Spokes (32 page)

Luca rose and joined him. "So much greatness here," he whispered.

Christopher nodded; another tear escaped. "And so much sorrow."

"We remember them." Luca rested a hand on the small of Christopher's back, guiding him out into the piazza. He dropped his
hand but turned them to the bronze statue framed against the mountains across the lake. One weathered metal cyclist rode forever, his arm raised. For
victory? To scream at the universe for his companion's sake? The other man had fallen, tangled in his bicycle, and would stay on the ground
forever.

"They are us," Luca whispered. "We ride. We ride for them."

"We ride." Christopher struggled to read the words on the bronze border. "
Caddero sulla strada
--"

Luca spoke from memory.
"--
inseguendo un sogno de Gloria. Che raggiunsero nella luce del sacraficio delle loro giovani esistenze.
They fell on the road, following a dream of
glory. They reached the light in the sacrifice of their young lives."

Stu. Rolf. Maybe there was glory in going out doing what you loved best in all the world. But falling at all.... A Stu-shaped void opened in
Christopher's heart.

"They are the
fuga bidone,
Christopher. They broke away. They're too far ahead to reel in," Luca whispered, his voice
breaking into the wind that licked the mountain top. "We are the peloton."

"We'll see them again at the finish line." Pain that felt like hope lanced through him.
Luca.
He groped for
Luca's hand.

Luca clasped back with crushing tightness. Christopher tipped his head, trying to find some angle that would keep the tears back but he hurt too much, and
Luca's hand was all that anchored him. Luca's hair lifted in the breeze, fuzzily, and then clearly when the tears fell anyway, and his
face was already wet.

"Christopher," he whispered. "Live forever. It would kill me to come here for you."

"Crazy man who thinks he'll ride Mont Crostis, what do you think it would do to me?" It was too much, too much, and he
didn't know how they went from hurting each other to stave off the tears to holding each other and letting them fall.
Please, God, he
'
s going to keep riding. Keep him safe.

"I stay off Mont Crostis. But I can't stay off bike."

"I know. I'll learn to deal with the fear. Somehow." His voice cracked on the last word. He'd have to learn how to
send Luca off to the wars on the road with a smile, to do nothing that would interfere with his confidence. Best start now. "And you will come
home victorious and be rewarded for it."

"Come home," Luca repeated. "I like."

Their storm had shaken them to ignoring everything, everyone around them, but Christopher let go of Luca to muttered comments, some of which he understood.

"That's the Antano-Clark rider who lost a teammate."

"Who's the other guy?"

"Don't know. Friend of the dead guy, maybe?"

"Poor fellas."

The click of a camera interrupted someone who was probably saying the same thing in Swedish. Fucking tourist. Taking pictures of other people grieving. The
photographer needed a swift kick in the nuts.

Luca dropped his hands and stepped back, taking one more look at the bronze. "I go talk to priest about Stu. And for Rolf. Team will come here
after Giro, have ceremony for him."

"His family might want to come." They'd spend their own two days on the train, but they might think it time well spent, to
see how Rolf's comrades honored him.

"I tell Michel. We bring them." Luca dragged the back of his hand across his face. "You want to look in the
museum?" He nodded at the graceful, curved building sailing on the stone of the mountain beyond the chapel. "More bicycles, more
history. Not the sad parts."

"I'll wait here."

Luca clattered away across the stone piazza. Christopher turned again to the statue. Did the fallen man collapse to the ground once his teammate rode away?
Captured forever in his last moment of life, his face was full of pain.

Rolf had gone quickly. Had Stu? Or had he been aware for much too long?
Please let it have been fast for him.

"Didn't expect to see you here."

Christopher turned slowly, lest his fist fly out and smash Bob the Goddam Barnacle in the face. "Aren't you supposed to be somewhere
far, far away?"

"Not on a rest day. Trying to do some 'think outside the race' stories. You've been getting some readers with them.
Haven't seen you around." Bob smirked at him. "Been getting cozy with the best story never to hit the airwaves? You looked
friendly enough to be getting an exclusive."

Deep breath. Take another deep breath. And don't jerk that camera off his neck and throw it into the lake. "Do you not remember what
happened? Can you not recognize grief?"

Bob shrugged. "Didn't think you knew Rolf Knecht that well."

"It's not just Rolf." Okay, keep a lid on the temper. Nothing quite like getting livid to make crying a thing of the past
though. "You asked what happened to me when you got a good look at all my scars back in Lienz, remember?"

"Yeah, you said you got knocked into some barb wire." Okay, he looked like the brain was engaged.

"I wasn't the only one in that accident. My best buddy Stu got hit too. He didn't make it." Christopher pulled his
phone out of his pocket and flicked the gallery to show Bob pictures from six months and a year earlier. He and Stu on the top of Flagstaff Mountain. He
and Stu at the reservoir. Stu popping a wheelie, shit, like Rolf at the finish line. "We were tight. I miss him every day and when I see
that--" Christopher looked toward the bronze cyclists. "--yeah, I'm gonna lose it. The Antano-Clark riders
caught the car. Luca was there for Stu's death too, and then Rolf..." Damn it all, he did
not
want to cry again. Not in
front of Bob.

"Rough. Sorry about your friend." Bob looked mildly concerned. Okay, Stu was a nobody to him. "So he's not talking,
even to you?"

Thinkthinkthinkthinkthink. "He's said some things."

"But you haven't published."

And Bob had pictures. That smug, shit-eating grin meant he had to have pictures. "Not yet. Last edits, ya know?"

"Then looks like I have an exclusive." He patted the camera.

Christopher regretted every tip and deflection he'd fed the man. "You mean you'd really post a pic of a buddy with snot
streaming down?"

"Might Photoshop that much out," Bob considered.

"Well at least use a pic of my good side." If Luca could fool some of the wiliest riders in the sport into believing he was exhausted
when he still had a tire-burning sprint inside him, then Christopher could play vain. "And his, ya know?"

"Which is your good side?" Bob punched up the pictures in the window and showed Christopher. He flipped through a couple. Christopher
flicked to a fourth. How many had the man taken?

"Any" was too many--Christopher pressed down the two buttons that would wipe the memory card entirely.
"Oops."

Bob snatched the camera away, but too late. "What did you go and do that for?"

"Let the man grieve his dead, Bob." Christopher went for grim. "Don't make news on him with that."

"I'd fuc-- I'd punch you if I hadn't downloaded all my pictures from the rest of the race." Bob
poked buttons as if it might disgorge a picture after all. "You're the only journo who gets exclusives with the great Luca Biondi, is
that it?"

"Depends on what it is." Had he just opened a huge can of ill-will? Riders who did that didn't get much help from the
peloton. "Catch him after his next race, because he'll be news, win or lose, and I won't fight you for it."

"You'd do that?"

Once.
"Yeah. That was kind of a dirty trick just now, but let him have some dignity, okay?" One more sop, to keep the thrown elbows down.
"Did you ever figure out the sprinter's chainring?"

"Not yet." Bob glared. "There's a trick to it, isn't there?"

He wasn't stupid or malicious, he just wasn't an equipment geek and he was a journo. "His elliptical chainring was the
equivalent of a forty-two tooth gear, and he was up against guys riding on thirty-fours and thirty-eights. He was working way too hard for the same
distance on the grade. You can do the math for watts, right?"

"Oh hell, yeah." Bob looked up from his camera. "Okay, I might forgive you some day." He shot another picture of
the statue. "I have to redo these. You want to pose?"

"Nope." Luca was on his way out of the chapel. "Gotta go."

He met Luca at the bike rack, "ready to go" being the world's biggest understatement. With drawn smiles they mounted and left
the bronze riders behind.

The three kilometers back to the car went fast, less than two minutes. Christopher tried not to ride the brakes--he didn't want to hold
Luca up. Every pebble and bump threatened to smear him across the road. The steady 7% grade needed all his attention and the brief 12% and 14% grades felt
like elevator shafts.
Stay loose, move with the bike.
He nearly overshot the BMW.

"Good descent, Christopher." Luca stayed straddled on his bike. "Like a pro."

"Thanks." Maybe practice would make that less terrifying at speed. Christopher popped off his front wheel and laid both sections of
bike in the car. "Want to hand me your frame?"

"No." Christopher spun around to see Luca's glorious smile, whipped by wisps of hair blowing into his face. "Feels
good. I ride back to the villa."

"Oh, okay."
Yes!
"I guess that makes this the team car?" Christopher grinned back and swung into the
driver's seat, fumbling for his street shoes. He'd follow Luca, just in case.

Luca didn't wait for Christopher to get back into the lane--he was off and peddling. With his back hunched into racing position, his
legs pumping smoothly to get to speed on the hill, and the flutter of his hair, he was velocity itself.

He sailed down the pavement with Christopher in heart-pumping pursuit. Not too close, but not too far behind, swinging the BMW through the curves. How did
the directeurs sportifs manage yelling on a radio, keeping track of their teams and the rest of the race, all while driving among two hundred unprotected
riders on roads worse than this? He tried not to look at the speedometer. The needle fluttered well above sixty.
Kilometers, it
's calibrated in kilometers
.
Please, God, keep him upright. If he goes down, don
'
t let me hurt him.

Luca leaned through the curves, pedaling intermittently, a turquoise and flesh missile on a downhill trajectory. The road sometimes took him out of sight.
The BMW's accelerator was enemy and tool--Christopher maintained his pace behind, sweat pooling between his shoulder blades.

Luca flashed on, every line of him melded with his machine.

Sixteen kilometers of twisty road brought them back to the villa. Christopher staggered out of the car, wiping sweat off his temples.

Luca leaped from his bike, nearly dancing. "Wonderful ride! Perfect!" He flung his arms around Christopher, staggering him backward.

Christopher thought he could breathe again, but Luca smothered him in kisses, crushing closer than clothing to his body. He managed to get his arms up and
around his beloved whirlwind, and found enough air to laugh. "Wonderful ride." Oh yes. Wonderful. Luca was back.

Back with joy, back with need. He was all over Christopher, pushing him into the house and yanking him to a stop to squeeze tight. Trying to keep up with
his kisses wouldn't work--he'd meet Christopher's mouth fast for a flash of tongue and lip, to dart away for a taste
of neck or shoulder.

What was he going to say? Slow down? Luca never slowed down unless something was wrong, and this wasn't wrong, this was days, weeks, of missing
right. It had been so long since they'd done anything beyond the merest suggestion of kisses. "Take off your helmet,"
Christopher finally begged after one thump too many.

Luca unclipped his headgear and tossed it on the coffee table--he'd backed Christopher into the living room. "And everything
else." He captured the zipper tab of Christopher's jersey in his teeth and tried pulling it down. He gave up and went back to hands to
get Christopher stripped--that went faster, though Christopher might have been on his back on the couch before his jersey hit the floor.

Luca knelt beside him, touching everywhere, tasting everywhere, frantic. "I'm not going anywhere," slowed him down a
fraction. Christopher finally got his arms around Luca and pulled him on top. Abandoning fast for thorough, Luca sealed his mouth to
Christopher's, his tongue flicking, demanding, conquering. Anything Luca wanted, okay--Christopher opened under his onslaught, wrapping
his arms around Luca's slender chest and demanding equality in a handful of muscular butt. Luca pushed against him, their cocks throbbing hard
under their racing shorts.

Too long since they'd demanded anything from each other. "I don't want to come yet," Christopher gasped.

Luca slid to his knees on the floor, still in Christopher's embrace. "Pacing, yes." He changed tempo, his mouth quieter, his
tongue slower, and Christopher matched him now, nibbles and licks, nose bumps and smiles. He could map the terrain of muscle under clothing; he'd
find the sweet, familiar planes of Luca's body.

His hair tickled where it fell around his face on his path down Christopher's chest. His tongue tickled too--he found
Christopher's nipples and the indent under his breastbone where his heart thudded so hard. Was it his own heart he felt slamming against his
ribs, or was Luca's pounding hard enough to shake them both? His chest pulsed under Christopher's hand.

Oh Luca was back--this was his lover, more ardent then he'd ever been in Boulder, more demanding, more confident that Christopher would
move with him, anticipating and matching him. Hell to the yes--he'd come across an ocean and slain dragons for Luca. This was his reward
too.

Luca hooked his thumbs into Christopher's spandex waistband--his hips rose smoothly to let him pull the cycling shorts down far enough
to expose what they both wanted. Harder than he ever remembered, Christopher waited for what Luca would do next, but only a few seconds. Swirling his thumb
through the droplets of precum, Luca flashed him a blinding smile. He swooped down to met Christopher's lips again, and turned his attention
south.