Chapter 16: Connection

I had to go to the conference with Sara that weekend, but I got back Monday, at three in the morning, I dropped my bags in my room, and went into Nick's room, he was sleeping peacefully in the bed, I stripped down to my boxers, leaving my clothes on the chair on my side of the bed, and I crawled in next to Nick.

"How was your trip?" Nick asked.

"Good, I learned lots, but I missed you," I said, then, for the first time since I met Nick, I got up the courage to lean in, and we kissed, I can't say that I kissed him, or that he kissed me, because we made the move at the exact same time.

The next week passed at just the speed of normal, me both dreading and looking forward to the next weekend, Catherine had managed to get us both the time off, as a repayment for us missing the weekend together because of the conference. I had two goals for the weekend, go flying with Nick, and hopefully have fun, and find a way to seduce Nick without scaring him off. At six the Friday morning, Nick woke me up, we had Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights off, he made sure I had a backpack large enough to hold two things, supplies for me, for the walk back, and a second bag for him to carry on the way back, full of his things. We left my cell at the house, and Nick put his on a setting that would only let Catherine or Tara call it, and get through. At the top of the mountain where we were leaving from, Nick set up the equipment, checking it again, while I was given an hour long private lesson from one of the instructors there. Once we were both strapped in, the instructor waved, and we took off, Nick was right, the feel of flying was exhilarating, and when we landed two hours later, far into the desert, I had a real hard on, so did Nick, "I can take care of that for you," he offered slyly, I had officially moved into his room that week, but we had yet to do anything more than kiss.

"How about we let all our firsts be about love, Not lust," I told him, he agreed, packing away the equipment, where we had landed, it would be a long way back, looking at the GPS, I saw we had gone several miles further than we had planned. The desert was still heating up for the day, but I knew we would be stopping a fair amount for breaks. We both had large camel packs full of water, that would hopefully last us until we got back to civilisation. The walk back took most of the day, but Nick had told me that most often the walk back was just as rewarding as the flight, both allowing time to think, the walk didn't have all the same sights as the air and it was an enjoyable walk. When we arrived back at the launch point, the classes that would be going on all weekend were just letting out. "Nick, will we be seeing you again tomorrow?" the main instructor asked.

"No, tomorrow we're taking Nilde to the Zoo," Nick said.

"Well, have fun," we were told.

We drove back to town, and we stopped at the grocery store to pick up something Nick said he needed for supper, he asked me to wait in the truck, and brought in a cloth bag, I knew he used one, but I still wondered what he was getting. I waited for him to come back, when he did, he put the bag, and something else in the back, he wouldn't let me see, "So what did you get?" I asked.

Nick made a romantic supper for us, Tara leaving us alone, when we were finished eating, I put out the candles, while Nick locked up, I was upstairs waiting for Nick, when he came up, the bed covers were folded out of the way enough but also in such a way that when they were needed, they could be reached and brought up with little fuss. Well, I wasn't quite done folding the blankets away, when Nick came in, he came up behind me, and wrapped his arms around my waist, I could feel he was aroused, and pushed my butt into him. Nick turned me to face him, and kissed me, we were soon on the bed stripping each other, my hands quickly drifted down to Nick, as soon as his pants were off, I trailed kisses down his body, and pulled his boxers off, I began to suck him gently, while I had never done it before, I knew what felt good, and was as gentle as I could be, Nick started to tense up, and I pulled off, to slide back up his body, Nick soon finished stripping me, while he was sucking on me, I felt a finger begin to tease my hole, "Nick, I want you in me," I moaned, pushing my butt into his hand, he removed his hand and pulled off my cock. I sat up halfway to see Nick pulling some lube out from a drawer under his bed. The night was full of bliss, we each made love to each other, and I slept holding Nick in my arms. The next day, we spent the morning at the Zoo with Cath and Lindsey, after lunch we went to an amusement park, Lindsey liked the big roller coasters, so I spent most of the time sitting on a bench with Nilde, or being dragged by Lindsey from one ride to the next. Nick finally convinced Lindsey that she wasn't to old to go on the Merry go round, something that he could take Nilde on, Nick passed the ride attendant the tickets, and they got on, Lindsey sat on a horse, holding Nilde in front of her, Nick leaned against the next horse, every time they would pass us, Nick would be smiling at me, Nilde was to, she seemed to enjoy the ride. Of course I discovered later what the trade off was for what turned into three rides on the merry go round, Nick and I had to go up on a version of the tower of terror, Catherine stood at the bottom holding Nilde, as I was dragged up to the ride entrance, Nick made sure I was strapped in before he was, and took my hand as we went up the tower. "You know how little height agrees with me, Nick, why did you agree to this?" I asked him quietly.

"Because it will help get rid of your fear of heights," Nick smiled.

Just as we reached the top, Nick kissed me, he pulled away, and the ride dropped, we were pulled up, and dropped several more times, when I stepped off the ride, I glared at Nick, took Nilde from Catherine, and walked away.

"I take it he didn't like it?" I heard Catherine ask, as they followed me.

"Warrick hated it, but I got him up there, which I'm surprised enough at, if he liked it, I would have had to have a heart attack," Nick joked.

I kept walking, I was seriously mad at Nick, I had thought his insistence that I get over my fear of heights was strictly to do with flying with him, but I had gone flying, and loved it, but that didn't seem to be enough. I practically ignored Nick for the rest of the afternoon, Catherine headed straight to the lab from the park, we were supposed to take Lindsey home, for three thirty, when her babysitter would be getting there. In the car on the way to Cath's place, the car was silent, as soon as we pulled away, I asked, "What is with you, and making sure I get over my disagreement with heights," Even to Nick I didn't like to say out loud that it was a fear.

"A disagreement, you call it everything but what it is Warrick, you have a fear of heights, why?" Nick asked straight out.

"Next time you want to know something, Nick, don't try to trick it out of me, I can't stand heights, period. What is your obsession with being high up? Being away from the ground as much as possible?"

"I can make things, even other people defy gravity, they'll float, as long as I can hold them, but I can't, not unless something is helping me, my family has a few strange rituals, since we're almost all strong, very few strong males, but the women are strong, we have to use whatever talent we have, to prove our partner's trust in us, and if our partner has an ability, we have to prove our trust in them, I trust you, and you've told me you trust me, but the talent that they'll want me to use to show your trust in me, will be levitation, made even more appealing to my father by the fact you're scared of heights, he'll have me hold you off the side of a building or something, nothing I can't do, but he'll still want me to do it, the more scared you are, and he'll know, the higher he'll want me to hold you, with Tim, we were thirteen, when my father wanted to test our trust, I had to trust him with my most emotional moment, he's an empath, one that he didn't experience with me, my dad didn't even know about it, and he's one too, In the memory I had found, I was nine, Tim knew about it, it was right before we got together, but I'd only shared the bare facts with him, knowing that the second I brought up this memory, he'd know everything I felt in that moment, scared me, when he entered my mind, it was the first time he'd invaded my mind in any way, he whispered, 'don't be afraid, I won't hurt you,' that's not what I was afraid of, it wasn't hurt, it was hate. I was and still am afraid of Hate. I'm most afraid that you'll hate me forever if my father has me levitate you, because, I know you don't like being more that four feet off the ground without steady support under your feet."

"Is that why you've been doing all this?" I asked, not needing to specify.

"I thought, if you didn't hate me for dragging you up into high towers, flying, all that, you'd either not be afraid anymore, or you at least wouldn't hate me."

"Well, I don't hate you, I don't think I could, I'm in love with you, but no matter how hard you try, Nick, my fear is to deep rooted for you to dig it out with a few well meaning rides, and flying lessons."

"Will you tell me some day?" Nick asked.

"Some day, but not today, I've not got a lot of energy to relive the experience."

For some reason right after supper, Tara took Nilde, and went upstairs, Nick started to make dinner, it was five thirty, I was watching TV, when Nick called me to the table, I stood up, remote in hand, I was just watching the end of a news piece, when Nick wrapped his arms around me, I pushed back against him, making full body contact. Nick didn't bother cleaning up the kitchen beyond putting the food away, we soon went up the stairs, another early night? You're thinking, well, Nick was extremely horny, as was I, our night together had released something in us that I don't think either of us expected. We made love several times, in fact, I received Nick eagerly four times that night. The next day, we were nearly inseparable, and I made love to Nick twice, he made love to me four more times, (yes I'm making them increadibly horny, but you'll see why soon enough). Nick's natural talent for getting me going, and mine for wanting him to get going was what kept us going at it all day. Monday afternoon, we left the house for work, I wanted Nick more than ever, as the end of the night came closer, at the scene, I could hardly get him off my mind, "Something wrong Warrick?" Catherine asked.

"Sorry, just thinking," I said, going back to my work.

"About what?" Catherine asked.

"Not work," I answered.

"Not work would be Nick, are you still mad at him about the ride on Saturday?"

"No, I didn't like it, but, it's no big deal, it was just a ride, Nick apologised for pushing the issue, and explained why.

I was working in the lab later that night and Nick came in, Catherine knew about us, there was no way she couldn't as we hadn't been hiding it around her, we weren't overt about it but we didn't hide it either. For some reason Nick broke our unspoken rule, and wrapped his arms around me, "What is it?" I asked.

"I want to see if I can get you pregnant, when we get home," Nick said.

"Where did that idea come from?" I asked.

"I was at the station, just finished interviewing a suspect, a guy was brought in, he looked at me, and said, 'A Phoenix, a phoenix with a mate, mating phoenixes, the others must know.' it made me think,"

"And now you want another baby?"

"Now's the perfect time, Nilde is six months old, nine months from now, she'll be over a year, perfect timing."

"To bad I'm a guy, huh?" I mentioned.

"That doesn't matter, Warrick, do you get extra horny right before you normally get sick?" I asked.

"Yeah, so?" I asked.

"Catherine and I were talking, not to long back, remember that friend of mine, with the same occurrence as you?" he asked trying to keep the topic of our conversation slightly private as a tech came into the room.

"Yeah, what about him?" I asked.

"His father's family has carried that problem the same way, he's traced his family back, it's genetic, and he's traced his family back to a generation where both parents were well..." Nick trailed off, realizing the tech was listening in.

"So now you think I can?"

"It's your family history too, he showed me a family tree, the first daughter married David Warrick Brown, your great-great-grandfather."