Page 60 of Provoked
“Will you permit me to give you one bit of advice, before we say farewell?”
Wary, David nodded.
“Don’t rule out marrying Elizabeth Chalmers. She’s in love with you, and she’d be a good wife to you. She could give you children and make you a home.”
It was so close to David’s own recent thoughts on the matter that he almost laughed. Instead he merely shook his head. “I couldn’t do that to her,” he said. “She deserves a husband who will love her fully.”
Balfour’s lips thinned, and his eyes glittered. All at once, his good humour was gone.
“There you go again,” he snapped. “Always the bloody martyr, aren’t you? With your terrible affliction that you won’t subject any innocent souls to? Christ, why don’t you just let yourself have a bit of happiness? Marry a woman who loves you and slake your needs with men on occasion. It’s not as though thousands of others don’t do it every day!”
“Is that what you’re going to do?”
“Yes! Yes, it is! I don’t want to be like you. I want everything this damned world has to offer! If that means bending the truth a little here and there, what’s the harm? Christ, you’re so damnably yes-or-no about everything! So judgmental—”
“I’m not judging you,” David protested. “I couldn’t give a damn what you do—but Ican’t bewhat I am not. I can’t, and that’s the beginning and the end of it.”
“Christ almighty, don’t you want to behappy?”
David knew, somehow, that that was a cry from the heart. He looked at Balfour, and it was as though the man was standing naked before him. The always present amusement had been wiped away entirely, and on his face was an expression of naked longing. It made David wonder what it was that Balfour longed for that made him look like that.
“I’m not sure life is about being happy,” David answered with quiet honesty.
Balfour gave a harsh laugh at that. “Another Lauristonian sentiment,” he sneered. “I should have predicted that one. Tell me, then. If life isn’t about pleasure or happiness, what is it about? Tell me, Lauriston, so I can learn from your great wisdom.”
It was tempting to say nothing, to walk away. He knew Balfour would mock whatever answer he gave. But for some reason, he felt compelled to utter it.
“I think it’s about being true to yourself,” he said at length.
He was right—Balfour laughed. It was an ugly sound. A sneering, mocking insult. “To thine own self be true? Christ, that’s rich, coming from you! You hate your own guts because you like cock, that’s how true to yourselfyouare!”
David felt a lump rise in his throat and had to swallow against it. He couldn’t deny that accusation. He thought of the night he’d lain in Balfour’s bed while the man kissed and stroked and suckled him. He thought of the wave of unprecedented tenderness that had washed over him afterwards.
Balfour wasn’t finished yet.
“You deny the very essence of who you are, and you do it every single fucking day. And then you have the gall to turn around and tell me that if I have the temerity to want the things that other men take for granted, I’m not beingtrueto myself?”
“I never said that,” David replied. “If you decide to marry, that’s a matter for you and your conscience. For my part, I won’t do it. Yes, I hate what I am at times, but at least I accept myself enough to realise that I can’t lie my way through life, pretending to prefer women when I don’t.”
At that moment, there was a knock on the door, and Balfour, who had opened his mouth to speak, swallowed his words and barked, “Enter!”
It was Johnston the footman. He’d brought David’s hat and coat—freshly brushed—along with the news that the carriage was waiting. If he’d overhead any of their argument, he gave no sign. Balfour dismissed him impatiently.
David shrugged the coat on and jammed his hat on his head. Suddenly he felt regretful and empty. This was likely the last time he’d see Balfour and, for some reason, that thought left David with a yawning chasm inside him.
“Believe it or not,” he said gravely, looking squarely at the other man, “I wish you every happiness.” He went to walk past Balfour and was surprised when the other man caught his upper arm in a strong grip. Before he could protest, Balfour took David’s face in his big, warm hands and kissed him fiercely.
It was a painful, desperate kiss. Balfour’s hard mouth ground the soft tissue behind David’s lips against his teeth and he made a strange, almost animal noise in his chest. Before David could even react, Balfour had thrust him away, and they stood staring at one another, panting. “Don’t wish me happiness, damn you,” he said bitterly.
David raised his fingers to his lips, and they came away bloody. He stared at the crimson smears on his fingertips for a long moment, aching for he didn’t know what.
“You should go,” Balfour muttered, turning away. “The carriage is waiting.”
Chapter Seventeen
Three months later
“Your turn, Davy,” his mother said, and shoved the bundled-up bairn into his arms.