Timber Lake (The Snowy Range Series, #2) (15 page)

“When they don’t?”

Patting his holster, Michael rolled his eyes, making it clear that there was a solution to that problem. He did not look apologetic about it. Sonny swallowed back a
you’ve got to be kidding me
response because obviously the warden wasn’t... kidding. Sometimes it was hard to tell with Michael. The longer they were together, the undercurrent of aggressiveness and suppressed anger seemed to fade, replaced by the kind of good-natured, relaxed banter that long-time friends used. His sisters had called it “bro stuff” when they’d instructed him on the finer points of male bonding.

Personally, he’d never really bought into the
mano a mano
alpha crap that defined how too many of his professional colleagues and male acquaintances related to one another. He preferred the solitude of his work or the company of one or two close friends, most of whom happened to be female.

Big surprise there. With a clan of earth goddesses raising him up, he was more than comfortable in the company of women. With men he was much more reserved, never going beyond casual, even with his few and far between hookups. That was the trouble with comfort zones—they succored you, made life predictable and predictable made it easy, pleasant even. But when something, or someone, breached your defenses, it could lead to chaos. And disappointment.

Watching Michael move with cool efficiency, organizing their gear and barely breaking a sweat reminded him that he was still treading new territory when it came to putting how he felt about the man into its proper cubbyhole. He’d managed to trip over the like part and fell immediately into lust. But that lust had somehow morphed into a near obsession—craving the man and not just physically. He wanted to be around the warden, to understand what made him tick, to engage in word-play and wicked innuendo. Holding him close at night, their bodies wrapped around each other and hands clasped together, seemed as natural as breathing.

Michael’s puffs of air on his ear, the light snores and possessive touches, the way he watched him out of the corner of his eye, making sure he was safe. Lust didn’t build that kind of connection. But something else did.

He had a word for it. A dangerous word, a word that would make or break the very fragile bond they were forging. For now, he didn’t require that word. Instead, he had a fallback position, one where he had tumbled into a world of like for Michael Brooks. Like was a less complicated state of being, less demanding, less of a commitment. The question was... would it be enough?

And if he were honest, sometimes the warden scared him to death. He’d never met anyone quite like him: self-contained, completely self-sufficient, assertive without being cocky... much. You had to earn his trust, though he commanded it of everyone around him. Michael Brooks came complete with a granite wall hiding the real man and a mercurial temperament you toyed with at your peril.

He also harbored secrets...

The most obvious secret, to Sonny, was that his warden cared. And Michael was probably the last person on earth who would admit it. The sum of all those disparate traits made him dangerous. He’d already proven to be hazardous to Sonny’s heart, putting him in a precarious spot because they weren’t in the Garden of Eden, suspended outside of time and the demands of civilization. At some point, they were going to have to come to grips about what happened next. Not necessarily the future, but the day after and the one after that, the near term shit that usually just rolled along without requiring a big investment in energy.

Sonny thought back to his sisters and the
will he call, why hasn’t he called
drama of young women on the cusp of having their hearts broken and self-esteem destroyed. Was that the way it worked between two guys who found satisfaction fucking each other blind? Or was there more to it?

Will he call? Will I?

When they finally left the wilderness and their cocoon of intimacy, which man was going to ride out on the big red horse? Would it be the angry guide who rode in, resentful and unpleasant, determined to do the job assigned him but only at the expense of a commitment and sense of pride. Or would it be the gentle, caring lover who cushioned a greenhorn from making the kind of mistakes that broke a man.

And it wasn’t just about Michael. Sonny couldn’t be sure who
he
was anymore. He’d been more than a little disconcerted going alpha-dom on the warden by doing a crazy Ivan and taking charge, rocketing them both into orbit. He’d surprised himself, not so much because he’d revealed that part of his long-buried personality, but because he’d enjoyed it, a lot. The flip-flop in their roles hadn’t fazed Michael at all... or at least he never said anything to indicate it unnerved him. On the contrary, Sonny was pretty sure his warden got his rocks off when stripped of choices and commanded to obey. But only if he was in the mood.

Deep down, Sonny knew that Michael’s occasional submission was a gift. He’d allowed himself to be vulnerable, and it hadn’t come easy. That shift in power between them was fluid, volatile and intoxicating because Michael came with a sidecar of quid pro quos and addenda. And the warden was very reluctant to allow access to the vault of discovery that constituted the shadow man. The few glimpses Michael awarded Sonny hadn’t quenched his curiosity, but rather it had piqued his interest such that his preoccupation nearly drove all other considerations out of his head—like his mandate to collect environmental data and the career opportunities waiting for him on the other side of the continent.

Michael Brooks had blinkered him to anything other than the next fix, the next touch, the next penetration, with its release and screams of ecstasy. He craved the electricity sparking between them. He lusted shamelessly for Michael to fill him with power and passion, driving him to the edge, then denying him the pleasure of breaking apart until his body worshiped at the altar of madness.

In his musings, Sonny recognized that the inconsistencies and holes in his logic were not-so-subtle reminders that Michael Brooks and the wilderness he called home carried their own set of rules, and those rules had nothing to do with the intimacy they had forged within the strange bubble of private acts that were dirty and pure and consensual to the point of no return.

He muttered, “I really need to know how the hell this works,” and jumped when Michael answered, “It’ll fucking work better if you get your ass in gear, Tex. I need to see if that stream’s got dinner waiting under a rock, or if we’re going to be faced with another meal of dehydrated mystery meat.”

Feeling more than a little unhinged from the thoughts racing through his head, Sonny welcomed the chance at a distraction. He desperately needed it, because the last thing he wanted was to push Michael in a direction neither of them was prepared to go. And right that moment, the only filter keeping him from spewing his feelings and ruining everything they’d built in so short a time was standing on the ledge hammering pitons into solid rock.

Ranger George had said,
don’t piss him off
. Sonny wasn’t sure why that sounded like good advice then and now, but instinct convinced him he’d do more than create hard feelings if he jumped the gun with emo shit, putting Michael on the spot. Forcing the issue. Trust got built slowly. When you lost it, it was with a monumental crash. And out here, in the wilderness, it was trust and having a man’s back that got you through the days and the nights. Friendship was an added bonus. The rest was just details.

Michael paused mid-swing, his eyes darting in Sonny’s direction, the expression on his face contemplative, even bordering on the edge of threatening.

Sonny gulped out, “What?”

“Nothing.” He held the piton up with finger and thumb, twirling it around.

Sonny wondered,
What is he? Psychic?

“Just thinking... I have a few extra of these.”

Okay, I’ll bite.
“So?”

“You ever see a St. Andrews Cross?”

“Um.”
Oh hell, no. Yes. No. Wait... what?
“What’s the question?”

There was that grin again. The evil Michael trademark, the one that promised Sonny would be singing the Hallelujah chorus before the night was out.

Grabbing the water buckets, Sonny managed to husk, “Water. I’ll see to getting us some water.”

“You do that, Tex. I just have one more thing to do.” Michael’s voice left it at a question mark.  The inflection was there, so was the challenge...
Come on, Tex, ask me what I need to do. You know you want to.

Rising to the bait, Sonny took a nibble but refused to get hooked. He growled, “
Maybe
I’ll help you when I get back.” He swallowed the smug follow-up—
not before, and then it’s on my terms, Warden, not yours—
as he stalked toward the lake, because
don’t piss him off
still sounded like really good advice.

Michael called after Sonny’s retreating back, “But you don’t know what I plan to do.”

Sonny turned around and glared at the self-satisfied smirk on Michael’s face. “I know exactly what you plan, Warden.”

“Really. How about you tell me, Tex, just so we’re both on the same page.”

Chuckling, Sonny barked, “You’re gonna need help in figuring out where the extra pole goes.”

“Oh, I already know where it goes, Tex. Question is... this time... do you?”

Sweet Jesus.

****

M
ichael finished strapping the hobbles on the mule. He’d selected a standard western figure eight latigo leather strap stabilized with a thick connecting doubled length of leather on a swivel. It was a single buckle, easy on, easy off system that restricted movement while grazing, though clever horses and mules soon learned how to motor at speed by hopping. That meant they could still put some distance between you and them when they had a mind to, but at least they wouldn’t end up in the next state before you went looking for them in the morning.

When he stood up, he shooed Spot in Sonny’s direction and watched him amble after the tall man swinging his water buckets. The mule handled the device with exaggerated care, not flipping out. Michael decided to turn their small herd loose while they had some light, just on a trial basis. He still planned on keeping them restricted to the highline overnight until he was sure they got the concept of this meadow being home away from home.

After grabbing his fishing rod and tackle box, he headed upstream, circling behind Sonny and the parade of critters following him. He wasn’t fooling about needing something fresh to eat. They’d decided to use the water from the stream rather than the lake given the potential for additional hot springs being in the area. Just because the upper section didn’t reek wasn’t worth the risk of developing stomach problems from a high mineral content.

Clearly it wasn’t toxic, otherwise Mr. Beaver and his family wouldn’t be thriving, but it was better safe than running for the woods with a shovel and a grimace. Been there, done that. Rode chafed for a week.

By the time he’d found a small pool that looked promising, the sun had set behind the mountains. It would stay light until nearly nine at that altitude, especially since the trees were less dense thanks to the engineering required to build the dam. Even so, his window of opportunity was rapidly shrinking.

As he settled into the soothing rhythm of casting, Michael blanketed his busy thoughts with nothing more than the sound of the rushing water and the drift of cool air across the back of his neck. Despite the calm of late evening casting its spell, it wasn’t enough to stay a moment of introspection accompanied by a side dish of doubt.

He recognized the
too good to be true
cautionary flag his brain raised, while at the same time his heart continued to beat double time whenever he looked at or thought about his lover. The fact that Sonny had assumed such a place of importance in his life was a clear indication he was getting in deep. What remained to be seen was if he’d gotten in over his head.

Nothing about their situation was natural. They’d been thrown together to do a job, and probably the last thing either of them had anticipated was having attraction come along as a hitchhiker. Now he was faced with feelings and cravings he had no clue how to deal with. He’d gotten to this place in his life where he appreciated the status of ‘good enough for now,’ not looking to the future. Living on the edge like he did meant he couldn’t be sure he had one.

Seamus Rydell had turned everything he understood on its ear. All he ever wanted was a purpose in life—standing between the wild places he loved and the people who would destroy it deliberately or through sins of omission or willful misunderstanding. Greed and ignorance were his enemies. Solitude had been his friend.

Until Sonny, he’d embraced a form of emotional stasis, tolerating the consequences of that type of solitary confinement because the alternatives were too harsh to contemplate. Tex had smashed that zone of tranquility into a million mirrored shards, each of them sharp enough to saw through his defenses until he was voluntarily exposing his most intimate self to a man he’d known for only a few short days.

Was it possible that the boy who’d never felt loved had finally found a way to ask for it? Perhaps the better question was... was Mister Zero the right one to ask?

The snap on the line jerked Michael out of his reverie. Content with the prospect of fresh fish for dinner, he muttered, “First order of survival... eat. Fish now, worry about where to put the other pole later.”

****

S
onny set the yellow LED lantern on a rock. It illuminated the equivalent of a fifty watt bulb without attracting flying insects. He quickly shed his clothes and boots and waded into the steaming water.

Michael followed behind him, moaning, “God, this feels fantastic. What’s the temp?”

Sonny consulted his thermometer. “Hundred and two here, but it’s pretty shallow and we’re a fair distance from the source. Good thing you insisted on scouting it out. If it had been me, I’d have just dove in any old place. Might not have been my finer moment since I don’t fancy being parboiled.” He sank onto his heels, letting his skin adjust to the sharp difference between the chilly air and the heat of the water.