Dorian spent an enlightening hour chatting with Mr. G, who alone of the agents in the office was less than frantically busy. Like all of Klaus’s agents, G had an excellent memory, and their reminisces of the Fercis affair and certain adventures in Alaska passed the time pleasantly. Dorian ignored, politely, the hints toward a future meeting, made a show of regret, and excused himself to wander the building. Klaus had barely spoken to him since their arrival in Bonn; what did he plan to do after reporting? What would he be allowed to do? What might he do anyway?

Klaus was waiting for Dorian, or at least waiting, in the severely clean and esthetically innocuous entrance lobby of the building, sitting in a perfect haze of cigarette smoke despite the "Nicht Rauchen" notices. Dorian’s suitcase was on the floor beside him.

He looked up at Dorian’s entrance, said nothing. Dorian didn’t know if that was good or bad.

"Hello."

"Guten Abend." Klaus put out his cigarette. "We may both leave for the night. Where do you wish to go?"

That was fair enough. Klaus had dragged him off to Germany without warning. Dorian was only surprised that Klaus had noticed the imposition; or did the question mean more? "I know of some good hotels in Cologne, or would you rather I stayed at your house?"

Klaus looked at him for a moment through the blue-gray cloud, face quite blank, and said merely, "Yes."

That wasn’t quite unambiguous. Dorian picked up his suitcase and followed the Major out to his car. They’d go wherever they went, Dorian supposed. Gambling on Klaus had added no end of fascination to his life, especially lately.

The Major drove, within the city, with absolute correctness and at exactly the speed limits. On the Autobahn, he covered the shortest possible line from one point to another at the greatest possible speed, pushing the Benz to its safety margin. Dorian, undecided on whether to be terrified or entertained, settled for admiring his lover’s profile while Klaus concentrated on the road. The straight, long nose and emphatic brows intrigued him as much as anything about Klaus.

When they pulled up in a courtyard at last, it was at Eberbach. Dorian unclenched his left hand from the door fittings and said, "I think I like it."

"Eh?"

"The speed, the singular concentration on an objective, the sensuous power of the machine, the hammering of pistons in cylinders, the…"

"Are you attempting to be offensive?"

"Yes. How am I doing?"

"As ever," said Klaus. Two male figures in livery had appeared from a massive boar-blazoned door. Dorian thought that was a lot of honor for his one suitcase. "Please try not to frighten my servants. They are not accustomed to madmen."

Dorian grinned and followed Klaus across the brick paving to the shadowed entry.

* * * * *

"We may be summoned to follow Katya Delannes at any time," said Klaus at dinner, which was served by an imposing number of footmen in a hall empty but for themselves, the servitors, and a couple of suits of armor too small for today’s army.

"I see. Me, too?" asked Dorian, spooning up potato soup that would not have disgraced a Michelin star. Klaus wasn’t touching his.

"NATO wishes you to continue on this mission. I do not approve."

"What else did NATO say about me?"

"Ask them."

"I did."

Dorian remembered every minute of his interview with the Chief after Klaus had been sent away. He’d leaned back gracefully in his chair and fingered a lace ruffle—he particularly liked this shirt, as Peters very well knew—and smiled ingenuously.

"What do you want to know?" he inquired sweetly.

"Just give your account of the events in your own words." The Chief’s eyes were sharper than Dorian liked.

"Am I being recorded?" he inquired, all innocent excitement.

"Yes."

"Good. I hate repeating myself." The Earl smiled again and proceeded to speak of the last three days in copious detail. "…so I brought it to Klaus, and he demanded where I’d found it, and I told him, ‘in the Turkish Ambassador’s mistress’s desk safe.’ He’d been blustering before—you know how he is—but he went all white and quiet then…"

Considering the amount of interesting information he had to leave out, Dorian thought it was a good story, full of the kind of material that lent support to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative. And it was absolutely true, as far as it went. "…I knew from one of my people, Jones, that someone always visited the Delannes house in the early evening, but except when she was entertaining there, she’d spend the night in the Turkish embassy complex."

"How does Jones know these things?" interposed the Chief.

"I don’t ask. He’s reliable."

"We will need to speak to him, and to Mr. Bonham, and any others of your, ah, support staff who are involved in this operation." The Chief held up a pudgy hand before Dorian could speak. "Yes, we will reimburse their travel expenses. I will not authorize a second job fee." Dorian closed his mouth, tried not to smile too broadly, and said: "So I phoned the Major at midnight and we drove to the house in one of my cars…"

He detailed the night’s search without significant variation from the version he’d given while Klaus was present. "And the picture?" asked the Chief. "Can you tell me anything more about it?"

"It wasn’t signed," said Dorian. "It looked like a scene from southern France, but I’m not an historian and I can’t say why I thought that. That’s merely what I thought at the time, in passing."

He tried to reproduce the sketch in pencil and handed the result to the Chief. "It’s barely an approximation, I hope you realize."

"I know your approach to reality, Lord Gloria," said the Chief. "What did you do after discovering the document was missing?"

"We drove back to the Arts Hall and went to the security office. The Major did tell me to stay there, but I wanted to hear what my people had found and I wanted some breakfast, so I walked out and went home to my hotel. And before I’d talked to anyone except my accountant, who’d just come back from a vacation and didn’t know anything, your Major followed me to the hotel suite and said we’d missed one flight out of Seoul already." Dorian flashed the Chief a conciliatory smile. "If that’s true, it is my fault. The Major hadn’t told me before, you see, how quickly we should be leaving. And after that I came with him to the airfield and we took a Danish transport jet all the way back here. I never did get a proper breakfast. Or lunch…"

Dorian expanded fancifully on the hardships endured at NATO’s hands in the past 24 hours. When he was quite done, to the last elaborate flourish of tapering fingers and lace-cuffed wrist, the Chief sat back and made a face. "What else happened?"

Dorian shrugged. "What?"

"Lord Gloria, have you finally seduced my best agent?"

Dorian’s eyes opened wide. "Is he your best?"

"Don’t repeat it or I’ll call you a liar. In public. Answer the question."

Dorian spread his hands, gracefully. "As you know, I have been endeavoring to seduce him since I first saw him." He paused and decided against fiddling with his hair. "Well, the second time. The first time, it was just a bluff."

"And this time?"

"He’s quite stubborn."

"Yes, or no, Gloria!"

"You’re really very good at this, Chief." Dorian considered lying, and decided it wouldn’t answer. The Chief knew what he was looking for: in fact he knew rather too well. "Yes, I did," admitted the Earl, and sat back with the tiniest of satisfied smiles. "Is that why you wanted a separate debriefing?"

"In part. How is he taking it?" There was a hint of too-close interest in the Chief’s tone.

Dorian threw back his head, teased a curl out of his mane to play with, and took in an extremely delighted-sounding breath. He leaned forward with the air of one prepared to exchange intimate confidences. "He’s very handsome, you know," he said with dulcet emphasis, "and, well…" He drew it into about eight syllables, fluttering his eyelashes meanwhile.

"Will it affect his work?" asked the Chief, hastily.

Having got the conversation back where he wanted it, Dorian dropped the curl and the artifice. "I don’t believe so. You will, of course, wish to judge for yourself."

The Chief gave him a very measuring look. "You’ve got a nerve, Gloria."

Dorian shrugged, simply. "Thank you. I have had to." His light tone should have sounded effortless, but he suspected that the strain was showing somewhere.

"I appreciate your talents…and not the ones you are doubtless anxious to boast of at the moment." The Chief chuckled, but warily.

"And Major Eberbach’s talents?" asked Dorian.

"I trust you will not obstruct him in any way."

Dorian sighed in private irony. "Quite the contrary, Chief. I trust you will not obstruct my seduction."

"It depends." The Chief studied Eroica for a moment. "The clever bastard. He’s got you on a string now, hasn’t he?"

Dorian met his eyes squarely. "That’s a crude way of putting it."

"Are you still willing to work for us, Lord Gloria?"

"You know the answer to that."

The interview with the Chief had produced no more definite an answer than that. Dorian wasn’t sure the time for definite answers had arrived yet, as he thought about the Chief and watched Klaus taste his soup and put the spoon back down. Klaus’s soup and Dorian’s empty bowl were taken away and beef and vegetables were brought.

"I asked the Chief," said Dorian, "but I don’t think I was very subtle about it. He must have said something to you."

"Yes, he must have." Klaus was unreadable.

"Well?"

Klaus gave him a full-force gaze of total neutrality, for about 30 very long seconds. "I think I like these greens. What would you say?"

Nonplused, Dorian agreed that the asparagus was excellent. Klaus informed him of the German name for it, and lapsed again into silence.

NATO hadn’t tossed the Major—or even Eroica—out of the operation, yet. That was all. Perhaps it was enough to explain the unforthcoming air of Dorian’s very unforthcoming lover. Demonstrating cooperation on the Delannes case could do them no harm, and meanwhile… "Can we expect a night’s sleep?"

"Probably," said Klaus, with the same lack of expression. It wasn’t how he behaved when he was anxious about a mission. Dorian wondered if the Major could be nervous about something else. Could he? "In a few hours," continued the object of his thoughts, "Mr. A will arrive in Bonn, with more data. I’ll be needed then, or before if anything vital comes to light."

"A few hours?"

"At ten tomorrow morning."

"That means we have," Dorian calculated rapidly, "fourteen hours to ourselves."

The Major gave him a modified hint of the full-force gaze. "Yes."

Dorian smiled. "Good."

* * * * *

"Splendid," said Dorian, from the bedroom assigned to him. He was not looking at the room, but at his host, who stood with still-unreadable poise in the doorway. "Just splendid. Do come in." The servant who had led them here had departed a moment before.

Klaus took a step inward and shut the door behind himself, not dropping the shuttered, bland look. He could mean anything. "Dorian."

"I’m here."

"If I stay, you’ll…"

Dorian felt like cheering. "We’ll make love. Won’t we?"

Klaus seemed to be at a loss for anything to say. Time stretched until the silence finally yielded a single, low-voiced word. "Yes." Klaus didn’t move.

Dorian raised an eyebrow. "Well?" He let his eyes wander over Klaus for a moment. "Quite splendid. The view is unsurpassed. Shall I go on?"

"No." Klaus walked slowly over to him and grasped him by the shoulders. Dorian found himself eye-to-eye with steely determination, although exactly what Klaus was determined to do was still not entirely clear. Even now, Dorian couldn’t quite believe it would not be a violent rejection, on NATO’s behalf if not Klaus’s own.

He returned the look. Gambling on Klaus was his chosen game. "You go on, then. Are you staying?"

Klaus sighed and released his shoulders, and, with precision, began to unbutton Dorian’s shirt. He said conversationally, "The door to this room can be locked," as he removed a sky-blue silk scarf from Dorian’s neck. He unwound it gingerly, grimaced at it, and laid it neatly on the room’s dressing stand.

"That’s good," said Dorian. "Is it locked?" He could not resist reaching up to run his fingers through Klaus’s hair while Klaus went back to his shirt buttons. Being undressed was delicious.

"Yes. I have told Jurgen where I am to be found, if I am needed. I am not sure this was wise."

"Somebody has to know," said Dorian, practically. He let his hands wander downward to open Klaus’s suit jacket and explore inward. That was delicious, too. "Don’t you trust any of your servants?"

"I must know whether I can do so."

"Trust," said Dorian, and kissed the smooth black hair as Klaus concentrated on his belt buckle, "works better than fear. Please don’t stop there."

The moving hands went on without hesitation to deal with Dorian’s fly, and he recalled that shyness and inconclusive action were not, in general, normal for Klaus. Nor would they be, it seemed. Warmth tightened in Dorian’s groin as his clothing and Klaus’s was laid aside, piece by neatly folded piece. This must be how Klaus undressed himself; Dorian felt obscurely flattered.

The bed, behind him, was becoming prominent in Dorian’s thoughts. He’d barely glanced at it, but now was as good a time as any to try it out. He put an arm around Klaus’s bare, hard-muscled waist and tugged. They landed sprawling on a lace-decked coverlet, a position Dorian found intriguing if not comfortable. Klaus, sprawled beside him, said nothing but smiled rather terrifyingly, and pulled him up to sit so that he could begin easing off Dorian’s half-boots.

That was a good idea. Dorian retaliated by unlacing Klaus’s shoes, and tossed them toward the dressing stand. Moments later, their trousers and all other impedimenta had been cast aside, carelessly folded or not folded at all. Dorian flung back the scratchy coverlet and pulled Klaus after him onto the cedar-smelling linen—it was odd not to have roses in the room somewhere. He put both arms around the lovely, lean-contoured body to feel it full-length against his own.

Klaus must have shaved before dinner, and he smelled very clean. Well. Dorian decided not to comment on that, just as Klaus leaned forward in a gesture half fearful and wholly unpracticed, to touch Dorian’s mouth with his own. Well, well. Delighted, Dorian freed one hand to cup Klaus’s head, making the most of the kiss, tasting what Klaus could not put into words; feeling the flare of his own arousal.

Finally Klaus pulled away and sat up again, looking down at Dorian for a moment as if he’d never seen him before. Dorian didn’t speak, and hardly knew what to expect. It was Klaus’s move. He’d waited forever for Klaus to make this move.

A long-boned hand reached to lay itself palm-down over Dorian’s racing heart, lightly, as if curious how his skin would feel under its fingers. It slid down his ribs to a hip, moved to curl delicately around his incipient erection. At that, heat pulsed up in Dorian’s groin and he could not restrain a squirm, but Klaus’s hand slipped away to stroke up his farther flank. A second hand touched him, with equally tentative boldness.

Its light caress was maddeningly slow, but Dorian was not really sorry. Klaus’s eyes were intent and his impassive face was a defense against the unknown: whatever Klaus’s relations with the opposite sex (or anyone at all) had included, Dorian would have bet a small Tintoretto—Klaus had one, downstairs—that idle or unnecessary touching of skin had not been a concern for either party. Klaus’s hands were discovering a new pleasure, and the thought as well as the touch spread prickling excitement through Dorian.

Presently, one hand wandered back toward Dorian’s groin and settled there, still acting as if Klaus had never seen anything like it before. Nevertheless, the careful, stroking fingertouches had him squirming, aching for more. Dorian wriggled closer to Klaus until he was curled over the seated man’s lap and could lay his head against the beautiful, flat abdomen and could kiss it, inhaling the faint odor of sweat and the stronger one of male sex. His hair brushed Klaus’s body and he leaned sideways to rub it, silkily, where he’d just kissed. There was a quick tightening of the pressure around his erection.

It felt nice. All of it. Dorian nuzzled again at the neatly arrayed muscles, feeling them twitch, then moved lower to lick at sensitive, rising flesh that quivered under his tongue. He wanted Klaus to feel that, now, as well.

Klaus gasped, then let his breath out shakily. One hand rose to skim with weightless encouragement over Dorian’s hair. He took in another audible breath, and Dorian licked again, further, tasting harsh saltiness and searching for more.

Klaus let go of Dorian to fall back onto the mattress, his gasping barely controlled. Dorian happily repeated the tongue-stroke and expanded it: he appreciated a good audience, very nearly as much as a good performance…perhaps more so, this time. The enticing pleasures of taste and touch and controlling action were carrying him as well as Klaus to the brink of climax; Dorian’s erection throbbed in sympathy but he would not, quite, have traded places.

Only when all voluntary and involuntary motion had ceased did Dorian slowly release his lover and push himself upright to look at Klaus’s face, smiling irrepressibly in triumph.

Klaus’s eyes opened, aware of himself and of Dorian. He still did not speak, but raised one arm, hand spread in invitation. Dorian, aching with love as well as desire, laid himself into the offered arm and pressed his body urgently against Klaus’s, kissing his right cheekbone and temple and finally his open mouth. His lust was overwhelming, and fiercely redoubled by knowing Klaus had felt the same, and remembered it.

Klaus accepted the frantic kiss, his body moving to ease Dorian’s. A hand slid unhurriedly but directly down Dorian’s belly, and the grip it found was experimental, almost awkward, but sweetly effective. Dorian buried his face in Klaus’s neck as he was driven to a painfully intense orgasm, conscious of the man in his arms even at the peak of that inner flight. He wanted nothing more: Klaus had responded to him and was making love to him and would not turn away afterward.

Long after the last echoes of sensation had died away, he lay silent in Klaus’s arms. Klaus’s left hand stroked slowly up and down his back with the same touch as before, that had never felt a human body and wanted, for the first time, to know one. Dorian accepted the wordless communication, hoping he could spend forever like this, if he could stay awake to enjoy it.

After a time long enough that the room was fully dark, Klaus’s arms tightened with a little more purpose, enough that Dorian was ready when he said, in an unfamiliar voice, "So."

"Yes," said Dorian. Whatever it was, he agreed.

Another purposeful motion provided a sheet to cover them both from the cooling night air. "Dorian?"

"Umm-hmm." Dorian kissed a convenient portion of collarbone.

Klaus’s voice was solemn and almost uncertain. "Dorian, have you considered how difficult this will be?"

Dorian was willing to concede anything from this position, but, "How do you mean, difficult?"

"I don’t know how we will behave together."

"You’re a fast learner."

"Don’t laugh at me, you…frivoller. I mean that we may have to work together. On this operation for NATO, perhaps others. If you still wish to."

"Do you think you’ll still be working for NATO, then?"

Dorian felt the body wrapped around him stir, and Klaus gave an annoyed-sounding rasp of laughter. "The Chief wouldn’t let me resign. He was most offensive about it."

"Your Chief is a holy terror and he deserves all the trouble we can give him. If NATO’s still willing to pay me, I’ll consider the jobs. I’m quite fond of Deutschmarks, and I just love the fringe benefits." Dorian wriggled meaningfully and settled with his lips next to Klaus’s ear. "Why not?"

"I don’t know how you are accustomed to treat your…bedmates…"

"You don’t?" asked Dorian, unable to resist an exaggerated drawl of amazement.

Klaus’s arms tightened around him painfully. "…in public. It must not become evident that we are…"

"Lovers?" said Dorian softly. "I’ll try not to embarrass you, you know." He wriggled again. "Does that mean no kissing in the streets?"

"I hope that is a joke. Assuredly not."

"Actually, I’d worry if you changed that much. Kissing in bed’s much more interesting. There are so many more possibilities." Dorian snuggled closer and kissed, delicately, just underneath the ear he’d been whispering into.

"Tonight has been interesting already," said Klaus sternly.

"Just an example." Dorian rubbed his cheek over a strand of smooth hair on the pillow. "But you knew what I meant, didn’t you?"

"I see. Yes. Do you think you could sleep now?"

"Please," said Dorian. The idea had definite merit after this long, long day that had started last midnight in Seoul.

"As soon as we have a lead, I…someone…must reach Delannes before she can take that information any further."

"The stuff in that envelope?" No one had explained it to Dorian.

Klaus nodded on his shoulder, there in the warm dark bed.

"What’s in it, anyway?"

"I don’t need to know, yet. I thought you’d seen it."

"I read it, but I’m no good with technical jargon, not even French technical jargon. It was just gibberish to me."

"Ah. Good." Klaus put his head back onto Dorian’s shoulder. "Are you comfortable?"

"Yes," said Dorian instantly. Yes, my steely beloved. "Are you?"

"I don’t know," said Klaus, but a moment later he was asleep.

* * * * *

A mellow electronic whistle woke Dorian from sound sleep. He glanced at the room, at the windows, and felt the body beside him start from slumber. It was morning at Eberbach, the sun well into the summer sky. Dorian located the noise source as a compactly modern telephone which— for reasons he did not regret in the least—had quite escaped his notice last night. He picked up what he guessed to be the receiver. "Hallo."

He half expected a German greeting, but a confident voice said, "Good morning, Lord Gloria. I apologize for interrupting your sleep, but I have instructions from the master that you are to be awakened at this hour."

"I see," said Dorian. He glanced down and met wary, pale-green eyes. "Thank you." Klaus pulled a hand out of the bedclothes and looked at his bare wrist, then at the bedside clock’s digital readout.

"There will be breakfast whenever you get up," persisted the voice.

"Good. Breakfast, you say?" Klaus nodded at him. "Give me half an hour. Good morning." Dorian replaced the receiver on its streamlined stand and raised an eyebrow at Klaus. "He said ‘the master’ left a message to wake me?"

"Jurgen came here when my father was alive. It is traditional." That is how we do things here, said Klaus’s tone.

"That might explain a lot."

Klaus was out of bed already, picking up his clothes, dressing rapidly. "I’ll see you at breakfast." He saw Dorian looking about uncertainly. "I believe there is a bathroom behind…here." Klaus pulled open an 18th-century door to reveal a glitter of plumbing that rivalled the telephone’s modernity.

"Not so fast, Quinquin." Dorian nipped out of the bed as well and wrapped his enjoyably naked body around the clothes Klaus had put on to walk down one corridor so that he could change them. "Once we’re out there, I can’t touch you."

Klaus, stiff with surprise, relaxed fractionally. "So you know that much."

"I’ve always known that much. Why do you think I’m such a clown half the time? Clowns can break the rules. That way, it’s me breaking them, not you." Dorian held him, hard, for a moment. "I do love breaking rules."

"You are frivolous." Klaus permitted himself to be held, and a thrill shot through Dorian as hands closed on his bare waist, palms curving closely to his skin.

"I surely am. Klaus my love…" He shrugged against the clothes, inside the hands. "That’s all I wanted to say, before we leave. Klaus my love."

Klaus stood dumb. Slowly, he pulled Dorian against him, returning the embrace without restraint; just as slowly he released it. Dorian felt felt a definite answering push at his groin, before: "Dorian. We have no time." The words were unyielding and final.

He sighed and stepped back. "See you at breakfast?"

Klaus nodded and quickly left the room.

END