Special Delivery: Special Delivery, Book 1 (5 page)

This
was sex. This was what he fumbled for in the dark, what he sought in his own fantasies and the fantasies of others—this, this searing, almost brutal claiming. Sam surrendered to it, like he’d waited his whole life for this kind of release.

Then it shifted yet again. Barely pausing, Mitch reached around Sam, sliding one hand beneath him to cradle his stomach and the other around the front of his shoulders. Mitch resumed his thrusts, but now he held Sam up and pressed him down at the same time. The switch made Sam dizzy. His breathing grew labored, and he clutched at the box as he tried to reclaim his exhilaration.

Lips brushed across the base of his neck once, and the second time the kiss lingered. His skin prickled at the tickle of stubble and tingled at the soft, damp press of lips. When Mitch’s mouth opened, Sam shuddered first at the whisper of Mitch’s breath and then at the swipe of his tongue. And with that last gesture, Sam found the place he sought once more.

Sam shut his eyes. He braced one arm against the box and reached around with the other to pull Mitch’s head to his neck, begging silently for him to maintain the contact. Each lick, each nibble of teeth and scrape of beard took him higher, sent him deeper into that pool of safety, a place where nothing could reach him, nothing but sex, and now because of this embrace and this strange backward kiss, Mitch. Though he had already spent himself, another pulse rose inside him. With a growl, a bite at the base of Sam’s neck and one last thrust, Mitch came inside him, and as if propelled by the act, Sam followed suit against the side of the box. They collapsed together, breathing rough, their chests rising and falling and pressing back to front and front to box. With reluctance, Mitch pulled away, running his hand down Sam’s spine as he rose.

Sam remained where he was, his body still humming, mind still melted.

Another stroke, this one across the trembling flesh of his backside. “You okay?”

Sam tried to nod, but it was so much work.
I’m fantastic,
he wanted to say, but all he could manage was a garbled, “Good.”

Mitch laughed quietly, and the sound made Sam long to purr and climb into his lap. He tried to move, to do this, but all he could manage was to roll off the box. He landed on his ass, which, well-used as it was, tingled at the contact with the cold metal floor. Sam let his head loll into his arm, but he rolled his face toward Mitch and gave him a sleepy, sated smile.

Mitch reached over to tweak the toe of Sam’s tennis shoe. “Much to my regret, I gotta get on the road. I have to get to Minneapolis by eight, and while you were worth it, I can’t afford to be too late.”

The reminder of obligation dulled Sam’s glow, but only around the edges. “I should get back to work too.” He bit his lip, pushed aside his insecurity and said what was on his mind. “Thank you. That was—I don’t know.
Amazing
.”

“Sunshine, that was your performance, not mine.”

“No. I’m never like that. Just with you, I guess.” The confession felt too bald, and Sam climbed weakly to his knees and wrestled with his pants. “I mean—God, I don’t know how I’m ever going to have sex again. Nothing’s going to measure up.”

This confession felt even more awkward, even more so as Sam saw Mitch had already refastened his own clothes and sat in a crouch near the open door.
Waiting to leave.
Sam felt a pang at the upcoming loss because he realized, as he stared at the man in the darkness who had shown him the way to great sex, that he would never see Mitch again. It was a stupid, silly thing to think, but he knew he’d miss the man more than he missed the sex.

Sam opened his mouth to say this, even part of this, but he gave up and simply reached for Mitch.

“Sam?” a voice echoed through the alley.

His heart slammed into his throat and then sank to the bottom of his stomach.
Aunt Delia.

Mitch watched him carefully now. “Your boss?”

“Worse. My aunt.”

“What’s the lie we’re going with?” Mitch stood and put his hand on the door. “Have I seen you run down the alley, or do I not know what the hell she’s talking about?”

“You haven’t seen me.” Sam curled his knees to his chest and waited as Mitch climbed out of the truck.

What would he do if she caught him? He knew she was looking for a way to get out of paying for him, and now that he was a legal adult, all she needed was an excuse to give her friends as to why. Fucking the deliveryman in the back of his trailer while on the job with stolen supplies was a pretty damn good excuse, and he’d handed it to her on a platter.

Except what scared him more than anything was the realization that he didn’t care. In fact, he almost wanted to get caught because then it would be out of his hands, and he’d be free.

Jesus, was he
that
fucked up?

Mitch reappeared and helped himself in again. “She’s gone.”

Sam climbed to his feet, but his legs were shaky. He half-walked, half-stumbled to Mitch, so focused on getting back into the storeroom he almost jumped down without saying anything else. Catching himself in time, he put his hand on Mitch’s arm and looked up at the trucker’s face in the late-afternoon light.

What was he supposed to say? Thank you? Before he could think of anything, he heard Delia calling his name from inside, and he decided maybe silence was best. He put his hand on Mitch’s chest, stood on tiptoe to kiss him gently on the mouth, then jumped down from the trailer and scrambled up onto the dock. He lingered a moment, watching as Mitch locked the doors. When the trucker winked at him, Sam waved, pushing aside a foolish sense of loss. Then, as Mitch headed to the cab of the semi, Sam opened the door to the pharmacy and slipped as quietly as he could inside.

Emma walked into the storeroom as he entered. “There you are. Hey—”

Sam shushed her desperately, grabbed her arm and dragged her off into the shelving. “Don’t. Don’t say anything.”

Emma wrinkled her nose. “Sam, you smell like sex.” Her eyes widened. “
Oh. My. God.
You got Keith to fuck you? And you did it
here
?”

“No, not Keith—” He heard the door open, and he clutched Emma’s arm so tightly his fingers hurt.

“Sam?” Delia called from the door. “Emma? Sam?”

“Who were you with?” Emma hissed.

“Emma, she’ll fire me.”

“Sam?” Delia called again.

Emma raised an eyebrow. “
Who?
”

Sam realized she was in the sort of mood to dangle him over the cliff to find out what she wanted. “A deliveryman. In the back of his trailer.
Now please, Em.
”

“Hardcore.” Emma gave him a thumbs-up.

Sam was not amused. In fact, he was almost hyperventilating with panic. “What am I going to say to Delia?”

“Relax. I got it. He’s here, Delia.” Emma waved an irritated hand at Sam as he whimpered. “He had his headphones on so loud he couldn’t hear us.”

It was a good excuse. It was a
great
excuse. But the second she said
headphones
, Sam paled, and his stomach lurched, and without caring what the hell Delia thought or said, he dashed through the shelves and out the door, but by the time he got to the loading dock, the semi was already pulling onto the street.

“Oh,
shit
.” Sam sank to his knees. “I forgot my iPhone!”

Later that night, after a grueling shakedown from Delia and an excruciating shift of inventory, Sam snuggled into the sugar-pink softness of Emma’s bed, hugged a lace-lined heart pillow to his chest and curled into a fetal position as Emma tried to force a flask of vodka into his hand.

“It could still work out. You could get one of the smaller ones or a different generation, since they’re so cheap, and replace it. Or maybe he’ll call and offer to return it. I know how you are—you already have it programmed with half the Middleton phone book.”

Sam pushed the flask away with the back of his hand. “I just want to lie here awhile, and then I’ll go home.”

Emma flopped onto the bed beside him, resting her forehead against his, and reached over to stroke his hair. “I hate it when you’re like this.”

Sam shut his eyes and let the touch soothe him. “I was so stupid, Em. I
am
so stupid.” He paused, wallowing in his worthlessness. “It isn’t only the phone. I don’t know what it is. That I’m an idiot, probably.”

“Was the sex that bad?”

Sam’s eyes had fallen shut as soon as she started stroking, which only made it easier to replay the scene inside the trailer against the back of his eyelids. “No. It wasn’t bad.”

“Then why—?”

“Because I shouldn’t have done it. Because it was a huge, stupid risk. Because I was so stupid I lost my brand new iPhone I saved forever to get.” He buried his face into the pillow. “Oh, Em. I’m such an idiot. I don’t even care. I know it’s not real, but I don’t care. I still want it.”

Her fingers stilled, and her voice lost its soothing softness. “Babe, you’ve lost me.”

“Being with him. With anybody, like that.” He hugged the pillow tighter to his chest. “He was so…different. Amazing. I felt set free.”

“Babe, that’s called
good sex
. You’ve been settling for the freaks and losers far too long.”

Sam couldn’t argue with her because what she said was logical, but at the same time he knew it wasn’t just good sex. It was something about Mitch himself. He couldn’t explain why. Or maybe he was delusional. Confusion tangled with guilt, making his stomach sick and his head sore.

“I shouldn’t have done it while I was supposed to be working, and not with somebody I didn’t even know. Not in the back of a trailer. I’m supposed to be focusing on school and working hard so I can get out of Delia’s basement. I shouldn’t have done that. But I don’t care that I shouldn’t have done it. I want to do it again.”
With him.

“Hon, it was a fling.” Em resumed stroking his hair. “It’s supposed to be fun, not eat you up inside.”

“I know.” Sam tightened further into a ball. “It’s because I’m
so stupid
.”

That earned him a slap on his backside. “You aren’t stupid, you idiot.”

“I just feel so…
lousy
. I can’t make it make sense, Em. It all happened so fast. And then…now… I don’t know. I want to go to bed and forget about it.”

She kissed the top of his head—another way to make him melt. “Stay here, then, for tonight. You know my parents don’t care.”

Part of Sam wanted to refuse this too, preferring to sulk in the privacy of his own bedroom, but there was too great a risk that his aunt would come down to pick a fight with him. She still suspected he’d been doing
something fishy
at work, and since she suspected correctly, there was a danger when he was in this sort of mood he might actually tell her. So he stayed.

He hadn’t slept over at Em’s for a long time, not since those dark days just after his mom’s death. She curled around him tonight as she had years ago, pressing her breasts against his back and burrowing her face in his neck, sliding her leg between his. It probably looked erotic as hell, but to Sam it simply felt safe and sweet. He loved Em’s breath on his neck, the softness of her breasts, which was something he didn’t say often. They were little pillows between their two bodies, and while they excited most men who got Em into bed, for Sam they diffused all thoughts of sex. If she found their snuggles erotic, he hoped she never told him about it.

She got him up in the morning and fed and dressed him. She’d put him in a pair of her sweatpants and an old T-shirt overnight, and to his embarrassment, he found Emma’s mother had washed his clothes for him. He ate the bowl of cereal Emma set out for him and played nice with the parents as they asked about work, and school, and his summer plans.

“So what’s the status on the apartment?” Emma’s mother smiled at Sam. “I assume Emma has you roped into her scheme, as usual?”

“Temporary setback,” Emma declared as she tore into her toast. “By August, Mom, you can turn my bedroom into your scrapbook room.”

“It’s a lot of money.” Mrs. Day’s voice held a warning, but it was a gentle one. Sam watched her face as she and Emma continued to spar, and it made his chest hurt. That was how his mom had argued with him, and he missed it. It wasn’t fighting. It was verbal jousting, and beneath the tussle, you could feel the love.

He thought of the cold reception waiting for him at Cherry Hill, and he looked down into his bowl of Cheerios, poking the oat circles beneath the milk as he blinked rapidly and scolded himself for his self-pity.

Once he finished eating he had to go to work, but Delia was out for the day, so he spent a pleasant morning and early afternoon counting out pills and pasting on prescription labels. Even better than a shift without Delia was going home to find the house empty and a note saying she and Uncle Norm had gone with the Baumgartens to dinner and a movie and that she expected to see the dishes done and the carpet vacuumed when she came home.

Sam did the dishes and carpets as directed. Then he grabbed his keys, headed to his car and went to the store.

He came home laden with a bottle of San Pellegrino, frozen pot stickers and Newman’s chocolate alphabet cookies. He cooked the pot stickers on the stove, did up his dishes and took his feast to the den. After nipping downstairs to fetch his VCR tape full of this week’s
Dancing with the Stars
, he tucked it into his aunt’s player, grabbed the remote and settled deep into the crevice of the couch. Uncle Norm had a state-of-the-art DVR, of course, but there was no way Delia would let him “fill it up with trash.”