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Architecture was not what soothed Theo’s soul whenever he gazed at the building, though. What comforted him was the occasional glimpse he had of one of the building’s inhabitants, if he was lucky.
As it happened, within a few minutes of sitting down and waiting for his troubles to fall off his shoulders as he stared at the grass in front of him, Theo was extraordinarily lucky. For not only was he able to catch a glimpse of that wicked sylph, Giles—he had tried in vain to learn the young man’s surname, therefore the lad was simply Giles in his mind, heart, and loins—he heard the young man’s sweet laughter sound from somewhere behind him.
It was as though Theo had been charged with sunlight. He jerked straight and twisted on his bench to gaze into the park behind him. He hadn’t noticed the small picnic taking place closer to the center of the square when he’d made his way to his usual perch, but there Giles was, lounging on a blanket spread in a patch of dappled sunshine under a spreading tree, enjoying some sort of repast with two of the female whores from Perdition.
Theo’s heart danced a jig in his chest at the sight of Giles. The young man was fully dressed, but there was still something obscene about him as he stretched across the blanket. It was a balmy day for autumn, and he did not wear a coat of any sort. Nor was he wearing a neckcloth. Furthermore, his shirt was undone at the top, exposing the lithe line of his throat and his soft, pink flesh in a vee over his chest. Theo felt that if he looked hard enough, he would be able to see one of Giles’s nipples exposed.
That thought send a burst of lust through Theo that had his breeches tightening obscenely and his heart beating with sheepish longing. Giles laughed at something one of the young women said, lighting his entire face. Indeed, everything about Giles was light and bright, from his white-blond hair to his clear blue eyes and the grace of his figure. He was most certainly a man, and a well-formed one at that, but the softness about him marked him for everything that he was.
And what Giles was, was a whore. A beautiful, perfect, unapologetic whore. Theo had first seen him in the halls of Perdition when he’d been led there by a Rev. Mulgrew, who had been concerned for his son’s immortal soul. Nothing had come of that mess except that Theo had met Giles…and had his heart ruined eternally.
With a deep, heavy exhale, Theo turned to face forward, staring at the grass once more. It would have been so much simpler if he’d never laid eyes on Giles. It was one thing for him to fancy men instead of women—something he could easily keep in check simply by never doing anything that could end with him prosecuted for his desires—but it was decidedly inconvenient that the object of his fantasies was a part of the very institution that he needed to bring down in order to save his own hide.
The impossibility of closing Perdition because of its connections to a notable duke was one thing, but the paradox of not being able to save himself and his position as a Runner by closing it for fear that the man he dreamed about would end up homeless and forced to ply his trade in the street was intolerable. As much as it pained Theo to think of Giles sharing his favors with whomever could pay him with their winnings at Perdition’s card tables, at least Giles was kept safe and clean within those discreet walls. At least he—
“What sort of thoughts have put such a gloomy expression on your face on such a lovely day?”
Theo nearly jumped out of his skin as the question and Giles’s sudden appearance on the bench beside him shook him out of his thoughts. He flinched and turned to Giles as though the young man had pulled a knife and intended to rob him. How Giles had approached and slipped onto the bench without Theo noticing was alarming in the extreme.
But Giles merely sat there with a smile, perched in an alluring fashion that showed his form off to greatest advantage. His brow lifted a bit, as though to remind Theo that he was waiting for an answer.
“I do not know what you mean,” Theo grumbled, turning his face away from Giles—mostly because he could feel the heat spreading across his cheeks and he was certain he looked like a lovesick fool. He refused to believe that he was either.
“It is a lovely day,” Giles said in his silken tenor, leaning closer to Theo and placing a hand on his thigh. “The sky is blue, the air is balmy, the leaves are beginning to turn in a dazzling display.” He shrugged, and the movement allowed his hand to slip toward the inner part of Theo’s thigh. “What cares could possibly weigh on you on such a day as this?”
Theo twisted to frown at Giles. “You should not be accosting strangers in the park in this way,” he grumbled.
Giles laughed, the sound reminding Theo of the babble of some heavenly brook. “I am not accosting you, I am merely inquiring about your sullen mood,” he said. “And we are not strangers, Mr. Theophilus Brunner. We have been introduced.” He spoke with a fiery look, gazing intently into Theo’s eyes the moment Theo darted a glance to him.
Theo caught his breath at the clear suggestion in those blue depths. His cock twitched in his breeches, as if complaining about the restraint. Giles’s hand was close enough to the member in question and the young man’s experience was such that he likely knew the effect he had, which only deepened Theo’s embarrassment.
He chose to cover his inconvenient feelings with gruffness.
“Learning each other’s names on the single occasion we have been in each other’s presence hardly counts as being introduced,” he said, picking up Giles’s hand and moving it off of his thigh.
“Oh, but we have been in each other’s presence a great many times,” Giles said, inching closer to him and replacing his hand on Theo’s thigh. When Theo frowned at him, he smiled broadly and said, “You’ve been watching me from this very bench for months now.”
Those words felt like ice water poured down Theo’s back. “I have not,” he lied, pretending more offence than he felt. Damn the blood in his face for making him blush at his denial and Giles’s proximity.
“I have seen you here at least three times a week since this spring,” Giles told him with a barely concealed smile of amusement.
“Because I have been investigating,” Theo said with pretend conviction.
That only made Giles grin more. “You should come inside Perdition to investigate further,” he said, walking his fingers across Theo’s thigh. He glanced up and met Theo’s gaze with a heated one of his own, then added, “You should come. Inside. Me.”
Theo sucked in a breath so fast he nearly coughed. His sweet little sylph had the mind and mouth of a satyr. But of course he did. That was his profession. He was wicked for profit.
“I have no intention of doing any such thing,” Theo huffed, though he’d lost track of the number of times he’d brought himself off in his lonely rented room at night, imagining just that. “I do not have the time,” he went on.
“Yes, you are far too busy attempting to bring Perdition down around us,” Giles said, teasing in his eyes.
“I am attempting to catch a band of conspirators who have been bribing the Chancellor of the Exchequer in a shipping scheme,” Theo argued.
His thought was to turn Giles away from the idea that he was actively seeking to damage the young man’s life in any way, not to reveal his other investigative business or to brag. But when Giles laughed and said, “Oh, I know all about that,” with a dismissive gesture, Theo’s gut clenched.
“You do?” he asked, pivoting to face Giles more fully.
Their knees knocked together. Giles rested his hand on Theo’s thigh again. He studied his hand for a moment as it slipped between Theo’s legs, then glanced up at him with an impish grin.
