Chapter 6
Byron
The hot water took an age to flow through the pipes.
So much so that Byron contemplated stepping under the ice-cold flow.
It might have done him good, a cool shower.
Truthfully, he needed it. His balls still ached and his cock still hadn’t got the message that nothing, nothing, was going to happen with Emory.
Still, her sweet laughter and bright-as-sun smile had infiltrated his mind and body even more now than they ever had. He couldn’t get the thought of her out of his head. Couldn’t shake the feeling that being flooded in was both the best and worst thing that could happen to them.
The rain pounded outside, but it wasn’t this storm he was worried about.
This storm would flood the creek and spread water across some of the lowest paddocks.
But that was nothing. That was a regular thing this time of year when the blasted air currents flowed whichever way they were.
Sure, the cows had a little less breathing room, but the bridge was still open, and life went by just as it always did.
So, nah, it wasn’t the sheeting rain that kept coming and going as the storm swirled around them that worried Byron, it was the rain up north.
That rain would fall, and it would have nowhere to go but down.
It would flow down the river, an endless stream of too much water, and where the creek turned narrow just out of town, it would be forced to stop.
It would dam. And when, not if, it did, the bridge would close.
Byron stuck his hand into the shower, flinching as the now-burning water hit his arm.
Turning the tap down, he stepped under the waterfall and tipped his head up.
Big droplets hit his face, and he closed his eyes as he let the water rush over his body.
It tingled on his skin, washing away none of the dirtiness that invaded his thoughts of Emory.
They might have one more day before the SES would be forced to close the bridge to his property.
They would be trapped. It hadn’t even been twenty-four hours, and already, the tension was thick.
Each blistering moment was another weight on his chest, and Byron wasn’t sure how many more he could take.
Maybe he should have bought a dinghy boat when Tucker did. At least then he’d be able to get away to breathe properly every now and then. If things kept going the way they were, he doubted his weary lungs were going to survive the pressure.
His mind raced as he carried out the motions of his shower. He did his best to keep his mind off the woman in the next room, but everything circled back to her.
Did he need more food? He might, now that Emory was staying.
How would he entertain Clayton when they couldn’t go further than the small section of manicured lawn? Hopefully, Emory had some ideas.
What would he do all day when he had no farm to tend to? What would Emory do when she couldn’t get to her shifts at the café?
Emory.
Always Emory.
His hands skated down his front, rubbing soap over his abdomen and lower between his legs.
His cock hung, still half hard, and the soap that trickled over it tickled at the tip.
He tugged at it, contemplating, but eventually thought better of the idea.
Not when Emory was right there, on the other side of the wall.
His cock protested, but he was determined to do the right thing.
If there even was a right thing anymore, now that he was so hopelessly gone for the one woman he could never have.
He’d been alone a long time, but not for lack of options.
Just about every woman in town had tried her luck in the years after Josie passed.
They didn’t really want Byron, though, they wanted what he stood for.
The young widower, alone in his farmhouse, raising the boys that would carry on the Gardner name.
Generations ago, Byron’s ancestors had called this land home, and the farm had been in the family since.
The whole damn township was named for his great-great-great—however many greats—grandfather.
So yeah, the women didn’t want him so much as they wanted a claim to the town.
Byron had tried for a while. Not to replace his late wife, because no woman could ever do that, but to open his heart to love again.
Nothing, no one, ever felt even close to right.
None of the women he tried dating made his heart sing or made the farmhouse feel like a home again. So, eventually, he’d stopped trying.
It was a cruel twist of fate when Emory arrived in town on the arm of his son.
Byron didn’t believe in love at first sight, but just seeing her started to chip away at the icy walls he’d built around his heart.
He’d been fighting to keep them built ever since, and it became increasingly hard when Jaxon left her, alone and pregnant, a little over three years ago.
Now, it seemed the walls were melting down faster than he could refreeze the bricks. Having her here, not being able to leave, was going to test him.
He rolled his shoulders and stood, still under the water as the soap washed free.
Turning off the tap, Byron heard something from the room behind the wall.
Frantic movements.
Laboured breaths.
He swore under his breath. He hadn’t meant to hear Emory, truly, but the walls of the old farmhouse were thin and her room was right on the other side of this one.
He couldn’t say he was disappointed that he had, though. If anything, he was glad. Of a few things.
Firstly, he was glad he hadn’t rubbed one out in the shower like he had done so many times before.
All those times he’d imagined Emory’s lips wrapped around his dick or her bouncing in his lap while he pumped himself dry.
He’d wanted to tonight, too, he rationalised, but something had stopped him.
Maybe it was knowing she was in the next room because it had felt wrong, somehow.
He’d hesitated, and he was glad he did because if he hadn’t, he would have still been in the shower.
Then, he was glad of the small lull in the storm that came at just the right time. He stepped out of the shower to the sound of Emory’s heavy breaths, the slight creaking of the bed, the wet pumping as she fucked herself with … well, he imagined it was her hand.
His cock sprang to attention. Never mind the fact it had been halfway ready ever since Emory had fallen on him in the kitchen. It ached, his balls hanging low between his thighs. And so instead of grabbing a towel, he reached below his waist and grabbed his cock.
Just a small adjustment, he tried to tell himself, but his hand lingered.
He stroked his firm length lazily at first, listening to the sounds Emory made, appreciating the little whimpers and the heavy moans.
But the pressure continued to build until his insides ran hot and his heart was racing.
Byron spat into his palm and rubbed the moisture up and down his shaft, collecting the bead of precum that was spilling from his tip.
A groan rumbled in his chest, and he dropped his head against the wall.
So close to the woman he craved, yet so far away. Always so. Far. Away.
With every tense stroke, he hated himself a little more, but he couldn’t stop. The desire, the wanting, was too much.
Emory’s pumps hastened, her breath turning shallow, and Byron imagined her falling to pieces in his arms. He imagined how her lips might tremble and her legs might shake.
Licking his lips, he imagined how she might taste on his tongue; musky and sweet, like the honey of her laugh and the earthy scent of the candle he lit in the kitchen.
The one he’d seen in the small boutique in town and just knew she would love.
He pumped his cock furiously to the sounds of Emory’s orgasm, ignoring the tiny voice in his head that said he shouldn’t, that it was wrong.
“Byron.”
As the sounds from her room slowed, she whispered his name.
It was as quiet as a summer breeze, but with his forehead against the wall, Byron heard it as clearly as though he was lying over her.
He never, in all his wildest imaginations, thought it might have been him she was picturing as she made herself come.
Knowing then that it was him in her mind, his orgasm hit him hard and fast. Spurts of his cum lined the tiled wall as he stroked every last drop out.
“Emory,” he whispered. And fuck, he hadn’t meant to say her name but then again, maybe from some deep part of his subconscious he had. Maybe he wanted Emory to know that he was thinking of her, too. That this, whatever this was, was shared between them.
Later, after he had cleaned the wall and the room beside his had long gone quiet, Byron lay atop his bed with his hands behind his head. Staring at the ceiling he couldn’t see through the dark, Byron listened to the rain as it pummelled against the old tin roof.
He didn’t want to think about tomorrow. When there was every chance they might wake up and realise they couldn’t leave. What would they do then?
And how should he act?
Should he pretend it never happened, or should they try to talk about it? But what would he say?
‘Hi, Emory, yes, I made myself come while completely breaching your privacy and listening to you pleasure yourself. Sorry, but I heard you say my name, did you hear me say yours?’
His cheeks burned at the thought, and a concrete slab found a place on his chest. Turning to his side in a futile attempt to throw it off, Byron curled his face against his pillow and closed his eyes. It was going to be a long few weeks. And not just because they were going to be stuck together.
But also because maybe, being stuck together was exactly what they both needed.
Byron huffed, pulling a pillow over his face.
That was his heart talking, or his balls.
Either way, it definitely wasn’t his head.
It didn’t matter that he heard Emory masturbating or that she probably heard him too.
It didn’t matter that they had called for each other from beyond the wall and through whispered breaths.
Byron could pretend it meant more than it did because he so desperately wanted it to.
But the cold, hard truth of the matter was that it meant nothing. It had to.
Byron was too old for Emory. She deserved a chance to forge her own path, not be tied to the family that caused her so much pain. So, even if she did fantasise about him, he couldn’t, wouldn’t, let either of them get carried away on a dream.