Special Delivery: Special Delivery, Book 1 (29 page)

“The neon sign on your forehead. You have a look about you that says you’ve been poking your head under the hood. I see too many of you running around this town. If you weren’t in college, you damn sure studied something a lot.”

Sam gave in and reached for the beer. “I’m in school for nursing. But it’s taking a while.” He took a drink. “It’s not going real well, either.”

“Not what you thought it would be, or harder than you imagined?”

Sam considered this. “Both.” He scraped his thumbnail against the label on his beer. “It’s taking so much time. And I’m tired of having no money and no life. Sometimes I don’t know if it’s going to change when I’m through, either.” He shook his head. “Then I figure I’m a stupid whiner and should shut up and go study.”

“It isn’t stupid to make sure you’re aiming yourself in the right direction. You only get one spin on the blue ball. Make sure it goes the way you want.” He salted the ground beef. “How’d you meet Mitch? Rest stop or truck stop?”

“The alley behind my aunt and uncle’s pharmacy.” When Randy glanced over his shoulder again, it was Sam’s turn to be smug.

“No shit?” Randy sounded surprised. “So you, what, struck up a conversation?”

Sam tried to think of how to describe it. “In a way.”

Randy rolled his eyes. “He fucked you.”

Sam lifted his chin. “And this is funny?”

“It’s a relief. So he fucked you. How’d you end up on the road with him? You left school and went?”

“No. I accidentally left my phone in his trailer, and he called me, and then he came back to return it, and we had dinner, and then—”

“Then you ran off with him?”

“No. Then he left.”

Randy put down the spatula and turned fully around. “And you didn’t have sex with him again?”

Sam blushed. “I thought I got to ask questions?”

Randy waved him aside. “In a minute. This is huge, here. Did you or did you not have sex with him—what, dinner in a
restaurant
?”

“Yes.” Sam was getting testy. “It was nice.”

“So he calls you, tells you he wants to return your phone, and then has dinner with you.” Randy gave him a look that said this was the tallest tale he’d ever heard. “Then gave you a peck on the cheek?”

“Okay, there was a thing in Old Blue after. And there was the phone sex. But everything else, yes.”

“
Phone
sex?” Randy turned off the burner, grabbed a chair and straddled it. “Start over, and this time don’t skip shit.”

Sam did, reluctantly, editing as much as he could, not wanting to tell any of this at all, and yet somehow he couldn’t resist his confession. He gave Randy the bare bones of their alley encounter, the phone call, the dinner, and what came after, and then he explained how everything had gone south with his aunt, and how he’d texted Mitch.

“He said to meet him at the truck stop near me, so I did, and here I am,” he finished.

Randy watched him, eagle-eyed and dubious. “And you’ve been fucking your way across the west, have you?”

Sam folded his arms and glared. “How did you meet Mitch? How long have you known him?”

Randy blew him a kiss before returning to his stove. “Since 1997. You know, when you were in grade school. We met at a truck stop outside of Houston.” He tossed Sam a smirk. “I was his first hustle.”

Sam hated,
hated
that answer. “So you’re lovers?”

Randy snorted. “
Lovers.
Fuck no. Have we fucked? Yes, and in more ways than your corn-fed mind can imagine. But we never were and never will be
lovers
.” He poked hard at the once-again-sizzling meat. “Jesus.”

Sam felt as if the weight of the whole Rocky Mountains had lifted off him. “Then why are you riding me so hard?”

Randy’s voice switched to a purr. “Peaches, I would be more than happy to ride you hard.”

Sam hated the shiver that voice and those words gave him. He retreated into his beer, peeling at the label again.

“What’s the kinkiest thing you’ve ever done?” Randy asked.

Sam was done with this game. “I’m not answering that.”

“Sure you are. I’ll answer it too. Mine is that I blew a frat boy in the middle of a hotel hallway while another one ate an ice cream cone out of my ass.” When Sam choked on his beer, Randy laughed. “Damnedest thing is, it was only last week. So. Your turn, Peaches.”

Sam considered the question, more for his own curiosity than because he intended to answer Randy. “Well, it depends on your criteria. Do you mean it had to feel dirty, or what?”

“Kinky. Like, you were doing it, and it felt really, really bent, but you loved it anyway.” He poked at the meat. “I want to see what my boy’s learned over the past two years.”

Sam let his sexual history roll past him in a swift, erotic home movie. Yes, the kinky stuff was with Mitch, but the hell he was going to tell any of that to Randy. Then he remembered Darin, and the time he couldn’t decide if he wanted to fuck or watch the game. “You won’t be learning anything, because it wasn’t with him.”

Randy turned around. “Oh, do go on.”

Sam raised his eyebrows, only blushing a tiny bit. “Getting fucked from behind during the entire last quarter of a basketball game while I knelt on a pizza box. He used my back for a plate, humped me in time to the dribbling and slapped my ass every time his team scored.”

“Spanked you?” Randy’s eyes danced.

“No, it was more of a tease. Just a slap. It was so disconnected, like I wasn’t even there.”

“And you got off on it?” Sam nodded reluctantly, and Randy clapped. “Peaches, honey! Well, that’s one big question answered.”

Sam was afraid to ask what question Randy meant. “Why do you call me Peaches? Is it the pet thing?”

“Partly. I call you Peaches because your ass is a very nice pair of them.”

“You haven’t seen my ass,” Sam pointed out.

“True. Why don’t you stand up, drop your jeans and let me find out?”

Sam flipped him off.

Randy blew him another kiss and went back to cooking. He cracked one more egg before reaching for a whisk. “So. We’ve got domination and humiliation so far, which is a nice start. I assume you like it rough too. Performance, though. That’s going to be the real cliffhanger, I can see it already.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Your sexual preferences.” Randy beat the eggs violently. “So, what’s the answer? You get off on the idea of being fucked in front of somebody or not?”

Sam sputtered. Randy kept beating the eggs patiently, as if he hadn’t asked a question so personal even Sam wasn’t sure of the answer.

“Shy boy,” Randy said wistfully, and picked up the frying pan. He reached for a strainer, poured the meat into it and rinsed. “So, asking you if you’d do a threesome is out?”

Sam got up from the table, suddenly shaky. “I’m going to switch my laundry.”

But Randy’s questions haunted him as he pulled the clothes from the washer and put them into the dryer.
You like the idea of being fucked in front of somebody?
His hand shook as he handled the clothes. He remembered Craig and what had almost happened, what could have happened, if he’d said yes. He acknowledged how much he’d wanted it.

Sam swallowed against a dry throat. Why was Randy asking him all this? Wasn’t it Mitch he wanted? This had to be some kind of trick. Some kind of test. Randy was clearly trying to get rid of Sam, so if he admitted that, he’d tell Mitch, and then—

He felt a warm hand on his back, pushing him down, and then another one on his hip as it pulled him roughly against Randy.

“The pizza fuck went something like this?” Randy pushed his groin into Sam’s ass. “Oh, wait—you said you were on your knees.”

Something pressed into the backs of his knees, and Sam gasped as he went down, falling onto his hands to brace himself. He cried out weakly, and he shut his eyes as Randy ground into him, his hand at Sam’s neck, keeping him in place.

“Please,” Sam shut his eyes, fighting to keep from going slack. “Please—don’t.”

The hand at his hip skimmed up to stroke the base of his spine. “See, people think it’s easy to fuck with somebody’s head, but it isn’t. You got to really watch them. Because right now it’s hard to tell exactly if this scares the fuck out of you because you hate it, or because you’re afraid I’ll find out you love it.”

Sam shuddered, the pleasure-fear ratio quickening at the thought of being discovered. “Please—
please stop
.”

But Randy kneaded his hip now, pushing what was clearly an erection against Sam’s jeans, and his own dick hardened in answer. Then Randy’s hand snuck around toward it, and Sam yelped and fought. He ducked and rolled away. Randy caught him and held him flat on his back. Grinning down, he took Sam’s erection roughly in his hand.

“And the answer is you’re afraid I’ll find out you love it.”

Sam tried to knee him, but Randy dodged. “
Fuck you.
”

“I’d enjoy that very much.” Still smug, Randy gave Sam one more knead before rising to his feet.

“Leave me the fuck alone.” Sam struggled again.

Randy made a moue with his lips and sidestepped Sam’s foot. “Make it worth my while, Peaches.” He pointed at Sam’s crotch. “Show me your goods, and I’ll be a saint until Mitch gets up, I swear.”

“Fuck
off
.” Sam climbed to his feet.

“What I’m wondering is if you’re submissive for Mitch or if you’d respond to anybody. My money’s on anybody. And I think that’s why you’re so scared.”

Sam
was
scared. He edged toward the kitchen.

Randy blocked him with his arm, and Sam froze, looking to the floor. Randy chuckled. “Oh yeah. I bet you’re real fetching in a pair of handcuffs. Better yet, tied up and bent over a bench.”

“
Stop.
” Sam shrank into the wall.

“Show me your cock.” Randy didn’t touch Sam at all, but Sam felt as if he’d been caressed lewdly. “Take it out and let me see it.”

Sam aimed for the washer, but Randy trapped him with his other arm. He shut his eyes. “
Let me go.
”

“See,” Randy said, still maddeningly calm, “that’s the thing. You want me to let you go, when all you have to do is duck under my arm or shove me, and you’re gone. You want to be here.”

“You’ll grab me if I try to go.” Sam’s throat was dry, his teeth aching. He kept hoping Mitch would burst in and beat the shit out of Randy, but he knew somehow that wasn’t going to happen. He told himself Mitch wouldn’t leave him with someone truly dangerous, but it wasn’t easy to believe now, standing here. His erection, already going soft, faded away to nothing, and he shrank into himself, closing down.

Abruptly, Randy was gone.

“And that’s too far.” Randy’s seductive tone was gone. He backed away, holding up his hands, then bent to finish putting Sam’s laundry in the dryer. Sam watched him, stunned, scared and confused.
Run,
he thought, and imagined himself tearing through the kitchen, down the hall to Mitch, shutting the door and crawling into the bed beside him. Hiding, being safe. Except he could also imagine the smirk on Randy’s face if he did that.

All of a sudden, he was furious.

“You
son of a bitch
,” Sam said, and rushed him.

Randy rose from the dryer, and when Sam hit him, he slammed the other man into the front of the machine. Sam grabbed Randy’s hair, yanking it roughly. “You
fucking son of a bitch
. What the
fuck
do you think you’re doing?”

Randy went limp in his arms, eyes still wide with surprise, and as Sam glared down at him, they twinkled. “See,
that
is the right sort of question, Peaches.” When Sam looked at him in confusion, he wriggled his pinned arm free, reached around, and calmly as you please, unzipped himself and pulled down the waistband of his briefs to reveal a thick, hard, bulging and uncut erection. For a stunned second, Sam stared down at it. But when he felt his own body begin to respond, he let go as if scalded and retreated toward the kitchen.

“You,” he said, voice shaking, “are seriously fucked up.”

“Everybody’s fucked up, Peaches.” Randy zipped himself up again and shut the door to the dryer. “Go on and get your whites, why don’t you, and we’ll get those started too.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. You think I’m going to fall for that twice?”

“Oh no. I’m done baiting you.” Randy held up a solemn hand. “No, Peaches, I’m serious. I pushed you too far, and if you tell him about that, he will punch me out, and then you two will be gone, and it’s all over. I’m an angel from here on.”

Sam faltered. “
What
is over?”

Randy winked at him as he headed into the living room, where he picked up the rest of Sam’s laundry. “Sam, you just got more out of me than you deserve. You’re not getting that too.” He came through, dumped the whites into the washer, started it up and returned to the kitchen, patting Sam’s shoulder on his way by. “Sit. Drink. Ask me questions. Nice, boring things, like what I do for a living or where I come from, or how I love living in Vegas. I’ll make you an egg casserole, we’ll eat and everything will be fine.”

Sam watched him cook for a few minutes, trying to decide if he should run, hide or hit him again. In the end, he sat down. “Where are you from, Randy?”