by Vremont, Ann
"Be careful," she whispered and stood up to watch him set across the desert floor. When she could no longer see him, she retrieved his clothes and headed back to the Ranchero. Certain he could still feel -- if not hear -- her she whispered it again before sliding into the cab.
*****
The Rottweilers started barking when he was still a quarter mile out. When he reached the fence, they knew exactly where Cruz stopped. He could hear them whining and digging at the opposite side of the corrugated steel.
The whining turned to snarls as he started to shift into his hybrid shape. Reaching an arm above his head, he slammed his hand, claws out, against the metal. His nails punctured the fence and he hauled himself up, swinging his free arm to slam it against the fence. Arm over arm he went, the metal shrieking and moaning from his weight and the holes he was leaving in it.
He curled the top of the fence over, bending it into a fragile ledge long enough for him to peer down and check that the ground below was clear.
The dogs had backed a few feet away from the fence, schizophrenic between snarling and baring their teeth and then whining and showing their bellies. Cruz hit the ground, his growl rumbling in his chest and throat. He snapped his jaws and watched them tuck their bobbed tails and run.
He’d last been at Steiger’s a couple month’s back, a rush pick-up for a family stuck in town on a cross country trip. He knew the old man stripped the older cars of their best parts and warehoused them in sheds scattered around the junkyard. Any other junkyard and he could have spent all night searching just for the right pile of crap, but Steiger was something of an obsessive compulsive. Fords were hauled to one section, Dodges to another, foreign at the back because he liked to make their owners and mechanics walk the extra distance.
Cruz came to the first shed in with the Fords. The door was padlocked. Typical Steiger. He went to the side window and saw small parts. He busted the padlock on the next shed. A bare bulb with a pull chain hung in the center of the shed. Cruz blocked the window and turned the light on. There was no original equipment in the shed for the Ranchero but the vehicle shared a platform with the Fairlane.
Good enough. He slung the manifold over his shoulder. That had been the easy part. He just hoped the old man had an acetylene torch and a hand saw in the garage.
Reaching the garage, he growled. He could hear the ultra low frequency of an alarm system, something the old man hadn't had on the last visit. The doors and windows were probably wired. It might take the cops half an hour or more to reach the junkyard, but the longer the theft went undetected, the better. He growled again and felt Dominic at the back of his skull watching in.
You know what you have to do, Manito.
He knew. He didn’t have to like it. He’d already broken a lock, clawed holes in the fence, stolen an expensive part and made the old man’s dogs piss themselves. Not to mention he was going to steal a torch and saw before he was done for the night.
Drop the hesitation, little brother. We'll make good with him later -- if we're still alive.
The door and windows might be wired, but not the walls. Cruz jerked his arm back, brought it smashing into the wood planks. He repeated the motion two more times and then started to peel the shattered wood pieces away. He let his nose guide him to the shelf holding the torch. The saw was just as easy, moonlight glinting off a row of tools hanging from a peg board.
Done, bro.
Well, done except for getting over the fence without breaking something. He let his nose lead him again, sniffing out a coil of rope inside the garage. He bound the pieces together, slow and clumsy in his hybrid form, and carried them back to the spot where he’d gone over the fence. He clamped the end of the rope between his jaws.
"Fuck," he thought, looking at the jagged metal edges of the holes he had made. He couldn't use them on this side without tearing his flesh. He was going to have to punch through all over again. Up he went, hand-over-hand, then stood precariously on the ledge he had bent earlier as he hauled the gear up and eased it back down to the other side.
He could hear the Ranchero approaching as he worked. A plume of shadow rose in the sky from the dust it kicked up. Cruz finished lowering the parts safely to the ground and then he jumped, hit the ground in a roll and came up human.
Dominic pulled the Ranchero to a stop, jumped out and stored the bundle in the back of the vehicle while Cruz slid into his jeans.
"No problems, right," Dominic joked.
"I just hope old man Steiger doesn’t have video running." Cruz got in the car and Tamsyn threw her arms around him.
She ran her hands over his hands and arms, cooing over the small scratches from his jump before she touched his face. "Were the dogs a problem?"
Cold and tired, he snuggled up to her. "Terrible. I thought they were going to rip me to pieces."
Dominic put the Ranchero in gear. "He’s yanking your chain, Tam. Dogs are still off in a corner hiding. Don’t let him milk it."
"I won’t," she agreed, turning so that Cruz’s head could rest more fully on her shoulder. "Not too much, at least."
They drove back through the desert to the dirt road, heading further away from the junkyard until they crossed another highway and disappeared off road.
Stealing the manifold and tools had been the easy part. Swapping it out, with just one jack and in the dark was an all night job. When Cruz finished, Dominic had to pull him out, lower the vehicle back down and fold Cruz into the cab.
"Sleep, Manito. You earned it."
*****
The chance for a real bed came late in the day. They stuck to small restaurants, smaller gas stations and bypassed the chain hotels until they found an out-of-the-way rental office for a string of cabins at the base of a mountain. A single room and a bath, two beds, a TV broadcasting off a dish satellite.
Dominic straight armed Cruz in the direction of the bathroom as soon as Cruz had the laptop set up. "You’ve definitely got dibs on the tub, little brother."
Cruz looked to where Tamsyn had already taken a seat on the far bed, a pillow bunched up on her lap, her chin buried in its top as she watched him. She lifted her chin just enough to motion at her bag next to him. "Toss me my supplements, first, Medina."
Cruz pulled the bottle out, eyed the waste basket against the opposite wall.
Tamsyn caught the direction of his gaze and voiced a low warning. "Medina..."
"Tam, you’ve almost polished the bottle off in, like, three days?" He shook his head, pulled his arm back, aiming for the can. "I don’t think that’s safe -- not to mention the potential for PMS and 'roid rage at the same time."
"Medina..."
He let the bottle fly. Her hand shot out, easily snatching the bottle from the air.
Dominic stopped reading Beemer’s messages on the laptop to stare at Tamsyn. "You been taking catching classes, Tam?"
She stuck her tongue out at him.
"Seriously. I’ve never seen you catch anything. Seen you try a helluva lot..." He looked to Cruz. "You, Manito?"
Cruz shook his head.
"I catch things all the time," she grumbled.
"Like what?" Dominic pressed.
"Like shit from the two of you." She threw the pillow at Dominic’s head, hitting him square in the face.
"Pitching lessons, too." Cruz took the pillow back to Tamsyn and gently wrestled the bottle from her. He tossed it in a high arc that forced her to reach awkwardly behind her to catch it -- but she did.
She unscrewed the lid and dry swallowed the last four pills before tossing the bottle herself. Dominic left the reading table by the window and stood next to Cruz. He leaned forward, nose tilted up.
"If you even think about sniffing me, Dominic, I’m going to punch you in the balls."
Dominic stepped back, hands up in a gesture for peace.
Cruz corralled him back towards Tamsyn. "Would you tell her it’s too dangerous?"
Dominic slid low, rolled onto the empty bed and propped a pillow
under his head. "How am I supposed to do that, little brother?" He picked up the remote, switched the TV on. "You must have been rolling in buzzard shit switching out that manifold and I can’t even get you to take a bath."
Cruz looked at Tamsyn, one of his dark brows raised as if seeking her opinion. She pinched a few centimeters of air between her thumb and index finger.
"A little, but I don’t mind."
"Fine." Cruz stripped his t-shirt off, wiped beneath his arms and tossed it at Dominic’s face.
Tamsyn waited until the bathroom door closed and then rapped her knuckles on the nightstand between the two beds. "Don’t you have a perimeter check or something to do?"
Dominic rolled his eyes and flipped to the next channel. Tamsyn moved to sit at the end of her bed and stared at him until he tossed the remote back onto the nightstand.
"Perimeter check, huh?"
She smiled sweetly. "Perimeter check, repack the Ranchero...count the rocks lining the drive."
He left, shaking his head and taking the laptop with him as she tiptoed to the bathroom door. Trying to ease it open without a sound, Tamsyn cracked it the first inch to find Cruz watching her from the tub. His gaze was heavy lidded, as if he was already imagining her stripped naked.
"You joining me?"
Tamsyn blushed, her boldness fleeing now that it was just the two of them again. "If I’m still girl enough for you," she joked.
His gaze wandered meaningfully to the center of the tub. She heard the surface tension of the water break and imagined his cock bobbing up -- hard and ready. "All indicators are a ‘yes.’"
He looked her up and down. "You have to take your clothes off to get wet, baby."
Tamsyn suppressed a snort. He had to know she was wet already, thinking of what the big, old tub was hiding from her view or the way he had just looked at her with his voice rumbling low in his chest like that.
She had already shed her sandals in the outer room and she slid from her jeans and panties. A week ago, she would have died at the thought of him seeing her naked, certain his attitude toward her was nothing more than an aversion to her size. Now, she wanted to feel his gaze, her flesh warm and tingling from the heat in his eyes as he watched.
Seeing his hand slide from where it gripped the rim of the tub down into the water, Tamsyn pushed the thought of him touching himself out of her head long enough to peel her top away and undo her bra. She stepped toward the tub. Cruz put just a finger out and touched it lightly against the jut of her hip so that she stopped.
His fingers traced the shallow line between her torso and thigh, down to the soft silk of her cunt hair. She looked down at the water to see his hand wrapped around his cock. Tamsyn widened her stance, just enough that he could part her labia with his fingers. Her thighs and pussy squeezed at the light touch.
"I was wrong, baby. You're soaking already."
Tamsyn nodded. She could feel how slick she was, feel the warm liquid beginning to wet her thighs as his fingers worked her clit. Her nipples were hard, feeling every tug on her clit as the sensation worked its way up her stomach.
He tugged at his cock, too. The strong hand bobbed up to swallow half the head before sinking down to the dark, wet tangle of pubic hair, pulling the skin tight along the tip and shaft. The top split pearled with pre-cum.
"You’re shaking, baby." He reached up from the water to capture her wrist. Leaning close, he rubbed his nose against the triangle of hair, kissed each thigh. "You need to sit down."
"Yes."
His stomach tensed, his cock lifted, offering her something hard and thick to sit on.
"Yes," she repeated and raised one leg. She could smell her excitement now, knew her smell from his and the dissolving bath salts he’d sprinkled at the bottom of the tub. She stepped into the water, brought her other leg in and slowly sank down towards his cock.
His hand moved between them to hold his erection steady as her cunt settled against the pearling head. Centimeter by centimeter she lowered herself, her breasts swinging towards Cruz. He captured them, sucked at the swollen tips until they were bruising a bright eggplant.
She loved that, loved the feel of him in her, loved his hands hard or soft on her body, loved the tugging pull of his lips drawing her nipple taut.
She started to rock. Little waves broke across the surface of the bathwater. Cruz leaned his head back, eyes closed, his hands massaging her breasts, squeezing them with each forward bounce of her body.
Cruz released her breasts and soaped the wash cloth up, ran it across her shoulder, down her chest. She arched back, letting her hair dip into the water as he ran the cloth over her stomach. Tamsyn leaned forward again, close enough to kiss him. Their lips met as she felt the cloth running down her back, over one butt cheek. He brought the cloth up heavy with water, rinsing the suds away. The kiss deepened, the circling of their tongues matching the hard grind of her cunt around his dick.
He dropped the cloth and knotted his wet hands in her hair. His hips lifted, thrusting. She moaned into his mouth, her hands wrapping around his shoulders as her nails pressed into his flesh. The tub, big enough a few minutes before, was now too small. He circled her waist with his arms, almost levitated from the bath as he got them out of the water and onto the floor.
He sat on the towels, she sat on him, her breasts pressed hard against his chest. She rode him, wild, clenching. Her thighs and ass muscles worked to keep her pussy constricted around him.
There was nothing civilized in the way she fucked him, moaned his named or whispered in his ear, "You’re so big, baby. So big."
"I can be bigger," he whispered back, lost in the same abandon that gripped her.
Tamsyn shivered, her mind flashing first to the selective mutation of Cruz’s hand in the restaurant parking lot back in Ajax and then his transformation on his way to Steiger’s. It had happened so fast, but with enough time that she’d seen--
She shivered again, rode him a little more desperately as her mind whirled around his suggestion. Tamsyn jerked, the idea hurling her against the wall of her first orgasm.
"Yes," she panted, craving another bone rattling climax. It was why she’d downed a 45-day bottle of Testarol in three days -- not just to be safe but to be with him totally, inseparable. "Bigger, yes. I want that."
"Slow, Tam." Cruz wrapped his hands around her hips and pressed his back against the floor. His hard grip kept her in place, except for the little circles her cunt moved in that he couldn’t -- and didn't want to -- stop.
She whimpered a little as he started to grow inside her. Not like she was hurt, more like she was a little out of her mind. She laughed, the sound crazy, hungry for more.
He was buried deep in her, all her upper body weight settled on his cock as he continued to expand and lengthen. Another whimper. Cruz groaned when she did it.
Tam looked down to where their bodies met. The dark ladder of hair that ran from the base of his cock up to his navel had thickened. More hair bristled along the top of his thighs, tickling her bottom and pussy.
She looked beyond him, to the closed bathroom door and the dressing mirror attached to its back. Just Cruz, human -- until she lifted a little off him and could see his cock. Thicker, darker, heavy veins on the surface, the center shaft swollen bigger than the head. So full inside her that he wouldn't be able to roll and thrust if she wasn't so wet.
She was secreting a slow steady flow from her urethra. She reached down, touched a finger tip to it, trailed the moisture all they way up her stomach to her nose. Viscous, clear. She took a small lick and then trailed another line down to her cunt and smeared more onto her fingers.
Cruz grabbed her hand, brought it to his mouth and started to suck on her fingers.
Oh, god. His cock and that slow sucking on her fingers made her head roll back. Her eyes closed as her climax wrapped itself around her spine and squeezed. Squeezed and kept squeezing until she collapsed forward onto him, panting and shuddering at each aftershock of pleasure rolling
through her.
Cruz rolled her onto her back. Inside her, he returned to normal -- still big and as hard as the wood beneath her.
"You know I watched over you," he confessed as he kissed her throat. "Watched you in your apartment."
She nodded. She had known, even if she had not been aware of the knowing. The connection had been there, fueling her passion on the solitary nights and her revulsion at Lonnie’s sallow head dipping between her legs.
So he knew -- what she liked, what she had done to preserve and satisfy herself at the same time. Cruz growled against her ear, almost like he was catching her thoughts and shaping them into intent.
"Tam, so dirty," he murmured approval against her ear. His hands moved down to her bottom, pulled her cheeks apart as she spread her legs. "So...mine."
He cock was slick from her cunt and the slow, steady secretion that had flowed from her urethra. The flow was still there, covering her swollen labia and pooling on the surface of his cock. He pushed the head against the opening to her ass. Her pussy tightened, quivered, and a shaky moan escaped her.
She closed her eyes, threw her arms up over her face. She didn’t want to see him watching her as she lost all control. And she knew she would go wild. It was already building in her as she felt the muscles of her ass stretching to accommodate his heavy erection.
And then his thumb found her clit. Little circles. Her hips found the groove, letting him work more of his cock into her.
"Fast," she begged between short gulps of air.
When he grabbed her hips, she worked one hand down to the hard length of her clit, and began to rub as he drove in and out of her, increasing his speed with each little plea that fell from her lips.
Coming. Gushing. So much of it on her thighs and lower belly, on his. He came with her, in her, his fingertips digging deep into the flesh of her hips as the last of his climax brought his body to a deep paralysis.
Cruz relaxed, gasping. His hands dropped to the floor, palms against the wood as he stared at her half covered face and closed eyes. She opened them, looked up at him to see his expression startle.
