He’d spent his entire adult life assuming that being gay meant never having a family of his own. Never having a partner to love and live out his days with. He’d been so stupid. So stuck in denial. So afraid to allow himself to be happy. Hell. Had all the past lonely years been some elaborate means of punishing himself for being who he was?
He made another full circuit of the cabin, this one wider. He memorized terrain, scoped out possible escape routes, and considered how he would assault the cabin if he were a bad guy.
Gradually, as the shock of really owning the idea of being able to be both gay and happily in love sunk in, it dawned on him that nothing had ultimately changed. He was still a SEAL, he was still out here doing recon, he would still protect Chas and Poppy from whoever was after them. He was still… himself.
The panic eased slowly as he made a third circuit around the cabin, this one nearly all the way to the base of the hill and back. There was too much brush and cover for his comfort. Too easy for hostiles to sneak up on the cabin. But hopefully whoever’d shown up at that last hotel was on their way to Canada now, fruitlessly chasing the truck he’d planted the tracking burr in.
When he returned to the cabin, Poppy was parked on the floor in front of the television watching some kiddy show with lots of bright colors and noise. She was enthralled. Chas had cleaned up after the meal and was dozing on the sofa behind Poppy.
“Go take a nap. I’ll take baby duty for a bit,” Gunner murmured.
“You sure?”
“We’ll need to tag team the munchkin to make this op work. I’ll take a nap later and be awake the rest of the night. Get some rest while you can.”
“We’re a team?” Chas asked cautiously.
“Yeah. I guess we are.”
Chapter Nine
CHAS WOKE up feeling refreshed and took over Poppy duty. Gunner looked frazzled after a couple hours of cartoons and peekaboo, which amused Chas to no end. “Parenthood’s not as easy as it looks, is it, Mr. Commando?”
“Hardest thing I’ve ever done,” Gunner replied deadpan. But Chas thought he heard a note of honesty in the remark.
“What’s the game plan for tonight?”
Gunner replied immediately—obviously he’d been thinking about it. “I’ll sleep for a few hours. When you get tired, wake me up and I’ll stand guard. Hostiles tend to attack late at night when everyone’s asleep or not functioning at full capacity.”
“You think we’re still in danger?” he asked quickly.
“I think an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of shitshow.”
“I don’t think that’s how the saying goes.”
Gunner shrugged. “I stand by it. I’d rather be cautious and not get caught with my ass hanging in the wind.”
“Hmm. I rather like the idea of your ass hanging out.”
Gunner’s gaze snapped to his, and Chas held his breath for a moment until Gunner grinned and rolled his eyes.
Okay, then. Gunner was settling into the idea of being in a relationship with him. This was good. Very good.
Gunner retreated to the adult bedroom, and Chas turned his attention to Poppy. She was repeating the sounds from the TV, and he thought he detected an Asian accent in her pronunciation. Was she from overseas? Startled, he spent a while trying to capture audio of her baby babble with his cell phone. Maybe one of Gunner’s contacts could identify where she was from by the things she was saying.
He pointed at his chest and said, “Chas,” clearly and slowly.
She mimicked him, enjoying the game but saying “Chi” instead. He laughed in delight and said again, “Chas.”
“Chichi,” she said clearly. She squealed, and he shushed her quickly. Hopefully Gunner had worn earplugs to bed.
They played and watched more cartoons until she started to get tired and cranky, and then he gave her a quick bath, popped her into her jammies, and gave her a bedtime bottle. She snuggled against him trustingly, and he was pleased that she seemed to be recovering from her recent trauma.
If they could just keep her life calm for a while and establish a routine for her until they found her parents, maybe she would come out of this mostly unscathed. He knew from working with little kids that they were resilient beings if they were just given love, support, and a chance to thrive.
He laid Poppy down in her crib and stretched out on the bed in her room. He woke up to the vibration of his phone at midnight. Time to go wake up Gunner. He rolled out of bed and padded barefoot into the other bedroom. It might have a king-sized bed in it, but Gunner sprawled across most of it on his stomach, out cold.
Chas tugged back the sheet to bare Gunner’s muscular back and grimaced at the patchwork of bruises. He bent down to kiss Gunner’s shoulder carefully on an unbruised spot.
Gunner groaned a little, but his eyes stayed closed. Placing a knee on the bed beside him, Chas kissed his way lightly across Gunner’s shoulder blade to his spine, where he headed south, down the indentation there, lined with ridges of hard muscle. Pushing aside the sheet as he went, he approached the rise of muscular buttocks, and he swirled his tongue in the faint dimple at the base of Gunner’s spine just short of where that glorious ass began.
Gunner moved lazily beneath him, awake now but clearly enjoying the attention. Inspired, Chas shifted position, kneeling between Gunner’s spread thighs, and commenced massaging those powerful legs, working his way down Gunner’s thighs and calves, digging his thumbs into the arches of his feet until Gunner groaned faintly. Back up his legs Chas massaged, kneading and rolling the heavy muscles under his palms.
He added his mouth to the massage, sucking the backs of Gunner’s knees until he squirmed a little. Ticklish, huh? Good to know. He nipped and kissed his way up the back of one thigh until he reached the junction. He hesitated for a second and then decided to go for it. Pushing Gunner’s thighs wider apart, he lightly licked Gunner’s balls.
Loving the gasp that elicited, he slurped his way up the underside of Gunner’s cock, which was already wide-awake. The thick vein there pulsated under his tongue, and when he swirled his tongue around the tip of Gunner’s cock, a drop of precum already had gathered there.
Gunner’s erection pulsed against the mattress beneath Chas’s mouth, and the gathered tension in Gunner’s entire body enveloped him.
Prepared to torture Gunner a little, he left off the sucking and licking and kissed his way back up Gunner’s spine until his entire body lay on top of Gunner’s.
He murmured against the side of Gunner’s neck, “Are you ready to do this properly, or are we going to pretend all you want is the occasional blow job?”
With one quick heave, he was flipped on his back with Gunner looming over him in the darkness. “Don’t tease me, Chasten.”
“Who’s teasing?”
“You sure you want to go the whole way? There’ll be no going back.”
“My dude, there’s already no going back. You just haven’t admitted that to yourself yet.” It was a risk pushing Gunner this hard. But the guy had been living in this stupid limbo for all of his adult life. It was time somebody shoved him off the fence.
Gunner stared down at him for a long time. And then slowly, slowly, inch by inch, he lowered his face to Chas’s. Gunner’s lips brushed across his. Another light kiss. As if he was testing this new relationship thing out.