Two Good Men [Hell's Delight: Unbridled 3] (Siren Pubishing Everlasting Classic ManLove)

by Karen Mercury

  “Yeah, what the fuck?” said Dodge. “The front door’s locked.”

  We decided to confront it head-on, and tiptoed tentatively down the stairs like cowards. Peeking around the corner, I got a visual of Levi looking like a spaceman in his suit and mask. If I didn’t know who it was, it’d be impossible to guess. He did have the wand connected to the tank stuck up the vent the whole time this peckerhead was yelling at him.

  “I didn’t authorize any fumigating and I demand to know who you are! Your credentials, motherfucker, before I call the police!” The guy was too young to have completely white hair like a helmet over his utterly red face. He had squeezed into one of those short-sleeved plaid shirts, and I expected a nametag over the pocket.

  Levi mumbled some shit no one could hear.

  “Take your fucking mask off!” yelled the asshole. “All the spray’s going up the vent anyway.”

  Levi yanked it off and sneered. “Mr. Osmond, do you have any idea what’ll happen when this gets into the public eye? You’re going to be Ron Wayne.”

  “Ron Wayne?” fumed Mr. Osmond. “Who the fuck is Ron Wayne?”

  “The dude who owned ten percent of Apple. Sold it in 1976. No one in Hell’s Delight will touch you with a ten-foot pole.”

  Osmond windmilled his arms and took a step closer to Levi. “Listen, you brillo-headed moron, I demand that you take that wand out of that vent or the cops’ll stick it where the sun don’t shine.”

  I stepped in then. For some reason a guy in a cowboy hat always demanded respect, at least in that town. More so than a guy in a white plastic spaceman suit. “Mr. Osmond,” I drawled, as though I knew who he was, “Mr. Steinbeck works for the county medical examiner’s office, and he has every authority to be here. He’s investigating the murders, so if you don’t stand down, you’re going to be charged with obstructing justice.”

  That sort of did the trick. Osmond stepped back from Levi, emboldening my lover and I. Dodge, hands on hips, said, “We know there was a fumigator here the day Flo Jannery and Mike Seville died.”

  Osmond growled, “I’m trying to tell this clown. There was no such fumigator here—ever! As owner of this fine historical building, I take exception to this insinuation!”

  Dodge rolled his eyes. “I know there was a fumigator. I saw his truck.”

  I added, “He fucking admitted he was here.”

  Osmond’s fire-engine-red face twitched every which way. I expected him to clutch his chest in a real or imagined heart attack. He was that sort of guy. “Well, if there was any type of truck like that here, they certainly weren’t authorized by me!”

  “Or my boss at Illuminati Construction,” Dodge said. “We just deal with structural and HVAC, no fumigating.”

  “Then you have no one to point the finger at!” Osmond cried, senselessly.

  Levi said, “The DA is going to authorize a review of your records, and they’ll find the invoice from the Calaveras Hotel. If you try to bleach the books, we’re going to take this little show on the road.” He sort of waved the cyanide wand around, making everyone in the room tense up. “Perhaps we’ll perform our show for the man named DA.”

  Osmond cried hysterically, “How were we supposed to know Seville was having a tryst in that room?”

  “Aha!” yelled Levi. “So you do admit you authorized fumigation?”

  “I admit no such thing! All I’m trying to say is, Seville had his own key. He could come and go as he pleased. It’s no one’s fault but his own he decided to fuck that whore the day someone—someone—someone might have been fumigating.”

  I said, “Yeah, but your cover-up is worse than the facts. Cops don’t take kindly to being lied to. If you fucking told Captain Marick you didn’t fumigate, and you did, there’ll be hell to pay.”

  Dodge said, “We found plenty of that brown paper used to block off certain vents and windows. Nobody bothered with room 411.”

  Osmond was wide-eyed, close-mouthed. Meanwhile, Levi turned off a valve on his tank and withdrew the wand from the vent. “All right, men. Let’s lock this place up and go have a cold one at the Pit o’ Dummies while we wait.”

  “For what?” croaked Osmond. He had no idea rats were currently choking and heaving in room 411.

  Dodge said, “You’re free to go upstairs and investigate. Know that you do it at your own risk.”

  Osmond looked like he wanted to run in ten directions at once and couldn’t make up his stupid mind. Finally he pointed one hammy finger at the ceiling.

  “You’ll be hearing from my lawyers!” He stomped up the wooden stairs so heavily I swore I heard them cracking. “You’ll regret this until the day you start your eternal sleep!”

  We all chuckled at each other, unconcerned, as though stoned.

  “I really feel like having an IPA,” said Levi.

  Dodge asked, “Do they sell your hooch in bars?”

  “Yes! They should have my Ginger Jake. Fair warning, though. Who’s driving?”

  Chapter Eleven

  Dodge

  “And now! Ladies and gentlemen, Dorothy Lodovico and Don D’Carlo, 2016’s queen and king of the Capital Crossroads Gay Rodeo Association!”

  I looked nervously to Ryan, wondering how he’d react to these sequined cow people riding their horses in a patterned, interwoven manner holding aloft pikestaffs with fluttering rainbow flags. Hell, I’d been nervous ever since inviting Ryan to this event. I’d had to tell him it was the gay rodeo. I had to. I didn’t want to arrive there and have Ryan see the banner and pitch a fit. To be honest, I didn’t know how he’d react. Homosexuality had never come up before, to be honest. It had never been an issue.

  Until now.

  So, without telling him outright that Kingsize Taylor was gayer than seven guys blowing eight guys, I asked if he wanted to go see him perform in a rodeo. Oh, the gay rodeo.

  “Sure!” said Ryan, so happily I wondered if he hadn’t heard the “gay” part.

  “It’s the gay rodeo,” I said again.

  “Sure, who cares?” Then he became introspective. “So…your friend King is gay? But he’s so macho. He doesn’t limp around lisping, taking selfies.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Is that what gay guys are supposed to do? What else?”

  Ryan shrugged. “They pluck their eyebrows. They talk about Sex in the City. They have little yappy dogs they like to dress up.”

  “Okay. That’s all a stereotype. Although I agree some of them argue about who is Samantha—”

  “What?”

  “—there are many macho gay men, too.”

  “Oh, yeah. Like the Village People.” Ryan began to sing tunelessly. “‘Macho, macho man…’”

  “No, no. Those guys are fabricated, cheesy. Let’s just say that if you come to the rodeo, you’ll see men who don’t fit your stereotyped ideas.”

  Ryan shrugged again. “Fine with me.”

  So that was how I got my prejudiced son to attend the gay rodeo.

  There was nothing overly sexy about it, really. It was just like every other rodeo barrel racing, roping, and riding. I didn’t see any of those cute Mutton Busters, kids in crash helmets riding sheep to win scholarship money. Rookies like Doil Payne could compete with pros like Kingsize Taylor for a share of the purse. Sure, some guys took advantage of the mid-spring warmth to whip off their shirts. King kept his on and looked way finer than any of them.

  I tensed when I saw a couple of shirtless guys embracing. Then I noted Alex Coldiron, local journalist, taking photos of them for the Hell’s Delight rag.

  Ryan, Georgia, and I sat in the bleachers—not the VIP section, reserved, well, for people like Jared Alessi, former mayor, and Mike Seville, former mayor. Richmond Herman, the newest acting mayor, was there now, along with some famous drag queens, or so I supposed. Men adorned with outrageous puffy skirts and blouses, loaded down with loud jewelry, and makeup so caked on it was hard to tell if they were twenty or eighty.

  I was afraid Ryan would point to them as
stereotypical “gay” people, but he kept his eyes on the barrel racers.

  “Let’s look down the list of talent,” said the announcer, as the digital scoreboard rolled out a list of men’s names. “The former world champion is here, but you got to look at the newbies, raring to go out of the gate. There’s some great talent in this whole list.”

  Powerful, muscular horses lined up, stamping their hooves with impatience. It looked like it took the rider everything he had to rein in the animal, to keep him from jumping the gun.

  And he was off! Ryan stood, cheering. I have to admit, it was thrilling watching that animal tear ass around the barrels, his body bent nearly in half like a cartoon. But rounding one barrel he slipped, landing on his flank and shoulder, and the rider decided to just head to the gate, patting the poor animal on its neck.

  “Holy shit!” cried Ryan, causing Georgia and me to share glares of annoyance. Of course, Ryan wasn’t supposed to swear. And, of course, he did. “That guy was thrashing it!”

  It was worth it to hear Ryan so enthusiastic. I knew King didn’t like children. I knew they weren’t part of his vision for his rodeo retirement career. He seemed serious about that whole orthotics thing, and he’d accompanied me on a couple of field visits, measuring a horse on another ranch, and a giant Newfoundland dog who had lost a leg to cancer. He asked all the right questions, and we’d discussed if he wanted to pursue schooling as I had. Becoming an orthotist like me required a master’s degree. It was difficult to imagine Kingsize Taylor studying animal anatomy and treating patients with dignity and respect.

  But then, King had nothing but surprises in store for me. He really seemed determined to get out of the ranching business. He could obtain his degree at UC Davis, not too far away.

  “He’s okay,” said the announcer. “The biggest priority is the health of that mare.”

  The next cowboy flew like a jockey around the arena, and that’s when I spotted Doil Payne. Like King, he was draped over the rails of a bucking chute. Not yet daring to be shirtless, he had compensated by unbuttoning his fringed shirt a few buttons and tying his kerchief around his neck stylishly.

  “I’ll be right back,” I said.

  Georgia looked nervous. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

  I knew what she meant. She meant “don’t get on your knees and take a cowboy’s dick into your mouth.” She had been very quiet and accepting since figuring out that we "liked" each other, but why did everyone think that was the only thing on gay men’s minds? We were at a fucking rodeo, for crying out loud. Rodeo business was on our minds. I knew that being around King and I made Georgia nervous. Every time we got within a foot of each other, she’d tense up visibly. Georgia’s point of view, coupled with how badly I wanted to protect Ryan from the harsh cold realities of the world, put a giant stumbling block in my future with King, if any.

  “Hey.” I motioned for another cowboy to get Doil’s attention.

  When Doil did twist his torso around to see me, his reaction was like a shot.

  Like a GIF of a terrified pug, his eyeballs doubled in size and he leaped off the rail, luckily not into the pen. I made a calming motion with my hand, but he continued to stumble over his new boots, hands in front of him as though blind, until he was staggering under the VIP bleacher, destination unknown.

  “Doil! Wait!”

  Doil didn’t wait, and I had to jog to catch up. When I put a hand on his shoulder, he whipped around with fists up, as though I was challenging him to a boxing match.

  “Hey, hey!” I shouted. “Calm the fuck down! What the hell do you think I’m trying to do?”

  He didn’t lower his fists. “You fucking fags said you wouldn’t tell my boss I was in a gay rodeo, but you did! I came into work a couple days ago, and Humphrey Osmond started tormenting me about being a fag and there’s only one way he could’ve known that!”

  “Wait, wait. There are hundreds of ways he could’ve known that. Look around. You’re in the public eye, man. We’re only about twenty miles from Hell’s Delight.”

  “Oh yeah? Then why did he come right out and say ‘Doil, I know you’re a queer because you’re palling around with those fags Dodge Hendy and Kingsize Taylor’?”

  That did give me pause for thought. Then I remembered telling Osmond that Doil had admitted fumigating that Saturday. Holy motherfuck. We had just gotten him in trouble, outed him inadvertently. “Oh, fuck…”

  “Oh fuck is right! He started telling me that now I’d flapped my gums, I was going to get Cockroach Blockers in all sorts of trouble, and it was my fucking fault if I had to testify in some fucking murder trial!”

  “Oh God, man, I’m so sorry. You know, if it happened, it was an accident, pure and simple. How were you supposed to know they were in room 411?”

  “Exactly! But Osmond rode me so hard I finally got fed up and quit!”

  “Quit? Oh holy motherfuck, I didn’t mean for that to happen, Doil, I really didn’t.”

  “I know you didn’t.” Doil deflated with knowledge of his reality. “That fucker Osmond’s been a rampaging assmuncher for years now. He’s just out of control. I will tell you one thing, now that I don’t work there anymore. Osmond told me to amp up the level of cyanide. Said there were tons of rats up there.”

  Interesting. “That’ll do it, all right. Kill rats, I mean.” I thought of our dozen white rats, condemned to a tortured death at our hand. When we’d gone back into room 411 after knocking back a few, the rats had already started bloating. One was halfway over the threshold into the bathroom just as Flo Jannery had been. Another was posed as if trying to help her, just like Mike Seville. It was eerie, and we didn’t spend much time in there, throwing the stiff rats back into the cage, where they took up much more room than before.

  “Listen,” I said. “I’m newly out, too. In fact, I’m not even ‘out’ in any real sense of the word.”

  “I guess I am now,” Doil said dolefully.

  “Sometimes things happen sooner than expected,” I said, trying to sound wise. “I hadn’t planned on being out. I wasn’t even really aware I was gay. I was in deep denial until I met King.”

  Doil’s dark cloud lifted, and he smiled. “Well, if anyone can get you out of deep denial, it’s that jacked fucker. He is one built stud.”

  I reflected. I hadn’t even been naked with King yet. I wanted our bodies to slide against each other. I wanted to nibble on his nipples, lick his six-pack, take big bites out of his bouncy ass. “Well, the struggle ain’t over yet, my friend. Coming to the gay rodeo is one move forward. You should come with us to the Bottoms Up some night.”

  “The nightclub in Sacto?” he said, using the term every native Californian hated. “That’d be great! I’m just not making friends in the rodeo circuit. I’m not nearly as good as King, and I have to compete against him tonight.”

  As if on cue, the announcer blared tinnily, “Let’s give a great big hand for those barrel racers, putting their all into it and making a great show! Next up is the highly-anticipated bareback bronc event, and the lineup looks absolutely devastating.”

  Doil grinned. “Sounds like he’s describing some new line of menswear.”

  I laughed, too. “Let’s get you back. You don’t know where you are in the lineup.”

  King saw us returning and looked at me quizzically. I just waved, not wanting to distract him from his Zen-like focus on the horse’s ass.

  “This guy’s a friend of mine,” I told Ryan and Georgia when Doil bucked out of the chute.

  He marked out okay—I was learning all the lingo from King—but he didn’t make it in the saddle the required eight seconds. He was thrown right on his tailbone, and everyone in the audience went “ooh” in sympathy.

  “Doil Lane!” yelled the announcer. “He’s new to rough stock and also rides the bulls! What a fantastic ride for a newbie. Let’s give him a big hand!”

  We did. Ryan rattled me by the sleeve and pointed. “King’s in bucking chute number three!”<
br />
  Of course I knew that. I’d seen pretty much nothing but that swaying ass framed so nicely by his fringed chaps. Now he was mounting his horse, almost instantly exploding through the gate. It might’ve been my imagination but it seemed like the crowd roared louder for Kingsize Taylor than for anyone before him. If he made it to nationals he’d be gone for two weeks or so, and I didn’t think I could bear that. I’d be as miserable as a dog being washed.

  I wanted this guy’s cock in my ass.

  King, his powerful thighs clamped around this amazingly muscular animal, was my “man to search for.”

  He had a superb ride, marking out right away in top form. He qualified easily, staying on the horse past eight seconds, chap fringes whipping, in supreme control.

  Was I screaming? All three of us—indeed, the entire arena—were on our feet, waving hats, real or imaginary. I wanted to stampede over those buckle bunnies in their tight micro-shorts, to rip their prissy white hats from their hands and yell, “See? That’s my man. Not yours. Mine.”

  It must’ve been thirteen seconds by now! I knew that because Ryan, looking at his cell phone, shouted, “Thirteen seconds!”

  “You go, King! Ride ’em, cowboy!”

  How the hell could King have heard me over the roar of everyone else in the arena? But he must’ve, because suddenly he looked right at me. Instead of the grimace of intense concentration, King’s face was utterly blank. Like he hadn’t even remembered I was there!

  That split-second gap in concentration was enough for the horse to buck him.

  King’s ten-gallon hat went in one direction. His body went the other. The rodeo clown, with his Elton John-esque sequined mask, had to do a sideways dive to avoid King’s flying body.

  I have to say, even in an unintentional dismount, he was beautiful. Fringes flowing gracefully, his arms waving as though doing a hula, even when he hit the dirt he was a stunning sight.