Christopher felt as if he were wading his way through a fog of thick, dark molasses edged with pain. He would occasionally hear the soft murmur of voices, and tried to push his way forward on those occasions so that he might hear them more clearly, only to fall back into full darkness before he could do so.
This advance and retreat happened too many times for him to count, and several times, he thought he heard someone calling his name, but he was unable to answer.
In the end, his full return to wakefulness came with a startled jolt. His eyes opened wide, and he drew in a gasping breath of air.
The room where he lay was dark except for a single candle flickering somewhere to dispel the worst of the shadows. An indication it was probably nighttime. A small fire burned in the hearth to dispel the edge of coldness in the air, despite it being summertime.
A slight turn of Christopher’s head to look about him further told him he was in a room he had never seen before.
Heavy dark furniture dominated the space, including the huge four-poster bed where Christopher lay under the warmth of the covers. It was a man’s room, of that Christopher had no doubt, but he had no idea to whom it belonged.
The last thing he remembered was a fever dream in which the building housing the Apollo Club was on fire and Christopher was trapped in the attic—
Maxim!
He let out a groan of distress as he recalled Maxim had appeared in that fever dream, come to save him from the flames consuming the building.
Maxim had kissed him in the dream.
Not only that, but he had expressed a desire to touch Christopher again as he did when Christopher became so aroused that he lost control.
But surely that was something Christopher wished might happen rather than—
“I am relieved to see you are awake at last.”
Christopher turned toward the sound of that voice. He instantly recognized the man seated in the chair drawn up to the side of the bed as the Duke of Wulferston.
Christopher meant to question the other man as to Maxim’s whereabouts, but instead of forming those words, he could only croak unintelligibly around the dryness in his throat.
“Here.” The duke rose to his feet and poured some water into a glass before helping Christopher to sit up slightly so that he might sip some of the cool nectar.
Christopher noted he was wearing a white nightshirt that seemed to be rather large for him, so much so that one of the sleeves slipped off his shoulder as he gratefully gulped down the soothing water.
His throat felt slightly easier when he finally fell weakly back against the pillows. But when he spoke, the words still sounded scratchy and unlike his usual soft tones. “How is Maxim? The Duke of Lancaster.” He felt his cheeks warm, and his gaze shied away from meeting the duke’s as he corrected the familiarity.
“Behaving as ridiculously as you are,” Wulferston said disgustedly. “Maxim has refused to leave your side, even for a moment, these past four days and nights,” he explained. “The only way I could persuade him to rest tonight was to offer to sit beside you in his stead. Now the first words out of your mouth are to enquire as to Maxim’s welfare rather than show any concern for your own.”
If Christopher concentrated hard, he had a vague recollection of a softly murmuring voice, accompanied by equally gentle hands making him more comfortable by washing him and changing his damp clothing from where he sweated with the fever. He also recalled having someone dribble water onto his parched lips, as well as feeding him a spoon filled with warm broth.
Had that been Maxim caring for him for four days and nights?
Was it possible that seeing Maxim run into the burning Apollo Club, then being desperately kissed by him and lifted into his strong arms to be carried down the stairs had not been a part of Christopher’s fever-dream, as he’d thought it must be?
That being passed into the arms of the Duke of Wulferston, and then carried from the smoke-and-flame-filled building by that gentleman was also real?
If all that had really happened, then where was Maxim now? Wulferston’s comments seemed to imply he’d survived the fire, and that he’d cared for Christopher since, but if that were so, then where was he?
“If you would care to look beside you,” Wulferston drawled. He replaced the empty glass on the side table, but remained standing beside the bed.
Christopher turned his head sharply to the right, happiness filling the hollow cavity in his chest when he saw Maxim’s dark head resting on the pillow beside his own.
“I did state he has refused to leave your side since the two of you escaped the fire,” the duke reminded. “Which, by the by, has destroyed most of the Apollo Club.”
Christopher could not stop staring at Maxim’s beloved face. He appeared far from his usual elegant self. His dark hair was in disarray, there were dark shadows beneath his eyes—possibly caused by the sleeplessness of caring for Christopher for all this time. His cheeks seemed gaunter than Christopher remembered too. His mouth was relaxed in sleep, his strong jaw and the long column of his bare throat the only other part of him visible above the bedclothes.
Leading Christopher to wonder what he wore beneath them.
Was it possible that the first time Christopher lay in bed beside a naked gentleman, he’d managed to sleep through most of it? How unfair was that?
“Utterly ridiculous, the pair of you,” Wulferston sighed.
“Fuck off, Wulferston, and leave a man to enjoy the welcome return to consciousness of his young and beautiful lover.”
Christopher’s chest swelled with even more emotion at hearing and seeing that Maxim was now fully awake, those dark eyes intense with concern as he looked at him. Not only was Maxim awake, but he was calling Christopher beautiful and his lover. Unless—
“You are feeling better, I hope?” The concern in Maxim’s voice as he moved up on one elbow to look searchingly at Christopher left no doubt as to whom he had been referring to. The falling of the bedcovers also revealed that Maxim was bare-chested.
“I am now I know you’re also safe.” Christopher reached up to trail the fingers of one hand down the hollow of Maxim’s cheek, uncaring of the other gentleman in the room. “After coming to my rescue, I feared you might have perished in the fire,” he admitted huskily.
“I would run through the gates of hell and bring you back if it was the only way to ensure you remained at my side,” Maxim assured huskily.
“And on that note of cloying sentimentality, I believe I shall take my leave and leave the two of you alone together,” the Duke of Wulferston stated disgustedly. “I should warn you, Lancaster, once I am down the stairs, I intend to go to your cellar to retrieve a bottle of your best brandy. I also intend to imbibe all of it.”
Maxim gave a dismissive wave of the hand he had released from beneath the bedcovers. “Help yourself.” His gaze remained fixed upon Christopher.
“Only your precious stock of twenty-year-old cognac will serve to placate me for the loss of a night’s sleep I have suffered on behalf of you and your lover,” Wulferston warned.
“You may drink the whole consignment for all I care,” Maxim invited without so much as glancing at the other man.
“My God, Mr. Brooks, I really do believe Maxim must love you with a singular passion.” There was slight awe in Wulferston’s voice. “In the past, he has been known to threaten to cut off my balls with a blunt sword if I so much as touched a single drop of his precious cognac.”
Christopher could barely breathe, but it had nothing to do with the smoke he’d inhaled or a lack of air in the room, and everything to do with having heard the words Maxim must love you with a singular passion.
“It is true, I do love you,” Maxim murmured once he and Christopher were alone and the door closed behind Wulferston. “Very, very much.”
He had brought the Christopher to his own bedchamber when they returned to Lancaster House four nights ago, and to hell with the blue guest bedchamber where Christopher had once spent part of the night.
Maxim had immediately called for a doctor. After examining Christopher, that worthy gentleman had assured him that the younger man would recover fully if attended to diligently, primarily by removing and replacing the damp clothing caused by the fever, and his wounds attended to and dressed regularly. Christopher was also to be kept hydrated and fed, alternately with water and a warm broth. In the meantime, the doctor had, at Maxim’s insistence, attended Christopher twice a day to confirm that he was recovering, if not quickly enough for Maxim’s liking.
Maxim had breathed a sigh of relief when the fever finally broke the previous night, but he still refused to relinquish Christopher’s care to anyone but himself, despite Wulferston encouraging him to engage a nurse to attend the young man.
Stonyhurst, no doubt more attuned to Maxim’s feelings for Christopher after seeing his care of him on the night of the fire, had remained silent on the subject.
Tonight was the first time Maxim had allowed himself to be persuaded by those two gentlemen’s promise they would keep watch over Christopher while Maxim took a much-needed nap beside him.
In retrospect, that now appeared to be a slightly unfair summary of Wulferston’s lack of sensitivity, considering his remarks of a few minutes ago.
“I love you,” Maxim told Christopher again huskily. “Singularly and deeply.”
Christopher drew in a shaky breath. “I am in love with you too,” he admitted softly.
Maxim gazed at him incredulously. “You are?”
“Deeply and singularly,” he echoed huskily.
“I thought perhaps… You seem fond of Billy?”
“We are all fond of Billy at the club,” Christopher dismissed. “It is hard not to be. But I do not, and never will, care for him in the way in which I love you.”
Maxim moved until his hands could frame Christopher’s face before he gently claimed those soft lips with his own. “I have been so worried about you these past days and nights. I feared you might not recover.”
“I am here now, dear Maxim.” He pressed one of his smaller hands against Maxim’s. “I feel surprisingly refreshed. And I can feel I am mainly healed too. So much so, I… Will you make love to me, Maxim? Please.” He gazed at him earnestly.
Maxim had never made love to any man. Not because he was a rough or inconsiderate bed partner, but because he had never been in love before now. “I would love nothing more, my love,” he acknowledged gruffly. “But you have been very ill and are only just returned to consciousness.” And each and every minute of his anxiety over Christopher’s unconscious state was, and would forever, be etched into Maxim’s memory as being the worst hours of his life.
“I don’t care,” Christopher assured before a look of uncertainty crossed his face. “Unless you do not want me—”
“Oh, believe me, I want you.” Maxim’s cock, never completely deflated whenever this young man was near, had leaped to a completely erect state the moment Christopher requested Maxim make love to him. “Your wounds from the beating have almost completely healed during the past four days. Along with fading of the extra bruises you acquired after falling down the staircase from the attic…?” His mouth thinned as Christopher nodded confirmation of that fact. “I nevertheless have no wish to hurt you.”
“You won’t,” Christopher assured as he crossed the short distance of the bed between them. He entwined his arms about Maxim’s neck, his legs becoming entangled with Maxim’s hairier ones beneath his drawers, the only piece of clothing he’d worn to take his nap.
Maxim drew in a sharp breath at the close proximity. “I have not bathed since this morning—”
“And I have not bathed since you washed me last,” Christopher acknowledged ruefully.
“You remember that?”
“Only vaguely.”
Maxim remembered it vividly. The silkiness of Christopher’s skin as he gently bathed him. How he had lifted each of his limbs in turn so that he could gently sponge them with a cloth soaked in warm water. The gentleness with which he had turned the wounded man so that he could not only bathe his back, but also tend to the cleansing of the wounds there. Which, the doctor had explained, were what had brought about Christopher’s fever.
He’d sensed the speculative gaze of the doctor upon him after he examined those deliberately inflicted wounds. To offer an explanation would have been to talk about Christopher without his knowledge, so instead, Maxim had chosen to remain silent on the subject.
Whatever the doctor thought of the situation, he had nevertheless diligently attended Christopher, as requested, both day and night. Most of the bruising on Christopher’s flesh had now gone, and where the skin had been broken was almost healed.
“Belonging to you completely is far more important to me at this moment than bathing,” Christopher encouraged. “We almost died, Maxim,” he reminded emotionally. “I need this physical affirmation from you that we both still live.”
Maxim had known of soldiers who had experienced this same need after a battle. And saving Christopher had been a battle, for all of them. Initially from the burning building, but then had come the fight against the fever attempting to take Christopher from him. It had been a battle Maxim refused to lose.
The proof of that was now lying beside him, Christopher’s blue eyes free of fever and alight with the love he said he felt for Maxim. His cheeks were a healthy pink, his delicate rose-colored lips slightly parted and begging to be kissed.
Maxim had no arsenal with which to fight that pleading, nor did he wish to have. Christopher had declared his love for Maxim as clearly as Maxim had stated his love for Christopher.
No other words needed to be said between them.
Not yet, at least.
Explanations could come later.
Much, much later.