Page 75 of The Leaving Kind
“Do you really want your backrub now?” High stakes wagers, all the way.
“Fuck no. It’s like a hundred degrees in here.”
Dexter, who’d been cleaning himself at the end of the bed, took the opportunity to slide up between them, his soft fur unwelcome.
“Seriously, Dex,” Victor warned. “Come any closer and I will use you as a come rag.”
“Hollow threat. You didn’t come.”
Victor clutched his slowly deflating penis. “Not for lack of trying. Apparently twice is my limit, for one afternoon, anyway.”
Cam thrust two fists into the air. “Aha!”
“Gloat away. You’ll be dry for the rest of the week.”
Smile narrowing, Cam turned his head in Victor’s direction. “You think?”
“Honestly, I don’t know? I’ve never had a come-off with anyone before. What the actual heck, Zimmermann?”
Cam’s shoulders shook with laughter. “You suggested it.”
“I must have temporarily taken leave of my senses.”
Cam leaned in and kissed him, the touch of his lips swift but firm, and in that instant, that seemingly inconsequential moment, Victor felt his grip on sense loosen by another thread. Oh no.
Propped up on one elbow, Cam continued to smile over him, the tired lines of his face somehow making him look younger. He was relaxed, Victor realized. In one place and relatively still. Not that Cam exhibited hyperactivity, but he did seem to loathe doing nothing for the sake of doing nothing.
And his damn face kept growing increasingly attractive. Victor could no longer remember a time when he didn’t think Cam good-looking. He especially enjoyed the cheekier smiles and the light that sparked in his eyes when he made plans.
He very much liked the way Cam touched him.
Stop.
Before Cam could touch him again, Victor sat and swung his legs toward the side of the bed. “Let’s eat. I’m starved.”
“Good plan.” Cam lifted his chin toward the ceiling. “What’s above this room?”
“Just sky. It’s one of the extensions. Why?”
“It’s on the hottest side of the house in summer.”
“And in the path of storms in winter.” Victor nodded toward the fireplace. “Hence my solid wall of heat.”
“I wonder if a sky light, or those higher windows—clerestory?—might improve the ventilation in summer.”
Victor studied the ceiling, picturing a windowed bump in the middle. It would have been cheaper to have included it when he’d planned and built the extension. But he could see Cam’s point. “When it gets hot, I sometimes sleep in the studio.”
“On your yoga mat?”
“Heaven forbid. No, I toss couch cushions in there and drag my quilt over them.”
Cam turned a fond smile on him, and the stitches sealing Victor’s heart shut loosened by another thread.
“Ever swim in the creek to cool off?”
“Not since the kids were little.”
Cam seemed to check himself, then. Clouds edged toward the sunshine of his face, the lines about his mouth and eyes—across his forehead—deepening slightly to leave him looking less weary and more straight-out tired. “It’s one of the things I always remembered fondly about living up here. How there were so many creeks. Or cricks, as we say. Nick and I used to swim in the one behind our house. When it got deep enough, we could swim. Otherwise, we’d float there with the water running around us. I remember playing this game to see who could lift up off the bottom the best, make themselves stiff enough to catch the current. Nick always won. He was skinny. And younger.”