“How embarrassing, to make an unprofitable murder.”
“His letters are dreadfully wild, saying that he is desperately in need. Really, if that is the case, you would think he might be a little more polite. I should refuse anyway because I promised Miss Whitecross, but I would find it a great deal harder if he were civil. I do not care to be bullied. Well, I don’t suppose anyone does, but I have been accustomed to it, and it has only very recently dawned on me that I can refuse.”
“That is wealth for you.”
“Not entirely,” Titus said. “I wasn’t rich when I gave Henry his—what’s your word? His congé. He had pushed me to the point where I could not bear any more, though, so it was hardly me standing up for myself. No. I think it’s you.”
“Me?”
“You won’t be bullied. You don’t put up with it, you don’t let anyone dictate to you, and the sky has not yet fallen upon you for it.”
“Give it time,” Nico said with a twitch of a smile.
“You joke, but really, Nico, you have no idea how liberating it is. I find myself feeling like a bad person because I refuse Laxton money or decline an invitation—did I tell you, George Etheridge wrote to say he had procured me an invitation to a select card party, quite as if I had asked him to, or he had done me a favour!”
“Charogne. I trust you threw it away.”
“That is exactly what I did. I thought,Perhaps I am obliged to go, and then,Perhaps I am obliged to write a polite refusal, and then I asked myself what you would say, and I threw it away. I am learning to stand for myself, and of course the money helps a great deal, but it’s more than that. I am as happy now as I have been in my life. I am to go to dinner with Vespasian tomorrow night, and Mr. Angerstein will be introducing me to artists and collectors. I’m enormously enjoying my art lessons,and I love this waistcoat, and so much of that is down to you. All you’ve done, all the sunlight you have brought into my life. I owe you everything, Nico, and, you know—”
“You owe me nothing,” Nico said, his voice sounding constricted. “Please. I am no wise guide, and you owe me nothing at all. It has been my privilege to accompany you on this adventure.”
That had almost the ring of a farewell. Titus looked at him in alarm. “Nico? Did I say something wrong?”
“Not at all. Just—I do not belong on a pedestal, of any kind. You are remaking your own life, and it is marvellous, and… dismiss Perreau early tonight, hmm? I want the evening with you, and time enough for the pleasures you have promised me. If you recall.”
He raised a brow. Titus swallowed hard. “I would love to.”
He could barely concentrate throughout the rest of the day, for anticipation of the night. He made himself go into the ingredients room for something to do: He was almost out of his preferred blues, and Gideon had asked for some gamboge. The familiar task of preparation busied his hands and distracted him from imaginings.
He did wonder if Nico was quite all right. When they’d come home, he had read a letter and shoved it into his pocket, and for a moment had looked positively worried. Titus assumed it was a bill.
He wanted to settle all Nico’s bills, give him a generous amount of money to manage as he saw fit, and not think about it again. He had absolutely no idea how to offer that without sounding like some ghastly aristocrat hiring a mistress.He didn’t want Nico to be a kept man or to feel any sort of obligation; he just wanted him not to worry.
He’d been working his way up to making some sort of offer earlier.I owe you everything, he’d planned to say,and if it weren’t for Laxton, my fortune would have been yours, so please would you let me share my good luck?He’d considered the wording carefully and hoped it would be taken well, but he had barely been able to get the first words out before Nico had closed it down. It seemed as though he simply didn’t want Titus’s money. Really, when he recalled how he’d thought of Nico originally, how long he’d suspected the man was attempting to profit off the Whitecross fortune, he felt positively ashamed. Granted, Nico might have come into his life for financial reasons, but—well, things were very different between them now.
All the same, it was absurd for Nico to fret about bills that Titus could cover without difficulty, so they would have to have that conversation. Not in terms of Titus owing him anything: that had probably been where he’d gone wrong. Nico didn’t want money as a quid pro quo, and that was quite understandable. Nobody liked to be in a dependent position.
Maybe Titus could simply say,I love you, and I want you to share what I have.It was what he felt in his heart, after all, even if he knew it was absurdly early to say any such thing.
It did seem too soon, logically. He’d known Nico a handful of weeks and kissed him for the first time only yesterday. But that didn’t alter the fact that he was in love. And he knew it was love because he’d spent the previous thirty yearsnotbeing in love, and this was quite, quite different.
If he told Nico as much, if Nico felt the same, then to share his wealth would seem perfectly natural. Maybe there would be a good opportunity in the Lakes; the poets and painters certainly seemed to think it was a romantic setting. But he would not renew the offer tonight, because buggeringa man and then offering him money seemed extremely likely to give the wrong idea.
He’d made up a satisfactory batch of paints while he thought all that through. It was time to change for dinner. And after that, bed.
Dinner was almost difficult, Titus was so on edge with nerves and anticipation and the things he wasn’t saying. Nico was the perfect counterpoint. He talked easily and got Titus talking, and his firelit eyes glittered as he laughed. If he was trying to be Titus’s perfect companion, he couldn’t have been better.
They lingered over hothouse grapes and a glass of port, conversation dwindling to a quiet, anticipatory companionship. Nico watched Titus’s fingers as he plucked grapes and conveyed them to his mouth. Titus watched Nico’s lips as he sipped the strong wine and licked a stray drop with the end of his tongue.
“Shall we go up?” Nico said at last.
Titus nodded, and they headed up through the dark house to his room. He shut and locked the door and turned to see Nico, very close, watching him.
He grabbed Titus’s lapels, unspeaking, and pulled him over. Titus bent to him, and Nico reached up, his fingers digging into Titus’s shoulders, leg wrapping round his hips. They kissed frantically, deep and wet and wild, Titus with both hands on Nico’s firm arse, riding the impossible glee of it, until Nico pulled his head back with a gasp and stepped just a fraction away.
“Mon coeur,” he said. “Listen. I know I asked for this. But I want to know it is your pleasure too, and if it is not, we do something else, hmm? Me, I would like you to fuck me, butwhat I want more than that—more than anything—is that you will tell me whatyouwant. That you ask for yourself, and put your pleasure equal to mine. Not second.”
Titus had sometimes wondered what it would be like to be with someone who understood him. Easy, perhaps, or happy, or even magical. He hadn’t thought it would be embarrassing, verging on raw. “No, but, it’s about what you want too,” he managed.