Special Delivery: Special Delivery, Book 1 (28 page)

Neither, he thought, sucking in a breath as he tugged the waistband into place, were these jeans.

Randy wolf-whistled. “That’s the stuff, baby.”

Sam ran his hand self-consciously over the leg and then the ass. “I can’t get them—you can see my underwear.”

“You are the funniest combination, Peaches, of prude and slut. The answer, of course, is to wear different underwear, or none at all.” He pulled open the curtain and motioned to Sam. “Come on, let’s go show your honey.”

Sam wrapped his arms over his belly as he followed Randy. He felt the breeze blow across his legs at every step, and he was suddenly conscious of every other patron in the store. Most didn’t look at him, but the few who did made him feel even more naked. When Sam balked, Randy grabbed his hand and dragged him the rest of the way, up to the front window where Mitch stood staring out at the street while he smoked.

Randy rapped on the window. Mitch turned. Randy spun Sam slowly, his hand lingering on Sam’s hip. Mitch’s face was closed off, but his eyes gave him away. He liked the jeans. He nodded curtly and took another drag, but he kept his eyes on Sam’s bottom half.

Randy chuckled. “Still think they’re impractical?”

Sam headed for the dressing room. “I need to try on the other pair.”

Randy didn’t come along and watch, to Sam’s relief. The jeans fit well, and Sam hated to take them off and put on his dirty ones, but he did, and carried the lot to the register. He gripped the ripped pair tightly, fighting a silent war with himself, but in the end he decided to get them too, and handed the clerk his credit card.

It was refused.

Sam flushed a deep, terrible red, a blush that worsened when the clerk wouldn’t hand his card back. “But—that’s
mine
. Why—?”

Randy peered over his shoulder. “Did you call and tell your bank you were traveling? Sometimes they put a hold on them if you don’t.”

Sam had not. “Give me my card,” he said to the clerk, fumbling for his license. “See? It’s me.” He let out an audible sigh of relief when she handed it over, but he balked when Randy passed her his credit card instead. “
No.
I’m not getting them.”

This seemed to amuse Randy a great deal. “Baby, come on.” He presented his card again.

Sam shoved him harder. “You aren’t buying them, and if you do, I’m not wearing them. I’m not your
baby
.”

“What’s going on?” Mitch asked, coming up behind him.

Sam averted his gaze. “I had trouble with my card. It’s got credit, but I guess I should have called and said I was traveling. It’s no big deal. Let’s go, so I can wash things.”

Mitch pulled out his wallet.

Randy shook his head. “I already tried that.”

Mitch held Sam’s gaze and gave the clerk his own card.

“Mitch,” Sam protested, but weakly. He didn’t want him to do this, but he wasn’t going to refuse him the same way he had Randy.

“Let me do this, Sunshine.” Mitch waved the card in front of the clerk, who watched Sam a little longer before acquiescing and running the charge.

Mitch collected the bag too and carried it all the way to the truck.

“So,” Randy said, as they crossed the parking lot. “Sunshine, is it?”

He spoke casually, but from the way Mitch stiffened, Sam knew it had significance.

Randy grinned, triumphant. “I told you, we always name the pets.”

“
You
did.” Mitch sounded angry. And guilty.

“You agreed to them.” Randy raked Sam up and down with his gaze. “Nope, you really are Peaches, not Sunshine.”

“It’s not like that.” But Mitch didn’t make eye contact with Sam as he said it, and suddenly the nickname which had made Sam feel so cherished and tender didn’t anymore.

Randy seemed pleased with himself. “How about a quick stop at the Watering Hole?”

“I still need to change my clothes.” Sam tried not to think about being a pet. But it was impossible.
Is that all I am to him? Why does he look so guilty?

“I’ve been burning the candle at both ends,” Mitch said. “I need to crash for the afternoon.”

“Even better.” Randy slung an arm around Sam’s shoulder.

Sam dislodged him, moving himself closer to Mitch as a result. Mitch surprised him by putting his arm around Sam’s waist. Sam started to stiffen, but Mitch squeezed him gently, and the gesture diffused Sam. He relented and sagged against him.

Randy watched them, frowning. “I ain’t buying it yet,” he said, in a different tone than Sam had yet heard him use. Less snarky, more…stern.

“Nobody’s sellin’ you anything, Skeet,” Mitch replied with a lightness that eased Sam. He wished he knew what the hell was going on.

“I meant to pay for those.” Sam spoke quietly so Randy wouldn’t hear as he and Mitch waited for Randy to unlock their door.

“This isn’t your mama’s glass chest. Only a few pairs of jeans.” Mitch leaned close, so close his lips brushed Sam’s ear as he spoke. “I call you Sunshine because when you smile, the sun comes out.”

Sam shut his eyes, the words a balm he hadn’t fully let himself acknowledge he needed. He remembered what Mitch had told him about the alley, about him looking happy, and all his doubts washed away. He brushed a kiss against Mitch’s lips. When he pulled away, he caught Randy watching them. Randy seemed surprised and wary.

“Speaking of jeans.” Mitch squeezed Sam’s ass. “I’m looking forward to seeing you wear yours. Especially the ones with the holes.”

“But they show my underwear,” Sam protested, as he opened the door.

“Wear the pair I bought you.”

Cue the blush. “I didn’t bring them.”

Mitch’s grin was wicked as he urged Sam into the truck. “I did.”

Chapter Twenty

The drive to Randy’s house didn’t take long from the neighborhood where they bought Sam’s jeans. After a quick stop at a gas station to pick up beer and some more cigarettes for Mitch, Randy took them down a series of streets until he pulled up behind a small, plain but decent-looking house. He parked in the drive and killed the engine. There wasn’t much of a yard, and it was done up in gravel and scraggly cactus rather than grass. But inside it was cool, and while it was shabby, it was cleaner than Sam would have expected.

Mitch, who had hauled in the bag of dirty laundry, a smaller bag of his own and Sam’s jeans, deposited them in the middle of the living room and collapsed on the couch.

Randy came in after him and gave him a withering glance. “Mitch Tedsoe, I was so looking forward to your mess.”

Mitch, keeping his eyes closed, flipped him the bird. “I gotta crash. My room still there? Or did you finally rent it out?”

Randy snorted. “That was an idle threat to get you to come back, as well you know. Though I’ll admit I’ve used it more and more for storage.”

“So long as you didn’t store anything on the bed, I’m good,” Mitch murmured.

“A little, but we can shove it off easy enough.” Randy picked up Mitch’s bag and extended a hand to him. “Up, Old Man.”

Sam watched them go, feeling much a third wheel as he hovered in the entryway and the pair of them moved down the hall. He spent a moment wondering how exactly he was supposed to behave, then decided,
fuck it
, and grabbed the shopping bag and headed in search of a bathroom. He found one in the hallway and changed, skimming out of everything and putting on his new jeans—the paint-splattered ones—and brought the dirty clothes out to sort with the others for the wash. He upended the entire garbage bag on the floor, sorted out light from dark and separated the sheets into their own pile. He put the darks back into the bag and the lights and sheets into two piles as unobtrusive as possible by the wall to the kitchen. He found the washer, started the first load, and when he still found himself alone, wandered down the hall to see what the hell was going on.

He stopped and listened as soon as he heard his name.

“Sam is a good kid. Don’t fuck with him.” Mitch sounded half asleep already.

“I’d like nothing better than to fuck with that hot little piece. Same as always, Old Man.”

There was a groan, and it startled Sam. It was a…pleasured sound. He dared a peek around the corner and startled anew at what he saw.

Mitch was naked down to his briefs, lying face-down and sprawled on the bed, which wasn’t even on a frame. It was a mattress and box springs in the middle of the floor. Randy straddled him, fully clothed and sitting on Mitch’s ass as he massaged the other man’s shoulders, but he also rotated his own hips in a sensual motion. As Sam watched, Randy reached back, caressing Mitch’s thigh and sliding his fingers toward the hem of Mitch’s briefs.

Mitch bucked, and Sam ducked into the hall, his heart heavy.

“Knock that shit off,” Mitch said, a little less groggily. “He’s gonna see you, and I don’t need you making this more complicated than it already is.”

Randy snorted, and Sam heard a muffled slap of flesh, which he suspected was Randy’s hand against Mitch’s ass. “You old goat. You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“I’m not fucking kidding, Randy. Leave him alone.”

There was a pause, which felt heavy to Sam, but that could have been because he was bowing under the weight of everything he heard, his emotions bouncing between hope to fear to betrayal to euphoria, sending him in an elliptical orbit of confusion.

“Let me take the two of you out tonight.” Randy’s voice was oddly gentle. “I want to watch you interact.”

“No, you want to fuck with him, and with me.”

Randy’s laugh was a guttural purr. “Oh yes. But first I want to watch.”

“We are not putting on a fucking show for you.”

“See, I think that’s where you’re getting it wrong. But I’m not sure yet. I need to study this a bit more.”

“Shit,” Mitch murmured. “Leave him alone until I’m awake. Try and be a nice person for one damn afternoon.”

“I’ll be
very
nice to him.” Randy winked. “And to you.”

There was another silence, and then another moan, and a wet sound that sounded far, far too much like kissing. Sam wanted to look but didn’t dare. He went to the kitchen, but he didn’t know what to do or how to behave. He wanted to cry, and he wanted to shout, and he wanted to stop them or at least make sure they weren’t doing what he was afraid they were doing. In the end, he stood against the counter, dying a little as every minute passed.

“Hello.”

Sam whirled around. Randy stood in the archway between the living room and the kitchen, looking smug. Sam clenched his fists at his sides and wished he could hit him.

Randy grinned. “Oh, Peaches, you’re cute, that’s what you are. Relax. He’s not going to fuck me, not with you here. Not
without
you, anyhow, but I’ll admit I’m probably dreaming even then.” When Sam sputtered, Randy leaned on the archway and folded his hands over his arms. “I know you were standing there listening, because I saw your shadow, and I know when you left because it moved. And you’d damn well better not plan on playing poker in town, baby, because you don’t have the face for it.” At the fridge, he pulled out two beers, holding one out to Sam. “Here. Sit. Drink. I’ll make you some food, and we’ll talk.”

Sam took the beer with some reserve. He sat at the table and held the bottle for a long time, watching Randy open the fridge again and take out hamburger, tomatoes, cheese and a carton of eggs. After a while Sam opened the beer, but he still didn’t drink it.

Randy cracked an egg, slid the yolk into a bowl and tossed the shell into the sink. He didn’t turn around. “Ask, or you’ll drive yourself crazy.”

Sam
hated
him. “What am I supposed to ask?”

“Anything. The four million questions you have would be a good place to start.”

Sam glowered at his back. “Like you’re going to give me honest answers.”

Randy shrugged. “Sometimes I will. And for every question you ask, I get to ask you one too.” He cracked another egg. “See? We both win.”

Sam watched him stab the spatula into the ground beef for a few minutes, then gave in. “Were you kissing him?”

Randy paused, clearly both amused and surprised. “Yes.”

Sam’s jaw tightened. “Did he kiss you back?”

Randy laughed. “Peaches, you suck at this game, you know.”

“
Did he kiss you back?
”

Randy returned to his ground beef. “Yes, he did. And then I blew him, and he came in my face, and he told me to tell the skinny bitch in the kitchen to fuck off, because he’d have no other.”

“You’re an ass.” Sam shoved the beer away.

“And you’re not very smart, for a college boy.” Randy continued to poke at the frying meat. “You weren’t listening, if you heard our conversation and could still ask if he kissed me back. Either that or you think far more highly of my seduction skills than he does, in which case I will be happy to bend you over the table.”

Sam startled and moved reflexively toward the wall. Randy turned in time to catch the movement and looked pleased, but in a strange way.

“Yeah, you’re a puzzle, aren’t you, little man? The question is, how to best figure you out?”

“How did you know I was in college?”