Before he lined up his next shot, Ryder shot Bas a quizzical look. “Why is your cousin loving the fact that I’m kicking his ass?”
“League.”
Both Bas and Tony spoke at the same time.
Ryder frowned. “League? Does that mean what I think it means?”
Tony nodded. “We play pool in a league. You are our new secret weapon. We’ve done much better since Bas came home, but we still can’t beat those asswipes from North Edwards.”
“There’s a bar there filled with enlisted men who can kick our asses six ways from Sunday and every Easter too,” Bas murmured to Ryder. “Apparently, Tony feels we have a shot at taking them this year if you play.”
“What if I choke?” Ryder asked Tony.
“Not worried. You’re a sky jock like my cuz. You dudes have nerves of steel to sit in a little bitty cockpit on a seat with a built in rocket, steering who knows how many tons of metal and missiles through the sky faster than the speed of sound.” Tony arched his brows and a smug expression settled on his hawkish features. “And sometimes you do it with hunks of metal that aren’t even commissioned for official use yet. Tell me I’m wrong.”
Bas and Ryder exchanged an amused look.
“You’re not,” Ryder admitted and bent to take his shot. The three ball went into the side pocket while the six went into the corner.
Bas saw his cousin salivate. Ryder must have noticed too because a calculating expression settled on his handsome face. When Ryder leveled a forefinger at Tony, Bas knew without a doubt that he was in trouble.
“I’ll make you a deal,” Ryder said in a voice that practically purred. “You help me get Bas to the tattoo parlor and I’ll play on your team.”
Tony’s dark eyes glittered with triumph. “Deal.”
Bas began to back away across the bar. Tony and Ryder advanced on him. “Oh, no! The two of you are not taking me to Got Ink. I’m not ready for a tattoo.”
“C’mon, Bas. It’s no big deal. It’s not like you weren’t a Thunderbird,” Ryder cajoled as he and Tony backed Bas into a corner near the popcorn machine.
“Why dontcha want a tattoo, cuz?” Tony asked, flexing one big bicep that sported a huge scorpion on it. “Nothin’ wrong with a little ink and it don’t hurt much.”
“It’s not pain or the needles. And I’m not opposed to having a tattoo,” Bas said hastily as Tony pinned him against the wall. “I’m just not sure I’m ready to go around sporting a tattoo that matches Ryder’s.”
“He’s afraid matching tattoos will give people ideas about the two of us. He’s afraid if we’re found out, it will cost me my career,” Ryder said softly.
Tony heaved a sigh. “Bas, no one will think that. They all know you were a Thunderbird. No one’s gonna think you’re fucking Ryder just ‘cause you’ve got the same tattoo.”
“Yeah well, Ryder wants the artwork to include extra scrollwork that hides his name.” Bas made a face. “I don’t mind. I want the tattoo. Just not yet. We’ve not even been together that long and he’s already had the design made.”
“That’s because I have every confidence in us being together for a long time to come. I have faith in what I feel for you, Sebastian.”
Ryder stared at him with fierce blue eyes and Bas felt a lump form in his throat. Tony’s big elbow plowed into Bas’s side with a painful thud. He winced and Ryder hid a grin.
“Lookit the boy, Bas. He’s all infatuated with you. Cut him some slack. Get the tattoo,” Tony urged. “You know you want to.”
“You just want him for your team,” Bas wheezed, checking his ribs with one hand.
Tony nodded. “I do, but I can also see the kid makes you happy. That’s important to the Marchettis.”
Bas heaved a sigh, knowing he would have to give in if only because of the veracity of Tony’s words. “You realize he’s not a kid. He’s only two years younger than me.”
“Whatevs.” Tony shrugged. “Get the ink. Look, I’ll even pay for it.” He shoved his hand into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He laid three crisp hundred dollar bills on the bar and glanced over his shoulder at Ryder. “That about cover it?”
“Four colors, custom design, hidden name scrolls…” Ryder’s face took on a calculating expression. “Yeah, I think it does.”
Bas stumbled as Tony shoved him toward the door.
“Go do it. Fuck man, you want the damned thing and he wants the damned thing. Nothin’ else should even enter into it, Bas. Give the guy a chance and stop being such a worry wart.”
At that, Bas found himself pushed out the bar’s door onto the sidewalk of Forza’s Main Street, then propelled toward the tattoo shop two doors down. The door of Got Ink opened as if they were expecting him. Not that everyone in town couldn’t see Ryder shoving him toward the tattoo parlor.
Got Ink was run by a wiry Goth looking guy with a bolt through his eyebrow and a pierced tongue. Bas had always wondered what else he had pierced, but he’d never had the nerve to ask. He should have asked his niece Haley because she happened to be the Goth guy’s girlfriend and a fellow tattoo artist.
“Oh, Uncle Bas! You’re finally going to do it!”
Haley’s cheerful voice almost made Bas wince. The girl had the shining upbeat personality of a cheerleader packaged in a Barbie-Meets-Living-Dead-Girl manner. Her boyfriend took the sheet of artwork Ryder handed him.
“Oh yeah. I remember making this a month ago,” he said with a smile.
Bas’s head whipped around. “You had that made a month ago?” he asked Ryder in astonishment.
His lover nodded. “Alan incorporated everything I asked for.”
The tattoo artist smiled. “It’s a great tattoo for you, Bas. I’d much rather put this on you that that crazy flaming Flying Marchettis logo your brothers have.”
Haley made a face. Her delicate pixie-like features scrunched up beneath her deep purple hair. “My dad is so damn proud of that tattoo. I bet when you start flying with them again, he’ll bug you to get one too, Uncle Bas,” she said. “I have the stencil. Uncle Cris made me save it for when you came home.”
Bas sighed. Silently, he had to agree with Alan despite the disloyalty to his family. He’d much rather have the Thunderbirds tattoo with the inverted 5 than the red and gold Marchetti logo. Ryder nudged him with a shoulder as Alan and Haley went to prepare their inks.
“When I retire, I’ll join the group too and we can get Flying Marchettis tattoos together,” he whispered seductively into Bas’s ear.
Startled by Ryder’s assumption they would still be together in two years, Bas turned and his gaze met his lover’s. What he saw in the depths of Ryder’s eyes held him spellbound. One hand came up to brush along his jaw and he shivered, the touch sending flames to lick at his nerve endings.
Bringing his face close to Bas’s, Ryder murmured, “I’ve fallen in love with you, Sebastian and I don’t think what I feel will ever end.”
Their lips touched and instead of fear of discovery swamping Bas’s senses, emotion swelled within him. He hadn’t wanted to label what he’d been feeling for Ryder. On their very first day together they’d agreed to no labels, but in his heart, Bas knew it had always had one from the first moment their eyes met.
Bas reached down and twined his fingers with Ryder’s, squeezing his hand tightly. “You’re going to give it a label?” he murmured, teasing his lover. “I thought we agreed not to.”
Ryder shook his head, his gaze never wavering. “I’m just telling you how I feel.”
A sigh escaped Bas and he smiled ruefully. “I’ve fallen in love with you too, Ryder. So far, so deep, that I don’t want this feeling to ever end. It’s just too awesome.”
“You’ll have to break the liplock to get the tattoo.”
Haley’s amused voice reminded Bas that they were in public. He stepped back from Ryder but didn’t release his lover’s hand. His niece smiled at him, an indulgent expression on her face.
“You realize we’re all happy you�
��ve found someone, Uncle Bas. We were worried you’d turn into some crazy old man talking about the war in Iraq until the day we had to put you in a home for old warbirds,” she teased gently.
A muffled guffaw came from Ryder, but before Bas could respond, Alan came back into the room. He ushered Bas to a chair, shoved up the sleeve of his t-shirt and began prepping for the tattoo. Ryder looked on, his expression smug, his blue eyes glowing with emotion.
In the end, Alan didn’t finish. He told Bas he’d color the tattoo in after the first part healed. With a sterile white bandage taped over the tattoo, Bas left the shop with Ryder.
As they drove home, Ryder said, “It didn’t hurt much, did it?”
“Not really. But I liked the excuse to hold your hand,” Bas joked.
Ryder smiled and stroked his hand over Bas’s jean clad thigh. “I wasn’t just trying to distract you back there, you know. I meant every word I said.”
Bas glanced at his lover before returning his eyes to the road. “I know. I meant them too.”
“It’s not too soon to say them if you feel them.” Ryder’s words came out as if he was trying to convince himself as well as Bas that confessing their love after only a month together wasn’t crazy.
Turning his truck into the long drive of his house, Bas shot his lover an amused smile. “You know, Ryder, being honest is important. I think we stand a better chance of making it as a couple if we’re honest about our feelings.”
In the light from the dashboard, Bas could see the wicked expression on Ryder’s face. He pulled the truck into the garage beside the Mustang and they got out.
“I guess I should be honest and tell you that I want you,” Ryder said in a mischievous tone. “Bent over the end of the bed, legs spread, your fine ass on display only for me.”
The garage door slid down and they walked toward the house.
“If we’re being honest, I should let you know that you have now got my cock so hard my zipper is biting into it,” Bas replied matter-of-factly.
Ryder hissed in a breath. “Hurry and unlock the door. I don’t want anything to happen to that beautiful cock.”
With a laugh, they stumbled into the house, already reaching for each other in an effort to honestly show each other how much they were loved.
Chapter Four
Bas heard the boom before he saw the drift of smoke in the distant sky. Fear took instant hold of him, pain stabbing his chest. He stared at the narrow trail of black smoke that rose from the far off desert floor. The area Ryder would have been flying over today.
His hand clutched the wrench in a white knuckled grip. He knew the flight patterns for the test pilots. He also knew the sound of a crash when he heard one, knew what the dark smoke meant. Heartbeat picking up speed, he put away his tools and locked the hangar with shaking hands. If there was a crash, it didn’t mean it was Ryder. The wing had more than one jet pilot. He jogged the quarter mile back to the house, afraid his cell phone would start to vibrate in his pocket.
Sweat beaded his forehead and dampened his armpits by the time he reached the garage. His gut told him it was Ryder. His head argued odds were against it. Still, he jerked his keys and phone from his jeans pocket. He got in his truck and headed toward Edwards, conscious of the phone lying on the seat beside him. As he ate up the miles toward the base gate, he prayed the phone wouldn’t ring. God, he didn’t know what he’d do if it rang.
Shivering despite the heat, fear wrapped around him, tightening like a tourniquet, staving off full-blown panic with its mind-numbing qualities. He drew a shuddering breath as he approached the gate. Seeing the stickers on his windshield, the guards waved him on through. Once inside the gate, Bas pulled to the curb momentarily. He didn’t see anything that would indicate there’d been a catastrophic accident. No servicemen rushing around. No base lockdown. No sirens.
For a moment, he didn’t know whether to head toward the testing wing or not. He had no rights. He might be Ryder’s partner, but that meant nothing to the Air Force. They could have been legally married by the laws of the state of California – not that any such law had been passed yet—and it wouldn’t matter to the military.
Anger welled inside Bas as he realized his phone would not ring. If there was an accident, if his partner was injured or dead, no one would call him. He glared at his silent phone. He had no rights. The man who meant everything to him could be dead and no one would tell him. According to the Air Force, he had no right to ask and they didn’t have to tell.
Pulling the truck out onto the street, Bas drove toward the test pilot school. He needed to ask someone who would tell him. Someone he trusted.
He stopped in front of the building where he reported to work twice a week and got out of the truck. Coming down the steps of the building was his boss and friend, Mike Aarons. When Mike headed straight toward him with an iron hard expression on his face, Bas felt his stomach sink. Nausea rose within him. He leaned against his front fender and clenched his fists to control his shaking.
“Mike?” His voice sounded like sandpaper as he tried to speak around the lump in his throat.
Sympathy washed over the colonel’s face and for a split second, Bas thought Ryder was dead. Then a little smile quirked up Mike’s mouth.
“He’s fine, Bas.” The deep tones of the colonel’s voice reached down into the pit of Bas’s stomach and warmed him. “He punched out. He’s got a concussion and a few scrapes and bruises but he’s okay. They’ll be releasing him from the base hospital in a bit. He’ll need to go home and go to bed. He’ll be de-briefed tomorrow when his head is clearer.”
Bas slumped against his truck and tried to mentally pull himself together. Ryder was okay and that’s all that mattered. “I can’t pick him up.” The acid words ate at his guts fueling his anger at the politics of the country both he and Ryder had risked their lives for repeatedly.
The colonel shook his head. “Look, I’ll have one of the guys take me down there and I’ll bring him back in his car. It can stay here overnight and you can bring him in tomorrow when you come to work. I wish I could tell you things were different, but they aren’t yet. Hopefully, by the time Ryder retires things will be the way they should be. No one’s ethnicity, gender, or sexuality should factor into their service to their country. You and Ryder have done your duty and your government appreciates it. They just don’t want to know who you sleep with in the privacy of your own home. And even then, if a serious conflict broke out tomorrow, Uncle Sam would be sending both of you to the front line. You’re the best there is regardless of your sexual orientation.”
Drawing a deep, shaking breath Bas nodded. “I know. It’s just hard. I’ve never felt this way about someone before. And honestly, Mike, it’s harder for me than for Ryder and he’s the one who is still active duty.”
Mike Aarons grinned. “No offense to you, Bas, but that boy has the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met. Whomever he loves will always come first with him and everything else be damned.” He clapped Bas on the shoulder in that familiar male gesture of comfort. “Lemme get Bubba to run me down there to get him. You just hang tight.”
Bas sat in his truck and tried not to worry. Mike’s words kept echoing in his head. He knew that men with the top notch skills he and Ryder had would never be free of service to their country should a war break out. He knew the climate seemed to be changing for the better for gays in the military too. However, it didn’t stop his heart from aching with the need to be with Ryder now when his lover was shaken and hurting after ejecting from his F-35. Bas just needed to touch him and breathe in his scent and know that Ryder was okay.
Staring at his hands, he noted the tremor of his fingers. He raised them to the steering wheel and gripped it hard. For thirty long minutes he sat in the truck in the hot desert sun, oblivious to the heat, trying not to panic, and filled with the need to see and touch Ryder. Finally, he saw Ryder’s Mustang coming toward him. He got out of the truck and stood awkwardly by the fender as Mike parked th
e Mustang next to the school and got out. The passenger door opened and Ryder’s long legs appeared. He angled himself carefully out of the small car, shoulders and legs moving stiffly in his green flight suit. His head turned and their gazes met.
Heart pounding, breath catching in his throat, Bas took a step forward. Ryder’s eye sockets seemed slightly sunken and one cheekbone had a bruise, but his blue eyes blazed with emotion as he started walking toward Bas. In a split second, Bas noticed the stiffness of his lover’s gait and the slight limp. Without thought, he broke into a run. When he reached Ryder, he grabbed him around the waist with one arm, half hugging him, half holding him up.
“Are you okay?” he asked hoarsely, trying to control his emotions.
Ryder laughed softly. “Yeah. Banged up a little but otherwise okay.” He leaned his weight on Bas’s supporting arm. “My knee hurts like fuck.”
“Doc says he’ll need to take these once he gets home and someone needs to keep an eye on him because of the concussion.” Mike handed Bas a bag from the base pharmacy and Ryder’s keys. “The car will be fine here overnight. You just take it easy and do what Doc says, Ryder. Bas, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Mike walked away and entered the test pilot school. The door whooshed closed behind him, leaving Bas and Ryder alone. Bas swallowed hard and clenched his fingers around the bag.
“Let’s get you in the truck,” he said gruffly. “If you need to be watched, you’ll have to stay at my place tonight.”
Ryder’s expression was ironic. Both of them knew Ryder had no intention of staying the night in the apartment. Bas wouldn’t have been able to bear it if he had. He could barely stop himself from stripping off Ryder’s flight suit and checking out his injuries right there on the street. Instead, he helped his lover into the truck, noting how Ryder winced when he bent his knee and how he favored his right shoulder a little too.
Bas got in the truck and turned the AC on full blast. Ryder let out a long sigh.
Afterburn Page 5
