Six Degrees of Lust (39 page)

Sam did his best to remain calm. “Did you understand what

he was talking about? That part about getting hard. Did you

know what it meant?”

“Yeah, but I told Dad I didn’t know what he was talking about

because it was so embarrassing… He was so mad at me…”

“Did he hit you?”

“No. When we got to the house he took me to his room and

made me watch a movie with him.”

“What was the movie about?”

Sam had such a bad feeling about the whole thing that he

couldn’t stop his question from coming out as a growl, but the

last thing he expected to hear was that his brother-in-law had

made Nicky watch porn so that he’d learn how to fuck.

Steven was such a piece of shit. Sam wanted to kill him.

Sam turned sideways and looked at Nicky in the eye. It was

very important the kid saw Sam wasn’t mad at him, while he

explained how his mom had tried to talk to Steven and apparently

gotten beaten for daring to interfere.

“Did he hit you?” Sam asked his nephew again.

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“Yeah…He said I was supposed to fuck girls and I’d better

get on it, but I knew I didn’t want to be with girls like that.”

“Make love. That’s how you say it. You didn’t want to make

love to girls.” He took a deep breath. “The movie he showed

you… Look, that’s not how things really happen between a man

and a woman, champ. Those movies are meant to arouse people

and… Well, make them experience sexual release in a quick way.

It can be impressive and being eleven I can understand how you’d

feel disgusted by looking at them, but—”

“But I didn’t. The lady was yuck… but the guy… his wiener

was so big. I couldn’t stop looking at it.”

Nicky’s eyes opened as big as saucers and his cheeks flushed

to an angry shade of red the second the words came out of his

mouth. Obviously it’d been a slip of the tongue.

“It’s okay, champ,” Same reassured him. “No need to be

embarrassed.”

“Dad says it isn’t right to look at boys,” he whispered, tears

rolling down his cheeks. It broke Sam’s heart to see him struggle

with what his dad said, what he was learning from being around

Sam and Logan and most likely his own nature. “So… Can you

set that date for me?”

“With a girl?” Nicky nodded and wiped his nose with the

back of his hand. “I thought you didn’t like those play dates.”

“I don’t. But maybe if I go Mom will stop crying and she’ll

like me again… she doesn’t talk to me much anymore. I think it’s

because I haven’t had sex yet.”

“Do you want to?” Sam asked carefully, choosing to ignore the

overuse of the word “fuck” and any of its variations for the time

being. More important things were at stake here. Like the fact

that his nephew was trying to fit into his mother’s expectations.

“I don’t think so.”

“Then you don’t have to.” Sam chose not to ask the boy if he

had any interest in boys. He already knew the answer, and after

their talk he could wait for confirmation on that. Nicky would tell

278 Taylor V. Donovan

him whenever he was ready.

“Not even for Mom?”

Sam looked at the ceiling, and for the first time in years he

prayed. He prayed for the right words and for the wisdom to

guide Nicky through such a difficult time and the strength to not

strangle his sister.

“Here’s the deal. Your mom already chose her path. I know

you love her and it hurts that she isn’t talking much nowadays,

but she isn’t talking to me either, so don’t take it personal just yet,

okay?” He waited until Nicky nodded before continuing. “You

have a right to choose your path too, and you can take all the

time in the world to do so if that’s what you need. In due time

you’ll figure out who you are and what you want and once that

happens, don’t ever feel like you have to change. Ever. Especially

not to please anybody, because you have a right to be accepted

and loved just the way you are today… and the way you’ll be in

ten years. You have a right to be your own person and happy,

even if some people disagree with your choices.”

“Like my parents.”

“Like your parents… like society… But for what it’s worth,

you’ll always have me, kiddo.”

Sam was expecting a hug, but what he got was a sound kiss

on the cheek. Nicky hadn’t kissed him in years, and it made Sam

want to cry.

“Forget about the date, okay?” His nephew settled down next

to him. “I don’t think I want to do it anymore.”

“Thank God. I don’t have any friends with daughters your

age.”

Sam pulled the comforter and covered them both with it.

That night he wasn’t sending Nicky to his bed. It would do his

nephew good to feel Sam was there for him, and it’d do Sam

good to have a reminder of what was really important in life.

August 7, 2009

New York City

Emiko Takahashi had been crazy about technology and

electronic gadgets since she was a little girl. There wasn’t a TV,

radio, VCR, or small appliance in her parents’ house she hadn’t

taken apart. She moved on to alarm and surveillance systems

when she was fourteen, and by the time she turned seventeen

computers were, indisputably, the love of her life.

She could build them from scratch. She could debug,

troubleshoot, and maintain them. Programming code was

a language she read, wrote, and spoke as fluently as English

and Japanese, and she had yet to come across a password or

information security software she couldn’t crack or bypass.

But out of it all, the internet was her favorite thing in the

entire world. Thanks to the global system of interconnected

networks, a vast, infinite world of information and knowledge

was at the tip of her fingers. For those who knew where to look,

there was nothing that couldn’t be found.

Familiar with every trick in the book, and having invented

a few of them herself, it went without saying that Mik knew

where to look. At times the process could be slow, like whenever

the information she was looking for didn’t seem to exist. It was

frustrating when that was the case, as often lives depended on

what she could find, but she never gave up because she loved

a good challenge; and because winning meant helping her team

catch bad guys such as Lev, who, in her opinion, was one of the

most evil they’d encountered in a while.

She typed a few commands and started a new search on

two different computers, hoping this time she’d find anything

that would help them with the case. Then she walked to the

280 Taylor V. Donovan

snack station and grabbed a banana and a glass of water before

returning to her chair.

A few red highlighted words on one of her computers

grabbed her attention.

“Whoa.”

She put the banana down, cleaned her hands with a wet

wipe, and used the mouse to stop the search. Words like burn,

hell, lesson, teach, repent, and salvation repeated themselves

numerous times in several entries on what seemed to be a blog at

a public forum, and a quick visual scan told her she might have

found something after all.

“Jackpot.”

Turning to her third computer she typed the name of the blog

and waited to see what Soldier of God was about. By the time

she finished reading the second entry, her blood was running

cold.

August 12, 2009

Houston, Texas

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Date: August 12, 2009

Subject: Ever been to Miami?

You remember telling me about all those plans you have

to eventually come out to the world and live happily ever

after? How you want to learn to be out with a guy? Well,

“darling,” do I have the perfect opportunity for you to

put your money where your mouth is.

My best friend and I were scheduled to take a vacation

together but work interfered. We were going to cancel

but then I thought, hey, it’s South Beach. It doesn’t get

gayer than that. Sun, white sand beaches, and hot boys

galore. Possibilities are endless. You really want to

experience the scene? Then you’ll come with me.

It’s three days longer than our agreement, but if we

get sick of each other you can always take off on your

own. Wednesday to Sunday, getting there on the 26th.

Need response ASAP. Are you game?

“Shit.” Mac minimized his email program and got up from

his chair, only to come back to his desk and shut the computer

off altogether. “There. If I don’t see you I don’t have to deal

with you.”

He stepped back from the desk, desperate to put as much

distance as possible between himself and the machine, because

282 Taylor V. Donovan

at that particular moment it represented some serious hazard to

his emotional balance.

“Shit.”

He put on a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, and his flip flops and

grabbed his gym bag from a corner of his bedroom floor. Two

minutes later he was in his truck and on the way to the gym, but

not even doing seventy-five on the highway helped him leave

behind the words he’d read only a few minutes ago.

He turned up the volume on his truck’s radio and drummed

his fingers on the steering wheel, keeping the beat with AC/

DC’s “Highway to Hell” in an attempt to distract himself from

that one question that kept repeating itself in his mind; “Are you

game?”

Mac couldn’t remember having such a strong, visceral reaction

to anything else in his life. He couldn’t remember a single time

when he’d wanted something so badly his knee jerk reaction to

possibly getting it had been to run from it as far as he could.

“I’m on the Hiiiiiiiiighway to Heeeell… Highwaaaaay to

heeell…”

He wasn’t the best singer out there, but that didn’t stop him

from belting out the song. Then he had to laugh at how very fitting

the lyrics were to his current dilemma. Sam had him so confused,

Mac just couldn’t tell heads from tails on this arrangement of

theirs anymore, and if he didn’t sort it out soon the whole thing

was bound to turn into a goddamn nightmare.

On the surface things appeared to be proceeding according

to plan. Sam made sure they never forgot it was all about the sex

and that they stuck to their weekly two phone calls and one video

chat session. Very cut and dry.

Except that it wasn’t.

The phone calls sometimes lasted up to three hours or were

replaced by video chat sessions just as long. They forwarded

jokes via text message to each other and exchanged unlimited

emails with their answers to a never ending game of twenty

questions. There were regular text messages of a sexual nature

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and short phone calls at any given time to discuss a hook up date

or reschedule a phone call.

During their weekly online sessions they’d talked about things

they wanted to try and things they did or didn’t like. They’d watch

the same TV show or movie and discuss it, play online games,

and even share links of places they wanted to go at some point.

They’d taken virtual tours of Alaska, a place Sam wanted to visit

so that he could see the Aurora Borealis, and Bora Bora, the

island Mac wanted to visit because he loved Polynesian culture.

It was never easy to get Sam to talk, but if he got going, it

was a pleasure to listen to him. He never stopped being a hard-

ass who insisted on having rules and sticking to them, but a few

times he’d found a very logical way to bypass them, leading Mac

to believe Sam actually liked talking to him.

So far they’d only had a rendezvous that lasted a little over

twenty-four hours, but they’d made good use of that time. Mac

had gotten the most amazing blow job ever the moment Sam got

in his truck, and several hours later, at the hotel, the sexy guy had

let him pour chocolate syrup all over his chiseled body and every

orifice he could reach, then lick it off. Mac was still congratulating

himself for having Remy prepare a breakfast basket for them and

adding milk and chocolate so that Sam could have his fix.

The sex kept getting better, and Mac wasn’t as much in control

of this “friends with benefits” business as he thought he’d be,

which was the reason why he was freaking out over the thought

of going to fucking South Beach together.

For five days.

How the hell was he supposed to be around the guy for so

long and stick to his part of their deal when Sam was turning

out to be the kind of man Mac could admire and respect? The

kind of man he’d always wanted for himself? He knew he

couldn’t go down that road. It wasn’t the right time for him and

it had heartbreak written all over it, as it was obvious love and