by A. M. Arthur
“Damn,” Wes said. “The food alone is going to be worth the price of admission.”
“You aren’t kidding,” Derrick said.
The Reynolds family was already seated and eating, and by the time their trio got plates and sat down, the dude-bros had arrived. The Chamberlains followed a minute later, and eventually everyone except Sophie and Conrad was eating and chatting.
Almost everybody.
Miles kept his head down and picked at the biscuit he’d covered in some kind of red jam, tearing it apart more than eating. Wes leaned over, pitched his voice low, and asked, “You feeling okay?”
“Not really hungry,” Miles replied. “Never been much of a breakfast person.”
Made sense. At home, Wes had never paid any particular attention to Miles’s eating habits. Wes was a food person no matter the meal or time of day, so he dug into his own heaped plate. Everything was delicious, just like last night’s barbecue.
“You should at least taste the sausage gravy,” Wes said. “It’s supergood.”
Miles reached over and speared a piece of gravy-covered sausage off Wes’s plate, then popped it into his mouth. “You’re right, it’s really good. Not too spicy, right amount of salt.”
Sophie and Conrad joined them about fifteen minutes later, and it took all of Wes’s self-control not to make a lewd comment. As they got their food, though, his curiosity rose. Conrad didn’t have the self-satisfied smirk of a guy who’d just gotten lucky; Sophie looked excited, but in an “I’ve got a secret” way, not an “I worked in a quickie with my fiancé” way.
Excited-Sophie-with-a-secret made Wes nervous.
After he finished, Wes put his plate and coffee mug in the required bus bin, then wandered out to the front porch. The morning air was still relatively cool, but the sun would scorch the earth in a few hours and raise the temperatures. He watched the open doors of the barn for any sign of Mack, but saw only a few of the other cowboys go in and out.
A blue shirt and brown hat flashed in his periphery, and Wes shifted his attention to the main house. Mack descended the steps of the front porch, a tablet in hand, all frowny-face about something. Wes loved Mack’s frowny-face. It made him look dangerous, like a growly-bear cowboy who’d ride him hard and put him away wet.
Wes’s dick took interest, and as if he’d read his mind, Mack looked up from his tablet. Right into Wes’s eyes. His belly swooped in a funny way. Mack’s frown deepened in a way that made Wes feel like he was the reason for Mack’s bad mood. Mack broke eye contact, then stalked toward the barn.
Weird.
“Okay, so don’t be mad,” Sophie said behind him.
No good conversation ever starts like that.
Wes turned in a slow pivot, only to find Sophie beaming at him, Conrad and Derrick looking way too neutral, and Miles frowning at the porch. “What did you do?” Wes asked.
“This morning before breakfast, I signed us all up for an overnight camping trip,” she replied. “They offer them Monday, Wednesday and Friday night for anyone interested.”
He vaguely remembered reading about that on the website and—“Hold up, camping trip? As in, sleeping on the ground in a tent?”
“Exactly. How cool does that sound?”
“Are you nuts?” Wes pressed the back of his hand to her forehead. “Are you feverish? Have you met me?”
Sophie knocked his hand away. “You’ll be fine.”
“I’ll be the one who gets eaten by a mountain lion.”
“Not if you don’t wander off,” Conrad said, visibly holding back laughter.
Okay, so Wes was being a diva over this. But camping? “I hate dirt.”
“Dude, if I have to do this, so do you,” Miles said. “It could be kind of fun, too.”
Wes heaved a dramatic sigh. “Okay, fine. I’ll suffer some dirt for the fun of the group and my sister’s good time.”
Sophie squealed, then tried to smother him with a hug. “Good choice.”
“When do we leave?”
“After lunch, but to go we have to spend some of the morning working with the horses. Getting to know which one we’ll ride on the trail.”
Well, now, that certainly explained Mack’s expression. Working with the horses meant being around the horse master himself, which gave Wes plenty of chances to flirt. Camping was starting to look like a lot of fun.
* * *
Three different nights. Three different camping trips led by three different sets of ranch hands, and Wes had to go and sign up for Mack’s night. One in three chance, and he’d beaten the odds, and now Mack was stuck close to the guy for the next twenty-four odd hours. News he broke to Reyes when he found him in the barn brushing down Zodiac for one of the riders. She was a paint with a sweet disposition and a favorite for their younger riders.
“All five of the bridal party signed up?” Reyes asked.
“All five, and so far just them.” But the guests had until ten o’clock to sign up, and it was only eight thirty now.
Reyes chuckled as he pulled the brush down Zodiac’s flank. “Never thought I’d see the day when you’re scared of a guest.”
Mack growled. “I’m not scared of Wes. He’s irritating.”
“Oh yeah, so irritating you sat next to him at dinner. On purpose.”
“So? He looked sad.”
“And you needed to cheer him up. Pal, just admit you’re attracted to him.”
“No.”
“You’re a stubborn jackass.”
“That’s not news to anyone.” Mack had barely seen Reyes since dinner last night. He hadn’t come back to their shared cabin until after Mack had turned in, and he’d been out the door while Mack was showering. “Seems to me I wasn’t the only one getting cozy with the bridal party.”
Reyes kept brushing the horse.
“Who’s getting cozy with who now?” Colt asked, appearing with his toolbox in hand. “What’d I miss?”
“Nothing,” Reyes replied.
Perfect. Mack hadn’t seen Colt since before dinner. He rounded on his friend, hands on hips. “Why did you tell Wes I was SWAT?”
Colt rocked on his heels, grinning that irritating shit-eating grin that made club twinks fall all over the guy. “Didn’t realize it was top secret information.”
“That’s not the point. It’s personal information you had no right to give to a guest.”
“Technically, I gave him personal info about me. I just let it slip that both of us were SWAT when I told him.”
“Gee, that makes it all better, then.”
“Oh fuck off,” Colt drawled. “You’re into the guy, you just don’t want to admit it.”
“What’s the point? It’s not like I can’t get laid if I want to.”
“Gee, yeah, one-off sex with a stranger in a bathroom, versus good sex with someone you’re actually attracted to?” Colt rolled his eyes. “You’re so dense sometimes.”
The way Colt laid it out held appeal. Sure, his hookups involved some level of physical attraction, but mostly it was about getting off in the most efficient way possible. Sex with someone he was attracted to this strongly hadn’t happened in a long time, and Wes pushed all the right buttons. “It would still be a fast and dirty fuck someplace out of sight,” Mack said. “No real difference.”
“Not unless you tell Reyes to hang out elsewhere for a few hours and invite Wes back to your cabin.”
The mental image of Wes naked on all fours on the bearskin rug between the two bunks scorched its way into Mack’s head and wouldn’t leave. Mack kneeling behind him, reddening that taut ass with his hand before driving home? Fuck. His jeans got uncomfortably tight.
He glanced at Reyes, who’d stopped brushing Zodiac to stare at him, a silent question in his dark eyes. Reyes would do it if Mack asked, but he hated putting his best friend in that posi
tion.
“Let’s table this, okay?” Mack said. “We’ve got horses to prep, greenhorns to teach and a camping trip to prepare for. Sex is not on the agenda today.”
Colt waggled his eyebrows and mouthed today at Reyes, who rolled his eyes again. “For a thirty-four-year-old man, you act like you’re perpetually fifteen,” Reyes said to Colt.
“Except you didn’t know me when I was fifteen,” Colt retorted with more bite than usual. “Maybe I did all my maturing back then, and now’s when I get to be a kid.” He turned and practically flounced back out of the barn, toolbox jangling by his side.
Reyes blinked hard. “Did I hit a button I didn’t know was there?”
“Probably.” Mack was closer to Colt than Reyes was, after having shared four years in SWAT with Colt, doing the kind of dangerous work that men truly bonded over, but Mack had no idea what that mini-tantrum was about. Colt’s mysterious past, probably. He didn’t like talking about much before joining the police force, after getting a degree forced on him by his parents. And Mack wasn’t much for making someone talk who didn’t want to talk, so he left it alone.
By the time ten o’clock rolled around, the camping trip had expanded by two: Miller and Liam. It surprised Mack, because the trio of girls weren’t going, and they didn’t seem to have any use for anyone in the bridal party except Sophie. But the seven-person group meant they didn’t have to add any other ranch hands to the overnight. He and Reyes could handle seven greenhorns on their own.
The group arrived at the corral for their lessons. Mack had picked out horses for each of the original five, and after thinking a minute, he sent Quentin into the barn to get two more for the frat brothers. Reyes called up to the guesthouse to let Patrice know what they’d need on the chuck wagon, and then he and Mack went through the motions of showing everyone how to tack their own horse.
“It’s important to remember every step,” Mack said. “You miss something, you risk injuring yourself and the horse.”
Zodiac was for Sophie, and the pair seemed to bond right away. She had trouble pulling the straps tight enough, so Mack helped her out while Reyes showed Conrad how to manage his horse. Everyone waiting their turn watched, though, and it helped when it came time to do the next pair. Derrick and Miles got their horses second, and by the time they were finished, Quentin returned with two more horses.
Quentin and Reyes saddled up with the college boys, so Mack led Blizzard over to Wes, who was delighted by his horse’s name. “Is it because she’s mostly white with black specks here and there?” he asked.
“Pretty much,” Mack replied. He couldn’t deny the way Wes’s proximity made his skin prickle, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. “We got her about three years ago. Arthur named her.”
“She’s beautiful.”
“She is, but she’s also a little stubborn. You gotta rein her hard sometimes, or she’ll wander off-path. But you seem to know somethin’ about being stubborn.”
Wes smirked, and no, that look didn’t make Mack’s belly wobble. At all.
Working closely to prepare Blizzard fucked with Mack’s senses a little. Every brush of skin or random touch zinged awareness through Mack’s gut. Each time Wes bent, stretching already tight jeans across that perky little ass. Long, thin fingers working the buckles.
Jesus, get a grip.
Finally, they were done and Mack could get some space from the sweet scent of Wes’s skin and clear his head with the stronger smell of horse dung. He ordered them all to mount their horses one at a time. Sophie needed a boost, even on a shorter horse, but she seemed less tiny on Zodiac than she had on top of Hot Coffee yesterday.
Mack swung up on Tude, Reyes on Hot Coffee, and they did a few practice walks around the corral. It was a different beast, trying to direct a single horse at a time versus control one horse as part of a group, but everyone did pretty well. Wes looked great atop Blizzard, his lean body rolling with each step. The tip of his tongue stuck out as he concentrated, which was...kind of cute.
No, not cute. Seriously, stop.
At eleven thirty, they helped the guests tie up their horses and then broke for lunch. “Make sure what you wear when we go out is comfortable and durable enough to wear until we get back tomorrow,” Mack said. “Bring sunscreen, wear a hat if you’ve got one. If not, you can purchase one at the canteen in the main house. Don’t worry about bringing your phones, unless you’re taking pictures, because once we get a quarter-mile out, the Wi-Fi signal will drop. We leave in one hour. You’re not there, you get left behind.”
He got a lot of nods in return. The guests headed toward the guesthouse front door, while Mack, Reyes and Quentin aimed for the back door. Halfway there, raised voices snared Mack’s attention, and he paused. On the front porch of the main house, Arthur and Judson were having an animated conversation that didn’t look particularly pleasant.
Judson was the Everyman on the ranch. He oversaw Patrice and the guesthouse. He oversaw the horses and their caretakers, including Mack. He assisted Arthur in running the business side of things, including payroll, the website and a social media presence. Judson kept a lot of plates spinning in the air at once, and that was one of the reasons Mack had taken over sleeping arrangements, instead of it being one more thing to land on Judson’s desk.
Mack steered himself in that direction. Arthur went back inside. Judson put both hands on his hips and tilted his head toward the porch ceiling.
“What’s going on?” Mack asked before he’d even put a foot on the bottom step.
“Same argument as always.” Judson came down to the ground and crossed his arms. “Realtor put in a higher offer on the back forty, but Arthur’s still reluctant to sell.”
The back forty was what they’d nicknamed the big patch of unexplored land northwest of the barns and buildings. Wild animals lived on that piece of the property, and they’d never had any reason to go out that far. Arthur had gotten offers on it fairly regularly over the past year or so, which was weird enough, because as far as Mack knew, there was no road access. The buyer wouldn’t come out and say why they wanted the land, and Arthur refused to sell to anyone who would develop it.
“It’s our job to preserve whatever bits of nature we can, before the politicians sell it all to corporations and ruin it,” was one of Arthur’s favorite lines.
“You know I’m gonna agree with Arthur,” Mack said. “Even though an influx of cash would boost the horse rescue, I understand and support his reasons for saying no.”
“I understand him, too, but this is the fourth offer in a year from the same buyer. They seem pretty determined.”
“They can be determined all they want, but until they can assure Arthur that the land won’t be turned into a factory site or condos, he won’t sell.”
“He’s a stubborn old man, I’ll give him that.” Judson glanced at the house. “At least he agreed to let me take a look at this week’s food order before he sends it in.”
“That’s progress. Listen, I’m heading out with the first group of campers in an hour, but I’ll have my radio if you need me for anything.”
“We’ll be fine. You worry about enjoying a beautiful night under the stars.”
“Thanks, Judson.”
Mack headed back toward the guesthouse kitchen so he could grab a few sandwiches. The chuck wagon was out back, and Patrice was busy packing food into it for tonight’s campfire dinner and tomorrow’s breakfast. Bert and Robin were loading up sleeping bags and a few other essentials. They had a large event tent stored in the bottom of the wagon in case of unexpected rain, but they usually got lucky and didn’t need the protection.
Despite the fact that he’d be surrounded by greenhorns afraid of the shadows and every coyote yowl, Mack loved being deep in the country, far away from unnatural lights, with only the fire and the stars to guide him. The wildness of it helped him forget his big city pa
st and pretend he was a real cowboy, free to be whoever he wanted to be.
Mack went inside to fix himself his sandwiches, which he wolfed down without chewing too much, hungrier than he realized. He helped himself to a big dill pickle out of the barrel Patrice kept just for the hands, then wandered to the kitchen door, drawn by the loud voices of the guests in the dining room.
Wes’s group was eating while standing, probably too excited for the trip to sit and be casual. And Wes was facing the kitchen. Mack froze, curious if—yeah, Wes looked up from his sandwich and caught Mack’s eyes. Then he spotted the dill pickle in his hand. Monster dills the size of...well, of a nice hard dick. Wes’s nostrils flared.
Happy to be able to tease the city slicker for a change, Mack brought the pickle to his lips and sucked just the tip of it between his lips. Color rose in Wes’s cheeks, and his eyes widened a fraction. Mack took another inch of the pickle in, savoring the tangy juice and the way Wes clenched his jaw. The whole thing was entirely too perfect, bordering on mean, so Mack snapped off the tip of the pickle and chewed.
Wes narrowed his eyes, then deliberately angled his body toward Conrad, who’d been speaking the whole time.
“You are a cruel man,” Colt said behind Mack.
Mack chuckled as he turned toward his friend. “He’s been flashing that ass at me all morning. I deserved a little revenge.”
“Careful, man, because Wes seems like the type to serve a pretty good counter-revenge.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
“Guess if he gets feisty out there, you can always dunk him in the creek.”
“Very true.” The mental image of a wet, sputtering Wes made him smile. “You’re evil, but I like it.”
Colt huffed on his fingernails, then polished them on his shirt collar. “Just doing my job as your friend.”
“If you were really my friend, you’d lead the camping trip for me.”
“Hah! No. Two hours on a horse without a break? Hell to the no.”