Rory sat up suddenly. “Hey.”
“I mean, it no longer matters where we are. We know where she is, right?”
“Yes, we do.”
“And if we don’t need to hide,” Yamane went on, “how about we go into Cheyenne tomorrow, or whatever passes for a town in this godforsaken wilderness, and I buy you a car that doesn’t smell like an open grave?”
“Hey.”
Yamane was already excited about his plan. “We’ll get new clothes and arm ourselves. We’ll go out in a blaze of glory like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.”
“I guess I know which one of us will be Butch.”
“I’ll have you know—” began Yamane.
“Oh, don’t even try, princess.”
“Rory—”
“I love my grandparents. I won’t allow anything to happen to them or to you. I just have to think.” Rory took Yamane’s good hand and started crawling from the tent, pulling the smaller man with him.
“Where are we going?” Yamane held on the bourbon.
Rory’s cheeks caught fire. “I want to enjoy the stars a little longer. With you.”
“Well, well, well.” Yamane’s eyes widened. “May I smoke?”
Rory pursed his lips. “Sure. I guess we weren’t planning to do any kissing tonight anyway.”
Rory left the tent.
“You heartless shit.” Yamane followed him.
Rory held out Yamane’s cigarettes and lighter when he emerged and dropped the tent flap behind him.
“When we get through this, you’re quitting.”
“That’s a deal.” Yamane took them and lit up.
“You’re only saying that because you think Amelia will kill us.”
Yamane took a deep drag.
Rory bit his lip before pulling Yamane to the ground on a blanket in front of the fire.
They sat cross-legged, enjoying the night air until the fire burned down to embers.
Rory watched the fire, and Yamane watched Rory.
His breath caught in his throat.
He took Rory’s jaw between his hands and turned his face so their gazes locked.
Cautiously, he brought Rory in for a kiss. He left no doubt Rory had the option of refusing. He was glacially slow, telegraphing his intentions clearly.
Rory leaned closer, hesitant at first, but when their lips met Yamane tasted bourbon, wood smoke, and sadness. He vowed to change at least one of those things before dawn.
“Are you really going to make me choose between smoking and kissing you?”
“Not tonight.”
Ethan studied Amelia’s impassive face. As always, the way she held herself irked him. One minute she seemed rational, the next, she was foaming at the mouth. Getting a handle on her moods was like trying to catch a falling knife.
He reported, “Delaplaines’s gas card has been used in Arizona, Nevada, and California, as if he’s heading southwest.”
She tossed her hotel key card onto the bureau. “So he doubled back, thinking we were following him east?”
“That’s one interpretation,” he admitted. “What do you think it means?”
“Why would he use a gas card now? He’s been so careful. I’d have to guess it’s some kind of ruse.”
“You think he’s that smart?” Ethan didn’t think so. “He played pretty smooth poker by all accounts. You can’t be stupid and play like that.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway.” She waved him off. “If he got my message, he’ll have to come here. There’s no way he’d let Granny suffer for Ran Yamane’s sake.”
He nodded. Probably not. “So then the question is do we keep tabs on his cards anymore?”
“Nah,” she said. “Let him come to us.”
Ethan said nothing.
What could he say?
Amelia Gianfranco was, in his estimation, the most loathsome human on the planet, and prolonged contact with her wasn’t improving his opinion at all.
He hid his contempt behind a mask of distant courtesy, like a good domestic servant. He could tell Amelia hated it. He took a grim pleasure in thwarting her early on, when he’d discovered she enjoyed toying not just with her victims, but with her employees as well.
Now he watched as she swallowed her disappointment.
Rory and Yamane lingered under the stars long after the fire burned down. Yamane was content to be with Rory, allowing his thoughts to drift as his head lolled on Rory’s arm.
“I’m feeling unaccountably shy,” said Rory.
“Ah.” Yamane hid a smile.
Rory took Yamane by the hand, helped him up, then led him into the tent. He opened his sleeping bag by unzipping it all the way and laid it on the tent floor like a blanket. “It’s warm out tonight.”
“Yes.” Yamane watched him.
“Okay.” Rory sat cross-legged on the floor. Yamane sat across from him in his most formal fashion, with his knees folded under him and his hands on his thighs. Rory reached out, placing his hands on Yamane’s upper arms, caressing them lightly and sliding down to the forearms, the wrists, and finally unfolding Yamane’s hands in his own. “What should happen here?”
“Well,” Yamane answered. “Strictly speaking, most men in your place want to use me and pretend I’m a woman.”
He said this carefully, keeping any emotion out of his voice. He found Rory’s frank, pure gaze too much, so he looked away.
“Strictly speaking,” Rory repeated. “Nah. That sounds like it sucks.”
“I see,” said Yamane tonelessly. He began to turn away, but Rory held his hands fast, preventing him from moving.
“I wonder. Might I…?” He gazed at Yamane in such a penetrating way it was almost frightening. “Would it be okay if I take a kind of self-guided tour?”
“What?”
“I think I’d like to explore. May I blow you? While I’m sure you could talk me through this, I find I’d prefer to find certain things out for myself.” He rolled his eyes as if he was embarrassed. “I imagine that reflects a certain masculine pride.”
Yamane considered this. “How do you know I don’t have masculine pride?”
“Au contraire, I know you do,” said Rory. “Do you ever find conflict in that?”
“You mean if two people are too proud to admit they don’t know what they’re doing?”
“Well, yeah.” Rory shrugged.
Yamane’s eyes swept down. “Men generally have certain preconceived notions where I’m concerned.”
“Why do I feel like plugging my ears and singing right now?”
“You understand I’m used goods, right?” asked Yamane painfully.
“Shh,” said Rory. “You just tell me if you don’t like something, okay?”
“Okay,” said Yamane.
Rory reached out and put a hand under Yamane’s shirt—so tentatively and so seriously Yamane wanted to tease him a little.
“Ouch!”
Rory jumped guiltily, yanking his hand back as if it were burned.
“No way!” he said. “Sorry.”
Yamane laughed like a kid.
“I’m kidding,” he said, flopping onto his back, kicking his feet, howling. “You idiot.”
19
Rory, whose heart was still pounding with shock, followed Yamane down, unbuttoning his shirt with one hand as he went. Working his way from the top to the bottom, his hands freed skin from fabric; skin to be explored, touched, and tasted.
He openly indulged his obsession with Yamane’s nipple ring, drawing it and the sensitive flesh around it into his mouth. The slightly metallic tang, the way it drew up against his teeth, the way Yamane shivered and sighed beneath his lips when he tugged on it gently was thrilling.
As Rory stroked the velvety skin with the flat of his tongue, Yamane came off the ground with a startled cry so sweet Rory redoubled his efforts.
He licked at the kanji character over Yamane’s heart and found the tattooed skin tasted the same as any other skin, salty with sweat an
d vaguely warm, throbbing with every beat of Yamane’s heart as his lips brushed over it.
Every small place, hollow, and crevice was interesting to Rory. The base of Yamane’s throat, that long and beautiful column with its Adam’s apple, received special attention. He ached to discover everything new and yet familiar about Yamane’s body. He rolled Yamane onto his stomach to do the same to his back.
“Rory…” Yamane sighed under his assault.
“Hm?” Rory said, brushing the hair away from the nape of his neck and nuzzling the tender skin behind Yamane’s ear. “You taste just like I imagined…light and electric somehow. Creamy.”
“Before you do anything really—”
“This is a self-guided tour; no narrations please.” Rory had no plans except to explore the man’s back, where he was currently leaving a trail of wet kisses. Yamane moaned. Rory smiled into that beautiful skin. When he came to the waistband of Yamane’s jeans, he reached around and undid the fly.
Yamane went still.
“Don’t worry, cher.”
Sliding Yamane’s jeans off proved to be a convenient way to find new places to explore, and Rory found he was particularly fond of the small of Yamane’s back, above what was easily the most exquisitely beautiful ass he’d ever seen, and he spent a long time kissing the base of Yamane’s spine in the little hollow above his butt cheeks. His fingers itched, as they had before, to inch their way around to the front of Yamane’s body and touch his erection.
When he put his mouth on Yamane’s back and gently stroked his cock, Yamane began making an incoherent moaning sound that made Rory smile.
Rory moved on to Yamane’s legs, kissing the backs of his knees, ankles, and toes. Then, rolling him over onto his back, he started up again, kissing and licking the tender insides of Yamane’s thighs until he came to Yamane’s balls, which he studied with detached curiosity. He nosed into them, taking in the scent of soap and man, licking the sensitive perineum behind the silky skin. Yamane’s cock was large for his small frame, uncircumcised, and the shaft stood rigid and tea-colored in Rory’s hand.
Experimentally, Rory licked the tip, wanting to taste the glistening drop of moisture there and feel that cock, smooth and rigid on his tongue. Yamane let out a noise so compelling that Rory did it again, finding he liked the way the man’s velvety skin felt against his lips, using his tongue to tease and taunt it. As it grew tauter, he took more and more of it into his mouth, sucking and licking, spurred on by Yamane’s cries, until he felt hands clench in his hair and warm, bitter fluid gushed into his mouth and down his throat.
Yamane moaned softly. He held Rory’s head to him and murmured, “Rory, jeez.”
Rory, for his part, felt damned pleased with himself and continued to lick and nuzzle Yamane’s softening rod. He kissed his way up the hollows of Yamane’s abdomen above his thighs, to his stomach, then his chest, ending up at the nipple ring where he began. Yamane reached down and dragged Rory’s head upward for a long, passionate kiss. “You are —”
“My turn, right?” Yamane pulled himself from Rory’s embrace, and soon Rory found himself on his back as Yamane dragged his lips and tongue down Rory’s abs and took Rory’s cock into his hands. Rory was already erect and straining for release.
Yamane placed the two middle fingers of his right hand into Rory’s mouth, urging him to suck on and moisten them, and then he slowly, delicately, teased them into Rory’s ass. He moved his fingers cautiously, allowing Rory to get used to the invasion, all the while taking Rory’s cock deep into his throat.
Rory’s brain was unable to digest the sensual confusion. Between the deep, exquisite pleasure of Yamane’s mouth and the pain/pleasure of his fingers, he skittered from sensation to sensation -- not landing on any one -- until the jumble of all of them came together into a gathering, building, unstoppable climax that rocked and shocked his whole body off the ground under Yamane’s expert assault. They clung together, kissing passionately, and fell asleep in a tangle of sweaty skin, arms, and legs fitted together as tightly as the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
Sometime in the night, right before dawn, Yamane woke. Tentatively, he snaked his hand to Rory’s cock to touch it again. Rory watched the black shape that was Yamane through sleepy eyes. Their lips met and he clung to Yamane, trying to convey everything he felt that night and every minute since he’d met him.
Something unspoken passed between them; some promise made that took Rory’s breath away and caused him to tighten his hold on Yamane’s slim hips. Yamane straddled Rory, reaching over his head to his toiletry kit for a condom and a smallish-sized plastic bottle. He held the condom with his good hand and opened it with his mouth, something Rory himself had done many, many times before. He hardly dared to wonder what it meant when Yamane unrolled the latex tube on Rory’s cock, sliding it down in a stroking motion.
The light touch sent shivers up Rory’s spine. The pleasure of it bloomed inside him. Yamane uncapped the flip top of the bottle with a snap, and Rory watched with growing desire as Yamane fingered and readied his own hole.
Immediately, Rory rocked against Yamane in anticipation. He felt the pressure of clenching muscles and heat as Yamane guided his cockhead through a tight, hot hole and then mind-numbing pleasure as he passed the ring of muscles. He was burning up, deep inside Yamane, who murmured gentle words to him even as his hair formed a curtain around them. After that, Rory completely lost his train of thought as Yamane took him the rest of the way inside his man’s body and rode him like a god.
At first Rory lay there, dry-mouthed, taking in the sensation. He could feel Yamane’s thighs bunching as he rose and fell, sensed the undulation of his pelvis as he moved. He could picture Yamane’s ass as he rocked, his own cock gliding in and out, Yamane’s abs tightening, rippling with pleasure and pain as he dug deeper and deeper into Yamane’s body. Suddenly, it wasn’t enough to be ridden. He wanted to possess Yamane, to drive his cock into him and leave no doubt that it belonged there. The desire to claim him and shoot his seed as far as he could inside Yamane’s tight, hot channel made the blood leave his head and he rolled them both, one arm clutching Yamane’s neck, and one holding his lower back, but he lost the connection while he shifted and fumbled to get a better angle. He groaned in frustration as his body demanded what it desired.
“Shit, Yamane,” Rory ground out. “Help me. I --”
“Shh.” Yamane settled beneath him, pulling a knee up with one hand while his other found Rory’s cock and guided it back into his hole. “I know what you need.”
Rory sank into the heat of Yamane’s body as it tightened back around him. Yamane locked his ankles around him as Rory picked up Yamane’s hips with a hand at the small of his back and jerked and snapped into him, dazed by the friction and pressure. He had no words to give Yamane, no pretty phrases, or incoherent babblings of baby or please or good, or even uh. He drove time and again into the sweetness of Yamane’s flesh, learning by listening to his cries what worked, what pleased, what sent Yamane spiraling out of control. When Yamane’s head fell back and his entire body spasmed in the deep and hidden places that closed down around Rory’s cock like a vise, Rory felt like they were flying together into a storm.
Rory’s muscles gave out and he collapsed, rolling them to their sides, unable to make himself draw away except to pull his sheathed cock carefully out and get rid of the condom.
“Yamane, I --”
“Shh,” Yamane whispered and reached out for him. Rory gathered Yamane close, breathed in his scent for a long, soothing time, and drifted back to sleep.
20
Yamane looked at Rory in the pale light coming through their tent. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” said Rory. “I feel strange somehow.”
“Like you crossed the great divide?”
Rory buried his head on Yamane’s chest.
Yamane stroked Rory’s hair. “I remember my first time. It was with a high school classmate I’d crushed on for a long time, who was
straight, and it involved alcohol.” He lit a cigarette without even asking, and Rory didn’t interfere. “It started as a dare, and then became kissing and sucking each other off. Eventually, he screwed me clumsily and we both took showers and went to sleep. In the morning, he was just…appalled.”
“I’m so sorry, cher.”
“Oddly enough, I’ve had the same experience many, many times since.” He laughed bitterly. “My revenge has always been to show them the best time they’ll ever have in this life.”
“You can’t think that’s what’s happening here, can you?”
“Is it?” asked Yamane directly. “Are you sorry you did something so…? Do you feel it’s unnatural?”
Rory shook his head and took Yamane in his arms. “I told you. It may be more natural for me than you think. It feels like the most natural thing in the world. I’ll never be ashamed of being with you.”
Yamane swallowed hard and said nothing, pressing his face into Rory’s neck as Rory held him. Finally, his lips found Rory’s for a deep kiss.
“I’m sorry, cher, but we’re going to have to move quick from now on.”
Yamane bit Rory’s lip gently. “Okay.”
“You shower and I’ll pack up. Shout out if you need me.” Rory seemed convinced Yamane needed a bodyguard.
“I like that. It makes me feel safe,” said Yamane, hugging his towel to him.
Rory took Yamane’s hand and pulled him back. “Yamane, I’m just a man. This could all go terribly wrong. We could both be hurt or killed. Please, don’t see me as something I’m not.”
“Are you a man who loves me? Even just a little?”
“Yes,” said Rory distinctly. “You know I am.”
“Then I’ll take my chances with you,” Yamane replied. “Whatever happens.”
They arrived at the car dealership in a cloud of foul-smelling exhaust. A man in a pair of khakis and a polo shirt that read “Dick’s Chevrolet, Wyoming’s #1” came up to greet them, shaking their hands and eyeing the car. “I hope you’re planning to buy a car today. It doesn’t look like that one will make it back off the lot.”
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