Royal Indiscretion, chapter 43 (Patreon)

Doug watched while Yves stirred fitfully in his sleep. Doug rested his hand on the lump of sheet that was Yves's hip. He wished he could do more to sooth Yves, but he didn't know how. He could only hope that Yves had made the right call when he used his mother's name is a tactical strike. Doug would've held that information back, at least until they had seen how Gerard might react.

Doug had been around a lot of powerful people. Maybe he didn't know royals, but he knew power, and Count Gerard scared him. 

Doug figured they would be safer once Gerard had taken the throne. A powerful man in the public eye had limits on what he could do. The offensive line coach was more dangerous than the head coach. The administrative secretary to the owner was more dangerous than the owner. Powerful people had publicists and lawyers who would stop them from saying anything that might jeopardize their position. And since all of those people relied on the income brought in by that person, they had a vested interest in making sure that any indiscretions stayed private. Doug knew for certain that the owner and the head coach were never going to say a word about Doug sexuality. 

For the same reason, Doug trusted that the first string players would either smile and nod, or simply ignore his sexual choices. However, the second and third string players who had just cashed their first five or six-figure check and who didn't have a staff… They would be the real problem. They would feel free to express their prejudices, and they didn't have a staff to stop them.

Doug figured royalty had to be similar. Right now, Duke Gerard controlled everything around him. Hagan was the exception, but Gerard didn't know that. And that illusion of control was going to make Gerard feel free to do whatever shit crossed his tiny mind. Once he was king, he would have a staff that answered to parliament. There would be government lawyers and publicists and advisors who made it clear he wasn't allowed to do certain things. Doug figured that's why King Alphonse hadn't yet gone public with his illness, because someone was trying to manage public perception.

Once Duke Gerard was in that top spot, Doug would feel more confident about their personal safety.  But Yves had chosen his play, and Doug would back it. He would just hire a little extra security along the way.

The alarm clock flicked over to 6 AM and started beeping. Yves made a miserable noise low in his throat. “What time is it?”

“Time to start stirring if you plan on catching our flight,” Doug said.

Yves turned toward him. “Oh, yeah. Today is the great escape.” He smiled.

Doug wasn't sure how he felt about Yves that phrase. It was probably accurate, but it's still worried Doug. He didn't want Yves to feel like they were running away, not when it was Yves’s own father playing the part of the evil jailer. For Doug, Duke Gerard was just a random asshole. But for Yves, this was his father. Even Doug's father had never posed a physical threat, at least not to Doug. Clearly he was a threat to others. However, Doug never thought that he would meet a human being shittier than his own father, but Duke Gerard proved that there was always a deeper level of depravity that a human being could sink into.

Doug leaned forward and kissed the end of Yves's nose. “How did you sleep?”

“Horribly.”

“You were still tossing and turning when I finally fell sleep.”

Yves frowned. “I apologize if I kept you up.”

Doug laughed at the idea. “I can sleep in the middle of the team bus with fifty grown men yelling profane jokes at each other. You didn’t keep me awake. I think I'm just excited about how many changes there are on the horizon.”

Yves propped his head on his hand. “Would excited be a euphemism for freaked out in this case? Did I use that phrase correctly? Freaked out?”

“Your English is fine, but your assumption is wrong,” Doug reassured him. “I'm excited about sharing my life with someone, about coming home and complaining about my day to someone. About having someone else complain about their day.”

For long seconds, Yves didn’t answer. “You are strangely excited about complaints.”

After shrugging, Doug said, “What can I say? I lived by myself for too long. I can’t even get a dog because I travel too much.”

“Do you want a dog?”

“I do.” Doug had spent a lot of time ignoring how much he disliked an empty house. Sadly, he had even gotten in the habit of leaving televisions running to avoid the sense that the house was empty. “I just don't want a dog that behaves horribly because I'm never home to make sure that it follows the rules. A couple of the guys have dogs that are first-class assholes. They hire people to essentially raise their animals, and that is not a good situation.”

Yves smiled. “That is sounding exceptionally paternal.”

“Is it?”

“Well, maybe we can start with a dog. Or a fish. A fish might be a good start because I have trouble keeping plants a live, but yeah, I would like a little more chaos in my home life. Maybe we could get a couple of acres, something with some space and a small house in the middle.” Doug didn’t add that more land would make it easier to defend the perimeter.

“I thought you were stingy with your money because you were saving up for your business.”

“I don't know. I just don't feel as stingy today.  But we will definitely want to set aside enough money that we can jumpstart a renovation project on your castle if the opportunity ever shows itself.” Doug figured that once Duke Gerard was king, Yves could apply to his country’s historic society for permits. King Gerard wouldn’t be able to stand in the shadows and piss on his youngest child.

Yves flopped back onto the pillow. “I don't think that's ever going to happen. I just hope Nick can find a way to stay on that land without my father making his life miserable. He liked the expanse of the property and it was good for the dogs to have more room to run.”

Even now, Yves was focused on what other people needed. For someone with a reputation as a bad boy, he was exceptionally empathetic. “You could ask your aunt to intervene on his behalf.”

“That is a brilliant idea.  I should do that before we leave.”

“Sometimes I manage brilliance,” Doug said as he wiggled his eyebrows. That earned him an eyeroll. When Yves shifted closer, Doug slid his hand around to the small of Yves's back. They lay like that as the clock marked the passing minutes. As long as they were in each other’s arms, the world could slide past without affecting them. Doug wished they could stay here forever, but that wasn’t possible. Doug kissed the juncture were Yves's shoulder met his neck.

“Is it okay if I don't want to have sex and I just want to lay here?” Yves asked softly.

It broke Doug's heart to hear the insecurity in Yves’s voice. “Of course you can. I happen to love snuggling.” Doug tightened his arm so their bodies were pressed close together.

“The big, buff football player’s a snuggler?” Yves in a teasing voice.

Doug whispered into the shell of Yves's ear, “I sure am.” And then he settled his head on the pillow and slung a leg over Yves's knee. They lay there, their breath tangling and the heat gathering between them. 

“This is nice,” Yves said.

“I agree.” In the past Doug had often enjoyed the cuddling more than the sex. That might have been a sign that he was on the gay end of the Kinsey scale, but until now, he had never found anyone he was willing to admit that for. But Yves was such a unique blend of strength and fragility, of morality with just an edge of wicked. Doug wasn't surprised that Rudy Sava had been attracted to him, but Doug couldn't understand how Rudy could have done so much damage to Yves. Hurting Yves felt so damn wrong. It wasn't quite like kicking a puppy since Yves could certainly hit back when he chose. His father was feeling that right now. But Yves didn't have an ounce of malice in him. There was no desire to hurt people, not even people like Rudy Save or Duke Gerard, both of whom had hurt him. That was so special that Doug hated every individual who had failed to recognize the beauty and Yves. They were all assholes.

“When do we need to abandon the bed?” Yves asked.

“How long is it going to take you to get showered and dressed?”

“Ten minutes?”

Doug glanced at the clock. “We can spend another ten or fifteen minutes here before we have to get moving. God I hate international flights. The check ends are a pain in the ass.” Doug’s colleagues who wasted their money on private planes and charter flights got to avoid the worst of it, but as much as Doug enjoyed riding in others’ jets, he wasn’t going to spend $35,000 on a charter flight. 

“I've never flown on a public plane. I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like. If half the stories I have heard are true, I am about to fulfill your every fantasy about listening to a partner complain.”

“You've never flown?” Doug relinquished his warm spot of sheet and sat up. 

“Of course I have. But when I fly, but I am going with my father on official business. We use the king's plane. Amazingly, there are fewer rules when one is flying the plane that belongs to the king of your country.”

Doug snorted. That was the only useful perk of royalty he’d heard yet. “I imagine. But trust me, you are not going to enjoy this.”

With a sigh, Yves sat up. He stretched, his back arching and his arms raised high so the lines of muscle along his side were evident. “I am strangely looking forward to not enjoying it. I consider it a bit of a transition to my new normal life where I get to be annoyed by all the mundane details.” Yves dropped his hands to his sides and yawned.

“You are so strange.” Doug picked up Yves’s hand and kissed the palm.

“Oh, you have no idea. You're about to find out how odd I am,” Yves warned.

Doug looked into Yves’s intense blue eyes. “I look forward to that.” And Doug was. For the first time in his life, he could imagine spending the rest of his life discovering every quirk of Yves's personality. That sounded like a great way to spend the rest of his life. “But for right now, we have to get moving because I do not want to miss our flight.” More specifically, Doug did not want to give Duke Gerard any additional opportunities to prove that he was a piece of shit human being. For now, retreat felt like the best alternative, at least until they found out how Gerard was going to handle Yves’s revelations of the day before. Doug felt an itch at the base of his skull, and he wanted to tuck Yves up close and get him somewhere safe.

Sooner rather than later.