Rendezvous in the South Pacific — A.M. Halford

ZANE McDOWELL is a hero to his small country hometown. He was quarterback of the football team, leading them to state three times in a row. He graduated second in his class, took a summer job at his dad's auto repair shop, and right after high school he joined the Marines and served his nation. He has every right to be proud of himself, except there's one part of him no one knows. One part he's kept locked away. He's a gay sub. Hoping to escape the suffocating praise of his hometown and to step out of the closet for a bit, Zane travels to the South Pacific where no one knows him.

KACEY MATHEWS loves his little island paradise. Having escaped the overbearing reality of his home back in the states, Kacey has made a life for himself under the sun and is open about who he is. Being valedictorian was his only claim to fame back home, and he was well off without it. Here he wasn't the nerd people ignored. Out here, he was just Kacey, the owner of Kacey's Surf Bar.

These two, from the same hometown, are not expecting to find each other on this isolated island. For Zane, it's a nightmare! His past has found him and he just knows Kacey is going to bring all those horrible memories back up. For Kacey, it's a dream come true. He'd always had a small crush on the town hero that plagued his dreams in high school. Now he could finally act on those feelings. If Zane would only let him.

This work was originally published as part of the SuMMer Heat Anthology. Nothing has been added to this story.