Page 7 of Touchdown
Insects buzzed. The same two birds—or another pair singing the same tune—sang high and sweet. Beyond, a breeze clattered through something that sounded like palm fronds. The steady low boom of the surf confirmed we were getting close to the beach.
Noah looked back at me, a question in his eyes. I had no answer but a shrug. Whatever he'd heard, I hadn't.
Same as with the trail cameras. We'd probably passed others, but I hadn't spotted a single one.
He started moving forward again.
“What was it?” I whispered. The song of the surf might mask our voices this close to the beach. But I wasn't taking any chances.
“I don't know.” He was whispering too. “Nothing, probably.”
“What did ‘nothing probably’ sound like?”
“Something like a cry, but it could've been a bird. A gull maybe off in the distance.”
The situation was getting to us. I was tired of getting freaked out by owls and gulls. But anybody would be a little freaked out.
We rounded one more curve to see a bright patch ahead where the shrubbery opened up to sunlight.
Although still some distance away, the sugar-white sand and aquamarine sea looked painfully bright after the deep shade of the tropical forest. Blinking, we moved forward even more slowly.
In a minute, we'd have to break cover.
What if someone was already down here waiting for us?
Chapter 5
I'll never know what alerted me. I reacted fast and from instinct, leaving memory with nothing to record but a blur.
That's why we need team video, after all. You gotta record the play. Slow it way down. See what you can't see in the fog of war.
Stopping cold, I snatched out for Noah with my left hand, momentarily pulling at the lumpy pillowcase before I adjusted my aim to grab him at the hip. The fabric was soft under my fingers, but the flesh was firm.
He could have walked out of my grip. Shaken it off.
He had better sense.
Silent and unresisting, he allowed me to pull him deeper into the shade.
It was also a move that pulled him tight against my body. As a football player, I'm comfortable with full-body contact. Or should be.
But Noah was different. My distractable dick couldn't help but respond to his lithe backside pressing urgently into my tense front. His pillowcase had swung around to the side, which allowed us to slot together like two puzzle pieces.
His toga wasn't much of a barrier between us. It felt like a thin sheet was the only thing stopping the firm globes of his perfect ass from grabbing hard at my bulging equipment. Felt like? That was literally what was actually happening here.
So, yeah, the dick was eager to lift its curious head.
“Stop this. We've got bigger issues, boy.”
“Bigger than me?”
The struggle, as they say, was real.
I held Noah still, but it didn't stop him from making an owlish head spin to look at me over his shoulder. His eyes were big with questions he dared not voice. Not letting go of his hip, I cupped my right hand to my ear to signal listening.
He nodded the world's tiniest nod.
We both listened.
