Guilt ripped at his insides. He didn’t mean to push Donnelly this far. He fucked up.
“I’m sorry,” Wyatt whispered, burying his face against the back of his neck, closing his eyes at the pain that seemed to tear through Donnelly as he cried into his own arm, shielding Wyatt from himself, from his emotions.
Wyatt let him, not wanting Donnelly to feel any more exposed than he already must have felt. They didn’t really know each other. And he didn’t want Donnelly to feel ashamed of his feelings.
“It’s not your fault,” Donnelly wheezed, chest heaving for air as he cried, shoulders shaking. “Fuck. I’m sorry.”
“No. Don’t apologize.”
He held him for a long time, heart breaking in his chest, and not understanding why. Donnelly was his captain, and they had great fucking sex, but seeing him in pain, seeing him struggle with his emotion, unlocked something in Wyatt that he didn’t understand. All he knew was that it hurt, and he wanted to make it better somehow.
He wanted to soothe him, hold him, kiss every inch of his body until whatever it was he was crying about was forgotten.
Donnelly eventually stopped crying and to his surprise, fell quiet—too quiet.
Wyatt waited, his fingers swirling in Donnelly’s thick chest hair, incapable of letting go. Luckily, Donnelly was still okay with him touching him.
“I haven’t cried like that since…” Donnelly stopped short, his voice gravelly from emotion. “Jesus,” he sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. “I feel ridiculous.”
“Don’t,” Wyatt whispered. “Don’t be.”
“I—I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything.”
Donnelly reached for Wyatt’s hand that was still wrapped around his waist, his fingers threading with his. It felt intimate. It felt good. So fucking good that it hurt a little. Wyatt swallowed.
“It’s been a hard year,” Donnelly admitted. “Possibly the hardest year I’ve had as a doctor. The politics, the trauma, the loss… all of it just hit so much harder for some reason.”
Wyatt understood, thinking about the highs and lows of ranch work, knowing how some seasons felt more painful than others. And he was young in his career as a doctor compared to Donnelly. He didn’t have the same responsibilities as him, nor did he really understand the weight he carried.
“I did all the wrong things to try to cope. I drank more, slept less, worked more…” Donnelly continued softly. “None of it helped. So, I just kept working, kept moving—thinking it would pass. That one day I’d wake up and feel better.” He wiped more tears from his cheeks, scrubbing a hand over his beard. “Fuck, I’ve been so lost. I hadn’t realized it until…”
He abruptly pulled away, dropping his face into his hands. “Christ, this is embarrassing.”
Wyatt wanted to reach out to him, wanted to soothe the ache deep in Donnelly’s soul.
“This job catches up to you,” Donnelly murmured. “It can break you if you let it. For a while there, I never thought it would. But it did. Then this stupid frozen shoulder happened...” He snorted a bitter laugh. “Oh, and let’s not forget I crossed a very real line and had sex with one of my residents.”
Wyatt flinched but said nothing. The power dynamics alone were questionable—Donnelly, the attending senior resident, and Wyatt, the fourth-year resident on the cusp of becoming a fully licensed doctor. On the most basic level, it was teacher fucking his student—well, Wyatt corrected, student fucking his teacher.
“I’m sorry, I should go.” Donnelly got to his feet suddenly, towel still around his waist as he reached for his clothes.
Wyatt climbed out of bed naked and touched the spot where Donnelly carried all his pain, all his stress, and pushed it.
Donnelly buckled and cursed. “What the fuck?!”
“You’re not leaving like this,” he declared firmly. “Get back in bed, let me make this better.”
“You already did enough,” he snapped, but it held little venom.
“I didn’t.”
Wyatt dropped to his knees and yanked Donnelly’s towel away, deciding to use his body rather than words to convey how much he needed to take care of him. To fix what he had done to him. Anything but to see him leave in such a state of emotional turmoil.
“Wait..!”
He didn’t listen to the older man’s weak protest and simply took Donnelly’s dick into his mouth, determinedly sucking it back to life. Donnelly let out a whimpering groan, stumbling into him. Wyatt held him upright and devouredhis cock, sucking him furiously and bobbing over him, taking him deep into his throat.
