by Amy Lane
Readers love AMY LANE
Chase in Shadow
“…a beautifully moving story of forgiveness, acceptance and love.”
—Smexy Books Romance Reviews
Gambling Men
“…a great friends-to-lovers story about changing up the rules and reinventing the game midstream.”
—The Novel Approach
Super Sock Man
“This is a sweet confection of a story, filled with lovely characters happily finding their way to love.”
—Joyfully Jay
The Talker Collection
“The growth of these two characters is wonderful to behold and when we see that final chapter between these beloved characters…well, let’s just say tears were flowing and a smile was on my face.”
—Love Romances and More
Living Promises
“Ms. Lane is not a pleasant afternoon curl-up read. She grabs her readers and never lets them go. Her writing is definitely in your face. Living Promises is painful and beautiful and so real.”
—Black Raven’s Reviews
By AMY LANE
NOVELS
Chase in Shadow
Clear Water
Dex in Blue
Gambling Men: The Novel
The Locker Room
Mourning Heaven
Sidecar
A Solid Core of Alpha
The Talker Collection (anthology)
Three Fates (anthology)
THE KEEPING PROMISE ROCK SERIES
Keeping Promise Rock • Making Promises • Living Promises
NOVELLAS
Bewitched by Bella’s Brother
Christmas with Danny Fit
Hammer and Air
If I Must
It’s Not Shakespeare
Puppy, Car, and Snow
Super Sock Man
Truth in the Dark
The Winter Courtship Rituals of Fur-Bearing Critters
GREEN’S HILL
Guarding the Vampire’s Ghost • I Love You, Asshole! • Litha’s Constant Whim
TALKER SERIES
Talker • Talker’s Redemption • Talker’s Graduation
Published by DREAMSPINNER PRESS
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com
Copyright
Published by
Dreamspinner Press
5032 Capital Circle SW
Ste 2, PMB# 279
Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886
USA
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Dex in Blue
Copyright © 2012 by Amy Lane
Cover Art by Reese Dante
http://www.reesedante.com
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Dreamspinner Press, 5032 Capital Circle SW, Ste 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886, USA.
http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/
ISBN: 978-1-62380-010-9
Printed in the United States of America
First Edition
October 2012
eBook edition available
eBook ISBN: 978-1-62380-011-6
Dedication
This is for Mate, as always, because all young men face a stalling point where they could remain young men forever, and the really good ones choose to step up and become really awesome adults. Mate, I’ve always been “tangled up in you.”
This is also for Mary, because she loves it with so very much of her formidable, generous soul. Dex and Kane have become our touchstones, and we often think in their dialogue as much as we think in our own thoughts. Mary, you have been such a wonderful friend these past years—it makes me so proud to know I can give you Dex and Kane and you will love them and love them and hold them and call them George. They live to be adored by you.
All Paths Lead to Johnnies
(David) Dex
“IT WAS okay, right?”
David Worral had to laugh. He’d never seen Dex Williams look so uncertain. They were driving down an empty stretch of Highway 87, right outside of Forsyth, Montana. They were in Dex’s dad’s old Chevy pickup truck, a big old beater, which they’d nicknamed “Shrek” because it had been beat to shit in its long life and had the green primer spots to prove it. The thing was too old for air-conditioning, so they had the windows rolled down and were talking over the wind as Dex drove seventy miles an hour down the straightaway.
“Yeah,” David said, smiling shyly. “It was fine.” He had to grimace for a moment. “Unexpected,” he admitted, adjusting himself more comfortably, “but fine.” His cock had begun to swell just from talking about it. Maybe fine was an understatement.
He fiddled with the ring on his finger—a plain titanium class ring that looked just like the one he’d gotten right after high school. But that ring was on Dex’s finger now, and this one? This one said Dex Williams on the inside of it. It was secret, right? And just thinking about that secret made him uncomfortable again, so he struggled with the seat belt to make room for his hips and wiggled again. The seat belts were a late addition to the bench seat in the big truck, and they’d mostly been added because Dex’s dad had been busted on the interstate for driving without them. Dex didn’t see the point in them either, but then, Dex had always been the risk taker.
He’d certainly been the risk taker today. It was thirty miles to Forsyth from David’s farm, which was, in turn, ten miles from Dex’s. The boys had ridden a bus to school, and all during school, they’d sat next to each other for twelve years on account of their names being so close. But today… today had been different.
There was a rest stop between David’s farm and Forsyth, stocked with sodas and chips and set back in some shade trees, which were watered by an open irrigation ditch that ran behind the stop. They’d stopped there on the way back from picking up supplies for Dex’s mom in Forsyth, taken a whizz, bought some more chips, and tried really hard to avoid the fact that David was slated to go off to Montana State in September, and Dex—who’d never been great at school anyway—was going to stay home to help his dad grow potatoes and cows.
They didn’t know what they were going to do without each other.
So there they were: David was leaning against a tree and taking a swig of soda, rubbing his taut stomach under his T-shirt because that’s just what he did, when Dex walked up to him real serious like, getting closer than strictly necessary in an obvious effort to make sure he had David’s attention.
David didn’t mind. He’d wanted to touch Dex that way since they were in sixth grade. You didn’t talk about that in Montana, though, so he’d started dating Sandra in high school, and Dex had dated Alyssa, because that’s just what you did, right? You didn’t make a move on your best friend, because then you wouldn’t have a best friend, right?
But here was Dex, standing too close and smelling like sweat, and David was mesmerized by his ordinary brown eyes and sandy-brown hair.
“You gonna miss me?” Dex said softly, and David tried to swallow through a throat that was positively arid.
“Like I have an option,” he said, and for this hushed, windless moment under the oak trees, he let some of his yearning shine through. Dex’s hands on his hips were as natural as David’s own, and the sun shining through his longish dark hair glittered off the almos
t impossibly long dark eyelashes. They were standing eye-to-eye, and David noted the straight nose, the square chin, the almost puffy lips. Dex had stubble and a broad chest and tightly strung abs, and he could in no way be confused with Sandra. David swallowed and took a risk, dropping his soda on the ground and putting his hands on Dex’s lean hips in return.
Dex’s look never strayed from that serious intensity, even when he thrust his hips forward so their groins met. David gasped—oh damn. It… it just felt so good. The ridge of Dex’s erection pressing against the placket of David’s jeans… it was hard and rough and….
Dex reached back and seized David’s corn-yellow hair, angled David’s head, and dove in for a kiss.
At the touch of those soft lips moving firm and possessively over his own, David melted and exploded both at the same time.
His bones softened and he became pliant, willing to do whatever Dex wanted, however he wanted it. His skin flared to life, craving, demanding, needing, and he shoved shaking hands up under Dex’s T-shirt, starving for the feel of that smooth skin under his palms.
He must have made a sound, a whimper, something, because Dex’s fingers tightened and he pulled David back. “I’ve been dreaming of this,” he said. His face—which was the kind with the sweet apple cheeks when he smiled—was suddenly hard and intent and commanding. “There’s a spot in those trees,” he said, his dark eyes insistent. “Go there and take off your clothes. I’ll be right there with a blanket from the truck.”
David opened his mouth for a moment, sudden fear of being caught in the trees naked clearing up some of the sun dazzle in his brain.
“Hey,” Dex said gently, “it’s me. Trust me. Trust me. I ain’t never let you down.”
David nodded and smiled shyly. “Okay, Dex. I’ll trust you.”
So he went to the small clearing surrounded by blackberry bushes and oak trees, down by the irrigation ditch, and took off his boots and his jeans and briefs and his T-shirt, folded them neatly, and put them in a little pile. It was hot and humid in Montana in August, so he was comfortable naked, standing there, waiting, and anticipation made his skin buzz. He closed his eyes for a moment and wrapped his hand around his cock, then moved it smoothly up and over, oiling the head with the little bit of fluid leaking out. He moved his other hand to his nipples and gave them an experimental pinch, grunting when that turned out to be just where he wanted to be touched today.
He heard a rustling in the underbrush, and his eyes flew open to see Dex standing in the clearing with a blanket tucked under one arm. Dex had that hard, hungry look on his face again.
“Don’t stop!”
David nodded and kept moving his hand on his cock, squeezing, oiling, pumping, while the little clearing was filled with the sounds of Dex’s harsh breathing as he laid the blanket out at David’s feet and took off his own boots and clothes.
David’s cock was swollen tight, more sensitized by his own hand and the passing breeze than it ever had been when Sandra had played with it, and his breathing hitched harder. He made a whimper and clenched his stomach muscles, saying, “Dex, I’m gonna—”
“Stop!” Dex commanded, and David did. He stood there, trembling, and Dex came up to him, naked, and smoothed his palms down David’s chest. “Don’t come yet,” Dex whispered.
David whimpered and Dex bent a little and took David’s nipple in his mouth, playing with the end. David brought his hands up to thread through Dex’s thick hair and tried to keep his knees from buckling. God. Just his nipples… he was going to come just from having his nipples sucked!
“Dex, I’m gonna—”
“No!” Dex pulled back and looked at him sternly. “I’ve been reading, Davy, and there’s shit I want to do to you… stuff you’re gonna like, I swear. But it’ll hurt if you come first… you gotta hold off.”
David closed his eyes and felt a shivering wave of want crash on him. He clung to Dex’s shoulders and let it sweep through him, leaving him trembling, on the verge, but at the same time content to let Dex take control.
“You did homework?” he asked, and Dex smiled at him, so close that the quick warmth of his mouth was not a surprise.
“Yeah,” Dex whispered. “I’ve been thinking about this a lot.”
David smiled back, and Dex whispered in his ear. “That smile, right there?”
“Yeah?”
“I’ve known you my entire life. You only smile like that for me.”
Their bodies were nude and smooth against each other, and when Dex’s arms came around his shoulders, David couldn’t get enough of the feeling of their naked skin rubbing together. He started to thrust his hips then, frotting up against the crease of Dex’s thigh and needing so badly that he was almost weeping with it.
Dex loved him.
“Shhh…,” Dex whispered. “Here,” he said, grabbing David’s hair again and pushing him down. “Suck on it. Watch your teeth. Be gentle.”
Oh God yes!
David sank to his knees on the little blanket and looked at it first, taking it in his hand, squeezing. Dex was probably like a lot of guys—six inches, maybe a little longer—but he was perfectly shaped, perfectly proportioned. It was every dick drawn in a notebook or on a comic (yes, David had seen them, done his own research furtively on the nights Sandra hadn’t been able to hook up), and David licked across the head, almost surprised to find that it tasted like sweaty skin.
Shouldn’t it taste like something more spectacular? Candy or bourbon or even the salty-bitter taste of David’s own come when he’d licked it from his hand? Dex groaned and his fingers tightened in David’s hair and he spurted a little. David shuddered, because now it tasted spectacular, and he wanted more.
Dex’s fingers in his hair pulled him back, and David went unwillingly, sucking until the cockhead escaped his mouth with a pop. Dex angled his head up and looked down at him, cupping his cheek in the other hand.
“I want to come in your mouth,” he whispered. “But that means we can’t do that other thing unless we’re late home. Is that okay?”
David moaned. “Yeah,” he said mindlessly. “We can be late.” (Nobody was ever late to his mother’s table.) “God… please, Dex, can I come too?” he begged, and Dex sank to his knees and kissed him, pushing him on his back on top of the blanket and continuing the hot, wet assault of mouth and tongue until David was bucking his hips frantically against Dex’s thigh. Dex moved quickly then—he and David had been in football in high school, and David had been the wide receiver, but Dex had been the quarterback, and he was muscular and not too big and scary fast. Suddenly his cock was hanging in David’s face like fruit, and David moaned as he pulled it into his mouth. While his mouth was full, he almost screamed when Dex did the same thing to him.
He wanted to howl, he wanted to gibber, he wanted to plead, but he couldn’t do anything, because Dex was thrusting his cock into David’s mouth while he fisted and sucked on David’s cock in return. David was helpless, he was frantic, he was…
Tearing his face away from David and begging, “I’m coming… oh God… Dex, please….”
“I’ll let you come,” Dex promised, his breath panting out harshly against David’s cockhead. “Just don’t stop sucking.”
David sucked him in hard and tight, and Dex gave one last squeeze and suck, his other hand going to David’s balls. Oh geez, oh geez, oh geez! David made a desperate sound around Dex’s cock.
Dex groaned and started to spurt down David’s throat and pulled away long enough to say, “Now, David!” and David’s world exploded into pleasure, amazing pleasure, give and take, fireworks, bright lights, and come.
Dex pumped forever into his mouth, too long for David to swallow it all, even though he tried, and David just lay there, convulsing, clutching Dex’s hips to him, until Dex shook him off. With a grunt, he turned around, and pillowed his head on David’s shoulder with a self-satisfied grin.
David looked at him adoringly, and Dex wiped at his cheek with a careless thumb. Davi
d turned his head and sucked the leftover come off of Dex’s thumb with a smile, and Dex grinned some more.
“Good, huh?” he asked, and David shook his head, still breathless.
Dex’s expression sobered. “Worth coming back for?” he asked wistfully, and David nodded and grinned some more. Silently, Dex pulled the class ring off his finger. They’d gotten matching ones because they’d gone through school together joined at the hip, and in spite of tradition, neither one of them had given their ring to their girlfriends. Dex grabbed David’s hand and switched rings, and David slid Dex’s ring on his own finger, where it fit just like it should. Not a word was said then about forever, or about ditching their girlfriends, or about coming out to their parents with the big scary scene and the “g” word. There was just the simple promise that David would come back, and they would do this again.
In the end they decided they had to come back in order to do it again anyway. It really was too late for them to try that other thing Dex wanted to do, so they cleaned themselves off in the restrooms and climbed back into the truck.
When Dex asked David if it was okay, David had no choice but to nod. Oh yes, oh yes, it had been more than okay, it had been something he’d dreamed about for years.
“It was real good,” David said softly, trying to find words, and Dex turned his head.
“What was that? Speak up!”
And David looked away from those intent brown eyes and saw the buck crossing the road. He yelled, “Watch out!” but it was too late.
HE WOKE up in the hospital the next day, with a concussion from hitting his head on the dashboard as well as a broken arm and a whole lot of bruising and various stitches and cuts. He was disoriented at first, and then he saw his dad and mom, sitting in the far corner of the room, whispering.
“Dex?” he mumbled, wanting reassurance, because what he could remember had been horrific, and there seemed to have been a lot of blood, and he couldn’t hear Dex’s voice in his head, like he’d heard it since kindergarten and maybe before.
