He snuggled in his jacket. “Are you going to be warm enough? Temperature’s dropped out there.”
“I’m good, thanks.” Although three minutes later, he shivered on his way to Jimothy’s car.
“Hang on, tough guy.” Jimothy turned and ran into the house. He came back a couple minutes later with a warm jacket, size X-large.
“It was my dad, Jim’s. He was a big guy too.” He held the jacket for Rick to put on. “It looks good on you.” Jimothy smiled shyly for a second. “It’s actually a short walk to the shop from here, but I want to take the car, so we don’t have to stay downtown for dinner.” He marched to the driver’s side and got in, leaving Rick to climb in the passenger side. The minute his butt hit the cushy seat, the reason for the drive came back to him and massive butterflies attacked again.
As if he’d heard Rick, Jimothy asked, “Have you thought about a style you’d like for your hair?” He maneuvered the car through the narrow streets of north Laguna and started down the hill. He hadn’t been kidding about it being close.
Rick swallowed but couldn’t gather enough spit to answer, so he just shook his head.
Jimothy glanced over. “What about having your hair cut do you hate so much?”
Hell, that was a direct question. Rick had always told himself he didn’t like being messed with, but if he was honest, Jimothy could pretty much mess with him any way he wanted. He also said he didn’t want to spend the money, but in the last twelve hours, he’d proved that was a big fat lie. So why does the haircut still give me willies?
“I don’t know exactly.”
“Is it camouflage?”
Also a direct question. Rick shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Okay, we’re going to take this slowly.” He dragged the word out, and even as tense as he was, Rick laughed. Jimothy said, “We’ll look at pictures, and I’ll trim a little at a time.”
“The trouble is, Alice won’t really be happy if I do too little. She’ll say she is but not really. I gotta do it.” He actually shuddered.
“Let’s not rush into things.” Jimothy parked behind the salon and hopped out of the car. Rick was slower, but finally, he stepped up beside Jimothy, and they walked around to the door of the darkened salon. Jimothy used his key and switched on the lights. “Go back to my workstation while I grab some magazines.”
Dragging his feet, Rick proceeded to the chair he’d sat in ever so briefly that day he’d come to see Jimothy the first time. It felt like a year ago, though it had only been a few days.
Jimothy came gliding up behind him and plopped several magazines on Rick’s lap and then leaned over the back of the chair. “I turned down some pages. Check them out.”
Jimothy’s warm breath tickled Rick’s ear, and he was practically leaning on Rick’s shoulder.
Squirming a little in the chair, Rick turned to the first dogeared page. It showed a guy with longish hair and a well-trimmed beard that was way more than scruff, but much less than the mighty bush Rick currently sported. It wasn’t bad, but—“I doubt this would really make Alice happy.”
“It’s perfectly acceptable, Rick. Lots of full-on corporate guys have this kind of hair and beard.”
The next picture also had long hair, but a fuller beard. “How’s this different?”
“The hair’s layered so if you want to sweep it back off your face and keep it out of your beard, you can. It’s a way to keep your beard fuller if you choose to.”
Rick wiggled again to escape the sweet breath in his ear. Or rather to escape the effect it was having. He shook his head. “No.” The third picture showed hair kind of brushed up and a scruff on the face.
Jimothy said, “This hair’s only about 4 inches long, but it still looks kind of mussed and casual. You could keep the beard a bit longer.”
The beard wasn’t the only thing getting longer on Rick. He turned the magazine page, but most of his brain had switched position to his crotch. The sound of Jimothy’s musical voice vibrated down the chair back right into Rick’s butt and beyond. Images of pulling Jimothy onto his lap and cranking that chair up and down played like porn on the screen of his befuddled mind.
Jimothy seemed to lean even closer. “Any thoughts?”
Oh man, that question was so not fair. “Do whatever you want.”
Chapter Nine
Jimothy grabbed a plastic cape and whirled it around Rick’s shoulders. This was partly to keep him dry as Jimothy washed his hair and partly to cover the nine-inch iron bar that seemed to have sprung up in Rick’s jeans. Wow. Just wow. Where did that beauty come from? And can I get one for belated Christmas? He snorted at his own joke, and Rick blinked.
“Let’s get your hair washed. Back here.” Jimothy led the way to the long row of wash basins set in a separate room in the back. Seating Rick at the first basin, Jimothy adjusted the heat of the water, and then said, “Just relax. This is the fun part.”
Rick leaned back over the bowl, but he was stiff as a board. No, he was stiff as the erection in his pants. Jimothy wanted to giggle and bit his tongue to keep from doing it. He sluiced the warm water over Rick’s thick, slightly wavy, dark-brown hair and then applied some shampoo. Running the soapy strands through his fingers, he worked up suds, but that didn’t appear to be the only thing worked up.
Rick’s eyes weren’t just closed, they were glued shut; his body jittered and jerked, an occasional funny sound came out of his throat, and the considerable lump in his jeans was big enough to show through the voluminous plastic cape.
What exactly is going on? Does this have anything to do with me? Wishful thinking for sure, but why would Rick have contracted a mighty erection while picking out a hairstyle? And was hair washing so erotic he couldn’t contain himself? Maybe the guy has a hair fetish? Is that why he never cuts his hair or his beard?
Jimothy ran the water under the heavy mass of wet hair and then turned off the tap. Before he could get a towel on Rick’s head, he’d sat up like Frankenstein’s monster. “All done?”
“Whoa. Let me towel dry your hair.” Jimothy applied the terrycloth and mushed it around on Rick’s head, but Rick clearly wanted up, so Jimothy said, “Okay. Go back to the workstation.”
Without even removing the towel from his head, Rick was off in a flash. Jimothy frowned as he wiped off the splatters of water on the sink. If Rick Ronconi is gone when I get out there, I’m going to sic my cats on him in an army.
But no. When Jimothy walked out, Rick was sitting there—taking deep breaths.
Just calm down. Come on. You’re a grown man. You don’t have to make a fool of yourself. Rick took another deep breath. The problem was being in such an unfamiliar situation. He didn’t really get touched a lot unless he was fucking. All the nudging and hair primping, the massaging and rubbing just made him think of sex. On top of that, he had a femme kink. But in his blue-collar life, he was almost never around really effeminate guys—except when he watched porn. Again, it all led back to sex.
In through the nose and out through the nose.
If he didn’t get himself together, he was going to offend Jimothy, and he didn’t want to do that. A. It was stupid. Jimothy was one of the few people who could help Rick get his life together before the wedding. And big fat B, he liked Jimothy. The dude was way out of Rick’s league, but for some reason, he didn’t seem to mind hanging out with Rick, and damned if Rick wanted to screw that up.