The Good Green Earth (Colors of Love Book 3)

by V. L. Locey

  I mulled that for a moment then sent a text to my boss. Hoping against hope that he’d see this as a good thing about me, a positive personality trait that would make him like me more. A text seemed cool, like less pushy.

  Me: Just signed up as an advisor for a junior league hockey team. Will let you know sked when have it so we can jibe CS time and volunteer time.

  He hit me back with a warm smiley face and a congrats that made me grin for a long time.

  Me: Tell your uncle how much I’m rocking all this community service stuff.

  Bran: I’m sure he’ll be as impressed as I am.

  My eyes flared. Was he really?

  Me: Are you really impressed?

  Bran: Yes. I am. I’ll be more impressed if you can make it here on time tomorrow.

  Me: I’ll be there early.

  He sent me a poop emoji. I roared at his calling BS on my promise.

  Me: For serious. Bet you a kiss I’m there before you are.

  Bran: Oh Zinkan, you foolish young man. I’ll take that bet. What do I get when I win?

  Me: What do you want?

  Say me, please, say you want me fucking you up against that wall of seed packets. Or over your desk. Or in the greenhouse with the impatiens. Or on the compost pile.

  Time passed by, those three little dots moving steadily. Was he typing a damn novel or was he typing and deleting? I was about to send a text asking if he was still there when a small reply appeared on my screen.

  Bran: You to behave for one whole day.

  Me: Define behave.

  I got a row of eye roll emojis before a goodbye appeared. Silly man. He had no idea what Nate Zinkan would do to win.

  Chapter Six

  Three freaking o’clock.

  That’s what time I woke up, cell phone blaring that old Nicki Minaj tune “Anaconda” right beside my head. There was something about Nicki’s voice that pulled me from sleep with a jolt. I love the shit out of her. Tough woman making a go of it in a testosterone thick genre got my total respect.

  Getting my ass moving even with Nicki bragging about her meaty ass was tough. I forced myself to do it though because of the double motivation of winning and getting a kiss. Stubbing my toe, forgetting my cap, and falling off the curb when my Uber arrived didn’t deter me. I made my driver, a cool dude with a massive afro and a smile that lit up his face, pull into a local donut shop for some coffee. I sipped the extra large with extra cream and sugar, sighing in pleasure but wishing I could mainline the shit. My eyelids were so damn heavy.

  Pulling into Sunflower Acres when it was still dark was creepy. I paid and tipped Marquee, the driver, and then padded up to the front of the store, sat down in front of the door legs out in front of me, and crossed my feet at the ankles. That was where Bran found me when he pulled up at quarter after five. I squinted into his headlights, lifting my empty coffee cup in greeting.

  The truck’s engine quieted and the sounds of night giving way to dawn returned. Crickets resumed their song, the call of a barred owl off in the distance picked up once again. I pushed to my feet, cup in hand, smile on my face. Bran exited his truck after a moment, giving my eyes time to adjust.

  “Maybe we need to make a daily bet so you can arrive on time,” he said, slowly closing the distance from the Apache to me. It was too dark to really see much yet but I hoped he had one of his stupid Neil Diamond tour shirts on. They were old and well-washed, the cotton thin yet holding enough of its form to stretch across his shoulders and arms when he was working. There was this white one that I’d grown to adore. In the sun you could just see the dark discs of his nipples when the shirt was damp with sweat. Fuck I prayed he was in that one and had pulled on some jeans, also worn, that hugged his thighs and junk while cradling his high tight ass. My cock was straining against the zipper of my shorts.

  “Maybe I just need the proper motivation,” I parried, holding my ground as he strolled up to me, the tiny twinkling fairy lights in the huge front windows doing little to illuminate his face.

  “Working to better yourself isn’t motivation enough?”

  He stood within touching range. If I shifted forward just a bit, my chest would brush his. A light night breeze ghosted around us, lifting the aroma of freshly-washed man to me. I drew that smell in, held it, and then released it. His soap and shampoo weren’t flowery or musky. It was woodsy with a sweet subtle smell. Cedarwood and something else, maybe juniper. Whatever it was appealed to me on every damn level. Kind of like him.

  “Sure it is, but so is winning and kissing hot older men.”

  That gave him pause. He stood there in the dark, tense and unsure, not coming closer but not moving away, just lingering as if he were waiting for me to make a move. Which I did because life was too short to stand outside a garden center in the dark with a man this sexy and not claim your boon.

  I slid a hand around the back of his neck. The muscles were tight, his skin warm, the fine hairs on his nape soft against my palm.

  “You got any idea of how long I’ve fantasized about kissing you?” I enquired as I led his mouth to mine firmly but gently.

  “This is an incredibly bad idea for so many reasons,” he said, his breath hot and moist on my lips.

  “Next time don’t bet something that you’re not willing to lose,” I whispered before I pressed my mouth to his.

  Kissing Bran was like putting your damp lips on a snapping high voltage line. The jolt stole my breath. It arced through my body, sparking and dancing along every synapse as he stiffened for a mere second then melted into the pressure of my mouth moving over his. My fingers tightened on his neck, my thumb resting on the base of his skull, the pad pressing into the bone as I tipped my head and licked into his mouth. There was no resistance on his part. He made a sound like a kitten when my tongue traced the seam of his mouth, slowly he opened it and let me in. I got a small taste, just a tease. He’d had coffee too, with vanilla creamer. His tongue lazily slid over mine, once and then again, the slow sweep making me lightheaded and harder, so fucking incredibly hard. If he would touch me right now, even a brush of a thigh against my shorts, I’d come in my shorts. Fuck, now I wanted that. I wanted him to tease me with his touch until I filled my underwear with spunk. Then he would drop to his knees right here on the rough wooden floorboards, unzip my pants, and clean up my cock with that coffee sweet tongue of his.

  “Christ,” he huffed then pulled away, my fantasy going up in a puff of erotic smoke.

  I held onto his neck, chasing his mouth, desperate to kiss him deeper and longer but he was moving away, my hand slipping down his chest and falling to my side.

  “I want more of you,” I told him. I heard his long and shaky inhalation and knew what his reply would be. “Bran, come on, why fight this? Let’s go inside and discover each other a bit more…”

  “Nate, what do you think will come of that? Of you and me going inside and letting this insanity go further?”

  “I think we might get off,” I answered, wishing I could see his face or his eyes. Were they bluer or grayer now? I bet they got wild and stormy when he was being fucked. Damn, I needed to see that happen. I had to get this man under me in some flowery pasture, the sun on his face, my cock in his ass, his gorgeous eyes clouding up into hot gray pools as he thrashed and shouted and shot all over his belly. “I think we might find something we’re both in desperate need of.”

  He turned from me. The jingle of keys filled the silence of a brand new day. “All it would do…” he murmured as he unlocked the heavy door, “is complicate an already complicated situation.”

  I slid up behind him, close enough that I could speak softly beside his ear but far enough away to keep my stiff dick from his ass.

  “Or it might make it less complicated. Tough to be mad at someone who just made you come like a geyser,” I whispered and got a disbelieving groan in reply.

  The door creaked open and he stepped inside. The lights came on and, sadly, the moment died.

  When h
e turned to face me, the cold man who I’d come to know was back, but the ice hadn’t spread to his eyes. The soft lips I’d just kissed were a mere slash now. Man, he was good at shoving emotions away from his face. Pity those eyes of his gave him away. Even with the lights on, when he looked at me, his pupils got fat with lust. Like my dick. Still. I hated to think that I’d have to spank off in the men’s room again, but it was looking quite likely.

  “Nate, I’m incredibly flattered,” he said, a slight little blush coming to the tips of his ears. “It’s been…well, it’s been a long time since a man has shown an interest in me, and a young man at that. It’s a massive ego boost.” I smiled. He sighed then ran a hand nervously over his hair. “And I cannot deny that I find you incredibly attractive. You’re exactly the kind of man that I’m drawn to. Brash, assertive, aggressive, dark-haired, inked, and obviously a top.”

  “Obviously,” I quickly concurred.

  “Yeah, my type,” he said on a huge exhale. “Despite that look creeping over your face, there is a but coming. I’m in a position of power here…”

  “No, no, not really. You’re just using this stupid community service gig to keep yourself over there in the Antarctic, all alone on the ice drift with only a fucking unimpressed penguin to keep you warm at night.”

  His nose wrinkled in consternation. “An unimpressed…”

  “Penguin, yeah, because a polar bear would eat your ass and you’re too damn rigid to enjoy a good ass eating.” I took a few steps closer. His eyes widened a little but he held his ground. “Let’s just be honest here with each other. You’re not my boss, or my teacher, or my coach. I’m not a teenager. I am a grown man. You got zero power over me aside from putting your name and some numbers on a form. That’s. It. Sure you can dick me around but you’re too honest and upright to do that. You’re just a good guy who’s into helping poor unfortunate souls.”

  “Wonderful, so now I’m Ursula.”

  “It’s not my voice that you want, Bran.”

  His mouth opened, shut, and then slowly broke into a shabby sort of smile. “You’re certainly not shy, are you?”

  “Nope.” I shook my head, a shank of pink hair falling down into my right eye. “When I see something I want I go after it. That’s why I’m poised to hit the major league next fall. We want each other. We’re both adults. Why the hell should we not enjoy each other? You and I could be thermodynamic in bed. You feel the air crackling between us after one kiss?”

  I gave him a tawdry wink and was rewarded by his ears growing a bit redder. The soft gurgle of the fountain and the lush smell of flowers surrounded us as he mulled over my words. The waiting was brutal, but I sensed I’d pushed as much as I dared.

  “I’m not sure I’m ready for a relationship,” he announced in a breathy expulsion of words.

  That must have cost him. “I’ve never had a relationship and will be gone as soon as my thousand hours are up. Looks like we’re both in the same boat just on different sides of the lake. Maybe we can just row to the middle and have great sex minus any attachments.”

  “Just sex. Do you really think that’s possible?” His eyebrows knotted.

  “Sure. You’ve never heard of fuck buddies?”

  “Well yes but…” He scrubbed his hand over his hair again, his gaze lingering on me.

  “How about this? How about we hang out tonight and see where things go? No obligations just two men who are insanely cranked for each other.” I hit him with my most charming smile, and I could see the lines easing around his mouth. He wanted this as much as I did but he was far too hung-up on society’s bullshit rules to just leap in. He’d have to be eased into Lake No Emotional Attachments. “If we get into things, cool. If not, also cool. Nothing will change between us either way.”

  He bit down on the inside of his lower lip, his gaze resting on my throat where some ink crawled up from my collar.

  “Can I think about this for a bit and then make a definitive date to hang out?”

  “Sure,” I hurried to say.

  He nodded a few times, smiled sheepishly, and then padded to his office and gently closed the door. Wearing a smile as big as the birdbath in front of me, I silently pumped the air and kicked out a leg. After the celly, I gave the office door a brief touch as I passed it on my way to the gardens. Maybe I could find that napping place among the petunias Phil had mentioned and grab a few winks before the seniors and their grandbaby pictures arrived. If I were lucky I might have a hot porno dream starring me, Bran, and the pile of empty burlap sacks in greenhouse three.

  He thought for two days.

  Oh. My. Fucking. God. Two days. Forty-eight plus hours of seeing him from a distance, exchanging those wistful kind of smiles that only ramp up your desire. I masturbated three times in those two days, in between rounds of pulling my hair out, gnashing my teeth, and journaling about how my life was impacted by my actions in relation to alcohol and cultures role and how it influences young adults to drink. In all honesty, I’d never really made the connection between beer and sports and young males before the group. Now that I had, I kind of wondered if sports teams really needed an official beer sponsorship. Thinking about beer kept my mind off Bran. Not.

  Two days. Not a clue what had taken him two days to ponder on but ponder he did. When he finally came to find me rummaging around in the back room, I was a curly hair shy of going off on someone just to relieve tension.

  “Got a minute?” he asked as he lingered in the doorway. I glanced over my shoulder, thought about giving him one of my patented ‘Look How Many Fucks I Do Not Give’ shrugs but opted to grunt instead. “What are you looking for?”

  “Those garden kneeler foam things? Mr. Ramírez wants a new one.”

  “Oh, we might be out. I’ll order more but for now, he can use the old ones in the community garden shed.”

  I turned from the wall of shelving filled with gloves, boxes of Miracle-Gro, small gardening implements, stacks of gardening gloves, seed trays, and plastic pots.

  “The only colors left are pink and he’s unable to move past his deeply set gender norm bullshit to use a pink one.” I slid my hands into my front pockets, the heat of the day seeping into the small area.

  “Ah, well, he’ll just have to kneel on pink foam or have you tend to his weeding,” he replied with a wry kind of humor in his gaze.

  “Whatever. I’ll tell him you said so. He respects you more and hates how I weed. Says only fluffy boys dye their hair and wear earrings in their nose and that I don’t know a dandelion from a daisy which, you know, is pretty much on the mark flower wise.” I went to slide around him but he moved to the side just enough to catch my shoulder with his. My gaze flew from the door to his face.

  “He’s from a different generation.”

  “Mm, yeah, well, I’m getting tired of giving bigots a pass because they’re from a different time. You’re never too old to learn how to speak to others respectfully even if you don’t agree with them on things.”

  He blinked and reached out to touch my arm with a finger. Just one finger but it was enough to light me up like a million-watt bulb.

  “You’re right, of course. Can we…I need to talk to you, just for a minute.”

  His gaze met mine then darted to the shelves and then flickered back to me. “Can we do this outside? This room smells like dead mice and blood meal.”

  “Oh sure. Uhm, let’s see if we can find a knee pad that’s not going to send Mr. Ramírez into a gender norm meltdown.” He touched my arm again, just a light brush of finger pad to forearm was enough. “I’m fairly sure he has no idea what gender norms are. He must be close to ninety.”

  “Eighty-eight. He told me four times today. Then he called me a puffy boy and whipped the pink knee pad into Mrs. Riggleman’s plot where it hit and broke one of her tomato plants.” We stepped outside and I frowned at the humidity and sun. “Things were totally heading into cage match territory.”

  Bran snickered at that. We walked to the small shed
at the far end of the garden area. Inside the shed we found four knee pads, all bright pink. Bran grabbed one, gave me a long look that I couldn’t read, and made a beeline to Mr. Ramírez. The old gent with the cane wasn’t pleased to be forced into using such a sissy-colored knee pad and flat out refused to use it. So, Bran did his weeding while I stewed and Mr. Grumpy Ass ranted on about shoving lifestyles into his face and the disappearance of “real men”.

  “He always that way?” I asked after we left the gardens behind. Bran nodded and swatted at the rich dirt from the knees of his jeans as we passed a couple whose kids were dashing around the sapling trees all bound in burlap. The wind was strong and carried the smell of rain even though the sky was still blue. He led me to the employee parking area, which was right beside the compost and mulch piles.

  “Always. He’s just one of those people.” He straightened and looked right at me. “I spoke with my uncle. About us.”

  I jumped up to sit on the tailgate of his truck. It was down in preparation for another flower delivery. “Yeah, and what did Judge Cavanaugh have to say?” I asked as if I weren’t interested at all.

  “Well…” He leaned on the tailgate beside me, his hip resting on my thigh. The sizzle of attraction moved from his body to mine through the thin denim of his worn Levi’s. “He thinks I’m making a big mistake in engaging in any kind of flirtation with a known hooligan like you.”

  I snorted so hard my sinuses rang. “Hooligan. Yep, that’s me. Total miscreant.”

  Bran smiled a bit, his gaze on the bright blue sky. “Well, he’s old and feels a need to watch over me since my father died. And, on some level, he’s probably right. If I weigh out the pros and the cons of giving into the attraction we share, the pros of sleeping with you are drastically lower than the cons.”