by John Inman
Terry gave his head another shake, then leaned forward and rested his forehead on Jonas’s bare shoulder. It was so unexpected that Jonas forgot what he was about to say next. Instead, he slipped his arms around Terry’s broad, warm back and tugged him closer, holding him in place.
“I don’t understand what you’re thinking,” he whispered in Terry’s ear. “I don’t understand what it is you’re so afraid of. If something happens between the two of us, then I say we go for it. If all that happens is we spend a few enjoyable hours making love, then I have no problem with that either.”
Terry exuded a rumble as he tried to clear his throat. He gave his head another tiny shake while still not lifting his forehead from Jonas’s shoulder.
Jonas slipped his fingers in the rat’s nest of Terry’s red hair and pressed a kiss into the middle of it. “Yeti,” he whispered around a smile, and this time he felt a returning smile pressed against his collarbone.
“Am I driving you crazy?” Terry asked without lifting his head from Jonas’s shoulder.
Since he figured lying wouldn’t get him anywhere, and saying the wrong thing would be even worse, Jonas took the coward’s way out and offered a simple grunt in return.
“I think I’m feeling guilty,” Terry murmured, another smile touching Jonas’s skin, as if he knew why Jonas hadn’t answered. “I-I didn’t expect to be with anyone again. Let alone have sex with them inside this very cabin in my very own bed. I wasn’t sure I’d even see anyone again after stashing myself away on this frigging mountain. It’s simply all too mind-boggling for me to get my head around, this sudden rush of feelings. Feelings I never thought I’d have again. Feelings I thought I’d never want to have again.”
Jonas snuggled close, pressing his lips to Terry’s ear, massaging Terry’s smooth back. He lowered his voice, barely uttering his words loud enough to be heard. Thinking it was more personal that way. Thinking it would be less frightening for Terry. Less threatening.
“I would never try to make you forget Bobby, if that’s what you’re worried about. You believe me, right? If what happened last night between us ever manages to go any further, it won’t mean you loved Bobby any less. It will only mean that your heart is big enough and brave enough to care about someone else as well.”
“I never said I cared about you,” Terry said.
At that surprising statement, Jonas took a moment to chew on his lower lip while he formulated a response. Finally, he said, “I never said I cared for you either. I do enjoy sucking your dick, though.”
This time the smile that brushed against Jonas’s shoulder had some teeth in it.
“You old smoothie, you,” Terry quipped. He lifted his head and gazed into Jonas’s eyes. Jonas was happy to note that the worry trenches in his forehead had evaporated. Most of the angst seemed to have been erased from his face as well. To his surprise, what Jonas did see was a sudden burst of concern light Terry’s expression. The expression deepened when Terry’s fingers came up and brushed across Jonas’s cheek.
“What happened to your face?” he asked.
Jonas blinked. Confused. “Why? What’s wrong with my face?”
Terry reached behind him and snatched up the stainless steel toaster, holding it in front of Jonas’s face. “Your skin is raw. You look like you’ve been sandblasted.”
Jonas studied his own reflection. Terry was right. His cheeks, nose, and chin shone bright red. Even his lips, buried as they were inside his sprouting beard, which was about thirty-six hours beyond a five-o’clock shadow but nowhere near as bushy as Terry’s, appeared red and swollen.
He realized what it was at the same time Terry did.
“It’s rug burn from my beard,” Terry said. “I scraped half your face off when we were kissing.”
Jonas grinned, staring back. “I wonder if there’s a rug burn on my crotch. That’s where you spent most of the night rooting around.”
Terry frowned. “Not funny.”
Jonas’s smile didn’t falter. “It’s a little funny.”
They stood silently considering each other. Both men still grinning. Both men as red as beets. Jonas from beard burn, Terry from embarrassment.
Terry lifted his hands and laid them to each of Jonas’s fiery cheeks, gently caressing the redness there. “Your skin feels hot,” he said.
“I’m hot all over,” Jonas answered, his single dimple popping unexpectedly into view.
Terry’s hands slid from his face and forged a trail along the length of Jonas’s warm chest and belly. They came to rest at the waistband of Jonas’s jeans, and as if working under a single purpose, both hands converged on Jonas’s belt buckle.
With a wicked gleam in his eye, Terry lowered himself to his knees and unclipped Jonas’s belt. When it was out of the way, he popped the buttons on Jonas’s jeans and with one quick yank, tugged them all the way down to his ankles. Jonas’s cock sprang up and bopped him on the chin like a billy club.
“Well, hello there,” Terry growled, as if surprised by what he’d found.
Jonas dug his fingers deep into Terry’s mop of red hair and coaxed him closer to his dick. Terry didn’t put up much of a fight.
“I guess your internal concerns have been resolved, then,” Jonas muttered, his voice weak, his knees beginning to knock.
“I guess they have,” Terry muttered back, grinning with anticipation.
Chapter Thirteen
JONAS HAD been ready for twenty minutes while Terry had been holed up in the cabin’s tiny bathroom since breakfast. It left Jonas with nothing to do but twiddle his thumbs and slurp at his sixth cup of coffee, which was about three cups too many. He was starting to vibrate from the caffeine.
As impatient as he was, he still managed to drift away every now and then in a dreamy trance, thinking about him and Terry sprawled naked in each other’s arms. After their first night together, things got sidetracked at breakfast the next day, starting with a blowjob on the kitchen floor. From there, matters spiraled into total chaos—sexually speaking—and they ended up spending the rest of the day and the next night together in bed all over again.
Today, twenty-four hours later, Jonas was so stiff he could barely walk. He couldn’t imagine what was taking Terry so long in the bathroom. This was the day they had chosen to scope out the first of the three caverns scattered beneath the surface of Terry’s mountain. The plans had been made while they were rooting around in the middle of the night in each other’s crotches, not to mention more daring locales, happily dehydrating themselves. They had the day all mapped out. So what’s the holdup?
“What the hell are you doing in there?” Jonas bellowed. “If you’re beating off and leaving me out of the loop while you do it, I’m going to be really upset!”
From behind the bathroom door he heard a bearlike growl, not from Terry but from Bruce. The pug was in there with him. He also heard a familiar human voice mumble something that sounded like “Slut.”
Jonas grinned at that. He settled back in the wooden chair, fully dressed in leather and denim and gloves. The only thing he hadn’t donned was the motorcycle helmet, which he cradled in his lap. He was tapping an impatient riff across the top of the helmet with his fingernails while the words to “You Light Up My Life,” echoed around inside his head. He wasn’t sure why. He hated that fucking song. He slurped down a little more coffee and stretched his legs out so he could prop his boot-clad feet on the kitchen table.
He was seriously considering battering down the bathroom door when he at long last heard it creak open behind him. Jonas scraped his boots off the edge of the table and dragged himself to his feet.
“It’s about time,” he snarled good-naturedly. Then his eyes popped open wide, and he stood there stiff in amazement. He took a step forward. Then he took a step back. He cupped his chin and cocked his head first one way, then the other, trying to analyze what he was seeing. Finally he decided to just stand still and stare. Slowly, a sweeping smile began to spread across his face. He could
n’t have hidden it if he wanted to. It was the Ebola of smiles. Unstoppable, uncurable. Flashing a myriad of teeth he barked out an astonished laugh. “Holy shit, Terry! What have you done?”
Terry ran a hand over his freshly shaved cheeks. He looked deeply uncertain all of a sudden. “Is it that bad?” he asked shyly.
Jonas gawked. He ran a hand over his own cheeks in reaction to what he was seeing. Then, seeing the doubt in Terry’s eyes, he forced himself to snap out of it. He stepped forward until their faces were inches apart. He stroked the back of his fingers along the smooth expanse of Terry’s newly mown cheek; then he used his other hand to explore the other cheek. While he was there, he slid his thumb along Terry’s bottom lip, enjoying the fact that he could see the man’s gorgeous mouth in all its beauty for the first time without it being buried under a truckload of grizzled facial hair.
“You handsome dog,” he said around that same dawning smile. “You did this for me, didn’t you?”
“You were getting a facial peel every time we had sex. I had to do something.”
“We could have simply stopped kissing.”
“That wasn’t an option.”
Jonas really liked that. He batted his eyes. “Aww.” Impossibly, his smile broadened even more. His jaws were starting to ache. “You’ve got a dimple in your chin I didn’t know was there.”
Terry grinned. “I’d almost forgotten about it myself.” He opened his mouth and clamped his teeth gently around Jonas’s thumb. “So do I still look like a Yeti?”
Jonas laughed. “No. Your Yeti days are over. Now you’re just a big, burly, clean-shaven redheaded hunk of lumberjacking manhood.”
“Oh, goodie. I always wanted to be one of those.”
Jonas heard a sneeze, and they both turned to look through the bathroom door where Bruce was sniffing at a pile of red curly hair that had fallen to the floor in front of the sink.
“Wow, look at all that!” Jonas bawled, impressed. “It’s like you shaved an orangutan.”
“Imagine how much hair there’d be if I shaved my ass.”
Jonas grabbed him by the shoulders and gave him a shake. “Don’t you dare,” he snarled. Then he laid his lips over Terry’s mouth and kissed him long and hard. Not having to chew his way through Terry’s beard made the kiss a totally different experience. And infinitely more enjoyable.
“Thank you,” Jonas muttered, stepping back and licking the kiss from his lips.
Terry blushed, but he looked pleased too. “You’re welcome. And thank you for the last thirty-six hours of nonstop sex.”
It was Jonas’s turn to blush. “Are you as sore as I am?”
“Stiff as a board,” Terry said. “And this time not in a good way.” Both men arched an eyebrow in sardonic agreement.
Jonas slipped his motorcycle helmet over his head and handed the other one to Terry. Before putting it on, Terry turned to Bruce who had fallen asleep atop the pile of hair on the bathroom floor.
“You stay here,” Terry said, wagging an admonishing finger at the pug. “Where we’re going, you won’t be safe.”
“Because of the creatures?” Jonas asked, gathering his stuff together. Hiking pole. Terry’s holstered Smith & Wesson 5-shot .38, which Terry told him he probably couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn with, but he was welcome to wear anyway if he promised not to shoot himself in the foot. A coil of strong rope he draped over his shoulder. Snacks and potable water and a couple of large Maglite flashlights with extra batteries they shared between them. The Maglites had been stolen from the sporting goods store in town the last time they were there. Except for the shotgun, which Terry planned on carrying, the bulk of the equipment was stowed inside two new backpacks, also commandeered from the sporting goods store.
“No,” Terry said. “Not because of the creatures. Because of the cave. It would be too easy to lose Bruce in there. He could disappear down a crack, and we’d never see him again.”
They were headed for the one cave not on Jonas’s map.
“So you know this cave pretty well?” Jonas asked.
“I don’t imagine anyone knows it very well. I’ve been in it a couple of times. Bobby and I explored it once. And I explored it once by myself. But that was before the creatures showed up. God knows how far back the cave goes underneath the mountain. Both times I entered, I didn’t go very far inside. It’s too creepy. And I didn’t have any equipment. I was afraid I’d get lost.”
Terry worked his arms through the straps of his backpack and positioned it comfortably across his shoulders. Before he could pull his helmet over his head, Jonas caught his arm and stopped him, just long enough to stroke his fingers down Terry’s freshly shaved cheek one last time.
“You really do look handsome,” he said softly.
Terry’s eyes crinkled up around a shy smile. “Thanks. I was half-afraid I’d scare you off when you saw the real me.”
“Fat chance.” He cast a glance through the kitchen window, then gazed longingly at the staircase. “The day’s still young. We could pop up to the loft for a few minutes before we leave.”
Terry struck a pose and cupped his hand behind his ear, listening.
Jonas stiffened. His gaze shot skyward. “What is it? What do you hear?”
Terry laughed. “My dick. It’s pleading for mercy.”
“So I guess that’s a no, then.” Jonas groaned, breathing a sigh of relief even while batting comically wounded eyes. He leaned in for a final kiss before slapping his face guard down to hide his grin.
“Got everything?” Terry asked, donning his own helmet and patting himself all over, checking his equipment, making sure he had everything he needed to take.
“The cave is close?” Jonas asked, adjusting his backpack.
Terry nodded. “This one is, yeah. We can walk.”
At the door, Jonas cast a last glance back at Bruce, still sleeping on the bathroom floor. As quietly as he could, he latched the door behind them, and he and Terry set off through the trees. The sky was overcast from the recent rain, the air brisk and cool and clean. The smell of evergreens lay sweetly pungent on the air. Above their heads, birds were singing a spirited concerto and chasing one another through the branches, happy the rain was over.
They weren’t twenty feet into the woods when Terry slipped his gloved hand around Jonas’s. The way he did it, without a hint of embarrassment, made Jonas’s heart swell.
“I’m glad I’m not alone anymore,” Terry said, pushing damp branches out of their way. “It’s good to have someone to talk to again. And do other stuff with too.” He made the statement calmly, like he was commenting on the weather. But Jonas heard the ardor with which the words were spoken. And again his heart responded.
Rather than speak in return or make a sly comment about the “other stuff” Terry had mentioned, he simply squeezed Terry’s hand and edged closer so their shoulders touched as they walked.
He smiled behind his faceplate, enjoying the nearness, as the trees slid past around them.
To his surprise, Terry wasn’t finished saying what he wanted to say. He tugged on Jonas’s hand and pulled him to a stop under the low-hanging fronds of a towering sugar pine. Fat cones, sodden with rain, hung from the tree and lay scattered across the forest floor at their feet.
Both men lifted their visors so they could see each other’s eyes.
As soon as their gazes connected, Terry said, “I think Bobby would understand about us. I don’t think he would hate me for what we’re doing.”
Jonas pulled Terry closer until they stood inches apart. “I’m sure he wouldn’t hate either one of us.”
They stood quietly then, ears cocked, while the birds trilled above their heads. “Listen. It almost sounds like nothing is wrong, doesn’t it?” Terry asked. “Like it’s just another day.”
“Was it always this quiet?” Jonas asked in a hushed voice. “Your little mountain?”
Terry stared up into the pine boughs draped above them. At the mockingbirds and
the starlings playing among the needles and cones. At the glimpse of blue sky peeking through dripping limbs.
“No,” Terry said in a sleepy, lazy voice. “There used to be more sounds on the mountain. Traffic sometimes carried up from the highway below. On still mornings you might hear the wail of a car alarm from somewhere in town. Hikers could be glimpsed now and then through the trees, laughing and fooling around. Down the trail in the other direction, there’s another cabin where a family used to come to spend their weekends. We used to see them laughing and traipsing about. I haven’t seen them since the trouble started. They may be dead for all I know.”
“Let’s hope not,” Jonas whispered.
“Yes,” Terry agreed. “Let’s hope not.”
By silent agreement, they lowered their face masks and continued their trek through the trees, still hand in hand. Jonas decided it would have been a pleasant walk if they hadn’t been so overdressed. The leather jacket chafed his armpits, and the helmet seemed to cut off all the air. He longed to rip them both off and fling them into the bushes. Even the shotgun was annoying the hell out of him, getting heavier and heavier as he carried it with the stock tucked under his armpit and the barrel aimed down at the ground in front of him.
The trees opened up, exposing them to the sky. They clambered up a steep hillside meadow dotted red with Indian paintbrush. Bees were everywhere, gathering pollen. Honeybees. Yellow jackets. Fat black-and-gold bumblebees. Jonas was a city boy and not that fond of bees. Suddenly he was glad for the leather jacket and crash helmet after all.
Cresting the hill, Jonas released Terry’s hand. He followed in Terry’s footsteps as they waded single file through the waist-high carpet of Indian paintbrush and descended the other side.
At a spot where a jumble of boulders lay scattered in a gully at the bottom of a rise, Terry pointed and said, “This is it.”
Jonas peeked over Terry’s shoulder and saw nothing but a pile of rocks. “I don’t see a cave.”