by Ariel Tachna
“Any help is appreciated,” Thorne replied diplomatically even as he compared the reaction here to the one he’d received at Lang Downs. Caine and Macklin had ordered all but a skeleton crew to the front lines. Molly, Carley, Kami, Sarah, and four jackaroos would stay behind on the station. Everyone else was already on the way to the fire line.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Williams said, “and I don’t blame you, but until the fires are threatening our land, I can’t do any more. I value my job too much to lose it.”
“Any help is better than none,” Thorne repeated. “I’ll lead the first group when they’re ready, and the second group can join us as soon as they get the utes outfitted.”
Williams nodded and turned to the gathered men, issuing orders right and left. The men scattered at his command, and Thorne stepped back to let them work.
It had taken him a good two hours to get to Taylor Peak, and it would take another two to get to the fire line. From here, they could go faster by the main roads rather than going through the tablelands, but even so, Ian and the others would reach the front before he did. He itched to get on the road, to minimize the amount of time Ian spent fighting without Thorne there to watch his back.
He thought back to the tense moment right before he left. Ian’s smile had been different. Thorne had seen quite a few expressions on Ian’s face last night, and this morning as they watched the sunrise, but Ian hadn’t smiled like that before. Soft and intimate and almost inviting. If Thorne didn’t know better, he’d take that smile as permission. He couldn’t do that, though. However much he liked Ian—and the more time they spent together, the more he liked him—he couldn’t offer anything, and Ian deserved better than a night of meaningless sex. Thorne was too fucked up to even think of anything more than that, even if he were in a position to stay beyond the duration of the fire threat. Even so, he wanted to see that look on Ian’s face again. More than that, he wanted to know if he really had read invitation in those green eyes, and if he had, he wanted to know what Ian smelled like, what he tasted like, what noises he would make as Thorne made love to him. God, he could imagine it already, and the thought made his body react
He shifted uncomfortably, trying to redirect his thoughts. He couldn’t spring a boner in the middle of Taylor Peak while he was waiting for them to pack up equipment to help fight the fires, and he certainly couldn’t afford to have those thoughts in his head when he reached the fire line, where a moment’s distraction could mean the difference between putting out the fire and getting burned alive.
He focused instead on everything Ian had said and not said about his past. He’d hoarded every scrap of information like a dragon hoards its gold. Thorne didn’t know what had happened to Ian’s family, but they were clearly estranged and probably by Ian’s choice, if the scorn in his voice when speaking about them was any indication. The question was when the estrangement had occurred and why, and Ian hadn’t said anything to answer those questions. He also had noticeably not mentioned any of the women on the station when he described them as family. Thorne hoped that meant no sweetheart tucked away somewhere. The omission didn’t make Ian gay, although the almost-kiss was a strong indicator in his favor, but it did mean his heart wasn’t already spoken for.
Thorne hoped it meant that, anyway. Perhaps Ian was just incredibly private.
“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath as he stalked back toward his ute. He was going in circles, and it wasn’t getting him anywhere except closer to a headache. He needed to be thinking about the grassfires, not about Ian and whether or not he had a girlfriend stashed away somewhere, and if he didn’t, if he might be interested in Thorne instead.
He climbed in the cab of the ute and resisted the urge to beat his head against the steering wheel. It wouldn’t solve anything and would just add to his brewing headache. Instead he grabbed the satellite phone and called the captain to give him an update.
“Grant.”
“Captain, it’s Lachlan,” Thorne said. “I have a report for you.”
“Let’s have it,” the captain said.
“Lang Downs is as ready as I can make it. We finished the rest of the firebreak yesterday, as expected. There are about fifty men with equipment, including makeshift fire trucks, on their way to you. They should be there any time. I’m at Taylor Peak now, the adjacent station. They’ve committed another twenty men including a few more modified utes,” Thorne reported.
“Good work,” Grant said. “What’s the ETA for the Taylor Peak crew?”
“We should be leaving here in the next fifteen to thirty minutes,” Thorne said. “Then two hours to get there. It’ll take longer for them to outfit the utes, so the first wave won’t be the full complement of troops. I’ll report back with the first group from Taylor Peak. I’ve been gone too long as it is.”
“You weren’t sitting around with your thumb up your arse,” Grant said. “You were getting assistance we desperately need.”
“It’ll still be good to be back in the action, sir,” Thorne said.
“See you in two,” Grant said.
“Yes, sir,” Thorne replied before ending the call.
Six
IAN SAT next to Neil in one of the station’s utes as they bounced north across the outback toward the property line and beyond that to a section of unused land where the fires burned. It wasn’t the first time fire had threatened Lang Downs in the time he’d been there and it wouldn’t be the last, he was sure, but that didn’t make it any easier. He worked with wood. Fire was his natural enemy, and as they continued on, he couldn’t help but think of all the hours he’d spent working with wood for the station. Every house had some touch of his hand, either in the furniture or in building the house itself. Almost every room in the bunkhouse was the same. He’d spent fifteen years pouring his friendship and affection into those pieces, and all it would take was for the flames to jump the firebreak and it would all be gone in an instant.
“Williams isn’t a fool, no matter what I think of Taylor,” Neil said beside him. “He’ll send anyone he can spare.”
“I’m not worried about Williams,” Ian said.
“Worried about Thorne, then?” Neil asked in surprise. “He’s carved from stone, that one, hard as a rock and immovable as the mountains. Nobody’s going to take a swing at him and get away with it.”
“He was a Commando,” Ian said. “The most highly trained special forces we have in Australia, and now he’s fighting fires with a volunteer corps. Does anything about that strike you as odd?”
“Maybe he just needed a break,” Neil said. “People get tired sometimes.”
“He slept on my couch last night,” Ian said slowly. “He almost had another breakdown in the canteen. Too many people, too much noise, I don’t know what, but he asked me to get him out of there, so I took him back to my place. No kids, no dog, no wife to disturb the peace. Just him and me and the view. We got to talking eventually. Sort of.”
“He’s not the talkative type?”
“No, definitely the strong, silent type.”
“Not bad-looking, either, if you like that sort of thing,” Neil observed.
“Should I warn Molly?” Ian teased, hoping to throw Neil off the scent.
“No, I like my women with… well, I like women. I was thinking about you.”
“Me?” Ian said. “Why me?”
“Because you’ve shown more interest in this guy in one day than I’ve ever seen you show anyone, mate,” Neil said. “I’m your friend. You know it makes no difference to me. Caine and Macklin taught me that, and Sam finished the job. Hell, he made me accept a bloody Taylor in my family. After that, it’s all a piece of cake.”
“I know,” Ian said. “If I were interested in someone that way, I wouldn’t be afraid to tell you because it was a guy. I’m just not interested in anyone.”
“Why not?” Neil asked. “I mean, I understand if you’ve never met someone on the station who catches your eye, but you never seem to
go looking anywhere else either.”
Ian shrugged, willing down the memory of searing pain. “It’s just never seemed worth it.”
“So you’re just going to spend your life alone?”
“I’m hardly alone. The station is full of people,” Ian protested.
“Most of whom will either be gone in a few months or are happily married—or shacked up, anyway—with the man or woman of their dreams,” Neil reminded him. “It’s not the same.”
No, it wasn’t the same at all, but Ian had accepted a long time ago that he wasn’t relationship material.
Realizing Neil was waiting for an answer, Ian shrugged again. “What do you want me to say? We picked this life, knowing it was isolated. You met Molly, Kyle met Linda and convinced her and Laura to move here, and I couldn’t be happier for either of you. You and Molly are made for each other. A blind man could see it. I haven’t met my Molly, and I don’t know that I ever will.”
“How will you meet your Molly if you don’t go looking for her, or him, as the case may be?” Neil pressed.
He wouldn’t. That was the whole point, but he couldn’t exactly tell Neil that. Neil might accept it, but he’d want to understand it, and that would require explanations Ian had avoided giving anyone but Mr. Lang for seventeen years. He’d hidden it from his foster mother, his teachers and classmates, the social worker who checked on him once a month. He’d hidden it from the men at the first two stations he’d worked on before finding Lang Downs. It had taken Michael all of an hour to get the whole story out of him, but Ian had never spoken of it since, and if he had his way, he never would. Some things were best left unsaid and unremembered.
“Did it ever occur to you that maybe I don’t want to meet anyone?” Ian snapped. “Maybe I like my peace and quiet and don’t want someone putting demands on my time. Maybe I want to eat in the canteen and not have to remember birthdays or anniversaries or any of the other shit that goes along with a relationship. Just leave it alone, Neil.”
Neil looked taken aback by the vehemence of Ian’s response. He opened his mouth to say something else but shut it when Ian glared at him.
“I’m sorry I brought it up,” Neil said after a moment. “I won’t mention it again.”
Ian sighed in frustration and ran his hand over his short red hair. He hadn’t meant to snap at Neil, but Neil just couldn’t leave well enough alone. His tenacity was a boon when it came to working on the station, but once Neil latched onto an idea, he didn’t know when to quit.
“No, I’m sorry I snapped,” Ian said. “It’s a sore spot, with everyone meeting someone. It was one thing when it was Chris and Jesse, both of whom were outsiders when they came, and I love Molly like a sister, but then Kyle met Linda, and even Kami met Sarah, and suddenly I’m the third wheel all the time. Nobody means to make me feel that way, but it doesn’t change the fact that everyone else has someone and I don’t.”
“So do something to change that,” Neil said. “I was joking about Thorne, but if you like him, maybe I could sound him out for you. He didn’t seem bothered by Caine and Macklin, and when you gave me shit about Sam and Jeremy yesterday, he called me on what he thought was a homophobic comment. You could get lucky.”
“Maybe I could,” Ian said, “but he’s not here to stay. He’s not even here for the summer. He’s here for a few days to fight the fires and then it’s on to the next fire or the next adventure.”
“You said yourself something didn’t add up,” Neil reminded him. “The same way it didn’t add up for us when we got here until Michael made it add up. Maybe he’s already one of us and doesn’t even know it yet.”
“Another of Old Man Lang’s Lost Boys?” Ian said with a muted smile. “That’s what they called us, you know. If Michael were still alive, maybe he could work that magic one more time, but he’s not here and I’m not him.”
“No, and Caine isn’t either, but he’s done a bloody fine job of filling his uncle’s shoes,” Neil said. “He took in Chris and Seth. He hired Sam and made Jeremy a crew boss. He went looking for Sarah when Macklin didn’t even dare try.”
“Chris and Seth were fifteen years younger than him, Sam and Jeremy asked for help, and Sarah would have given anything to see her son again,” Ian said. “Thorne isn’t like that.”
“So have Kami talk to him,” Neil said.
Ian nearly choked on his laughter. “Kami? He’s about as nurturing as your average rock.”
“He’s got better since he married Sarah,” Neil said.
“Okay, then he’s about as nurturing as your average soft rock,” Ian replied.
“If the problem is that Caine’s too young or too kind, then you either have to get someone older and less kind to talk to him, or you have to do it,” Neil said.
“You’re still assuming I want him to stay.”
Neil shot him an incredulous look before turning his attention back to the field they were crossing. “I’m not stupid, Duncan. If you didn’t want him to stay, you never would have brought up Michael. So quit lying to me, and to yourself if that’s what you’re doing, and figure out how the bloody hell you’re going to get what you want, because I don’t want to live with you moping if you don’t.”
Ian spluttered out another denial, but Neil clearly wasn’t interested in hearing it, so Ian subsided into the seat and grabbed the thermos to hide behind drinking his coffee.
He had enjoyed having Thorne on his veranda last night. The conversation hadn’t been the most natural one he’d ever had, but they both had secrets, sore spots they weren’t ready to share. Seeing Thorne on his couch that morning had been an almost perfect start to his day. The man was insanely good-looking. Ian could admit that even if he couldn’t admit anything else. He’d always had a thing for beards, probably because he couldn’t grow a decent one to save his life, and Thorne’s was thick and dark for all that it was relatively short. His hair, on the other hand, was on the long side, almost brushing his shoulders when it wasn’t pulled back in a short queue. And his eyes…. Ian thought he could get lost in them, they were so deep and blue. He’d caught himself staring more than once last night, although he didn’t think Thorne had noticed. Add all of that to a solidly muscular body that probably didn’t have even a hint of fat on it, and Ian could easily fall in lust.
If only he had any hope of following through on the desire looking at Thorne churned up in him. He knew better, though. He’d tried, in those disastrous months after he finally could leave his last foster placement. He’d been able to look, to find guys he found attractive. He’d even been able to kiss a few of them, mostly the younger ones, close to his age. He hadn’t worked up the nerve to approach any of the slightly older ones, the ones who really got his heart pumping. As soon as it went beyond kissing, though, he’d freaked out. Some of the guys had been understanding, but most of them had been less patient. “Tease” was the nicest of the insults they heaped on his head when he got them worked up and then couldn’t follow through.
Somehow he didn’t think Thorne would even be that kind. He didn’t seem like the kind of man one led on, however unintentionally. At sixteen, Ian hadn’t been able to do anything about it, but he wasn’t a kid anymore. He wouldn’t live in fear in his own home, and that meant not doing anything to make Thorne or anyone else think he was available. He wasn’t. End of discussion.
That hadn’t stopped him from dreaming last night, though. It hadn’t stopped him from wishing he could know the joy of another’s company. His dreams hadn’t turned into nightmares for once, and he’d sought Thorne’s touch in his mind as he slept, reveling in the intimate contact instead of fleeing from it. He’d awoken earlier than normal with an unusually insistent morning erection. He’d taken care of that silently, but it hadn’t brought any real pleasure. It only served to remind him of everything he’d never have.
And then there had been that moment after breakfast before Thorne left for Taylor Peak. Thorne had been so earnest, giving him advice and insisting he be car
eful if he made it to the fire line without Thorne as backup. Ian wasn’t worried about that. He had Neil, Kyle, and the others to watch out for him, as he would watch out for them, and that didn’t even count the other Firies of Thorne’s company who were already there. He wouldn’t be fighting the fire alone. No, it was the look on Thorne’s face, the intent way he’d studied Ian’s features as if committing them to memory. Thorne had pulled away before it could become anything more than a fraught look, but Ian could almost believe Thorne had considered kissing him.
It was probably just as well he hadn’t tried it. Ian didn’t know how he would have reacted, and if he ever did get a chance to kiss Thorne, he didn’t want it ruined because he couldn’t handle it.
Bloody hell, Neil was right.
“I don’t even know where to start.”
Neil crowed in triumph, giving Ian no choice but to sock him in the shoulder.
“Ow! What the fuck, Ian?”
“You don’t have to sound so pleased with yourself,” Ian said grumpily. “Maybe I’ll ask Jeremy for help. He’s been single most recently.”
“I can help,” Neil protested.
“Really?” Ian said. “When was the last time you set out to seduce a guy?”
Neil’s mouth opened and closed again, reminding Ian of a fish, but after a moment, he shook his head. “If all you wanted was to seduce him, you’d have done it last night. Instead you sat and talked to him and let him sleep on your couch. Come to think of it, that’s probably exactly what you need to keep doing. Well, other than maybe the couch part. He could sleep with you instead.”
Ian ignored the last part of Neil’s comment. He wasn’t ready for Thorne to come anywhere near his bed, even if all they did was sleep. “Just talk to him?”
“How else are you going to figure out if he’s really the one you want?” Neil countered. “I mean, what’s dating but doing things together so you can get to know each other and see if you like the same things and want the same things out of life, and if you want to try to get those things together? It’s hard to ‘date’ in the sense of going out places when you’re on the station, but the rest of it still applies.”
