Erotic short. A young man lusts after an unattainable gentleman until the gentleman’s valet steps in.
4k, rated E, cis M/M — introducing Vincent Lucas Samuels, Ulysses Valentine, and Kit Sanders, with a new appearance from the illustrious Lawrence Kidd. Lots of teasing and flirtation, rough sex, bruising, hair-pulling, size difference, and some nasty men who like to take advantage.
CW for some consensual but unsatisfying sex, some mild consent issues, and manipulation.
Terms used for genitalia are cock, prick, balls, and arse.
The alcohol had put a lovely haze over absolutely everything, and Kit was laughing breezily as he leaned on Larry’s arm. Larry Kidd was a good friend of his — the two of them had gone to university together, and where Kit had put his reading in history and classics to museum curation, Larry had put his to…
Well, a few different things, actually, here and there — Kit couldn’t really remember most of the jobs Larry had had over the past few years, there’d been so many of them — but now he was publishing fiction books, really splendid novels, and he did very well at that.
They’d been out in a lovely, quiet little speakeasy that Larry was a regular in whenever he came to London — Kit normally favoured far busier places, ones that would be utterly packed with men, but Larry was frightened of crowds and started to sweat as soon as there were more than seven people in a room with him, so Kit always let him pick the place.
It had started to get too busy, the hour past midnight, and they were now on their way to the home of a friend of Larry’s — a Mr Vincent Lucas Samuels, who was an illustrator.
Vincent’s home was just about the cosiest place Kit had ever walked into: furnished in creams and browns and warmed to the perfect, pleasant temperature, it was as though the perfect cup of coffee had been distilled into a perfect little flat, and he marvelled at it as Larry pushed the door shut behind them.
When Kit went to his buttons, he fumbled them with cold-stiffened fingers, and Larry laughed and undid them for him, sliding his coat off of his shoulders.
There were three other men in the room, but two of them were already getting up to leave. The one staying in was a handsome, blond creature with freckles over his face: he was sprawled on the floor beside the fire, asleep with his head half-mashed into a cushion, and the other two were both extremely lean, each with the sort of cheekbones you could cut someone on.
“Larry, we’re just on our way home,” said the one with dark hair. He added in a slightly low voice, glancing back into the flat, “Mr Valentine is on the warpath tonight. He needled poor Cricket there as though he were going to mount him on velvet and put him behind glass.”
“Well, Cricket’s full of needle holes from Mr Valentine,” said Larry, glancing to the sleeping man as he hung his and Kit’s coats up together. “He really should know better by now. This is my friend Kit — Christopher Sandler. Isn’t he handsome?”
“Very,” said the dark-haired one.
“Terribly,” agreed the one with the chestnut hair. “I’m Ford, and that’s Hawkins, and now we’re both gone. Lovely to meet you, darling.”
“You too,” said Kit. They left very quickly, almost disappeared in front of his eyes — he really was quite drunk — and Larry pulled Kit to sit down beside the fire, Cricket asleep at his feet. “Is he very popular, your Mr Samuels?”
“Oh, terribly,” said Larry, picking up a blanket from over the sofa and tossing it over Cricket. “I have to do that,” he said when Kit looked at him in interest. “Mr Valentine, Vincent’s valet, quite hates Cricket, and I wouldn’t see the poor idiot freeze just for idiocy.”
“I wouldn’t let him freeze, Larry, no matter what Valentine wanted,” said a sultry-voiced gentleman, and Kit turned to look at him and stared.
Vincent Samuels was a vision: he was a little above average height, plump, with bright red apples in his cheeks and beautiful waves of blond hair. There was a cleft in his chin, and when he smiled, he had deep dimples and a sort of delicate V-shaped crinkle either side of his eyes, like arrows pointing out their bright colour and vivacity. His eyes glittered blue as they alighted first on Larry, and then on Kit.
He caught Larry by the shoulders to kiss him on both cheeks, and then he came to sink down onto the sofa beside Kit, one arm slinging around the back of his shoulders.
“And who might you be?” he asked in his tremendous voice, which was low and plummy but had a smoky quality to it, and Kit stared at him for a moment or two, his lips parted, not saying anything. Vincent put two knuckles underneath his chin, stroking the skin there. “Larry, who is this darling creature?”
“This is Kit — I told you about him. Kit, this is Vincent.”
“Hullo, Mr Samuels,” said Kit breathlessly, and Vincent chuckled, leaning in and sliding his thumb against his chin.
“Aren’t you just adorable? Call me Vincent, you dear thing, calling me Mr Samuels is barely a step above calling me sir, and there’s no cause for that at all.” His gaze flitted behind him to Larry, who laughed. “Larry, do you have these boys commissioned, or do you hunt for them until you’ve found the prettiest ones there are?”
“They just sort of stumble into my life, Vincent,” said Larry good-naturedly. “It’s my magnetic personality. “
“I’m really not handsome,” said Kit. “And not — Not interesting. Not like you and Larry are, artists, I mean.”
“You’re not an artist?” asked Vincent, pouting out his lips. “You mean to tell me you’re a model, hm?”
“A model? No, no, I’m a… I manage accounts in the Queen Street bank.”
“You’ve brought a banker into my home?” asked Vincent. His hand was still gently holding Kit’s cheek, thumb pressing under his lip and barely tickling its bottom edge. “A very handsome banker at that — you don’t mean to tell me, Christopher Sanders, that you have a jaw like this, and you hide it all day in a teller’s booth, counting out coins and giving receipts?”
“Uh, no, Mr Valentine, I don’t really do much with normal customers day to day, or even the account holders, really, I mostly just — ”
“Don’t you see how that’s worse?” demanded Vincent, arching his eyebrows. “My dear creature, you should be modelling nude for the masters to depict the curves of these fine thighs of yours in oils, not sitting at a desk in a pin-striped suit with a face like a fish.”
“Oh,” said Kit. His mind was blank. “Sorry?”
Vincent gave him a look he really didn’t know what to make of, and then looked at Larry, his lips quirked up at their edges, his blue eyes sparkling in a way Vincent had never seen eyes sparkle before.
“Larry,” he said again. “Where do you find them?”
“Vincent’s teasing, Kit,” murmured Larry, and squeezed his shoulder. “He’s just an awful flirt, that’s all, and I’m sure he’d be very interested in your work at the bank if he was any good at keeping track of his money.”
“Money shmoney,” said Vincent uncaringly. “Valentine takes care of all that wherewithal.”
“A lesser valet would take advantage of that,” said Larry. “Make use of your carelessness to cheat you.”
As if on cue, an imposing figure appeared from the kitchen doorway, and Larry beamed widely at the square-faced, scowling man who emerged. He looked almost as though someone had made and shaped him at the canning factory, his shoulders extremely square, his jaw just as much so, and he had supremely thick, powerful brows. When they furrowed, which they did as soon as they looked from Larry to the tableau on the couch, Vincent holding Kit by the chin, Cricket sprawled at their feet, Kit couldn’t help but think of two great cliffs coming together, or two glaciers crashing.
“Every valet alive is lesser than Valentine,” said Vincent lovingly.
“Kind of you to say, sir. Mr Kidd, sir, good evening.”
“Good evening, Valentine,” said Larry cheerfully. “Has my man been in touch with you?”
“He has, sir, yes.”
“He meets with your approval, I hope?”
“Mr Riggs is quite a capable man, sir,” said Valentine. “For all his youth, he lacks the damning deficiencies of many new entries to the craft, and he listens very keenly to instruction and correction.”
Larry laughed, and said, “Kit, Mr Riggs is my new valet. Valentine knows everything about everything, but especially about valeting, and I suggested they get in touch — believe it or not, taciturn a creature as he is, this is the highest praise I’ve ever heard Mr Valentine bestow upon anybody. I have no doubt that when I tell him of this, Valentine, Riggs will weep with joy.”
“No, sir, I don’t believe so, sir,” intoned Valentine with an edge of disapproval. “It would be unbecoming for a valet to perform such an exaggerated emotional display during the course of his duties, let alone before his employer.”
“You’re right,” said Larry. “He’ll save up his tears and cry them all at the end of the day, I expect.”
Valentine gave Larry a very cool look, which Larry returned with a smile of one who had learned very well how much baiting the dog would take before he snapped, and knew that no matter the appearances, he wasn’t yet anywhere near the line.
“I do appreciate your tutelage of my man, Valentine, really,” said Larry warmly. “It’s very good of you.”
“Yes, sir,” agreed Valentine. “It is.”
Kit hardly knew what to make of the man as he came forward, looking coldly down at Cricket as though he wanted to crush him under the heel of his perfectly shined shoe, and then looked down at Kit.
“A drink, sir?” he asked.
Kit didn’t know what to say, his tongue fat and frozen in his mouth.
“Give him a good screw, Valentine,” instructed Vincent, and Kit’s cheeks glowed with heat, but Vincent, laughing, went on, “Screws all around.”
“Happy to please, sir,” said Valentine, with a good-naturedness that Kit gleaned from context was reserved exclusively for his employer. He stepped over Cricket with a glance down at him of unreserved disgust, and then he went over to the cocktail bar, began to work.
“Mr Valentine is a valet of prodigious skill and discretion,” murmured Larry in his ear, and no matter that he wasn’t Larry’s type and that he didn’t fancy his chances with Vincent either, Kit flushed to have one man leaning over him and another right in front of him, touching his face, “but he’s got a prickly personality, to say the least.”
“I’ve never found him prickly,” said Vincent. His fingers had moved from tracing down Kit’s chin to stroking over his neck with the backs of his fingers as though he were a cat, and Kit was embarrassed, but it really felt quite good.
“That’s because he reserves his soft parts for you,” retorted Larry.
Kit laughed, feeling his cheeks flush darker, although he flinched slightly as Valentine came over with a tray ready.
Kit let out a surprised sound when he actually sipped at his glass, finding that Valentine had put something into the cocktail to balance out the acid in the orange juice — he almost couldn’t taste the vodka, but there was a balance to the sweetness, and Larry laughed.
“Yes,” said Vincent, fingers trailing down Kit’s chest. “Valentine’s a treat, isn’t he?”
Kit couldn’t breathe. He just nodded silently, and shivered when Vincent showed his smile with his teeth.
* * *
It was many hours later when Vincent leaned in toward him, his lips almost brushing Kit’s, and Kit let out a breathless little noise, almost squeaking.
Cricket, who was a breathless, slightly spacey man with a deep affection for insects and arachnids, had woken up after an hour or so and immediately become distracted by Larry — Larry had started by playfully pitching insect-based novels at Cricket, but at some point their play had become a serious sort of artistry, and they were sitting aside with a mostly-empty bottle of vodka and a great many pages of scrawled notes between them.
“It’s ever so late,” said Vincent: his mouth smelt of orange juice still, sweetness coming off his tongue, and Kit ached to taste it as he looked into Vincent’s shimmering blue eyes. “You simply must stay the night.”
“I,” mumbled Kit, his cheeks burning.
Vincent had been flirting the whole of the evening, touching Kit’s back, his face, his neck, his hair, and they’d been talking a lot but as a result of all the talking, Kit couldn’t remember much about what — Vincent’s most recent illustrative work, pets, suits. All of it blurred into the shapes Vincent’s lips made when he talked, and the cadence of his plummy voice.
Right now he was the closest he’d been all night, Kit able to smell his breath, almost able to taste it, feel it on his lips. He ached to close the gap, tried to push himself to do so, but just as he made himself inch slightly forward, Vincent leaned back.
“Take the spare room, of course,” he said airily. “Cricket and Larry will sleep here beside the fire if they sleep at all — but when Larry’s in one of his creative moods, he chugs and chugs like a train on neverending track, and Cricket’s an obsessive by nature.”
Kit opened his mouth, getting to his feet, but Vincent was already in the corridor, and he heard a door click shut.
Sighing, he cast one glance back at Larry and Cricket, who were speaking with a lot of seriousness about the romantic potential of two katydids sharing a single dewdrop, and trudged into the spare room.
His shoes he’d already removed, and of course, his coat, but although the fire had been burning through the night his fingers maintained a sort of chill to them, and he opened and closed his hands a few times, attempting to work out the stiffness, but he was clumsy undoing his waistcoat nonetheless.
He managed it after a while, but he let out a groan of frustration as he tried and failed to start off on his shirt.
“Sir?” came a voice from the doorway, and he jumped, looking at Valentine’s serious face.
“Oh,” he said. “Hullo, Valentine.”
“Do you require assistance, sir?”
“Um,” said Kit, swallowing. “I’m terribly sorry, Valentine.”
Valentine didn’t say a word, but stepped forward, and with large but nimble fingers he began to unbutton Kit’s shirt.
“They get stiff all the time in winter,” said Kit miserably. “My valet puts something in my tea for, for circulation, you know, and always puts a compress out for me. It’s as though I’m already eighty.”
Valentine said nothing. He wasn’t an extremely talkative fellow, and under the weight of his oppressive gaze Kit almost felt like falling to pieces, felt like crawling under the bed and hiding there. He undid Kit’s shirt buttons, unbuttoned his braces too, and didn’t fully undo his trousers, but undid the big button that was very stiff, was most difficult for him to work on.
“Thank you,” said Kit. “It’s very good of you, Valentine. I hope I — I really hope I’m not too much of an imposition, I promise I won’t make a mess.”
“Mr Samuels appears to have taken a shine to you, sir,” said Valentine quietly. “I have no doubt you’ll be invited back.”
“Do you think?” asked Kit, too eagerly, as Valentine helped him off with his shirt and set it on a hanger, taking up his vest as well. Kit fumbled his way out of his trousers, his socks, and Valentine collected them over his arm. “He’s really — He’s really quite a, quite a wonderful man, isn’t he? So… You know, being so handsome, and so artistic, and charming, and his voice is really… Really…” He trailed off, swallowing.
He’d been flirting all night, but hadn’t even seemed to consider inviting Kit to bed with him. He’d touched Kit almost all over, and then simply…
“Sir,” said Valentine, and Kit turned to look at him. “Would you consider it speaking out of turn were I to give you a piece of advice regarding my employer?”
“I, no, goodness, Mr Valentine, please, tell me… tell me whatever you like.”
“Mr Samuels does not bed his friends, sir,” said Valentine, and Kit turned to meet his gaze, aware that his mouth was open. “New or old.”
“Oh,” said Kit. “Of course. I suppose he wouldn’t.”
Valentine came forward as Kit approached the bed, pulling back the blankets for him. Vincent was ever so lucky, having a valet like Mr Valentine — Kit’s was an older gentleman, almost doddering in his manner, and he often treated Kit rather as though he were his father as much as his valet, no matter that he called him sir. Kit wasn’t certain he even conceived that two men might be attracted to one another.
But Valentine —
Valentine was very close, and terribly big. He reached out, touching Kit’s neck, and Kit heaved in a gasp.
“Would you like me to stop, sir?” he asked lowly, even as his other hand rested on Kit’s hip, slid up to his waist under the shirt, thumb playing over his belly. Kit had been worked up and up into infinity over the course of the evening, and his cock came to life again as though it were mounted on a spring, his skin electrified, his body wanting.
“Oh,” whimpered Kit. “Oh, Mr — Mr Valentine, I — ”
Valentine’s kiss wasn’t the soft, gently commanding thing Kit had imagined of Vincent — Valentine’s kiss was biting and just a little too rough, and Kit whimpered at the way he caught his lip before he shoved him down.
Kit was hot all over, his skin singing with want, but Valentine tore his clothes off of him as though he were a present left half-wrapped for him — as soon as he was naked Valentine’s hands slid over his body, grabbing at his waist, his arse, his thighs. Vincent’s hands were delicate things, stained in places with paint and charcoal but moisturised and very soft, but Valentine’s weren’t.
Valentine’s were huge and strong and marked over with callouses and little rough marks, and he didn’t touch him so gently as Vincent had — he was rough, almost possessive, and he gripped hard enough to bruise, to mark him up.
“Ah,” moaned Kit as he wrapped a hand around his cock, arching his back off the bed, and he risked a look at Valentine’s face. It was concentrated, focused on him, but what made Kit’s heart beat faster and his lungs ache as he breathed a little faster was the slight smirk on his lips, smug and satisfied.
His fingers felt very big and really very strong as they shoved inside him, lubricated with paraffin but still forcing him to stretch, and Kit grabbed at the sheet with one hand and put his other over his mouth, trying not to cry out.
“There you are, sir,” said Valentine, his voice lower than it had been, his fingers scissoring wide. “Over you go.”
“Over — ?”
There was no further explanation: Valentine gripped him under the knee and flipped him onto his belly, the amount of strength he had in just one hand making Kit’s stomach feel like it was still flipping over. Valentine’s strong hand gripped under his thigh and hip, hauling him back to the edge of the bed, and before Kit could ask him to take a moment, to stop, Valentine was thrusting inside him, and Kit’s eyes were watering.
Valentine’s cock was too thick to be human, undoubtedly the biggest Kit had ever taken when he normally took up with much smaller men, and he whined into the mattress as Valentine snapped his hips forward, filling him to the brim and making him choke on it.
“Ah, ah, Mr — Valentine, won’t you — ”
The grip on his hair was too tight, stinging and making Kit keen, and Valentine shoved his face down against the bed, his hips moving with a strong, piston-like pace. He fucked hard, hard and rough and so big, too big, and Kit couldn’t really catch his breath as Valentine pounded into him.
It did feel good. There was a sort of savage goodness in it, though, the savagery overwhelming the pleasure, and Kit kept grabbing awkwardly at the sheets underneath him with his still-still fingers, thrusting down against the mattress with his cock hard and his balls aching.
Valentine was different to his usual in more ways than one — Kit’s encounters were normally a little quicker than his, put a great emphasis on the foreplay so that the actual sex was gentle and quick, but Valentine had stamina, and Kit was certain his bruises would last.
By the time Valentine came, Kit’s cock felt sore, his arse forced open and fucked rather raw, his throat hoarse, his face a mess, and even when Valentine put his hand around Kit’s prick and squeezed him off, it was rough.
He came, came hard, but it felt —
There was a sort of sudden drop when Valentine pulled back from him, and Kit felt as though he’d landed on the ground as he turned to look at him, his lips parted, wetness still streaking his cheeks. Valentine had a wet cloth in his hand — he’d already tucked himself away, looked put together and perfect again — and ran it over Kit’s belly, his body, his arse.
“I,” he mumbled. “I, would you — Would you stay?” he asked. “A moment? Just — just until I fall asleep?”
Valentine stared down at him, arching one eyebrow. He seemed coolly baffled by the request, but he set his lips together, and then said, “Very well, sir.”
He didn’t get into bed with him, didn’t touch Kit’s hair, didn’t soothe, didn’t… Didn’t anything. He just turned off the light and stood there in the darkness, a sort of immovable tower, and Kit almost wished he’d just let him go, because he must have lain there an hour with Valentine stockstill and staring down at him, the sound of Larry and Cricket’s insectile conversation drifting in from the other room.
* * *
“Ulysses.”
“Yes?”
“Will you come to bed with me?”
“Always.”
Vincent put out his arms, hands opening and closing, and Ulysses quietly laughed, dropping forward onto the bed and wrapping his arms around him. His body, as ever, was big and warm and really quite wonderful, and Vincent sighed contentedly, pressing his cheek against his chest and putting his arms around his waist, settling between his big, powerful thighs.
“Not for long,” said Ulysses. “I want to iron Mr Sanders’ shirt for the morning before I retire to bed — I’d normally attempt to outlast our guests, but I know better than to match myself against Mr Kidd.”
“You really are soft on Larry,” said Vincent, intentionally packing the accusation into his tone, and Ulysses responded by smacking his arse through the silk of his pyjamas, making Vincent jump and laugh, although he muffled it against Ulysses’ chest.
“Mr Kidd is obnoxious, and an irritant,” said Ulysses, “but he cleans up after himself, and he neither lies nor obfuscates.”
“What do you think of our new darling?” asked Vincent, stroking back and forth over his thigh, squeezing it through the fabric. “Kit. Is he very tight?”
“More so than I expected,” murmured Ulysses.
“He’s quite delectable, the sort of thing you might devour in one bite.”
“He’s not used to rough treatment, it was obvious. He thought of you every moment I was over him.”
“He told you?”
“He didn’t need to.” Ulysses brushed his lips over the side of Vincent’s temple, and his breath was warm and ticklish over the shell of his ear as he murmured, “They all do.”
Vincent smiled, satisfaction pooling comfortably in his belly, and he gripped tighter at Ulysses, enjoying the heat of him, the softness of him, his strength.
“Sleep with me?” he asked.
“We have guests,” Ulysses reminded him, and Vincent sighed as dramatically as he could, falling back over his thighs.
“Cruelty,” said Vincent, and Ulysses chuckled, gripping tight at his hair, making Vincent grunt and then sigh at the pleasant, tugging pain of it.
“I indulge you more than I do anyone else alive,” he said.
“What’s a little more indulgence, then?” retorted Vincent.
“If Kidd and Vauxhall go to sleep,” said Ulysses. “And only then.”
“Drug their vodka,” suggested Vincent, and Ulysses chuckled, gently pushing Vincent from his lap. “Ulysses Valentine.”
“Hm?”
“I love you very much.”
“As I do you, Vince,” said Ulysses quietly, and brushed his lips over the back of Vincent’s hand. “Go to sleep.”
Vincent thought of handsome Kit in the next room, fucked silly by Ulysses, and sighed contentedly to himself. It hardly mattered that he didn’t like Ulysses’ manner, his roughness and his strength and his beautiful wildness — Vincent had no doubt that if he asked, if he wanted to watch, Kit would go along with it again.
He would ask, too. He might paint it, even.
That would be nice.
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