Page 2 of The Poison Within

His grey eyes had already glazed over. I’d become addicted to seeing that molten, needy expression claim his features. Coupled with his obedience, it’d long proved to be my downfall.

I lowered myself further. Unhurriedly, without breaking eye contact, I closed my mouth around the pink head of his straining shaft.

Elly panted, lips parted in his striking face, chestnut hair splayed across his pillow. In his lustful ecstasy, he resembled the inspired figures depicted in old paintings I’d admired exhibited in the hall of his manor.

Despite his rapture, he never once moved his hips.

I knew it would be brief; we never lasted long in the mornings. I gripped my own cock—it took only a few urgent tugs. Elly’s breathy moans and his stillness tipped me right over the edge.

“Käyru…” he ground out while I captured his essence on my tongue and swallowed him down. I collapsed onto his stomach, gasping.

A moment later, his arms were pulling me upwards. He gave me a languid kiss, groaning into my mouth as I shared his taste with him.

Then I stared at him for a while, unabashed, holding his shapely head in my oversized hands.

He met my gaze in a way that sent a shiver down my spine. It wasn’t the first time I’d caught him looking at me like that, although it happened with increased frequency as of late. I didn’t dare name the glimmer shining in his eyes as something meaningful—like a silent promise—it would be insane and improbable to think that. But it made my heart lurch with hope, regardless of how foolish and dangerous holding such hope might’ve been.

Given the choice, I wouldn’t leave his side. At times, the tenderness I felt for him choked me. It surprised me, too. I hadn’t thought myself capable of feeling such deep longing for another person. Growing up in a family with too many mouths to feed had taught me to elbow my way through life. My parents were not bad people, just too tired of poverty and backbreaking labour to show affection. Early on, I understood that one had to be quick and resourceful not to go hungry. I learnt to look after myself because nobody else wanted the job. Caring for others didn’t come naturally to me.

Yet I’d grown to care for Elly more than I ever cared about anyone, including myself.

A loud growl escaped my stomach and snapped me out of my musings.

Elly smiled and stretched out on the bed like a contented cat. “Let’s have breakfast.” He sat up with abrupt enthusiasm and licked his bottom lip. “They bake sticky rolls with honey and poppy seed here.”

I hid my smirk. Elly’s fondness for sweet tidbits and light dishes never ceased to astonish me. I doubted he’d ever had to worry about staving off hunger. For me, morning called for something substantial and savoury, like a steaming bowl of fish stew or a hearty helping of buckwheat fried with bacon and sage. Such became the lifelong habit of a person who once couldn’t tell when his next meal would come.

We got off the bed and took turns washing in the basin. Our clothing lay strewn across the floor of the spacious room, which the owner had advertised as the best at the inn. I’d paid handsomely for it the previous night. I figured that the claim of luxury referred to the size of the bed and the wall-mounted looking glass.

I checked my reflection in passing. A typical peasant—blue-eyed, fair-haired, rugged and brawny—looked back. I never understood what Elly saw in me. I rubbed the stubble on my jaw and did my best to slick down my spiky crop.

I was fully clothed by the time he’d managed to put on his breeches and boots. Granted, his elaborate attire involved more complexity than my stark Inspector’s garb.

I came up to him as he struggled to fasten about two dozen buttons adorning the opening of his shirt. At first glance, they looked like pearls—and probably were. The damned garment must’ve cost more than my horse.

I took the front folds of his shirt out of his hands and started doing up the buttons myself. He rolled his eyes, but patiently stood there, watching me in silence with his chin raised, one side of his lip curled. However clumsy my thick fingers might’ve looked, a childhood spent in the forge repairing intricate chains and hinges had left them surprisingly nimble.

I enjoyed dressing him almost as much as I loved peeling the clothes off him. My fixation appeared to amuse and exasperate him in equal measures. But for whatever reason, he indulged me.

“There, my lord,” I said, smoothing the seams of his coat when I’d finished. “All done.”

“Thank you, Käyru,” he uttered in a warm voice.

Right then, a thought struck me that I’d never entertained before. I frowned. “Do you have your manservant do this?”

I regretted blurting it out the moment I said it, but I couldn’t hide the wave of unease that had washed over me at the notion of some robust young buck touching him so intimately. Did the servant assist Elly with something else, apart from helping him out of his clothes on cold evenings?

“Why?” Elly tilted his head, pursing his lips as though he fought a smile. “Are you jealous, Inspector?”

I stared at him. Damn right I was jealous. So jealous, in fact, that it burnt my guts.

After we met the second time, I’d stopped fucking other men. Following the first night we spent together, I’d quit the women, too. I couldn’t bear to touch anyone else but him. Not for a minute did I suspect he’d done the same, but I tried my best not to think about it.

My face must have been a picture because eventually, he shook his head and heaved a deep sigh. “I’m not infirm, Käyru. I can dress and undress myself just fine. Besides—” His face broke into a grin. “Serh is about a hundred years old. He’s got arthritis in his knuckles.” He laughed, probably at the relief he read in my eyes, but soon his laughter morphed into a prolonged cough.

The violent sound of it made me flinch. Another quiver of concern crossed my mind. “Please, Elly. Send for your family healer today.”

Immediately, his expression set into his lordship mask.