“You. He heard you. My mouth was full of your delicious cock.”
I buried my face in his hairy chest, face flaming. He smelled good. The subtle lingering smell of soap and Hoyt.
“I will never be able to look him in the face again.” I snuggled in closer, his arm coming up with the blanket to cover my bare ass. “I’m walking home tomorrow.”
“Nope. You’ll get blisters on your little feet. You can ride in the back with Adobe.”
“Okay, that’s a good idea. He and I need to become friends.”
“Yeah, you do. I want to teach you how to ride. The ranch is gorgeous in the summer. And spring too, winter is brutal but beautiful.”
“I’m more a ‘stay-inside-with-a-hot-toddy-and-a-good-book-when-it’s-cold’ kind of man,” I confessed, letting my cheek come to rest on his beefy bicep.
“I sort of assumed that about you.” He dropped a kiss to my knotted hair. “So we’ll ride out on nice days only.”
“Mm, that sounds nice. I like Adobe. He’s sweet, and patient, and has a lovely white patch on his face.”
“Blaze. That mark is called a blaze.”
“Oh, of course. I have lots to learn about cows and horses. Cattle. Cattle and horses.”
“I’ll teach you all you need to know.”
I sighed a happy sound outwardly but inwardly I wondered how that would ever come to be when he was leaving soon. Nope. Nope. No sad thoughts. Not tonight. I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep as he slumbered away under me. As a famous Southern belle once exclaimed “I’ll think on that tomorrow” or something to that effect. Maybe not even tomorrow. Maybe not until he and his horse rode out of Chance one last time. Then I would have to think on it…
Chapter 15
Hoyt
“Are you going to miss me?” I gave my left shoulder a roll, pleased to feel no pain, and then hit my PT guru Tom with a look that made him laugh out loud. “I’ll take that as a no.”
“You did a good job. It feels great.”
“Why thanks. I’m glad you’re ready to ride again.”
Tom and I had talked bull riding a lot. And yeah, I was glad to be back to nearly one hundred percent. Being forty I would never be at my peak like when I’d been eighteen and flexible like a reed. My bend wasn’t as bendy now, nor did I bounce back as fast. Also, the drive to hit the road was fading slightly.
“Yep. I think I might just join the kids and ride sheep,” I teased. Sort of. Tom laughed as he walked me out to the waiting room which was packed full.
“I would like you to be careful when you get back to the rodeo. You’re healed, and you’ve aced your strength training for weeks now. All your tests show your left is as strong as the right.”
“I sense a but coming.” I nodded at Dee the receptionist and got a wink back. She tried, bless her cotton socks, but she was howling up the wrong tree as the coon hunters liked to say.
“But you’re newly healed. I’m releasing you to return to ranch work with no restrictions, and also to return to your profession with an important suggestion. Try your hardest to not let a ton of pissed off beef come down on your shoulder again.”
I smiled while adjusting my hat. “I’ll do my best.” Following a handshake I stepped out into the heat of an early July day. Ah yes, the furnace that was Colorado in a heat wave. It was a dry heat though, so there was that.
Ole Main was deserted. Mad dogs and Englishmen, as the old saying goes. Strolling down the sidewalk I took note of the Pride stickers in several of the shop windows. Things here were changing. Slowly. But there were signs. No one had run out to beat me and Aubrey up when we walked along holding hands. A few of the business owners even stepped out to say howdy. When I was younger this wouldn’t have happened. Many of the old timers were of the same mindset as Abel. Thankfully not so much anymore. There were still those holdouts who harbored their hatred for anyone different but they didn’t seem to have the backing of the town.
I’d enjoyed Pride this year. First time ever for so many things. Walking down this street with my boyfriend hand-in-hand. Wearing a pin on my hat. Just being me. The me Abel had tried to whip out of me but had failed. Just. I’d been ashamed and in the closet for years. So many years. Suffering, lying, hating myself. Now though…
Now I was out. Not with a grand announcement or fireworks. But with a quiet ease. The American flags hung listlessly from the store fronts. Not a whisper of air could be felt but the forecast was for rain tonight. Thunderstorms would roll in like a herd of wild cattle, dousing the earth, lighting the sky. I’d be in bed with Aubrey, either sleeping or working on more poetry with two cats stretched out over and between us. Work was flowing out of me as if someone had turned on a tap. I alwayshad my journal. At the ranch, at home, even now it was in my truck for easy reach. I’d need a new journal soon. Expressing myself wasn’t just limited to being out it seemed. The millstone of Abel’s death and falling in love had freed me in so many ways I couldn’t catalog them all. I’d seen a change in my brother as well. Were we skipping down the lane singing merry songs? No, but we were not dragging a fucking brontosaurus of guilt, shame, and misery with us. Maybe now it was just a smaller dino. Like a velociraptor.
I turned down the alley, smiling at the sandwich board touting cold iced tea and hot romances at High Noon Reads. That was me and Aubrey. A hot romance. He was working in the front window when I arrived, his hair loose from what was left of a bun he’d pulled the dark mass into this morning. His glasses were on the tip of his nose, his tongue between his lips while he stacked some vintage romances in flowery dustcovers. It impressed me how he found all his secondhand beauties online. I’d never known there were so many gently used bookshops.
I tapped on the glass. His head spun like an owl’s. When he spied me his grin was wide and genuine. It had only been a few hours since I’d kissed him goodbye before rolling out to Snow Creek Ranch for a morning spent tossing square hay bales from the back of a wagon onto a conveyor belt that carried the bales up into the mow. There, two men worked in tandem to catch then stack the bales. All alfalfa to be fed to growing calves and lactating mares and cows as a boost filled with lots of protein, calcium, and energy for special needs.
He motioned to the display. I gave him a thumbs up then pushed into the shop. The cooler air blew down on me. I sighed softly then found myself with an armful of sweet man in his summer attire of skinny slacks, a short-sleeved cotton shirt, and a bright bowtie. He kissed me soundly before pulling a kazoofrom his shirt pocket. With a short blast the several customers perusing the wares turned to gape.
