Slip and Slide

by Patricia Logan

  “Can I put them on ya? Just to see how they look?” he managed to ask.

  “Would you?” Thayne handed Jarrett the first cuff and then reached for the pouch, pulling out a matching one. He held it out to Jarrett who took it with shaking hands. Thayne presented his scarred wrist and Jarrett slipped it on, positioning it just right before snapping it on the inside. The silver and leather bracelet fit perfectly over the deep handcuff scars Thayne had been carrying with him for more than a year. He fastened the second bracelet and Thayne just stared at them. The matched set was amazingly sexy and masculine.

  “That’s nice,” Jarrett said, leaning back as he examined his lover and the full effect of the cuffs. He smiled at him.

  “Nice? They’re almost the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen,” Thayne said, smiling sweetly. He sat forward, pushing Jarrett back on the bed so that he was flat on his back. He slid up his body, lying over his naked form. “Almost,” he whispered against his lips.

  Jarrett smiled against Thayne’s warm full lips. “You seen somethin’ sexier, Wolfe?”

  Thayne slowly rocked his thickening cock against Jarrett’s groin. “Maybe,” Thayne drawled. He grinned against Jarrett’s mouth and Jarrett couldn’t help but snort in laughter. In one smooth move, Jarrett flipped Thayne flat onto his back, rolling over the top of them so he was pinned beneath. He ever so slowly ground his hard cock down on Thayne until his lover was gasping and writhing beneath him.

  “How about we skip fried chicken and I tell ya about it in infinite detail?” Jarrett whispered, kissing slowly down Thayne’s jaw as he drew his hands up over his head.

  “Mm… you’re right, that does sound better than fried chicken. Any day.”

  The End

  Special preview of “Locked and Loaded” (Death and Destruction Book 4)

  Prologue

  Camp Confidence

  Apple Valley, California

  ATF Special Agent in Charge, Lloyd Stanger, stood with his hands on his hips, turned out sharply in beige, brown, and khaki fatigues. He was flanked on either side by two Marines, outfitted just the same. In his late fifties, Stanger was still in great shape for a man of his age and he commanded the respect of the audience that had gathered to hear what he had to say on a breezy January morning in California’s High Desert.

  It was icy cold and the assembled group, also dressed in camo, stood waiting to find out just why they’d been called to a vacant air field not far from Vandenberg Air Force Base, the West Coast equivalent of Cape Canaveral, Florida, home of the US space shuttle program. The gathered group of agents, all from the ATF’s Los Angeles field division, had been divided into two, with Jarrett, Thayne, Sarah Connor, and three others on the left side of the field and Tim Darcy, Jose Galvez, Craig Baldwin, and three others on the right.

  “I bet this about team building again,” Thayne whispered. His partner in the ATF, Jarrett Evans, stood by his side, looking handsome as hell in fatigues that matched his own and all Thayne could think about was just how fucking good it was that he hadn’t been in his unit in the Marine Corps when Jarrett was younger. Seeing him dressed like that every day would, without a doubt, have been Thayne’s downfall. The days of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell would have assured Thayne of a dishonorable discharge because there’s no way he would have been able to keep his hands off the man.

  Jarrett Evans was thirty-six years old, six foot four inches tall, with ice-blue eyes, deep dimples, and snow-white hair. His muscled body was long and lean and under those fatigues, Thayne knew the man went commando and was scarred, sensual, and sexy as hell. Thayne should know. He was lucky enough to have Jarrett in his bed every night.

  “Shit. The Nova needs another wax job and you made me leave it at home… damn you,” Jarrett growled under his breath, as he leaned in close, his teeth bared.

  “Evans! Wolfe!” Stanger bellowed. “Are you paying attention?”

  Thayne shook himself out of his reverie, not the least bit embarrassed about where his thoughts strayed, but a little angry with himself that he hadn’t been able to focus since he’d seen Evans pull on those fatigues in the barracks locker room wearing absolutely nothing underneath. Fuck!

  “I—I’m sorry, SAC, I was distracted,” Thayne murmured, shooting Jarrett a dirty look.

  “Well, un-distract yourself! I’m not up here talking to myself. From this moment forward, I want all of you agents to listen to what’s going on. Your team members will be counting on you for the next three days,” Stanger growled.

  Thayne was certain he heard Jarrett suck in a hissing breath beside him and he reached up to cough into his hand to hide his laugh.

  “I’m sure,” Stanger began, “that you people think this is another team-building exercise…”

  Jarrett began to hum the Marine Corps hymn under his breath and Thayne glanced over just before elbowing him.

  “… you have been divided into teams and are here this weekend to complete a training course that will help you gain confidence out in the field… confidence with firearms, your physical readiness, your intuitive thinking, and the ability to accept that following directions is of utmost importance at all times… Evans.” Stanger narrowed his eyes at Jarrett.

  “Hey!” Jarrett protested.

  Thayne glanced at his partner who’d set both hands on his hips and was glaring at Stanger. He bit his lip to prevent the smile that threatened and he knew Jarrett was holding back as much as he possibly could with that one simple word. The truth was, Jarrett did have a reputation in the office for doing outlandish things like rappelling off ten-story buildings using a suspect as a counterweight, using little girls to spit-polish his classic automobile, and making enemies in the motor pool by crashing more than one company vehicle while out on assignment. Thayne loved him anyway. They’d been paired as partners for almost a year and had put some serious bad guys behind bars at great risk to their own lives, but living with Jarrett Evans was by far the greatest challenge Thayne had ever faced.

  “Anyway, I would like to introduce you to your drill instructors for the weekend. You are to do anything and everything they say or you will fail this exercise,” Stanger said. He looked straight at Jarrett again. “Please take note, failing this exercise will assure you a month of riding a desk doing paperwork.”

  Thayne was almost certain he heard Jarrett whimper before the pathetic sound died away. If there was one thing in the world Jarrett hated more than bad guys, it was paperwork. Stanger stepped forward and held out a hand to a massive muscled Marine in khaki brown slacks and a beige shirt along with a drill sergeant’s cover. His belt buckle was spit-polished so brightly, it was like looking at a mirror.

  “This is Marine Corps Sergeant Jackson. He will be overseeing Evans, Wolfe, Connor, Jamieson, Burroughs, and Black.”

  Thayne breathed a sigh of relief. At least he and Jarrett were on the same team along with his close friend Sarah Connor and three others from their office.

  “This is Marine Corps Sergeant Emmerson,” Stanger continued, introducing the other, shorter Marine. “He will be overseeing Baldwin, Darcy, Galvez, Mann, Montgomery, and North. One last thing before I leave you to your teams. For God’s sake, don’t embarrass yourselves or me!” He glared at Jarrett again and Thayne almost felt sorry for his partner.

  Thayne turned his attention to Sergeant Jackson. The man’s back was ramrod straight and he looked as severe as any Marine Thayne had ever seen. He held a clipboard and he walked slowly down the line where the six on Jarrett and Thayne’s team stood, more or less, at attention. Jarrett was pulling it off pretty darn perfectly if Thayne was anyone to judge. The rest of them, though trying, didn’t have the same appearance at all. Jackson stopped his pacing in front of Jarrett, leaning forward and peering at him. Jarrett looked straight ahead, not meeting the sergeant’s eye. Thayne was surprised when his lover quirked a smile.

&nb
sp; “Wipe that smile off your face, dog breath! You’re with the ATF now?”

  “Yes, sir!” Jarrett barked, still focused on looking straight ahead.

  “Couldn’t make it in the real man’s Marines, huh, Evans?”

  “I’m retired, sir!” Jarrett barked again.

  Jackson smirked and Thayne noticed he looked mean as hell. Apparently the two men had history and it was obvious Sergeant Jackson had no great love for Jarrett.

  “Retirement is for civilians, Evans, unless you and your fat little girlfriend plan on moving down to Florida and sipping a rum punch. Is that what you’re gonna do, sip a rum punch with your fat little girlfriend?”

  “Don’t have a girlfriend, sir, fat or otherwise,” Jarrett said.

  “I see. So maybe you’ll get one of those gas-guzzling RV’s and go tooling around the country taking pictures of the Grand Canyon while the rest of your unit is off fighting towelheads in I-ran for the oil to put in it!”

  Thayne watched a muscle in Jarrett’s cheek begin to twitch as he clenched his teeth.

  “No, sir!” Jarrett barked.

  “Um, excuse me,” Sarah suddenly piped up. “I’m freezing, Sergeant. Can we march or something?”

  Thayne cringed as he watched Sarah stomp one foot on the frozen ground and then the other. Jackson spun on his heel and walked away from Jarrett, marching over to Sarah who stood on the other side of him. He leaned forward until the wide brim of his cover bumped Sarah’s forehead.

  “Did I give you leave to speak, Connor?” he bellowed.

  “No, sir,” Sarah said as strongly as she probably dared without sounding snotty. In the nine years that he’d worked with Sarah, Thayne had never seen her back down from a man or woman, not even those in authority. Of course, she was his best friend aside from Jarrett, so he was probably biased.

  “Drop and give me twenty-five, Connor!” Sergeant Jackson barked. “That should warm the cold right out of you.”

  Thayne wanted to punch the guy and just as he opened his mouth to say something, Sarah grinned at Jackson and dropped to the ground and started doing pushups. She had near-perfect form and Thayne was very proud of her. When she was finished, Jackson stepped back and nodded at them.

  “Now, we’ll begin with a few calisthenics to warm your blood, assuming you ladies have it in you!” Jackson set down his clipboard and began doing jumping jacks to show them what he wanted. “Give me one hundred and count off! Go!”

  Thayne glanced at Jarrett who smirked at him and the group began doing jumping jacks. Sergeant Jackson walked along the front of their column, stopping in front of each as he barked commands in their faces. “Faster! Higher! Keep up with the others! Poor form!” At the end of a hundred, Thayne was only slightly winded.

  “That was the most pathetic excuse for calisthenics I’ve ever seen!” Jackson barked at them. “Just for that, I’ll be timing your five mile run to see what old women you all are.” He held up a stop watch. “Begin!” The group took off in a jog that Thayne found harder than he thought he would because of the leather boots they had been given to wear in the locker room that morning. Jarrett came up beside him and looked over as they ran.

  “I take it you know that asshole,” Thayne said.

  “We’re acquainted. Jackson was never one of my favorites. Went through special ops training together but he washed out just before I was recruited as a sniper. Never forgave me for beating him in just about every discipline except one.”

  Thayne had a hard time believing Jackson could have beaten Jarrett at anything.

  “What was that?”

  “He was the biggest asshole in our unit.”

  Thayne chuckled, breathing out a long breath as he jogged. “That’s a discipline?”

  “In the Corps, it takes skill since they have their share,” Jarrett said with a grin. “I ought to know. I was one of the best. He still beat me.” He panted. “But the Marine Corps is really good at finding just the right place for a man and they outdid themselves with Jackson. They found the perfect place for him.”

  “Being a drill sergeant?”

  “No, being the biggest asshole in the unit and getting paid for it. Pay attention, Wolfe.”

  Thayne couldn’t help but laugh. “Shit. He’s gonna make your life hell this weekend,” Thayne said as Jarrett jogged beside him.

  Jarrett smirked. “Naw. He might try, but I can be a bigger asshole if I want to.”

  Thayne grinned. “Do you want to?” he asked.

  “Fuck yeah. It’s like they taught us in combat training. You look for the opportunity and take your shot. Well, I’ll be looking for my opportunity.” Jarrett winked.

  Thayne snorted. “This may be fun after all.”

  ****

  “This is worse than hell week in college.” Sarah Connor was lying on the grass beside the barracks that housed their shared dorms while Jarrett and Thayne bent over, holding their own knees to catch their breath. They’d just arrived back from an entire day out in the camp. Sweat dripped off all of them and they were covered head to toe in mud, barely leaving rings around their eyes. “Is it always like this?” she gasped.

  “Basic training? Yeah,” Jarrett replied. “Thing is, I went through basic when I was eighteen, not thirty-six.”

  “Are you saying you forgot how fucked-up it is?” Thayne asked, wiping a smear of mud and sweat across his forehead to keep it out of his eyes.

  Jarrett looked at him and shrugged, standing straight as he threw Thayne a smirk. “Yeah, I guess I did.”

  “My hair hurts,” Sarah whimpered.

  Jarrett and Thayne laughed and Jarrett bent again, offering her a hand. She grasped it. “Come on, darlin’. Time for a shower.”

  “Ugh,” she grunted as he hauled her up. “I’m too tired to take a shower.”

  Thayne reached around her shoulders with a muddy arm. “Come on, sweetie. Jarrett’s right. Time for a shower. We have to be in the mess in thirty minutes or no dinner.”

  “I can’t eat. I’m too tired,” she complained. “I just need to sleep.”

  “Gotta eat, Sarah. There’s more of this tomorrow and you’ll need the calories,” Jarrett said; they walked inside the dorm and headed for the locker room.

  “More tests of endurance no doubt,” Thayne added.

  After their five mile run, the participants had been ordered to climb a ladder made of logs, the type of logs that telephone poles were made of. They had to climb from one log to the other until they were twenty-five feet off the ground and then cross an expanse using a rope that was strung between the first ladder and a second ladder over a distance of twenty feet. Once they reached the end, they had to climb down the second log ladder to the ground. When that task was concluded, their day continued on to a mock battlefield where they had to crawl through mud with one team member on their backs, acting as a casualty, over a distance of 300 feet. For the men on the team it had been challenging. For 115-pound Sarah, dragging a man who weighed twice as much, had been exhausting. She’d had to stop and switch places with Jarrett after making it halfway. After the mock battlefield exercise, called the Battle of Fallujah, they took a break for lunch. They were given MREs that consisted of a cold foil packet of something resembling food, a tiny bag of Skittles, an apple, and a large bottle of water so they’d stay hydrated.

  After lunch, they returned to the field and were put through another test of skill. Given rifles, they had to utilize a belly crawl and a back crawl, using their weapon to lift barbed wire strung low across the ground, and make their way underneath it. During the crawl, Sergeant Jackson stood over them and screamed down into their faces that they weren’t trying hard enough, weren’t going fast enough, and were leaving their casualties behind to die. For Jarrett, it was like going through basic all over again, only not as fun or easy as i
t had been when he’d been a fresh-faced kid eighteen years before. Jarrett had been prepared for it but he knew the others hadn’t been. The whole time they went through the paces of the obstacle courses, he planned what he was going to do about Jackson, the asshole from the past who’d come back to haunt him and taunt him. By the time they finished and were dismissed to their barracks, he’d formulated a plan to get back at the drill sergeant from hell.

  They showered, taking their time under the hot water, soaping their hair, and getting ready for dinner. Jarrett knew they’d most likely continue on short rations and if things went the way he expected, they’d be existing on short sleep as well. He didn’t mention any of his thoughts to them but when he saw Craig Baldwin, the other former Marine in their work group, Jarrett walked over and spoke to him.

  “I have an idea Emmerson is about as much of a prick as Jackson. Am I right?” Jarrett asked.

  “Fuck yeah. Maybe more. I feel like I’m back in basic. How’s Sarah doing?” Craig asked.

  Jarrett smiled and turned to look at their pretty blonde friend before glancing back to Craig. He’d always thought maybe Baldwin had a thing for Sarah. He’d observed the furtive glances he gave her in the office. Jarrett didn’t think Sarah had noticed. If she had, she hadn’t mentioned it. When Jarrett first met Sarah, he’d thought maybe she had a thing for Thayne but then he’d learned that they were only best friends, which suited him fine. Once he’d gotten to know Sarah, he’d found that he adored her. She was bright, worked well with all the other agents in the office, and never ever looked as though she was breaking a sweat. After Jarrett himself, she had the best marksmanship, including beating out Thayne and Craig Baldwin once or twice at the gun range. She was the first one to volunteer for assignments when they came up, regardless of the danger it put her in or the physical endurance involved. Jarrett truly admired her and Baldwin would be lucky to get her to go out with him if she ever bothered to glance in his direction. Not that dating between coworkers was allowed. It wasn’t.