Well Traveled

by Margaret Mills

  This trip had been entertaining enough already, but it had just now got a whole hell of a lot better. He reached to tweak a dark nipple that had kept him so fascinated even when Jed was abed and sick with fever, and he grinned more broadly when that smooth chest arched toward the touch. “Can I kiss it?” he asked, not wanting to make a wrong move that might scare this brave off, not after this.

  Jed blinked his dark eyes open and frowned. “What?”

  Gideon flicked the nipple again. “There. Y’all don’t kiss on the mouth, I didn’t know if….”

  In answer, Jed just reached up and slid his hand around the back of Gideon’s neck, drawing him down. Gideon fell forward, catching his weight on his hands, and suckled that little teat like a hungry kitten, feeling a thrill run through him at the tiny sounds Jed made. So that gets him going. Gideon admitted to himself that it did plenty for him. His prick twitched violently, but that was a lost cause, at least for a little bit, so he eased off the suction and fell down beside Jed, his back to the fire, wrapped his hand around that lean waist and pressed right up against him, relaxed and sated to his bones.

  “We should dress,” Jed whispered.

  “We should do that again first,” he countered.

  “We are off the trail, but not so far that our fire can’t be seen or smelled by passersby,” Jed said, and Gideon felt a chill run down him that dampened his lust effectively.

  “Uh… yeah,” he said, and took one last, hungry look. He didn’t want Jed covered up yet, loved the way his shirt hanging open made him look more naked, more appealing than if he were stripped bare. But he sure as hell didn’t want to get caught at unnatural practices with a man, neither. Jed was right, darn it all. Still, Gideon nuzzled the long neck one last time, smelling that fresh wild scent of the man before he rolled to his hip and reached for the clothes he’d pulled out. He shook out his union suit and tugged it up his legs, sliding the sleeves up over his shoulders and buttoning slowly. Nobody’d make a thing out of a man sleeping in his underwear. Nobody’d make a thing out of Jed now either, his buckskins pulled up but loose at his waist, his dark feet bare, his shirt buttoned.

  “That was….” Gideon swallowed and chuckled a little. “That’s sure as hell gonna make nights in the wild more appealing,” he admitted. Then it struck him to ask. “Why now?”

  “Why now, what?” Jed asked, and Gideon remembered all those times women frowned at a man for answering questions with ‘what’.

  “If you heard what I said all the way back in that whorehouse in Livingston, why’d you wait til tonight to mention it?”

  “Because you respected my wishes,” Jed said.

  Gideon frowned his confusion, even though Jed wouldn’t be able to see it. “Huh?”

  “About entering the town. You could have tried to press me to go with you into the city. You could have gone in alone. You chose to stay with me.”

  Gideon’s heart warmed at the thought that it was just that simple kindness of friendship already grown between them that had pushed Jed toward this. He rolled on top of Jed, settling comfortably and holding his weight off the man with knees and elbows. “Have to say, I’m damned glad I did,” he said, and leered.

  If Jed understood the look, he ignored it. “Dawn will come early, and I’ll have snares to empty.” He stared up at Gideon for a long moment, though, before using his hips to nudge Gideon off. He rose easily to his feet, the leg not giving him any trouble at all that Gideon could see, threw a few more sticks they’d collected onto the fire, and tugged his blanket around until it made a little angle with Gideon’s. They slept head to head, their bodies stretched away from each other, as innocent a picture as two men could make if someone came upon them in the night.

  “‘Night, Jed,” Gideon said, watching the fire and listening to night birds, scarce insects, and Jed’s even breaths. “And… well, thanks.”

  “Good night, Gideon,” Jed replied.

  Gideon smiled. It sure had been.

  WHEN he woke the next morning, Jed was gone. He’d become accustomed to it since they’d left Livingston, but this morning, after what had happened between them last night, Gideon had a few seconds’ frustration that the man had risen and run off so quick. Morning wood was clearly pointed in the direction of Jed’s blanket—or where Jed’s blanket had been.

  When he’d blinked himself a little more awake and smelled the coffee on the fire, he sat up and looked around. Jed’s blanket was tied off on the back of his traveling pack, which sat on the other side of the fire. The coffee was good—not scorched—and he drank it down gratefully, wondering where his Indian had learned how to make coffee.

  His Indian. The idea stirred a fire in his belly, plenty of which was lust, but he knew some of it was friendly affection, warmer than just the idea of a poke and something more like he’d felt for Miss Lila after they’d spent some time getting to know each other. Before he could study on it for long, he heard the soft tread of feet coming near and looked up to find Jed making his way through the tall grass, carrying a duck in each hand.

  Jed frowned when he saw Gideon and shook his head. “Morning,” Jed said, and Gideon raised his coffee cup, still a little bleary-eyed in the pre-dawn light.

  “Good coffee, thanks,” he offered after he’d swallowed down a few more sips. His prick, which had started to settle down like a gentleman, was reacting to Jed working purposefully around their camp, to the way Jed’s hip showed so clearly through that soft buckskin as he knelt down to start the hard work of plucking the feathers off the birds.

  “I don’t know how you white men sleep so hard,” Jed said. “I woke, I loaded the fire, I made coffee, put up my bedroll, and left to get these,” he said, shaking the birds for emphasis. “If I had been someone else, you could have been injured or worse,” he added, right chatty, for him. “You could have been killed half-dressed.” He waved his free hand, indicating Gideon in his union suit and socks, so Gideon looked around for his pants—which Jed had moved, draping them over his suitcase instead of that creosote bush where he’d hung them last night.

  Gideon grinned. “You’re no better. Hell, night before last I got up to relieve myself and you didn’t even blink an eye.”

  “It was very early, just before the moon set,” Jed said, surprising the hell out of Gideon.

  Gideon remembered that, seeing the waxing crescent just touching the horizon and giving him barely enough light to point his prick. “I was quiet!”

  Jed snorted. “I suppose you thought you were. You should be more alert.”

  He shrugged off the admonition. Indians got raised for a whole different set of skills then citified folks like himself, and Harold Crowe, the star brave in Bill Tourney’s show, had the same kinds of talents Jed seemed to. “Good to know you’re worried about me,” he said and laughed as Jed rolled his eyes.

  The morning light was bright enough for him to see the flush that stained the Indian’s high cheekbones, and it brought back that warm feeling he was enjoying so much.

  Gideon finally forced himself up and into his clothes and pitched in with the birds, pretty mallards, and they had them cooking about the time the sun crested the hills to the east. The ducks cooked quickly, fat sizzling and melting into the fire until Jed emptied the pan of coffee, rinsed it in the creek, and set it under the birds to catch the drips. They were on their way soon after, skirting around Virginia City and heading south. Jed set the pace as he had the three days before, and they made good time. They were quiet at first, and Gideon wondered if he had misjudged Jed’s attitudes about last night. But as the sun climbed and the day warmed up, Gideon found himself caught up in the rhythm of Jed’s chanting. Gideon wasn’t chanting along, but he was humming to it, softly and without thought.

  About the time he realized it, he found Jed looking over at him, a smile on his thin lips. Looking at those lips reminded him of other things they could do, and Gideon smiled in recollection, wriggling a little in the saddle. Got an answering smile in return, s
o he was looking forward to stopping tonight. Definitely.

  The further they got from Virginia City, the wilder and rougher the country became, and Gideon slid off Star and loosened her saddle’s girth, leading her along as he walked shoulder to shoulder with Jed. By the time the sun reached its zenith they were wandering through a flat valley floor covered in dry brown grasses and not much else, with tree-covered hills sticking up on both sides. They were moving a mite slower, too, over the rockier ground. Jed had been doing well for the past three days, but Gideon noticed that he was limping a little now.

  “You all right?” he asked as they made their way more slowly down a hillside into the ravine they’d been following. “You could ride for a little, if you like.”

  Jed frowned, but nodded, and Gideon was pleased that Jed wasn’t about to let manly pride slow him down. Gideon still kept the reins though, mostly because Jed didn’t reach down for them, and when Jed started chanting again, Gideon listened to the guttural sounds, hynuh-hyah hyah hyah. “What do the words mean?” he asked.

  Jed seemed startled by the question, and his answer was accordingly spare. “Words of thanks,” he said after a long hesitation.

  Gideon shrugged acceptance of that, and kept his mouth shut when Jed started up again a few minutes later. The chant was quieter this time, but Gideon ignored it, or pretended to anyway, and they walked along in companionable silence, both in their hats to ward off the hard afternoon sun. Just about the time Gideon was getting ready to complain about being parched—he’d emptied his canteen an hour back—he heard water running up ahead. They skirted around a small hill to find a wide, shallow river burbling along and a wider ribbon of green grass and trees that relieved the dull browns they’d been walking through the past few hours. The grass gave Star her own reasons to want to stop, and Gideon wondered if maybe he and Jed couldn’t enjoy a little break, too. Still, he set to business after Jed slid off Star, watering his horse and himself, refilling his canteen, and then pulling off her bridle with a command for her to stay close, and then sitting back on his butt to let her munch on the tall grass for a bit. Jed seemed content with the break—he even broke out some of the leftover duck, and they munched on it happily, supplementing it with wild onions picked along the way, green tops wilting in the heat. But damn, they tasted good.

  “Ready?” Jed asked a few minutes later.

  Gideon was ready for plenty, but he kept his mouth shut for once and called Star with a whistle, scratching her behind the ears and giving her a kind word, since he’d run out of apples and hadn’t found another tree yet. Jed didn’t mount up this time, so again they walked side by side on a road that ran just beyond the trees, whose roots fed off the nearby river. Gideon found himself dragging, not to slow them down but just so he could watch Jed’s butt move, a tiny sway to his hips that spurred more than Gideon’s imagination. He had to adjust himself in his pants.

  “We ought to stop for the night,” he suggested, “maybe get to bed early.”

  He hadn’t meant to be lewd, exactly—even though it had been hard not to think of Jed and the pleasure they’d shared last night as he’d followed that buckskin-clad butt over the course of the day—but Jed looked back over his shoulder, frowning. “The trail slows us enough,” he said. “We should go as far as we can. We still have enough duck for tonight and tomorrow so there is no need to hunt.”

  “How’s your leg?” Gideon asked just before he slid over loose rock and sand and nearly landed on his ass.

  “Better than yours,” Jed answered with a snort.

  The next time they turned toward the river, the game trail they’d followed dumped them in a little glen of aspens. Late afternoon sunlight dappled the grassy earth and sparkled off the river, and Gideon was about to put his foot down about stopping, the place was so pretty. Before he could ask, though, Jed set about making camp, clearing a spot for a cook fire and scouting around the glen, checking for—Gideon hadn’t asked what Jed checked for, had just assumed it was any hints of cougars or bears, maybe signs of other travelers nearby.

  “Hey, what are you lookin’ for?” he called as he took off Star’s saddle and bridle and left her to eat and drink and rest.

  “Boar scat,” Jed said, sounding irate.

  Gideon chuckled and shook his head. It sure did vex Jed that he’d gotten himself caught by that wild pig. “You ain’t more worried about bears out here?” They’d seen some sign, but hadn’t run across any live ones yet.

  Jed patted his rifle and untied his blanket. “Bears are shy creatures,” he said, working as he talked. “They are no more interested in us than that tree over there,” he said, pointing.

  Gideon frowned at the idea, because he’d heard plenty of stories about bears showing plenty of interest in the larders of folks’ homes. But he wasn’t going to argue, not as long as Jed kept his rifle close. “That duck’s sure gonna be good,” Gideon said, changing the subject. It would be. He was hungry enough, and he still had a little hardtack left, but he was wishing for a stove-cooked meal, biscuits or cornbread, stewed tomatoes and greens.

  “The river has trout,” Jed countered, and looked his way. “You like fish? Save the duck for tomorrow?”

  Gideon nodded eagerly. “Fine by me.”

  Jed dragged two flat rocks from the riverbed and set them by the kindling Gideon had piled up nicely. “Start the fire,” he said, so Gideon did. Jed hadn’t had much success at tickling trout to the surface in the shallows, so Gideon knelt down with him to help, doing the luring with his fingers so Jed could stab them with a sharpened stick. Once they’d pulled up a few, he pulled out his knife and gutted each fish, and Jed laid the cleaned fish on the flat rocks to roast. Gideon wasn’t surprised that while the fish cooked and the sun slid toward the western hills, Jed stripped down and bathed in the water, again ducking his head into it and cleaning his long hair. He was less surprised when his manhood hardened at the sight, looking forward to more of what it had got last night. Gideon was torn between two hungers—the smell of cooking fish making him salivate, and the sight of Jed’s naked body, knee-deep in cold water and arched back as Jed wrung out his hair, making his prick twitch almost painfully.

  He was a little surprised when Jed waded out of the river and walked naked to Gideon’s gear, untied the pan from the saddle bag, and turned straight for him. Jed pushed Gideon’s knees apart and settled between his legs, opening his pants with a familiarity that made Gideon forget all about the fish. In fact, as Jed deftly unbuttoned first Gideon’s shirt, then the tiny buttons on the fly of his union suit and reached inside to draw him out, Gideon forgot about pretty much everything.

  “Yeah,” he panted—not the most brilliant sex talk, but it earned him a grin from Jed anyway.

  He watched Jed’s dark hands on him, handling his balls and his cock, and sucked in a breath when Jed dipped his fingers into the duck fat he’d saved from last night, stroking it down Gideon’s rigid shaft. “Hell, yeah,” Gideon hissed this time. The feel of the fat, making his prick slick like a woman’s juices would, eased the friction and increased the pleasure tenfold. That was before Jed reached back into the pan and then behind himself, and when Gideon realized what Jed was doing to his own backside, he didn’t have any words left. He dropped flat to his back and grabbed Jed by the waist, urgent to bury himself in that skinny little ass. Jed didn’t hesitate, just slid his knees up beside Gideon’s hips and squeezed them tight, like he was holding on to the barrel of a galloping horse, and Gideon tried not to smile at the image because there was sure to be some bucking involved in the next little bit. He peeled one hand free of Jed’s waist and used it to hold his shaft, slid the other hand back over a neat little butt cheek and tugged it open, feeling with his shaft, lining it up and tilting his hips up to get the head in.

  Jed groaned at that, and Gideon couldn’t tell if the look on his face was pain or pleasure. He knew what he was feeling, though, and that tight heat, slick with goose fat, felt like a little slice of heaven to him.<
br />
  “You, uh… you okay?” he asked, resisting the urge to just pull Jed all the way down onto him. As much as Jed had resisted the idea of Gideon’s hands on his head last night, he didn’t seem to mind Gideon’s hands at his waist now, even though Jed had to know what Gideon wanted to do with ’em.

  “I….” Jed’s muscles squeezed his manhood almost painfully tight, then relaxed some, and Gideon gave into his need as gently as he could, urging Jed’s hips down with his hands. Jed went, slower than Gideon might’ve wanted but quick enough, his face still caught in that grimace that could mean pain or pleasure or both, but Gideon had been on the other side of this more than a few times. He was pretty sure he knew what he was seeing.

  Jed had gone quiet again, but Gideon wasn’t nearly so reserved. He gasped and groaned, he cursed, “Aww fuck, aww fuck,” over and over again, and set to the slowest motions he could manage until Jed’s lips parted and the intense concentration on his face eased some. “Aww fuck,” Gideon said again. “Jed, I—can I—”

  Jed dropped his weight fully down, closing that last bit of distance between their bodies, and Gideon felt Jed’s tight-drawn balls press against his pelvis, rubbed up a little to feel his own balls touch the tiny curve of Jed’s butt cheek. His hands kneaded compulsively on those cheeks, fingers burrowing into the crease and tugging them gently wider. Jed opened his eyes and looked down at him, and when Jed smiled, Gideon learned he’d never really seen Jed smile before. Tiny grins, looks of amusement he’d seen, sure, but not this full-hearted smile of pleasure, of joy even, white teeth glinting in the early evening light.

  “Yes, go on,” Jed said simply, and leaned forward a bit, grasping Gideon by the shoulders, setting himself as surely and confidently as any bronc rider ever did.

  Gideon didn’t need no more permission than that, and he started the ride for them both, pushing up and in, watching the little bursts of pleasure cross Jed’s face with each thrust, watching that pleasure get bigger and better when he peeled a hand off a butt cheek and grasped Jed’s rock-hard shaft, stripping it in time with his thrusts.