If he ran, Martin wouldn’t chase him.
The pull in Martin’s heart couldn’t be denied, and his own loneliness clouded his mind before deserting him to the comfort of Peter’s arms.
“Let’s go home,” Peter said, arm around Martin’s waist.
Martin awoke in Peter’s bed early the following day and dressed quickly, giving Peter a quick kiss on the forehead before hurrying off for his morn meeting with the guards under his command.
Chapter Twenty-nine
WhathadPeterdone?He wiped down the bar for something to do, his nerves jangling on edge. One thing to dream of another man in the privacy of his loft room, another entirely to take one there.
More than once.
He’d escaped others’ advances on theSeabirddue to his father’s intervention. But, even after leaving theSeabird, he rarely gave in to the impulse to have another man in an alley or other out-of-the-way place. Get each other off and go their own way, no talking. Definitely no kissing.
Except for a young man he’d once found near death, whose life seemed irrevocably entwined with Peter’s.
Looking back on all the times he’d said no to a potential lover, he’d compared them to a memory and found them lacking. Even the most accomplished lovers couldn’t compete with the fumbling of the right virgin in his cabin.
The mere thought of the man now known as Martin caused Peter’s cock to swell, though he’d not seen Martin in a sevenday. No. Not here. Not now. Not in his tavern, surrounded by customers.
He swiped a hand over the back of his neck. Good crowd tonight, come for plentiful ale and Addie’s fish stew and crusty bread. “Have some more, love!” she encouraged a customer in her loud, booming voice while trading an empty bowl for a full one.
The rooms overhead were all rented for the sevenday, a rare occurrence. All should have been fine.
Still, unease prickled Peter’s spine, the sense of being watched. He turned. Only a group of laughing men by the fireplace, swapping tall tales. A few women kept a polite distance in the corner.
Nothing. All in his head.
He swiped a cloth over a vacated table. An adjacent card player bumped an elbow against Peter, dropping a card on the floor. “Sorry, mate,” the man said in a foreign accent.
“No harm done.” Peter bent to retrieve the card. The black cloud. Even he, with his limited experience, recognized a bad omen. Which certainly didn’t help his already rising disquiet.
Stop being ridiculous, he chided himself.Just a bunch of superstitious nonsense.
The door opened, a gust of wind sweeping into the room. Peter looked up, as he had for every customer since he and Martin had last shared a bed. No one. Someone must’ve failed to secure the latch. He crossed the floor in three long strides, glancing right and left at the street. A few sailors strolled together, too far away to have opened the door.
Black as pitch tonight, save for the flickering gaslights feebly illuminating shopfronts. For some reason, their light didn’t travel as far as expected, individual spots of brightness quickly fading to dark. A fine fog drifted in the air, creating halos around the lamp globes.
A shout from near the hearth yanked him from his reverie. “Yo! Tavernkeeper! Another round.”
Peter shut the door with a sigh and returned to work. Keep busy. Yeah. He’d keep busy until the unnerving feeling in the pit of his stomach passed. Hours flowed by in quick succession, allowing little time to dwell on Martin or the eve’s eeriness.
The eve wound down, guests retreated upstairs, and the tavern regulars drifted in ones and twos out into the night. Peter focused on cleaning.
“Addie, I’m stepping out back.”
“Alone? Why that’s no fun at all. Please tell me you ’ave a handsome fella waiting back there for you.” Addie gave him a saucy wink.
Peter ducked away to hide his heated cheeks. Did the woman have to blurt out every single thought to pop into her head? He rolled an empty barrel out the back door. Pale gas lamps across the street gave him little light by which to see. He froze, the hairs on his arms rising. What was that scuttling sound? “Who’s there? Show yourself.”
Nothing. Maybe his imagination ran away with him. Addie hadn’t sent someone back here to play a prank, had she? Or perhaps she’d escalated her matchmaking game. But no, she’d met Martin. Based on her innuendo, she’d figured out the mutual attraction there, though Peter hadn’t confessed to knowing the man seasons ago.
Peter rolled the barrel across the alleyway to join four others. He’d need to replenish his supply of ale soon. Lots of ships this season meant plenty of thirsty customers. He’d long since stopped brewing his own ale and gave his benefactor’s recipe to another, who kept him well supplied.
A flash of movement from the corner of his eye caught his attention. More scuttling, slithering like scale over stone. His heart beat wildly in his chest. Had the sailor Martin accosted returned for a bit of payback? “I’m warning you. I’m armed,” Peter lied.
Nothing. “Peter, stop scaring yourself. You’re jumping at shadows,” he mumbled. He stacked the barrel with the others.
