28. STORM

“Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”

“Both,” he says, pulling a small black pistol from his jeans. There’s a heavy plastic bag with the words Cabella’s Sporting Goods on the side in his other hand.

“Okay,” I say, nodding. “Have to admit, I didn’t see that one coming.”

Nick asked me to meet him at the southern edge of the gardens after he got back from town, said he’d tell me what it was about when we got here. The box of ammunition he removes from the plastic bag answers the question for him.

“It’s a natural extension of your self-defense training,” he says as he thumbs shells into the pistol’s magazine.

“If you say so. I’ve never even held a gun before.”

“This is a good beginner pistol,” he says. “Ruger LC9, seven-round single stack clip, one in the pipe, chambered in nine-millimeter Luger.”

I shake my head. “Remember when I was telling you about finger positions and major scales?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s what you’re doing to me right now.”

He smiles. “Sorry. It’s accurate and has less recoil, so it’s a good gun for a beginner to learn with. Better?”

“Better.”

Ever since that day with the dogs, Nick has seemed a little off. I find myself having to repeat things I’ve said because he wasn’t paying attention. Now this. He’s still the same guy, but just… I guess distracted is the best word.

But I don’t want to bring it up. I mean, what do I know about how guys act when they start living with a woman? All this is new to me.

He slides the magazine into the handle and then pulls back on the barrel. It clicks as it springs back into place.

“Think of the weapon as an extension of yourself,” he says, handing it to me handle-first. “It’s just like your hand, or your knee, or your brain. Just another tool in your self-defense toolbox.”

The gun is surprisingly light as I close my hand around it. The matte black finish gives it a dangerous, utilitarian look, and suddenly I’m eager to try it out.

“What am I shooting at?” I ask.

Nick points me towards a dying oak about thirty yards away. Then he reaches into the Cabella’s bag and pulls out a rolled-up sheet. He unfurls it, revealing the outline drawing of a man aiming a gun back at me.

“Just get used to it in your hands,” he says as he walks to the tree and tacks the target to it. “Don’t worry, the safety is on.”

I fiddle with the pistol, feeling the weight of it, sliding my finger over the trigger. It should feel alien – I’ve never even been around a gun before now, let alone fired one – and yet it doesn’t.

It feels good.

Nick positions himself behind me and turns me to face the target.

“Okay,” he says. “Let’s start with the stance. Feet shoulder-width apart, arms at shoulder height. Now take your left hand and wrap it around the other on a forty-five-degree angle.”

He positions my hands on the gun so that both my thumbs are on the left side of the handle, pointing forward.

I frown. “That doesn’t look like how Jason Bourne holds it.”

Nick takes a breath to speak, and I realize what I just said.

“He’s a character in an action movie,” I say, cutting him off.

“Movies aren’t real.”

“Well, duh. I’m just saying this is different.”

“Who do you trust more, this Bourne guy or me?”

He’s got me there. I stretch my fingers a bit but keep them in the same position, already feeling the weight in my shoulders. Nick points out the safety switch on the left side of the barrel, and I flip it with my thumb, ready to shoot.

“Okay, the LC9 has a long trigger,” he says in my ear. “So make sure you squeeze. Don’t pull; it’ll throw off your aim.”

“Got it.”

He slides a pair of what look like earmuffs from the Cabella’s bag over my ears, then another over his own. He follows that with a pair of plastic safety glasses for each of us. Finally he puts a hand on my hip and gives me a pat.

I hear a muffled “Let’s do it,” and I aim for the target’s head. Arkady’s face stares back at me. I squeeze the trigger like Nick told me to.

There’s a loud explosion and suddenly my hands are sailing back towards my face. The gun almost hits me square between the eyes before I catch myself.

“Shit!” Nick shouts. “Sorry, I forgot to tell you: you have to push forward a bit with your gun hand and pull back a bit with your left. It helps stabilize the weapon.”

“You’re lucky you’re rich and good-looking,” I gripe as I set myself back into the shooter’s stance. I do as he says with my hands and squeeze the trigger again.

This time the recoil is much less, like a slight jolt to my shoulder, and the gun stays relatively stable in my hands. In the distance, I see a bundle of splinters fly off the dying oak, about ten inches above the target.

Nick pulls my right earmuff aside. “That’s great for a first shot,” he says. “But aim more for the body mass. If you try for the head, you’re almost guaranteed to miss unless you’ve had a lot of training. Even then, police are trained to aim for the torso because the whole idea behind combat shooting is to stop your opponent.”

“Torso,” I say, positioning myself again. “Got it.”

He replaces my ear muff and I picture Arkady’s beating heart in the center of the target. This time my squeeze is followed by a nice little hole in the black paper of the man’s chest.

“Finish him!” Nick yells from behind me.

Without another thought, I squeeze off six more times, each one more satisfying than the last. The seventh squeeze is just a click.

“Whoa,” Nick breathes as he pulls of his headgear and walks toward the tree.

“How did I do?”

He stares at the black paper for a moment, then turns back to me.

“I sure hope you weren’t picturing my face,” he calls. “You got seven in about a ten-inch grouping right in the sternum. That’s amazing.”

“I think you know who I was picturing,” I say with grim satisfaction.

Nick comes back to me and hands me another clip, showing me how to slide it in.

“Let’s keep going,” he says.

“Practice makes perfect,” I say as I squeeze the trigger again.

After a hundred or so rounds, the target is in tatters and there’s a pile of split bark all around the base of the oak’s trunk. Nick is still behind me, encouraging me in my ear.

“One shot left,” I say.

“Let’s make it count,” he says. “You’re doing great, but you should try to modify your feet a bit.”

He slides his leg between mine and pushes outwards, widening my stance.

And sparking a familiar sensation down there.

“Now,” he says, reaching around to close his own hands around my grip on the weapon. “Align the top of your gun hand with your nose.”

As he presses against me, I feel the hot hardness of his erection pressing against my ass. I lean back so that he knows I’m feeling him.

My God, we’re both getting turned on by firing a gun. Is that sick? If it is, don’t call the doctor.

“Now!” he shouts in my ear.

I squeeze one final time, feeling the pull of the trigger, the recoil in my hands, the rock-hard cock pressing between my cheeks. This time, the slug strikes home in the shooter’s left eye.

“Wow,” says Nick.

“Beginner’s luck,” I say, pulling off my headgear.

“All I know is I never want to be on the receiving end of whatever you’re shooting.”

He turns to face me and I grab his belt, pulling him to me. I grind my crotch against his bulge and he gasps as I stick my tongue down his throat.

“All I know is I do want to be on the receiving end of whatever you’re shooting,” I whisper in his ear. “And I want it right now.”

He responds by yanking my shirt over my head and unzipping my shorts. My hands fumble with his belt and zipper and in a few seconds, we’re both naked.

“Did you…?” I pant as his mouth roams over my breasts.

He pulls a foil square out of his front pocket. “Ever since that first night,” he says.

Not thirty seconds later, he’s inside me, scratching the itch that’s been driving me mad since I squeezed off that first round. It hard and it’s fast and it’s dirty, and I don’t care if anyone is watching, even though I know there’s no one for miles.

* * *

“You really are a natural,” Nick says as he pulls on his T-shirt. “At a lot of things.”

“I have a good teacher.” I grin, shimmying my shorts up over my hips.

“Mmm,” Nick mutters. He’s looking at the low hills in the distance to the north of the estate.

“Everything okay?”

He looks startled for a moment. “Hm? Oh. Yeah, perfect.”

I wish I could figure out where his mind keeps going. But who am I to say? For all I know, he’s still stunned from the spectacular sex. I know I’m not having the easiest time thinking right now.

We collect the paraphernalia and amble back to the house. As we do, I swear I see Nick glancing over at the hills again.

Maybe it’s just my imagination.