Chapter 6
SIX
The heat woke Jesse first, then the scent, woodsmoke and ozone, and then the certainty, the flash of it, all panic — Jesse wasn’t alone in the cabin.
Fuck, Jesse wasn’t even alone in the bed.
He tensed, every muscle pulling tight. The hunting rifle Wyatt had left him was propped at the side of the bed, way too far away to reach. And even if Jesse did make a lunge for it, would he have time to aim before the zombie started chowing down?
Probably not, but fuck, he had to try.
Jesse launched himself up and out of bed — and a big palm slapped flat to his chest, stopping him dead.
“Relax,” a voice ordered, real low, all gravel, all up in Jesse’s ear. Then firmer, when Jesse really didn’t fucking relax, “It’s just me, bud.”
“Wyatt?” Fuck. Jesse let that big hand put him where it wanted him to go.
He flopped back down onto the bed, his heart doing some crazy shit in his chest. “Jesus, Wyatt, what the fuck?” Jesse couldn’t make out much in the glimmer of light from the banked fire.
Just the shine of Wyatt’s eyes, the slope of his nose, his lips pressed flat. “You scared the shit out of me.”
Wyatt made a noise somewhere deep in his throat, a grunt that was hard to translate as anything other than disapproval. “That’s what happens when you don’t lock the goddamn door, Jess.”
The door…
A rush of panic and then shame, the chill of it like something Jesse hadn’t felt in weeks, not since his fuckup with Maddie.
It prickled all across his skin. No denying it, though, because he’d been too busy fucking his own fist to do the one thing he’d promised Wyatt he’d do. The one fucking thing.
“Shit, I’m sorry.” The words came out in a rush. “Wyatt, man, I’m so sorry. Fuck. I didn’t mean to—”
Wyatt shook his head. Jesse felt it more than he saw it, that shift in the air, a fresh hit of Wyatt’s scent. Wyatt’s big hand eased down Jesse’s side, to curve there at his waist, the heat of his touch registering even through the heavy cotton in between.
“Later,” Wyatt said, and his voice was thick. He sounded totally exhausted. “We gotta sleep now, bud. Just sleep.”
He hauled Jesse in, kinda unthinking, almost like he was already half-asleep. He hauled Jesse close, an echo of that first night in the cabin, in the bed they were sharing again, Wyatt curled up around Jesse.
And Jesse would bet all the money he didn’t have that Wyatt wouldn’t be so content to snuggle if he knew just what Jesse had spent the last few weeks fantasizing about.
That thought hit like a jab to the ribs.
Jesse’s breath stuck. He tried to shimmy out a little space between them, but Wyatt made a grumpy noise and pulled Jesse back in.
Closer even, his thigh pushing between Jesse’s thighs, their ankles tangling, and Wyatt’s breath a steady puff against the back of Jesse’s neck.
It made Jesse shiver, that closeness — then it made him settle. The hit of adrenaline, the crash after, and Wyatt, back with him, safe.
* * *
Jesse had turned in his sleep.
When he woke up, however the fuck long later, in the weird gray light of maybe-morning, he was still caught up in Wyatt’s arms, but he was facing Wyatt now, one leg hitched high over Wyatt’s hip, clinging on tight, koala-style.
He’d pushed the sheets down with all his wiggling, and his flannel had ridden up, leaving more than a slither of Jesse’s bare belly on display, and all of Jesse’s pink panties on display — for an audience of one, in the form of Wyatt, who was very much awake and very much staring.
Fuck.
“I—” Some kind of excuse choked up in Jesse’s throat. His eyes met Wyatt’s in that same second.
Wyatt’s eyes were black. Not zombie black, thank fuck. All pupil instead, the color straight up swallowed away.
“Jesus,” Wyatt breathed.
And there was nothing in that word, no tone that Jesse could translate. He couldn’t read it either, the expression on Wyatt’s face. Jesse was out of practice after weeks apart. Surprise, definitely, it was all up there. But—
What else? Disgust? Fuck, was it disgust?
Something roiled in Jesse’s chest and sank sour in his belly. He tried to shrink back, but Wyatt was holding him too tight. “I didn’t have enough clothes to...” Jesse began, but whatever pathetic excuse he had lined up fizzled out as Wyatt came up onto his elbow.
“You don’t—” But Wyatt stopped, and he was shaking his head, like words were too hard, maybe.
Jesse felt a little like that too, but Jesse must have had it worse, because words were never hard for Jesse, and right then they were, with Wyatt’s big hand curving around Jesse’s thigh, on that one stretch of bare skin above his socks.
Jesse sucked in a weird, unsteady breath. Did nothing to steady him. But how could it, with Wyatt’s hand resting so close to Jesse’s morning wood and to the pastel pink panties that bricked-up potential was currently calling home.
“God.” Jesse made to yank down on his flannel, to cover himself up even just a little, but Wyatt caught him by the wrist and held his hand away. “Wyatt, what—”
Wyatt just shook his head. He was still shaking his head. His hand was warm and calloused, wrapped all the way around Jesse’s wrist. But that look, Jesse just couldn’t decipher it, still. It was blown open, that much was clear. Shock and freaking awe. But nothing else. Fuck, Jesse had nothing else.
“Wyatt,” Jesse whispered again. He needed something, anything. “Please. You gotta. Please.”
Wyatt’s eyes dragged up from Jesse’s panties. Locked in on Jesse, a sniper taking aim. “Fuck, you look—”
“What?” Jesse demanded, too quick.
But he needed to hear it, kinda desperately.
Needed those words from Wyatt’s mouth. Stupid.
Ridiculous. You look like an idiot, bud.
What the fuck are you wearing? Those were the words Jesse needed to hear to knock him out of his fucked-up horny bubble.
To kill his boner and the weird, weirdly intense, unrequited crush that had hit Jesse like a semitruck and was still hitting weeks later, a time loop of painful embarrassment and embarrassing arousal.
“What, man? Please, you gotta say it,” Jesse begged. “Please, just tell me. You have to—”
“Beautiful,” Wyatt said.
Jesse’s breath was in him, and then it was out of him. All of it, gone. He couldn’t start the cycle again. Oxygen was an optional upgrade, and he’d only paid for the base model.
“What?” Jesse choked out. His ears were fucked up too, like he was trying to listen from underwater, sound gone muddy and thick. Because Wyatt didn’t just say what Jesse thought he said. “What the fuck?”
Wyatt’s hand tightened on Jesse’s wrist, flexing then giving. “You look so fucking beautiful, Jess.”
Except Wyatt did say that. Jesse’s lungs and ears came back online, the full package, every optional extra and detailing too. Didn’t help much though, because all Jesse could do, gone dumb as fuck, was stare up at Wyatt.
Who was staring right back at him, both of them caught in the moment, suspended by it, the buzzy, tight anticipation stretching out between them like a gossamer thread. But the weight was too much for that pretentious literary shit.
The thread frayed, and it snapped.
Objectively, time moved at exactly the same speed time always moved, but watching Wyatt’s hand right then, Jesse saw it in slow motion.
Wyatt’s big, rough, calloused fingers, the spread of his palm, both of them and all of them together sliding down Jesse’s bare belly to cup gentle around the tidy bulge in Jesse’s panties.
“God,” Jesse whispered. The heat of Wyatt’s palm bled through the thin cotton, instant and insane. “Oh my fucking god.” The first time he’d fantasized about Wyatt touching him, it was just like this, and now Wyatt was touching him, just like this. “Fuck. Oh god. Oh Jesus. Fuck.”
Wyatt was watching Jesse so carefully still, not even one blink. “Yeah?”
“Yes,” Jesse said, emphatically. He followed it up with a little more emphasis, just to make things real clear. “Yes.”
Wyatt firmed his grip, more intention to it, and Jesse couldn’t help the groan that tore out of him.
He lifted his head to see, and that made him groan some more.
Moan. More moan than groan, all fucked up.
His dick was entirely contained in Wyatt’s hand.
Straight up lost in it. Wyatt had him, completely.
“God,” Jesse breathed. “Oh god. Oh fuck.” His hips hitched up into the heat, independent of his short-circuiting brain. He ground himself against Wyatt’s palm, and it felt so good that the pleasure of it left Jesse in a needy, pleading little whimper
Wyatt watched him the whole time, not moving at all. Just holding Jesse’s dick and letting Jesse hump up into his hand. He watched Jesse like Jesse was worth the price of admission.
“Just like that, Jess.”
Wyatt’s voice was so low. It was always low, but right then, it was so close and so quiet that it was all bass, thrilling across Jesse’s skin, tingling those tiny hairs in his ears. “God.”
Wyatt shifted, the cup of his other hand slipping under Jesse’s head. He was pressed up all along Jesse now, a perfect bracket of heat and muscle, the bulk of him resting between Jesse and the whole wide undead world outside.
Cupped and held and surrounded and safe, and Jesse was overwhelmed by all of it.
He tried to say something. Tried to tell Wyatt all the crazy shit he was feeling, but he couldn’t get the words out.
Just a cracking little moan that filled the cabin, then broke on a pathetic whimper as Jesse hitched up into Wyatt’s hand.
Wyatt’s mouth quirked. “Feels good, huh, bud?”
“Feel’s so good,” Jesse whispered. He couldn’t get his voice louder than a whisper. “But I need— I need—”
Wyatt eased Jesse’s butt back down onto the bed. “I know what you need, Jess.”