Rhyme of Love

By Emily Carrington

Gil struggles to hide his loss of status from Jack, but when he finally confesses, Jack turns around and blurts out his own secret. Who can Gil trust now?

Jack knows he screwed up but he believes in honesty above everything else. Well, almost. Running the risk of losing Gil, Jack must learn to lie convincingly or he’ll lose SearchLight, his life, and Gil, as well.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Changeling Press
• Release date: Aug 10, 2023

Book preview

Rhyme of Love (Jack and Gil 3)

A SearchLight Paranormal Romance

Emily Carrington

All rights reserved.

Copyright ©2023 Emily Carrington

BIN: 010882-03539

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Publisher:

Changeling Press LLC

315 N. Centre St.

Martinsburg, WV 25404

www.ChangelingPress.com

Editor: Crystal Esau

Cover Artist: Angela Knight

Adult Sexual Content

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Table of Contents

Rhyme of Love (Jack and Gil 3)

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Epilogue

Emily Carrington

Rhyme of Love (Jack and Gil 3)

A SearchLight Paranormal Romance

Emily Carrington

Gil struggles to hide his loss of status from Jack, but when he finally confesses, Jack turns around and blurts his secret. Who can Gil trust now?

Jack knows he screwed up, but he believes in honesty above everything else. Well, almost. Running the risk of losing Gil, Jack must learn to lie convincingly, or he’ll lose SearchLight, his life, and Gil too.

Chapter One

Around about ten that morning, Jack’s lover had turned on cello music. Not just classical cello, although there was some of that too, but also cellos playing contemporary songs. The rich, melodic lines were very quiet, but Jack still cued into them as he rested in Gil’s arms.

They’d made love most of the night and into the morning. It was time to rise, shower, and get this new day started. He’d barely slept two hours in the last twenty-four, but Jack refused to shirk his duties no matter how tired he felt.

On the other hand, it was extremely relaxing to lie here, in Gil’s bed, with Gil’s arms surrounding him. He could smell the aroma they’d made together, and he loved it. He felt so very content and safe here.

He’d almost lost Gil. Not to danger but to jealousy and misunderstanding. That isn’t meant to be, Jack thought defiantly. Gil is mine.

He closed his eyes and breathed deeply of Gil’s scent, which was part arousal and part sweat. They needed to rise but Jack couldn’t make his body obey his mind. He sighed contentedly and opened his eyes, gazing at his lover.

Gil rubbed his arm with one dark, broad palm. Are you awake? he murmured.

Jack smiled, pushed himself forward, and kissed Gil lightly. When the basilisk tried to deepen the kiss, though, he pulled away. Time to get up.

Gil hugged him closer but when Jack still resisted, he grunted, nodded, and let Jack go. Naked, Jack got up and strode to the door of the bathroom. He’d been in here twice, in the middle of the night, to use the facilities, but the lights had been off and he’d been distracted. Now, flicking the light switch, he took in the wondrously huge, almost echoing chamber that held bathtub, shower, toilet, two sinks, and a lounging pool that Jack assumed was for Gil’s nine-feet-long basilisk form.

A moment’s insecurity flashed in his hind brain. Gil was powerful, rich, the ruler, or almost, of an entire country. And what was Jack? A Night Wanderer. A newly changed Night Wanderer who couldn’t always control his shifted form of a Kodiak bear.

Screw that, he thought rebelliously. I will not lose Gil again because of my own feelings of inadequacy. I’m the head of Public Relations, the highest position in SearchLight except for the Founders, and I get final say on everything.

The Founders, the sons of Lady Weinberg, formerly Agent Weinberg, kept their hands largely out of SearchLight’s day-to-day operations. They hadn’t even weighed in when Jack decided to announce and involve all of SearchLight and the heads of most of the magical communities around the world in a discussion of suspicious disappearances.

So, even though he wasn’t a Crown Prince, one miniscule step below ruler of all the world’s basilisks, he and Gil were equals. At least he thought they were.

But this bathroom was spectacular. Extravagant. And Jack felt a little embarrassed about his nudity in such a place. The bed creaked behind him and Gil crossed to him. Jack didn’t want his lover to see the nerves he wasn’t quite sure he could keep out of his expression.

Gil closed his hands on Jack’s shoulders and began to massage. Jack relaxed almost at once as the feeling and scent of his beloved surrounded him.

Are you all right? Gil murmured.

I am now. Jack glanced over his shoulder, flashed Gil a grin, and pulled away. Shower or bathtub?

Together? Gil suggested.

Separately, or we’ll never get out of here.

Is that such a bad thing? But he was teasing because he said at once, I’ll take the wading pool. I suggest you take the shower stall.

Jack nodded, padded to the aforementioned, grandiose, glass-walled luxury and busied himself testing the water. There was a towel hung conveniently just outside on a heated rack. He listened to Gil turning on the water in the wading pool. His lover was muttering, Now, how does she get it to just that right temperature? That made Jack smile a little. Gil wasn’t used to doing for himself, but he wasn’t a complainer either. He was just a little lost.

As Jack was.

He shrugged off that thought and glanced over his shoulder to check and make sure Gil was all right. But his lover had changed into his magnificent basilisk form, which was nine feet of powerfully built, Komodo-dragon-like scales and girth. Nine feet long from flicking tongue to muscular tail, Gil was glorious.

Jack smiled as Gil slid into the water. He lay there, tongue in and out like a snake’s, his short, powerful legs bent under him so he could sink to his belly in the water. Satisfied that Gil was content, Jack slipped into the shower and immediately began a deep breathing exercise. The heat of the water helped to relieve muscles that had been tense for far too long.

Not because of Gil, or because of their lovemaking, but because of all the crap dumped on Jack’s head. Damn Agent Weinberg for leaving him to this!

He briefly considered tracking her down and handing her back the whole shit show. But finding her would take more time than he had. Standing there under the spray, he realized he’d been hoping for a distraction when he’d second-guessed himself after getting a good look at Gil’s bathroom. Maybe an internal struggle would be easier than the politically charged climate he’d been plopped into.

He thought, Trading one stress for another isn’t going to solve anything. It’s time you started addressing all the balls you’re juggling instead of burying yourself in Gil’s love.

All right then. No mercy was what he was going to get, at least from himself, so it was time. He snagged shampoo and dumped some into his hand. It smelled of Gil.

He thought, furious with his wandering mind, Stop it. Concentrate.

He could do that. But he’d nearly lost Gil yesterday and --

Quit it, he growled softly. Lay it all out.

He began to do just that. As he buried his shampoo-coated fingers in his slightly-longer-than military short red auburn hair, he cursed the dragon, now dead, who’d forcibly changed him into a Night Wanderer. The creature had raped him too and he still hadn’t really dealt with that, but he focused, hard, on his transformation. He didn’t hate his new, magical, form. He didn’t. He refused to despise a part of himself. But he surely hadn’t coped with --

Stop, he muttered, almost snarled. If you don’t get ahold of yourself, you’re going to change right here and now. He had assumed his Kodiak bear guise against his will once already. Not because anyone had compelled him to shift but because his body had simply demanded it of him and he hadn’t been able to gainsay it.

His real problem wasn’t that he was a Kodiak bear shapeshifter. The true issue was that he might actually kill someone while in that state. He’d tried to make peace with that when talking to Gil, and he’d been able to forget while making love, but now it came rolling back, and he was powerless to talk himself out of fear.

The training he’d been doing, over Zoom, with Jeremy Redpath, another Night Wanderer who was much older, had been helping. He knew it. Jeremy had taught him how to control his actions while he was in bear guise. But Jack still dreaded the shifts he couldn’t fully dictate.

Maybe, he thought as the shampoo began to rinse out of his hair, maybe if I didn’t have to worry about a gathering storm, then I could have time to teach myself how to be a Night Wanderer.

The truth was, he didn’t have the time. He’d called a meeting of all the heads of the magical world that SearchLight was aware of. Some had sent representatives, like King Salvador assigning Lord Miguel Spiritu to attend. But most of the heads of state, and he used that term loosely, had come themselves.

That meant he was dealing with dragons, werewolves, kelpies, genies, grand fae, common fae, and a sprinkling of other beings who had their own prejudices and didn’t play well with others.

Maybe if those were the only two balls he was juggling, he still could have managed. But he’d been in this position less than six weeks. He’d inherited a cadre of all-male, mostly human, advisors and he didn’t know them at all. And at least one of them was actively making his life a living hell.

And… Geez, there was another thing: he’d had to tell Dan, his secretary, that he, Jack, had been accidentally leading the other man on. That had been an uncomfortable conversation, especially when Dan had said, in effect, that only Jack would ever give him a chance at love.

Jack grabbed the bar of soap and began to lather. Damn it, damn it, damn it, he chanted. He needed to make a plan. He needed to stop reacting and actually direct events. He needed --

The door to the shower stall opened and Gil, human guise very much in evidence, got in with him. Jack didn’t open his eyes. He knew Gil’s scent and didn’t want the other to see how upset he was.

Gil hugged him close, rubbing his back and murmuring, It’s all right. It’s all right.

Jack didn’t cry. He was far beyond tears of frustration. Instead, he grunted, I’m fine.

Of course, you are. Gil pecked him on the cheek and then, turning Jack’s head with gentle fingers, kissed him full on the mouth.

Jack reacted without thought, wrapping his arms around Gil’s neck and one leg up around his waist. His cock was half hard and the need to be claimed, to just belong somewhere, and to someone who loved him, overwhelmed his other emotions. He could feel Gil’s cock stiffening between them. He nipped Gil’s lower lip and when Gil moaned, Jack bit.

Not deeply. Aware of his newfound strength, he didn’t want to hurt Gil.

Gil turned his head and freed his mouth. Then he grinned at Jack, lowered his head, and sank his teeth none too gently into Jack’s shoulder. The feeling wasn’t electric, and it did hurt a little, but as Gil began to lave the wound with his tongue, mixing his saliva with Jack’s blood, arousal lit Jack up from the inside. He groaned and scrabbled at Gil’s back, digging his nails in. Fuck! he cried as Gil’s tongue traveled to his pulse point and then Gil was sucking on the side of his neck.

He’d have to wear his shirt buttoned all the way up and hope the collar hid any marks. His cock was throbbing between them. Please. Fuck me.

Gil nudged him backward.

Jack stood on both feet, unsteady. But Gil supported him, turning him with tender care. Then he reached over Jack’s head and turned off the water. Jack shivered in anticipation as he was stretched by two fingers up his ass. He tossed his head and then stared at the wall, willing himself not to spill.

His lover pulled his fingers out and his hot, thick cock was pressed at the entrance to Jack’s body. Do you want me? Gil asked.

Jack bit his lip as the warmth of Gil’s voice pushed him closer to the edge. You know I do.

Gil pushed inside him, claiming him.

Moan for me, Jack.

He did, pressing himself backward until Gil was fully seated. Then Jack pulled himself forward, until there was barely anything of Gil’s cock up his ass. Fuck me. Please.

Gil rode him hard then, tangling one hand in Jack’s hair and stroking Jack’s thinner length with his other hand. Come for me, Jack. Please.

Again, Jack did, giving in. He cried out his satisfaction as Gil came deep inside him.

As he was still riding the aftershocks, Gil said, his voice commanding, I want you to remember you belong first to yourself, second to me, and third to SearchLight. Don’t confuse that order.

Jack bowed his head and breathed deeply. Thank you.

* * *

Well, this was surpassingly surreal. It wasn’t that Gil had never walked into his kitchen, but he’d done so infrequently, expecting the brownie who’d been his servant for the last several years to take care of his needs. Now both she and Siyabonga weren’t there, and although Gil had enjoyed the peace of a quiet house where he could make Jack beg as loud as they both wanted, now he felt… awkward.

And not just because he hadn’t been in this kitchen more than half a dozen times since this place was bought for him by his parents. He needed to tell Jack he was no longer a prince, that he’d been disowned.

Damn it, just the thought of it, of telling Jack, put tears in his eyes. He turned away from Jack, who was rummaging confidently in a cupboard, and wiped his eyes hastily. I’m sorry she’s not here to make us breakfast. I can’t imagine where she’s gotten to.

What’s her name? The brownie who works for you? Jack was taking a frying pan out of a lower cupboard.

I… Gil winced. I can’t remember, he confessed. Then he added quickly, I’ve learned to start paying attention to those around me if that’s what you’re going to say. But I haven’t had a chance to talk to her since having that realization.

Jack chuckled. Yeah? What changed your mind and convinced you to start?

Dan, Gil admitted.

Jack tensed and turned, the pan in his hands. Dan?

When you first smelled like him, I couldn’t even remember where I’d seen him before, let alone his name. And I thought you were sleeping with him. Not just that he was imposing himself on you and trying to take care of you in a way you didn’t really need.

Jack hmphed. If I’d been in my right mind, I would have realized he wanted more than to help me. As it is, I fucked that up. Royally.

I’m sure he’ll forgive you, given enough time.

Huh.

That noncommittal answer drew Gil forward. He placed both hands on Jack’s shoulders and shook him gently. You’re not to blame for his pain, Jack.

If I’d only realized --

Are you trying to be perfect? Because no one is. No matter how hard they try. Gil was aware he wasn’t holding himself to this standard but pushed on. Give yourself some grace, as my… He stopped.

As your… what?

As my mother used to say, Gil muttered, turning his head away in a desperate attempt to keep Jack from seeing his expression.

Jack asked, Are you all right?

Rather than lie, Gil simply shrugged. Tired, he said, hoping he could pass off anything unusual as just lack of sleep.

Jack laughed outright. You said it. We’re going to be working off coffee today. Then he paused. Magical creatures can’t, for the most part, get drunk or buzzed. Will caffeine help either of us?

Probably not, Gil said, and he grinned as Jack groaned. "I suppose I should have warned you about that, but I was too busy last night to