Beckett couldn’t have conjured up a reply if his life depended on it.
Or his mam’s.
He’d spentso muchtime, that night and from the moment he’d first laid eyes on the duke, thinking about how it would go between them.
The problem was, every single one of those conjured scenarios had started with both of them dressed, and every fevered and imaginary encounter began with a tussle.
Coats were torn off. Shirts ripped at the seams and fell to the floor in shreds. Breeches were hauled down over quivering buttocks.
The usual.
So he was completely and utterly wrong-footed when he let himself into the master’s bedchamber with a cocky stride, only to see the duke already stark bollock naked and sprawled out on his bed like a hussy.
To his shame, Beckett couldn’t help the small noise of surprise and sheer want that escaped.
His Grace lounged against a mound of creamy pillows, naked body gleaming in the soft light.
Lounging wasn’t all he was doing.
On and off throughout dinner, he’d delicately taken the stem of the wineglass between finger and thumb and slowly stroked it. Up and down, up and down. Now, he had his entire hand wrapped around that huge alpha cock of his, and he was stroking himself the exact same way.
Beckett pulled the door shut behind him.
He locked eyes with the duke and held his gaze as he stalked across the room, not stopping until the fronts of his thighs touched the edge of the mattress.
Jack should have looked vulnerable. He was naked. He was on his back. He was right there, spread out for the taking, but…
It was a lure. Temptation.
Beckett narrowed his eyes.
He wasn’t stupid.
Jack narrowed his eyes back at Beckett. Unlike Beckett’s, his expression was one of amusement, not suspicion. His hand didn’t stop moving.
Beckett tugged his shirt out of his breeches, and had it up and over his head in an instant. “All right.” He dropped his shirt carelessly to the patterned rug that sat beside the enormous bed. “We can play it like this. I’d been expecting a good rousing fight for it, but if Your Grace wants to jump ahead and give it up from the start, that’s fine by me.”
Jack didn’t say anything. Just smiled and lifted a pointed brow at Beckett’s groin.
Beckett frowned and got the fall of his breeches unbuttoned with trembling fingers. He shoved the breeches down to his thighs, realised that he’d forgotten to unfasten them at the knee, and that was when the bastard lunged.
In other words, when Beckett had hobbled himself.
Maybe hewasstupid.
Jack hauled him onto the bed, rolled him, and dropped on top of him.
Beckett slammed his hands, palms flat, on Jack’s wide shoulders, and heaved upwards. He levered Jack’s upper body back a couple of inches, but that was all he managed. “Arsehole,” he said. It lacked anger.
Jack flashed him an arrogant grin that had Beckett growling. Beckett bucked urgently beneath him, felt that alpha cock slide against his, and his growl turned into a moan. He didn’t feel too embarrassed about it. Could barely even hear it under Jack’s moan, after all.
Beckett hesitated and then, slowly, he let his hands fall to land beside his head. Jack was lying between his legs, or at least as far between them as he could wedge himself, considering Beckett was still hobbled by the breeches that were cutting into his lower thighs.
Far enough that their bare cocks were touching, though.
They lay there, breathing hard, and contemplated each other.
He’d never done this before. Lain beneath a man. He wasn’t about to tell the duke that. Jack, in turn, seemed surprised that he’d wrestled Beckett into the position with so little fuss.
