Uncovered (Dev and Lee Book 4) (7 page)

“I’m good,” I say, putting arms around him and rubbing fingers through his fur, over his muscles. “Just thinking.”

He exhales and settles atop me with a comforting press. “About your Mom?”

I lick the side of his muzzle. I’m definitely not going to tell him about the court case, not after how he reacted the last time I brought up Vince King. “If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not talk about my parents while you’re half-naked on top of me in bed.”

“So…” He chuckles. “Should I put some clothes on?”

I tighten my paws around him. “Why don’t you take mine off?”

Fingers slide under my shirt. “You sure? I know it’s been days, but I can talk, too.” The vibration of his voice shivers through my chest. “I could tell you about the commercial.”

“What, about that sexy wolf you had to hug?” I slip my paws under his boxers on either side of his tail. “All that stuff will still be there after the game. It can wait.”

He kisses me and stops arguing, and then he makes me forget everything else.

*

Saturday I go out walking. Hellentown is as humid as Chevali is dry, and my fur feels thick and unruly by noon. I spend lots of time in shops because they are climate-controlled, even if most of them have terrible plastic souvenirs of the local amusement park and its millions of associated characters: cartoon lizards and ducks and unicorns and dragons. The non-copyrighted souvenirs are worse, all swamps and gators, whether just plastic or actual gator meat, gator-skin leather, tacky stuff like that. Actually, I find a gator-skin tie that Hal might like, and buy it for him just in case.

In a sports store, I find the Hellentown Pilots shirt I want to wear that night, with the word “PILOTS” over their aviator logo, and then I find an air-conditioned coral-pink and sand-yellow food court where I can have lunch and call my father to tell him about the court case. “You think she knows about it?” I ask into his silence.

“I’ve no idea,” he says, not needing to ask who I mean. “Are you thinking of calling her?”

“I wasn’t going to.” Well, I was thinking about it. I still might. I mean, what do I really have to lose?

“Didn’t think so. But I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s a bad idea. I know—” He senses my interruption and stops it. “I know what she did. I’m not excusing that. It’s been a week, and probably you need to give it a little more time. I was going to say, if you want to call to talk, to apologize for screaming at her—”

“I was thinking about just telling her about the court case.” Two raccoons waddling past me stop, huge white shopping bags weighing them down, and glance at me before continuing on. “Apologize? Seriously?”

“
And
. And give her a chance to apologize in return.”

“Right. Did you get a forecast for snow in hell today or something?”

“You might be surprised.” He types on his keyboard. “She doesn’t want to lose you.”

“Of course not. She just wants to lose the gay part of me.”

“Wiley…”

“Am I wrong?”

Silence. I remember that I’m in Hellentown, out in public, but nobody seems to have noticed my “gay” comment. I don’t see any ears perked in my direction, no curious muzzles or grimaces.

Finally, my father says, “It’s not that simple.”

I rub my whiskers back. Outside, a slinky male weasel in a tight t-shirt and shorts struts past the window and then stops to peer inside. So gay, I think. “It never is. But I need to worry about me and Dev.”

“You don’t need to worry about the King family.” I stay silent. He types some more. “As long as you’re not just doing this to get back at your mother. It’ll affect her, you know, but maybe not as much as you’re thinking.”

“I’m not,” I say, and then I take a moment to think about it. Am I? No. No, I’m pretty sure I’m not. “No, it’s really just to get at the people involved.”

“All right.” He types again, click-click on the keyboard.

The weasel has apparently decided the food court is acceptable. He comes in but walks toward a table as if he knows someone, then keeps going, vaguely in my direction. I check myself—I don’t look that gay, do I? “Busy at work?”

“Very. There’s a lot of really interesting things going on. Now, with the potential of having some clients from your team—thank you for that, by the way—it’s likely to take even more of my time.”

“It’s not my team, not yet. And probably won’t be.”

He chuckles. “They’re your team by association.”

“Fair enough.” I rub paws down my shirt and think about the oversized Firebirds polo I got from the owner’s plane, and that makes me smile. “Did any of them actually call you?”

“Angela Marvell did. The others I think are waiting ’til the season’s over.”

“Dev is, I know.”

“How’s he doing? Relaxed, ready for the game?”

He was certainly pretty relaxed after climbing on top of me last night. I take a moment to savor the memory of his warmth, the muscular ripple of his chest against my shoulders, the hard warmth inside me, his whispered growls in my ear, the letting go of all our worries and concerns in our movement together. “Pretty relaxed, yeah.”

“Good. I don’t have any other teams to root for now, so they better win.”

“Doing our best.”

“You giving him football advice still?”

The weasel walks past me, one paw resting on his hip. I give him an appreciative smile and then turn back deliberately to my phone. He flips his tail and walks on past me. “Not a whole lot. He’s getting good advice from Gerrard and the coaches and he’s executing on it. He knows what he needs to do. Doesn’t really need my advice any more.”

“I’m sure he still wants it.”

“Maybe. He hasn’t really asked in a few weeks. I saw him miss an assignment and I told him, but he already knew. He’s doing really well.” I’m pretty damn proud of him, and I wish I could keep helping him.

“There’s an article in SI about the Firebirds’ defense. They mention him.”

“Mostly talks about Gerrard, I guess.”

“Of course. He’s the big star. What’s amazing is how he seems to keep getting better every year.”

“Hope Dev does too. He’s got lots of years ahead of him.” The weasel completes her circuit of the food court without getting any attention. He lifts his head and pushes open the door, strutting back outside.

“Seeing him before the game, or is he not allowed?”

“He’s allowed. Has to be back to the hotel by eleven, but that’s plenty of time.” I cough. “For dinner.”

“Uh-huh. Have a good weekend, then. Go Firebirds.”

“Go Firebirds,” I echo, and hang up.

A ringtail teen coming back from Pizza Hole with two huge slices pauses near me. “Firebirds?” she laughs. “Those faggots are goin’ down.”

Oh, if only the weasel were still here. There’d be a fight for sure. Thinking of the last time I was in Hellentown for a game, I want to challenge her to wager some money. But there’d be no way for me to collect, and anyway, she’s just a teen. “Don’t bet on it,” I say. “Word of advice.”

“Hah.” She shoots me a superior look and walks on.

I want to yell after her that the word is “homosexual” and there’s only one—who’s out—but the food court is moderately crowded and I don’t want to attract that much attention. So I just grab my bag with the t-shirt and gatorskin tie and walk out.

For the rest of the afternoon, I wander into music stores and bookstores and look at titles I know I’m not going to buy while my imagination kicks into overdrive. I’m telling Mother about the court case, telling a national paper about the case, confronting the humiliated Families United people, listening to Mother tell me she can’t believe she ever fell in with them—in other words, fantasizing. Eventually I give up and go back to the hotel, check e-mail, read all the articles on the playoffs, and wait for my tiger, trying to turn my fantasizing to a more pleasant subject.

Dev actually gets away to meet me for dinner, so we order room service again and sit next to each other at the desk. I push my laptop out of the way to make room for the food. While we eat, I ask, “How’re you doing with the practices? You guys ready for the Pilots?”

He nods. “We know ’em so well now we could probably run their plays for ’em.”

“Maybe you should. Confuse ’em a bit.”

He grins. “We already got five formations to counter what they’re doing. Coach wants us to get more aggressive on the defensive side.”

“What’s Steez think about that?”

Dev shakes his head. “Steez says we shouldn’t take chances. But I dunno, Coach has been around a while.”

“So has Steez.”

“Yeah.” He stares down at his plate. “But Gerrard says all that means is we keep doing what we’re doing, and if we see an opportunity, we jump on it faster.”

“Smart guy.” I sip the house wine, which isn’t all that bad considering where we are. “You’re doing really well, by the way.”

He tilts his head. “At…?”

“Football. I haven’t really found that much to critique you on. You know your routes, you’re working well with Gerrard and Carson, and you’re kicking ass on the field.”

“Okay. Thanks?” He smiles and puts an arm around me.

I lean into him. “Just wanted to say I’m proud of you. No matter what happens tomorrow.”

“Aw, fox. We’re gonna win tomorrow.” He squeezes me.

I grin. “I know.”

“All right. So how was your day?”

I rest a paw on his thigh, rubbing through the fabric to the thick muscle beneath. “Pretty good. Talked to my dad. He’s handling Gerrard’s money now, I guess. Angela got in touch with him.”

“Cool.” He curls his tail back over mine. “I’ll set mine up with him as soon as the season’s over.”

“Lots of things can wait ’til the season’s over.”

He turns to look at me. “You knew that, though.”

“Uh-huh.” I lean against his shoulder and don’t look up. “You just play the best you can. All this stuff will work itself out.”

He puts a finger under my chin and lifts it until my eyes meet his. “It’s part of my job, fox,” he says.

“Yeah.” I move forward and give him a kiss. “And I meant it. I’m proud of you and we’ll have time to talk about the rest of it.”

“Okay.” He searches my eyes. “You still seem kinda down. Did you talk to your dad about your mom at all?”

“A little.”

“You can talk to me about that if you need to, you know. I can’t imagine how I’d feel if…” He sighs and lets my chin drop. “Did I tell you when I told Mom about it, she got all—all Mom—and she told me you’ll always be welcome in our house?”

I shake my head and don’t have to force my smile. “Thanks. Thank her for me, too.” My chest tightens, and I wonder how I can feel that flash of love for Duscha and still be so angry at my own mother. “I’ll be okay. Let’s finish up.”

“Mmm.” He grins at me and lets me go, and for the rest of the dinner we just talk about the Pilots and the other game, Highbourne at Peco. It should be a good one; Highbourne’s the better team, but Peco’s at home and that’s always a tough place to play. As the higher seed, Hellentown got to choose their game time and they chose afternoon, so Rocs-Fraters kicks off at noon, and then Firebirds-Pilots is at four.

“You ever hear from Seito?” I ask. The white wolf backs up the QB position for the Rocs, and played against Dev in the Division II playoffs their senior year.

He shakes his head. “He’s busy same as I am. But it sounded like he wanted to get together after the season, so maybe I’ll contact him.”

After dinner, Dev cleans up while I go into the bathroom with my Hellentown t-shirt, put it on, and take off everything else. I try to leave all my unsexy thoughts in the pile of clothes on the bathroom floor, all the worries about the court case and Families United and Mother and Rodriguez and the Yerba job. It’s just me and my tiger tonight. I watch myself in the mirror, black paw on my white sheath, the tip hidden under the edge of the shirt, and I think about Dev chasing me, grabbing me, holding me and pressing into me. A little squirt of lube under the tail and I’m ready.

When I walk out, Dev stares. I give him a saucy smile. “Come on, defense, tackle me.”

He growls and leaps; I dodge around the bed and he comes across it, lightning-fast. I’m laughing now and also getting more aroused, and in my haste to get back to the other side of the bed, I stumble over one of the decorative pillows that got dropped on the floor. In a second, Dev’s on me, arms wrapping me up tightly, bearing me down to the floor. “I’ll show you defense,” he growls.

“Eek!” I squeak, mostly theatrically. “Let’s at least get on the bed!”

“Nuh-uh,” he growls, keeping me pinned with his weight while he undoes his pants.

So we do it there on the floor. It’s hard and a little uncomfortable, and maybe that’s why some of those thoughts I tried to leave behind come back, like the sour thought that he doesn’t mind being gay here in the hotel room, where he can fuck me on the floor and nobody has to see, but what about out in public?

I know with my head that those are silly, insecure thoughts, that I’m going through all this because of my family and my joblessness and insecurity about my own future. Dev can’t just parade me around in front of the team, but he hasn’t been ashamed to bring me to events, and the guys know me. And Dev loves me, I can tell by the passion with which he’s holding me, rubbing against me, mouthing at my ears. When he gets himself all slick and ready, I tell my inner voice in no uncertain terms to shut the hell up. Eyes squeezed shut, I lose myself in the sensations, in the rocking and thrusting, in the weight and solidity on me, in his warm breath still smelling of the dinner we just finished, and in the love that underlies all of that. His paw reaches under me to finish me off and that carries us all the way to the yelping, moaning, growling end.

“We’ve made a mess on the carpet,” I murmur, my stomach pressed down into it.

“Uh-huh.” He kisses my ear. “Don’t care.”

If this hotel had a surcharge for foxes (“scent neutralization fee”), I wouldn’t care either. But they don’t, and I don’t want to leave a dried, sticky carpet for the maid to clean, so I know I’ll clean it up myself after Dev’s gone. But I’ll probably use the sticky Pilots shirt, and that makes me smile. “Me neither,” I say.