V: The V in Vigilant

by Snyder, J. M.

  At first his fare didn’t notice. But when Vic opened the door and engaged the brake, letting the bus idle, the businessman cleared his throat to call out, “Everything all right?”

  Vic suppressed a smirk. “Going a bit fast, is all. I have to sit here until the schedule catches up with me.”

  Confusion flickered across the man’s face. “What?”

  “Have to wait a few minutes.” Vic half-turned in his seat and gave the guy a stare most couldn’t return. It worked—the fellow gulped and glanced out the window at the driving rain. “I’m a little early. Can’t leave until I’m supposed to.”

  The man fingered his Bluetooth. “When’s that?”

  Vic shrugged. “Ten minutes or so.”

  “Shit,” the businessman cursed beneath his breath. “My stop’s just ahead…”

  Vic shrugged again. “You could walk.”

  The man’s eyes widened. As if on cue, the rain picked up outside, flinging down with such force, the bus rocked slightly from the pounding. “It’s pouring. Can’t you—”

  “It’s only water.” Vic turned back to the windshield, dismissing him.

  They sat in an uneasy silence as Vic waited. One minute, two…the man paced to the front of the bus and peered out the open door, worry etched into his chiseled face. Three minutes, four, five…he was now officially late for work. Seven minutes, eight…he looked at Vic, who leafed through the morning paper he’d brought with him to work and waited. “How much longer?” the guy asked.

  With a glance at his watch, Vic checked the bus schedule. He’d been going too fast in the rain and really was a bit ahead of schedule, but he’d sit here all day if he had to, just to ruin this fucker’s day. “Fifteen minutes.”

  “Shit,” the man swore again. He turned up his collar, which didn’t even meet the bottom of his expensive haircut. “Can I borrow your paper?”

  Vic gave him a look of pure loathing. “I’m reading it.”

  The guy sounded like a petulant child when he moaned, “But I’m going to get wet.”

  Vic stared him down. Without another word, the guy ran down the steps and across the sidewalk to the covered bus stop, his shoulders and back growing dark with rain in the process. “Shit!” he cried, shaking like a wet dog. On the bench there he grabbed a discarded copy of Style Weekly, one of Richmond’s free papers. Tenting it over his head, he raced out into the downpour, expensive shoes splashing through puddles as he hurried down the street toward his office building.

  Vic waited two minutes, then closed the bus doors. He released the brake, put the bus into gear, and eased back into the flow of traffic. As he passed the asshole running pell-mell down the drenched sidewalk, he sent one last thought into the guy’s head. ::Karma’s a bitch, ain’t it?::

  Sometimes Vic loved his job.

  * * * *

  Matt diLorenzo was thankful to be on the phone when the gym’s receptionist, Roxie, dropped by his office to deliver the mail. Through the large window in front of his desk that overlooked the pool, he watched her approach and groaned as he saw her flipping through yet another jewelry catalog, the second this week. All he did was request a copy, one, and now he couldn’t seem to get off their damn mailing list. Every time a new catalog came, Roxie started in again on how he just had to let her be in the wedding.

  What wedding? He wasn’t planning anything, really. He just thought maybe he and Vic could exchange rings, or something sweet like that. Hell, they lived in Virginia, for Christ’s sake. They couldn’t legally get married here. But Roxie had a dress all picked out, to hear her tell it, and she was determined to be Matt’s maid of honor.

  “Grooms don’t have maids of honor,” he’d tried pointing out once, with little success. “They have best men. You don’t exactly fit in that category, Rox.”

  She had simply shook her head, patting the chopsticks holding her dyed hair into twin buns on either side of her head. She looked like some sort of anime creature with it up like that, but when Matt had asked what Pokemon she was supposed to be, he had to duck to avoid the stack of bills she chucked at him. “Vic’s your best man,” she said. “He’s the only guy you know, Matt, and he’s already in the wedding. So that leaves me. I’ll wear a tux if you want. Oooh! Wouldn’t that look cute? Tails over my flouncy lace miniskirt with striped leggings, and my Doc Martens, of course. What do you think?”

  What he thought was that Roxie might be a little bit more excited about the whole thing than he was himself. He hadn’t even spoken to Vic about it yet, and if he knew his lover at all, he knew Vic wouldn’t want anything big. Maybe just a quiet evening at home, the two of them exchanging rings, whispered promises of forever, and the rest of eternity spent in each other’s arms…

  Roxie interrupted his thoughts as she entered his office. “Matt, check these out—oh!” Her brassy voice dropped to a stage whisper. “I didn’t see you on the phone.”

  Sappy violins wailed in his ear, but Matt gave her a stern look and put a finger to his mouth to warn her. She didn’t have to know he was on hold. Maybe she’d just drop off his mail and leave.

  No dice. Leaning back against the open door, she continued to flip through the catalog, waiting for him to hang up. Great. “Roxie—”

  A click in his ear cut him off. “Hello?” he asked, his voice a little too sharp. “Is this customer service?”

  “My name is Tom,” a man said in a lilting Indian accent. From the sound of his voice, Matt seriously doubted his name was anything so simple. “How may I assist you today?”

  Turning his back to Roxie, Matt fingered the invoice on his desk and started in on his complaint. The new lockers delivered for the women’s locker room off the gym’s pool were the wrong style. Instead of having a latch to allow members to use their own combination locks, each locker came equipped with a keyed lock already installed. Matt knew he had ordered the right thing—he’d ordered a hundred lockers in the exact same style for the men’s room the month before, and they were correct. It seemed simple, really. Someone on the distributor’s end had made a mistake.

  Apparently, conveying that to someone half a world away wasn’t as simple as it sounded. “Tom” refused to acknowledge an error had occurred—he insisted that Matt had ordered the wrong thing. Matt found his voice rising in anger, and the constant sound of Roxie turning pages behind him didn’t help matters. After almost five minutes back and forth, he snapped. “Let me talk to someone in America,” he said, pissed. “That’s where I ordered the damn things from in the first place.”

  With a resigned sigh, Tom conceded. “One moment please while I connect you to a supervisor.”

  Matt whirled in his seat and caught Roxie with his best glare. “What?”

  “Jeez,” she drawled, cracking her gum. “You’re in a mood.”

  Matt wasn’t buying it. “Roxie, what do you want? I’m sort of in the middle—”

  “Never mind.” She tossed the mail onto his desk, catalog and all. “Call me when the snit passes, will you? I don’t get hazard pay.”

  Ignoring that comment, Matt turned back to the invoice and silently apologized to Tom for being such an ass. But hey, it got Roxie out of his hair, didn’t it?

  Luck was on his side—he managed to avoid her the rest of the day. When one of the lifeguards called in sick, Matt stepped in, and the role kept him poolside until Joy came in to relieve him around four. Then a problem with the pool’s filtration system occupied him until a little before six, when he finally got the pump working again. After a quick call to the doggy daycare to assure them he was on his way, Matt ducked out the back door of the gym in his haste to pick up Sadie before the place closed. So, technically, in his mind, he wasn’t avoiding Roxie. He was just too busy to see her before work ended was all.

  The daycare was only a few blocks from the gym, but rush hour traffic and an insistent downpour stretched a fifteen minute drive into a half hour from hell. By the time Matt pulled into the parking lot, tires squealing, he was sure they would’
ve closed already, trapping his dog inside for the night. They’d threatened as much to other clients before; Matt had heard them. But the young girl behind the counter thought him cute and had Sadie leashed and waiting in the lobby when he arrived. “God,” Matt gushed as he knelt in front of Sadie, who tackled him in joy. “Thank you so much for waiting. The day I’ve had…”

  The girl giggled. She wasn’t even out of high school, and Matt could never remember her name. Unfortunately she had already taken off her nametag, so he couldn’t sneak a peek and fake it.

  “It’s okay, Mr. diLorenzo. I knew you were on your way.”

  She towered over him, tall and slim, head ducked shyly so her blond hair fell forward a little. When Matt flashed her a smile, she blushed and blinked quickly several times. “I don’t mind waiting for you,” she said, her voice soft.

  Matt had to stifle a laugh. He didn’t need his lover’s super-powered telepathy to guess what the girl was thinking, but sometimes he wished he had Vic’s ability to toy with others’ thoughts. He would’ve liked to take whatever daydreams she might have about him and turn them on their head in a rude, eye-opening way. True, she was probably still in school when Vic dropped Sadie off in the mornings, but surely one of her coworkers had to put together the pieces and could clue the poor girl in. Two men owned this dog. Both their names were listed as emergency contacts in Sadie’s file, and they shared one address. In this day and age, no one pretended that didn’t mean what they thought it meant. Once he and Vic exchanged rings, there’d be no further question.

  If he ever got up the nerve to talk to his lover about it, that was.

  Tonight, he promised himself, face buried in Sadie’s soft fur. He’d bring it up tonight. What was he worried about? How could Vic possibly say no?

  * * * *

  The rain cleared up when darkness fell, but the streets were still wet as Vic made his way home from work. The muscles across his back were bunched in tight knots—he wanted a hot meal, a hot shower, and his hot lover sitting naked above him, gently massaging away the stiffness in his shoulders. Though his day had been trying, the night stretched ahead of him full of possibility.

  When he passed a familiar mailbox two blocks from their apartment, Vic reached out with his mind to try and connect with Matt’s. For a moment he sensed Matt asleep in the recliner, television on low and the dog curled heavily on his lap. Vic didn’t want to wake Matt, but before he could pull back, the dog woke with a soft bark and jumped down, trotting to the door. Matt jerked awake, one thought on his mind. ::Vic?::

  A slow smile spread across Vic’s face in the darkness of his car. ::Almost home.::

  As Matt stretched, Vic felt the energy course through his own muscles, too, as if they were one soul in two bodies. ::How does she do that?:: Matt wanted to know, not for the first time.

  Vic couldn’t talk with Sadie telepathically—when they first got the dog, he had tried, but her thoughts were so foreign to him, they simply didn’t register on his own the way other people’s did. He’d been ready to say it didn’t work when he noticed her looking at him, one ear up, head cocked quizzically. Maybe he couldn’t understand what she might be thinking, but she certainly seemed to hear him loud and clear. Whenever he and Matt communicated silently, she watched them as intently as she did when they spoke aloud. Commands given to her mentally were obeyed without hesitation. And whenever Vic was on his way home, Sadie always picked up his presence as easily as Matt did himself.

  Now she scuffed at the door while Matt snapped on her leash. Pocketing his keys, he told Vic, ::Meet you outside, lover. I’ll be the one with the dog.::

  Vic’s mood improved with each passing minute, and by the time he pulled to a stop in front of their apartment building, the rest of his bad day had fallen away. Even the muscles clenched in his back seemed to relax, though he still wanted that hot shower, and the hot lover went without question. After he turned off the car, he sat behind the wheel a moment and watched Matt, dressed in a battered pair of jeans and an oversized shirt Vic recognized as one of his own. His lover stood on the bottom step of their stoop, arms crossed as if to ward off the autumnal chill, a leash leading from one hand into the scraggly azalea bush beside him. Vic could tell he’d just woken up—faint color pinked his cheeks and he kept yawning as he waited. ::God, you’re gorgeous,:: Vic told him.

  Matt turned, his gaze drifting down the curb until he spotted Vic’s car. ::When did you get here?:: he asked with another yawn. ::I didn’t even hear you pull up.::

  ::You’re half-asleep—::

  Those full lips of his pulled down into a pretty pout. ::I am not.:: Beside him, the bush began to shake and Matt tugged on the leash, his attention easily diverted. “Sadie, get out of there, will you? Sadie!”

  As Vic climbed out of the car, the sound of his door slamming caught the dog’s interest and she burst from the undergrowth with a raucous bark. “Sadie!” Matt admonished. He let her tug on her leash, releasing the retractable lead to its full length.

  She strained at it a moment before Vic came close enough for her to paw at his legs. He scratched behind her ear. “Someone missed me.”

  “Make that two.” Matt reached out and snagged the front of Vic’s jacket, pulling him in for a slow, lingering kiss. Against Vic’s mouth, Matt murmured, “Dinner, shower, and me…what am I forgetting?”

  Vic pressed his lips to Matt’s, claiming another kiss. “Not a thing. Sounds like the perfect evening to me.”

  * * * *

  While Matt cooked dinner, Vic showered. The dog sat in the doorway near the stove, one eye on Matt in case he dropped anything to eat, one ear cocked toward the bathroom door. Vic finished before Matt began assembling the tacos, so Sadie rushed down the hall at full speed, buying Matt a few precious moments without her underfoot. He managed to transfer the ground beef into the taco shells before she came racing back, Vic trailing behind her wearing his worn flannel robe and smelling faintly of Irish Spring.

  “Should have warned me we’d be having tacos,” Vic muttered, getting himself a glass of iced tea from the fridge. “I would’ve held off on the shower until after I’d eaten.”

  “Second shower never hurt anyone.” Once Matt finished filling the tacos—three for him, the other nine in the package for Vic—he took the leftover ground beef and scraped it onto an empty plate. Since Sadie had come into their lives, Matt cooked more than before, saving a portion of the meal to feed the dog. Now, as he placed her plate on the floor, he saw Vic’s reproachful look from the corner of his eye and asked, “What? She likes it.”

  “She has her own food,” Vic countered. “She’s going to get fat.”

  Matt playfully elbowed Vic’s slight paunch. Grabbing their own plates, he nodded at the dining room table. “Food is love. Sit down, let me love you.”

  Before Matt moved out of reach, Vic ran an arm around his waist and pulled him back to plant a quick kiss on his temple. “How about after I eat, what do you say? I’m starving.”

  Matt took him up on the offer. Watching his man eat always turned Matt on, and Vic downed the tacos like a champion on the competitive food circuit. By the time Vic licked the last of the taco sauce from his fingers, Matt shifted uncomfortably in his chair, his dick hard as steel in the front of his jeans. When Vic carried their empty plates into the kitchen, Matt sidled up behind him and leaned against his lover, thrusting his hips into Vic’s so there was no doubt about where his interests lay. He smoothed his hands down Vic’s bulging biceps and purred against the back of Vic’s neck, “You, in the bedroom, now.”

  Vic laughed as he ran water in the sink. “Let me clean up here first—”

  “No time.” Grabbing one end of the sash holding Vic’s robe closed, Matt took a step toward the doorway and the promise of their bed at the end of the hall. He tugged the sash, but his lover didn’t move. He tugged harder. “Now, Vic. Don’t make me beg.”

  The spigot cut off and Vic smirked as he wiped his hands on a dish towel. “That might b
e worth seeing,” he said, half-turning toward Matt. “Would you get down on your hands and knees? Or just whine like a little boy until you got your way?”

  Matt tried the whine as he pulled on Vic’s sash. “Vic!”

  The loose knot at the front of Vic’s robe slipped. Matt took a step back and gave another tug, harder than before. The knot unraveled and the sash slid free from its loops, sending Matt backpedaling into the hall with the sash in his hands and Vic still resolutely standing by the sink. Only now his robe hung open, the front panels falling back to display the smooth expanse of muscle along Vic’s chest and belly. Matt’s gaze traveled lower, and he saw the red tip of his lover’s cock peek out from between the folds of flannel.

  Coming back into the kitchen, Matt wrapped the sash around Vic’s waist, this time holding onto both ends as he pulled his lover closer. With the sash securely held in one hand, Matt let the fingers of his other hand dip into the front of Vic’s robe. They tickled over Vic’s belly and down, over his pubic mound, down, until they grasped the thickly veined length jutting from Vic’s crotch. “Does my begging turn you on?” Matt murmured, kissing the hollow of Vic’s throat as he massaged Vic’s dick.

  He felt his lover’s moan on his lips; the sound excited him. His next kiss landed on the underside of Vic’s jaw, then on Vic’s chin, until their lips finally met. This time Vic’s moan was lost in Matt, who pressed against his lover in his eagerness. “Follow me,” Matt whispered.

  Vic could offer no argument. “Lead the way.”

  Keeping a tight hold on Vic’s erect cock, Matt obeyed.

  * * * *

  Definitely the best thing about their relationship, in Vic’s opinion, was the telepathic bond they shared. Matt knew every nuance of Vic’s personality, every thought, every desire. He didn’t have to tell his lover tonight he was a little tired and sore—Matt already knew. When they reached their bed, Matt eased Vic’s robe off down his arms and massaged the thick, tense muscles in his shoulders. “On your belly, babe,” Matt said, giving Vic’s ass a smack as he knelt on the bed. “Let me work these knots out of your back first. Rough day?”