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He plopped the sheets back into the trunk. “No secrets after all.”
“I beg to differ.” Henry set the gramophone aside and gave him a huge, crooked smile.
Dark eyes danced, and Henry’s chest rose and fell.
One hand atop his, another braced at his hip, Henry hauled him close. Words combed his ear. “Can I convince you to tell me?”
Their thighs bumped. “You can try,” Cameron said breathlessly.
“It worked at Halloween. I like my chances.”
Cameron felt Henry’s smile at his ear, then the rush of gravity as Henry spun him into a dance. The room whirled, and he settled on that smile he couldn’t get enough of. “Dancing? Without music?” He tried to sound unimpressed, but he knew his dimples had given him away.
“Glad you brought that to my attention.” Henry cleared his throat and crackly tuneless sounds emerged.
Cameron winced.
“What? Alicia says I’ve got a gift.”
“Alicia is either making fun of you or blowing smoke up your ass.”
Henry growled and nipped his ear with pressed lips. “You can do better?”
Cameron hummed and sang. He started out shaky, not daring to look at Henry, and steadied as he reached the chorus—“I won’t back down.”
Henry closed his eyes.
Cameron finished, and Henry slowed their dancing, coming to a stop at the window. “Tom Petty. You know all the words.”
“It’s a great song.”
“You sang it well.”
“Just well?”
“Magnificently. Splendidly. Exquisitely. Pitch perfect.”
“Better.”
“Better enough for you to tell me your secret saucy story?”
“It’s certainly not saucy.”
“Could we add that part in?”
Laughing, Cameron shook his head and tried to pull free, but Henry wouldn’t let him escape. Cameron gave up and leaned against him.
Henry peered out the window. “Does it have something to do with the chapel?”
Cameron shook his head.
“The gargoyles?”
“No. How many of them are there?”
“Twenty around the property.”
“Do you have a favorite?”
“Cameron.” Henry sighed, eyes twinkling. “Please?”
“Asking nicely doesn’t always mean you get what you want.”
“True.” Henry herded him against the hard wall and leaned in, planting his hands either side of Cameron’s head. Their noses grazed. “But you lose one hundred percent of the time if you don’t try.”
Henry’s lips were still not on his. Just hovered there, waiting.
“This is very sexy coercion, Henry.”
“I’ve barely started, Cameron.”
Lips skated along his jaw, and Cameron’s pulse hitched. Henry’s hand fell to his shoulder, slid up the curve of his neck, cradled his cheek. A thumb dug gently into the groove of his dimple. Their breaths tangled as Henry sank against him, their thighs pressing, their chests bumping.
Lips whispered together, and Cameron gasped.
Under his roaming hands, Cameron felt the steady rise and fall of Henry’s chest. Calm, in control, sure.
The total opposite of Cameron.
Henry tapped his dimple again and pressed their lips together. He tasted of salt and old wood and beloved books. Cameron opened his mouth, and the flavor of coffee slid over his bottom lip.
“Stine,” Henry murmured.
Cameron pushed him back to read his face. “Stine?”
“My favorite gargoyle.”
He laughed, and Henry devoured every second of it. The kiss zig-zagged through him, up and down, like the road dipping suddenly, balance disappearing for a few exhilarating seconds.
His hands roamed Henry’s back, tentatively slipping into his thick, soft curls.
Under Cameron’s hoodie, Henry’s blunt fingernails dragged over his hips.
Henry groaned and Cameron’s mind fritzed as Henry’s hard length rubbed his own. Cameron dropped his head back, hair catching on the rough wood.
Henry’s thick voice at his ear riddled him with shivers. “What’s your verdict? Will you share?”
Cameron pushed Henry back, catching his breath, and clutched the wall behind him. He was already melting from a kiss. What would more do to him?
Kiss me again. Rip my clothes off. Have me right here. “Promise not to tell anyone else. Complete secrecy.” Why was this easier than asking Henry to sleep with him? Cameron drew in a deep breath. “There are ghosts in the graveyard.”
“Ghosts?”
“You said you wouldn’t laugh.”
Henry flattened his grin. “Not ever. Promise. Tell me everything.”
Cameron recounted his thirteen-year-old experience, his panicked escape, how it’d taken him a decade to muster the nerve to visit the manse again. Henry paled with genuine shock.
“Thank God, you believe me.”
Henry blinked, pulled away from Cameron, and jogged toward the stairs.
Cameron chased Henry back to the claret-and-gold-stenciled bedroom. He rummaged through the bottom dresser drawer then surveyed the room, frowning. His gaze fell on the bed. Crawling to it, he peered underneath.
He reached deep and dragged out a wicker box. A tiny, determined frown creased Henry’s brow, and he gnawed his bottom lip. He lifted out old exercise books and set them aside. Cameron pinched one and peeked inside. Henry’s elegant handwriting filled the pages. Dated at the top corner.
Henry would have been fifteen. Still at boarding school.
“Here.”
Dark eyes met and held his as Henry pulled out a faded brown moleskin with a familiar gold ink doodle on the spine. Cameron’s heart pounded. His first ever script. “You found it?”
