Home for a Cowboy (Windsor, Wyoming Book 1)

by Amy Aislin

  Marco had taken his heart with him, all the way to DC, and Las was floundering without it. Without him.

  How did people in love manage long-distance relationships? Not that he was in love. Just . . . longing. Intense like. Desire and attraction.

  Fuck, maybe he was in love. What did he know?

  A door closed down the hall. Las rolled his chair to his own doorway. Alice, dressed in ankle-height cowgirl boots, a loose and flowy knee-length white dress with a red belt, and a jean jacket, stood outside her closed bedroom door, thumbs working on her phone.

  Interest peaked for the first time in days, Las cocked his head. “Where are you off to?”

  With a smug smile, she dropped her phone into a small clutch the shape of a large wallet. “I have a date.”

  Las blinked at her. “With who?”

  “John.”

  “Which John?” There were two ranch hands named John, plus his mom’s landscaper, and… Las was sure there was another one. Maybe in guest services?

  “He’s a sous chef at Fire & Sky.”

  Fire & Sky was their high-end restaurant at Windsor Ranch House. “You’re dating one of the seasonal workers?”

  No doubt she caught the contempt in his voice. Her smile turned into an unimpressed tightening of the lips compounded with a squinty-eyed don’t judge me, asshole look. “Unlike you, I’m not looking for Mr. Right. Just Mr. Right Now. I want to have fun. If I want to date twelve men at a time, you don’t get to say anything about it.”

  His eyes popped. “Twelve?”

  She waved a hand. “Not that I am. I’m just saying. Maybe if you had a little fun,” she mumbled, almost too low for him to hear, “you wouldn’t be such a stick in the mud.”

  He didn’t know which part to argue first—that he wasn’t looking for Mr. Right or that he wasn’t a stick in the mud. In the end, he went with, “I’m not…”

  Alice just stared at him, waiting for him to finish.

  “Well.” He coughed once. “Have fun with . . . John.” While you can, he almost added.

  “I know you think it’s stupid to date a seasonal worker—”

  “I didn’t say anything!”

  “But isn’t it stupider not to take advantage of us both being in the same place at the same time?”

  “Okay.” He could see the logic there, but his planning-for-the-future self had trouble grasping the concept long-term. “But what’s the point when he won’t be here three months from now?”

  “God!” Exasperated, she threw her hands up. “You sound like a broken record.” She stomped toward him, her boots making little muffled thumps against the carpet, squeezed his face in her hands until his lips puckered, and kissed his forehead. “I love you, little brother, but you need to live a little. Seize the day!”

  With that, she turned on her heal, trounced down the hall, and disappeared down the stairs.

  Seize the day, huh? Las wasn’t used to living life day by day like Alice and Marco. He was more the seize-the-future type. Plans, charts, commitments, planning ahead, to-do lists.

  “How do you seize the day without losing yourself?” he called.

  But she was already gone.

  MARCO ARRIVED BACK AT WINDSOR Ranch in time for the Fourth of July party. Party, however, was too tame a word. Festival was more like it. Horse-drawn carriage rides, a scavenger hunt, stalls set up with local bakeries and cafés selling tarts and iced coffees and patriotically themed cookies, a bingo table, a pop-up bouncy castle for kids, a clown making balloon animals, a puppet theater, face painting.

  The whole town had shown up. Seemed like it anyway. There were people everywhere, taking guided tours of the horse barn, towing kids to the next fun thing, licking popsicles, leashed dogs trailing behind them.

  Reid had picked him up at the airport, and they walked together from the house to the staff cabins for Marco to deposit his duffel, weaving around toddlers and senior citizens and everyone in between. Twilight darkened the sky, and it smelled like hot dogs and sunscreen.

  Reid said, “Jesus, I think it’s busier now than when I left to get you.”

  “Fireworks are starting soon, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah.”

  People were rolling out beach towels and picnic blankets, claiming their spot on the grassy hill outside Windsor Ranch House. There were so many people that cars and trucks had been parked on the side of the highway for miles.

  “We should grab our own spots,” Reid said as they jogged up the steps of their cabin. “Most of the seasonal staff is watching from the fire pit.”

  Marco dropped his duffel on his bed. “Have you seen Las?”

  “Not since the dance party.”

  Since the night Marco had created this distance between them.

  Was Las out in the crowd somewhere? If so, Marco would never find him. Did he plan on watching the fireworks from somewhere else? His bedroom at home, a vantage point in the fields on the other side of the highway, the highest window in Windsor Ranch House? Was he avoiding the crowd and festivities altogether and hiding out at his tent?

  It wasn’t until he and Reid emerged from their cabin and found Las at the bottom of the steps, dark hair made darker by night’s fall, that Marco realized he’d been compartmentalizing a secret fear that Las would never talk to him again.

  The ball of tension in his gut unraveled. “Hey.”

  “Hey.”

  Reid clasped his shoulders from behind. “I’m joining the others at the fire pit. See you both later.”

  Marco didn’t notice him disappear.

  Las cocked his head. “What are you doing right now?”

  Marco swept his gaze up Las’s tall frame. The cowboy boots, the jeans that hugged his thighs, the fog-gray T-shirt stretched across his torso, the leather cord with the green jewel clasped around his wrist. His body language was relaxed, one hand in his back pocket as if he’d put their . . . disagreement? differences?. . . behind him. Something about the open posture, the lazy smile, the familiar glint of something green on his person, made the craving for him that Marco always felt—but kept on the back burner—start to simmer.

  Voice dropping, he said, “Whatever you want,” and locked his knees to prevent himself from lunging at Las.

  Las led him to the barn, where an already saddled Harriet waited with a second horse.

  “This is Juniper,” Las said. “One of the horses we use for guest horseback rides and riding lessons.”

  “We’ve met.”

  Juniper was beautiful, a mottled white and brown like what you’d expect a typical storybook cow to look like, and a short copper mane. Three of her legs were fully brown; the hind right leg was white.

  As he passed by Harriet, she stuck her nose in his chest. “Hi, Harriet.” He patted her shoulder. “Sorry I don’t have any apple slices. Didn’t expect to see you so soon.” To Las, he said, “Where are we going?”

  “To watch the fireworks.” Las climbed into the saddle, all grace and ease and familiarity.

  Marco’s own climb was jerky and awkward, a fact Las didn’t miss judging by the lips he pressed into a line to keep from laughing.

  “Shut up,” he mumbled.

  Las’s chuckle was everything he’d needed since the dance party. “It gets easier the more you ride. Are you still taking lessons?”

  “Yeah, but it’s less frequent with the onset of the busy season. Once or twice a week.”

  Outside, Marco and Juniper followed Las and Harriet to the highway, where they walked parallel to the line of cars parked bumper to bumper until they found an opening large enough for their horses to fit through. Juniper was a docile horse. Marco barely had to do anything to get her to follow Harriet, whereas Harriet tossed her head and huffed as if she wanted to be doing anything else. Horse and man appeared to be in tandem; Las also appeared to want to be doing something else if the pace he set once they crossed the highway was anything to go by.

  Marco tried to remember what he’d been taught about keep
ing an imaginary straight line from his ear, shoulder, hip, to his heel, and holding his hands at hip-level and his elbows at his sides, and following the movement of the horse with his seat and core, and sitting straight but supple, and moving his arms and hands to prevent the reins from getting too long, and to watch where he was going, and the fourteen hundred other tips he’d been given over the course of the past few weeks. It was a lot to remember.

  Las was born to it. The ease with which he controlled his horse—hell, the confidence he exuded—it was sexy as hell.

  They left Harriet and Juniper in the barn behind Las’s family home, then headed to the pickup truck parked behind the house.

  Where blankets and sleeping bags had been spread out in the bed.

  Grinning, he hopped into the passenger side without any prompting.

  “Tell me about camp,” Las said once they were on the road.

  The last time they’d done this trip, it’d been full dark, everything invisible except for Las’s profile in the driver’s seat and the peaked mountains silhouetted against the sky. Now, Marco saw the dirt path they traveled on, the wooden fence lining either side of it, the fields beyond, currently empty, and the slate-gray and pearl-white mountains in the distance.

  “It was good. Really good. But…”

  “But?”

  The car bumped over a rocky patch in the road as Marco recounted to Las most of what he’d told his family just last night.

  “I learned a lot. More than I expected to. There was more classroom time than I anticipated.”

  Las glanced over at him quickly before pulling over to the right, alongside the fence. “Still not hearing the but.”

  Marco scrubbed his jaw. “At times it felt like a dog and pony show.”

  They jumped out of the truck and met at the back, where Las lowered the tailgate. “You said that’s not camp’s purpose, right? It’s more about learning and developing skills?”

  “Yeah.”

  Las removed his boots and climbed in, sitting with his back against one side. Marco did the same.

  “But it sometimes felt like we were being paraded in front of buyers. It felt . . . wrong. Like they weren’t seeing me as a full-blown human with feelings and desires and a whole history. Just a guy with the skills they might need.” He tilted his head back, regarding the sky and the stars. “I’m not explaining it right.”

  “I get what you’re saying,” Las said. “Like being on display to be bought.”

  “Yes! Exactly.”

  “I avoid horse auctions for the same reason. You can tell there’s a lot of appreciation for horses in that kind of environment, but it’s never sat right with me.”

  They were quiet for a stretch, as if they were getting reacquainted with each other’s presence.

  Las said, “Was there anything about it you did like?”

  “Oh man.” Marco’s grin pulled wide. “Being on skates again reminded me of why I kept playing in the first place. And it was fun. I got introduced to all of the coaches, played with some of the vets, and the other guys in the camp were great.”

  A crackle and a shower of sparks lit the sky, the fireworks show finally starting now that full dark had claimed the horizon. Color streaked above, white, red, blue, purple, igniting the sky on the other side of Windsor, miles away.

  “The view from here’s amazing,” Marco said in awe. “No wonder everyone’s watching them from your property.”

  “We did the fireworks one year, when I was little. I don’t remember very much about it except that it startled the horses so bad it took most of the ranch hands to calm them. Haven’t done it since then.”

  “Don’t blame you.”

  When the show was over and the last firework faded away, leaving only a translucent smoky trail behind, Las sighed deeply and slouched against him. Marco couldn’t help himself if he wanted to—he stuck his nose in Las’s hair and inhaled the scent of horse and summer.

  “How are you?” he asked. “Your week’s going okay?”

  “Don’t tell anyone.” Las was sleepy and cuddly. “But I missed you.”

  Hope expanding in his chest, Marco leaned his own weight against him. “Secret’s safe with me.”

  Marco was forcefully shaken awake sometime in the middle of the night. “Wha…?” Blinking blearily, he squinted into the red light of Las’s flashlight before registering the dampness on his face.

  “Come on, get up.”

  “Wha…?” As he sat up, his sleeping bag squelched, little rivulets of water trailing into the blankets beneath him. The very wet blankets. “It’s raining.”

  “No shit.” Las sat on the tailgate. “Damn it, there’s water in my boots.”

  Marco, in the way of the sleep-deprived everywhere, found this hysterical, and he laughed as he crawled his way to sit next to Las.

  Las turned to scowl at him. “Just wait and see what yours are like, asshole.”

  Soaked. Marco’s running shoes didn’t just have water in them, they might as well be made of water at this point.

  The drizzle Marco had woken to increased to a steady patter as they bundled wet sleeping bags and blankets in their arms; increased to the kind of sheet-rain that was a bitch to drive through, windshield wipers on their highest speed but you still couldn’t see the car in front of you. In seconds, they were drenched. Having stripped off his jeans before climbing into his sleeping bag earlier, Marco’s white briefs were no doubt see-through, his feet were freezing, his T-shirt was plastered to him, and his hair hung lank to his shoulders, a tangled rat’s nest.

  After shoving everything into the space behind the front seats, they climbed into the truck, the doors slamming behind them a muffled thump underneath the steady drum of the rain pelting the top of the truck, the cab, the hood. The sound was almost tinny. It could’ve been musical had Marco not been so damn cold.

  “Jesus.” Las shoved hair out of his eyes, making his bangs stick straight up, and stared out the windshield. The rest of his hair was plastered to his head like a swim cap. Like Marco, he too was in briefs, black ones that hugged all of the important bits and enticingly outlined his cock and balls. T-shirt soaked through, dripping into the seats and onto the floor. Vaguely Marco had the thought that he hoped their jeans had been in the blanket bundles they’d thrown into the back, but mostly his mind kept focusing on a half-naked, wet Lassiter in the dimness of the overhead light.

  It was everything Marco had dreamed of and more.

  The biceps, defined and straining his T-shirt, developed over a lifetime of manual labor. Brawny, hairy thighs several shades paler than the skin on his arms and face. Water tracking down his face, dripping off the end of his nose and jaw.

  Las turned to him…

  And they burst into laughter.

  The overhead light switched off. Marco scrubbed his wet face with his wet hands. “Didn’t you check the weather before we came out here?”

  “Yes. The rain was supposed to hold off until mid-morning.” Las’s gaze swept him up and down, alighting briefly on his see-through briefs, before he met Marco’s eyes with a grin. “You look like you took a swim and forgot a towel.”

  Marco grinned with him. “You’re not any better.”

  “Jesus,” Las repeated around a small chuckle. “Let’s get out of this rain, yeah? I don’t think it’s gonna let up anytime soon.”

  Las took the path slowly, high beams highlighting the brown sludge they drove through and the rain falling straight down in rivers. He parked as close to the barn as he could get and turned to Marco. “Ready?”

  “I mean, I’m already wet.”

  They jumped out. Pellets stung Marco’s shoulders. Removing one of the blanket bundles from the back, he then met Las—bundle of his own held close—at the barn doors.

  Inside, it was bright and warm, yet loud from the rain hitting the rooftop, and it smelled like horse and hay and slightly leathery.

  Las dropped his bundle. “Be right back.”

  Marco hunc
hed his shoulders and shivered. Somewhere, a horse whinnied.

  Less than a minute later, Las was back with fluffy bath towels that he’d retrieved from somewhere. “We keep them in the tack room,” he explained at Marco’s questioning look. “In case any of the ranch hands get caught in the rain.”

  Marco dried off, scrubbing the towel over every inch of exposed skin in an effort to beat the chill that had settled in. But with his dripping underwear, T-shirt, and hair, and his feet still in wet shoes… What he really needed was a change of clothes. Las too.

  “Come on.” Las picked his bundle back up. “Help me lay these out.”

  It was even warmer in the hayloft; Marco started to unthaw a little as he helped Las spread the blankets, sleeping bags, and their jeans over the railing to dry. The hayloft was big enough to convert into an apartment. It was all exposed beams and wooden support posts and square windows placed high up the wall, out of reach without a ladder or standing on one of the taller stacks of hay bales. Other than hay—lots and lots of it—there were a couple of rakes leaning against a wall and in a metal bucket were a pair of scissors and some twine.

  “Ugh.” Las passed a towel over his hair. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Not your fault meteorology isn’t an exact science.” Marco couldn’t remember the last time he’d been caught in the rain so badly. On a walk back to the dorms from class maybe?

  “Tell me about it.” The towel went over the back of Las’s neck. “At least it wasn’t hail. We’d be a bloodied mess. Or snow. We’ve had snow in July before. I think the last time was…”

  Marco lost all hearing as Las removed his shirt.

  Wet muscles on full display, rippling in the low light of the single bulb hanging from a string. A prominent vein in Las’s right bicep that Marco wanted to lick all the way to his shoulder. A smooth chest, his nipples a pale, pale brown, like diluted chocolate. Baby fine dark brown hair trailing from his navel and disappearing into his briefs. Black briefs that left nothing to the imagination and cupped the tightest ass Marco’d ever seen.

  The craving that had been a simmer earlier erupted into a boil, sending a feverish heat into his extremities, flushing his skin. Every part of him became hyperaware of everything—his T-shirt clinging to him, the briefs that were becoming uncomfortably chafey against his skin, his own heightened breaths, the water dripping down the back of his neck, the raised hairs on his forearms. His skin was too tight for his body, his nails too sensitive.