The Cowboy's Secret

by Riley Knight

  He was fully hard, no matter how he might try to deny it. When he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, it was impossible to miss how his dick jutted out from his body, swollen and ready for action, and how ridiculous was that? He was a grown man, responsible and controlled, and here he was completely ready to go, just from a ten-second interaction in the hallway.

  Malcolm had already known that he was going to have to be careful around Kyle, and his own stupid reaction to the other man was just more proof of that if he’d needed any. With a frustrated sigh, grimly ignoring his throbbing cock, Malcolm turned the water on and stepped into the warm flow, letting it wash everything away.

  Or that was the theory, anyway. In practice, every single rivulet and droplet of steamy water seemed to be caressing his body, making him far too aware of how sensitive his skin was, how ready he was to be touched. The more he ignored his erection, or tried to, the more he found himself focusing on the ache which centered between his legs, in his balls.

  It had been way, way too long since he’d last gotten laid, but who had time for that? Only his rebellious body didn’t seem to agree with that assessment of the situation, and he softly groaned as he turned his face into the spray, which caressed his cheeks and lips and closed eyes as he fought the fog of sensuality that was taking him over.

  Fought it, and lost.

  He could only ignore his body for so long, and that was probably what all of this was about. His hands, he realized, were sliding over his own body, stroking over the sensitized skin, lubricated by the shower water. No soap, he wasn’t cleaning himself, just touching his own body.

  “Fuck,” he whispered, pads of his fingers brushing over his own nipples, teasing them until they hardened, which didn’t take very long. His cock pulsed, the head resting on his stomach, and as his fingers dipped down lower and lower he eventually had to admit to himself what he was going to do.

  Of course, jerking off to relieve the tension was going to be far better than going out and trying to get laid, which he didn’t have time for—not to mention that the only person that he had been even remotely interested in for far too long was Kyle.

  And that was a mistake, thinking about him.

  Instantly, his cock, which had already been achingly hard, pulsated with new desire, and all it took was thinking about how that towel had just barely been clinging to Kyle’s hips. And those eyes, how open and unguarded they had been just for a few seconds, round and soft and sweet as he gazed up at Malcolm.

  It was far too easy to think about what Kyle would look like in bed, although Malcolm hadn’t had a man in his bed for a very long time. Not that there had ever been a bed involved in the occasional encounters he had, mostly pressed up against the side of a barn, kissing frantically, sometimes groping and stroking to release.

  He wanted to do so much more than that with Kyle. He wanted to strip him down, to worship every inch of that slender, pale body with his lips, to kiss and stroke and touch until Kyle was gasping for breath and begging for more.

  His own fingers darted down, and with his eyes closed, it was easy to imagine that it wasn’t his own hand closing around his desperate erection, but Kyle’s. Not that Kyle was into men, probably. Not that Kyle, even if he was as gay as a maypole, should be the sort of person that Malcolm fantasized about.

  But Kyle would never know, right?

  In his imagination, he gently guided Kyle down onto his knees, fingers slipping into that short, soft hair, and it was so easy to imagine how the flow of water would dampen the strands of his hair and turn it to black. He was having no problem at all filling in the details that made it seem almost like it was actually happening, and he groaned as he stroked all the way from the tip of his dick, leaking precome into his palm, down to the base, which he slightly squeezed as if to hold his orgasm back.

  That was an exercise in futility, of course. When had the last time been that he had let himself have this release? He was normally too tired for it, and it had probably been at least a week, maybe more. His balls tightened and churned as little bursts of pleasure rocketed through him.

  The more he had, the more he wanted. The more he thought about Kyle’s sweet, beautiful lips parting to take the head of Malcolm’s cock, the more his body tensed up and readied itself for an orgasm that he wasn’t going to be able to do anything to control.

  No one had to know. He reminded himself. Kyle never had to know that he was going to prompt the most intense orgasm that Malcolm had had in years. It seemed so bad that he was doing this, so forbidden because he didn’t like Kyle and they were directly in opposition, but his body neither knew nor cared about that.

  It was early, and Malcolm raised his other hand, the one not stroking his eager cock, to his lips, finding that he actually had to stifle his moans. Like it or not, something about Kyle got to him like no one else, this man who was his adversary, who wanted something that Malcolm could never get behind.

  The forbidden nature of it only made Malcolm groan louder into his own hand, teeth biting down on the fleshy part right under his thumb to stifle the noises which wanted to come out. Behind his closed eyes, only in his imagination, he pulled out of Kyle’s mouth and finished himself with his hand, painting over Kyle’s adorable face with his hot fluids.

  The orgasm ripped through his body, so hot, so intense, that for a moment, he actually couldn’t breathe. His teeth dug down into his own hand and he whimpered into it as he squirmed and bucked his hips, fucking into the air as he spilled his release into nothing to be washed away by the shower.

  He had come thinking about Kyle. There was no getting away from that fact, nor from the fact that he had never enjoyed any orgasm that he had ever had more. What would it be like, he had to wonder, to be with Kyle? To have the gorgeous man in bed with him, to kiss and touch and be kissed and touched in return?

  Of course, Malcolm knew that he would never know, and that was definitely for the best. He was distracted enough by Kyle already, and he had far too much to do in his life to allow that, even if Kyle hadn’t been so thoroughly off limits.

  His imagination was all that he had, all that he would ever have, and even with the afterglow of that incredible release radiating warmly through his body, he couldn’t help but be a little bit sad about that.

  * * *

  By the time he was out of the shower, Malcolm had it under control again, and when he pulled on his clothes, he told himself that he wasn’t even thinking about Kyle. Besides, no law said that he needed to be around the guy. The ranch was big, and there was a lot of work to do, so it should be easy enough to stay away from Kyle.

  That worked out well enough, although Malcolm also found himself staying away from everyone else. He barely nodded to Anna as he grabbed coffee and breakfast on the way out, and after he shook Logan awake, he left him to his own devices, too. That was the great thing about Logan. He knew what to do without being told. Logan, Malcolm, and Malcolm’s father were the only people in the world who really knew this land.

  The work was as exhausting as ever, but Malcolm kept going, driven as a man possessed who could only find salvation through tending to the animals and fixing the endless expanses of fences. By the end of the day, his whole body was aching, and he stumped back to the house well after dark.

  It wasn’t that he had deliberately skipped dinner or anything, he told himself. That would be cowardly. But it didn’t exactly break his heart that he wasn’t going to have to face Kyle again, look into his eyes and remember what it had been like to imagine painting his face with come.

  Even as exhausted as he was, that mental image made his cock twitch in reaction, and he had a stern conversation with himself as he came into the house, washed up, and then went to see what he could scrounge up in the kitchen. No one was around, he was pretty sure, which felt like he’d dodged a bullet.

  Or so he thought until he saw his father sitting in the breakfast nook, a pack of cards in his hands and spread out over the table in a game of solitai
re.

  “Hey, Dad,” Malcolm commented, trying to be casual, although his urge was to be furtive. He fought it, though. He had nothing to be ashamed of, he told himself firmly. So what if he had the hots for someone? It wasn’t like he would ever do anything about it. Ever. Even if Kyle wanted to.

  “Son,” the older man acknowledged and then beckoned Malcolm over. Bowing to the inevitable, Malcolm came to the table, a bowl of leftover stew from two nights ago heating up in the microwave. But he had a beer in his hand, which always seemed to make things a little bit better.

  “You missed dinner,” the older man commented, his tone mild enough, but there was a hint of rebuke in his voice, too. Malcolm winced a little and then had to admit that that was pretty funny. He was an adult, and yet his father could still make him feel like a little kid again just with a few words.

  “Yeah. I got busy.” Malcolm forced himself not to explain more than that. He didn’t owe his father any more of an explanation than that, but his father seemed to see things that other people might not have. It was damned inconvenient sometimes.

  “I spent the day out of bed,” his father informed him, as if apropos of nothing, but there was a light in his eyes which Malcolm hadn’t seen in quite some time. “Spent a lot of time with that new boy, Kyle. Nice kid.”

  Kid. Kyle was anything but. He had been through law school, which had to make him, what, in his late twenties at the very youngest? Malcolm fought down a smirk, trying to imagine how the nice kid would react to being called that if he knew.

  “He’s trying to take the ranch from our family.” Malcolm felt the need to point out. “He’s not even trying to hide that, Dad. He’s working for Wyatt, and we all know that the only use Wyatt has for this place can be measured in dollars.”

  “He’s doing his job,” the other man mused, almost to himself, and Kyle snorted and swallowed down a healthy swallow of his beer. He was going to need something stronger soon, especially if his dad kept this up. “Can’t fault him for that. You could be a little nicer, kiddo.”

  Malcolm sighed, tossed down the last of his beer, and went to grab another, as well as his bowl of stew. Even his father, who should have been the last person to be sympathetic toward Kyle, was falling for the man’s charms. It was ridiculous.

  “Sure. Makes sense. I should definitely be nice to the asshole who wants to take everything that I’ve ever worked for.” Malcolm flopped himself down at the table, a petulant feeling going through him, one that he hadn’t really had since he’d been a teenager.

  “He doesn’t want to,” his father informed him, watching him with avid jade eyes, even leaning forward a little to look at him, though movement wasn’t exactly easy for the man at this point. “You could convince him to give it up, I think. Just give him a chance. I saw the way he looked out the window, son. He could love this land, just as you do.”

  Malcolm frowned, something deep inside of him rejecting that premise. No one loved this land even half as much as he did, no one other than the man sitting right in front of him, who should know better than to think that sort of thing about city-bred, lawyer Kyle.

  “What do you want from me?” he demanded bluntly, and his father shook his head, a wry smile on his lips as he gazed at Malcolm.

  “Give him a chance. Show him around. He could be a powerful ally, if you can just show him why,” the older man informed him. And that was even logical. He had to admit, at least until he thought about spending time with Kyle. Then, a dull, throbbing ache started off in his heart and the pit of his stomach.

  He didn’t want to do it. And if he tried to explain to his father why he didn’t, he would have to explain far too much, so it seemed that there was little for him to do other than nod in acceptance.

  “I’ll try,” he replied, and it was settled. Even as sick as his father was, it seemed, he was good at getting his way, and for whatever reason, Malcolm spending time with Kyle seemed to be what his father wanted.

  FIVE

  Coming into this, Kyle had been so completely sure that he would sweep through the ranch, pushing all resistance aside. Part of him, at least, had been so ridiculously overconfident in his own abilities. Surely, with as much determination as he had to do his job, and do it well, there was no way that he could fail?

  Only he found himself in the incredibly odd position of not even being able to fight for what he wanted.

  Malcolm was the one that he had to convince. Everyone had been very sure of that. Who the other brothers were, Kyle didn’t know, he’d never met them, but clearly they weren’t around on the ranch, and no one seemed to think that they would be much of an obstacle.

  But other than the incredibly awkward meeting with Malcolm in the morning, Kyle hadn’t even seen Malcolm since the previous night. There was no fighting, no debating, and no convincing because he would have had to be in Malcolm’s presence to do any of that stuff.

  Not that his day had been spent unpleasantly. He had been surprised by how rewarding it had been to sit and talk with Malcolm’s father, who had an interesting, mellow perspective on things that Kyle found compelling.

  He had always been the sort of person who was on the go, Malcolm’s father, and it was only since getting sick, he claimed, that he had been so calm about everything. Kyle could relate, at least partially. He was no stranger to hard work, even if most of his had happened in books and computers rather than backbreaking physical labor.

  And it was that very focus on his work that made Kyle a bit antsy as the hours passed and he didn’t see even the faintest trace of Malcolm. He saw everyone else living in the house. Mary Anne smiled at him as she bounced off to catch the bus to high school, and Anna made him a nice, big, filling breakfast. Even Logan tossed him a smile and a wave as he headed outside, presumably to do ranch stuff. Not that Kyle had any idea what that would be.

  His ideas about cowboys mostly came from old Western movies, and he had to admit that things had probably changed a little. He’d never really thought about it much until coming here.

  The day passed, and then the night, and still there was no sign of Malcolm. From the looks and comments that were tossed around the dinner table, it wasn’t normal for this sort of thing to happen, but it wasn’t like Kyle cared or anything. Not beyond doing his job.

  Which didn’t explain why he couldn’t get the look in Malcolm’s eyes that morning by the bathroom out of his head, he thought. For just a split second, Kyle had been almost positive that Malcolm had been checking him out. Not that it mattered, of course, even if it was true, which it almost undoubtedly wasn’t.

  So why did his heart pound hard in his chest whenever he thought about it? Why did he find himself more aware of his own body than he had been in quite some time? Would he be appealing to a lover, he wondered, and then wanted to slap himself for even thinking about it.

  Still, he had to admit that he headed out to have a shower at the same time as he had the day before. And as much as he might like to deny it, he wasn’t only trying to run into Malcolm to try to do his job. Part of him just wanted to see the man, to see if that look that he had given Kyle meant anything.

  But Malcolm, he reminded himself in the shower, wasn’t some random guy at a bar to pick up while he was drunk. Malcolm was his adversary, that was it. No matter how much Kyle might like to be looked at the way he could almost swear that Malcolm had the morning before, ultimately, that wasn’t what was going to get him what he wanted.

  He was here, he reminded himself, staring into his own eyes in the clouded, foggy mirror after his shower, to kickstart his failing career. That was what mattered, nothing else, and by the time he was pulling open the door, he almost believed it again.

  “Hey.”

  It was a deep, slightly hoarse voice, one that he was starting to think that he would know anywhere, despite barely having heard it. It was Malcolm, who was standing there, wearing just the loose sweats that he had been the day before, and looking at him with a strange mixture of expressions on
his handsome face. There was a sort of breathless eagerness, Kyle could almost be sure of it, along with a reluctance which would have seemed far more understandable to Kyle.

  “Morning,” Kyle replied cautiously, not sure why Malcolm would be initiating any sort of contact. It was almost like the man had been waiting there for Kyle to get out of the shower, which was, of course, ridiculous. Even if it did sort of make him want to blurt out that if Malcolm did want to wait for him, if he did want to talk to him for some reason, he could always come into the bathroom and do it. Maybe even take down those loose sweats and join him right in the shower …

  His imagination was getting away from him, clearly. What were the chances, he wondered, that there was a gay bar anywhere within a hundred miles of this place? Probably not good, and, he reminded himself firmly, it didn’t matter even if there was one. He had work to do, and sex of any kind would have to wait until after he was done.

  “Wanna ride out with me today?” Malcolm abruptly offered, and Kyle blinked, wanting to rub his eyes or pinch himself or something else to make sure that he was out today. The tone was ungracious, but the offer had been there and apparently sincere, and Kyle couldn’t, for the life of him, figure out why Malcolm had made it.

  “What?” he asked, hating the stupid, confused tone of his voice, even more so when Malcolm rolled his eyes and gave him a look that seemed filled with pity. He could handle people disliking him, but he had worked too hard to be looked at like that by someone like Malcolm, an ignorant hick cowboy probably with hayseeds in his hair.

  “I’ll show you around if you want,” Malcolm offered, and Kyle would have given anything to be able to tell the smug man, who now had a bit of a smirk growing on his face, that he could shove his offer right up his ass. He was not interested in being a source of amusement for anyone, thank you very much.

  Only he couldn’t do it. This was his chance to spend some time with this guy, try to talk him into doing the right thing, doing what Kyle had been paid, and paid well, to get Malcolm to do. He had to take it and knew, deep down, that it was a minor miracle that Malcolm was offering at all.