Chapter 6
Chapter six
Rhys
A New Tune
The little car rumbles off down the road and I'm left with Duncan and Clyde.
We're quiet as we start our walk and my brain registers the rhythm of our footsteps against the pavement mixed against the clop of hooves.
It's two quick steps of our feet and a clop-clop repeated as we make our way down the lane.
I couldn’t sleep last night. I told my parents it was the jet leg.
I told myself it was the predicament my love life is in.
I told lies.
Every time I tried to force sleep a pair of rain-spotted glasses above a wide, warm smile appeared. My neck would heat, my mouth would go dry, and I’d flip my pillow hoping for relief.
I know I look haggard and rough.
Duncan looks fresh and full of life with his slightly rosy cheeks. It’s mud splattered glasses this time but the same, electric smile consumes my attention.
I’m not sure how much time passes but, without the highland drizzle barely misting, it’s long enough for the mud caked on my pants to dry, making them stiff.
But I won’t admit it to Duncan, I’m sure he’d have a field day with that comment. I can’t believe his dad joked about mud wrestling. And I can’t believe how much my body liked the idea.
I’m still a fragile heartbroken mess.
Aren’t I?
I’m supposed to be.
Instead I’m fixating on the veiny hands and muscular forearm peeking past the cuffs of his waffle knit shirt.
"So decided to start your day on horseback this morning?" Duncan’s slightly sassy leading question interrupts my mental thirsting.
"Don't make this an upstairs downstairs thing."
He laughs. "Of course you know that show."
"Doesn't everyone?"
"Aye," he makes a show of using the Scottish yes. "But I watched it with Granny Franny when she'd let me stay up late on our visits."
"Ah, well I'd watch with my parents."
"Up there in the castle?"
"Yes, up in the castle." I roll my eyes.
"Do your fans know where you grew up? Like, it just seems so removed from the country music culture."
"There's a reason my first album was called Country Set." I shrug as we reach the driveway.
"Ha!" He barks out a laugh. "I never put that together. Too many hits in the head."
"Hits in the head?"
"So you didn't google me." He performs disappointment well.
"I haven't had the chance."
His eyes flare and my pulse quickens.
"I play hockey." He says as we head up the driveway to the house.
"Ah."
"For the D.C. Renegades."
"And that's a big deal?" I'm teasing him, I know enough to know they're a professional team.
"Aye." He rolls his eyes. "C'mon up and have a wash."
We head to the side of the cottage where a kitchen garden is wildly overgrown.
Duncan slides off his glasses and sets them on the window sill.
My feet freeze midstep as he reaches up behind his neck and drags his mud-caked, long-sleeve, navy henley over his head.
It falls to the ground in a heap and I am treated to a view of his athletic body.
The broad, rounded shoulders I admired in my jacket last night sit atop a thick, hairy, muscular chest. The brown curls thin as my gaze travels down his tapered torso.
They pick up again under his navel and form a trail leading into the waistband of his trousers.
I snap my gaze to his face again as my thumb flies up to the side of my mouth before any of the drool pooling in my mouth leaks out.
I have no idea if Duncan has caught me staring because he’s turning away from me as slides his fingers into the waistband of his joggers.
My eyes devour the slow, sensual way he guides the fabric down his thick legs.
He steps out of the wellies, tosses his bottoms away, and he's left standing barefoot in the sparse grass in just a pair of red boxer briefs.
Before I can regulate my body temperature back to normal, it skyrockets again.
"Not bad." He says as I recklessly map every inch of his broad, muscular back. "I thought I'd be way messier after that tumble."
My brain scrambles but I can't form words to respond.
Carrying on, he bends to reach for the hose and turns on the tap. I think. I’m too focused on his round, firm, bubble of a butt and thick hair-dusted thighs.
And the last remaining brain function I possess evaporates when he tips the hose above his head and starts to wash off the debris from his time behind the car.
It's like watching soft porn in slow motion. I track the way his hand drags through his quickly wetting hair. He grips the back of his neck and I assume trails his hand down his chest because it disappears from view.
A feather could knock me off a cliff as he turns to face me.
His large, veiny hand is working its way down the clipped landscape of his chest as he washes the residue off his body.
My eyes track the trails of water as it bounces off the ridges of his abs.
And lower, to where it dampens the front of his boxers.
The outline of his cock is highlighted like a fucking neon sign.
Even under the cold stream of hose water it’s impressive.
When I trail my gaze back up to his face he's smirking at me knowingly.
Totally unashamed of himself.
Am I embarrassed?
I should be.
Probably.
It has been years since I've pursued a spontaneous attraction. My line of work makes me a target for people looking to use me to get ahead. To get attention. To get their name in the papers.
My heart pinches with the fresh reminder of the hurt Mike left me with. And the reason I am here in Scotland in the first place.
I shouldn’t be checking out Duncan like he exists purely for my viewing pleasure.
My head clearly isn’t on straight.
"Sorry-ach fuck!"
The words to apologize for the blatant eye-fucking are cut off when he sprays me in the stomach with the freezing cold water.
A laugh of disbelief tumbles out of my chest and I blink open my eyes to see him standing in front of me holding the hose with a kink to stop the water flow. "Was that necessary?" I ask.
"Well, you’re covered in mud."
"Yeah but now I'm also soaking wet and covered in mud."
"Well there's only one thing to do about that."
I roll my eyes but strip down too, leaving my soggy clothing in a pile a yard from his on the ground. "Better?" I demand impishly.
"Much." I’m overheating on a dreary cold May highland day as his eyes take in my body. He wets his lips as his gaze traces the ink sprawling up my arms and across my chest. What does he think of them? Is he curious? Mike never asked, never seemed interested. But if Duncan asked I’d tell him everything in one breath.
He turns towards the tap and I shake my head. He must be a playboy with how comfortable he is with flirting. Like it’s his natural state of being.
And getting involved with some fuck boy is not remotely a possibility.
"Listen, I'm sorry for-AHH!" Again he cuts off my apology with a spray of water to the face.
"Missed a spot."
I wipe my face and lunge towards him. "Fool me once you nit!" I reach for the hose and Duncan bobs out of the way. When I turn to him he's pointing the hose at me and closing in.
I raise my hands in surrender. "Easy now."
"Oh, I highly doubt any of this will be easy." He steps even closer and my heart takes flight. I could lose myself in his eyes, in his body, in his joy.
It would feel so good.
Total escape.
But I'd be using him. It's not possible to move from one relationship to the next so quickly. Not when the last meant something.
Or I thought it did.
"Rhys." Duncan says darkly as he steps even closer and I feel the presence of the house at my back.
"Duncan."
I watch in confusion as he starts to lower down into a squat. My hands tighten int fists as a wave of arousal crashes through my body.
He wouldn't do that now, outside, with his family just inside, with Clyde here.
Would he?
I close my eyes and hate the way my cock pulses. My brain commanding my body to shove him away, to stop this from escalating any further, my body frozen, unable to act against my desire.
Squeak, squeak, squeak.
My eyes fly open to find Duncan turning off the water and setting the hose down to drain.
Dueling sensations of relief and disappointment leave me feeling off balance.
"C'mon, I've got some clean clothes you can borrow for your ride home." Duncan says and he steps around me towards the front of the house. "And Granny will have a bucket of oats for my man Clyde. She buys the stuff in bulk."
"Ah okay, yes. Thank you."
I follow behind, tying the reins around the front porch rail. Next to the front door are two towels and Duncan hands me one before opening the front door. I follow him inside in a daze.
I can't shake the desire I shouldn't be feeling. It's reckless and too soon. I'm not the guy who just hooks up for the fun of it. That's too risky.
I also can't shake the rhythm of our footsteps from the walk back. And for the first time since I flew home to write music, there's a tune forming.
One I need to pursue.