what happened to me eighteen years ago, but now your honour can’t bear it if I won’t let you pay up late?” He snorted disgustedly. “Well, here’s the thing, Henry: I’ve made my own way in this world without your money, thank you very much. I neither need nor want it now!”
“Christopher, please,” Henry said. “It’s not about need, or even want—it’s about what’s fair. It’s only just for me to make amends to you, and I—”
“Don’t give me that!” Christopher said sharply. “This isn’t about fairness, or justice. Or you making amends. It’s about you trying to buy off your guilt. But you can’t do that, Henry. You owed me that house and that money, eighteen years ago. That was when I needed it. That was when I suffered the consequences of not having it. You can’t balance the ledger between us simply by giving me that sum now, when I no longer need it—not even if you add compound interest—because there’s no cost to you. Not really. You’re so wealthy you could give me that money ten times over and still not notice its loss. So how does that—that transaction—make amends for what you did?”
Henry stared at him, horrified. Horrified… and mortified, because there was something in what Christopher said, wasn’t there? Henry was trying to buy his way out of the guilt that had been dogging him since the day he’d sent Parkinson to Christopher’s door. Oh, he’d dressed it up in the fine clothes of principle and honour and fairness, but was he more driven by the desire to have his own sins forgiven, his own slate wiped clean, than by an honest desire to do right by Christopher? Was he even thinking about what that would entail?
“I'm sorry,” Henry said desperately. “I do want to make amends to you, just tell me what you want and I will see it done.”
Christopher’s expression was all bitter fury. He gave a harsh laugh. “What could I possibly want from you now? Wait, I know—perhaps you should earn the money you owe me the way I had to earn it? On your knees, and on your back, taking my cock like a whore.”
Henry blinked, stunned—and, mortifyingly, aroused—by the filthy, furious words. He was suddenly aware of his cock pressing against the placket of his buckskin breeches, and when Christopher’s gaze dropped to his groin, his eyebrows slowly rising, Henry’s cheeks burned.
“Well, would you look at that,” he said bitingly. “It seems you like that idea.”
They stared at one another, the silence between them oddly charged.
Christopher stepped closer to Henry. He was still a very beautiful man, but his face did not have the uncomplicated comeliness it had once had—it had more character now. More grit. There were faint lines of experience etched onto it. Creases at the corners of his eyes that—despite his current fury—suggested he smiled often.
“Perhaps it would be interesting,” he said now, “to invert our transaction.” His gaze on Henry was curious. “I’m not sure you’d be up to the challenge though.”
“What makes you say that?” Henry managed, his mouth very dry.
“You’re a duke,” Christopher said, his tone making the title sound like an insult. “You’re used to being in charge, used to having your desires indulged, used to being the user—rather than the provider—of services.”
Services.
Henry did not want to let that pass.
“I realise that is how you see our arrangement now,” he said. “As some hard-nosed exchange of services for money—and perhaps it was like that, at the beginning. But later… well it was not like that for me.” Heat stole into his face as he made himself admit the truth aloud. “Maybe I am being very naive, but… I felt that we were making love together.”
For just a moment, Christopher looked wrecked, but then he gave a derisive snort. “Pathetically enough, I would probably have agreed with you once, but then I did used to be a perfect idiot.”
“Don’t say that,” Henry breathed. His heart felt raw and bleeding, but he felt oddly alive too, for the first time in a very, very long time. Christopher might hate him, but he was looking at him, reacting to him. Reacting to Henry, as a person in his own right.
In this moment, Henry wasn't the the Duke of Avesbury, or the father of the Asquith children.
He was just… Henry.
Christopher said flatly, “Before you get carried away, Henry, consider this aspect of our arrangement: I was always the one on my knees—or my back—and you were