Page 34 of Constantly Cotton

“Yessir.”

“Don’t fall out of that fuckin’ tree.”

There was a sputtering on the other end of the line. “Falling out of trees is your job, sir.”

“Fuck off, Captain.”

“Yessir.”

Cotton laughed a little, enjoying their camaraderie. Unbidden, the obvious question came out, and he could have kicked himself after it did.

“Why aren’t you dating him?”

Jason swore and popped two fingers into his mouth. “Wha…?”

“He’s got a boyfriend. Why isn’t it you?”

Jason frowned. “I’m his superior officer. I can’t sleep with him. That’s unethical.”

They both heard Burton snicker on the other end of the phone.

“And I thought he was straight until he met Ernie,” Jason said loudly, mostly for Burton’s benefit.

“So did I!” Burton shot back. “How about that one?”

“Gimme a sec.” Jason did some more tinkering and then looked at his monitor. “Good. Five degrees right. One more. Good. Perfect. You can get down out of that tree.”

“Yessir. Bit of a hike. Hanging up to save battery.”

“Ten-four.” Jason hit End Call and then stretched, yawning. “Did you have a good sleep?”

“Yes, thank you.” Cotton caught himself midyawn and grimaced. “I had no idea how tired I was.”

“Well, you’ve been nursing me back to health. It’s been a full-time job. And yesterday was no picnic.”

Cotton nodded and then remembered he was there for a reason. “How’re you feeling?” He noted Jason’s paleness, the high color in his cheeks. “Here.” As Lance had trained him, he walked forward, put the back of his hand on Jason’s forehead, and grimaced. “Still low-grade,” he guessed. “I’ll go get the medkit. I think you need your antibiotics too.”

Jason groaned good-naturedly and took his hand before he could pull it back. “Yeah, I’ve only been up for a couple of hours, and I could sleep for another week. Once we get the cameras up, I’ll feel better. The cabin has this great window over the lake and then a couple of them from the guest bathroom and the mudroom, but the living room and master bedroom are blind. If we could have a camera system in our room, I’ll sleep much better.”

Cotton paused, biting his lip, not wanting to state the obvious but not wanting it yanked away from him either. “Our room?” he asked, praying a little.

Jason looked away, releasing his hand before sitting down at the monitor.

“If that’s okay with you,” he said gruffly.

“Yeah,” Cotton said, smiling a little. “I, uhm….” He bit his lip, and Jason looked up to meet his eyes.

“It was nice,” he admitted. “Holding you. Probably not wise. You’re very, very much younger than I am. Probably holding you is all I should do.”

“You’re not that old,” Cotton said, thinking about all of the sugar daddies he’d hoped for while he’d been in porn. None of them—not one—had seemed as old or as grounded or as real as Jason Constance, though.

“Thirty-six,” he muttered, with the same intonation he might have used to say, “One hundred and six,” or “Three thousand two hundred and eighty-seven.”

“Well, that’s a whole fourteen years,” Cotton said dryly. “Are you going to need a walker? Viagra? Let me know, old man. I can order what we don’t have.”

Jason snorted. “Condoms? Lube? An instruction manual? It’s been so long since I’ve had sex with another person, I’ve probably forgotten how.”

Cotton snorted and had just opened his mouth to ask how long it could have possibly been, but then the phone rang and Jason picked it up. He and Burton started their techspeak, and Cotton ran to the bedroom to find the medical kit he’d packed in that terrifying ten minutes.