Page 56 of Sass in the Grass

Dixon laughed in that deep, sexy way he had. “I’m sure it would be a minute.”

“A million minutes,” he said, but he laughed when he thought of it. “Maybe I take too many.”

“Don’t be sorry about it. If it made you happy, then it was a good thing.”

Jovian had never experienced someone so understanding. “Where…where did you come from? You really like me, don’t you?”

“Honey, I told you I like you. I wasn’t lying. Did you think I was lying?”

“No, but…not exactly, but…”

Dixon moved their plates away and then crawled over to him until he could sit and hold Jovian, moving Jovian’s head to his shoulder. “You’re just a little sweet baby, aren’t you? Don’t worry. I can be your daddy and take care of you.”

Jovian’s tears were hot. They burned his face as they fell, but like the knight in shining armor he was, Dixon swiped them off Jovian’s cheeks. “Why are you crying?”

“I’m not,” he protested, then sniffed loudly. “It’s very dusty out here.”

“Oh, okay. I’m glad you cleared that up, but you know, Jovian, I’d like a sweet baby like you to be truthful with me, so I know what you need from me.”

“I need…I need nothing,” he said before he broke into big, ugly sobs that made him hide his face in Dixon’s shoulder, for fear of him seeing that ugly crying.

Dixon held him, rocking him and kissing his temple. “It’s okay. Cry it out.”

“I’m not crying,” he yelled into Dixon’s big, muscled shoulder. “I’m…having a moment, okay?”

“Okay. You have your moment.”

“You’re so very condescending!”

All his words were terribly muffled, but he yelled them loudly enough that Dixon heard. He didn’t laugh. That was the thing. He wasn’t laughing at Jovian. He didn’t back away from the emotions. That was rare and wonderful on its own.

When his crying subsided, he was embarrassed, but Dixon wouldn’t let him be for long. After handing him a napkin to wipehis nose and eyes, he laid him on the blanket and laid beside Jovian, on his side, staring down at him, smiling sweetly. “Feel a little better?”

“I don’t know why.”

“Sometimes, we just have so much going on inside of us, it comes out in ways we weren’t expecting. I feel like crying whenever I go hiking, and see a wildflower pushing through the spring snow, or see a rabbit with the new babies around their den.

“So many things trigger our tears, and the thing is, Jovian, if we cry more over the good things in life than the bad, we’re living a good life.”

“You see things so…good. I don’t hear you complaining, like…at all, even though the camp is failing.”

He hadn’t meant to say that. It just slipped. Dixon wasn’t shocked, he knew. “Did someone tell you that?”

“A…friend, he overheard it. Is it true?”

“We’re working on it, Jovian. It’s nothing you need to worry over. I promise, we’ll figure it out, one way or another. If we have to, we’ll move the camp. I don’t have a sizeable chunk of land, and none of us have the money to build cabins like we’d need, but we could start out in tents. We’ll figure something out. I don’t want you to have to worry over it.”

“Why would I be worried? I was forced to come. I’m sure you know that.”

“I do, but, Jovian, you’ve changed. If I were to believe my friends, you were quite the nightmare, but now? You’ve been taken out of your comfort zone and shown another path, another way to live. You act like you hate it, but you’re smiling a real smile now, whereas when you came, it was so fake, if you smiled at all.”

“In my defense, I was forced to come, but, well, I will say you’re lying if you repeat this, but maybe it’s not as bad as Isuspected.” He winced as he said it, but he was granted another kiss for the confession.

And not just a kiss. While Dixon pulled away, he whispered, “Good boy.”

Trembling, Jovian pulled him down into his arms, holding Dixon there on top of him for a long time. He was heated, freezing, shivering and sweating, and he had no idea how one man could make him feel that way. “Stop making me want to cry,” he croaked, and then he did it. He cried again.

Dixon pulled away, but not far. “I didn’t do anything.”

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