AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Bowie yipped back that he was the cleverest of the good boys.
“So how did you actually meet him?” said Luca.
“Maybe I’m a hero? Maybe I rescued him from beneath a burning tree and nursed him back to health?”
“Did you?”
“Nah. Last summer I forgot to close my door one night. I woke up to him eating my leftover spaghetti.”
Luca laughed. “Yeah, he does love an open door.”
“Then he just kept hanging around. And I wasn’t going to turn away a furry friend.”
“Yeah, that’d be super out of character. Particularly a cute and affectionate one.”
“You don’t know the half of it! He was still a baby last summer. Like, half his current size?”
Luca swooned at the thought of the already adorable fox in miniature. “Oh, God. My heart!”
After several more minutes of teasing with the toy, Bowie finally lost patience, leaping in full carnivore mode toward the rat. His little fangs chomped heavily on the stretchy flesh as Artair playfully fought him off. At one point during their tug-of-war, Artair lifted the toy to his chest, with Bowie levitating in midair, back legs kicking frantically and refusing to let go of his latex prey.
When Artair finally got it free, he tossed it across the room. It thumped against the rain-streaming window and landed on the bed, enjoying about three seconds of freedom before a full-sprinting Bowie chased it down, doing his best to tear out the elastic jugular.
They both chanted encouragement as the squeaks got higher and Bowie became even more ravenous. At one point, he rolled completely off the bed, before leaping back up as if nothing had happened.
Luca sat back against the door. He was wearing a t-shirt and shorts, alongside socks and no shoes. Artair slumped beside him, shirtless and barefoot, wearing nothing but a pair of jocks—crimson briefs that should have clashed with his rosy complexion, but somehow only enhanced it.
Luca leaned into the bulky fuzz of Artair’s shoulder. He smelled of high-tempo activity in colder weather—spicy and warm and with a layer of musk.
It was self-fulfilling prophecy of a scent, inviting and invigorating, drawing Luca in and making him want to engage in the activity that caused the scent in the first place.
“Is the toy from a haunted house?” Luca asked.
“Not this year. I got close to a woman who owned a few bars in Aspen. Really good sort. She had me working most nights, and always made sure I had somewhere to stay.”
“Close, close?” asked Luca, without jealousy. He’d had plenty of bisexual bedmates and had never been prone to sexual envy.
“Just friends,” said Artair, wrapping an effortless arm around Luca’s shoulders, providing a fresh kiss of the increasingly familiar musk.
Luca sighed contentedly. Artair was so unlike any other man he’d been with. So unashamed of his affection. So unworried about things being taken too seriously.
It was the same as how he kissed—freely, openly, not holding anything back out of fear that Luca might misinterpret things.
It was unfamiliar, but... nice. Being able to have that intimacy, even though it was obviously just a temporary entanglement.
And Luca did know that all of this was temporary. Because how could it be anything else? You didn’t live without a mobile or an email or an address if you planned on staying in contact with your lovers. You only did that if you lived where your feet were. If you embraced the moment and didn’t dwell too much on the past. If the men you met were momentary.
Sure, they hadn’t talked about it explicitly.
But Luca knew exactly what this was.
It was a summer fling—with a guy who’d wander off into the sunset as soon as the season ended.
And he was fine with that.
Of course he was.
“It’s amazing that you can just turn up in a new place like that,” said Luca, thinking about Artair arriving in Aspen without any plan or safety net. “Not knowing anyone? Not having any idea what the city’s like? And just making those kinds of connections without a mobile phone.”
