Page 40 of A Gaze So Longing (The Fall of Livenza #1)

Leonardo was quiet.

Sitting on his bed, staring at the wallpaper as if the painted flowers would reveal an alternative future, if only he looked for long enough. He paid no attention to the couple of servants bustling around him, drawing his bath, preparing his chamber for slumber.

Favian wondered if the prince even realized that he had switched positions with Rodrigo, if he even noticed Favian’s presence in his room, playing valet.

He didn’t know what he was doing, but it didn’t matter—he was not actually here to help Leonardo with his clothes, so he might as well have ceased his pretentious perusing of the prince’s wardrobe.

Leonardo’s eyes were glassy, his posture stiff.

“Out,” he commanded out of nowhere. “Everybody out. Leave me alone.”

The other two servants quickly bowed their heads, murmured their Yes, Your Highness es, and exited. Favian followed them up to the door, then stopped.

For a second, he regarded Leonardo, troubled by the prince’s rigid expression. He did not feel comfortable leaving Leonardo to himself, but he also didn’t want to disregard his wishes.

Just when he was about to follow the other servants, Leonardo spoke.

“I can’t go to war again.” His voice was small, so, so small.

“You won’t have to,” Favian replied.

A moment of silence.

Then: “I don’t want to take a wife, either.”

“We will figure it out,” Favian asserted with more confidence than he felt.

At that, Leonardo finally shifted. His head perked up, eyes meeting Favian’s.

“We?”

There could—perhaps should—have been anger in the prince’s eyes, suspicion, or hurt.

But instead, what Favian saw on the face of the person making himself small on the huge bed was fear, desperation, hope.

Favian strode toward him and stopped directly opposite Leonardo, their knees almost touching.

He held out his hands, offering himself.

Their gazes held.

Hesitantly, Leonardo took the palms extended to him, pulled them to his face. Favian stepped closer as the prince buried his face in the servant’s hands and began to cry. Quickly, tears coated Favian’s fingers, drops collected in his palms.

Favian carefully drew one hand away from Leonardo’s face and placed it on his back, hugging the prince to his chest. Leonardo followed the move without reluctance, pressing his face into Favian’s torso as he wailed. Hot breath through fabric, shivers.

The prince was falling apart in front of him, and all he could do was hold him.

It felt different this time.

The last time Favian had held the prince’s crying form in his arms, Leonardo had been quietly weeping, his cries steady but measured. Now, they were mighty, almost violent. He bawled, each sob accompanied by a shudder in his entire body.

The prince grabbed a fistful of Favian’s tunic as if he needed something to hold on to, pulling the linen toward him until their bodies were flush, one of Favian’s hands still secure on Leonardo’s back, the other reaching around his shoulders, cupping his neck from behind, securing him against his chest.

Leonardo cried, and Favian held him.

Held him for minutes; five, ten, twenty. Lost track of time.

It did not matter.

After what could have been an hour, Leonardo’s sobs began subsiding, turned into whimpers, then deep inhales and faltering exhales.

When, eventually, the only sounds remaining were two lungs breathing to the backdrop of crackling candles, Favian finally said what he should have admitted in the morning.

“I am so sorry, Leonardo. I apologize.”

The fist in his tunic loosened, and Leonardo drew back. Only slightly—just enough for them to look at one another. “What for?” he asked, voice husky.

Favian moved his right hand along the prince’s shoulder until it nestled on the side of his face, thumb on cheek.

“For all the things I have no control over,” Favian said.

“And all the things that I do.” His thumb stroked Leonardo’s skin.

He candidly met the prince’s eyes, not eluding the admission.

“I shouldn’t have said what I said last night.

It wasn’t true. I’m not sure what came over me, I—I think I got scared because you pushed me away.

But I shouldn’t have pushed you like that in the first place, and I understand why you didn’t want me to kiss you. ”

A brief moment of silence.

“It’s not that I didn’t want to kiss you,” Leonardo said. Salty remnants clung to the corners of his eyes, and Favian rubbed them away.

He was about to respond, but the prince stopped him with a gesture.

“I want you to kiss me because you like me as a person, not in a spur-of-the-moment decision—not if you don’t want to talk to me about it.”

Fighting the instinct to evade Leonardo’s gaze, Favian felt blood rushing into his cheeks.

“I don’t want to be used as a means for other people’s ambitions anymore.

I don’t want to feel that way again.” A crack in his voice.

In a gesture so unlike him that it took Favian a moment to process, Leonardo looked away.

“Please, Favian, only kiss me again when—if you are sure you want to be with me. Promise me, please.”

Just this once, it was Favian who wouldn’t accept the other evading his gaze. He placed his second hand on the other side of Leonardo’s head and carefully turned the prince’s face back toward his. He put everything he could into his expression, then, but only for a second.

“I promise.”

Without hesitation, Favian kissed his prince.

Not hesitantly, but cautiously, this time. Leonardo gasped and stilled, then his hands found Favian’s hips. The lips underneath his were soft. Leonardo was porcelain, and Favian could shatter him if he wasn’t careful enough.

Their mouths were hot, fiery breath mingling in the little space between their faces.

Favian tasted honey.

The kiss intensified as their lips parted, tongues tentatively meeting.

Favian slid a hand behind Leonardo’s neck, cupping the back of his head as he leaned down to drink in every second of him.

The prince’s fingers wandered, too, from Favian’s hips to his waist to his chest, fisting in the fabric of his tunic again.

It was different than before, Leonardo’s fingers equally desperate yet devoid of agony.

Now, they were exploring him, moving around, drawing Favian closer, closer, closer.

He registered too late that he was pushing Leonardo down into the bed. The prince landed on his back with a thud, pulling Favian with him. He caught himself on his elbows, scantly missing Leonardo’s head.

Before he could apologize, Leonardo had wound his arms around Favian’s neck and once more pulled him close.

As they continued their kiss, Favian drew himself further onto the bed. He placed one of his knees on the mattress while the other inadvertently landed between Leonardo’s legs. The prince inhaled sharply when Favian’s hipbone made contact with his crotch.

Favian halted and removed his lips from the prince’s. He made to sit up, move his leg somewhere—anywhere—else, but Leonardo stopped him with a hand on the back of his thigh, almost at his ass. “Stay,” Leonardo panted, face flushed. “I like it.”

Favian nodded, allowing Leonardo to pull him back down with one hand while the other maneuvered Favian’s leg into a comfortable position between his. This time, it was Favian who made a sound when his thigh brushed against the prince’s unmistakable erection.

“Fuck,” Leonardo sighed right before their lips met again. His hips were buckling, grinding against Favian’s thigh, asking him to rub against him in return.

The feeling was new, exciting. Intoxicating.

“Wait,” Favian yelped suddenly. The irritation in Leonardo’s eyes almost made him regret it. “Should we talk about what happened today?” he asked, his leg’s movement suspended.

The prince’s eyes softened. “I’d rather not.”

“But didn’t you say to me—”

“I know what I said to you,” Leonardo interrupted, firm but kind.

“But I also gave you time, didn’t I? Now I’m asking you to do the same.

Let’s talk about it tomorrow. I don’t want to think right now.

I just want to enjoy this.” He pushed a strand of Favian’s hair behind his ear, fingertips lingering on his face. “And I think you do, too.”

Leonardo was right. He so frequently knew what Favian was thinking, feeling , before he did.

Favian did want to continue, wanted to keep kissing, keep touching Leonardo. He so badly wanted to turn off the part of his brain that worried, always worried, went through each alternative, considered every potential path.

“I do,” he managed to say. Deep inhale. Eyes closed. “But I—I’m worried. About you, about us, about all of it.” About hands on me, no matter how much I want them. “And I don’t know how to turn it off. I wish I did—I wish I could.”

“Were you thinking about all of that a minute ago?” Leonardo asked innocently, a teasing twitch in the corner of his mouth.

Favian shook his head.

Leonardo smiled and drew their faces back together. He was different, now. More energetic, more forward.

Bolder.

And so, Favian allowed himself to get lost in his prince again. Their hands played around each other’s faces, each other’s hair, each other’s backs, while Favian’s thigh resumed its movement, spurred on by the sounds emanating from Leonardo.

Gods, the prince felt good beneath him.

Favian abruptly shot up the moment Leonardo’s fingers found their way underneath his tunic. He arched back, almost violently grabbing the prince’s wrist and shoving it away from him before he realized what he was in the process of doing.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” Leonardo gulped, “I should have asked.”

Favian rocked back onto his knees and slung his arms around his waist.

Leonardo regarded him, a frown on his forehead. “Favian?” he asked. “I’m sorry. How can I make it up to you?”