Free All for One by Ariel Tachna, Nicki Bennett

the musket aside and turned his attention to dinner. “If we haven’t at least heard from him by the day after tomorrow, I think we should ride back toward Époisses, if only to see what’s going on. The scoundrel might be able to tell us something even if he isn’t well enough to travel yet,” he declared, reaching for a plate and filling it with meat and cheese. “Come eat,” he added. “You need to keep your strength up.”
    “I’m strong enough for you any time, never fear,” Léandre promised, piling a slice of meat on a crust of bread and taking a bite. “Though perhaps you’re right about riding out to meet Aristide. Staying here cooling our heels is gaining us nothing.”
    “We could leave in the morning if you’d rather,” Perrin allowed seriously. “Not that I think he has anything to fear from a wounded messenger, but whoever sent that letter will expect to see results, and when they don’t get any, they’re going to start wondering why. And if they’re amoral enough to make up such lies about M. de Tréville, they won’t hesitate to take out a simple musketeer.”
    “You’ve known Aristide long enough to know there’s nothing ‘simple’ about him,” Léandre chuckled. His knee tapped impatiently against the bedding while he tried to decide which consequence would be worse—the growing frustration of inactivity, or Aristide’s annoyance at their returning to “rescue” him. “He wouldn’t thank us for thinking he can’t take care of himself.”
    “He wouldn’t thank us for not being there to back him up either,” Perrin replied. “Actually, in this case he probably would, wouldn’t he? He’d say something noble about it being more important for us to protect M. de Tréville than him.” He frowned. “All right, we’ll give him until the day after tomorrow before we go looking for him.”
    Léandre nodded in reluctant agreement. “Just because it’s the right decision doesn’t make the waiting any easier,” he grumbled.
    Taking the words as an invitation, Perrin pounced, rolling Léandre beneath him and pinning him to the bed. “Then I’ll just have to find a way to distract you,” he growled, grinding his hips against the blond’s. “We wouldn’t want you going off half-cocked or anything.”
    “Speak for yourself,” Léandre rumbled, his reaction to the hard weight pressing him into the bed immediate and inevitable. He reached a hand up to brush the side of his fingers over Perrin’s full lips. “Besides, I thought you were hungry. You said something about keeping up your strength?”
    Perrin shook his head, catching the wandering fingers in his mouth. “No, I said something about keeping up your strength,” he retorted, enjoying the feeling of the lengthening shaft against his stomach. “And I am hungry, but not for food. I’d much rather feast on you.”
    “You don’t have to worry about my strength,” Léandre retorted, arching his hips upward to grind his pelvis against the younger man’s, rubbing his significant length against the matching hardness. “But by all means take what you need to maintain your own prowess.” He grinned up at his dark-haired partner salaciously. “I wouldn’t want Aristide to think I was depriving you.”
    “If anyone’s deprived at the moment, it’s him,” Perrin commented, loosening the laces on Léandre’s shirt enough to pull it over his head so that their bare chests rubbed together. “We’ll have to make it up to him when he gets home.”
    As arousing as were the possibilities of how they might “make it up” to Aristide on his return, Léandre had to admit he enjoyed the chance to have Perrin—and Perrin’s attentions—all to himself. Wrapping an arm around his lover’s back to increase the friction of their chests until dark hair mingled with light, he dropped his other hand to cup Perrin’s arousal, squeezing it through the fabric of his breeches. “This certainly doesn’t feel