Will let out a slow breath. “Next time consider stealing from the rich and powerful, all right?”
“That’s it? You’re not cross?”
“Of course I am. But, Martin, I probably would have stolen from a nun if it meant keeping you alive this past winter. I would have stolen from a nun and liked it.”
Martin felt himself preening, almost, at Will’s admission that he’d do bad things for him, and then caught himself. “Only a rich and powerful nun, though.”
“Of course,” Will said, with the first hint of a smile since they had left Hyde Park. “Did it ever occur to you that we were together even before we were . . . together? I mean, you’re always at the front of my mind, even when we’re hundreds of miles away. You’re the most important person in my life. Even if we had never gone to bed together, even if neither of us fancied men, we’d still be together. We just wouldn’t have a name for it.”
“Did it occur to me?” Martin repeated faintly. “Yes, William. It occurred to me. Did it occur to you that even if we had never gone to bed together, you might still be jealous of any wife of mine?” Will looked up at him with a round-eyed surprise, but he didn’t deny it.
Martin didn’t know which of them stood first, or which of them led the way toward the bedroom. Half an hour earlier he wouldn’t have thought it possible that either of them could have wanted this. Will was shaken and anxious; Martin was tired and ill. But there they were, peeling one another’s clothes off, kissing with more affection than heat. He had always thought sex was something base and animalistic, and maybe sometimes it was. But it was also this—a comfort after a long day, a reminder that there was someone who wanted to take care of you, a small piece of mercy in an unyielding world. When Will lay back and Martin bent over his lap, he was astonished by the gentleness of the act, the tenderness of his own lips and tongue, the sweetness of Will’s hand in his hair. And then, later, his face buried in Will’s neck, he found that there could be a sort of surrender in his own release, a slackening of the line between what he needed and what was possible.
Martin woke up warm but still tired, Will’s back plastered to his chest. Will was very much asleep, and if Martin knew anything about his friend’s morning habits, it would be at least another hour before he even cracked an eye. Carefully, Martin eased himself up to sitting position, extricating an arm from underneath Will’s chest and a leg from over Will’s hips. Will let out an unsatisfied little huff and tipped over onto his stomach.
This gave Martin a view of Will’s dark curls tumbled over the pillow, one wiry arm flung out to the side, and the lattice of scars that covered Will’s back. In the morning light, some were faint and fine, mere pale slivers that might have passed unnoticed if not side by side with their raised and ropy mirror images. He knew, from the few things Will had said and the many things he hadn’t said, that these marks had been the work of months as the Fotheringay made its slow progress from the West Indies to Portsmouth.
Martin had always thought that officers in the navy were spared floggings. It turned out that this was true only insofar as officers were spared public floggings. What went on in the cabin was quite a different matter. What went on when the captain was a power-mad despot was a different matter still. Martin bent down, pressing a kiss between Will’s shoulder blades, then raised the sheet to Will’s neck.
The man they had met in the park yesterday had said Will saved lives. Martin wasn’t certain exactly what Will had done—whether he had spoken to the rightfully disgruntled sailors and then been punished for it, or whether it was simply a matter of allowing himself to be used as a scapegoat—but if there was any man in the world who could have done it, Martin believed it would have been Will. And somehow, despite that nightmare, despite the year of oblivion he had sought upon coming home, Will still found joy. He still trusted and loved. Martin wasn’t much given to considering the existence of any divine creator let alone going