BLOOD TALISMAN J.P. Bowie 88
“Fine. He was surprised, but as there are always plenty of guys waiting to transfer to
other shifts he was okay with it.”
“Jason’s waiting for us at the bar,” Alex told him.
‘Things are good with you and him then?” Tommy asked.
“Yeah, real good,” Alex said happily. “We’re talking ’bout moving in together.”
“I’m glad to hear that, Alex. Glad you’ve finally found the one.” Tommy didn’t add that
now they might not see each other as much in the future. He was happy that his best friend had found someone to share his life.
“Is Andrew joining us at the bar?”
“Yes. And a few of his friends—well, our friends now—his and mine.”
“Oh, yeah? Cool.”
“Yeah, they’re a great bunch. Kinda different, but you’ll like them.” Tommy put his
arms round Alex’s shoulder and hugged him close. ”Once you get to know them.”
Also available from Total-E-Bound Publishing:
A Ghost Story
J.P. Bowie
Excerpt
Manchester, England 1899
From Lord and Lady Maplethorpe:
You are cordially invited to attend an intimate soirée on the evening of February 24th at 8 p.m.
The renowned poet Mr Robert Clavell will entertain us with a short dissertation of his recently
published poem, Lannisbourne. A light supper and refreshments will be served.
Robert sighed as he read the words printed in an elegant scroll on the very expensive
card he held. He wished now he had never agreed to attend or read a stanza or two from his latest poem. Lannisbourne meant more to him than being listened to by a gin-swilling mob of degenerates masquerading as nobility. In his opinion, the secret life he led was a damned sight more palatable than the ghastly indulgences favoured by some of the Maplethorpe’s friends.
Only yesterday, he had heard through the gossip mill that a young girl had been
admitted to the local hospital suffering from a severe beating after attending a private party given by some well-heeled fops. Robert had a suspicion as to whom the gossip referred. He shuddered, hoping against hope that George Russell would not be one of the attendees at tonight’s soirée. The man was a thorn in Robert’s side, a self-proclaimed ‘master of the verse’, and one to quickly deride Robert’s work at every turn in the editorials he wrote for the newspaper bequeathed to him by his late father.
A discreet tap at his bedroom door pulled him from his dark thoughts. “Come in,
Danvers.”
His manservant appeared in the doorway, a small smile on his lined face. Danvers had
been his parents’ manservant before their tragic accidental deaths five years earlier in a hotel fire in Venice, Italy. As their only surviving heir, Robert had inherited the townhouse on Featherstone Avenue, and he had asked Danvers to stay on in his employ.
“Mr Edmonton is here, Master Robert. Shall I tell him you will be down momentarily?”
“Ask him to come up please, Danvers. I’m not quite finished dressing.”
“Do you require assistance?”
“No, no… I can manage.” Robert rarely asked Danvers to assist him with his wardrobe,
requiring him only to draw his nightly bath and occasionally help with a bothersome button or collar.
“Very good, Master Robert. I shall send him up directly.”
“Thank you, Danvers.”
Robert breathed a sigh of relief that he had managed to garner his friend John
Edmonton an invitation to tonight’s gathering. John, a successful lawyer based in London was in Manchester for a weekend visit, staying at a gentleman’s club. With John there it would be bearable, and perhaps afterwards they could return here for a brandy, and…
Another tap on the door, this one more robust, and John entered, his handsome face
wreathed in smiles. “Robert, how dashing you look in your best bib and tucker!”
Robert chuckled and opened his arms to his friend. “And you will turn every head
tonight, John.”
“The only head I want to turn is the pretty one perched on your shoulders.” John
wrapped his arms around Robert and kissed him, gently at first, then as longing and need took over, with a fervour that had both men moaning into each other’s mouths.
“Oh, Robbie…” John groaned his pet name for Robert softly against his lips. “It’s been
too long since last we enjoyed one another’s company like this.”
Robert ran a hand over John’s thick, sandy-coloured hair, his fingers straying over the
nape of John’s neck in a tender caress. “I know, my love, but it’s difficult when we live so far apart.”
“You could move to London.” John kissed Robert’s neck. “What is there here for you
that makes you refuse to leave?”
“This is my home, John. I have friends here…”
“You have friends in London, you have me in London, but more importantly I hear that
you have a jealous enemy in Manchester. I wish you would reconsider and move away so
that you’d no longer be exposed to the vitriol George Russell spews about you in that rag he calls a newspaper.”
“Russell is a boor, and everyone knows it.” Robert’s tone was dismissive. “I just pray
he’s not there tonight.”
John tightened his arms around Robert. “If he throws one disparaging comment at you
or about you, I shall whip the man to within an inch of his life.”
“Mmm… Your role as my protector makes me want to send a message to the
Maplethorpe’s saying I cannot attend, then divest you of every bit of clothing and make love to you until dawn.”
“A notion I cannot for the life of me fault.”
Robert canted his hips to press his erection against John’s, taking his lips again with a kiss that sent fire through his blood and very nearly made him forget that he was needed elsewhere in a very short space of time.
Danvers’ tap on the door had them springing apart and straightening their clothes as
the manservant announced without opening the door, “Lord Maplethorpe’s carriage is here, Master Robert.”
“Damn, but your man’s discretion is to be lauded,” John muttered, smoothing down the
front of his trousers in an effort to disguise the obvious bulge.
They chuckled together, then after a quick kiss that held a promise of more, they made
for the door.
Robert’s heart sank as he entered the elegant but crowded salon at the Maplethorpe’s
town residence. Despite the throng, he could almost feel the stare of hatred George Russell
sent his way.
Damn the man, and damn Lady Maplethorpe for inviting him
, he seethed. Even John’s strong grip at Robert’s elbow was not enough to give him complete comfort.
As far as he was concerned, the evening was already ruined. He had half a mind to
feign a sudden illness and give his hosts his apologies. It would serve them right for having the charlatan in the same room as him. Surely they knew of the discord between Russell and himself? A rumour had reached Robert’s ears that Russell dabbled in the black arts, that the man had been seen casting runes in order to destroy the success of a competing newspaper publication. As far as Robert was concerned, any wrong-doing that was laid at George Russell’s door most likely had some merit—outlandish as this story seemed.
“Steady, Robbie,” John murmured close to his ear. “Ignore the swine.”
“Easier said than done, John,” Robert remarked through a forced smile at an elderly
dowager who was bearing down on them like a silk-clad galleon at full mast.
“Mr Clavell, how gracious of you to attend my daughter’s soirée,” she gushed, one eye
appraising John as she came to a stop only inches from the two men.
Robert bowed over her hand. “The pleasure is mine, Lady Brightwell. May I introduce
my friend, John Edmonton?”
“Delighted,” the lady simpered, accepting John’s bow with a smile and a faint nod in
his direction. “And we are to be regaled with a recitation of your latest work, are we not?”
“If it pleases Lord and Lady Maplethorpe.” Robert tried hard not to glance in George
Russell’s direction even though he knew the man was still glaring across the room at him. He was never quite so glad to see Lord Maplethorpe as he was at that moment, the man’s vast girth blocking Russell from his sight.
“The guest of honour!” Maplethorpe declared, shaking Robert’s hand. “And who’s this
fine-looking fella?”
Robert introduced John to a tipsy Lord Maplethorpe, who then swept them from Lady
Brightwell’s startled presence, a massive arm around each of the men’s shoulders as he led them to where wine was being dispensed by the household staff.
“Wonderful red from the Loire Valley,” he informed Robert and John, pressing a glass
into each man’s hand. “Just arrived yesterday. What d’you think?”
“Very good,” John said after taking a sip. “Very good indeed.”
Robert nodded his agreement, hoping the wine would take the edge off his unease. He
downed half the glass in one quick swallow, enjoying the vague dizziness that accompanied the bouquet as the wine slid over his tongue. He was suddenly filled with a longing to leave the crowded room, be completely alone with John and make love to him until they were both exhausted. He flicked a look at John over the rim of his glass and saw the same lust in his friend’s hazel-green eyes.
Oh, but let’s put a speedy end to this evening
!
“Come now, Clavell,” Maplethorpe was saying. “Let us hear your splendid new
poem… Hush now,” he practically bellowed at the assembled crowd. “Mr Robert Clavell, the esteemed poet, will now honour us with a recitation from his magnificent work.”
Robert’s face burned with embarrassment, but he kept his composure, allowing
Maplethorpe to lead him to a space near the grand piano. Fixing his gaze on John’s smile and relieved that he could no longer see George Russell’s hateful visage anywhere among the sea of faces staring at him, he gave a perfunctory bow and introduced his poem,
Lannisbourne
.
“Lannisbourne is a land that came to me in my dreams. Unfortunately, it does not exist,
but if it did, I would take all of you there so you could experience for yourselves the beauty of the lush forests, the majestic mountains, the sweet water rivers… All of that is Lannisbourne.”
From somewhere in the room he heard the sound of a derisive snort followed by
someone’s whispered, “Hush…” He saw John turn his head trying make out who was being
so crass, but Robert knew. He tensed his jaw and straightened his shoulders, then found
George Russell’s baleful stare directed at him with such loathing, that for a moment his heart stilled and his breath caught in his throat.
There was no doubt whatsoever in Robert’s mind that the man wished him harm, and
that if he indeed pursued knowledge of the black arts to empower himself, it was now being unleashed in order to ruin Robert’s dissertation. He opened his mouth to begin and found his lips could not form the words. He coughed to clear his throat…
“In Lannisbourne two lovers kissed,
And murmured softly in the mist.”
Steeling himself, he turned away from Russell’s malignant gaze and locked eyes with
John, whose smile of encouragement gave him strength to continue.
“They lay in shadows’ dark delight.
Forbidden love disdains the light.”
His voice gained its normal composure as he continued,
“In Lannisbourne as they embraced
In passion dark, their bodies traced
The mark of love upon the bed,
Their lips sore bruised with words unsaid.
In Lannisbourne two lovers vowed
To love ‘til claimed by stone and shroud -
‘Til death and then what lays beyond
Their love an everlasting bond…”
The applause and murmurs of bravo a few minutes later when he finished the short
excerpt were gratifying enough, and Robert couldn’t help but feel a certain smugness that Russell had to be grinding his teeth in furious frustration.
Well, let him
, he thought, smiling at John as he approached, a glass of wine in each hand.
The wretch is merely jealous, knowing he will never be asked here to recite any of his rancid rhymes
.
“Wonderful,” John murmured, handing Robert a glass and meeting his eyes with a
smouldering gaze.
Robert met that gaze with one to equal its emotion. “It will be dedicated to you, John,”
he said, his voice low-pitched and husky. “And one day, perhaps you and I will find our
Lannisbourne.”
“I feel ashamed,” Robert murmured as he and John entered his home a couple of hours
later. He had decided that his earlier suspicions of Russell’s dark side must have been his
own foolish fancy and nothing more. Some people might believe in the power of the black
arts, but he did not.
“I thought you to be strangely quiet on the carriage ride here,” John remarked. “What
are you ashamed of?”
“My pettiness towards George Russell. The man deserves my pity not my anger.”
“The man deserves a kick on his arse, Robbie. He is fortunate I didn’t take it upon
myself to do just that before we left the Maplethorpe’s residence. The man is an utter cad, and ugly to boot.”
Robert chuckled and led John in the drawing room. He was pleased to see Danvers had