Page 40 of Axel

When the pair of them made it to ground, they swiftly ran across the clearing in the direction away from how the tree would fall.

‘Who knew having a tree surgeon as a friend could be so useful?’ Kipp quipped as the three of them steadied themselves and watched as the grand old tree swayed and looked dangerously close to falling. ‘But what about those two assholes?’

Kipp pointed over at the two soldiers as they groggily came to. They were directly in the path of the expected tree fall. And while Axel might have hated them both, there was no way he could in good consciousness let them be crushed underneath the tree.

‘Come this way,’ Axel called out, waving the men toward him as they got to their feet. ‘The tree’s going to fall. Come to us. We can talk. This doesn’t need to get violent again.’

But instead of listening to Axel, the men shouted and hollered obscenities at Arlo, Axel, and Kipp. They were angry, and clearly not in the mood to settle things peacefully.

‘Fuck you!’ Kray called out, spitting in Axel’s direction. ‘You want to trap us here while you wait for the cops, right? Not happening. But don’t worry, you’ll be seeing us again real soon. And it’ll be the last thing you see too.’

‘Argh! I hate you!’ Arlo called out, making a move to run toward the pair of them before Axel held him back. ‘You suck! But I feel sorry for you too. You must be so miserable to bully people like me!’

Harper and Kray simply laughed.

But the laughter was short-lived. An almighty tearing sound ripped through the air as the tree fell. And as Harper and Kray ran, they were soon crushed underneath the fallen tree’s enormous weight.

There were no screams of pain. Only silence.

Axel knew that the men’s fait’s had been sealed. It was all over. The threat was gone. But Axel had a young man who hadalready been through enough trauma to last a lifetime – and it was time to make sure that he was okay.

As Kipp called the police, Axel took a shaken up Arlo to one side.

‘My darling, special Arlo,’ Axel said, resting up against a thick tree trunk and drawing his boy in close. ‘I’m sorry you had to see that.’

‘It’s okay, Daddy,’ Arlo replied. ‘We tried to help them. Even though they wouldn’t have done that for us. We did our best. We did the right thing.’

‘You’re right,’ Axel replied. ‘And now it’ll be in the hands of the authorities. So I’m thinking we head on out and go somewhere nice and safe.’

Arlo simply nodded and attempted a smile.

Axel knew that he would need to tread carefully with Arlo until he was feeling himself once more – but Axel was Arlo’s Daddy, and it felt like looking after and caring for him was what Axel was born to do.

Chapter 17

Arlo

A few days passed and while Arlo was physically feeling fine, the mental toll of what he had been through was still all too evident. Arlo would be fine for most of the time, but then a sudden flashback or memory would occur, and he would need a big cuddle from his Daddy – and this meant that more often than not, Arlo was sticking as close to Axel as was humanly possible.

When the police arrived at the scene in the forest, there was no question over believing Arlo and Axel’s side of the story. So from a domestic point of view, there was nothing to worry about. But that didn’t mean that Arlo’s struggles with the military were over though, and as long as his appeal process was ongoing, Arlo knew that there would always be a nagging doubt and a little bit of fear in his mind.

However not everything was bad.

A big bonus of sticking so close to Axel was that Arlo was able to travel around with him on all his jobs. And with a clear skyabove, both Arlo and Axel were at Jack McPherson’s family home to check up on the progress of a tree that Axel had made a lot of effort to save – and the signs were looking good on that front too!

‘Daddy, I think you’ve done a great job,’ Arlo said as he walked around the base of the fine old tree. ‘Not that I’m an expert.Yet.’

‘Hey, don’t sell yourself short,’ Axel chuckled, a careful eye on some of the tree’s upper branches. ‘You’ve picked everything up so quickly these last few days. Seriously, I’m running out of things to teach you.’

‘Naaaaw, thanks Daddy,’ Arlo replied. ‘But that’s silly. I’ve seen all your big tree books, and I don’t think I know even one tenth of what there is to know. But… I would kinda like to.’

Arlo didn’t want to come out and say it directly, but the thought of actually working with Axel was appealing to him. Arlo loved being outdoors, he loved nature, and he was now beginning to find himself truly wanting to learn all about trees in a way that he’d never considered before.

However if Axel was thinking along the same lines, he certainly wasn’t saying anything out loud. Instead, Axel’s mind appeared far more focused on the job at hand.

‘Come over here, Arlo,’ Axel said, taking a step backward and pointing up at the top of the tree. ‘Follow my finger down, you can see how we’ve corrected the tree’s central line.’

‘Cool,’ Arlo replied, feeling all warm and cozy as he pressed his butt back against Axel’s body.

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