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Rory examines his nails, and from the dismissiveness of this act, my heart plummets. He stalks away from the wall and over to Finlay, walking around him as though bored.
“We have a problem.”
Finlay turns to Rory in askance, his clever gaze scrutinizing. He too has noticed the shift in Rory’s body language, but his cock surges as if craving more of Rory’s coldness.
“Tonight, you came in here and judged a decision that is personal to me. That does not happen in this castle. So it will not happen again. And you too will not come.”
Finlay frowns at him. As Rory slowly circles him, I get flashbacks to the moment we first met. When his expression analyzed me as worthless filth desecrating his castle, and I’d considered him a pompous and sneering jackass.
I hadn’t been wrong. I just hadn’t considered there’d be a whole other host of moods to make up his temperament. That there’d be anything deeper to Rory Munro than pure fucking asshole.
Pure fucking assholeis clearly what’s flying through Finlay’s mind, however, as he stares in wide-eyed astonishment at his fellow chief. He waits for Rory’s bright peal of laughter, the comfort of his warm embrace, the familiar lightness Rory gifts those who love him the most. But tonight, there is no light. Tonight, Finlay fucked up.
“Whit?” Finlay asks — soft, stunned, frustrated — but his cock wrenches closer toward his stomach, tick by tick, like the hand of a clock. “Are ye actually daein’ this tae me?” He glances down at himself, gesticulating with his bound wrists. “We urnae…?”
“No.” Clipped. Frost-cold. Beside Rory, Finlay glances at the stone ceiling, releasing a steadying breath like he’s trying not to crumble. His eyelids flicker and he gazes at his traitorous, ever-hardening cock. “It shouldn’t matter overly much, given your alleged nightly dalliances with Luke. Surprised you have it in you, given all you’ve been up to.”
“Are youjealous?” Finlay asks, sounding bewildered. But when no answer is forthcoming and Rory remains uninterested in his twitching cock, he snaps: “I didnae lie. Exaggerate, aye, fine, but no’lie.”
“I don’t believe a word you say.”
Finlay blows out a frustrated breath and gives a humorless laugh. “Ye’re just daein’ this ‘cause ye’ll explode when I come and ye cannae risk that. How embarrassin’ for ye that would be, celibate prince,” he spits. “Need tae save face in front o’ the others because losin’ it a’ on me after so long just isnae a good look.”
“Make up whatever tale you wish. It hardly matters.” He indicates Finlay’s stiffening cock with a faint smirk. “You seem to enjoy deprivation almost as much as I do.”
“Fuck you,” Finlay snarls, and wrenches off the tie I’d bound with his teeth. I don’t know how Finlay finds the willpower not to deck Rory with one of his freed fists. Part of me wants to, for the show I’ve been denied. Instead, we watch as Finlay dresses in a swift, galling rush, glowering at Rory the whole time, watching avidly for the second he changes his mind and becomes merciful.
But Finlay’s master is not in a merciful mood. Not when it comes to sex, anyway.
“The marks,” Rory notes quietly. “What happened?”
Finlay yanks his collar into position, tugging the flaps along the crease. “Why do you care?” he growls. “Wanted tae see whit the auld boot had tae say. She mainly spoke wi’ a metal ruler.”
“For fuck’s sake,” Rory curses, and it’s his first sign of genuine emotion instead of his regular cool facade. After a moment, he raises: “Your fees…”
Finlay’s tying his kilt when he answers gruffly, without looking anyone in the eye, “I’m entitled tae a hardship fund.”
“So your mother…?”
“Nothin’. Nae dosh. But since there’s only a few months left o’ school, there isnae any point chasin’ loans and shit when I can just use the hardship fund that’s already there.” Finlay pauses. “I think it’s the only reason Baxter went soft on me.”
“That’ssoft?” I blurt, horrified, and finally he glances up.
As Finlay adjusts his kilt around his hips, he murmurs darkly, “Oh, don’t worry. I went in hard.”
I watch him struggle to lace up his Docs. He looks a hundred times more flustered than when he’d arrived tonight, and yet Baxter’s punishment must have been fresher then. But perhaps this is the real punishment: of revealing the truth of his dire financial straits to a veritable lord, and of receiving sympathy instead of sex from said lord.
“Even if you were a right prick to her, striking a student is out of order.”
“Leave it. I get it. I get why, before, ye were a’ so… small. I get why I have tae be, an’ a’. Self-preservation, aye?” He stands, fully clothed, and spreads out his palms. In a sarcastic tone, he adds, “Well, this has been a fine how-d’ye-dae. One for the books. Get me naked just tae humiliate me. Whit a lesson.”
“If you feel humiliated, that’s on you.”
“Gaslightin’ prick.”
Rory just shrugs. “You needed to be put in your place. You even agreed to it. And you’re still all hot and bothered by it. I regret nothing.”
“How can ye keep this up?” Finlay whines, his hand drifting to the front of his kilt. “Even in Edinburgh — fine, we werenae like rabbits as such. But we stillcame. We saw each other come. We respected it, that it was necessary for each o’ us as a release. Whit ye’re daein’… when ye have Jessa right there… when ye have me,beggin’ye…” He shakes his head. “I didnae even understand ittaerespect it. In a’ honesty, I think ye’re fuckin’ nuts.”
