A Forbidden Rumspringa (Gay Amish Romance Book 1) (13 page)

David kissed Isaac messily as he rubbed against him. “Oh help me. I’ve wanted this for so long. Wanted to touch you and hear you cry out for me. I can’t believe this is real.”

“David,” Isaac moaned, working his hands beneath David’s shirt to grip his sides and feel the muscles flexing there.

“Let me hear you, Isaac.”

His cries and calls echoed through the rustling leaves as Isaac gave himself over to the growing fervor within him, the pure bliss licking out through his body like flames spreading through a hayloft. David buried his face in Isaac’s neck, his lips soft and wet as he thrust against him.

Isaac wondered what it would be like without their pants on and nothing between them. Gasping, he tangled his hands in David’s hair, breathing his name as he reached the edge. When he tipped over the side, it was like falling from Kaffi’s back all over again. Yet this time he didn’t come down, instead launching above the treetops as if he could touch the stars.

He floated back into himself and held David close, not caring that he’d made a mess of his pants. He could feel David’s hard shaft through the material, and he wrapped a leg around David’s hip to encourage him. Straining, after another minute David shook and exclaimed something Isaac couldn’t understand. He petted David’s hair as they caught their breath, tangled together.

This can’t be true
.

David kissed his neck as he moved up to Isaac’s face, pressing pecks to his cheeks, forehead, nose and chin, and to the corners of his eyes. His lips were gentle, and Isaac had never felt so cared for. So special.

“My little
eechel.
”

The endearment was nonsense—little acorn—but Isaac’s heart swelled. David kissed him again, this time finding his mouth tenderly. Nearby, Kaffi ambled, rustling the foliage as he munched contentedly.

Isaac waited for the horror of what they’d done to reach him—to grip his soul in mortal terror. Yet as they kissed and breathed each other in, sticky and sated with the oaks standing sentinel, Isaac felt only a peace and wholeness he hadn’t realized he’d been missing.

That it was a sin, he had no doubt. But it was the sweetest he’d ever known.

“Just where do you think you’re going?”

Heart sinking, Isaac froze by the front door, straw hat poised over his head. He glanced back at Mother in her rocking chair in the main room, Father reading a prayer book in his rocker next to her. Father turned the page, but Mother raised an eyebrow.

“Isaac, you look like you did when I used to catch you sneaking an extra piece of streusel. Don’t wander far—we’re going visiting at the Lapps’ shortly.”

“But I promised Mervin and Mark we’d go to the lake.” The lie flowed easily.

“Surely that water’s far too cold now. You should take your other hat too. Time to put the summer hats away. Don’t you think?” she asked Father.

“Mmm,” he affirmed, eyes still on his page.

“All right, I’ll get my other hat.” Isaac’s pulse raced. “So can I go?”

Mother eyed him sharply. “What’s at the lake? You can’t be swimming. More fishing? Didn’t you have enough of it last night? Not that you actually caught anything. Seems to be a waste of time.”

He’d completely forgotten the sack of fish by June’s fence after David kissed him. It was incredible to even think the words—
David kissed me.
The memory of what they’d done should have shamed him, but hungry desire sparked instead.
The
sweet wet of David’
s mouth, his breath hot,
rutting together, and
—

Isaac dropped his gaze to the floor and forced his mind blank. “We were just going to play around.”

Father cleared his throat. “The Lapps are expecting us all.”

He sighed. “Yes, Father.” He knew that when Father used that tone, his pronouncements were as carved in stone as the commandments.

Squeezed in the back of the family buggy with his brothers and Katie before long, Isaac winced. His back was sore from where he’d tumbled to the ground, and the bumping of the buggy didn’t help. He fiddled with the knife in his pocket and remembered the night before, careful not to let his mind stray too close to what had happened on the forest floor. He was liable to tent his pants.

After he and David—a current pulsed through him just at the thought of David’s name—had become too cold in the night air and straightened themselves, they’d remounted Kaffi.

He’d rested his cheek against the stiffness of David’s jacket. His arms wound around David’s waist, and he’d held on tighter than before, closing his eyes to the dark forest and sure he could drift off right there. The gentle rocking as Kaffi walked home made him like a baby in a cradle. Just to hold David close was bliss.

“Don’t fall asleep now,” David had teased.

“Mmm.” Isaac had opened his eyes.

Reaching back, David had stroked Isaac’s thigh. Wonderful warmth flowed from David’s hand all through him. They’d continued on in comfortable silence, and still Isaac had waited for the proper disgust for what they’d done to find him. It remained mysteriously absent.

When David’s darkened house came into sight, Isaac had roused himself enough to sit up straight and keep a respectable few inches between them on Kaffi’s back. In the stable, David had turned the lantern on low, and Isaac led Silver from her stall, dreading the buggy ride home on the dark road. David had fiddled with a curry comb, and they’d stared at each other.

Now it would happen, Isaac had thought. The guilt and accusations. The blame for the sins they’d committed.

But they’d only moved into each other’s arms as if they had a hundred times before. Isaac held David close, Silver’s reins looped over his wrist. “Thank you,” he’d whispered.

David took a deep breath. “I don’t want to wake up from this.” He’d pulled back and pressed their lips together. “Get away tomorrow if you can. They’ll all be visiting. I’ll make an excuse. Mother won’t question me.”

“I’ll try.” The very notion that there would be a tomorrow for them had made him so happy.

David had drawn his fingertips down Isaac’s cheek. “This will be our own little rumspringa. They never have to know.”

A tendril of fear unfurled in Isaac as he’d remembered what they were risking, but he’d pushed it away.

“Isaac!”

He blinked back to attention, jostling against Nathan as the buggy lurched over a dip in the road. His siblings watched him. “Huh?” he asked.

“What’s up with you today?” Ephraim regarded him suspiciously.

“Nothing!” Isaac willed himself not to blush.

“So?” Katie said, watching him expectantly. “What about David?”

“David?” He felt hot under his felt hat and wished he’d worn the straw even if the wind was whipping today.

She rolled her eyes. “Do you like him?”

“Why would I?” Isaac’s heart was like rain beating on the tin roof.

“Is he really good to work for? You’re away so much now we hardly talk to you.” Ephraim leaned in and lowered his voice. “We just want to know what it’s like being off the farm.”

“It’s…good.” Isaac didn’t trust himself to say anything else at the moment.

“One day I’m going to be the teacher,” Katie pronounced.

Nathan laughed. “No way. You have to help Mother at home until you get married.”

Her eyebrows drew together. “It’s not fair I’m the only girl left.”

Giving her cheek a pat, Isaac smiled at Katie. He kept his voice to a whisper. “You’d be a good teacher.”

She beamed with her crooked smile.

There were cakes and pies and happy greetings at the Lapps’, but Isaac quickly stole away to the paddock beyond the barn. Clouds hung heavy, and soon enough he’d see his breath in the air. He glanced back and realized Father and Joseph followed. It seemed he wouldn’t have any peace this day. If he couldn’t be with David, then he wanted to be alone so he could remember every moment they’d shared.

Mr. Lapp greeted him by the fence, watching two horses circle each other. Isaac could see right away it was a stallion and a mare. He could also see the stallion’s engorged cock. It shouldn’t have sent a shiver deep within him, but his blood stirred. Now that he’d experienced that kind of sin with David, he itched for it.

Father frowned. “Isn’t it late in the season for mating?”

Mr. Lapp nodded. “That it is, but we need another foal. We’ll try, at least.”

Father and Joseph took up places by the fence. They all watched in silence, and Father stroked his graying beard. He wore his thick jacket, and it stretched over his belly. Mother would have to make him another soon. With each year Father seemed to grow outward despite the hours of work he did.

Amid a flurry of whinnies and grunts, the stallion mounted the mare. Isaac’s breath came shallowly, and he was surely touched by the devil given the thoughts polluting his mind. It was dangerous, and he wished he could escape to some privacy and relieve the growing pressure.

What would it be like to have David behind him, taking control of him—possessing him? Throat dry, he dug his fingers into the weathered wood of the fence. As surely as the mare was in heat, so was Isaac.

He could imagine himself on his hands and knees, offering himself up. He’d cry out and tremble, and take every inch of David. He remembered the heavy thickness of David’s cock through their pants, and imagined the heat of it inside him like a poker, branding him and—

“Is that sodomy?” Joseph asked.

Isaac almost swallowed his tongue, and coughed roughly. Mr. Lapp slapped him on the back unhelpfully.

At eight, Joseph’s face was still round with baby fat, and his hat almost seemed too big for him. He peered up at Father from beneath the brim. “Eli Hooley said sodomy’s a sin. I didn’t know what it was, and he said it’s what horses do.”

Awkward silence stretched out before Father finally spoke, his words measured and sure. “Horses are free of sin. This is their natural way. It is as God intended.”

Joseph watched the stallion finish and stagger off the mare’s back. “But for people it’s a sin?”

“Yes.”

Isaac’s mind knew the truth of it, but in his soul he couldn’t deny his desire. Bishop Yoder had rarely touched upon the abomination of men lying with men. It seemed to be taken as a given that it was blasphemous, and not something the preachers felt needed repeating. It was the modern, unclean ways of the English with their technology and pride that the preachers railed against.

Father and Joseph drifted away with Mr. Lapp, but Isaac was rooted to his spot by the fence. How could he daydream about entering into an abomination so willingly? With such anticipation and
joy
in him? He should take joy in his family, and the Lord. In his work, and one day in his wife and children.

His stomach soured. For years he’d wondered at his lack of interest in Mary or any other girl. If he’d known this seed of sin was growing in him, waiting to bloom, perhaps he could have cut it down. Salted the earth so it would never grow again.

Had
he known deep down? He wasn’t sure. But knowing and admitting were sometimes as far apart as Zebulon and New York City.

“Isaac! Come and eat something,” Mrs. Lapp called.

“I’ll be right there!” He forced his hands to unclench from the fence. The grooves of the wood had made red marks on his palms.

Last night David had been eager to see him again, tender with his kisses and goodbye. But what if in the gray light of this Sunday, he’d realized they were being crazy? That it was far too dangerous.

Putting one foot after the other, Isaac rejoined the others. The next morning could not come soon enough, and until it did, he could only wonder.

Dread was his companion as Isaac urged Silver faster along the road. The sun wasn’t up and he would be early, but he had to know. Rain pelted the buggy, spraying him from the front and dripping through the roof, rolling off his heavy hat. He shivered and called to Silver to go faster, flicking the reins over her back.

Lanterns glowed from the Lantz house in the gloom, and Mary opened the door to wave as he arrived. Isaac jerked his hand in reply, continuing on to the stable. It was too miserable for Silver to stay outside, and he quickly unharnessed her and pushed the barn door open. In lamplight, David already stood by his worktable, pencil in hand. He wore no hat, and stared at Isaac uncertainly.