Special Delivery: Special Delivery, Book 1 (26 page)

When Mitch returned, he pulled out his phone and placed a call to a service station. Then, for the first time since Sam had started riding with him, Mitch turned on his CB.

“This is Blue, sitting on 95 heading north into Sin City. Anybody got their ears on?”

There was a silence, then static, and then a faint voice said, “Roger, Blue. This is Razor Baiter. What’s your pleasure?”

“Nothing,” Mitch replied. “I let go a pair of alligators here, and I’m downed. No granny lane, and no shoulder, either, so keep your eyes peeled.”

“Ten-four, Blue,” Razor Baiter said. “You need a 10-34?”

“I’m called in, thanks.”

“Blue?” This was a new voice on the CB, and Mitch stiffened at the sound of it. “Well, well, Old Man. Here I thought you were dead. You headed for the dice, are you?”

Mitch’s whole body tensed as he replied. “I’m dropping off then bundling out for L.A., Skeet.”

“I’ll look for you.” Skeet’s voice flowed like wicked silk over the crackling CB.

“I see you up ahead, Blue,” Razor Baiter said. “Can I leave anything for you? Bottle of Jack? Couple of girly mags to keep you company?”

Skeet laughed. “You’re a green apple, aren’t you, Razor, if you’re offering that to Blue. It’s a good buddy he’s after, but knowing him, he’s already got himself a buffalo. Ain’t that right, Old Man?”

“Spread the word about the bubble trouble, boys. This is Blue, over and out.”

Mitch snapped off the radio without listening for a reply. Then he locked the doors, killed the engine and climbed back toward Sam.

He lifted him up and nudged him into the shower, and he stayed there while he turned on the spray, aiming it at Sam. Sam let Mitch lather him, rinsing away the mud, dirt, blood and rocks, and then he let Mitch lead him over to the bed. He lay there, silent, while Mitch took a shower of his own, and he didn’t move, not even when Mitch came and sat beside him naked on the bed. Mitch’s hand rested on his bare ass, and Sam’s heart kicked a beat when Mitch spoke.

“I’ve picked up guys before.”

Sam opened his eyes and stared at the wall, listening.

“I’ve picked them up at truck stops, and by the side of the road. I’ve taken them to the next town or across the country. I used to do it a lot, so much that when other truckers saw me, they’d call out on the CB, asking if Old Blue had somebody along to blow his horn. Because I’d pick them up, and I always fucked them.” He stroked Sam once, then pulled his hand away. “And I did it with Randy.”

Sam held still, not sure he wanted to hear this.

“What you said to me that first night in North Platte was pretty much what I always did. I played games with them. The games got kinkier and kinkier as the years went on. Eventually Randy got into the act too, the two of us riding together and picking guys up, and the games got more and more wild, and more intense, and then, finally, somebody got hurt.”

“Hurt?” Sam echoed.

Mitch blanched. “Not—Jesus. Not
hurt
. Just feelings.” He grimaced. “But it was ugly, and it tore me up. I swore we were done, and we were. I never picked up anybody again, not for two years.” His hand on Sam’s hip stroked sadly. “Until I picked you up.”

He pulled away and faced the front of the cab, bending forward to rest his elbows on his knees.

“I’m not a real nice guy, Sam. Not usually. I’m gruff, and I’m rough, and I don’t have many friends. I get in more fights than conversations. The only time I’m charming is when I want a job or want to fuck somebody, and even then I think it’s probably a dubious claim. It’s why I do cross-country drives, and why I don’t turn on the CB anymore except for what I just did.” He sank forward deeper onto his knees. “When I take you into Vegas, if I take you around for more than a drive through town, we’re going to run into people I know, who know what I am. When they see you, they’ll think you’re one of those boys. My special deliveries, they called them. But you aren’t that, Sunshine. You
aren’t
.”

Sam turned over and faced Mitch, who sat blue-shrouded and miserable in the dark. “What am I, then?”

“Damned if I know.” He ran a hand through his hair. “You scare the shit out of me, Sam, and the way you keep looking at me cuts me up. I know it’s my fault, and I keep trying to fix it, but I broke it, didn’t I? So you might as well know the truth. What I did to you, what I almost did there in the rain, when I hit you, knocked you down, over the
edge
—” He broke off.

“You didn’t hit me on purpose.”

“I about died when I realized what I’d done.” Mitch trembled. “And then there I was, fucking you raw—
shit.
”

Sam pushed up onto his elbow, then winced because it hurt. He lay back down and reached for Mitch. “I told you to do that. I begged you for it.”

“You’re not them.” Mitch looked almost sick. “You aren’t them, but I keep making you that way.”

“Mitch, I wanted you to fuck me. It hurt, but I didn’t want you to stop. I wanted it. I’ve wanted everything you’ve done to me.”

“You’re not them,” Mitch insisted angrily. “You’re not
him
.”

“Will he be there? Randy?”

“That was him on the radio.”

Sam glanced at the front of the cab, as if an echo of the man might still be there. It had been a mistake to come. He wished they could leave. If the tires weren’t blown, Mitch would go. This was his fault, for insisting.

Yet if they didn’t face this, nothing would ever be okay.

What’s there to be okay?
a dark voice inside him whispered.
What sort of future outside of more fucking do you think the two of you have?

Sam shifted uncomfortably on the bed.

Mitch sank forward so far his head was nearly between his knees. “I’m too old for this.”

Sam tugged at Mitch’s bare arm. He realized Mitch wore only a towel, and that he himself had on nothing at all. “Lie with me.” He tugged again. “Come lie with me, Mitch.”

Mitch came, reluctant, and Sam wrapped the sheet around them, pushing away the towel so they were pressed skin to skin. He kissed Mitch’s chest, his neck and his mouth, coaxing him open, stealing inside as his hands roved over the other man’s body, shaping it, feeling it. He explored Mitch’s arms, his sides, his pecs and his belly, moved on to his hips, and finally, his cock. Mitch stroked him back and kissed him, but though the heat built up between them, it never crested, just kept a slow, steady burn, until they both grew weary and simply pressed their foreheads together, their hands slowing to gentle skims, until they stopped entirely.

They lay silent in the dark, waiting for morning, listening to the thunder and the rain as the storm played out across the desert.

Mitch’s transformation began with the arrival of the service truck.

Once again Mitch was gone when Sam woke, except today he came into consciousness to the sudden banging that turned out to be the huge portable jack hefting up the end of the trailer before Mitch and the tow truck driver wrestled two new tires into place. Sam hurried into pants and took his shoes and T-shirt with him on the way out the door, eager to be out of the unsteady vehicle. This was his first mistake.

The tow truck operator saw Sam first. Sam was so barely dressed his pants weren’t even buttoned, and he gave the tow truck driver an awkward wave as he hopped on the rocks to put on his shoes. The man gave Sam a disgusted look and returned to tightening lug nuts on the first tire. When Mitch came around, he saw Sam and flinched.

Sam tugged his T-shirt over his head and tried not to notice. When the jack shifted and the trailer shuddered, though, he hopped the rail he’d fallen over the night before, putting some distance between himself and the vehicle. But he didn’t get twenty feet away before Mitch saw him.

“Careful, Sam,” he called out. “There’s scorpions and snakes out there.”

Sam yelped and headed to the trailer.

“See you had some takeout from pickle park,” the tow truck driver remarked as Sam went by.

Mitch’s grip on his wrench fumbled as he aimed it at the next nut. “Sam’s a friend.” Mitch’s tone suggested the conversation should end now.

The mechanic snorted. “Yeah, I bet he’s a real good buddy.”

For some reason, this made Mitch even angrier, and for a horrible moment Sam thought Mitch was going to use the wrench on the guy. But he said and did nothing, and Sam hurried around to the front of the truck, where he remained out of sight, trying not to think about how badly he had to piss. When they lowered the trailer, Mitch came up front to the cab.

“Get in,” he said, and Sam did quickly. He headed straight for the bathroom, and while he was using it, the engine started, and Mitch took them off toward Vegas. Sam washed up, came out, dithered a moment, then unplugged his phone from its charger and surfed. It took him a few minutes, but he found a Wikipedia entry for CB slang. He looked up buffalo and pickle park, and more by accident than anything, good buddy, which apparently didn’t mean what it used to mean from the 80s’ trucker movies.

Ah.
Sam plugged the phone in, grabbed a mineral water from the fridge and headed to the front of the cab. He sat down, drank a little, then decided this would be better faced head-on.

“You know,” Sam said, as carefully as he could, “it’s not like it’s a lie.”

Mitch glanced at him, still ruffled. “What’s not?”

“What they said about me on the radio, and what that guy said. You didn’t pick me up at a rest stop, but surely a truck stop is close. And while I’m not exactly a prostitute—”

“It’s not the same.”

“Well, it’s splitting hairs, from where I sit. I don’t care.”

“
I
care.” Mitch glared at him. “It’s not what you are.”

This was last night’s argument again, and it was dangerous territory.
Am I your boyfriend, then?
He couldn’t ask that, even though he wanted to, because it felt ridiculous, especially after yesterday.

Sam propped his feet on the dash and retreated into his bottle of water. The endless desert gave way to small mountains cropping up in the distance. “This is why you kept me in the cab all the time when you loaded and unloaded. You didn’t want anyone to see me.”

Mitch didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Yes.”

Sam’s hand tightened on his bottle. “Fuck. I’d rather be known as your piece on the side than your great big secret.”

“You’re not—” Mitch cut himself off and reached for his cigarettes.

“I’m not a secret? I’m not your
buffalo
or your
good buddy
or your
pickle
thing, whatever they called it? What the fuck
am
I?”

“You’re Sam.” Mitch lit his cigarette.

“This is so fucked.” Sam threw up his hands. “What the hell
do
you want me to be?” Sam gestured at the city beginning to open up before them, just the start of the suburbs. “Why did you bring me here? Do I have to hide the whole time in Las Vegas too?”

“I don’t know.” Mitch put out his barely smoked cigarette and lit another one.

Sam swore, unbuckled his belt and headed through the curtain, ignoring his first entrance to Las Vegas entirely.

He got into the shower as Mitch pulled off the road and toward the warehouse. Sam took his time, doing his hair and primping, swearing at his lack of clean clothing. He needed a washer and a dryer. Climbing into his mud-caked jeans, he stuck his head out the driver’s side window and glanced around, hoping to see a Walmart or somewhere he could buy something different to wear.

“I knew they were wrong.”

A familiar voice drifted up at Sam from below. Sam looked down, surprised, and found a dark-haired, wiry, slightly greasy man wearing a black T-shirt, black jeans and black motorcycle boots leering up at him. “I heard the rumor Mitch had cleaned up his nose, but it’s good to see some things never change. What’s your name, honey?”

Sam felt somehow he should be embarrassed, but this guy was so outrageous he couldn’t manage it. “My name’s Sam.”

Then the puzzle pieces clicked, and even before the man spoke, Sam knew what he was going to say.

“Good to meet you, Sam.” The man’s face lit up in a wicked grin. “My name is Randy.”

Chapter Eighteen

The little bastard, standing in front of him after all this time. This was Mitch’s Randy. The man who kept fucking up Sam’s life.

Sam tried not to let his nervousness show. “Hello.”

The man laughed, a deep belly rumble that tingled Sam’s insides. “You’re a pretty one, Sam. You and Mitch heading to the Watering Hole after he unloads?”

“I have no idea.” Sam glanced down at himself and suppressed a shudder at the sight of his pants. “I hope to hell we’re heading to a laundromat, or a mall.”

“I can take you shopping, baby. You climb on down here, and we’ll take a little ride.”

This wasn’t so bad, actually. Randy was more over the top than scary, so far. “I don’t even know you, except you’re the guy from the CB last night, the one who made Mitch mad.”

“Oh, I usually do,” Randy agreed. “But yeah, that was me. Why don’t you come down, and we’ll see if I still have my touch?”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.” Sam was almost enjoying this. “I’m waiting for Mitch.”