Still Waters

by Jayne Rylon

  “Stay still. Give it a second. You’re going to love this.” Bill didn’t waste any time. He began riding Bryant, slamming into him hard enough that his balls slapped against Bryant’s taint. Bryant was half-excited and half-terrified. Neither eclipsed his pain.

  He gave it a second.

  He still wasn’t having fun.

  Bryant shouted, “Enough! Get off me! I changed my mind.”

  “I’m almost done.” The guy huffed, then slapped Bryant’s ass, hard. “Stay still. Man up and take it. Fuck yeah.”

  “No, stop!” Bryant started to panic. He balled his fists but couldn’t reach around far enough to get in a swing at the guy taking advantage of him. “I’m serious. Stop. Please…”

  Just as he was about to freak the fuck out, someone shouted, “What the hell is going on in here?”

  In that moment, Bryant felt relief first, followed immediately by a sickening wave of humiliation and shame.

  Jake.

  Bryant couldn’t see what happened then, but he felt Bill’s cock being ripped from his body around the time he heard a dull thud that sounded like a fist smashing into someone’s face. Oh shit. Oh shit.

  He scrambled to his feet, yanking up his pants as fast as he could given the shock of his body and the utter disappointment mixed in with the rest of the swirling emotions assaulting him. Something he’d dreamed about forever had just gotten utterly wrecked. He’d learned his lesson.

  Cowboys weren’t for him.

  “Get the fuck off this ranch. You’re fired. And if I ever see you again, you’ll lose more than your job over this,” Jake snarled, enraged and dangerous in a way Bryant hadn’t fully realized he was capable of. He was seeing a lot of the world for the first time today.

  “Who gives you the right?” Bill had the bad sense to argue. “You’re just some old man—”

  “He’s part of our family,” Bryant barked. It was one thing for someone to come at him, but no one messed with Jake. He stood beside the man he’d come to think of as a surrogate grandfather.

  “None of the Compass brothers will stand for you attacking innocents around here, least of all one of their own children.” Jake spit at the man. “Go ahead and try them if you think they’ll be more lenient than me. You’ll find I’m a cuddly teddy bear in comparison. Start with Silas. He’s always had a soft spot for Bryant. This kid might even be Si’s favorite nephew. It’ll be fun to watch how you handle yourself with someone your own size. Your own age. Someone far stronger and faster, too.”

  Bill paled. The consequences of what he’d done were finally beginning to sink in. “I didn’t need this piece-of-shit job anyway.”

  “That’s good. Because once I spread the word about how you’re compensating for that tiny cock by abusing young men, you’re not going to get another offer within a thousand miles of here.” Jake crossed his arms and spread his feet wide. “Get out of my sight before I change my mind about kicking your ass on the way out.”

  Without another word, the guy turned and ran, his belt buckle clanking with every step. He hadn’t even bothered to finish getting dressed.

  Bryant sagged against the tack room beam. Thank god the barn was there to hold him up.

  His family, the ranch—they would always be there for him to lean on.

  Even when he’d been a colossal idiot.

  “Are you hurt bad, kid?” Jake winced as he caught sight of a streak of blood on Bryant’s pants. It wasn’t anything life-threatening. Alarming enough to make them both realize what might have happened if Jake hadn’t sensed something was off and come to check on him, though. Had Vaughn tipped Jake off somehow?

  Bryant dusted off his jeans and forced himself to stand straight. “I’m fine.”

  “You’re not. But you will be,” Jake promised.

  “I just wanted a kiss,” Bryant croaked. “That’s it. I swear.”

  “You’re a handsome kid, polite, charming, and you’ve got more brains than everyone else on this ranch put together. There’s somebody out there for you. Somebody who will respect you.”

  Bryant studied the wood grain in the floor intensely. “I don’t know. It’s just…the Compass Curse, you know? No one will even look at me once they figure out I’m a Compton.” He shrugged one shoulder. “Every eligible guy in this damn town stays half a mile away from me because they’re afraid of my dad and uncles. And you, of course.”

  “Well, the smart ones are anyway.” Jake grinned. “Didn’t mean to cock block you.”

  Bryant groaned and tried to erase that phrase and Jake using it from his memory. In fact, he wished he could delete the entire day from his medial temporal lobe. He hoped they could walk out of here and never mention it again.

  “Jake, please. Don’t tell my parents, okay?” He swallowed hard, trying his best not to disgrace himself further by crying. But when he thought about having to admit what had happened to his father or Uncle Silas…shit. The last time he’d done that he’d probably been five and had gashed his arm bad enough to need stitches when he’d ignored Jake’s advice not to chase his cousins with pitchforks in this very same barn.

  Damn this place.

  He thought of the letter he’d gotten yesterday, the one he hadn’t even told his family about yet despite bragging to Vaughn about it.

  His mind was instantly made up. He was going to go away to college.

  “Kid, I don’t know…” Jake slapped his hat against his thigh. “That bastard should go to jail for what he did to you. Your uncle Sawyer would have him locked up in a second. You know that, don’t you?”

  Bryant nodded. He did. And that was the problem.

  “I don’t feel right about that.” Bryant cleared his throat. “I might have led him on. I wanted to see what it was like and…well, now I know.”

  “You don’t know shit, Bryant.” Jake whipped a glare in his direction. “If you think that what happened here today is anything like it should be when you make love with someone you care about, and who cares about you, you’re nowhere near as genius as I thought you were. Hell, even if you were just looking to hook up and have a little fun…nope. That’s not what I saw and heard as I came into this barn.”

  Bryant’s face burned. He stared at his boots.

  Then things got even worse. Vaughn bolted through the door. News traveled fast in a small town, faster still on the ranch. “Son of a bitch, Bryant. Are you okay?”

  “Fine.” Like he would admit anything else to the handsome young cowboy who’d turned him down flat.

  “Vaughn, time to get back to work.” Jake came to the rescue again. “I’ve got this covered. Thank you for your concern.”

  Though he opened his mouth as if to argue, Vaughn closed it. They both knew he needed his job to support Snake, who was going downhill fast. “Yes, sir. Sorry.”

  “No need to apologize. Just go on now.”

  With a final lingering glance over his shoulder, he nodded and left.

  Jake mumbled, “Boy, he’s the one you should have been screwing around with.”

  “I tried. He isn’t into me.” Bryant might as well admit it. He had no pride left to object.

  “Hmm.” Jake made a sound somewhere in between disbelief and wisdom. Had it been some other day he almost certainly would have had more to say about the matter than that simple harrumph. But both of them were a little talked out.

  They’d shared enough for one day.

  If only Bryant had stayed and listened, he might have saved himself a whole lot of pain and longing. Because for years after, no one could measure up to the beautiful boy he’d lost before he’d ever had him.

  1

  Six Years Later

  Bryant spun around lazily on a swivel-top stool. He sat at the one of the tall tables in his college’s hydrology laboratory. He couldn’t believe he was running out of time here. The science complex had become his haven over the past six years. It was never really home, exactly. More like a sanctuary.

  Even though he’d been in academic
exile, he’d stayed away knowing someday he’d take everything he learned and apply it, improving his family’s ranching operation back in Wyoming. Still… For a while, it had been a safe place. One where he was judged by his performance and his own actions exclusively, independent from the expectations or privileges that came along with the Compton name.

  After years of taking extra credit loads and advanced coursework, he was set to break the record for the fastest time to earn a PhD in water conservation engineering from his college. All that stood between him and his diploma was one final project. To be exact, it was the proof-of-concept portion of his dissertation, which had otherwise been complete for nearly a month. The theoretical work had all been approved by the school board. Now he had to show that what he’d hypothesized on paper could work in reality.

  The science of it all didn’t scare him. Equations were made to be solved. And he was damn good at it. The emotional impact of returning home—not for a quick holiday visit, but to stay—well, that was kind of freaking him out. He didn’t want to lose the self-sufficient person he’d discovered he could be at school in the herd of Comptons waiting for him to rejoin them. Plus, he felt like he might have been so busy sticking his head in his books that he wasted his chance to stick more fun parts of himself in more fun places. Once he went home, the opportunity to explore his sexuality as a relative unknown would be gone for good. And lately, he’d found himself thinking about relationships more and more.

  It must have been because his cousins Austin and James had recently become infatuated with two particular women, reminding him of what he’d been missing all this time.

  Only one person would understand why. Jake.

  Okay, maybe two, but he would never talk to the other about his anxieties. It was better if he forgot Vaughn Sevan existed. Otherwise he’d start showing up in Bryant’s dreams for a do-over of that fateful day as he sometimes did. As much as Bryant tried not to think about the sexy cowboy, it was hard not to when Jake constantly updated him about the guy. Even his sister, Sterling, periodically mentioned that Vaughn had asked how he was doing when the two of them got together for their coffee breaks at their neighboring shops in town.

  It was hard enough to pretend Vaughn, and the terrible event he was linked to in Bryant’s memory, didn’t exist from here. How the hell would he manage it at home?

  Bryant reread the long line of scribbles covering his whiteboard. He wished it was as easy to solve the rest of his problems. Whether or not he was ready, he was going to have to face them soon.

  As if he were psychic, Jake chose right then to call.

  Bryant grinned as he connected his phone for voice only. Unlike Bryant’s cousins, the Compass Boys, the gruff old ranch hand hadn’t embraced the video chat functions the rest of the world now considered default. “Hey.”

  “How’s it going, kid? Haven’t heard from you in a while. That usually means something’s up.”

  “Here I thought you had super powers. I was just thinking about you.” Bryant couldn’t wait to share his thoughts about what he could do for the ranch.

  Although he’d earned a free ride to university, his parents had still sacrificed by letting him go. It took enormous amounts of manpower to run Compass Ranch. A young, strong guy could be a lot of help. Over Christmas break he’d realized Jake had slowed down. Hopefully he could start picking up some of the slack.

  “If I could have a super power, I wouldn’t waste it on knowing when you wanted to talk to me. I’d fly. Or have laser-beam eyes. No…time travel. That’s it. There are a few things I’d like to change about my younger, foolish days.” Jake sighed then.

  “Me too.” Bryant echoed his sentiment, though he could only imagine how much more Jake had suffered, especially over the loss of the love of his life. Haiwee had left him about a half a century ago, taking Viho—their unborn son—with her. She’d passed away before Jake could reconcile with her. On top of that, he’d spent decades completely oblivious that Viho even existed.

  Maybe it was time Bryant bucked up. Things could be so much worse than his petty drama. Letting one bad choice ruin the prime of his life might be even stupider than the original mistake he’d made.

  After a slightly awkward pause, Jake said, “I was just calling to check up on you. What was on your mind? I’m guessing you wanted to chat about more than the weather. That’s usually Doug’s specialty.”

  Bryant could imagine Jake kicked back in one of the wooden chairs on the porch of the main house. Probably with a toothpick between his lips as he fished the remnants of Aunt Leah’s lunch from between his charmingly crooked teeth. She cooked for him and the rest of the hands most days.

  “Yeah.” No sense in denying it. “I have to finish some practical application stuff for my final project. I think it could be really useful for Compass Ranch. Kill two birds with one assignment, you know?”

  “That doesn’t sound like a problem,” Jake said.

  “It’s not going to be cheap.” Bryant sighed. “The grant I applied for was denied since I’ve already hit the lifetime max for student financial aid through my scholarship.”

  “What’s this project do? And don’t tell me in your fancy scientist mumbo jumbo either.” Jake snorted.

  Bryant thought of the holistic system he wanted to implement in layman’s terms. “It’s a top-to-bottom water conservation, capture, storage, and delivery system. Think of it as drought-proofing the ranch.”

  “For the livestock or the crops?” Jake clarified.

  Although Compass Ranch focused on cattle, there were a bunch of side shoots of business that had developed over the years. Uncle Seth bred horses, and they’d started growing extra hay to sell in case of rough times. Austin had even expanded his trucking services to haul stuff for their neighbors.

  Diversification removed some of the risk from ranching. None of it could function without water. Bryant hoped to protect them all from a crisis situation by ensuring they always had a sustainable hydrological plan, especially given the impact of climate change on the region.

  “Both.” He started to get amped up. “Given the high evapotranspiration rate of the current straw variety, we could start with switching to more tolerant species, then use soil additives and plant border landscaping to retain more moisture. I’ve designed proprietary fixtures and an irrigation delivery network to manage outlays on as small as a plant-by-plant basis. I’d also fortify the drinking supply for the cattle by building a collection system that feeds an underground storage network, a few dams, and retaining ponds. Then we could focus on the purification of wastewater, recycling it instead of letting it run off. With all of the improvements taken into account, I estimate we could supply the ranch with at least two cycles worth of water to be rationed during droughts. That is, once the system comes up to maximum capacity.”

  “What did I tell you about that fancy shit?” Jake growled. “I think what you’re saying is that you know a way to guarantee the ranch could keep on as usual even if it didn’t rain for two whole years?”

  “Yep.” Bryant nodded even though the other guy couldn’t see him. “Probably more. Because if we can also revamp the consumption side—”

  “Bryant, that’s enough.” Jake cut him off.

  He wasn’t excited to hear the rest? Damn, maybe Bryant had misjudged the ranch’s needs.

  “I mean, you don’t have to pitch me any more than that. That’s worth a hell of a lot, kid.” Jake chuckled. “Your dad can be tight with the ranch’s purse strings, especially with all of this season’s expenses, but if you can show him a solid plan to do what you just said, he’ll be writing you a check so fast his pen will melt.”

  “A six-figure check? Seriously?” Bryant should have figured Jake would understand his hesitation.

  This was the first time he could prove to his family that his education had been worthwhile. That what he’d done while he was away had the power to make an impact at least as big as Austin’s with his truck-driving, and James’s with h
is life-saving jumping-out-of-planes manliness, and Doug chasing those tornadoes.

  Sometimes brains were just as important as brawn, right?

  He sure hoped so.

  “Yeah, of course.” Jake got quieter then. “I’m proud of you, Bryant. They are, too. If you can pull off even half of what you think you can, you’ll be making a big difference around here. Fuck, it’s only April and it’s fifteen degrees above average. Mark my words, by July we’re going to be scorched. We’ll need some help to make it through this year. The sooner you can get home, the better.”

  Bryant didn’t know about that. The sooner he went home, the sooner he had to deal with the consequences of his bad decisions. Hopefully he’d be far too busy to worry about the ghosts in the barn.

  Hey, it had worked for the past six years. Why not a few more?

  Whipping out his super powers again, Jake must have picked up on his silence.

  “Have you been letting loose any out there?” Jake wondered, his casual tone one Bryant knew was anything but innocent.

  “Nope.” He had a clean conscience there. “I’ve been studying and working my ass off. It hasn’t been easy to finish these three degrees in the time it takes most people to earn two.”

  “Hmmm.” Jake could show a lot of disapproval with a single sound. Sort of like he had that day…

  “What hmmmm?” Bryant was wiser now. He asked and Jake let him have it.

  “There are plenty of things to learn besides stuff you read about in a book.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like how to find a boyfriend, for one. What to do with him for another.” Jake sounded like he’d gotten to his feet and was pacing the porch.

  “I promise, I learned my lesson, Jake. I’m not going to fool around with the cowboys, causing a ruckus for you, my dad or uncles, or anyone else back home by screwing the help. I swear.”

  Jake cursed beneath his breath. “You idiot, that was never the problem. You weren’t the problem.”

  “Then my choice to wait for the right person—someone I care for, someone I trust—shouldn’t cause any issues either.” It felt good to say it out loud. When his cousins teased him about his living the monk life, he brushed it off. With Jake, he could be honest. The guy knew why he felt that way.