxfordshire, even their London townhouse all were untenanted wastelands compared with the long narrow
salon. Not since Badajoz had there been so many other bodies around him. And while the scents and sights of a nobleman’s salon in Derbyshire were far removed from the stench of smoke and entrails—or worse the vision of what had been men fragmented by shot and shrapnel—Ian’s ears roared as blood pumped hard
and fast, heating his skin, empowering his limbs. The voices around him faded under the drumming of his pulse, vision narrowing as if through a tunnel, the only sight not blurred that of the plume nodding on Charlotte’s bonnet.
A hand fell on his shoulder. Blood full of heat, muscles warm and vigorous, he whirled, good right
hand reaching for the saber he no longer wore at his waist.
“Ian.”
If there had been a trace of shock and fear on Nicky’s face, Ian’s chance to study it was lost as Nicky used the hand on his shoulder to pull Ian into a half-embrace, which though entirely appropriate to the season and their outward familiarity, left Ian rigid. The thrum of battle-ready nerves still vibrated across his skin, but for an instant the familiar scent of the flesh just above Nicky’s collar managed to penetrate the sensory blinders keeping him shuttered from the crowd.
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In that instant Nicky became a bulwark, shelter and shield against the worst memories of the
Peninsula. He was reaching to offer some reciprocation but Nicky had stepped back, hand sliding along
Ian’s arm to close on the empty sleeve.
Ah, there it was. Horror soon masked by pity. The dark blond curls that had slipped through Ian’s
fingers in countless caresses fell over Nicky’s forehead, but the clear blue eyes still laid his feelings bare.
“Lord Amherst.” Ian executed as correct a bow as possible with Nicky yet clinging to his sleeve and
turned, wrenching free at last.
But although Charlotte’s plume was still in sight, the path to her had closed and as he sought another, Nicky stepped around him again.
“Lord Amherst, is it? Are you not aware that in this bedlam no one would hear were you to shout,
Captain Stanton?”
“I am a simple gentleman only, my lord. As I am of no further use to His Majesty, I have resigned my
commission.”
More sympathy, lashes