Page 25 of A Gathering Storm

“My apologies, sir,” Pipp said insincerely. “Nevertheless, you will observe your dinner remains uneaten.”

Which was Pipp’s roundabout way of demanding an explanation.

Ward eyed the congealed plate of food at the edge of his desk without enthusiasm. “I didn’t notice you bringing it in.”

“That’s because Martha brought it in and she’s too frightened of you to speak.”

Ward shrugged unrepentant. “I’ll just have some tea and toast.”

“Certainly not,” Pipp said, glaring. “You’ve had nothing since that half-eaten scone when Mr. Hearn first came this morning. If you’re going to be as distracted as this every time he comes, you’ll fade away to nothing.”

“Oh, for goodness sake, Pipp!” Ward snapped. “I’m six-and-twenty, not six.”

Pipp stared at him for several long moments over the tops of his half-moon spectacles, plainly offended by Ward’s sharp tone. Then he sniffed.

“A man of twenty-six wouldn’t ask for toast for dinner.”

Ward just shook his head, infuriated and amused in equal measure.

“How about a nice bit of roast fowl with some Duchess potatoes?” Pipp wheedled.

“All right,” Ward sighed. “Have a tray brought up.”

Pipp didn’t bother to hide his triumph. “Very good, Mast—sir,” he said, and swept out of the study.

Ward looked down at the journal. He’d written pages and pages of notes, recording every detail of the day that he could remember, then, at even greater length, his thoughts and follow-up questions. Nicholas Hearn was a fascinating man and Ward had only just begun to explore the complicated layers of his nature and history. Whether or not the man had any natural abilities so far as spirits were concerned remained to be seen, but he was intelligent and sensitive, and those two characteristics together gave Ward hope that Nicholas would be able to help him, even if he was only one subject and Ward had been hoping for at least half a dozen.

When his dinner arrived—delivered by Pipp himself this time—Ward polished off both the roast fowl and a dish of ginger pudding, discovering with some surprise that he was hungry after all.

Pleasantly full, he bathed and retired to bed, expecting to drift off directly.

He did not.

Instead, he lay awake in the darkness, and his mind returned to Nicholas Hearn.

He was painfully aware of the irony of having blackmailed Nicholas into assisting him under the implied threat of revealing his true nature, when Ward himself was a shameless, unrepentant sodomite.

Oh, the things he would do to Nicholas Hearn, if he could . . .

Ward’s cock thrummed at just the hint of such thoughts, stiffening under his nightshirt at the memory of Nicholas Hearn walking up the stairs this morning to greet him, taking Ward’s hand in his own and meeting his gaze.

Nicholas was a few scant inches taller than Ward’s five foot seven, his build lean overall but with broad shoulders. When he’d been standing in front of Ward, his hair had shone with the lustre of a magpie’s plumage. And then there were those disconcerting, silver-bright eyes.

Everything about Nicholas Hearn tugged at Ward, attracting him closer, in the same way his magnets drew the iron filings. Something about the man demanded Ward’s attention, some kind of energy perhaps. That lean, lithe form seemed to Ward to hold a fierce and palpable power that called to him.

There had been a few occasions that day when he’d wondered if he’d felt Nicholas’s gaze on him while Ward wasn’t looking. It was possible he’d imagined it. One did imagine things, sometimes, especially when one lusted after someone the way Ward lusted after Nicholas.

With a muffled cry of frustration, Ward pushed his sheets aside and yanked up his nightshirt, baring his slim body to the cool night air. His nipples hardened in the chill, gooseflesh rising as he took hold of his shaft in his right hand and began to stroke himself.

His mind’s eye went straight to a visual memory of Nicholas: standing before Ward down by the mill stream, a somewhat shadowy presence in the waning light. Only his white shirt stood out, almost luminous in the dusk, a bright contrast to the strong brown throat and lean forearms exposed by his open collar and turned-up cuffs.

Today, Nicholas’s arms had been covered, but when Ward had taken his hand in greeting, he’d discovered something new he hadn’t known before: that Nicholas’s hand was calloused, far rougher than his own.

Ward’s hands—certainly the one that was sliding over his shaft anyway—were very far from calloused. His hands were soft from lack of manual work. Hardly surprising, he supposed, given how little he did with them, other than leaf through books and write up notes.

Just these thoughts—of Nicholas fully clothed, of the callouses on his hands—had Ward’s shaft impossibly hard before he even started pleasuring himself in earnest. A bead of fluid blossomed at the eye of his cock, and he collected the bounty with his thumb, groaning as more oozed up. He smeared the wetness around his cockhead, distantly fascinated by the way the fluid dried so quickly and stickily.

Nicholas.