Will You Be My Escort

by Meg Harding

  The man who owns the boat—or kid, really (Aaron has a hard time believing he could be older than twenty)—greets them as they step onto the softly swaying vessel. “Hey,” he says, holding his hand out. “Jackson and Aaron, right?”

  “That’s us,” says Jackson, shaking his hand. “You’re Griffin? Toby said you’re the best on the island.”

  Griffin’s grin is huge. He’s got a lot of teeth. Like a shark. “That’s me. You guys done this before?”

  Neither of them have, so Griffin walks them through the basic safety guidelines and instructions. All in all, it seems very simple. There’s not much for them to do other than to strap themselves in.

  They sit on the back of the speedboat as Griffin gets the motor going. Aaron leans a little over the side, conscious of the hand Jackson has grasping his shirt. “What’re you doing?” he finally asks, once his stomach has got over the initial “what the fuck” of being tossed about by the waves, and he thinks he can open his mouth without the contents of said stomach making a break for it.

  “In case he tilts the boat and you start to fall.”

  Aaron pats his knee, smiles. “I’m thinking that’s just going to drag you down with me.” Especially if Griffin is still moving this fast.

  Jackson shrugs. “Then when I laugh, it’ll be as much at me as you.”

  It’s such an odd statement, but somehow so sweet. Aaron turns from his view of the ocean passing by them. He flicks a glance at Griffin, but the man is concentrating on what he’s doing and not them. “Can I kiss you?” he asks.

  Jackson smiles, dimple flashing and teeth making an appearance. “Of course,” he says.

  His lips are still curled when Aaron kisses him, and he can’t help but smile against Jackson’s. It makes him laugh into his mouth, giggling more than kissing. Jackson doesn’t seem to mind, if his answering laughter is any indication.

  Jackson rubs their noses together. “I’ve never laughed while kissing anyone before,” he says thoughtfully. “I’m normally too busy thinking.”

  Aaron buries his head against Jackson’s shoulder, rolling his forehead against the jut of bone. Jackson’s words make his stomach clench. “Thinking?”

  Jackson’s shoulder moves beneath his head. “You know, like, should I be more responsive? Should I tell them they’re using too much tongue? Should I use more tongue? When are we going to stop kissing and get to the next part? Is there going to be a next part? Sometimes my neck starts to crick, and that’s kind of distracting.”

  “Do you think about that when we kiss?” Because he’s certainly not thinking at all—except for maybe about how much he’s enjoying himself—when they do. And if Jackson is, well, they’ve got a problem.

  He shakes his head, hands pushing at Aaron so he’ll sit up. Aaron thinks this is a weird moment for Jackson to decide to be the stickler for eye contact. “No,” he says, expression dead serious. “I don’t think when we kiss. Well, I mean, I do a little. Normally about how it’s making me feel? I like it. A lot.” His nose wrinkles. “And sometimes my neck does start to hurt, and I’ll spare a second to think about how I can switch positions without having to stop.” He smiles. “But I don’t want to stop. And I’m not worried about if I’m doing anything wrong, if that’s what you want to know.”

  “It is.” Aaron grabs Jackson’s hand and squeezes. He tries to ignore all the feelings bubbling up inside him. Now isn’t the time to be analyzing or dealing with them. “But from now on, let me know when you need to change it up. Everyone gets neck cricks.”

  Jackson frowns. “Then why does no one mention them?”

  “Is this the first time you’ve ever mentioned them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then there’s your answer,” says Aaron. “You’re not the only one nervous about speaking up.”

  WHEN PUT like that, it seems like such an obvious thing. Jackson is gobsmacked. How could he have missed it? How could it have never occurred to him? He doesn’t know what to say, stuck on wondering how many times something could have gone better if he just spoke up. Or if his partner at the time spoke up. It’s a relief that Aaron doesn’t appear to expect an answer, because Jackson isn’t capable of giving one.

  He’s too busy replaying the most memorable, uncomfortable occasions of his relationships. The times where the sex wasn’t great, but the other person was enjoying it so he figured it was just an off day on his part. The times where he didn’t want to sleep cuddled close to someone because he was hot and their hair was getting in his mouth and tickling his face. The times where he wanted alone time but didn’t know how to say “I need you to not talk to me for an hour.”

  And it isn’t till he’s strapping himself into the parasail contraption that the other part of their conversation smacks him in the face.

  He doesn’t think when Aaron kisses him. His brain isn’t trying to race ahead. He’s not wondering if he needs to do more or less, or if the kiss is going to end sometime that year. He’s not worrying about making noises or seeming too needy—or not needy enough. His mind is blessedly quiet.

  What does that mean?

  Unfortunately the parasail releases right then, and all thought flees his mind as his body is yanked back and up. In the space of what feels like a heartbeat, he’s soaring, the ocean racing by underneath his dangling feet. For a moment he feels like his stomach got left behind on the boat. In another, he’s laughing and whooping, kicking his legs as they trail the speedboat.

  He looks to Aaron, seeing a similar look of enjoyment on his face. Aaron’s hands are holding tight to the ropes leading to the sail, but he’s leaning back, clearly having a good time. He reminds Jackson of the grown-ups he’ll see on the swings at parks sometimes, sneaking in moments to act like a carefree kid again.

  He has to look away, lest he blurt out something that would definitely not be a thing ever said in a fling. He looks below him, gaze catching on the slice of gray that rips right through one of the incoming waves. It feels like his heart stops for a beat as he strains his eyes to better see the faint shape in the water. If it’s a shark swimming beneath them, he might actually have a heart attack at the tender age of twenty-seven.

  Several more sleek forms join the first one, and Jackson lets loose a breath of relief. Dolphins. He can deal with those. Fear is quickly replaced by amazement as he watches one leap from the water, and he hears Aaron’s delighted exclamation.

  His eyes are streaming from the wind; his hair is being blown back. He feels like he’s in one of those machines that makes all the skin on your face ripple back and look weird. A glance at Aaron shows him that’s not the case. He can’t help but smirk at the way Aaron’s dark hair is sticking up, though. It looks like he went to town with a blow-dryer.

  They’re up there for a while, with a beautiful view of the island and the beach, and of the ocean that stretches into the distance, before Griffin starts to head closer to the shore. He told them this would signal the end of the session. Once the waters are shallower, he’ll kill the boat and they’ll float down to the water.

  Jackson has his suspicions about whether they’ll be floating or plummeting. He’s going to hold his breath either way. Just to be safe.

  The closer they get to land, the slower Griffin goes. Gradually the parasail sinks lower. When the boat goes still, it’s like they’re suspended in midair for a brief second. And then they’re falling. There’s a little bit of a jerk, from what wind there is even without them being in movement, but not near enough to keep up two grown men.

  Small drop or not, his breath flees his body at the impact, and it takes all of his self-control to wait till he’s above water to gasp in air. Aaron does the same beside him, once windswept hair now plastered to his head like a swim cap. His eyes are closed tight, water dripping down the long slope of his nose.

  “Good idea or no?” he asks when he can stop coughing.

  Aaron reaches a hand out to blindly pat at him. He spits out salt water. “Fantastic idea,” he says.
“He’s not going to haul us back like this, is he?”

  Griffin leans over the back of the boat, tugging on the ropes to slowly pull them back in. “Would you like me to?”

  Aaron shakes his head. “Not particularly.”

  “I do waterskiing sessions.”

  Aaron starts to smile, and Jackson starts to warn him, but the wave smacks them both at the same time, and he gets a mouthful of ocean for his trouble. It’s far from the last wave to give them difficulty.

  They’re both out of breath by the time they get back onto the boat. “I’m going to pass,” says Aaron, voice rough. “On the waterskiing. I’m not up for moving again today.”

  Jackson completely agrees. When the boat docks, rather than walking down the beach to get back to their condos, he hires one of the many bikers offering rides in little carts. A cab would probably be better for air-conditioning, but he really doesn’t want to wait for one to show up.

  Aaron falls asleep during the ride, his head hitting Jackson’s shoulder hard enough that Jackson doesn’t know how it didn’t wake him up. He’s probably going to have a bruise on his shoulder. He doesn’t disrupt his sleep till they’re at the hotel and he absolutely has to.

  “I can pull him around the island if you don’t want to wake him,” offers their driver.

  Jackson laughs quietly. “And how much would that cost me?”

  Their driver’s grin is quick and his expression amused.

  Aaron manages to make it to their room and the bed without any aid. But the second he’s close enough to the bed to do it, he collapses.

  “You really should shower.”

  Aaron flicks him off. He doesn’t even lift his hand off the bed to do it. Just folds his fingers against the bedspread.

  Jackson crawls on the bed next to him, tired himself and feeling sticky from a long day of being out. But if he naps now, maybe he can shower with Aaron later. He must say his thoughts aloud again, because Aaron hums and says, “Good idea. Sleep now.”

  He really needs to work on that whole brain-to-mouth thing. He curls his back to Aaron, soaking in the faintest bit of warmth on that side and enjoys the air on his front. He’ll start when he gets up. After the shower sex, of course. He has priorities.

  Chapter Twelve

  A CARLISLE family reunion comes with certain inevitabilities: There will be a fight (could be physical or verbal, it varies). Someone(s) will get injured (these injuries range from minor scuffs to broken bones). And someone’s budding relationship will come to a fiery end (often times this couple also ticks off the fight inevitability). They don’t happen right away, or even all at once. But they do all happen, at least once, every single time.

  So far none of them have occurred.

  Well, that’s not quite true. Jackson’s watching numbers one and three happen right at that very moment.

  They’re all standing on a decent-sized boat (they’re going to be going scuba diving today), and his cousin Victoria is being broken up with by her boyfriend of five months. Apparently he’s had enough of her family.

  They’re “asininely crazy.”

  Jackson will give him this. He’s never heard it quite phrased like that before. But that’s all he’s going to give him, except for maybe a black eye if he doesn’t shut up. Calvin—every time he hears that name he thinks of the chipmunk because they sound similar—is a mean bastard. The only reason no one’s interrupted to put him on his ass is that Victoria’s holding her own. Turns out she can be pretty mean herself. There’s a lot of screaming. Apparently the two of them have been holding back some really insulting and nasty stuff in their limited time together.

  The boat may be large by some standards, but there are a lot of people on it and there’s not really anywhere to go that gets them out of earshot. Subsequently everyone is privy to the fight and unable to get away from it.

  The audience doesn’t seem to be fazing Victoria and Calvin.

  Jackson wishes it would.

  He’s standing next to them unfortunately, and he’s keeping an eye on Calvin from the corner of his vision. For all the shitty relationships he’s had, he’s never had anyone get physical with him, but he’s known many a person who has had that happen. He’ll put Calvin on his ass before he lets him touch Victoria, if it comes to that. Aaron’s trying to edge through the tense crowd to get to him. Jackson can see the wary and appalled look on his face as the shouting escalates and so do the insults.

  It’s thanks to his attention, and his being so close, that he sees Calvin getting ready to shove her. Given she’s standing inconveniently in front of one of the diving sections, it’ll probably send her flying off the boat.

  He acts on instinct, pushing her to the side and stepping into her place to take the shove. Now, in his head, he’s thinking he’s pretty steady and maybe he’ll stagger back a step or two and that’s it. He somehow doesn’t factor in the fact that Calvin’s a six-foot-three brick wall who might be a body builder for a living.

  Which is why he falls off the boat. And he’s not at all braced for it.

  It’s a shorter fall than the day before when he was parasailing, but it’s a million times worse because he goes in flat on his back. With his mouth open in shock. His startled shout barely reaches open air before he’s swallowing a mouthful of water that cuts it abruptly off. In normal circumstances, Jackson would be able to calm himself and come right back to the surface. But these aren’t normal circumstances, and it’s possible he might not ever get his breath back.

  He hits the reef below the boat, his head glancing sharply off a large chunk, and yet more water streams into his lungs. He sees the bloom of red as it starts to swirl around his head, as his vision blurs and dims. His chest burns.

  Dark shapes pop into sight and then hands, a multiple of them, are grasping at him and tugging, yanking him up to the surface. Black spots are blooming in his vision, little starbursts that make him feel dizzy and sick. His back hits the deck of the boat with a thump and he’s being turned onto his side, hands hitting his back till he vomits up all the seawater that invaded him.

  He’s carefully rolled to his back once he can’t cough anything else up, and through his swimming vision he can make out a very wet Aaron and Laurence hunched over him. Both of them look wrecked. He furrows his brow, groans when the movement makes something hurt like hell. “Did you fall too?” he tries to ask but just ends up coughing.

  The motion sends his head against the boat deck, and the next thing he knows is nothing.

  JACKSON’S HOSPITAL room is packed. Aaron thinks he should feel bad about taking up the seat closest to the head of the bed, but his heart still hasn’t slowed down from its racing terror when he saw Jackson fall. He was off the boat, Laurence at his side, before he could even think about what he was doing.

  Calvin wasn’t in sight when they brought Jackson up. He heard the angry shouting as he went into the water, though. He’s not going to lie, he’s sad he didn’t get to punch Calvin in his smarmy face. He’s ecstatic that Denver and James did. It’s a miracle (or possibly a tragedy) that Calvin didn’t end up in the ocean as well.

  Jackson looks pale and washed out under the hideous fluorescent hospital lights. The gash on the side of his head is even more obvious, the stitches stark against the angry skin. The wound curls around the upper right side of his forehead and trails into his hairline. The dirty-blond strands are dyed a rusty red at the moment. Fortunately for Jackson, the gash as it went farther got smaller and they didn’t need to shave his hair. Aaron has a feeling he wouldn’t have been okay with that.

  It’d be cool if he woke up to express an opinion about his state, but he’s been out cold since he was on the boat. The doctor swears up and down that that’s normal given his ordeal, and that he didn’t even hit his head that hard. Those kinds of injuries just bleed a lot. The whole thing is being dubbed a weird, freak accident. If they ignore the fact that Jackson was shoved off the boat.

  Aaron doesn’t think the people in the ro
om are going to be letting that go anytime soon. He’s certainly not.

  He rests his head against the sheets and closes his eyes. He’s in way too deep, needs to reorder his thoughts. This whole thing… it puts his feelings in a harsh light. Makes them harder to ignore. Nearly impossible. It’s so ridiculously stupid on his part.

  He has to open his eyes after a minute of nothing but images of Jackson falling playing against the closed lids. When Tristan’s big hand lands on his shoulder and squeezes, he straightens up so he can lean on him instead. “Hell of a family reunion, huh?” asks Tristan.

  It makes Aaron giggle, and he’s not the only one. The whole room breaks out into laughter, stifled giggles, and muffled snorts as the tension and stress breaks.

  Because he has impeccable timing, Jackson wakes then. The sound of his coughing and his slurred “What the fuck?” cuts through their noise like a knife. Suddenly everyone’s crowding around the bed, staring down at Jackson. Instead of looking freaked-out, he looks soothed by the sight of everyone encroaching on his space.

  Aaron wants to cradle his face and press kisses to every inch of it.

  Jackson smiles weakly, bringing his hand up to lightly pat at the stitches on his forehead. “Please tell me someone punched that asshole?”

  Georgina’s startled snort of laughter cracks halfway through. “Yeah,” she says, reaching out to hold Jackson’s hand. “Denver and James did. It was all very macho and impressive. How’re you feeling? Do you want us to call a nurse? Do you need anything to drink?”

  Aaron can see Jackson squeeze her hand. His own fingers twitch in reaction. “Head hurts.” Jackson smiles again. “Not gonna lie, I’ve had worse. Some Advil and I’ll be good as new. No nurse. Water would be nice. My mouth tastes like ass.”