“Let me know if I can do anything,” he said, and they ended the call.
He sat in the cruiser, fighting temptation, then gave in and hit dial on the number he’d been wanting to call all morning.
“Under-sheriff,” Wade answered.
“Hey. You okay?”
“Is this a courtesy call? A new service offered by the department for those who have recently enjoyed their hospitality?”
He was trying to cover, Jericho realized. Trying to remind him that the feds were listening, and Jericho needed to be acting like the cop he was.
But he’d meant it when he said he didn’t care anymore. “Can you meet me? I want to talk to you.”
“Not a good idea, Officer. I don’t have anything to add to the thorough statement I gave to the FBI last night.”
“Did you recite the alphabet for them? I hear they like that.”
Finally, there was a little inflection in Wade’s voice. “This isn’t a joke, Jericho. You know better.”
“I don’t care what I know.”
“Well, I do. Don’t call me again.”
The line went dead, leaving Jericho staring at the phone in his hand. What had just happened? How much of it had been real, how much a performance for the listening feds?
All of it had been for the feds. It had to be fake. Whatever he and Wade were doing, it had the weight of inevitability behind it. Neither of them had a choice; neither of them could simply walk away. It had to be affecting both of them, because if it was just Jericho? If Wade wasn’t coping with this desperate, irrational need? No, Jericho wouldn’t even waste time thinking about what that might mean.
He pulled the cruiser out into traffic, back to his aimless driving. There were no new leads to pursue, nothing useful to do. He was relying on the FBI to deal with Wooderson, expecting Kayla to deal with her father’s issues, and now Wade, the one part of his life that had actually seemed to be moving in a positive direction, was shutting him down. He was just done with it, all of it.
Probably he needed another hard workout and should go back to the station gym, but instead he found himself driving up into the mountains. As he drove, as the trees surrounded him, he calmed down. Wade had been talking to the feds, not to Jericho. It was clear. It was fine.
By the time he reached the cabin, he wasn’t even a little surprised to see the beat-up truck parked beside it. Not Wade’s usual vehicle, but that made sense if he was having to sneak away from federal surveillance in order to keep things as secret as he had clearly decided they should be.
The cabin door was open, and as Jericho pulled up, the inner shadows solidified and became Wade’s lean body as the man stepped outside and shook his head in his trademark amused dismay. “Was there some part of ‘don’t use the phone’ you found difficult to understand?” he called as Jericho climbed out of the cruiser.
“Is there some part of ‘I don’t care what people know’ thatyoufind difficult to understand?”
“You’re fucking impulsive, young Crewe.” Wade moved closer, his expression warm and relaxed. “A week ago you wanted this all to be secret, now you want to advertise it to the world. But you need to remember—once the world knows, you can’t switch back again when you change your mind. Once the cat’s out of the bag, you’re not going to be able to cram it back in.”
“That’s something for me to worry about, not you.”
“Well, when youwereworrying about it, that was true. But now that you’ve stopped, seems like I need to come in and take over.”
Jericho was suddenly exhausted. The adrenaline was leaving his system now that he was somewhere he felt safe. With someonewho made him feel safe. “Can we, I don’t know, can we talk about that another time? Right now I just—”
“Okay,” Wade said as he stepped forward, calm and steady. He wrapped a hand around the back of Jericho’s neck. “We’ll talk about it later. For now?” His kiss was gentle. An invitation, but a nonspecific one. It was clear enough: comfort, competition, anger, or passion; if Jericho needed it, Wade was offering to provide it.
Jericho deepened the kiss. He needed all of it. Everything Wade had, Jericho wanted. He let himself be shuffled backward, guided around the rough terrain until his back was against a wide tree trunk. “You’re good, Jay,” Wade murmured, his lips moving against Jericho’s jaw, then his neck. “Everything’s good. It’s only you and me, okay?”
It was lucky there was a tree to lean against, or Jericho might have slumped right to the ground. Everything was so much more than good, so much more than okay. “You’re perfect, Wade,” he managed, and felt Wade’s lips curve in response.
“Well, that’s just your boner talking.” Wade dragged his hand across the strained polyester of Jericho’s uniform pants. “And your dick has never been known for its good judgment.”
“It knows what it likes,” Jericho responded.
“And you’re okay? Whatever had you worked up, you’re over it?”
“Over it?” Jericho said. “Keith Wooderson knows we’re after him, and I expect he’s going to try to book it out of here before we can build enough of a case to even charge him. So he’s going to find another town, another hooker, and—” Jericho shook his head so violently Wade pulled away. “And there’s nothing I can do about it. So, fuck, I don’t know. I need to forget about it. Just one more way the world is broken, right? Is that what you’d say?”
“Sounds like I don’t need to say it, not when you can say it for yourself.” Wade kissed the corner of Jericho’s mouth. “You want me to help you forget about all that? That why you’re here?”
“That’s part of it.”
Wade didn’t push for the rest. He just tugged at Jericho’s tie, loosening it and then pulling it free. “Okay, then. Let’s get rid of some clothes.”
It had been quite a while since Jericho had been naked outdoors. He’d forgotten how much more intense everything felt—the sun’s warmth, the tree trunk’s rough bark, the cool whisper of the breeze—when there was no clothing to diminish the impact. Wade’s mouth left a damp trail on Jericho’s belly, and the wind blew across and gave him a trail of goose bumps, showing where Wade had been.
Jericho threw his head back and let himself get lost in the sensations. He felt taken care of, protected, encouraged. He explored Wade’s body, one that he had once known as well as he knew his own, and rediscovered its beauty. When Wade reached for his pile of clothes and retrieved a foil package and a little bottle, it was inevitable and completely natural. Wade rolled the condom onto Jericho’s cock while kissing him, then turned around and looked back over his shoulder in an exaggerated, almost coquettish way that made Jericho smile. Wade, the source of every temptation.
And for a while, there in the forest, with no one to watch or judge them, Jericho was more than happy to give in to that temptation. It was Wade, and it was Jericho, and they were together—all was right with the world.
