I patted the Stetson resting beside me. “I’m just like Bandit,” I tossed out. He stared at me in loss. “Bandit. Smokey and the Bandit. Burt Reynolds?”
“The movie with the black trans am?”
“That’s the one.”
“My father loves that. I’ve never seen it, well, no, I lie. I saw about ten minutes of it once. The guy in the truck ran over motorcycles. So how are you like Bandit?”
Somehow the humor of the joke had faded. “He only took his hat off for…it’s not important.” Christ I was old. What the hell was I doing sitting in this tent, trying to flirt with a man who was literally half my age and didn’t know why Bandit took off his hat?
“You look surly again,” he murmured, peeking at me around a loose strand of hair. “It looks good on you.”
“My hat?”
“No, well, yes, the hat, and the surly.” He smiled softly then lowered his head as he went back to work. My dick liked the compliment. Okay so maybe sitting here flirting with a man half my age wasn’t totally stupid. “Do you secretly love my bun?”
“Nope.” That made him snort in amusement. I turned my head away to smile. The work was tedious, which normally didn’t bother me. I enjoyed such things or else my career in banking would have been short lived. It was the proximity of Bishop that was messing with my head. He was incredibly science-geeky with his glasses on, yet the bun and the sun-kissed surfer skin was an amazing juxtaposition that kept me tuned into him. The way he breathed, the rich scent of coconut, the brush of an arm. Thirty minutes into the “work session” and I had entered ten lines of data at the most. “Jesus Christ,” I muttered.
His gaze lifted from his tablet, the blue striking. The tent grew hot, sticky, oppressive. “Problem?”
My eyes moved from his dirty face to a dried fleck of plaster in his hair. Why I reached out to grab and tug the tiny bit free I cannot say. Nor could I ever give a rational explanation for why, when his breath hitched and his pupils grew, did I card my fingers into the mess of gold and wheat. Maybe if Bishop hadn’t taken the reins so perfectly I might have been able to pull back. But that small assertive move knocked the pins out from under me. His mouth claimed mine. No toying or teasing. A claiming that surprised the hell out of me and knocked out the weak supports holding up the walls around my desires.
With a grunt, his tongue slipped between my lips as we tumbled backward onto the air mattress. My heart thundered as he stroked my tongue with his.
Yes, yes, fucking hell yes!
He kissed me with a passion and boldness that made my balls ache. No sooner had my back hit the mattress, I shoved my fingers upward, shaking out the bun. He groaned into my mouth. My cock throbbed. I shifted a little and perfect alignment occurred. His hard cock ground against mine. There was no coming back from this now. I now knew the taste of him and the feel of his long, hard body pressing down on mine. Holding his head tightly, we licked and lapped at each other. His teeth clamped onto my lower lip. I sucked in a lungful of air as I teetered dangerously close to blowing a nut right then and there. Hooking a leg around him, I rolled my hips and was rewarded with a growling huff of pleasure. How a man this young could know how to dominate as he did was beyond me, but I basked in his domineering kisses. They went on and on, both of us hot and breathless, cocks rigid and straining. Lost in the glory of a man who knew what I wanted, what I needed, I almost begged for him to do more. To let me please him in ways that I’d not pleased a man in years. Since Devon. Her laughing eyes appeared then, and I stiffened, pushed, and shoved until he was lying on his back stunned, and I was scrabbling to my feet. I fell out of the tent, one knee taking the brunt of the fall.
“Fuck,” I gasped, stumbling to my boots. I looked around the dig site like a frantic stag bolting from the hounds. Then he was there, beside me, blue eyes wide with worry, lips pink and puffy, sunny hair loose around his face. His glasses were cockeyed.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered as he handed me my hat. “I shouldn’t have done that. Forced myself on you…”
“You didn’t force anything. I wanted you to kiss me, to pin me down, to make me feel again.” He drew back, obviously shocked at the confession. He couldn’t have been more surprised than I was, yet there it was. The truth. “I think I need some air.”
“Yeah, sure. I am sorry. I just…ever since we met there was this vibe and I, well, are you okay?”
“I’ll be fine. There was a vibe. Is. There is a vibe.” I desperately wanted to touch him again. It had been years since a kiss had done to me what that meeting of the lips had. I ripped my sight from his face and looked out over the vast Wyoming land. “Let’s ride.”
“Okay.” He adjusted his glasses after placing my hat on my head. I had no idea what to say to him, or even why I’d asked him along, but once we were seated and his arms were around me, it didn’t seem to matter. Why, who, what, where. I was feeling something. Something bright and warm. I’d forgotten how incredible the first rush of attraction was.
We bounded along, him tight to my back, for about fifteen minutes until we parked on top of a soft rise that looked down over the creek bed and dig site. Night was settling over us like a cool black coat. A few stars began to twinkle and wink. I cut the engine and the silence of night descended. Bishop rested his chin on my shoulder. My jittery stomach flip-flopped.
“I hear spring peepers,” he whispered.
“From a small watering hole close by,” I replied, twisting my head to look at him. He smiled. My whole being began to hum like a tuning fork. “I want to kiss you again.”
“Do it.”
I did. It was awkward and rather silly, but I managed to put my mouth on his. It was a sweet kiss, nothing like the mad passionate groping session back in the tent but just as powerful. I wiggled free, easing out from between his legs, and walked to the back of the Polaris to gather my thoughts.
“Tell me about yourself,” I said, my attention on the night sky. The four-wheeler moved as he climbed off. I felt him beside me, bicep to bicep, his fingers toying with mine. “Are you seeing someone?”
“No, no one. There hasn’t been a someone for about a year. I’m not sure what you want to hear,” he admitted, his pinkie hooking with mine, as our asses rested on the rack that held my rifle.
“Anything you want to tell me. I need to know something.”
“Well, I’m not a serial killer.” He settled in beside me, pinkies still connected. “I was born and raised in California by a single mom, the best mom in the world, Diane. I have a twin brother who lives in Reseda, his name is Armie, short for Armand, and he works in the film industry as a makeup artist. He and his boyfriend have a nice little house and a pug dog named Alphonse.”
“You and your twin are gay?” I asked, eager to learn about him and not talk about me.