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Even in mortal peril, I hear the way he pants and grunts as he climbs, and it takes me right back to baseball practice, to long days in the sun, to times when Ryan and I would just lie in the grass, tired as shit and panting from a long run or training session, and bake in the afternoon sun.
Ryan settles on a high enough, thick branch. I do the same, taking the one right next to his. The pair of us lean against each other, panting from our efforts, and staring down at the bank of the creek.
“I … I didn’t realize … that you were serious …” hisses Ryan between his breaths.
“I wasn’t. I was kidding. I didn’t know.”
“That’s a fucking water moccasin.”
I’m staring at the snake right now as it sits at the edge of the bank by the bridge, half-submerged. It isn’t moving.
We listen to each other pant for a while longer before Ryan whispers, “It is alive, right …?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper back.
We continue to stare at it. The snake continues to … not stare back. I don’t think it even moved to attack us or anything when we were in the water near it. I just saw its slithery form, panicked, and yanked Ryan out of the water as fast as humanly possible.
“Can’t they move up trees?” he whispers.
“Fuck if I know.”
“I think they can.”
“Then what the fuck are we doing up here??”
“I panicked.”
He looks over at me, and our eyes connect. I’m drenched from head to toe. Water drips from Ryan’s messy black hair, making his hazel eyes sparkle. We must stare at each other for a solid minute, neither of us saying anything at all.
Then our faces come together at once, and I consume his lips with another furious kiss.
Everything ignites inside me all at once. My fears. My desires. My frustrations. My excitement.
When his tongue comes out, I’m done for. I grip the back of his wet head, fingers tangled in his hair, and pull his face against mine so powerfully that it aches.
Twice, he almost slips off his branch—even as big and sturdy as it is—but I hold him in place. I’m not letting Ryan go anywhere until I’m done having my way with his mouth.
And from the gasping sounds of our breaths whenever we pull apart, we are far from finished.
I can’t catch my breath as I discover a dozen different ways to lock our lips together, and a dozen more ways to entwine our wet, aggressive tongues.
Ryan Caulfield’s got me twisted around his finger, and with every wet, breathy kiss, I twist around him a little more.
I don’t think I’m ever getting free from Ryan.
He’s got me.
We pull apart at the same time, all out of air, our eyes locked to one another’s and our lips red and slick. Neither of us say a thing, letting whatever explosion of energy between us just now settle.
“Our backpack of food’s still sitting on the bridge,” murmurs Ryan. “And a damn good thing I left my phone in the truck. It’s not waterproof.”
I chuckle. His worrywart mind is everywhere. “I know.”
So I decide to put his mind right back where I want it. Chasing an impulse, I let go of his head and reach down to grab his crotch. His eyes flash. He’s so hard, I’m surprised he isn’t busting out of those tight denim shorts.
“In … In retrospect,” he murmurs suddenly, “you could be bi.”
I quirk an eyebrow. “I got a hand on your crotch halfway up a tree in the middle of Terry Park, and that’s your observation?”
“I’m just saying. Could be.”
“Maybe it doesn’t matter. Like I said.” My face draws close to his, so close I can feel the warmth coming off of his skin. I sneak a kiss on his soft lips.
It feels so fucking good … so fucking right.
“No labels?” he asks. “That’s what you want?”
“You’re my bro. I’m yours. That’s all the labels we need.”
“Homo.”
I growl at him.
“What? You really that afraid of the word?” he taunts me.
“Ryan,” I warn him, my voice low.
“Homo,” he says again.
“You want me to push your ass out of this tree?”
He gives it a second of thought, then returns my soft kiss, pulls back to look into my eyes, and mutters, “Dare you … bromo.”
Bromo. I catch myself grinning. Pushing you out of this tree is a dare I’ll proudly chicken out of.
21
RYAN
He can’t stop kissing me, even when the two of us are sitting in a tree with imminent death awaiting us on the ground.
If the water moccasin is even a poisonous one.
It might not even be alive.
And to make matters worse, his powerful grip—which is used to and trained in handling hardballs—is firmly affixed to my crotch, which is being relentlessly (and mercilessly) grinded by that powerful, muscular hand of his. It almost aches, how strong he grinds me.
