Two Marriages: Marrying Men, #5

By Hollis Shiloh

This ebook contains two stories:

 

A Perfectly Respectable Husband

Tobias has to marry or lose his inheritance. He's made a deal with an old school chum that will cost him a great deal, but it's bound to be less than his uncle is currently stealing. Although the situation will be less than ideal, he can endure it. However, when sweet Perry steps back into his life, needing help and offering to be "a perfectly respectable husband" to help him in return, all bets are off...  ~9800 words

 

A Gentle Man

Edwin is distressed by his second cousin's engagement to an absolute bounder. Fortunately, his old friend and secret crush Sampson is here to help...  ~9300 words

 

In the "Marrying Men" series, pseudo-historical tales feature men marrying one another in various worlds and ways. Happy ending are to be expected.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Spare Words Press
• Release date: Jul 2, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393924111

Book preview

A Perfectly Respectable Husband

About the story:

Tobias has to marry or lose his inheritance.  He's made a deal with an old school chum that will cost him a great deal, but it's bound to be less than his uncle is currently stealing.  Although the situation will be less than ideal, he can endure it.  However, when sweet Perry steps back into his life, needing help and offering to be a perfectly respectable husband to help him in return, all bets are off... 

~9800 words

A Perfectly Respectable Husband

by Hollis Shiloh

The gardens were looking lovely, but even so, Tobias had to brace himself up strongly before he could face going out there and seeing old Perry. 

Though he was of age (aside from those foolish provisions in the will) he felt less equal to the task of facing Peregrine now than he would have had they still been at school together.  Of course, now two years of age made far less difference, and as this was his home territory and Perry his guest, he should not have found the meeting at all intimidating.

But he managed it somehow.

He stood for a moment at the entrance of the gardens, trying to compose himself, to manage his face.  He'd always been terribly soft where Peregrine was concerned.  No harm in that, of course; he was a charming fellow.  But Tobias knew very well he would have to tell Perry about his impending marriage, and he had rarely felt less equal to a task.  His courage had quite deserted him.

He did not know how long he stood there hesitating, or how much longer he might have, had not Peregrine looked up suddenly, as if alerted to his watching eyes.  He'd been examining a rose on a particularly fecund bush, and dropped it now, so the lush flower head bounced back down level with the others, dewdrops spraying off their petals and the leaves, a shower of blessing on the rather angelic young man who had been studying it.

Tobias!  His smile was bright and quick, warm as sunshine and twice as lovely.  It made Tobias's heart quicken every time—and hadn't he felt like an awful fellow for that when they were younger?  Perry was so vulnerable and trusting, so sweet and innocent. 

It would have been very easy for an older boy he half hero-worshipped to talk him into things he was too young for.  Tobias hadn't, and he hadn't let anyone else do so, either.  But he'd had such wicked thoughts. 

To be looked at with such frank devotion by a lad as beautiful as Perry, when he already spent most of his days in a lather of frustrated hormones and half-erotic imaginings, surrounded as he was by healthy, sweaty, vibrant, and active young men around his own age (as well as which, half the teachers had the indecency to be eloquent and handsome in one way or another—the school could have done with a great many more ugly teachers, so that he'd have had a great deal fewer confusing crushes to deal with). 

Would he have been able to face his old maths instructor any easier than Perry?  Somehow he thought he might have. 

At any rate, he'd survived school, learning a great deal of self-discipline along the way.  No doubt it had been good for him.  Perhaps it had not been as bad for boys who fancied girls; he would never know what that might feel like.  (It was probably a very different sort of frustration.)

As challenging as being an adult could be, as many new things to learn and strange waters to navigate, he would never have willingly gone back to being that frustrated boy, trying so very hard not to let on how he felt.  He'd like to think at least half the time he kept his feelings bottled up and hidden.  He was not optimistic that was the truth.

And somehow facing Perry here, in his home territory, made him feel as if he was being asked to do go back to childhood vulnerability.  For a moment, he did not think he could speak.

He managed it at last.  Perry, old fellow.

Peregrine walked up to him and stopped at the last moment, still grinning too hard, and looking as if he didn't know what to do with his hands.  His eyes had such a sparkle; surely Tobias couldn't be the only one who felt tongue-tied around the fellow?

He remembered at last to put out his hand and give Perry a firm handshake, since that seemed to be what he wanted.  Peregrine was nineteen and he twenty-one now, both of them quite grown up, far from school days.  Though they seemed somehow close at present. 

Perry would be in his uniform, and shorter, looking up at Tobias, half in awe, wanting to tell him something, or wanting his help with something.  Tobias had strived to always be the trustworthy sort of fellow he could trust with his problems, to look after him in whatever ways he could.  And Perry had trusted him.

Surprised to see you, said Tobias gruffly.  To what do I owe the honor?

Can't I just want to see an old school friend?  He looked at Tobias through his lashes and smiled, showing that perfect dimple.  The man was too beautiful to be real; he must be an angel, or a vision. 

Good lord, he was even better looking now that he'd grown up!  Tobias would never have thought that was possible, that somehow the perfection of the boy had been an aberration, nature's chance, rather than a token of his future perfection.

It really felt unfair sometimes,

Reviews for Two Marriages

[L'eau · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Both sweet stories, but both could yet some more editing.