Strong Signal (Cyberlove #1) (5 page)

Oh God. Why was I signing things with “love.” I had no idea how to interact with people anymore, so I defaulted to awkwardness. I did some more laundry, and glanced at my phone constantly until he replied. There was something about this entire conversation that was…heartening. A former hater, or wannabe hater as it was turning out, having true respect for my stream made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

Argh! Again with the “G.”

I typed out a quick reply, smirking to myself as I did. Time to change the trajectory of this conversation.

Geez. I’d planned to flirt, but looking at it was kind of alarming. I was getting coy with a soldier overseas. He was probably off risking his life every day and I was hitting on him. I should be arrested. Or prevented from speaking to people. I wondered if I’d spoiled our friendly back-and-forth. Maybe he’d tell all his soldier friends about the fag who’d hit on him. Ooooh, maybe he’d tell them in the communal showers. While wet and soapy.

I hit send before I deleted the whole thing. No backing out now. Either he’d run for the hills or write me back. I was sure it’d be the former.

With the communal shower fantasy playing out in my mind, I made some oatmeal and returned to my desk with the bowl. While catching up with celebrity gossip (my vice), I received a new message from G.

Holy shit.

There was a picture attached. One. And I nearly spilled my oatmeal all over my lap, because Jesus fucking Christ on a cracker, the guy was smoking hot. The picture was clearly a candid shot. He sat sprawled on a cot, wearing nothing but camo pants—the light beige ones—boots and dog tags. My mouth went dry, and I set my bowl down before I dropped it, leaning forward to get a better look. He had aviator sunglasses on so I couldn’t see his eyes, but he had thick, messy brown hair shot through with sun-bleached gold.

And muscles. Like, lots of muscles.

I whimpered. If this was a joke, and he’d sent me a fake pic, swear to God, I’d fly to wherever the fuck he was and smother him with a pillow. It wasn’t nice to tease a guy who hadn’t been laid in two years.

This time he signed his name—
Garrett.

Even his name was hot.

I rubbed my sweaty palms up and down my thighs. He could have been trolling me. This could be some random picture he’d found online. But there was something so authentic coming through. God, was I crazy? Was I losing my touch? I was always so cautious about who I trusted.

I regarded the picture for another moment and pressed reply.

My finger paused above the send button, then I said screw it and hit it. Immediately after, I pushed away from my desk with the intentions of working out. I needed to burn off this energy and not sit around waiting for his reply. I wasn’t desperate, even if my first thought after seeing that picture was how fast I’d climb in his lap or get on my knees for all that camo and muscle.

Garrett

This had definitely not been part of my plan. My email to Kai was supposed to have been nothing more than a heads up, but it had turned into more and I’d fired off the in-game message before I could come to my senses.

Stupid. So stupid. And yet I’d followed it up by writing a bunch of heartfelt crap. The worst part was, I wouldn’t have even answered my own email. It was ridiculous and amounted to not more than “I was creeping on you and got creeped out to see that other people are doing the same!” No. But I’d fired that off too.

Now, it was on. We had back-and-forth exchanges going. He was flirting with me, which was a little weird, but I had a feeling this kid was used to playing “scare the hetero.” As if. I played that game in real time on the base whenever I held on a little too long after a straight dude finished getting me off. Even so, I took a little while to respond to his message.

How could I prove the picture was of me? And why did I want to prove it? I’d meant to warn him, not convince him I was attractive. Even so, there was no way to back down once my word was on the line. Proof was needed to defend my honor.

With the corner of my lower lip stuck between my teeth, I flipped through the saved pictures on my laptop. The only one with “proof” had me holding my dog tag in front of my left eye. Kai was adorable, but adorable didn’t open doors leading to my social security number, so that was a big no. The only option was to take a picture of myself with the camera on my laptop.

Feeling like an idiot, I set the camera up, scrawled out a little sign that said “proof of Garrettness” and held it beside my unimpressed face. It wasn’t the best picture given my slightly overgrown beard and irritated expression, but shaving frequently required a better razor than I had.

I started to send the picture but paused and took another. This one with a sign that read “the guy who will kick Samwise’s ass one day.” In that one, I smirked at him.

Attaching both images to the reply email, I typed:

This time, it took longer for him to reply.

What if he thought I looked like some military psycho? Or worse—a hipster, thanks to this beard? What if he didn’t find me attractive? Who knew what his type was? He was so damn gorgeous he could probably have anyone he wanted. He probably
had
anyone he wanted, if he was as well-known as he claimed. He was probably a local gay celebrity.

Fuck. I was obsessing again. Why did I even care about that? This shit was getting ridiculous.

Two strong taps at my door ripped me out of my random bout of insecurity, and I pushed away from my desk. Simultaneously thankful for the distraction and annoyed by the unexpected visitor, I pushed open the door. Costigan stood there like a wet dream—drenched in sweat from either working out or a game of basketball, with his shorts dipping down so low the V of his torso was put on display. Every day I wondered if this guy was only temporarily into dick, because straight guys didn’t usually try to put on a show for me.

“What’s good, Reid?”

“Not much.” I looked behind him. “Anything up?”

“Nah.” Costigan raised his arm in a stretch and arched his back. Without his Aviators on, I could see his eyes wandering my body. “You busy?”

“Kind of.”

Costigan stepped into my tent. “I was playing ball with Ramirez and he asked me about you.”

“Yeah?” Potentially not good. Ramirez had been my tour-homo during my first deployment, and we hadn’t rekindled that experience this time around. “Should I care?”

“You might.” Costigan got all up in my space. A smirk curled the corner of his mouth. “Apparently the asshole followed us one night and caught an eyeful. He came right out and asked if you was letting me hit it. Told me you were real quick to swap dicks once you had a white boy interested in your ass.”

I blanched. “What the fuck? That’s bullshit. He hasn’t spoken two words to me since we got here. I figured he was straight and embarrassed about what had gone down, and I’m not desperate enough to press the issue.”

“I feel you. Was just repeating his words, man.” Costigan didn’t step back even though his sweaty chest was practically grazing mine. “So, you ain’t straight, huh?”

Oh great.

“Would that really be a problem for you considering how many times you’ve had your hand on my cock?”

“Nope. I’m just wondering why Ramirez got to turn you out and I only get to jerk you off.”

Oh, for fuck’s sake. He probably thought his leering and talking about nailing me was going to be some big turn-on, but my irritation couldn’t have burned any hotter. Why the hell were they sitting around talking about me like I was going to be their base-bitch? Next thing I knew they’d be planning to come in here overnight and take turns banging me. No thanks. They could save the soldier porn for the Internet.

I started to say just that, but then…I wondered if I really wanted to blow my shot to get laid for real. With the majority of my deployment left in this shithole, desperate times may call for desperate measures.

The ding of a new email jerked me out of the brief foray into seriously considering bending over for Costigan.

“I prefer to top,” I said flatly. “But Ramirez was too skittish to let me fuck him. I’m assuming you’re the same.”

“Yeah because that’s gay as hell.”

“Right.” I shouldered past him and held the door open. “My sister’s about to call me on Skype. Dismiss yourself from my space.”

Costigan snorted. “Yeah, yeah. You’ll come around.”

“Unlikely.”

I closed the door behind him and tried not to be pissed off, but I was. What was it with straight guys always thinking they were irresistible to gays? Costigan’s dudebro bullshit wouldn’t be charming even if he was a gold star homo on or off the base. The streak of defensive anger swelled inside me as I thought about the potential bullshit I’d just gotten myself into with that conversation and subsequent blow-off. Coming out and then lashing out was like a double whammy of bad idea. Hopefully he kept his mouth shut.

“Fuck.”

The chair squeaked against the floor when I plopped down. I clicked on Kai’s email with one tap of my finger.

We’d already ruled out catfishing and now he thought I was pretending to be queer? Who would even bother?

My fingers flew over the keyboard, clacking loudly, as I speed-typed a rant.

I sent the email, winced, and immediately sent another.

He probably thought I was a freak. Hell, I knew I was acting like a freak. If Kai had been in my face, or even on the phone, there was no way I would have unloaded and said all those things. But things were different via email. The words just came out.

I just hoped I’d typed the right ones.

Kai

Well, shit. Now I cared.

I fucking cared.

Garrett’s emails were too full of emotion, and too raw, to be faked. Sure, I’d been skeptical, but what straight guy talked like that to a gay guy who was hitting on him?
None.
And he was hot as hell. He was bearded. And smirked with full lips I wanted to bite between my teeth until he moaned.

Picturing Garrett pissed off and alone, sitting on a lumpy cot in Bumfuck Iraq or wherever. Where did the government even send these guys anymore? I had no idea. All I knew was from watching the uninformative American news and that movie with Jeremy Renner. Whatever the case was, Garrett was upset and, after all of the nice things he’d said, I sort of…wanted him to not be upset.

The little green circle next to his name on Gmail was lit. He was online. I could send him a message in Gchat. My stomach flopped.

Real-time messaging was…something I couldn’t control. One of the reasons online was home to me—and the world outside my apartment wasn’t—was because I could control my interactions online. I could determine what everyone saw of me.

But Garrett’s words tugged at my heart. What if I was the only person he had to talk to? It was a slightly egotistical thought, but if he had a ton of other people lining up to hear him out, he wouldn’t be spilling to me in an email, would he?

And no one besides Shawn had ever confided in me. Even before I’d withdrawn from the world, no one had ever talked to me about anything besides gaming or dancing.

I stared at the picture of his scowl, then of his smirk. He was fuckable in both. Dammit.

I opened up Gchat. What the hell did I say? I didn’t even know this guy.

Shit, I was sweating. This was ridiculous. But I was determined to be there for him. There was a connection now, a tentative one, but strong enough to keep my fingers on the keyboard and my focus on the man half a world away.

No going back now.

I stared at the green dot next to his name. Part of me wanted it to turn gray but the other part of me—the larger part—wanted him to reply.