Page 19 of Fortress
Gripping his shoulders, Tobias lifted his mouth to find Jake’s.
They had made out half a dozen times since their last stay at Roger’s. Tobias had the feeling it wasn’t as frequent as either of them would have liked, but even Jake seemed skittish about it. For Tobias, having the power to pull Jake close seemed like a dream to him, too unreal and wonderful to have actually happened without repercussions.
Some things in the real world got easier, requiring less thought and preparation: thumbing through a menu, flicking through channels on the TV, turning the key in the Eldorado, smiling at witnesses without letting the fear, the reality ofotheronto his face. They didn’t leave him as breathless, terrified, exhilarated, overwhelmed.
Kissing Jake was never one of those things.
If anything, kissing was a fire that burned brighter each time. It was like between them, Tobias and Jake had a store of gasoline just waiting in their bones for the spark. Now Tobias knew Jake’s body like breathing, knew how his lips parted when he wanted Tobias to press harder, knew the feel of Jake’s hand against the small of his back pulling him close, knew how Jake groaned when he slid his hand behind Jake’s neck and held them tight together. He had learned not just to open to Jake, to burn, but maybe even in his monster heart believe he had a right to this, to make Jake lean into his touch like Tobias’s hands were a fire too.
He used to be afraid of this. The lessons about freaks that had gotten too close to reals were burned into his brain, his skin. But Jake always broke off the kiss when Tobias hesitated, because Jake was perfect about the things Tobias couldn’t say.
Even though now Tobias knew Jake wasn’t perfect about everything the way Tobias had once believed. Jake wasn’t always great at following sound medical advice, even though he never failed to make sure Tobias was “better safe than sorry.”Sometimes he drank until he couldn’t walk straight through a room without hitting a bed, much less watch out for himself in a bar. And as good as he was at hunting (one of the best, no one could deny it), he wasn’t as good at research or interviewing. He demanded when he should have coaxed, kicked down the door when he should have waited. He couldn’t always sit still long enough to hear out a witness when Tobias could tell she could be coaxed into telling them what she had seen, if someone could be patient enough to wait out her fear. But even if Jake was not perfect, that was okay, because now he had Tobias to help him, and Tobias was learning, with every kiss, that someone could be perfect and not always do everything right.
Then Jake groaned and pulled back, one hand on his shoulder. Tobias panted for breath, searching his face in the dark.
“Jake?”
“Shit, Toby.” Jake’s eyes were squeezed shut.
“Are you in pain?” Tobias lurched toward the bedside table to snap on the small lamp. A heart-stopping bolt of fear shot through him with a terrible conviction:Jake is sick, Jake is sick from kissing me, how could I ever have thought it would be okay?
Jake groaned again, pulling the pillow from under his head to cover his face. He mumbled something into it, then lifted it enough to say, “PG fuckin’ rule, tiger.”
Tobias stared at him. “What?”
“PG.” Still without looking at him, Jake clapped his palm on Toby’s shoulder, then rolled out of bed. He shut the bathroom door behind him, and a moment later the shower turned on.
Tobias sat upright in bed, struggling to think, until the shower shut off. A moment later, Jake opened the door again, back in his pajamas, wet hair dripping. He paused before the bed.
“You okay?”
Tobias opened and shut his mouth. He had to trust Jake and that it would be okay to ask. “W-we never talked about that rule.”
Jake frowned at him, perplexed.
“The PG rule. When you first said it.” Tobias swallowed, his mouth dry, heart beating too quick in his chest. “I thought it was...”
Jake’s shoulders tensed. Slowly he walked around to his side of the bed and sat down next to Tobias, studying his face in the lamp light.
Tobias made himself continue. “I thought it was about me. Not touching you. I mean. I didn’t know what PG meant at all,but the context—and then I learned from the movies, and it was about keeping it kid friendly. With kissing. Nothing... below the waist.” He’d learned that phrase in the last few months and what it was supposed to mean.
Jake grimaced, making a face not unlike the time he’d tried those Mexican peppers on a dare. “Fuck. Yeah. I guess... we should’ve talked about it.”
He sounded so reluctant that Tobias could’ve laughed if it had been about anything else. But he could still feel the edges of nausea waiting for him.
Jake scrubbed his face with the palm of his hand, then met his gaze. “The PG rule was to protect both of us, okay? Make sure we didn’t get ahead of ourselves when we were still . . . not on the same page. But things are better now, right?”
Tobias nodded quickly.
“I still think we should go slow.” He hesitated. “Do you think you’d better sleep in your own bed? I mean, if that’d feel safer?”
“No,” Tobias said at once. He almost recoiled. They’d slept side by side in every motel since the night they’d left Boulder. He didn’t want to even think about losing that comfort, the safety and warmth of Jake beside him, there whenever Tobias woke up.
“Okay.” Jake smiled, one of his sweet, genuine smiles that only Tobias saw. “So let’s keep doing what we’re doing. Grab some privacy when you need to. Sound good?”
“Sounds good,” Tobias said, though he wasn’t sure he understood anything.
It would’ve been a hell of a lot harder to be back in Boulder, with all those damn memories of panic attacks and a paralyzed Tobias who was practically a stranger to him, if it hadn’t been for Christmas. Toby fucking loved Christmas, starting with thedecorations engulfing houses and buildings all over town like joyful, glow-in-the-dark fungi. Jake had no particular fondness for the trappings of the holiday (any extra cash was always earmarked for ammo, not cheesy decorations for little kids), but he appreciated how as the lights flickered on at dusk, nothing about Boulder looked the same as in summer.
