Love's Fortress Page 19

  She couldn’t wait anymore. She placed a hand on Gideon’s trembling right thigh and leaned over to lick a path from his root to his tip. Her tongue traced a heavy vein there and Gideon groaned as if he were dying.

  “Closer,” he whispered. He reached out blindly and Sarah scooted closer, until she was pressed to Charles’ side, Gideon’s cock a standard between their faces. Gideon latched on to her hair and pulled her in, and from the corner of her eye she could see him do the same to Charles. Charles smiled and then he followed her lead, licking Gideon on the other side. On his next pass Sarah joined him, so that her tongue actually met Charles’ as they swirled them around the shaft. Gideon made a noise halfway between a sob and a shout. Sarah cupped his sac and rubbed the stones inside with her thumb and Gideon cried out again. “I’m not going to last,” he gasped. Sarah knew he spoke the truth. She’d done this to him enough times to recognize the signs of his impending orgasm.

  “Good,” Charles said, his voice dark with satisfaction. “I don’t want you to. Not this time. I want to taste it—taste you.”

  Sarah sucked the side of Gideon’s cock as Charles engulfed the head in his mouth. Gideon was gasping for air, his hips thrusting. With a kiss to Charles’ cheek Sarah pulled away, her hand still massaging Gideon’s sac. Gideon grabbed Charles’ head with both hands and pulled him down.

  “Yes,” Sarah whispered, amazed at her boldness but gratified at Gideon and Charles’ ardent response. They both groaned and Charles moved his head up and down in counterpoint to Gideon’s hips. Sarah laid her cheek against Gideon’s thigh to watch her two men love each other and Gideon stilled, letting Charles do the work. She was more aroused than she’d ever been. How could that be? Neither man had touched her in passion, not really. Yet she felt as if she might explode with Gideon at any second.

  “Charles,” Gideon groaned and Sarah moaned at the sound of the other man’s name on Gideon’s lips. She hadn’t realized until this moment how much she wanted this. How much she wanted them to feel for each other what she felt for them. She wanted them to want each other. She wanted them all to be able to do anything—everything—when they were together this way. Without thought Sarah turned and bit down on Gideon’s thigh, so full of emotion and desire she couldn’t stand it. Her hands were trembling, her sex was clenching and suddenly Gideon was coming.

  “Charles!” he shouted. He curled up from the bed, holding Charles’ face pressed to him, his cock buried in Charles’ mouth. Charles coughed but he reached out and gripped Gideon’s hip when Gideon tried to push him away. Sarah watched in wonder as Charles’ throat moved, swallowing Gideon’s release. Gideon whimpered, his body locked in place, his chest heaving as he came and came. Sarah clutched his good leg, pressed her breasts against it and ached for her own release.

  When Gideon was done he collapsed on the bed, his cock pulling from Charles’ mouth. Charles gasped and fell back to sit on his heels, his hands on his thighs. He was panting and his hair was plastered to the sides of his head with sweat. Sarah ran her fingers lightly through his damp hair. He turned and gave her a half-smile, a sensual quirk of his lips that made her hold her breath, waiting and wondering what he planned to do next.

  Charles stood up and made a great show of unbuttoning his trousers. He glanced at Sarah. “Do you mind?” he asked. She thought she understood what he was asking. She shook her head with a smile. “Good,” Charles replied. Then he climbed on the bed and straddled Gideon.

  “And what am I supposed to do with that?” Gideon asked drily as Charles situated himself so that his cock was poised right over Gideon’s mouth.

  “You are supposed to want it.” Charles’ answer was very quiet and what had started out playful became quite serious.

  When Gideon didn’t say anything Charles began to pull back but Gideon stopped him with a hand wrapped around his bottom. Without a word Gideon rose onto his elbows and took Charles in his mouth. Charles gasped and gripped Gideon’s shoulder so hard Sarah could see the tips of his fingers turn white with the force of his hold.

  “Gideon,” Charles said with an uneven sigh. His hips moved languorously as he fucked in and out of Gideon’s mouth. Gideon was awkward and uncharacteristically passive. It took Charles a moment to notice but Sarah saw right away that Gideon didn’t know what to do.

  “For heaven’s sake, Gideon,” she said with exasperation, “it isn’t complicated mathematics. You simply need to suck it.”

  Charles burst out laughing as Gideon raised his eyebrow at her. Charles stopped laughing abruptly when Gideon sucked hard enough to pull his cheeks in.

  “More,” Charles said, groaning as his hips flexed.

  Sarah clambered onto the bed, her skirts twisting and impeding her movement. Through the haze of his desire Charles reached out a hand to help her up. When she took it he suddenly squeezed tight enough to hurt her a little. She gasped and her head jerked up. Gideon had slipped his hand between Charles’ legs and his mouth rested at the very base of Charles’ cock, completely engulfing his length.

  As soon as she was on the bed Charles let go of her and put his fist down to support him. He was breathing raggedly as Gideon slid down and then back up his cock. Instead of grabbing Gideon and fucking him as she was sure he wanted to do, as he had done to her in the past, he ran a shaking hand through Gideon’s short hair.

  “I’m not going to last, Gideon,” he said softly. “When you take me like that, you have to know…” His voice trailed off and he bit his lip.

  Gideon let Charles slip from his mouth. “I know.” He lay back and ran his hands up the back of Charles thighs. “Come fuck my mouth, then, like this. I want to take you, Charles.”

  Sarah sat right next to them, her skirts bunched around her, fascinated by the play between them. Gideon was rougher with Charles than with her, while Charles seemed to be afraid of being too rough. He hesitated even after Gideon issued the invitation. “He means it, Charles. You must stop worrying. You won’t break him. You haven’t broken me yet, have you? And didn’t you just say we all liked it a little rough?”

  Gideon jerked on Charles’ thighs and Charles fell forward. He leaned over Gideon, dominating him, his hard cock inches from Gideon’s mouth. “She’s right. I like it rough. Fuck me.” Gideon never thought he’d say those words to another man. Not even Charles. And he wouldn’t have, not even a year ago. Before Sarah he had felt too weak. If he’d been the one taking Charles he would have been crippled by doubts about his manhood. Sarah left no room for doubt. She wanted him, he pleased her, he satisfied her in bed and she begged for more. She had made him man enough to take Charles like this without worry.

  “I’m the same man who threw you down and fucked you in those woods, Charles,” he whispered. “I can take it as well as I can give it.”

  It must have been the right thing to say. With a growl Charles thrust against Gideon’s mouth, demanding entrance. Gideon obliged. It was strange, the taste and feel of Charles in his mouth. But he liked it. He liked the salty tang of him and the velvet softness of his cock as he ran his tongue along the vein pulsing there. It was different and yet not. It was Charles. And he could admit this was what he wanted. He wanted to take and be taken by this man.

  Charles gave him no quarter, and he wanted none. When Charles fucked in and out of his mouth he reveled in it. Charles was rough and hard on him, forcing him to take his cock deeper with each thrust. Gideon sucked him down and demanded more. He had longed for this from Charles, to be treated as an equal, a man, a lover, not an invalid or a shell of his former self. He wanted Charles to remember him not as the broken man on the battlements who had begged and screamed, but the man who could do this to him.

  Gideon dug his fingers into the flexing muscles of Charles bottom, loving the hard feel of him beneath his hands. For years he’d wanted the freedom to explore Charles’ hard, muscled body with his hands and mouth. He would do it today. He would roll around on this bed with Charles and Sarah until he had his fill of them or collap
sed from exhaustion.

  “God, yes, Gideon,” Charles rasped. “Take it, suck me like that.”

  At his words Gideon sucked harder. His own cock was filling again. Charles knew how to drive him mad, how to arouse him. Gideon had suppressed his desires for too long. Now the words alone were almost enough to push him over the edge. Charles continued to fuck his mouth, growing rougher by the second. And then he was pushing inside as the hot, salty taste of his release washed over Gideon’s tongue, filling his mouth, spilling from his lips. He swallowed hungrily and gripped Charles harder, holding him in his mouth until the last drop of his climax fell to Gideon’s tongue.

  Charles was unsteady as he backed down Gideon’s body until he could lie next to him. Without a word he leaned over and kissed Gideon. They tasted like semen, both of them. Gideon could taste himself in Charles’ mouth, and when Charles licked the corner of his mouth Gideon knew he was licking his own semen from Gideon’s lips. His stomach clenched in need at the carnality of it.

  “Sarah.” His voice was rough from the mouth fuck he’d just received. He smiled. He liked it.

  “Gideon?” Sarah sounded desperate. He understood. When he watched her and Charles fuck he became desperate too.

  “I want to fuck you now.” He looked between her and Charles. “I’m hard as a pike again from sucking him.”

  Sarah laughed. “Well, that’s convenient, then.”

  Gideon crawled over Charles who laughed and nipped his hip as he went past. “I’ll join you two as soon as I recover. I think Gideon may have sucked my spleen out.” He tried to untie his cravat with fumbling fingers. “And by then perhaps we’ll all be ready to undress for the occasion.”

  Gideon dragged himself over Sarah as she lay down laughing. He shoved her skirts to her waist and without preamble slid inside her hot, wet sheath. He shuddered at how perfect she felt wrapped around him. She gasped and her legs went around his waist, pulling him deeper moments before she burst into climax. She moaned and trembled in his arms, and he drove into her again and again as she continued to climax.

  “Sarah,” he said again. She nodded as her walls pulsed around him. She understood that this was perfect. He kissed her temple as she sighed tremulously. Sarah always understood.

  ———

  A few weeks later Sarah had her first inkling of unease. The night before Charles had asked yet again if she and Gideon would prefer he not come inside her in order to prevent his getting her with child. They had both vehemently denied having any worry about Sarah’s bearing Charles’ child. She believed Gideon when he said he would claim it and raise it as his own so no stigma would attach to the child. But his answer had not satisfied Charles, she could tell.

  The next morning when she walked into the breakfast room she kissed Gideon’s cheek and smiled at Charles. He did not smile back. She couldn’t go to him or ask him what was wrong because Anders was in the room with them. They had not eaten silently for quite some time. This morning they did so. It was painful for Sarah, as if the last few weeks of happiness had never happened.

  “I wish to have a dinner party.”

  Gideon’s announcement startled Sarah and her teacup made an audible clink as she abruptly set it back down in the saucer.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Why?” Charles asked at the same time, a scowl on his face.

  Gideon seemed unperturbed by their less than enthusiastic responses. He waved Anders away. “Leave us.”

  Anders immediately bowed politely and left, closing the door behind him. He had become very good at rapid exits in the last few weeks. Sarah often wondered if he knew what was going on. It was hard to keep secrets from family retainers, after all.

  “It is high time we entertained,” Gideon continued blithely. “Sarah and I have been married for almost two months. I know that Anne and her two will be wearing themselves ragged at this point, their rabid curiosity over our marriage driving them insane. Freddy and Brett are as bad as Anne with their managing ways and uninvited advice.” He shared a smile between Sarah and Charles. “So we shall assuage their curiosity and soothe their fears with a glimpse of our blissful married existence.”

  Sarah’s look was doubtful. Gideon cocked his head inquiringly. “Are we not blissful?”

  Her look turned exasperated and she tapped the back of his hand. “Of course we are. Bliss follows me around like a devoted puppy.” Gideon laughed. Charles did not. Sarah turned worried eyes to him. “Charles? Are we not blissful?”

  Charles sighed. “I didn’t consider what this would mean for you, Sarah.”

  “What do you mean? Inviting people over? It is hardly something I have longed to do, let me assure you.”

  Charles rested his arms on the table and twirled his table knife between his hands. “No. I mean people knowing. About us.”

  Sarah was taken aback. “I hadn’t planned on announcing it at dinner. Were you?”

  Gideon chuckled, but Charles’ frown was fierce. “This is not a joke. You know that people will figure out we are all lovers. It is in every look we share, the way we touch. Anders knows.”

  “How do you know?” Sarah was aghast, although she had suspected.

  “You see?” Charles said, waving his hand at her. “You do not want them to know.” He moved his hand in a circular motion. “This is not normal and is certainly not approved of.”

  “I gave you the choice of normal. You denied wanting normal, very forcefully if I remember correctly.” Gideon had turned cool again, his voice sharp and cutting.

  “Perhaps I was wrong.”

  At Charles’ response Sarah’s hand involuntarily went to her heart. He was thinking about leaving. She couldn’t breathe for a moment.

  Charles shook his head. “No, I wasn’t. I’m sorry. I don’t want normal. I want this. But perhaps that’s wrong of me. They will hurt Sarah, ostracize her.”

  “Who? Anne? Freddy? Brett?” Gideon scoffed. “Think, Charles. They have no room to criticize since they have the same sort of relationship we do. I hardly think they will have the temerity to cast stones.”

  “No. But others will. I could not stand it if my presence here caused either of you trouble.”

  Sarah rose and went to Charles, pulling out the chair next to him and sitting down facing him. “I’m sorry. My initial reaction was a negative one. But I do not care. Let them scorn me.” She took Charles’ hand in both of hers. “I care about us three, and only us. I am happier than I have ever been, Charles. You both make me so happy I feel as if I’m living in a dream. Here at the farm we needn’t worry about what others think.”

  “One day we will leave the farm, Sarah,” Charles told her. “We will go to London or some other place, where strangers will judge you harshly for our relationship.”

  “London?” Sarah laughed to cover her unease. “What use have I for London?” She shook her head. “I would not like to be the object of pity or, worse, aversion because of my mark, Charles. No, for many reasons I will not go to London.”

  Now Gideon was scowling. “Your birthmark is not hideous, Sarah. It is hardly noticeable when one knows you.”

  She smiled wryly at Gideon. “I could say the same of your scars.”

  Gideon waved aside her observation dismissively. “Nonsense, they are in no way comparable. You are a beautiful woman, and a small discoloration on your cheek cannot change the configuration of your features or the voluptuous curves of your form.”

  Sarah was overwhelmed. “Gideon…I…I don’t know what to say. No one has ever said something like that to me before.”

  “He is right.” Charles placed his hand over hers. “You are beautiful. I told you that on your wedding night.”

  “Our wedding night.” Gideon spoke quietly but with an intensity that said more than his words. “I knew that night. I knew then that we would all be together like this. At least, I knew that’s what I wanted.” He took a deep breath and his voice and posture were relaxed when he continued. “I want them to know.
I want the world to know.”

  “Yes, but…” Sarah couldn’t voice it. She loved Charles, truly, but could she handle the consequences of their arrangement?

  “I know,” Gideon said rather sadly. He sat back in his chair, his shoulders drooping. “I can’t tell them. But surely letting our friends know of our happiness is not dangerous to Sarah’s reputation?”

  “What of yours?” Charles asked, as dejected as Gideon. “I know the last few weeks I have not done a very good job of hiding my feelings for you either. I grin like a fool when you’re around, and Lord knows that has not been the case for the last several years.”

  “Look at us,” Sarah said sharply. “What a sorry lot we are.” She stood up and brushed out her skirts. “Of course we shall have our acquaintances to dinner. I dare any of them to cast a disparaging eye on us.” She made a fist and stuck her thumb out, swinging her arm like a pugilist. “I shall poke them in the eye if they try.”

  Charles leaned forward and rested his cheek on his fist with a silly grin as he watched her.

  Gideon laughed outright. “Ah, Sarah. What would we do without you to defend us?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  “How are you this evening, Mr. Haversham?”

  Sarah was extremely nervous. She hadn’t seen the Duke and Duchess of Ashland and Mr. Haversham since the wedding day. The knowledge that the three were lovers like her and Gideon and Charles did not quell her unease. She simply was not good around people. Perhaps eventually she would grow accustomed to them. Presumably she would be seeing a great deal of them since they spent most of their time at the ducal seat at Ashton Park. And from what the duke said, with the birth of their child the time they spent in the country would increase. Gideon had drily noted that their absence from Blakely Farm for the past two months was the longest he had been relieved of their company since his arrival in Ashton on the Green. Sarah had tried to hush him, but the duchess, Anne, had only laughed and assured him that she would resume her frequent visits if he continued to be so entertaining.