by Anna Martin
Leilani crouched down, and Logan called Dizzy over. She was already responding to her name and simple commands. Maybe unsurprisingly, she was about as easy to train as a bird.
Dizzy bumped her head against Leilani’s outstretched hand, making soft chirruping noises and gently nipping at her fingers.
“She’s hungry,” Logan explained.
“What does she eat?”
“A whole range of stuff at the moment.”
He had his phone out and quickly fired off a message to Kit. There was no way Logan could leave without updating Kit on what had happened this afternoon.
“You can go on inside,” Leilani said, straightening up. “I’m sure Kit won’t be long.”
“You’re going out?” Logan asked.
“Yeah. I joined the knitting circle.”
Logan just grinned at her.
“Don’t say anything!” she said, holding her hands up. “I need a hobby; otherwise I’m going to drive myself crazy.”
“Have fun,” Logan said and laughed when she flipped him off as she walked away.
Chapter Twenty
Kit picked up Logan’s message and rushed home, watching the storm roll in off the coast. It usually only took him fifteen minutes to get home, but he made it in ten, wanting to know just what Logan’s SOS had been about.
He walked into a scene of quiet domesticity that was almost—but not quite—out of a fairy tale. Logan was at the stove cooking something that smelled good, one of Leilani’s aprons wrapped around his waist. Dizzy was chasing a ball around the kitchen. It was designed for dogs, to dispense small treats, but they’d found it worked just as well with dissimosaurs.
“Hey,” Logan called over his shoulder. “I was hungry, and Leilani said I could eat whatever I could find.”
“That’s fine,” Kit murmured. He walked over and wrapped his arms around Logan’s waist, tucking his head into the dip between his broad shoulders.
Logan reached down and squeezed Kit’s hand.
“I’m just making a bolognese. Nothing fancy.”
“Sounds good to me. We have pasta. Not spaghetti, though.”
“I found penne. It’ll work.”
“Thanks.”
Kit slipped away to change into sweatpants and a T-shirt, suddenly wanting out of the shirt he habitually wore to the office. In the bathroom, he took out the contact lenses he’d been wearing all day and slipped on his glasses instead. He preferred the glasses, but sometimes they got in the way behind protective goggles, so he switched to contacts. But now his eyes ached.
Back in the kitchen, he sat on the floor to give Dizzy some love. She was growing so fast. It had been less than two months since they’d rescued her, but she was already stronger, and thriving.
Thank God. They’d made the right call.
“So, not that I mind, but why the social visit?”
Kit noticed Logan’s shoulders tense. “I need to bring you up to speed on stuff. After dinner?”
“Okay.”
Kit turned the TV on and found something to watch while Logan plated up their meal.
“Thanks,” Kit said when Logan passed him a plate, and impulsively leaned over to kiss Logan’s cheek.
Logan blushed. He was adorable.
Kit made small talk about the project he was overseeing and how Leilani was really starting to come into her own as a researcher. He was proud of her, how her confidence had grown in the past few months.
“So, what did you want to tell me?” he asked when they were done eating.
Logan sighed and rubbed his hands over his face. “Kit, there’s poachers on the islands.”
Kit blinked. “You’re sure?”
“Yeah. My team found one of them. We think he was attacked by a troodon.”
For a moment, Kit struggled with a flood of emotions. Disgust, horror, anger, grief. They blended together; then Kit picked resolve out of the mix and squared his shoulders.
“What happened? Did you bring the remains back?”
Logan was already shaking his head. “No. It’s not safe. We had to pass through the new carnotaur territory.”
“So you just left him out there?”
“Kit, we didn’t have any other option. He was found close to the river. We think that’s how they’re getting in and out, on the river that comes from the west and leads right into the center of the island.”
“On a boat.”
“Yeah.”
“But you didn’t find a boat.”
Logan shook his head. “No. Or a gun or anything we could use to identify him. He came in with someone who decided to leave him behind, Kit.”
“There’s more of them,” Kit said, understanding.
“There has to be. He didn’t fall out of the sky.”
“Okay.” Kit rubbed his hands over his face. “Have you reported it?”
“Not yet.” Logan reached over and took Kit’s hand, threading their fingers together. “Kit, I need your help. You know your words carry more weight than mine around here.”
“That’s not true.”
“It is,” Logan said with a laugh. “I don’t mind. It’s just the way things are. But I need you to verify my reports. Or, I don’t know, look at the footage for me and come to your own conclusions.”
“You videoed it?” Kit’s stomach swirled with renewed revulsion.
“We had to. I had to cover my team, to make sure no one can claim this is anything but what it is.”
“Okay.” Kit took a deep breath. Then another. “Show me the footage?”
It wasn’t an easy watch, even as Kit was detached, watching it on the small screen of Logan’s phone. He didn’t even want to imagine what it was like for Logan actually being there.
“You know I can’t conclusively say that he was attacked by a troodon or anything else,” Kit said when the video ended. “I’m not a medical examiner. I don’t even have a body to examine.”
“Right.”
“But, if I was asked for my professional opinion, yes, his injuries are consistent with an attack by a small carnivore.”
“Okay,” Logan said with a whooshing sigh. “Thank you.”
“What happens now?”
“I’m still trying to figure that out. How do you think they’re going to react?” Logan asked.
Kit stretched his neck from side to side. “Not well.”
Logan snorted. That was fair. Kit was stating the obvious.
“We need to have some kind of idea of what we want out of this. I don’t know whether to bring Dizzy into it.”
“She might become a bargaining chip,” Kit said. “Whether we want that or not. Johansson knows, so you can bet the rest of the senior team does too. If you’re going to argue that the islands aren’t safe for tourist safaris because of the poachers, then they’re going to want something back in return.”
“I know.”
“They won’t want the media involved either. The Archipelago is supposed to be this perfect, protected ecosystem. Any suggestion that we’re failing in protecting the animals is going to be pounced on. We could all lose our jobs.”
Logan nodded. “I don’t even know what I want anymore. I thought I’d do this job until I retire, but I’m not good with people. You might have noticed.”
Kit leaned into his side. “You’re good with me.”
“You’re an exception to the rule,” Logan murmured, leaning down to press a kiss into Kit’s hair. “I don’t want to lead teams of rich people around while they take pictures. That’s not why I took this job. It’s not why I’m here.”
“Do you want to leave?”
“No,” Logan said, though he didn’t sound sure. “I want to do what I’m doing now—protecting the dinosaurs, helping with the research. It’s an incredible job.”
“It is,” Kit agreed.
“I still think they’re going to take Dizzy away.”
Kit looked over at where she was sleeping, curled up in front of a heater. “It’s not outsid
e the realm of possibility.”
“And then what? She’s not a normal pet, Kit. It’s not like having a dog. I can’t go out and get another one.”
“No. She’s dangerous, though. Just by us raising her, it’s showing people that you can domesticate a dinosaur. How long do you reckon it’ll take before someone decides they want a domesticated dinosaur pet too?”
Kit felt Logan’s hackles rise. “She needs specialist care. We’re fucking up all over the place and we’re supposed to be experts. It’s not like you can just package them up and sell them at Petco.”
“I know that,” Kit said gently. He sighed and looked over at the clock on the wall. It was getting late. “Do you want to stay tonight?”
Logan raised one eyebrow.
“Not….” Kit felt his cheeks flush. “We don’t have to do anything. But I thought you could stay. If you wanted.”
“You’re in the mood for another blow job.”
It wasn’t a question.
Kit covered his face with his hands and groaned, while Logan laughed, the bastard.
“I am wearing long pajamas tonight, just you wait. I’ll be covered from neck to wrist to ankle.”
“I doubt you have any nightwear that would fit me. So I’ll likely be sleeping naked.”
“I really didn’t think this through, did I?”
Logan leaned over and gave his cheek a smacking kiss. “Nope.”
“I have enough food for Dizzy. And I’ll make breakfast in the morning.”
“I’d love to stay,” Logan said. “You don’t have to convince me.”
“You bastard,” Kit said and smacked his arm. Logan just laughed.
He was right, though; Kit really didn’t have anything suitable for Logan to wear to bed. He was nonplussed by this and stripped out of his shorts and socks and crawled into bed wearing the same T-shirt he’d been wearing all day.
“Is Dizzy going to be okay?” Kit asked, carefully selecting clean pajamas from his dresser.
“Yeah, she’ll be fine.” Logan clicked his tongue at her a few times, and she wandered through from the hallway.
“She’s not sleeping on the bed,” Kit said firmly.
Logan chuckled. “Okay. Can she sleep on the blanket?”
Kit thought about it for a moment. “Yeah. That’s fine.”
With a heaving sigh, Logan rolled off the bed again and got Dizzy settled on and under the blanket from the couch. She seemed content enough, finding a comfortable position with her own little huffs and squawks.
Kit brushed his teeth and combed his hair and cleaned his glasses with the special stuff he kept in the bathroom because then he wouldn’t forget. He looked at himself in the mirror—small, bird-boned, delicate features—and held his head high when he went back to his bed with his man in it.
“Do you want to brush your teeth? I have a stock of toothbrushes.”
“Nah.”
Logan was on his back, hands folded under his head, ankles crossed.
“Logan. Go brush your fucking teeth.”
“Jeez. Mom.”
Kit paid him no attention and turned all the lights off save for the one on his nightstand. Dizzy was curled up in her blanket, not sleeping yet, watching him almost wearily. He wondered what would be more awkward: waiting for Logan and getting into bed together, or him already being in it when Logan came out.
He went for the latter and loaded Candy Crush on his phone. By the time Logan got back, he’d beaten two levels and was feeling rather smug.
If Logan had any regrets or hesitations, he didn’t show them. He crawled into bed, pillowing his hands under his cheek and curling up to face Kit in the darkened room.
“Better?” Kit asked.
“Yeah.”
Kit put his phone down. “Are you sure this is okay?” he asked, shuffling down under the covers.
Logan huffed. “Bit late now if it’s not.”
Kit smiled and shuffled to reflect Logan’s position.
“Do you want kids?” Logan asked.
“What?”
“Children. Do you want them?”
“I don’t know.”
“Bullshit. You know.”
Kit shrugged awkwardly. It wasn’t easy to do lying down. “Yeah. Maybe one. But I feel like I’m almost too old for it.”
“Bullshit,” Logan said again, softer this time.
“My moms were both young when they had me. Mom was twenty-three and Mama was twenty-five. They were always running around with me and doing stuff, taking me to the park, museums, zoos, that sort of thing. They had so much time for me. I want to be able to give that to my kids too. My job means so much to me—the work we do here sort of takes over your life. I don’t regret any of it, but it’s not the right environment to raise a child in. I don’t know how I would do it.”
“It’s not generally the sort of thing you do on your own.”
“I suppose,” Kit said. “Honestly, I don’t think about this kind of stuff.”
“Settling down?”
“Yeah. Do you?”
Logan nodded. “I think about it. I don’t really have any intention to do anything about it, but I think about it.”
Kit smiled and reached out to smooth his hand down Logan’s arm. It felt nice, so he did it again, rucking all the soft hairs the wrong way, then smoothing them back into place.
“It’s getting late. I’m going to turn the light off now.”
“Don’t I get a good-night kiss?” Logan asked, teasing.
Kit hesitated, then leaned in, brushing their lips together whisper-light. When Logan reached up and cupped Kit’s cheek in his hand, it felt like permission to take more. A little more pressure, lips catching, the gentle glide of tongue to ease the way.
“Good night,” Kit said against Logan’s lips.
“Mmm.”
Kit turned off the lamp on his nightstand and rolled onto his side, facing away from Logan.
“Night, Dizzy,” Logan called.
She made a soft noise back at him.
Kit immediately sat up and glared at Logan in the dark.
“Are you kidding me?”
“What?”
“She responds?”
“Yeah. She started doing that a few days ago.”
“She knows what you meant.”
“Arguably, yeah. Go to sleep, Kit.”
Kit dropped to his elbow. “Good night, Dizzy,” he said, a little louder than his conversation with Logan.
She made the same noise again.
“Holy shit,” he breathed.
Logan chuckled and slung an arm around Kit’s waist, dragging him down on the bed, his chest pressed tight to Kit’s back.
“Night, Kit,” he murmured.
“Yeah, yeah.”
Kit woke with a hand on his ass.
Logan’s hand, his brain supplied, as he wriggled on his belly. The hand didn’t move. Then it did. Fingers splayed, curled, and the thumb gently tucked under the waistband of his pajama pants.
“Are you groping my ass?” Kit mumbled.
“It’s a very nice ass.”
Logan’s voice was scratchy with sleep and muffled. He was still facedown in the pillow. He squeezed, very gently, and Kit tried not to be affected by it.
“Thanks.”
Logan squeezed again and this time Kit laughed. He shuffled closer to Logan and poked until Logan rolled onto his back. Then Kit could throw a leg over both of Logan’s, put his head on Logan’s very nice chest, and snuggle.
“Oh, I see how it is,” Logan mumbled. He wrapped his arms around Kit’s chest and kissed his hair. He skimmed his hand over Kit’s back a few times, then went back to groping his ass.
Kit just laughed.
“This is nice,” he said softly.
“Mm.”
“You want breakfast or anything?”
“I could eat breakfast.”
“I have cereal. And soy milk. Leilani is allergic to cow’s milk.”
“Perfe
ct.” Logan’s arms tightened around him. “Not just yet, though.”
“Okay. Not just yet.”
Kit took a deep breath and relaxed into the feeling of being held. Logan was good at this. The crush Kit had kept secret for the longest time was starting to mellow into something more; no longer a spiky-edged, fizzy rush of lust, now it had sunk into some deeper connection. Sure, Kit was very okay with the broad expanse of chest under his cheek. He could admire that as a healthy gay man.
There were other things too, now, though. Like the way Logan laughed, a deep rumble in his chest, and how he reached for Kit so easily. There was want between them, a lustful longing, but Logan wasn’t pushing. He respected Kit’s boundaries.
Yeah, that crush was definitely changing.
Chapter Twenty One
Logan got into the office after his breakfast of Cheerios and knew he had to do something. He wasn’t good at waiting around for other people to make decisions. He was a get-out-there-and-get-shit-done type of person.
So he’d taken his truck and headed out onto the islands.
It was easy to forget how big the Archipelago was. Logan often overheard people talking about the South Island like their small community had taken over the whole place, but that just wasn’t the case. The island was a few thousand square kilometers of land, and most of it was untouched jungle. Less than three hundred people were huddled into one corner to live and work and socialize.
Logan had always been okay with his own company. Even as a kid he’d been more interested in exploring on his own than being part of a crowd. So being alone, several hundred miles from civilization, wasn’t something that fazed him.
It was a weekend, no one would be monitoring the emergency response unit, and no one knew exactly where he was.
After he’d spent a day trying to reintroduce Dizzy to the dissimosaur herd, Logan had taken a meandering route back through the island, checking in on a few species. The protoceratops that had been injured and hiding was now back on her feet and moving around, which was good. The ornithomimus herd were starting to show signs of recovery after a difficult breeding season. For a while Logan was worried they would die out, but it seemed like there were several new hatches among their group.
Logan knew it was a bad idea to linger in predator territory, but he hadn’t been able to get the image of the dead poacher from his mind. They would probably never know exactly how he died, but that didn’t stop Logan from wanting to investigate.
