“Honestly, I don’t do much outside of working on the land,” he said, scraping his fingernails across his chest and my gaze couldn’t resist following his hand over all of that golden skin.
The smattering of auburn hair that sat in small tufts in the center of his chest and then ran in a trail below his shorts was so sexy. I imagined being on my knees right then discovering what treasure lay beneath that zipper. Holy fuck.
I squeezed my eyes shut before my boner filled with more blood.
“Genetics, I guess,” he said, in a throaty voice. When I opened my eyes, he was watching me. “And your physique is just fine, by the way.”
We stared at each other for a long awkward moment as I got my breathing, as well as my cock, under control. It was time to end this little outing before he saw the desire plain as day in my eyes.
“I’m going to head back,” I said and without warning, took off into the brush, my body too overheated as it was. I wanted to get back to the house and jump into a cool shower.
He trailed behind me at first and I wondered if his muscles had tightened up on him or if he was done with this excursion as well. Soon enough though, he was beside me, breathing evenly through his nose.
We ran in silence most of the way back. But I could tell there was something he was stewing on. He had this habit of fishing his bottom lip through his teeth when he was about to say something.
“Are you and my sister…” he asked suddenly.
“Getting serious?” I said, filling in the blank. He must’ve read into something I said back there.
He nodded and I saw him swallow roughly, as he waited on my answer.
“You’re pretty protective, aren’t you?” I smirked.
“Wouldn’t you be?” he asked, side-eyeing me.
“Sure,” I said, shrugging. “Believe it or not Cassie is fierce and can handle herself.”
“Even still,” he said and I could picture how he might’ve been when they were kids. How Callum was probably defensive over his siblings after his mother passed.
“Don’t worry so much,” I said, attempting to reassure him. “All is well. If we don’t work out she’s an amazing girl and we’ll always be friends. I’ll keep a watch out.”
His eyebrows lifted. “You’re already banking on not working out?”
Fuck, I needed to stop putting my damn foot in my mouth.
“I’m saying I would never intentionally hurt her and vice versa,” I said, trying to smooth over my earlier statement.
No goodbyes were said when we finally made it back, we simply headed in opposite directions.
8
Callum
It was plain stupid to have gone on that run with Dean. Not only because my muscles were protesting but also because now I liked him more, was even more attracted to him. His trim body was exactly the kind I preferred, and those full lips sipping from that water bottle nearly sent me to my knees.
I still didn’t know whether he had good intentions toward my sister, but my intuition told me he probably did. Good news was that he’d be gone in a few days time and I’d be left with my fantasies, my hand, and a lingering hard-on.
Today we had a last minute group of shooters at the gun range. They’d be finished by the afternoon because of prep time for the approaching wedding ceremony, but that extra money would help us sit tight this month. Daddy always worried too much about the years ahead, even though I reassured him that our family was sitting a nice little nest egg.
But he figured some kind of emergency was bound to happen to put us in debt right quick. Grammy always said that his logic had completely changed since Mom had died and he could never shake the feeling that his world might be turned upside down again.
Braden was in charge of loading the targets and after I washed up, I headed over in the three-wheeler, since it was more stable on uneven terrain, to see if he needed additional help.
I ignored the rush of the shower from the direction of the guest bathroom as well as the steam escaping beneath the door¸ as Dean got ready for his day. I adjusted myself on the uncomfortable seat as I pictured his naked chest. The inky black hair surrounding his nipples that became taut as pencil erasers from the cool air at Pines Ledge. Imagining what the rest of him looked like wasn’t going to help matters much.
Fuck, I needed to cut this shit out. But I couldn’t help my illusions from running rampant when I noticed him checking me out. I knew it was only in a curious kind of way but damn if it didn’t get my blood pumping.
I pulled up to the range just as a group of five men exited their trucks. Braden was greeting them and beginning his spiel about the target practice.
I sidled up behind the group to listen to my older brother, who was the consummate professional and was fantastic as the face of our family business. I was better suited and entirely more comfortable behind the scenes.
“We rent shotguns here, but if you brought your own,” he said, nodding to the man who had his double barrel semi-automatic leaning against his leg, “that’s cool.”
I caught Braden’s eye and he shook his head at me, telling me in his own way that he had the session under control. Still I stuck around and helped lead them to the range and got them each placed in their own slot. Protective eye gear and earplugs were distributed to help blot out noise.
Braden and I stepped to the side to allow everyone to regroup and aim at the individual targets. I suspected some of these men were hunters, like the man who had brought his own equipment, more than likely to keep his skills sharp. But the others might’ve tagged along as part of a male bonding trip, which seemed more likely to me. There was a lot of shouting and high fives.
They rented the pen for an hour of time before switching to the wobble deck to shoot at clay targets. Afterward, we needed to hightail it over to the open field on the south end to help clear more brush for the ceremony.
My cousin had hired some low-rent wedding planner. The whole nine yards at a bargain price as Grammy called it, so essentially they were only using our property. But we were lending them chairs and tables and were instructed by our daddy to help if they needed anything moved or supplied.
“Is Jennifer staying out here for the wedding?” I asked Braden. Jennifer was the girl he’d been dating for the past year. She was a nice person, but if I was being honest, I didn’t know if she was the one for him. We had all grown up together in Roscoe, everybody knew each other’s business, and this was a relationship that arose after a trip to one of the only local bars.
“She’d like to,” Braden said, not sounding as enthusiastic as he should about the woman he’d been spending his time with. She had been placing pressure on Braden to get engaged but he was resisting at every turn. He was a hard person to talk to about it however, shooting me down every time I’d tried bringing it up in the past. Not that I was much more forthcoming about my own dating prospects. It was in my senior year of high school that I finally admitted to myself that I was gay.
Everything had gone haywire when I was twelve years old. After my mom died, Grammy stepped up to the plate to help raise Billie. She’d been living on the property anyway and her son—my father—needed all the help he could get. He was distraught by the sudden death of my mother, though they were told it was a high-risk pregnancy—we all were. Losing your mother felt like losing your foothold in the world. Suddenly everything had turned dark and terrible and devastating, like somebody had vacuumed up the sun.
It wasn’t until Billie had his first seizure as a toddler that we snapped out of the fog and realized that he needed services or we’d lose him, too.
Despite us rallying as a family around the care of Billie for a few years, I had retreated inside myself after realizing I had a mad crush on the star pitcher of my high school baseball team. I avoided the locker room when he was changing, terrified that I would pop a boner. Having to stare at his tight ass in those white baseball pants from the outfield was torture enough.
I had been dealing with all
of these crazy hormones and feelings and I didn’t know where to put them. I had even pulled away from Cassie, whom I was closest to growing up.
Years later, I still felt her confusion and hurt over it.
Truth was, I was terrified of coming out in this small, conservative township, and I was worried she wouldn’t understand, so I isolated myself, losing her companionship in the process.
“How come you don’t have a guest for this wedding?” Braden asked and I stiffened. He hadn’t questioned me about my dating life in awhile. I pretended to see this girl occasionally when I headed into Gainesville, but it was really Jason, who met me sometimes for a quick hookup. “What about that girl, Sheila?”
I waffled, grasping at straws and then came up with my standard answer. “She’s busy.”
He narrowed his eyes. “She’s always busy.”
Whatever,” I said, watching the group of men who probably all had wives waiting for them back home.
My first sexual experience in college was with Jason, and he taught me the ropes, so to speak, as I earned my Associate degree in Agriculture at the University of Florida. College opened up a few gay doors for me but living where I did now just pushed me further back in the closet. Then Cassie had earned her bachelor’s degree, working toward her master’s next. She left me here to suffer silently and we had grown further apart with each passing year.
“At least I’m not stringing somebody along because I’m too chicken to say goodbye,” I muttered, kicking at a stone on the ground.
“It’s more complicated than that,” Braden bit out and then sighed because he knew I was right. “She’s a good girl. I like spending time with her.”
“I get it,” I said, bumping his shoulder. “As long as you’re clear where this is going. Then she’s free to walk away if she needs to.”
The arrangement I had with Jason and any other guy over the years was no strings attached. Jason was out to his family and friends and has had boyfriends here and there, but he understood my situation. That I was next in line to run this family business, that we relied on this income, and that breaking my father’s heart yet another time was not a decision that I could make lightly.
“Is that the ‘arrangement’ you have with Sheila?” he asked using air quotes.
I ignored his quip, but damn, telling him the truth was right on the tip of my tongue, because sometimes it was exhausting, hiding who you really were. “Yeah, man.”
9
Dean
After my shower, I got dressed, not sure what the day would bring. I had agreed to come to this family wedding with Cassie and pretend to be her date, but who would’ve known how difficult it would prove to be? Or even guessed that I’d be so wildly attracted to her brother? He was as different from me as the sun to the moon, besides being straight and so not into me.
“Dean, can I talk to you?” Cassie asked on the other side of the bedroom door.
After I let her in, she walked around the room eyeing the dresser and knickknacks, maybe having forgotten what this room looked like. She brushed her fingers over the angel figurines all lined in a row and I imagined her mother showing them to her as a child. She had a photo of her mom back at our apartment and I knew how much Cassie had favored her.
“How was your run?” she asked me absently, her mind somewhere far off, tucked away in a memory.
“It was good,” I said, licks of heat curling around my stomach remembering Callum’s torso in all his sweaty glory. “Your brother joined me.”
She turned abruptly to face me. “My bro—”
“Callum,” I said. “He wanted to be sure I was safe…I guess.”
There was a blend of emotions in her gaze. Pride and melancholy mixed together. When she sat down on the edge of my bed, still thinking about it, I decided now was the time to ask.
I placed my hands on her shoulders in a light massage, like I always did. “Why doesn’t any of your family know this is just made up between us?”
“Because the general consensus is that I jumped ship and I’ve been trying real hard to show everybody that I’m doing just fine on my own. I don’t need to marry somebody from back home,” she said, rolling her neck. “Even if it disappoints my dad. He always said I had a restless spirit like my mom.”
Cassie had never seemed restless to me, though she kept herself plenty busy. More so I saw her as outgoing and bubbly. Maybe living in a bigger city was what she needed after all.
“What about your Grammy?” I asked, more than curious about the woman who helped raise them.
“She is the best kind of lady. But truth be told, she remains Switzerland around here. The way a grandmother should be, I suppose,” she said. “She was always there to listen. But she knew how to keep neutral. Even on this Jerry thing. It was kind of infuriating. Mom would’ve put dad in his place. Told him to back off. ”
I smiled, imagining an older version of Cassie, telling it like it is.
“Your siblings?” I asked, staying general, even though I really wanted to zero in on the one brother. “Somebody you can confide in?”
Her eyes took on this sad, faraway look. “Callum and I used to be real close.”
I sat down on the bed next to her and reached for her hand. “What happened?”
“He closed himself off. It was the summer after his senior year of high school,” she said in a sad voice. “He just…I don’t know. Wasn’t the same brother anymore. To me. He was always there for Billie though, no matter what.”
I felt a pang in my chest remembering how Callum had talked to Billie last night at the fire. How sensitive and vulnerable he’d sounded soothing his brother’s fears. I imagined what it would be like to be close to your sibling and them all of sudden not.
It had happened in a physical sense with my brother Shawn, who had died of leukemia. But that was altogether a different kind of pain. Maybe the same kind of ache that Callum was fearful of experiencing.
“Did something happen to Callum?” I asked, my heart beating out of my chest, wondering what would make somebody disappear inside of themself.
“Not that I could ever put my finger on,” she said. “Unless it had to do with making a decision about helping run Shady Pines. Braden was already assisting dad, but Callum seemed unsure at the time. Grammy would say he needed to sow his wild oats.”
“And did he?” I said, laughing at the terminology, especially when she said it in her southern twang. “Sow them?”
“I have no idea,” she said, throwing her hands up as if perplexed. “I have never even seen Callum with a girl. Not like Braden. Callum would go into town sometimes—maybe he was seeing somebody, maybe not. But one thing was for sure, he never told anybody about it.”
I pondered that a second. Callum sure as heck seemed reserved, but more like stuff was just bubbling at the surface for him. Like he could explode at a moment’s notice, yet only allowed you small glimpses of everything he was holding inside.
“Anyway,” she said, standing up. “Don’t want to keep Grammy waiting. Meet you at the breakfast table.”
I pushed a comb and some gel through my hair, trying to appear halfway decent—for whom, I wasn’t sure anymore—and then sat down at the kitchen table to inhale the most amazing breakfast with my coffee.
“These have got to be the best pancakes ever,” I said around a mouthful and Cassie grinned.
“Grammy is the best cook,” she said, pouring more maple syrup on her stack.
Billie was eating his fill across the table from me but the other Montgomery men were nowhere to be found. They probably had a million things to do on this land and I was learning to appreciate exactly what the job entailed simply from twenty-four hours of being here.
“Want to go for a ride with me on some four-wheelers?” Billie asked after a nibble from a long strip of crispy bacon. I wondered if there was a hog’s farm somewhere around here as well. I found the thought didn’t bother me as much this time around. Besides, no way to escape carnivores aroun
d mealtime, even in the city.
I looked to Cassie with raised eyebrows.
“Billie knows his way around this property like the back of his hand and he can ride the four-wheeler as long as somebody is nearby, in case…”
“In case I have a seizure,” Billie said, wiping his mouth. It was the first time anybody had mentioned his illness out loud in front of me. They had years to get used to the idea, I’d only just found out, so I tried to keep my face neutral. “But Bullseye will be with me too. And he’ll know ahead of time, if…”
“Bullseye can’t help if you fall off the bike,” Grammy said, pointing her spatula at him. “Dean here would be a dear to ride with you.”
“I’d love to go,” I said and Grammy threw me a wink before she flipped more pancakes in the scalding pan. I felt like I had just been awarded a gold star.
“Now don’t get crazy swerving that bike along those back roads, Billie,” Grammy warned as he hustled out the door, Bullseye on his heels. Then she turned a critical eye on me. “You keep him in check, you hear?”
“Will do,” I said, in a salute, and then kissed Cassie on the cheek before carrying my empty breakfast plate to the sink.
I met Billie near the garage entrance as he waited impatiently on his four-wheeler, adjusting the strap of a sturdy white helmet. A second vehicle caked with mud was parked alongside. I had only been on one of these all terrain vehicles once in my life, but remembering how to fire up the engine was simple enough.
When I got the motor humming, I nodded in Billie’s direction. He rolled ahead of me, driving at a slower pace while Bullseye ran beside. I wasn’t sure if his speed was for the dog’s benefit or my own, but I appreciated being able to get my bearings and a good look at the property at the same time.
As we cruised up and down the trails, I realized it was a hell of a lot of fun to simply take in the scenery while the wind whipped at my back. It was kind of how I felt on my bike in the city, except it was all concrete and busy sidewalks that you had to navigate around. This was serene and leisurely and wide open. Plus, the camaraderie wasn’t so bad, either.
The Deepest Blue (Roadmap to Your Heart #2) Page 5
