Spokes (16 page)

Christopher still had an hour and a half before he needed to be at work. In less than ten minutes he'd rattled out an account of the race,
including quotes from the other cyclists: if they didn't want to stand behind those words, they shouldn't say them, but anyone who said
a kind word about the winner got a mention.
CycloWorld
wouldn't want an incomplete account of the race, so parts two and three would have
to wait until tomorrow and Sunday.

Too full of triumph to sleep again, Christopher dressed for riding. He ran a regretful hand over his road bike; too many memories mixed with sorrow perched
on its saddle. Not today. Maybe not tomorrow or next week. No, today he'd park his backside in Luca's place and take some borrowed
courage out on the road. He wheeled the visiting mountain bike out the door, heading south and west with enough gears to smash Flagstaff Mountain into
speed bumps and his hands in Luca's grips.

He picked his way through the neighborhoods, avoiding the main street, filled as it was with armored monsters guided by fools. Stu whispered in his ear to
be careful and patted his shoulders with icy hands. Luca spoke more firmly, the memory of
We honor our fallen by not giving up
mixing with his fear.
The morning was still cool, turning the drips of sweat down his back chilly.

Pausing at the corner of 6
^th
and Baseline, he considered turning back. To go on would put him on Flagstaff Road in less than a block, heading up the
mountain over endless switchbacks. Not much traffic, more on two wheels like himself than on four. They were no danger to him, and he'd hug the
shoulder, stay away from the cars. Luca whispered
You will know when it is time to ride again.

Christopher shoved his foot into the toe clip. It was time. Telling Stu to hush up if he wanted to come along, he pushed into a steady cadence.
I
'
ve ridden this road a dozen times. I
'
ve ridden hundreds of miles safely. I can do this.
Still, every car
that went around him put a cold cramp in his gut, and only Luca's remembered encouragement kept him pointed uphill. A metallic monster came far
too close in its passage.
We met one of those recently,
Stu mentioned.
Shut up, Stu
Luca responded.
If I let fear rule me, I ride slow.

Fear couldn't win, not when he'd found the right gear for a steady pace, not when the pines and grasses murmured about the breeze, not
when the power in his legs shoved him and this heavy bike up toward the sky.
Just get to the restaurant
, Christopher urged himself,
and take Luca for dinner there if you win the lottery. Just get to the amphitheatre, just get to the summit.
Small goals kept him pedaling.
Feed power evenly around the stroke,
Luca reminded him.

His phone chimed him to the side of the road after about twenty minutes of steady pace. Losing his cadence was a small price for the respite from the
dueling voices. His caller went from offering encouragement inside his head to greetings from across the ocean.

"
Ciao,
Christopher."

"Luca! That's all? No 'Wahoo, I won!'?" But Christopher could have drowned in the two words.

"Okay, I did, but short stage of 2.2 race." His grin came right through the phone, belying his calm.

So what if it was a second tier stage race? That only meant more national and regional teams mixed in with all the top level pros. "Yeah, and I
know who followed you, so don't give me 'too humble'. They weren't expecting that, I could tell." He
propped the mountain bike against a tree and found a handy rock to sit on, a chunk of reddish sandstone that wouldn't dump him onto the asphalt.

"You saw?"

"Yeah. You're worth getting up in the wee hours for." Christopher arranged himself comfortably on his rock, a knee up to
support his elbow. "You made it look easy. Everyone else had to work for it, and they couldn't catch you. Not even close. You did
good."

"Was easy, this time. Surprised them all, and high-altitude conditioning still very fresh. Three months from now will be more like everyone else
except for strengthening from racing."

"Yeah." Red blood cells had a finite life span, one of the things that gave away the EPO-using crowd. "Can I quote
you?"

"Yes. Not about tactics for next stage though, but here's what we going to do..." Luca shared state secrets,
bringing Christopher's heart to his throat, before turning to other things.

They mumbled words that would have been sweet nothings had they been together and private. News of tiny hotels and bigger races had to do: what Luca hoped
for the next day, how a small room with a single bed for himself and another for Rolf made Christopher's basement apartment look palatial.
"Are you alone?" came up.

"Yeah, but not exactly private." Damn, had Luca managed to be alone except for his hope? "I'm most of the way up
Flagstaff Mountain." Standing, Christopher held his phone lens out to catch his own smiling face framed against the panorama of Boulder and
Denver glittering out to the horizon fifteen hundred feet below, filtered through pine branches. "Here's where I am."

"
Bellisimo
."

It was more than just beautiful; it was a small triumph to lay at Luca's feet. Nothing compared to having bested the top riders at their own
game, but it was all Christopher could offer. He snapped a picture of Luca's bike, its seat raised to accommodate his longer legs.
"Here's how I got here."

"Oh, Christopher." Luca's accent caressed his name. "You did good."

Chapter 15

Once Christopher fled the bike shop for the day, he dashed home for some video editing. The streaming service would keep today's stage on file
indefinitely, but he had to snip out the winning ride and Luca's triumphant salute for his own private collection.

Damn: tomorrow's stage would start so early the birds wouldn't even be thinking of getting up. He set the alarm for 4:30 a.m. and
loaded the coffee pot so that one blind swat would produce enough go-brew to get his eyes all the way open. Going to bed early was no
problem--today's early start, the exertion of his ride, and remembering everything Luca had teased him with on the phone made him sleepy
hours before his usual bedtime. Just because he hadn't been able to find a spot where he and the bicycle could go unseen and still stagger back
to the road didn't keep Luca from taking advantage of the one-sided privacy.

"Tell me again where you put your tongue," Luca had mumbled and eventually gasped when Christopher told him that and a great deal more
besides. They could talk without being overheard but Christopher wasn't about to risk stray hikers with his shorts down. "I tell you
all about my tongue when you have privacy," Luca promised when he could speak English again.

Christopher had privacy now, but Luca should be sound asleep in a Belgian bed, with fucking Rolf stretched out three feet away. Christopher wrapped his
hand around his cock and swore to be somewhere he could do it again when Luca called.

The wee hours rolled around, and Christopher would have hit the snooze for anyone else but Luca. Instead, he knuckled the sleep out of his eyes and
hunkered down to see four hours of maneuvering, tactics, and sinewy effort.

"Yesterday's surprise time trial winner, Luca Biondi, is cruising in the middle of the peloton, flanked by his teammates, and keeping
up easily. There was some concern that he'd burnt himself out in a showy effort in his first race of the season, but he looks like a man out for
a casual spin...." As if a measly 9.5 kilometer time trial would seriously sap Luca.

The announcers prattled on, filling the air time and the miles. One hundred seventy-four kilometers, a hundred and eight miles, would give them plenty of
time to babble, until the race sorted itself out into a display of strength and challenges. The hazards of the road, the peloton, and of tactics
hadn't gone away though--this would be no walk through. He took notes when the leads changed, when the announcers mentioned something he
hadn't noticed on his own, when Luca spoke to a teammate or occasionally to the thin air, which meant he was acknowledging instructions from his
directeur sportif through his radio helmet.

Half a dozen riders went down navigating a roundabout in an unpronounceable town--Luca and most of Antano-Clark were on the far side, streaming
past the circular obstacle unhindered. All six got up and rejoined the race, though one's black and white jersey showed skin and red at the
tattered shoulder.
One hundred percent casualties.
At least it wasn't any worse than road rash.

The miles ground on, the motos working back around the peloton to get different views of the parti-colored mass of men. Twenty kilometers to go. The pot of
coffee issued a reminder. Luca's promised tactics hadn't materialized yet--a quick trip shouldn't be an issue.
Right? He wasn't such a crazed fan that he'd have to take the laptop with him. Was he? No, but fuck, yeah next time he would because
here he was, stuck with his dick in his hand and the announcers getting excited and he couldn't make out one word in ten over the sound of his
own running water. "Breakaway!"
Faster, faster, faster....

Skidding back onto the futon, his screen was full of turquoise and black, green with yellow, orange, some brown (who thought up that uniform?), and one
black-suited rider with blue flashes who'd jumped into the fray without any teammates to support him. And Luca was in the center of the battle.

"--riders from Antano-Clark, Mondiale, Duclos-Wurth, Euskatel-Euskadi, and an optimist from Team Sky have staged a breakaway from the
peloton. With twelve kilometers yet to go, the odds are good that the peloton will reel them in and pass them."

"Unless Biondi has the legs to take it alone, I imagine we'll see him finish somewhere in the center of the pack," opined the
talking head, who didn't have any idea what kind of legs Luca had. Of course he could take everyone in the peloton, and everyone in this
breakaway, which included-- Christopher compared jersey numbers to names, decided most of them were trustworthy, and kept his eye on Rolf.

Okay, he was pedaling like hell, leading out, letting Luca draft like a good domestique should, and glancing at the orange-suited rider next to him who did
the same for his own team star.

"There's a three second gap between the breakaway and the peloton," intoned the announcer.

"And it's growing," observed the other.

"Go! Go!" Christopher urged them.

The group did, accelerating to a five second gap and then a seven second gap, even though the peloton surged after them. The leaders of the breakaway group
fell back, to be replaced by another of Luca's domestiques and a different rider in brown and white.

"Three kilometers to go, and the peloton is not catching that breakaway!" Not in the first circuit around the Belgian town of
Harelbeke, and not in the second.

But Luca--he was biding his time, Christopher knew, conserving his strength over this last small urban stretch, even as he spent it to leave one
hundred eighty pursuers in the dirt. He'd been on the road four hours already--if his legs were screaming he didn't show it.

"One kilometer to the finish," said the announcer, and at that moment the tiny pack fell apart. The Antano-Clark rider peeled to one
side, letting Luca shoot out as if he had some mystery gear no other cyclist had ever dreamed of. Others pelted after him, leaving the tatters of the group
in their wake. The Mondiale rider and the optimist left it too late to make their move. Luca drew ahead in his sprint to the finish.

"Go! Go!" Christopher bellowed. If he'd had a cowbell, he'd have deafened himself with the clatter.

Luca shot under the arch of the finish line, his arm flying into the air with his triumph, his grin wide as the ocean that separated them.
"YES!" Christopher shrieked even as he counted
one thousand one, one thou--
"YES!"

Not that Luca needed the few extra seconds to stay in yellow, but he'd opened up enough of a gap that his two closest followers didn't
share his time. One second was enough to add to his lead, the overall lead that would have been his anyway if he'd stayed with the peloton, cut
by nothing--none of his challengers today had come within twenty seconds in yesterday's time trial. Those who'd been close but
too slow yesterday were too slow again, bumped to plus twenty-six seconds, plus twenty-seven. Luca--and Christopher--could breathe easy
until tomorrow.

Two stages and another leader's jersey--Christopher twirled around the living room, between the bikes, and into the shower. He had to be
to work in twelve minutes and couldn't wait to see Luca on the podium being dressed in yellow for leading overall. He'd watch that part
tonight.

***

Christopher's phone buzzed in his pocket, and nearly hit the floor in his fumbling attempt to see the text
right now.

**Won stage :D no crash**

**Great sprint finish! Plan worked!** He glanced over each shoulder, wary of the manager questioning why he was poking his phone instead of hanging miracle
fiber socks on a display rack.

**Have no blood left**

**attacked by FIC vampires** They'd both expected the
Federation Internationale des Cyclistes
to take an active interest in Luca,
and only a joke kept Christopher from being bitter at the implied distrust. Not that plenty of other riders hadn't created grounds for suspicion
of any top performer. If the FIC officials thought they'd find banned substances in Luca's blood they could be looking a long time.
Maybe they should jab random athletes in Colorado for comparison. Christopher would hold out his own arm if it meant they'd leave Luca alone.

**Nice to win stage. Would have had to finish back of pack to lose overall lead**

**Better to keep it**

**Now have two jerseys, two fuzzy dogs. Share with you**

What did the racing officials think cyclists did with the plush animals they presented at stage wins? Multiple stage winners like Chris Froome had to do
something with half a dozen stuffed lions per race or risk their homes looking like the display at Toys 'R Us. Christopher suddenly wanted a
plush dog in the worst way. **Dog will sit by pillow**