Over the next few days Dale kept his distance from Michael, he was confused and wasn’t sure what he should do anymore. He loved Michael and wanted this to work but he wasn’t so sure that they should.
Michael had noticed the gap that grew between them once again but their sponsor meetings kept both of them booked and he couldn’t find an extra 5 minutes in which he could talk to him alone.
Before they knew it, it was time to go racing. Dale was in his car strapping in and trying to mentally get his head in the game. Michael jogged to the Bud car and knelt outside the window.
"Hey kid."
Dale’s eyes met those beautiful blues and he couldn’t help but smile. "Hey Mikey."
"Look, we don’t have a lot of time but I wanted to make sure you are ok. I have noticed you haven’t been around."
"Yeah about that."
Michael shushed him. "DW is taking the kids home with him and Stevie tonight. Come over? We can…um…talk?"
Dale looked at him, so much for getting his head in the game. "Yeah, sure, unless of course I win today and have to stay over for media duties." He said as the Earnhardt grin surfaced.
Michael matched his smile with one of his own. "Then I will meet you at your condo. Have a good race." With that Michael stood and jogged back to his car. He glanced ahead one last time at the red machine before climbing into his own car. He knew Dale had to be second guessing the whole idea after everything that had happened the past few days. He didn’t blame him but he did had every intention of changing that tonight.
Dale closed the visor to his helmet and tried to get Michael out of his mind as the order to start their engines came. Dale didn’t know what he was going to do tonight. Any time he was around Mikey his reserve melted away and he found himself giving in to his heart, no matter what kind of pain was to follow. "Damned if I do, damned if I don’t." He said out loud realizing the pain that would follow no matter what he chose.
"What was that Junebug?"
He heard Pops come across the radio. "Oh, nothing. Where is my pit?" Dale swerved the car back and forth warming his tires and forcing his mind on the task at hand. "Ok, let’s go win us a race."
Winning wasn’t going to be in the history books this year for either DEI car. On lap 200 Ryan Newman blew a tire, sending him hard into the wall and taking 3 other cars out with him. Unfortunately, Michael was one of those cars.
As Dale’s car drove slowly around the track following the pace car he watched as Michael climbed out of his mangled car. "Tony, Michael ok?"
"Yeah, a little pissed, the car probably won’t get back on the track but Slugger says he is fine."
"OK." Thank God, he thought to himself. Dale had a good day but not good enough, he ended up fourth after getting tangled up in a pit row incident.
He walked towards the copter pad. He had drove down to Daytona but wanted to get home and to Michael who had a couple hour head start on him. Stewart had offered him a ride home if he wanted one and decided he would have his car towed back to Mooresville with the team. Jade caught up to him before he climbed on board.
"Dale, here."
Dale took the envelope from him. "Thanks." He climbed into the back of the copter and opened the envelope after buckling in.
June,
Hoping you still are coming over, looking forward to being able to spend some time alone with you. Have a few errands to run real quick, I should be home by the time you get to town. Just in case, you know where the key is come on in and make yourself at home. I will see you in a few hours.
Mike
Dale smiled and tucked the note into his pocket. The flight back was fairly quick, Dale grabbed a taxi back to his place, deciding he needed to get cleaned up a bit before heading to Michael’s.
He took a quick shower, changed clothes, and grabbed a 6 pack before heading out the door. He drove the 30 minutes to Michael’s his mind racing with options of what he could do. He felt like a teenager heading out on a first date and noticed how sweaty his palms were as he pulled down the long driveway.
He noticed Michael’s car wasn’t there so he grabbed the spare key and let himself in. "Mike?" The house was quiet and dark, he put the beer in the refrigerator before turning on a couple of lights. He was headed back to the living room when he heard the front door.
"Hey, sorry, I had hoped to be back by now. You been waiting long?"
"No, just got here."
"Good, what’s with the Hummer in the drive?"
"Oh, flew back with Smoke so the truck is getting towed back with the hauler." He took one of the bags out of Michael’s hands.
Michael saw him peaking into the bag. "You are worse than a little kid. It’s dinner. I hope Chinese is ok, was in the mood for it."
"Yeah, it smells great." He set the bag on the counter and started unloading the little packages as Michael pulled down some plates.
"We really need those?"
"What we going to do the eat out of the containers on the floor?"
Dale just shrugged. "Why do dishes if we don’t have too?"
An hour later Dale and Michael sat full on the floor leaning against the couch with empty Chinese cartons in front of them. An Austin Powers movie played on the tv, neither of them wanting to have to think too much about anything and there was really only so much racing replays a person could take.
"So."
"Yeah," Michael replied.
"I am sorry I pushed myself away from you for the past week. I did what I asked you not to do. I didn’t mean too I just." He paused.
"What?"
"I don’t know." He looked at the tv not really paying attention to it, he just didn’t want to have to face Michael.
"Yes you do and so do I." Dale now looked at him. "I know I made you feel cheap that day. I didn’t mean to, I just wasn’t expecting anything to happen and."
"Mikey, don’t. I know you didn’t mean to. I shouldn’t have started anything, I hadn’t planned on it, I just I saw you in that towel and couldn’t stop myself." He grinned the image of Mikey wet from the shower entering his mind, "I knew you had to get to the girls." They sat in silence for a moment. "Mikey?"
"Yeah."
"What now?"
Michael took a deep breath. "Dale, I have feelings for you that I never thought I could have for anyone except my wife and it is a different kind of love; but I do love you and I don’t want to let you go. I honestly believe we can find a routine that would allow us to spend time together and still keep everyone clueless. We both knew it wouldn‘t be a traditional relationship."
"I know, but how is this going to work? Michael, this isn’t going to be easy."
Dale felt Michael’s hand on his chin. He pulled his head gently around so that they were looking eye to eye. "No it won’t but tell me it won’t be worth it." Michael’s thumb gently ran back and forth along Dale’s jaw. Dale stared, lost in his eyes for several seconds. "That’s what I thought." Michael’s lips captured Dale’s as they both laid back on the floor.
Dale pulled Michael’s body down on top of his own, relishing the familiar feel of how they meld together. Michael let his tongue slowly and teasingly run along Dale’s jaw, down his neck, and back up to his ear. He gently tugged the bottom of Dale’s ear with his teeth and heard him moan into his neck. Michael slowly made his way back to Dale’s waiting lips. Tonight had been a long time coming and neither of them felt any need to rush it, who knew when they would get another chance to be alone.
Dale’s hands ran down Michael’s back and pulled the polo up over his head. Michael pulled away from Dale’s mouth only long enough to let the polo come over his head and then to do the same to Dale. They rolled over giving Dale the upper hand and he took full advantage of it. He slowly covered Michael’s upper body with his kisses not leaving an inch of skin untouched. He paid special attention as he swirled his tongue around his now hard nipple.
Michael moaned and wrapped his fingers into Dale’s hair. "God June." He sighed as Dale moved lower to his naval then his waist. He nipped at the tight toned skin around his naval as his fingers quickly worked the button and zipper of the jeans that covered what Dale wanted most.
He let his mouth leave Michael’s body to pull the jeans from him. Dale grinned. "You aren’t one to normally go commando there buddy."
"Guess I was just being hopeful about tonight." Michael grinned that devilish grin of his own.
Dale quickly covered Michael’s body with his own and brought his mouth down to his out of need of passion and lust. Michael rolled them over and disrobed Dale quickly and quietly but before he could continue his own journey of Dale’s body, Dale flipped them over and picked up where he left off just moments before, only this time he started with his ankles and kissed all the way up to his hip then back down the other leg.
"Dale."
Dale grinned as he ran his tongue up Michael’s inner thigh. "What Mikey?"
"You do know you are going to pay for all this teasing later, right?"
"I usually do." He grinned before lowering his mouth to Michael’s hardness. He heard Michael take in a deep breath.
For the next several hours they fulfilled their every need in each others bodies, made up for lost time, and realized that no matter how difficult this would be; they owed it too themselves to try and make it work.