by Amy Aislin
It was just enough for Marco to want more. Anything. He’d take it all. Please.
In the black of that night, lying side by side underneath the Big and Little Dippers, Marco had almost asked Las about the flirting thing. But then he’d chickened out, afraid of the answer. Don’t read too much into it, I’m like that with everyone scared him just as much as I like you, Marco. The former would crush his optimism, his hope. The latter meant heartbreak at the end of the summer.
And that was when Marco had clued in to something Las had once said: What’s the point when they’ll be gone at the end of their contract?
Las didn’t want to get involved with anyone who wasn’t going to stick around.
Marco didn’t blame him, especially not after what had happened with Ben. Las was understandably gun-shy.
But at the same time, they were both here, right now.
And contrary to his fears, he didn’t think Las was a flirt with everyone. He’d seen evidence to the contrary for two weeks: when Las had unexpectedly shown up at the staff dining room for dinner and chatted with some of the other trail guides; earlier this week when he’d joined the seasonal staff at the fire pit; and just yesterday when he’d sat with Marco and Reid on the front steps of their cabin, hanging out.
Las was polite. He laughed. He shared stories.
He didn’t flirt.
Except with Marco.
Stifling a grin, he leaned his own weight onto Las and was rewarded with a small smile and an averted gaze that made his stomach flip and bounce into outer space.
“Back again?”
They sprung apart. Las shoved his hands in his pockets and cleared his throat. Marco clutched a print to his chest.
Austin was grinning at them. “That the one you’re getting today?”
“Huh?” Marco glanced down at the print and found he was holding a portrait, a close-up shot of a grinning little girl with freckles wearing a knit hat with a pompom. He wanted to buy it as much as he wanted to watch Las flirt with someone else. “Yes?”
Austin was outright laughing now. Quickly flicking through his stack of prints, he pulled out another one. “How about this one instead?”
The print he handed Marco was a panorama with a wooden fence in the lower third of the image. Above the fence was an indigo sky filled with hundreds of stars, and silhouetted against it were the outlines of two men, taken from behind, stargazing.
“It’s perfect.”
After he’d paid, he said, “How did you get the fence to look like it’s lit up? I’d think it’d be invisible against the sky.”
“It’s . . . complicated,” Austin said, tucking Marco’s cash into a zippered pouch. “That image is actually a composite of two different ones. Maybe three.”
“Three?” Examining the image, Marco tried to find why you’d need three images of the same thing to make one thing.
“Night photography is complex.” Austin leaned in and circled a pinky finger over the fence. “Because the light is in the sky—the stars—if you focus your camera there, everything else ends up in shadow.”
Las shoved his way between them and peered over Marco’s shoulder.
Austin continued after a brief glance at him. “If you want to capture the fence in the dark, you need a separate light source, and you need to focus on the fence and ignore everything else. Then you’re left with two semi-crappy images. Blending them together gets you something like this.”
“I guess you use some kind of photo editing software?”
“Mm-hmm. If you’re interested in photography, I’m running a beginner workshop on Tuesday and Thursday nights this summer starting the second week of July.”
Las was squinting at Austin.
“Really?” Marco perked up. “How do I sign up?”
“Here.” From his back pocket, Austin extracted a slim case from which he removed a business card. He handed it to Marco. “Call my studio, ask for Carine. That’s my assistant. Tell her I said to give you the friends-and-family discount.”
“Awesome! Thanks, Austin.”
“And if you want,” Austin said, pocketing his case, “after the first class we can grab a coff—”
“We’re leaving!” Las announced. Grasping Marco’s upper arm, he shepherded him out of the tent.
Marco waved over his shoulder. “See you next week.”
“Tonight,” Austin corrected. “At the dance party.”
Las growled and marched him forward.
Later that day, when the sun was starting to set, painting the sky the color of fire, Las sat on a table in the recreation building—a repurposed old barn—and watched Marco learn to line dance.
The dance party was in full swing, attended by ranch guests, staff, and townies alike. The recreation building housed daytime activities, like arts and crafts for kids. For the party, the tables and chairs had been placed along the sides of the room to provide seating, and the filing cabinets and shelving units containing the craft supplies were moved into a storage room. It left the center of the barn as a dance floor.
The barn doors were thrown open to the warm evening. On either side of them were tables topped with snacks and drinks: chips, pretzels, a vegetable platter, finger foods like mini cheese balls and sausage rolls, a watermelon rind filled with sliced fruit, plus beer, wine, soft drinks, and water bottles.
“He’s not bad.” Sitting next to him, Reid gestured at Marco.
Marco really wasn’t too bad. First, he observed, no doubt noticing that line dancing was just a series of the same steps over and over again. Then he followed along, catching on to the simple steps fairly quickly. The faster ones tripped him up a little, but by the middle of the song, he was dancing like a native. All that was missing was the cowboy boots.
Marco spotted him and waved. It was too much for him—he lost the rhythm and had to wait it out until the dancers, as one, turned ninety degrees and repeated the sequence facing another direction, to the tune of “Help Me, Rhonda” by the Beach Boys.
Las had no idea what the DJ was thinking, but hey—you could line dance to anything. The proof was right in front of him.
For such a big guy, Marco was adorable in the middle of the dancing crowd. He wore dark blue jeans, a white T-shirt that barely contained his shoulders, a dark brown belt, running shoes, and the cowboy hat that made all sorts of things jump in Las’s chest.
“He’s looking pretty good out there.” Austin appeared at his left elbow, beer in hand.
On his other side, Reid nudged him. “You should join him,” he said quietly. “You know he wants you to.”
Las stilled, side-eyeing Reid. “I don’t do that.”
“Dance?”
“Date.”
Reid smirked. “I didn’t say anything about dating. It’s just a dance, not a lifetime commitment.”
The words lifetime commitment conjured a picture of the two of them, Las and Marco, having dinner on a warm summer evening on the wraparound porch of their future home, after a long day of working the ranch and . . . whatever Marco would be doing.
Las flew off the table. “I don’t… I’m not…”
Reid looked to Austin. “What’s his problem?”
Austin sipped his beer. “He got his heart broken.”
“I didn’t just get my heart broken.” He scowled at Austin. “Ben and I had plans—we were gonna come home, run different areas of the ranch together one day. And he just fucked off to England and decided not to come back, like our future, everything we wanted, didn’t matter.”
“Mine fell out of love with me,” Reid offered.
A sad, wry tilt to Austin’s lips. “Mine’s dead.”
Las winced. Fuck, he was so insensitive. How could he have forgotten that Austin’s wife had died of brain cancer three weeks after their wedding? Las had known the MacIsaacs forever; he’d been there for all of it. The first time Austin had brought Lindsay home on Christmas vacation from college, where they’d met their freshmen year; their first apartment
above a hair salon in downtown Windsor; Austin announcing their engagement and then eight months later, Lindsay’s diagnosis; Lindsay trying to call off the wedding and Austin insisting that he wanted to marry her anyway; Austin’s hopelessness, despair, defeat when she’d passed away.
That was four years ago. Austin wasn’t even in his thirties when he lost the person he loved the most in the world.
It made Las’s problems seem trivial by comparison.
Reid toasted Austin with his beer. “You win.”
“It’s not a competition,” Austin rebutted with an eye roll. “All I’m saying is that if you want something, don’t wait. You never know how much time you have until it’s gone.”
Las had two and a half months before Marco was gone. He narrowed his eyes on Austin and said, “Says the guy who hasn’t dated in four years.” Not that Las blamed him.
“Doesn’t mean I haven’t been ready for a while now.” Austin’s stare trailed past Las, to the dancers who were performing a different line dance to “Hello, Mary Lou” by Ricky Nelson.
Las turned to look. Behind the dancers, on the other side of the room, a small group of the full-time ranch hands sat at a table, engrossed in conversation, Cal among them. Las followed Austin’s gaze, and—
“Marco? That’s who you’re interested in?”
“What?” Austin blinked at him, shaking his head as if to clear it. Then he laughed, a loud guffaw that made Reid grin at him. “Trust me, I’m not interested in your guy. He’s not my type.”
So why had Austin been all chummy with Marco this morning then? “He’s not mine either.”
“You sure about that?” Austin leaned back against the table, next to Reid, who was much too interested in their conversation. “He’s more your type than Ben ever was.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Ben was always flighty and unreliable. You think it surprised me or our parents that he decided to stay in England? He has no idea what he wants and he’s out there looking for it.”
“Marco’s not any better.” It made Las feel like he was betraying Marco to say it, but he wasn’t wrong. “He doesn’t know what he wants either.”
“Ah.” Austin’s eyebrows went up, and he said ah like he’d come to some kind of conclusion. “Why do you keep falling for confused guys?”
“I haven’t—”
“Don’t lie. I have eyes. You think I missed how jealous you got when you thought I was asking him out?”
“Weren’t you?”
“Nope. Just trying to get you to see what’s right in front of your face.”
Las crossed his arms. “You’re an asshole.”
Austin shrugged one shoulder. “An asshole who’s right.”
Blowing out a breath, Las scrubbed his hands over his face and into his hair. “He’s going to be gone at the end of the season.” Jesus, it felt like he’d said that to everyone he knew. “What’s the point?”
“What if you don’t take the chance, Lassiter? And it turns out that Marco is everything you didn’t know you needed.”
“What if I do take the chance, Austin? And I fall hard and fast—” He was halfway there already. “—only for Marco to leave?” He shook his head. “We want different things.”
Reid piped in for the first time. “You just said he doesn’t know what he wants.”
“Well, whatever it is, it’s not this.” Las flung his arms out, lumping together the recreation building, Marco’s job, the ranch, Windsor, all in one wild gesture.
“Have you asked him?” Austin said.
Las scoffed.
“Speaking of Marco.” Reid peered around Las. “Where’d he go?”
Las found him outside, several dozen feet from the recreation building. He sat on the wooden corral fence, feet braced on a lower rung. Las slowed his trek across the grassy slope and ran his gaze over Marco’s broad back, his sturdy shoulders, the brown hair that the sun had added highlights to the last few weeks. It was up off his neck, tied into a messy bun on the crown of his head. Wavy wayward strands escaped to flutter in the breeze and tease his jaw. His hat rested in his lap.
What if you don’t take the chance, Lassiter? And it turns out that Marco is everything you didn’t know you needed.
Needed, Austin had said. Not want. Need.
Las wanted Marco, there was no doubt about that. Had wanted him for a long time. Needing him was another matter entirely and one he wasn’t sure he wanted to visit right now.
Could they meet in the middle? Las’s mind jumped to friends with benefits, but he’d never had a friend who was also a benefit; he wasn’t about to start now. Las didn’t do sex without emotion and emotion was already involved when it came to Marco. Which meant Marco was off-limits.
Fuck. He was thinking way too much for a Saturday.
The sun had dipped behind the mountains but hadn’t fully set, throwing craggy peaks in sharp relief and silhouetting Marco’s frame against the side of the barn. Spine tingling with nerves for reasons he couldn’t name, Las drew up next to Marco and leaned his forearms on the fence next to Marco’s hip.
“Why’d you leave?”
“A lot of people just arrived. Needed some space.”
The horses were tucked into their stalls for the night, but in the middle of the corral, a squirrel scratched its leg.
Las nudged Marco’s elbow. “Looked like you were having fun.”
“I was.” A hint of surprise colored Marco’s tone. “I’ve never line danced before. I did feel out of place in my running shoes though.” He straightened a leg and rotated his ankle, showing off said running shoe. “I’m surprised by how many of the guests have cowboy boots.”
“Actually, the cowboy boot-wearing contingent is mostly from town.”
“That makes sense.”
Marco hopped off the fence. With it between them, he leaned his own forearms against the top railing next to Las, cowboy hat dangling from his fingertips. Their arms brushed, sending Las’s arm hairs standing straight up.
“What are you doing out here?” Marco asked.
Trapped by Marco’s gaze, by the gold striations in the brown, Las said, “Looking for you.”
Electricity sparked where they touched wrist to elbow. There was no part of Marco that wasn’t sexy in a rugged, rough and tumble sort of way. He looked a bit like a California surfer dude, all tousled hair and scruffy jaw and arms Las had dreamed about wrapped around him. They were strong enough to mend his tattered heart.
Marco’s dark eyes dipped to his mouth and Las stilled, breath stuttering, at once anticipatory and wary. They were so close that Las could feel how warm Marco was, the soft puffs of his breaths against his cheekbone, the flyway hair teasing his chin. Marco licked his lips, and Las had to grip the fence to keep himself from lunging.
“My flight leaves tomorrow afternoon,” Marco said softly, his voice twining intimately around Las. “Can I treat you to breakfast first before I head to the airport?”
Treat you to breakfast or treat you to breakfast? Las suspected it was the former, Marco actually wanting to take him out.
On a date.
Las gulped, unable to look away. In the pinks and purples of twilight, as the first stars dotted the sky, as Marco leaned more of his weight on Las’s shoulder, Las couldn’t think of any reason to decline.
But he had to, for both their sakes.
“I can’t,” he whispered roughly. The words tore a piece of himself in two; the pieces crumbled into dust at Marco’s sad closed-mouth smile and falling shoulders. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” There were rocks in Marco’s voice. “I’ll, uh…” He cleared his throat. “I’ll see you when I get back.”
Back from DC, where Marco was essentially trying out for their NHL team after receiving an invitation to their development camp. Further proof that they were heading in different directions.
Marco started to pull away. Las caught him with a hand to his bicep, selfishly unwilling for the tou
ching to end. He let his hand run down Marco’s upper arm to cup his forearm, his thumb making figure eights against the skin of his inner elbow. Marco sucked in a sharp breath. Las rested his forehead against his temple and inhaled the scent of him—woodsy earth and sun.
“I want to say yes,” Las confessed.
Sighing deeply, Marco nuzzled against him, tucking his nose into his cheekbone. “What’s stopping you?”
“The same thing that stopped me in April.” Las wrapped his other hand around Marco’s bicep, holding him near.
“Graduation,” Marco said, repeating Las’s reasoning. His nose tickled Las’s cheek. “Going separate ways.”
“We’re still going separate ways.”
“And you don’t date.”
“I…” Pulling back a couple of inches, Las blinked at him. “I don’t remember saying that.”
“You did.”
And Marco had asked him out again anyway? Taking in the downward slant of Marco’s mouth, the corners of his eyes, Las swallowed the growing lump in his throat and ignored the stinging in his eyes. “Marco—”
“It’s okay.” A corner of Marco’s lips went up like he was trying to smile gamely but couldn’t make himself. “I get it. You’re right; we are headed in different directions.”
Las didn’t want to be. He so, so didn’t want to be.
Marco extracted his arm from Las’s grip. Fear swept through Las in a flash but, startlingly, Marco didn’t move away. After hanging his hat off a post, he stepped closer, the fence still between them, and cupped Las’s face, his thumbs tracing over the end-of-day stubble. His eyes were sad, so sad, but so incredibly kind when he repeated, “I’ll see you when I get back.”
With one last sweep of his thumb over Las’s cheek, as if he knew he wouldn’t be able to touch Las like this again, Marco dropped his hands, stepped away, and retrieved his hat.
“Wait. Where… Where are you going? The party…”
Marco surveyed the recreation building, where the music had only gotten louder, the conversations more frantic, and where the booze was no doubt flowing freely. “I’m partied out for the night.” With a final search of Las’s face, he said, “Goodnight, Las.”
