Title: Doubt Thou the Stars Are Fire

Author/pseudonym: Caroline Crane

Fandom: CSI

Pairing: Nick/Greg

Rating: NC17

Status: complete

Archive: yes to list archives

Series/Sequel: Part 1 of the Camping Trilogy.

Camping Trilogy 1: Doubt Thou the Stars Are Fire
by Caroline Crane

"When's the last time you did this?"

Nick knew what Greg wasn't asking; what he really wanted to know was who Nick had brought out here last, who he'd considered important enough to pack up all his camping gear and drive out to a secluded spot near Lake Mead. He wasn't surprised that Greg was curious – they hadn't really been dating that long, after all – but he was surprised that the other man didn't seem to want to come right out and ask the question. It wasn't like Greg to hold back about…well, anything, really.

"A few months ago," Nick answered, watching Greg out of the corner of his eye as he leaned forward to put another branch on the fire. "My sister and her husband drove up with their kids, I played tour guide for a week."

He knew it didn't answer Greg's question, but if Greg wasn't going to ask him directly he wasn't sure he wanted to volunteer information about his past. Not that there was much to tell; there were a few dates here and there, mostly casual sex with people he met outside of work, but nothing serious. He'd told himself for a long time that he didn't have time for serious, but he knew that wasn't really it. He'd put work first for so long that he wasn't sure how to do anything else, and when he and Greg stumbled into this thing together he hadn't been thinking long-term. Things between them just sort of happened, and now just a couple months into their relationship he found himself thinking about the future for the first time in a long time.

They hadn't really talked about what they were doing. After the first time they found themselves in bed together they'd just sort of fallen into a routine, and somewhere along the way it started to feel right. Comfortable, for lack of a better word, because they knew each other well enough that they didn't have to fill up the silence with a bunch of awkward conversation. Nick didn't have to explain his bad nights at work to Greg because Greg already knew, and somehow over the past few years Greg had learned how to make Nick laugh when he didn't think it was possible.

It was as terrifying as it was good, and for the first time in his life Nick was okay with feeling a little out of control. He wasn't exactly sure what came next, but he wanted to stick around and find out, even if it meant waiting out Greg's infrequent but frustrating bouts of silence.

He stifled a sigh and leaned a little further back against the log some previous campers had dragged into the small clearing, looking up at the stars that he rarely got to see in Vegas. Even if he didn't spend most of his nights too focused on the job to remember to look up, the lights of the city pretty much took care of the view of the desert sky. Out here, though – out here there were no lights and no city noises to distract from the scenery, and he found himself wondering why he didn't make time for this more often.

"We should see if we can get some time off together this summer," he said, glancing at Greg's profile before he looked up at the sky again, "head up to Glacier. Or maybe Alaska. You ever been?"

Nick waited a few seconds, but when Greg didn't answer he shifted his attention away from the stars and back to the man sitting next to him. "G? You there?"

"What? Oh, sorry," Greg said, shaking his head and pulling his jacket a little closer. Nick frowned as he watched Greg suppress a shiver, pushing himself back into a sitting position and pulling Greg close.

"I told you to bring a warmer jacket," he scolded. "Gets cold out here at night."

"I noticed," Greg said, smiling and burrowing a little further into Nick's side. "So you're really into this camping thing, huh?"

Nick shrugged and picked up the stick he'd been using to stoke the fire. "I guess. I don't get as much chance as I did when I was a kid, but it's kind of nice. Open air, nobody around for miles…" He grinned and pulled away far enough to meet Greg's gaze. "You've been camping before, haven't you?"

"Yeah," Greg answered a little too quickly, "it's just…you know, tent on the beach, get up with the sun to catch the good waves before all the tourists show up. That kind of camping."

A soft laugh escaped Nick's throat as he glanced at the sleeping bags he'd drug out of the truck when they got there. He hadn't even thought about a tent; he liked being able to see the stars when he woke up in the middle of the night, and it wasn't like they had to worry about rain at this time of year. "Man, why didn't you just tell me you didn't want to do this?"

"I did want to," Greg shot back a little defensively. "I was just wondering. Who you usually do this with, you know."

"Who'd you sleep on the beach with?" Nick asked, his own defenses creeping up on him as it dawned on him that Greg probably hadn't been out catching the dawn surf by himself.

Greg grinned at that, some of the uncertainty fading from his expression. "What, are you jealous?"

"Jealous of your surf buddies? Don't flatter yourself, Sanders." Nick smiled and stoked the fire back to a bright flame, then tossed a couple more branches on it. "If you want to know the truth, I usually come out here by myself."

"You go camping in the middle of nowhere by yourself?"

The slightly scandalized tone made Nick smile, and he shot a glance at Greg over his shoulder. "What do you think is gonna happen out here?"

Greg shrugged and looked pointedly over at the sleeping bags sitting safely away from the fire. "I don't know. You could freeze to death, you know. Hypothermia is the silent killer."

"That's heart disease."

"Whatever, Boy Scout. You gonna show me how you keep warm out here or what?"

Nick rolled his eyes and stood up, ignoring Greg's protest about the sudden drop in temperature as he unrolled the sleeping bags and then zipped them together. When he was done he glanced over at the other man, shaking his head when he found Greg watching him expectantly. "I thought you were cold."

"I thought you were going to warm me up," Greg shot back, one eyebrow raised in an expression that looked more devilish than challenging in the firelight. "Isn't that in the Boy Scout motto or something?"

"Do you have some weird Boy Scout fetish I should know about?" Nick asked as Greg stood up and closed the distance between them.

"No," Greg murmured as he let Nick pull him close and brush their lips together, "but I could think of a couple other fetishes we could try out if you want."

Nick was pretty sure he'd regret asking about Greg's fetishes eventually, but for now all he cared about was getting them both undressed and into the sleeping bag as quickly as possible. He pulled off his own clothes first so he wouldn't have to listen to Greg complaining about the temperature any longer than necessary, then he pulled Greg with him into the sleeping bag and zipped it up. He knew sharing body heat was the fastest way to warm Greg up, so he pulled the other man close and covered as much of Greg's skin as he could find with his own.

"Better?" he asked between long, slow kisses, his hands rubbing warmth back into Greg's arms and chest as he kissed his way down the other man's chin.

Greg's only response was a murmur that sounded more or less affirmative, so Nick kept up his careful exploration of Greg's jaw line, then the underside of his chin down to the hollow of his neck. His hands moved up and down Greg's body in broad strokes, lingering whenever he found a spot that made the other man shudder underneath him. Greg was murmuring something, a combination of words and sounds that Nick couldn't quite make out as he kissed his way down the center of the other man's chest.

It wasn't ideal, because the sleeping bag was too restrictive to let him get much further than the center of Greg's chest and if he unzipped it they'd both be too cold to enjoy it anyway. Still, it was kind of nice to be able to take his time, exploring Greg's skin with his mouth and hands the way he didn't always take the time to do when they were home.

He slid a hand along the inside of Greg's thigh, laughing against the other man's skin when Greg thrust up instinctively into the touch. He looked up to find Greg watching him, his mouth twisted into the crooked grin that had first caught Nick's attention four years ago when they met. It was hard to believe it had really been four years – harder still to believe how long it had taken them to admit how they felt – but in a way Nick didn't really mind the wait. They knew each other, and that meant they knew what they were getting into before it was too late to back out without making a big mess.

Backing out was the last thing on his mind, though, especially when Greg was still watching him from under his eyelashes, his hands tracing a lazy pattern on Nick's back. Nick leaned forward again, pressing their mouths together to swallow Greg's gasp when he wrapped a hand around the other man's cock. He slid his other hand under Greg's head, cradling his neck as he began to move his hand in long, slow strokes.

One of Greg's hands left his back to slide between them, his fingers wrapping around Nick's cock to match Nick's strokes. It felt a little like being back in school again, but the hand jobs he'd gotten in school were a lot more frantic than this, and he'd never spent as much time kissing anyone as he spent kissing Greg. He'd never really thought much about it before, but Greg's enthusiasm for making out was infectious and there were times when Nick was sure he could spend hours doing just that. They didn't get a lot of opportunities to put that theory to the test, but there wasn't much else to do out here under the stars.

He was definitely going to have to take Greg camping more often.

Greg's hips were moving a little more erratically now, so Nick tightened his grip and began stroking harder. The hand on his own cock tightened in response, and he found himself thrusting more urgently into Greg's grip. He breathed in sharply through his nose, savoring the flavors of sweet and Greg on his tongue as Greg surged up into the kiss. His hand was still cradling Greg's skull, pebbles digging into his elbow where it braced their weight against the ground. And it wasn't even close to comfortable; his elbow hurt and his shoulder was starting to ache and he was pretty sure there was going to be a rock-shaped indent in his left thigh in the morning, but none of that mattered while he could taste the sweetness that let him know how close Greg was.

It was going to be messy. He realized it too late, realized that he hadn't thought this far ahead. All he'd thought about was getting Greg out of the city, out of the lights and the noise and the violence that had become so routine in both their lives. He just wanted to look at the stars and not think about anything for awhile, and for the first time in ages he'd known exactly who he wanted there with him.

He hadn't planned for hand jobs in a pair of thermal sleeping bags, hadn't planned for the inevitable mess or the fact that they were going to have to sleep in these same sleeping bags with no chance of avoiding the wet spot. But somehow it didn't matter that he'd have to sacrifice his shirt to clean them up enough to keep them from sticking together in their sleep, and it didn't matter that they were still going to feel gross when they woke up in the morning. All that mattered was that Greg was actually here with him, and he didn't seem to be in a hurry to be anywhere else.

Greg came first, wet warmth coating Nick's hand and he couldn't resist…he had to taste. Greg was panting and slack-jawed but his eyes were open, and Nick knew by the way his hand tightened on Nick's cock that he liked what he was seeing. Nick would have laughed at that if he wasn't still so hard, but the pressure in his groin was distracting and he didn't even think about it before he reached down to cover Greg's hand with his own and finish himself off.

He waited until his chest was rising and falling more or less evenly before he reached above them for the first available piece of clothing – his boxers, as it turned out – and wiped their stomachs and hands off before he tossed them back in the direction of the rest of their clothes. It was then he wished for the first time that he'd thought to bring a pillow, because the ground was pretty hard and for the first time in his camping career he was starting to realize how uncomfortable sleeping outside could be.

He pushed himself up on his elbow for a second time, wincing at the fresh pain that shot through it as he stretched far enough to retrieve his coat and bunch it up under their heads. It wasn't perfect, but it was better than the stick that had been digging into his ear a few seconds ago.

"Were you serious before?"

Nick started at the sound of Greg's voice in the darkness, glancing over at the other man to find Greg lying more or less on his back, his eyes wide open as he stared up at the sky.

"About what?"

"About this summer. You really want to go camping together?"

For the first time Nick realized how that must have sounded; when he said it he hadn't thought Greg was even listening, but now it dawned on him that it was the first time either of them had made any kind of plans farther into the future than a week.

"I wouldn't have said it if I didn't mean it," he answered, shifting to find a comfortable position on ground that was a lot harder and rockier than he remembered.

"Then we are so getting an air mattress," Greg said, and Nick glanced over just in time to catch him wincing as he shifted a little closer. "I think there's a rock embedded in my ass."

Nick laughed and slid his sore arm under Greg's shoulders, letting the other man snuggle closer so he could use Nick's shoulder as a pillow. He knew in the morning his arm would be even more sore, but it was worth a little pain if at least one of them managed to get some sleep. A few months ago he would have laughed at the idea of an air mattress, maybe even accused Greg of being too soft for the great outdoors. He'd learned to pick his fights over the past couple months, though, and anyway he was starting to think there were some compromises that were definitely worth making.

"Whatever you want, G."

end