Ends of the Earth: Gay Romance Read online

  About Ends of the Earth

  A desperate young father. A lonely ranger. A race against time.

  Jason Kellerman’s life revolves around his eight-year-old daughter. Teenage curiosity with his best friend led to Maggie’s birth, and her mother tragically died soon after. Only twenty-five and a single dad, Jason hasn’t had time to even think about romance. Disowned by his wealthy family, he’s scrimped and saved to bring Maggie west for a camping vacation. The last thing Jason expects is to question his sexuality after meeting a sexy, older park ranger.

  Ben Hettler’s stuck. He loves working amid the glacier-carved peaks and valleys of northern Montana, but his love life is non-existent, his ex-boyfriend just adopted with a new husband, and Ben’s own dream of fatherhood feels more out of reach than ever. He’s attracted to Jason, but what’s the point? Besides skittish Jason’s lack of experience, they live on opposite sides of the country.

  Then a criminal on the run takes Jason’s daughter hostage, throwing Jason and Ben together in a desperate and dangerous search through endless miles of mountain forest. They’ll go to the ends of the earth to rescue Maggie—but what comes next? Can they build a new family together and find a place to call home?

  Ends of the Earth is an age-gap gay romance from Keira Andrews featuring action/adventure, sexual awakening, a plucky kid, and of course a happy ending.

  ENDS OF THE EARTH

  BY KEIRA ANDREWS

  Ends of the Earth

  Written and published by Keira Andrews

  Cover by Dar Albert

  Copyright © 2019 by Keira Andrews

  Second Edition. Originally published as Road to the Sun copyright © 2017 by Keira Andrews

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author or publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  ISBN: 978-1-988260-44-0

  Kindle Edition

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. No persons, living or dead, were harmed by the writing of this book. Any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Acknowledgements

  Author’s Note

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Epilogue

  Afterword

  About Flash Rip

  About Honeymoon for One

  About Valor on the Move

  Also by Keira Andrews

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  Thanks as ever to Anara, Anne-Marie, Becky, Jules, and Mary for their support, friendship, and excellent beta reading. Profound gratitude as well to Leta Blake for the superb developmental editing that made this book so much stronger. Couldn’t do it without you! Thanks also to Annabeth Albert for suggesting the new title of this story!

  Author’s Note

  While Glacier National Park is a real (and gorgeous!) place, some aspects of the park and ranger details have been fictionalized for plot purposes.

  PROLOGUE

  Harlan didn’t have to turn around to know it was her—he’d recognize Mary Beth’s nauseating giggle anywhere. In the week since she’d walked out, he hadn’t missed her at all. He was better off without that bitch nagging him all the time and sticking her big nose in his business.

  The fluorescent light above the bank of refrigerators flickered restlessly, a low rattle echoing through the back of the roadside store. Harlan curled his fingers into the plastic holder of a six-pack of Bud cans. After a moment of debate in the snack aisle, he grabbed a bag of corn chips, a smirk curving his lips as he heard Mary Beth ask the cashier for a pack of smokes.

  She’d come crawling back soon. She always did.

  Turning toward the cash register, he stopped dead, staring at Dwayne. Dwayne had been his buddy since high school, when they used to pump iron and camp out in the woods, living off the land, practicing for when the world finally went completely to shit.

  Now here was good ol’ Dwayne, with his shock of red hair and ugly freckles—and his arm around Harlan’s woman.

  Mary Beth had been Harlan’s since they were kids, and Dwayne knew she was off limits. But here they were, giggling and whispering with their heads real close.

  Just who in the hell did they think they were? They were making a fool of him. No one made a fool of Harlan Brown.

  No one.

  Ears buzzing with a hot rush of blood, Harlan watched them slide open the ice cream cooler by the counter. Why, they hadn’t even noticed him standing there. Like he was nothing. That little whore had gotten all she could out of him, and now she was making a spectacle of herself with Dwayne, of all people. Digging around for popsicles and laughing like they didn’t have a care in the fucking world.

  The steel was cool in Harlan’s hand, trigger smooth against his finger. He’d carried the same pistol in his belt going on twenty years, and ain’t never used it for more than shooting cans off fence posts and putting the fear of God into anyone who sorely needed it.

  Mary Beth rubbed herself against Dwayne, her peroxide curls bobbing. When the bullet slammed into her back, she wailed like a calf being branded, staggering against Dwayne and toppling him over. They collapsed on the floor in a heap, Mary Beth’s blood pouring out onto the dirty tile.

  Dwayne stared at Harlan, his mouth open but no sound coming out, like a fish flopping on the bottom of a boat, eyes bugging. He shoved at Mary Beth as Harlan approached. Then he started to cry and beg—a sorry sight if ever there was one. Harlan put the bullet through Dwayne’s forehead to save the man’s dignity.

  No one should go out crying like a little bitch.

  From the corner of Harlan’s eye, he saw the cashier raise the rifle. Harlan was faster, and the man went down hard behind the counter. It was a damn shame—Harlan had no argument with him. Why did people have to go and make him do things he didn’t want to?

  With his six-pack of beer under his arm, he returned to his Mustang and tore open the corn chips. The salty crunch was just what he’d been craving, but he belatedly wished he’d picked up some beef jerky too.

  As he drove away down route five, distant sirens already echoed. Damn cashier must have tripped the silent alarm. Stupid fucker deserved to die.

  Harlan sighed. They’d have his license plate from the surveillance camera before he could make it back to his trailer. Fucking technology. Good thing he always kept his gear in the car. He was prepared.

  Harlan drove to his favorite spot out by the old quarry and finished his chips and beer, listening to the CB radio frequencies. Sure enough, soon they were talking about him, although they didn’t know his name yet.

  Then a trucker with the call sign Big Papa piped up into a conversation. “My buddy’s a cop out there in Whitefish. The dead woman’s uncle is on the force and they’re out for blood. Said
the unofficial order is shoot to kill the bastard. Apparently he was her ex, a loser by the name of Brown.”

  As strangers chimed in with enthusiasm for this idea, Harlan crushed his last can. He’d just wanted a fucking quiet night.

  He drove the car off the dirt road and hid it in a stand of thick trees. His rusty Mustang had been a good friend over the years. A man couldn’t ask for better. He ran his palm over the trunk and swallowed the lump in his throat. Bitterness roiled in his gut. God damn Mary Beth and Dwayne. Look at what they’d gone and done to him.

  Harlan slung his bug-out bag over his shoulders and disappeared into the forest.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Although he tried to burrow deeper into his sleeping bag, Jason Kellerman couldn’t escape the finger poking his side. He mumbled, “Five more minutes.”

  “Dad, are you going to sleep all day?”

  He pried open his eyes and peered up at his daughter’s round face and clear hazel eyes, her bobbed, golden hair grazing her chin. Groaning, he asked, “What time is it?”

  She grabbed his phone from beside his sleeping bag and checked the screen. “It’s already six thirty-five.”

  Jason groaned again. “Mags, this is supposed to be a vacation.”

  “The sun has been up for almost a whole hour. I let you sleep in.”

  “Oh, what a kind and generous daughter I’ve been blessed with.” He wasn’t sure how Maggie had ended up a morning person, but she’d woken with the sun since she was a toddler, and at eight years old, it didn’t seem likely to change anytime soon.

  “I’ll make you breakfast. But you have to start a fire first.”

  “Why did I ever agree to go camping?” Jason rubbed his face and yawned, the air mattress wobbling as he stretched out.

  She put on a sing-songy voice. “Because you’re the bestest daddy in the whole wide world.” With that, Maggie pressed a kiss to his cheek and darted out of the tent, the flap left hanging open in her wake.

  Jason smiled despite himself. Her sleeping bag was tidily zipped on her side of the small tent, her pillow tucked inside. He supposed she got her neatness and early bird enthusiasm from her mother, since it certainly hadn’t come from his genes. At the thought of Amy, the familiar twinge of guilt rippled through him.

  Brushing it off as he did every day, he traded his plaid pajama bottoms and ratty T-shirt for jeans and a sweatshirt and crawled through the opening in their little tent. The sky was a clear blue above the treetops, white-capped mountains soaring high on the horizon. They called it Big Sky Country, and compared to Philly, Montana was a different planet. He breathed the clean air deeply.

  “The wood’s ready, Dad.” Maggie fidgeted by the stack of logs and kindling she’d carefully piled, tugging on the hem of her purple hoodie. Her skinny legs stuck out of her too-short capri pants. At the rate she was growing, she’d need a whole new wardrobe to go back to school in September.

  Jason’s stomach clenched. He’d spent too much money already on this trip, even with redeeming years of Air Miles. How was he going to afford more clothes and shoes? Maybe he should have put off the vacation until next summer and saved more first. But by the time he’d been eight, he’d already been to Europe, and Maggie hadn’t even been outside Pennsylvania. He had to give her everything she deserved—everything a good father would.

  Looking at Maggie’s sweet face, he pushed the worry aside for later. “Good work, sweetheart. Where did you get the kindling?”

  “Just from right there.” She pointed to the brush on one side of the campsite. The campground was fairly secluded, and neighboring sites were separated by fifty yards of trees. “Don’t worry, I know I’m not allowed to go off by myself. But I had to pee.”

  Jason’s heart skipped a beat as he peered into the dense bush. “Why didn’t you wake me up? It could have been dangerous.” Why had he agreed to go camping? In nature, there were so many variables.

  Maggie rolled her eyes artfully. “Dad, we’re in the middle of the woods.”

  “I’m painfully aware of that.”

  She ignored him as she added, “No one was here. The people next door were still in their tents. Besides, I’m not a baby.”

  “So you keep reminding me. But you know we’re in grizzly country. Tomorrow, wake me up when you have to go to the bathroom and I’ll take you over to the outhouse. Okay?”

  “Okay, okay. Now will you light the fire?” She held out the box of matches.

  “Gladly.” Jason took the box, shivering. He was surprised by how low the temperature dropped at night, and it was still too early for the sun to have had much effect.

  Jason boiled a can of water for coffee, missing the old machine in their kitchen that whined alarmingly but still produced a delicious brew every morning. He grimaced as he swallowed the instant crap, but it was better than nothing.

  “Dad, where’s the ketchup?”

  “I think it’s still in the trunk.” Jason fished the keys out of his small backpack and pressed the button on the fob as Maggie raced over. He was continually amazed at the way she rushed into even the most mundane task with enthusiasm.

  “Make sure you seal up the cooler.”

  “I know.” Her voice was muffled as she rooted around in the trunk of their Toyota rental car. “Always keep food and toothpaste and shampoo and deodorant or anything that smells locked away or hung up in a tree. I taught you that.”

  Jason had to smile. “My deepest apologies.” Bacon sizzled in the pan, the salty aroma wafting through the air. Jason glanced around at the encroaching wilderness and fished their can of bear spray out of the tent, keeping it close by.

  As Maggie cracked eggs into the pan, Jason grabbed his sketchpad and pencils from the tent. It was silly of him to always keep his pad by the bed at home and stash one in his car—and even bring it all the way to the middle of nowhere. He knew that. He was never going to art school, and he’d never be a real artist.

  Standing under the rising Montana sun with pine needles beneath his sneakers, he let himself think of what it would have been like to go to Parsons or CalArts or the Rhode Island School of Design. He imagined being immersed in art, making real friends who understood him, living on campus and going to parties and all the stupid stuff he’d dreamed of since he was a kid.

  His prep school friends had gone off to college and careers and forgotten him, especially after he left home and moved across town. He could still remember the gape-mouthed horror on Colin Nason and Richard Wong’s faces when he’d told them he was keeping Maggie and getting his own place, even if it was only a tiny studio apartment. They couldn’t fathom why he wouldn’t let his parents take her, saying the same thing everyone else did.

  “But you’re too young.”

  Even now that he was twenty-five and an official adult, people still didn’t think he was old enough to be a father. Didn’t think he was good enough. He’d prove them all wrong. He’d made the right choice, even if it had meant no art school.

  Shaking his head, Jason snorted to himself. As if his parents would have let him go to art school anyway. No, it would have been an Ivy League business degree for him. A suit and tie and shiny leather loafers in a soulless high-rise. No smudges of charcoal on his fingers, no pencils flying across paper.

  He ran his fingertips over the smooth edges of his sketchpad. It was only a cheap one from Staples, although a little voice hissed that he could get them for even less at the Dollartown in the strip mall. Guilt slithered through him. He shouldn’t spend a penny on himself before Maggie had everything she needed and more.

  It was ridiculous anyway. He was never going to create story illustrations or comic books like the ones he’d loved to read since he was a kid. His art was never going to be anything. Yet the lure of pencils and paper called to him, and he opened his pad, knowing he should be a better father.

  He sat on a fallen log and sketched a few pages of the campsite and mountains rising across the wide horizon beyond the looming trees. Then he knock
ed off a drawing of Maggie by the fire, optimism and happiness shining from her wide eyes as she lived her dream of coming to Montana. He’d given her that, at least.

  After breakfast—mercifully free of any animal visitors save for two little chipmunks that Maggie scared off with her delighted shrieks—they headed to the visitors’ center for a guided nature walk. Jason glanced in the rearview mirror at a stop sign and grimaced as he ran a hand through his messy blondish hair, which was due a wash. Ah, the many joys of camping.

  It was also due a cut, and he could imagine his parents’ pinched expressions at seeing him in worn jeans with stubble on his cheeks and his hair shaggy. His mother’s golden hair had always been perfect, even if it was just in a ponytail for yoga. Even on weekends, his dad had worn button-up shirts and his Rolex.

  If Jason had chosen differently all those years ago, he’d probably be sitting behind a desk at his father’s firm in a bespoke suit, calling clients and monitoring the stock exchange.

  With a pang, he thought of his younger brother, Tim, who’d just graduated Waltham Prep and was going to Harvard according to his Instagram. Jason would love to talk to him and discover the man he was becoming, but that door had closed when their parents made their ultimatum.

  Maybe now that Tim was going to college, he’d reach out. And maybe Tim doesn’t want anything to do with me. If he did, surely he’d have tried to contact Jason before now?

  Jason gave his head a mental shake as he turned into the lot and parked. He shouldn’t hold his breath for Tim to try and contact him. They were strangers now. Maggie was his family. He’d learned long ago not to dwell.

  “Dad? You coming?”

  Jason jumped. Maggie had already clambered out of the back seat and now peered in through Jason’s window, hopping a little in place, a grin lighting up her face. He returned the smile and said, “Right behind you,” as he closed the windows.