Chapter 01: John
Why had he left the photograph there, standing right there in a leather frame on the dresser top? More important, why was the photograph here at all? I had gone into his room to put his things together so they could take them down to Hayden along with the body, and there it was.
To some extent the whole success of the Wolf Creek Ranch had hinged on J. Harvey Kincaid's patronage and good will. He had been coming to Wolf Creek for as long as I could remember. And where J. Harvey Kincaid went, everyone else of note followed. He was the pied piper of world literature, an icon of unique proportions.
Back almost in pioneer days, my grandmother had taken a large acreage of homesteaded land in a remote Rocky Mountain valley dipping down into northern Colorado from dusty Wyoming that few others could find let alone want. And she turned it into a dude ranch for celebrities—writers, movie stars, and politicians mostly—who either wanted to retreat from the pursuing world for a short time or wanted to hunt animals and bag them in privacy.
J. Harvey Kincaid had been one of the latter. He was already a writer of legendary status when he started coming to the ranch in search of the majestic elk in the high, snowy regions of the Rockies bordering on the Medicine Bow National Forrest. He said he identified with the elk, and indeed he had every reason to do so. He wrote celebrated men's novels of male bonding in challenging and dangerous circumstances, themes, and situations that bring out the grit and nobility of strong and bold men. His writing brought him fame and international awards. And his books invariably inspired noble and strong and bold movies that won international awards on their own merits despite the fact that they missed casting the ideal protagonist—J. Harvey Kincaid himself. He was the epitome of the rugged, handsome, square-jawed, determined man battling the elements, whatever they were—and winning and possessing what and how he pleased.
He had come to our ranch three or four times a year from the time I was a child, and my father took him up into the upper slopes of the Rockies, no matter the weather, and they stayed out there for three or four days at a time or for as long as it took to bring back an elk. I always held him in awe; everyone did. He had a rich, deep, expressive voice befitting his stature, both physical and intellectual, and he could tell a story as overpoweringly as he could write one. For years I would sit under the dining room table as he dominated and enriched the dinner conversation no matter what other celebrities were in residence.
As I said, my father was always the one to take him into the mountains. That is, until he died unexpectedly. I was off at college when my dad died. We had had our problems and had left much unsaid, but I loved him deeply. When he died, I had to leave college and come back to the ranch and do my share in filling the gigantic hole in maintaining a demanding business that his death had created. And there was so much to do that I didn't have time to grieve for my loss.
J. Harvey Kincaid stepped in to fill a great void. The first summer after my father's death he came to the ranch three times rather than his usual single time during a season. And he made sure that the regular celebrities came as well—and that new ones started to come. He saved our business for us.
On the third visit he spoke at dinner of missing his trips up into the mountains in search of the mighty elk. I, of course, offered to take him hunting as my father had done for nearly two decades. We owed him everything.
I had little idea how to track elk—that had been my father's specialty—but J. Harvey Kincaid was a patient man, a very patient man. We rode across the isolated ridges for days, searching near the tree lines, where Kincaid said my father often took him. By the third day our horses were worn out, and Kincaid suggested that we just lay by in a stand of cottonwood trees next to a fast-running stream in a sheltering ravine he remembered from previous trips.
We ate that night over an open fire, leaning against the saddles we had slung on the ground between the bank of the stream and the line of cottonwoods. J. Harvey Kincaid was his charming best, weaving stores of male bonding and the raw challenge of man against nature in that rich baritone voice of his, in words that were strong and raw but also mesmerizing in their poetry.
The air was crisp and slightly chilly, and Kincaid called me over to sit beside him as he leaned against his saddle so that we could share the blanket. He said we would be so much more comfortable making maximum use of our shared body heat. And I believed him. I had always believed him.
We sat there, against each other, as J. Harvey Kincaid continued weaving the magic of his stories. He asked me questions about what I thought of male bonding, of how close one man could be to another, how much support they could give each other in struggling against the elements. And he helped me provide the answers. He asked me about my connections with my father, and I started to cry, the grieving gripping me now, at last. He kissed my tears away. And he kissed my cheeks. And he kissed my lips. He told me not to cry, in that mesmerizing poetic baritone voice of his. He told me he loved me, and no one had told me that before, not even my father.
He asked me if I trusted him and if I loved him too. And then, at that moment, I surely did. He was a connection to my father. He was the savior of our ranch. He cared for me and comforted me. He unbuttoned my shirt and comforted the hollow of my neck with his lips, and then he comforted my nipples and my belly with his hands and his tongue.
He was unbuckling my jeans and slowly unbuttoning my fly, all the time telling me that he loved me and wanted to take care of me. And asking me if I loved him and trusted him. And I did and I told him so. And he told me again of the joys and comfort of male bonding and said he wanted to bond with me. And he asked if I loved him enough to bond with him. And I did. I yearned for male bonding. And I told him so.
He told me it would hurt at first but that it would become glorious and that it would be a connection unlike any other. That it would wash my grief away. He told me that a man fought through the pain for what was important, and asked if I was ready to give myself to him. To trust him to take care of me. He was handling me, stroking me through the open fly of my jeans, and it was a new, pleasant sensation.
He asked me again if we could bond, out here in the crisp mountain air, in the beauty of nature in front of a crackling fire. And I said, "Yes, oh yes."
And I'm sure I meant it.
He was kissing my penis now and urging me to follow his lead. He had his member freed from his jeans and it was thick and long and hard. I tried to do as he was doing—but I gagged and he didn't. He tasted salty and his tool was hot and hard and throbbing and was pushing at me. Between my lips, the unsheathed tip pushing against my inner cheeks and depressing my tongue, pushing deeper inside. I gagged again, but then got the knack of handling him.
He was murmuring at me, giving me encouragement and guidance. Telling me how beautiful my body and my penis were, asking me how his attentions felt. And when I told him I was embarrassed at how I was filling out but that I was feeling pleasures I never had felt before, he told me that I was doing the same for him. That we were bonding beautifully, that I was pleasing him very much—but that we could bond even closer.
