Captain Charles Hawkins has returned from the Napoleonic wars desperate for solitude. When the man who saved his life asks a favour, he feels honour bound to agree, but the request fills him with horror.<br><br>Sebastian Farrah knows the only useful thing he can do with his life is join Wellington’s army. He has tried everything else and failed. He agrees to his brother’s ridiculous request to spend a month in the country because it is the only way his brother will agree to purchase him a commission.<br><br>Charles and Sebastian clash but quickly form a bond that deepens into much more. However, they are running out of time. Charles begs Sebastian to stay, but Sebastian knows to do so he will be forced to reveal what it is that stopped him from succeeding in everything. The shameful secret he carries from the schoolroom.

Promises

He looked Charles in the eye. “You haven’t listened to me at all, have you?”


“Of course I have listened to you.”


Sebastian shook his head. “No. You have not.” He cocked his head and searched Charles face. “So, imagine for a moment that I said yes. That I would stay here. What would I stay as?”


Charles looked genuinely bewildered. “As my guest.”


“What? Forever? Just stay here, dig your garden, and let you fuck me? That’s it? Don’t you think that I might need more in my life than to serve you? Don’t you want more in your life than to watch me dig your garden and fuck me? Are you going to hide away here until you wither and die?”


Sebastian clamped his mouth shut. He hadn’t meant to say that.


Charles went a deathly shade of white and a muscle ticked along his cheek. “You have clearly not listened to a word that I have said either if you believe that.” His voice was cold. Clipped. His gaze shuttered.


Chapter 28