I swirled my tongue along the underside of his shaft and he grunted, so vocal. Every reaction was my reward. I skimmed my hands along his hips, then up and under his shirt, searching out his nipples. I circled each soft nub before gently pinching.
“Oh fuck!” Jack cried. He took rapid breaths and his cock surged in my mouth, so I did it again and again until he flexed underneath me. “Gonna come.”
I sucked harder, and he swelled and spurted into my mouth. I swallowed every drop, humming gratefully as I did.
I let him slip from my mouth, and he was the picture of satiation. His arms now hung limply at his sides, his face serene, and his gorgeous cock, glistening under the light, lay across to his hip. He chuckled lazily. “Wow.”
I sat back on my haunches, proud that I’d rendered him undone.
He lifted his hand and beckoned me closer with his finger. So I put my hands on his knees and leaned in to kiss him, but he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me onto the couch with him. He lay us both down, somehow, like I weighed nothing, and he sighed contentedly. Then he kissed me, soft and lingering, before he pulled me in for a sleepy hug. Okay, so Jack was the cuddling kind. I smiled against his neck.
“Stay the night,” he murmured.
I repressed a sigh. I didn’t want to ruin this peaceful mood. But I also wouldn’t lie. “I can’t.”
Jack took a deep, disappointed breath. “When will you say yes?”
“When it’s right.”
I felt his confusion in his embrace. “Is this not right?”
“This is very right.”
“I’m confused.”
I chuckled. “I can’t stay tonight.”
He pulled back, and the look on his face was indeed confused and, if I were being honest, hurt. “It’s okay if you don’t want to.”
I put my hand to his cheek and kissed him. “I have another early start tomorrow.”
“Oh, that reminds me. I have a meeting tomorrow. I can’t come with you.”
I pouted. “That’s a shame. I enjoyed having you around today.”
He brightened a little. “But don’t forget dinner tomorrow. You’ll need to be here early, if that’s okay? I think the chef extraordinaire is getting here around six, so you might want to get here around six thirty.”
“Should I bring anything?”
He shook his head and smiled. “No. But can I make one request?”
“Of course.”
“Wear a bow tie.”
“Is it a formal dinner?”
“No! Not at all. Very informal, in fact.” He bit his bottom lip and adjusted my bow tie, which, with us lying down, wasn’t easy. “I just find them really hot.”
I chuckled at him. “Then I shall wear my finest.”
He gave me his most genuine, eye-crinkling smile. But he never said anything. He just stared into my eyes and I couldn’t look away. The intensity of his gaze, the fire burning behind them, made my heart gallop.
“I should go,” I whispered, though my tone held no conviction. If he’d asked me to stay right then, I would have said yes. And I was sure he knew it too. He held the power to make me stay or leave, but he knew my wishes, so instead of getting what he wanted, he didn’t push.
“Okay.” He kissed me softly again. “Text me when you get back to your room. Or in the morning. Or both.”
Reluctantly, with a willpower I didn’t feel, I got up and fixed my clothes. I gave Rosemary a pat goodbye, and Jack stood on the porch to see me off.
“Oh, wait!” he said, dashing off the porch steps and running into the dark at the corner of his house. He came back a moment later with his hand behind his back and a goofy grin. He stood in front of me and presented me with a sprig of rosemary. “It’s not a date without a flower. Though it’s not really a flower, but it’s symbolic of me and my dog, so it’s kind of appropriate.”
I took the rosemary, put it to my nose, and inhaled the earthy scent. “It’s perfect.”
“The date? Or the rosemary?”
I leaned up and kissed his cheek. “Both.”
I drove away watching the man and his dog on the front porch, knowing that something had changed. Something irreversible. Something amazing. Something I wasn’t sure I would ever get to have given we lived states apart, but out here in the woodlands of north-east Tasmania, I’d found something unexpected, something completely wonderful.
*
I found nothing in the woodlands I scoured the next morning. I found chrysalises of Zizina labradus and Pieris rapae as I had found in the other areas I’d searched when Jack was with me, but nothing on the Eltham Copper.
I ate just an apple for lunch, washed down with two bottles of water, and searched again until four, walking my usual grid, taking notes on observations, checking undersides of fallen bark and large rocks a thousand times. I’d done countless field searches, so I knew patience was key, though it was hard not to be disillusioned. And frustrated. I was running out of days on this trip. Maybe I should ask Jack to re-evaluate the mapped areas.
Mmm… Jack.
My mind kept wandering back to him, making it difficult to focus on my data. Knowing I was running out of days here and running out of days to spend with him exasperated my frustrations.
It was foolish, I told myself. I’d known him for a matter of days, and what we had together was no more than a holiday fling. Not that it was really a holiday; though I technically was on annual leave from my employer, I was still working.
I came to Tasmania in hopes of finding evidence, or proof at least, of a species of butterfly not yet documented. Instead, I’d found myself the kind of man I’d only dared dream of. Of course he had to live in a different state than me; it couldn’t be that easy. I had no clue if he wanted to keep in touch when I went back to Melbourne or how we could even make it work. He said his last potential boyfriend didn’t want long-distance, but he wasn’t opposed to it. But just how did one factor in scheduled weekends, airports, and hired cars into a relationship?
God. Would he even want that with me? Just how far ahead had I let my heart wander unsupervised?
Like I said. It was foolish.
It was a lot of fun and incredible while it lasted, but foolish nonetheless.
I sighed as I loaded my storage tubs back into the Defender. I thought of Professor Tillman and how many decades he’d searched these areas and wondered if I was wasting my time. Had he simply handed the baton over for me to give decades of my life just like he had done? Was this now to become my life’s work?
I allowed myself to wallow in my disillusionment on the drive back into Scottsdale. It was a pretty little town, and I could see why Jack loved it. Everyone knew him by his first name, said hello in the street. He could walk into any shop in the main street and have a chat with whomever was working. It was a world away from Melbourne. Not just the community feel, either. The cogs turned slower here, and that wasn’t a bad thing.
It wasn’t a bad thing at all.