Wild Raspberries (12 page)

So Tyler wasn’t going to say anything that would make Dan feel like he’d worn out his welcome, any more than he’d do or say anything to make him feel tied down.

Full of good intentions, he got into bed naked and smiled at Dan when he walked in, wearing nothing but one of his ridiculous pairs of shorts. Pink hearts. Worse than the rabbits. “Boy, tell me you’re planning to take those off before you get into bed.”

Dan hooked his thumbs in the waistband. “Off?” he said, all innocence. “You mean — you want me
naked
?”

Tyler narrowed his eyes even as Dan widened his in a wholly unconvincing attempt to look shocked at the idea. “Put it this way; if the shorts stay on, I’ll be asleep inside of thirty seconds as a way of saving my sanity along with my eyesight.”

“And if they come off?” Dan did a shimmy and the shorts slid down an inch or two, revealing a flat stomach and, as Dan was already hard — God bless youthful libido — the head of his dick, peeking out tantalizingly. “Think you can stay awake for, ooh, five minutes or so?”

“Five minutes.” Tyler gave that some consideration, dragging his gaze up to Dan’s face with an effort, and then nodded. “Yeah, I guess you naked would be interesting enough to keep my eyes open that long. Ten might be pushing it, though.”

Dan sucked in a breath and shook his head. “You’re going to regret saying that. Maybe I’ll be the one to fall asleep at five minutes no matter what we’re doing. Leave you high and fucking dry, man.”

Tyler kept his face straight. “Maybe I won’t notice and I’ll just keep on hammering into you.”

The shorts slid south another inch. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were confessing to being under-equipped, because it seems to me that a man should notice something like that going on.”

“Oh, you’ll notice,” Tyler promised him, breaking down first and grinning. “Now get your bare ass over here, will you?”

“Sir, yes, sir.” Dan glanced down as he said it and kicked his way free of the shorts, which was good, as it gave Tyler a chance to get the smile back on his face before Dan noticed the grimace that had replaced it. Fuck, way to bring back bad memories. Even said jokingly, those three words were enough to make his skin crawl.

Drop and give me twenty.

Sir, yes, sir.

See that hill on the horizon? Jog around and back, full kit, and if it takes you more than thirty minutes, you’re scrubbing toilets with a toothbrush.

Sir, yes, sir.

Get your mouth on me, soldier, suck me nice and slow. No one’s going to interrupt us.

Sir, yes —

Did I ask you to fucking talk?

Kill that man. No, he’s not a kid; he’s old enough to hold a gun, kill him before he takes out one of your buddies or worse yet, me. Shoot the little fucker and that’s an order.

Sir, yes, sir…

Then Dan crawled in next to him, the light from the bedside lamp more than enough for him to be able to appreciate the wicked grin that was all Dan was wearing, and he stopped thinking about the past.

“Are we really going to do this?” Dan asked as they lay facing each other. He wasn’t quite touching Tyler, but the space between them was small enough that it felt like less of a barrier than an extension of their skin, as if Tyler could move his fingers, currently resting against his thigh, and Dan would shudder, shiver, smile.

“If you still want to.” He wasn’t going to push for it. After the famine of the last few years, Tyler was happy with just about anything that had him coming with a warm, friendly body beside him. “It’s not a problem if you don’t.”

“And you never say it if you don’t mean it.” There was a skeptical edge to Dan’s voice. “’Cause you’re hard, you know. And I’m thinking you wouldn’t really like it if I backed down now.”

Tyler sighed and rolled to his back, ignoring the twinge of pain from his ribs. “I’m in bed with you and we’re naked; of course I’m hard. I know what you feel like, what you smell and taste like. I know how you sound when you’re a heartbeat away from coming. I’ve got all that in my head, and you seriously think I
wouldn’t
be hard?”

“Hmm.” Dan shifted closer and put his hand on Tyler’s chest, high enough up that it didn’t hurt. One of his fingers, the middle one, was directly over Tyler’s nipple, which rose, yearning for more than the uncomplicated, accidental contact, needing to be licked, bitten, pinched just this side of pain with an answering jolt of arousal in his cock. He’d told Dan having them played with didn’t work for him. He’d been less than truthful about that. Dan’s hand moved, restless, light, and Tyler bit back words, not sure if they would have emerged as plea or demand. “When you put it like that…”

“Right now, you could get me off just by touching me. I’m really not going to complain if I don’t get to fuck your ass when I’m this close.”

“Hmm.” This time it was thoughtful. Dan’s hand moved lower, skimming lightly over bruised skin and pausing again, this time on Tyler’s stomach. He felt his muscles contract sharply and Dan’s hand press down, maintaining contact. The heel of Dan’s hand was inches away from the head of Tyler’s cock, a small gap, tiny, but it felt vast to Tyler, impossible to breach. He lay still and let Dan explore him, the sheets thrown back to drape over their legs, his body displayed, and felt anxious and wanton, two emotions that just didn’t mix well.

“You are so fucking hot.” Dan’s words exuded sincerity and his fingers, drifting, stroking, touched Tyler with a reverence Tyler didn’t think he deserved. “You make me feel… fuck, I say ‘safe’ and it’s going to sound weird, isn’t it?”

“Considering what I told you I did, yeah.” He’d been waiting for Dan to bring it up, dreading it, and now he’d done it himself. He felt Dan’s hand stop moving, not abruptly, but slowly, as if Dan’s focus had shifted from the supposed hotness of Tyler’s body to what it was capable of, beside the bestowal of mind-blowing orgasms.

“I was almost wondering if that was real, or something you told me to scare me off.” There was something in Dan’s voice that made Tyler think about whether a lie would be a kindness, but he couldn’t do it.

“It’s real. And it wasn’t illegal — well, put it another way, it was government sanctioned, but I shouldn’t have told you. Talk about it and we’ll both end up in a world of trouble.”

“I worked that out myself.” Dan’s hand moved again, his thumbnail tracing the hollow at Tyler’s hip with enough force behind it that the skin sang and thrummed, shocks of pleasure radiating out. God, he loved someone finding the places on his body that made him pliant, sweet, and he hated that he’d never trusted anyone enough to tell them where they were or let them see how good it felt. “I’m not going to tell you it doesn’t freak me out, because it does. Big time.”

“Just as long as it doesn’t turn you on.” He’d known people it did: the snipers themselves, and the people they rutted with afterwards. He’d never accepted that it was life-affirming, or any of that shit. Escaping death; yeah, that could leave a person charged up and ready to go, but taking a life? No. Blood didn’t make good lube, real or metaphoric.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.” The flat disgust in Dan’s voice was reassuring. “I like an action movie as much as the next guy, but when it’s real… God, no.”

“If it helps, they were all — they —” He ground to a halt. Evil? Deserved to die? He’d thought so at the time, but he’d only had the data he’d been spoon-fed. For all he knew, for some of them, their main crime had been that they were in the way of a plan, an objective, a valuable piece of oil-rich real estate. He turned his head away from Dan, his arousal dying, and then, needing to hide the way his hands had begun to shake, rolled to his side, his back to Dan, his hands in fists. They still shook.

“Hey.” The lamp was clicked off, the sudden darkness welcome as a place to hide in. Tyler tried to control himself enough to ask Dan to go, but before he could speak, Dan spooned up behind him. Dan’s arm came around to give Tyler a hug that felt hesitant, as if Dan expected him to lash out or something. “
Hey
.”

And that was all he said. Tyler let himself be held, because he didn’t have the strength to pull away; he let Dan drop gentle kisses onto his shoulder, let Dan rock him, his wiry arms stronger than Tyler had expected. Didn’t let Dan turn him so that they were face to face, because his cheeks weren’t wet, but he thought that one more piece of undeserved kindness and they might be.

The shaking was usually just the start of it; he’d end up shivering, his teeth chattering so violently he’d once bitten his tongue deeply enough that he’d choked on his own blood. He could stay like that for hours, in a waking nightmare, the world around him shadowed and gray, peopled with ghosts. With Dan holding onto him, holding his body still, the trembling gradually eased off. He waited to be sure it had, unable to feel relieved, still tense, waiting for it to strike at him again with a redoubled force.

Dan patted his shoulder, gave a satisfied murmur, and then pulled back enough to let Tyler choose his own position to lie in. Tyler made it to his back, and lay there, staring up at the ceiling, the beams dimly visible. Dan’s hand found his and held it loosely. He let his fingers curl around Dan’s for a moment and then drew his hand away. He couldn’t get used to this. Couldn’t rely on Dan for comfort, for sex, for anything.

He thought he heard Dan sigh, but it could’ve just been the boy settling down to sleep. He didn’t want to follow. He might have escaped the worst of the physical reactions to what he’d done, but he didn’t fool himself that his dreams would be safe. Dan couldn’t follow him there and anchor him to the present.

Sleep came anyway, the moment when it struck lost, as ever, impossible to remember or pinpoint. He knew that he was dreaming, but it didn’t make it less frightening because everything in his dream had happened. Years ago, but still, it was real. No monsters, just men, no demons but the old-fashioned kind, with labels like “guilt” and “regret” hung around their necks.

He shouldn’t have thought about that last job. This, all of it, was inevitable once he let those thoughts in. He knew that and he’d still —

Sunshine and the smell of cut grass and roses. Summer smells. Children laughing, shrieking, their light, high-pitched voices carrying to him across the space separating him from their world. They’re in the pool, out of sight, and his target is busy in the garden. It’s an affectation, a hobby. The grounds are huge, kept trim and tidy by at least three people, working full-time, but every Wednesday, Victor spends an hour, no more, no less, rain or shine, wandering around, a trowel in his hand or some pruning shears, making a mess that the staff he pays will tidy up with a quiet efficiency afterwards.

He watches the man through the scope and walks into Victor’s world. Sees the clean sweat on the clean neck, sees the gloved hands poke and prod at soft, tilled earth. Sees the blaze of scarlet petals of a flower calmed by the glossy, dark green leaves that surround it. Feels his finger resting against the trigger, waiting to squeeze off the shot.

And all this is familiar, he’s done all this before, and he knows what will happen and he’s distracted by that knowledge. He will fire; Victor will die. The leaves will be dotted with blood and the man will die, alone, quietly, to be found at the end of the hour, because no one is allowed to interrupt him.

He’s allowed Victor ten minutes to touch the earth with his neatly gloved hands. That gives him fifty minutes to get far away. Plenty of time.

Victor will die.

He watches Victor shake his head over something he can’t see; a withered leaf, a bug? He should do it now. Soothe the frown away with the gift of oblivion, ease every worry, large and small.

Like the question of how many millions of dollars Victor wants to send this week to support a terrorist group whose original intentions have long been lost in the heady rush of power from destroying buildings and lives. People like Victor use them as their own personal strike force. It’s amazing how a few blocks of C-4 strategically placed can influence stocks and shares and votes of confidence. Amazing.

Taking out Victor won’t stop the terrorists, of course, but they’re someone else’s assignment. Tyler’s too good at this to be risked on infiltration. His myriad identities have never been questioned and neither has he. He’s invisible, unnamed. Hush-hush.

Hush, Victor, hush…

He doesn’t know why he lets the minutes tick by. He’s not really interested in this thin, balding man with the pot-belly and the cold eyes. Not at all interested in the flowers, none of which he can identify by name, because they’re all roses, sure, but he knows they have names, pretty names. One is called “Peace,” and he wants, he really wants to find some, for himself, for Victor, for the screwed-up, fucked-up country that pays him to do this and won’t look him in the eye when they hand over the money.

Ten minutes left before people come to find Victor and worry him with questions, chatter, demands, the way all important men are badgered and harassed.

Is he cutting it this close to add a spice of danger? No. He’s too professional for that. Boring is good. Safe is good. They mean he doesn’t get caught.

It’s just… Ah, fuck it. He pulls the trigger without conscious thought and he’s on target, he is, he has been the whole time, tracking, adjusting, endless small corrections.

He misses. Not the heart, the spine, and Victor’s flopping on the ground, graceless, comical, screaming, and he shoots again and —

“Tyler! Fuck!”

He sucked in a ragged, panting breath. The sheet beneath him was damp with sweat and his heart was hammering wildly. Dan’s face filled his vision, and he blinked against the blaze of light from the lamp and the concern in Dan’s eyes.

“You with me?” Dan demanded. Dan was straddling him, sitting on his legs, hands pressing down on Tyler’s shoulders. “Shit, Tyler, are you awake?”

He moved his head in an attempt at a nod, and Dan’s hands relaxed. “You scared the shit out of me, man.”