by John Inman
Bruce was snoring again, curled up in the arms of his teddy bear, which had grown more ragged and worn as the days slipped by. Not six inches from his head, the fire was crackling on the grate, mostly embers now. A single thread of smoke was being pulled upward through the flue toward the mountain sky outside. If one of those smoking embers should explode, it would probably set the pug on fire. Bruce seemed willing to take the risk.
“I know of a cave,” Terry said, watching the fire die away. “The opening is very small. I doubt if it’s on your map. I can take you there one of these days.”
As if Jonas hadn’t heard, he turned to Terry and said quietly, “I lost my lover too. In a car wreck. More than a year ago. I just wanted you to know.”
“Oh. I’m sorry,” Terry stammered, surprised and touched that Jonas would share this information with him.
Jonas nodded. Terry could see the reflection of the embers in his eyes. For the first time since he had met the man, he also saw sadness there.
“I wanted you to know you’re not the only one who’s suffered a loss,” Jonas said. “And if we don’t find a way to stop these creatures, I fear the whole world will come to understand loss. They won’t stay here, you know. Your little beasties. On this tiny mountain. In your tiny hometown. They’ll spread out. Maybe they’re working themselves up to it already, now that the food supply is growing thin. A few soldiers and scientists and highway patrol guys manning roadblocks and keeping people out won’t stop these things from migrating. They have the whole sky to travel in. If they choose to leave at night, no one would even know. We have to find them and kill them before they do.”
Terry reached out to pour another shot, then stayed his hand. He’d had enough. He firmly placed the bottle back on the table.
“You make it sound so easy,” he said. “How exactly do you plan on killing them?”
Jonas shrugged. He was getting bleary-eyed. He looked like he’d had enough to drink as well. “We have to find their nest first, Terry. Then we’ll figure out how to kill them.”
Terry’s gaze traveled around the cabin. At the work he had done to reinforce the place. He had accomplished a lot, but there was still a lot more to do. Perhaps two-thirds of the inner walls were covered with the galvanized fence posts, nailed in place an inch or two apart, lined up one right after the other. Then, on the walls and parts of the ceiling that were finished, he had strung wire between the posts, strengthening the walls even more. When he was finished, he was pretty sure nothing would be able to get inside. The entire cabin would be as safe as the blood room already was.
Terry turned to study Jonas, who was staring into the fire, looking melancholy. Terry wondered if it was the mention of his dead lover that made him feel that way.
“We have to finish the cabin first,” Terry quietly said. “You help me do that, and I’ll help you find the creatures and kill them.”
Jonas lifted his eyes, surveying the walls already done. “Do you have enough posts to finish?”
“No. We’ll need to go into town and commandeer some more. There are hundreds of them at a home improvement store on the outskirts of town. I can only carry so many in my Jeep, but two more trips into town should do it. Will you help?”
Jonas dredged up a smile. He didn’t look quite as bleary-eyed as he had a minute ago. Maybe he could hold his liquor after all.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ll help. We’ll finish the cabin before we do anything else. That way we’ll have a safe refuge if shit starts hitting the fan. Agreed?”
Terry dipped his head. “Agreed.”
He groaned his way out of his chair and screwed the cap on the whiskey bottle before crossing the room and setting it on the kitchen counter. Bruce had lifted his head and was watching him as if he knew it was time for bed.
“There are spare blankets and pillows in that closet there,” Terry said. “You know where the bathroom is. If you decide to go outside for a stroll, don’t. Leave the doors and windows closed and locked.”
“All right.”
Jonas was already unbuttoning his shirt. Terry stood at the foot of the stairs, cradling Bruce and watching him. Without any show of self-consciousness, Jonas shrugged out of the plaid work shirt and tossed it on the chair he had been sitting in. He kicked off his boots and peeled his socks away. Standing now in nothing but blue jeans, the fly of which was already half-unzipped, he moved toward the closet and dug around for bedding.
Terry held his breath, observing him. Jonas James was indeed beautiful. His skin was tanned and flawless, the hair on his chest dark. The veins in his lean arms bulged beneath the skin. When he bent into the closet to retrieve the bedding, the top of his jeans pulled down to show the cleavage of his ass and the smooth, pale skin surrounding it. At the base of his spine was a small patch of dark hair that Terry found mesmerizing. Somehow he knew in that moment exactly how Jonas’s skin would feel beneath his fingertips. And more importantly, how it would taste against his lips.
As if suddenly aware he was being watched, Jonas took a peek backward under his outstretched arm to see Terry there behind him, ogling. He straightened and turned to face him. The jeans he wore had lost a little more of their battle with gravity while he was poking around inside the closet. A trail of dark hair had become visible, sweeping down from his belly button to the beginning of a bush of black pubic hair and just a hint of the fleshy base of what looked to be a rather substantial cock resting inside it.
Terry’s own cock twitched at the sight. With cheeks suddenly burning hot, Terry gulped and turned away.
Behind him, Jonas called out, “Have a good night, roomie!”
Somehow Terry knew the bastard was grinning when he said it.
Chapter Nine
TERRY AND Jonas spent the morning reinforcing the walls and ceiling of the loft where Terry slept. With the metal posts slotted across the windows and blocking a lot of the light, the room was left in dusklike gloom, even while the noontime sun burned bright outside.
They had been at it nonstop for four days now. Working and living close together, they had learned a lot about each other, and an easy friendship seemed to be taking hold. It wasn’t only friendship, though. Sexual tension had been building too. At least it was building on Terry’s end. How Jonas saw their budding relationship, Terry wasn’t sure. And he was afraid to ask.
Jonas cracked a sardonic smile while checking out what they had accomplished. “At least the bars over the windows are spaced far enough apart that you can peek outside and see what’s trying to kill you.”
Terry offered a wry grimace in return. “Always a consideration when you’re about to get eaten.”
“It’ll be hot in the summer with no breeze to speak of,” Jonas noted, looking doubtful as he reexamined the nailed-over windows.
“That’s assuming we survive till summer,” Terry said, knowing full well his comment was likely to put a damper on the conversation.
“You’re a cheerful guy,” Jonas said, but there was no humor in his eyes. The truth of Terry’s words was obvious to both of them.
“Back to work?” Terry groaned, rubbing his back.
“Back to work.”
They slaved for a couple more hours, arranging the last of the galvanized fence posts across the loft’s ceiling, fixing them to the walls with fat nails, then attaching the final few yards of baling wire Terry used to strengthen his barricade. They only quit when they ran out of material.
Terry eyed Jonas as they both threw down their tools and heaved sighs of relief. It was getting hot in the closed-off loft, and they were both sweating buckets. During the course of the long hours, they had shed their shirts to ward off heatstroke. At least that’s what Terry kept telling himself.
He was working in a pair of battered cargo shorts with tools hanging off every belt loop and nails bulging the pockets. Jonas had donned a pair of sweatpants with the legs cut at the knees. Terry had to fight to tear his eyes away from Jonas’s bare torso long enough not to smash his th
umb with the hammer at least once every two minutes.
With the last of the posts attached inside the loft, they stood side by side and studied their handiwork. Jonas slung a companionable arm across Terry’s shoulder. The skin-on-skin nearness impacted Terry more than it probably should have. Images flashed inside his head of the first night Jonas spent in the cabin. Jonas standing shirtless by the closet door with his jeans dragging down around his ass. His skin so perfect in the glimmer of embers burning on the grate. His strong bare feet poking out from under his pant cuffs, with little wisps of dark hair sprinkling his toes. Every inch of the man sexy as hell.
After that, Terry had made it a point to be upstairs and away from temptation when Jonas undressed for the night.
That first night with Jonas standing half naked in the light of the fire still made a nice memory, though. Of course, it didn’t hold a candle to looking at Jonas now with his chest all sweaty and his dick bobbing around under the thin fabric of the sweatpants he had on. Sometimes when Jonas stood just right, Terry could see the outline of his cockhead pressing against the fabric. At times like that, it was all Terry could do not to gawk. Clearly the guy didn’t believe in underwear.
“We should go to town,” Jonas said, blithely unaware that Terry was staring at his crotch. Or at least pretending to be. “We’ve used up all the posts except for those three over there in the corner. We’ll need a lot more to finish up that last wall downstairs.”
“We’ll also need to pick up more baling wire.” Terry sighed. “It’s a pain in the ass, but it strengthens the walls. There’s not much afternoon left. Before the sun goes down, we’ll drive into Spangle and pick up what we need. I don’t like to be out after dark.”
“All right. Dinner first?”
Terry wiped his sweaty brow. “Yeah,” he said. “Dinner first. I’m starving.”
They gathered a few odds and ends from the kitchen—canned corn, which they could eat cold from the container since they weren’t that picky, tuna, a couple of tins of fruit cocktail, three or four candy bars that were already getting stale—and toted it all out to the porch. Plunking a can of Alpo into a bowl for Bruce, the three of them settled in.
Jonas studied the blisters on his fingers. “When I first saw all the work you’d done on the cabin, I didn’t realize how hard it must have been for you. Working alone, I mean. How long have you been at it?”
Terry shrugged. “The idea came to me about a month ago. Actually it wasn’t so bad. It gave me something to do to pass the time. I hadn’t realized how lonely it would be, out here on this mountain all by myself. For the first couple of months, I was pretty much a basket case. Still trying to decide if I should stay or leave. Missing Bobby. Grieving. Trying not to let myself fall apart.”
“I’m sorry about your husband,” Jonas said, his mouth turned down, watching Terry through hooded eyes.
Terry turned to him then. He forced a smile when he saw the pity on Jonas’s face. “You don’t have to keep apologizing every time I mention Bobby’s death. It wasn’t your fault. Maybe I shouldn’t talk about him so much, but it’s hard not to. When he was alive, he was such a huge part of my life. With him gone it’s like I’m left with a big empty place where he used to be. If I didn’t talk or think about Bobby, my mind would be a blank hole filled with nothing.”
“I know,” Jonas said, his eyes taking on a sadness of their own. “Loss leaves us kind of fractured and incomplete. I still reach out sometimes in the middle of the night and run my hand through the bedclothes, searching for Martin.” Jonas stared out into the trees, the can of fruit cocktail resting forgotten in his hand. The highest branches of the pines were rustling softly, tossed by a gentle breeze blowing up from the desert foothills.
They were seated side by side on the front step with Bruce at their feet. He had finished his Alpo and lay napping now with his little puggy chin resting on his front paws. His ear did a flip when an ant crawled across it, and the ant went flying.
Feeling self-conscious about it, but doing it anyway, Terry laid his hand on Jonas’s arm. The dark hair there bristled against the palm of his hand. For the first time, he let himself enjoy the warmth of Jonas’s skin beneath his fingertips. The feeling was electric. In a voice barely loud enough to carry, he said, “It gets better, don’t you think? The missing? The incompleteness? It goes away a little bit more each day.”
Jonas looked down at Terry’s hand on his arm; then he lifted his eyes to Terry’s face. “I suppose so,” he said. “The missing does get easier. The loneliness doesn’t, though.”
“No,” Terry said, an old familiar melancholy burrowing through him. “The loneliness doesn’t change much at all. No matter how much time passes.”
The air was getting cooler as the afternoon waned. Terry supposed they would be putting their shirts on soon, and he dreaded that. The two of them sitting half-dressed was a definite turn-on. No two ways about it.
As if Jonas had read his mind, he reached over and dragged his fingers through the hair on Terry’s chest. Terry froze.
“You look like a lumberjack,” Jonas said, smiling, his strong fingers massaging Terry’s breast. “A big furry lumberjack. I’ve never seen so many muscles and so much ginger fuzz on one human being in all my life.”
Terry frowned, but his eyes crinkled with amusement at the same time. “You make me sound like a redheaded Yeti. Not sure if that’s a compliment or an insult.”
“Trust me,” Jonas said, “it’s a compliment.” His fingers flexed outward, moving more slowly over Terry’s chest now, as if gauging the suppleness of the flesh beneath his hand. When their eyes met, that one damned dimple flickered on Jonas’s cheek.
Terry edged a millimeter away, because Jonas’s touch was making him feel uncomfortable. Jonas took the hint and withdrew his hand. The humor in his eyes didn’t fade much, however. Terry got the impression Jonas was amused by Terry’s wariness when they made the least show of getting to know each other better. Especially if it involved physical contact. Jonas always backed off, though, whenever Terry sent out those vibes. Just as he did now. To make everything a little more confusing for Terry, he couldn’t decide if he was happy to be left alone at times like that or annoyed that Jonas would give up so easily.
He gazed down at his hands, trying to think of something to say to make the moment less awkward. “Do you think it will be enough? What we’re doing to protect the cabin? Do you think it will keep the creatures out?”
Jonas took a moment to study Terry’s face before glancing back at the open door behind him. Dust motes still hung in the air inside the cabin from all the hammering and banging they had been doing. Jonas was evidently giving the question serious thought. To Terry’s disappointment, when Jonas finally answered, he didn’t look convinced.
“I think there’s more you can do,” he said.
Terry blinked. He hadn’t expected that. He’d mostly asked the question for something to say to get past the moment when Jonas had laid his hand to his chest. That he might not be doing everything he could do to seal off the cabin truly had not occurred to him.
“Like what?” he asked. “What else can we do?”
Jonas’s gaze turned shifty and his dimple reappeared. “You can wire all that metal up to the generator. Then if an attack comes, and if those fuckers so much as touch the cabin, you can burn them out of the sky.”
Terry sat frozen in concentration, considering what Jonas had said. “Like a big bug zapper,” he breathed. He realized right off that it wouldn’t be that hard to do. With only one drawback. “We’d have to bring the generator inside. Right now it’s sitting at the back of the cabin under a little overhang of roof. We’d have to move it inside so we wouldn’t need to leave the cabin to crank it up.”
Jonas shot him a wink. “And how hard can that be?”
Terry tried not to groan. “What I don’t know about electricity is a lot. If it was left up to me, I’d probably either leave us permanently in the dark or fry the cabi
n right off the map.”
“Luckily,” Jonas said, “I know a few things about electrical work that maybe you don’t. It shouldn’t be that big of a job. Just unhook the generator outside, drag it in, and rehook it to the wires at the first junction inside.”
“The generator runs on gas,” Terry said. “What about exhaust fumes?”
Jonas tapped his chin, thinking about it. “We’ll have to drill a hole big enough for the exhaust pipe to disperse the fumes outside so they won’t asphyxiate us.”
Terry had to agree with that. “Not being killed by fumes would be good.”
“Yeah. Plus, we wouldn’t want to deprive the creatures of killing us first.”
They smiled at each other briefly.
Terry squeezed one eye shut, considering their plan. “If we’re inside when we juice up the walls, won’t it juice us up too?”
“Not if we stay on the wooden floor and away from the metal posts.”
Terry considered that. “Will it kill them?”
“The creatures? Probably not. But it might give them incentive to think twice if they decide to attack the cabin a second time.”
“So basically what it will probably do is piss them off.”
“Yeah. It’ll be fun.”
They stared at each other with dawning grins.
“I like the way you think,” Terry said, tossing out a wink.
Jonas winked back. He pushed himself off the front step and gathered up his trash. “Thanks. Let’s go to town.”
Chapter Ten
MORE WORK was involved in thoroughly securing the cabin from the predatory creatures than either man expected. Another week passed and many trips into town ensued. Still they weren’t finished.
On one foray, they raided the Suzuki dealership and acquired motorcycle helmets with drop-down face masks. They took to wearing them every time they left the cabin, since even an injury as minor as a bug bite might be all that was needed to throw the creatures into a frenzy. Also, while the helmet wouldn’t prevent an attack, it might afford a few extra seconds before the smell of blood leaked out from an unintentional head wound or nosebleed, giving Terry or Jonas time to reach safety.