Chapter 1 #2
Gretta tsked as she passed us, dragging her husband further down the trail toward the parking area. “Language, Jack Wyatt! And kindly remember, this is a public hiking path!”
I stared after them for a few seconds, waiting for the world to come back into focus, and then Hawk squirmed beneath me—beneath me—which was the moment I realized that I was lying fully on top of him, the full length of my body sprawled indulgently over the full length of his.
I stared down into his honey-brown eyes, which were looking up at me with love and affection and—ah, fuck—want. “Shit.” I started to roll off him, but he freed his hands and grabbed at my shoulders, holding me in place while blinking rapidly.
“It’s okay! Seriously, Jack, I’m fine! Could you just stay still and listen for a second?
” He swallowed hard. “Look, I know maybe this is a bit of a, um… surprise? But it doesn’t have to be a big deal.
It’s just… I hadn’t intended to stay a virgin this long, and I realized that I keep reading about this stuff but never experiencing it, a-and I decided that I wanted to.
To experience it, I mean. A-and I’ve been thinking for a while—kind of a long while, really—that you’d be the perfect person to experience it with.
I want it to be… well, not special-special, exactly, but…
nice. And I know you’re not, like, in love with me or whatever…
” He bit his lip. “Unless… I mean… Are you, by any chance?”
“What? No!” I gasped.
“Right!” he agreed quickly. “No, right. Of course not! Same. But sex doesn’t have to mean a relationship or love or whatever, right?
I just think, in an ideal world, my first time should be with someone I think is really hot—which, like, have you seen you?
—and also someone I trust, and I trust you more than anyone.
So.” He shrugged, as much as a person trapped against a bed of pinecones could shrug, and stared up at me beseechingly. “What do you say?”
“Erk!” I squawked. My heart was beating in my throat so hard I couldn’t get any actual words out. Was this heatstroke? Was I hallucinating? Was I dying?
Hawk thought I was hot? Hawk wanted…? With me?
Hawk continued as if my squawk hadn’t been a clear refusal.
“Maybe don’t answer me now, okay? I know you probably need time to think about it and, like…
plan it or whatever. I mean, not plan it, plan it, since obviously you know the, ah…
mechanics and whatnot. I remember Peter, that smug asshole you dated for a couple weeks last year, bragging about you being a ‘demon’ in bed—which, not gonna lie, left me with a whole lot of questions I’d really like you to answer.
And Donny Whatshisface, the guy I saw you with at the Stag and Crowne back in March, who must’ve had, like, forty-seven hands, couldn’t stop groping you in public and whispering all the stuff he liked you to do to him in a voice that was not a whisper—”
“Hawk,” I groaned, my face going hotter than it had been while we were hiking, which was weird because all the blood in my body had rushed south.
“No, right, sorry. Tangent. My bad. Anyway, I was thinking we could get tested… o-or if you’d rather use condoms, I’m open to discussion—”
“Hawk,” I insisted, belatedly rolling away to flop onto my back… only for him to sit up and continue talking while peering down at me.
“Okay, maybe not a discussion, per se,” he said, more desperately than ever, “since clearly talking about this is making you more uncomfortable than Donny with the hands ever did, so you just tell me which you’d prefer, and it’s all good with me!
See how simple and straightforward this will be?
You’re basically my favorite person. And we’ve been friends forever—I’m helping you fix up your house, you helped me with my car when it had that timing belt issue—so, why not help me with this, too? ”
“Hawk!” I sat up also, putting more distance between us, not that it did anything to dispel the images that were taking over my brain of all the ways I could “help” Hawk.
“Because you said it yourself, Jack!” Hawk shifted onto his knees, his voice openly pleading. “You said, ‘if you’re attracted to someone and you care about them, what’s the problem?’ So, like—”
“Halt.” I managed to bark. “Halt this now.”
The edge of Hawk’s mouth turned up. “Halt? What are you, a castle guard now?”
My head spun, and as it often did, my gaze focused on the little hoop nose piercing Hawk had gotten a couple of months before. It was oddly delicate, like Hawk himself.
“I mean, please stop doing that mile-a-minute talking thing you do when you’re nervous. I just need to think—er, to recover. From the fall. And the pinecones. And the… Pilkners. And… Wait. Are you okay? No, you’re clearly not okay. Here, take my hand.”
I yanked him up so quickly he nearly tumbled into me and sent us sprawling again. Thankfully, he wasn’t heavy enough to knock me over the way I’d done to him a few minutes earlier.
“Now who’s nervous babbling?” Hawk muttered under his breath. “Yeesh, I asked a simple question…”
Simple? Was he high?
“I’m not taking your vir—er… having…” I swallowed thickly around an obstacle in my throat. “With you… the sex,” I hissed.
“Jack,” Hawk said, soft and rebuking. “You make it sound dirty. I know for a fact that you sleep with people all the time. It’s not like I’m asking you to do anything illicit—”
“Sleeping with my best friend’s baby brother is plenty illicit!” I sputtered, stomping several feet back down the path before turning to stomp in the other direction. “Not to mention dangerous.”
“Dangerous? Sex with me?” Hawk’s nostrils flared as he tried to hide a smile, but I knew his expressions too well to doubt what he was feeling. Amusement, damn him. “I know I’m a lot younger than you, Jack, but I think you have the stamina to keep up, at least if Peter is to be believed—”
“Not dangerous like that! Jesus. And stop mentioning Peter. Also, my stamina is not an issue, thank you very much,” I couldn’t help but add before remembering that my sexual stamina was not a thing I should be discussing with Hawk ever.
I spun around again. “But you are a lot younger than me. And Webb might be my best friend, but he’d still murder me and bury me in a shallow grave if I laid a hand on you.
Hell, I’d be lucky to die a quick death.
More likely, he’d get your brothers to help, like some kind of…
fraternal vengeance posse. Webb, Knox, Porter.
God, even Reed would make a trip north, and he probably has CIA torture training or some shit. ”
“Reed’s a consultant. No one actually believes he’s a spy,” Hawk scoffed. He stood with his arms folded over his chest, watching me pace back and forth. “That’s just something Porter jokes about. And since when do you care what people think?”
“Since I’m busy contemplating how your family will come for me in the dead of night and do things to me all because of your simple proposition that I tread on sacred ground!
” I yelled, gesturing wildly at him. I huffed out a breath and added quietly, “And don’t tell me I’m being dramatic because we both know better.
When Webb tried to set me up with Knox, he all but invited himself along on the date to play chaperone, and Knox is older than Webb! With you…”
I didn’t finish my sentence because I didn’t have to.
We both knew Webb was protective of his family by nature but could be stiflingly overprotective where Hawk was concerned.
If he believed Hawk was in danger, he’d raze entire cities to the ground.
It wouldn’t matter that Hawk had consented to the danger.
It wouldn’t even matter that he had gone out in the damn woods and propositioned the danger.
“Well. Yes.” Hawk sighed and deflated a little. “That is a consideration. I’d sort of hoped that you’d want this with me more than you’d care about that stuff,” he said quietly.
Ugh. I ran a frustrated hand through my sweaty hair. I hated when he got quiet. Quiet meant sad and hurt when I’d rather die than hurt him.
“Hawk. Bird. I do care about you—”
“And it’s kinda funny when you think about it,” Hawk went on with a little shrug. “If Webb and the others really want me to be safe, they should be proud of me for choosing someone trustworthy to have sex with. I could just find some rando on a hookup app, I guess, but—”
My brain exploded into a heap of toxic sludge until I was afraid I was about to have a medical event.
“You will not lose your virginity to a random stranger from an app,” I informed him.
There was something dark and rough in my voice I’d never heard before.
My heart continued to thunder in my neck, and I was lightheaded at the thought of this man—my precious Hawk—in the clutches of an unknown player.
“Promise me, Bird. Promise me you will not do something as stupid as—”
Hawk threw up his hands in an uncharacteristic display of temper. “Whoaaa. Hold on, buddy. Did you or did you not meet Smug Peter on Hinge?”
I opened my mouth and shut it again. “Not the point.”
“And everyone knows Knox and Gage were both on Grindr before they got their shit together and admitted they were in love. And Porter has GROWLr installed on his phone because he’s got a thing for bears—”
“No.” I shook my head. “Too much information. Way too much information—”
“So why is it okay for everyone else to have sex with strangers but not me?”
Because you are special. You are precious. You are mine…
That last one brought me up short.
Mine to protect was what I meant, obviously. Mine to care for until a person came along who deserved him.