Chapter 8 #2
“Seasonal hand. A young guy, just turned nineteen. He’d signed on for the summer.
Normally we wouldn’t have a green hand moving a bull, but he grew up on a ranch in Wyoming, knew his shit.
Most of the other hands were busy clearing a tree that came down on a fence.
” I looked down at Ebony’s furry black side, so I couldn’t see Austin’s face.
“Miguel rode up and I asked him to get the gate ahead. He said, ‘Sure, papi. Finish with the bull and I’ll give you a reward.’ Then he looked at the bull and whistled, grabbed his crotch, and said, ‘Now those are big balls on that bad boy.’ He pretended to be jerking off. I laughed.”
“Well, bulls are, uh, big.”
“Yeah, but… I was so caught up in Miguel, in his joking, in how hot he looked and his hand on his jeans… I lost track.”
Austin kept silent, giving me time to voice my shame.
“I didn’t pay attention. I was the experienced guy, the one responsible. Zachary was supposed to know how to play it safe, but he rode too close, pushed the bull too hard. If a bull resists, you have to back off, give him room.”
“I haven’t worked with bulls, much.”
“You have to nudge them along real slow. They’re touchy and they’re tough.
They hate a strong tailwind, which we had, because they can’t scent predators in a tailwind.
So that bull kept trying to turn and break back to the cows.
It’d been a long day. We were tired, frustrated.
When Dozer got stubborn, instead of backing off, Zachary rode in closer.
I was laughing at Miguel and not watching like I should’ve.
That bull got mad and he charged Zachary.
Zachary was riding Copper, who knew what she was doing, but that bull was fast and two-thousand pounds of pissed off muscle.
” My breath caught as memories flashed through my head, a horror movie of bellowing, shouting, thuds, screams. “Dozer got Copper on the rump, knocked her right over. She came down with Zachary underneath.”
“Fuck,” Austin whispered.
I squeezed my eyes shut but the disaster played out behind my closed lids. “Zachary screamed so bad. Broke his pelvis in two places, cracked his spine, busted up his right leg. The fall broke Copper’s hindleg too. We had to put her down right there, one of Kendrick’s best mares.”
“I’m sorry.”
My words tumbled over themselves, exposing every detail of what I’d caused.
“Zachary never healed right. He had a bunch of surgeries, was in a wheelchair last I heard. The docs said he might walk someday, but he’d never ride again.
Copper was dead.” I clenched my teeth and forced the last part through my tight throat. “And it was all my fault.”
“Seth.” Austin sounded like he was trying to coddle me.
“No, it was!” I looked up at last, glaring at Austin through a shimmering haze in my eyes.
He needed to know this about me. “I was in charge, and too busy cruising the hot guy I was sleeping with to keep my work partner safe. I should’ve noticed the bull getting angry.
Should’ve seen Zachary was too frustrated to be smart.
We could’ve backed off, moved Dozer another day. ”
“That’s hindsight, Seth.”
“That’s common sense!” I rubbed my face. “That was my job. I fucked it up because I couldn’t keep my eyes off Miguel. Zachary and Copper paid the price.”
“Sounds like Zachary fucked up too, pushing too hard. Sounds like Miguel fucked up, distracting you in a dangerous moment.”
I’d told myself those excuses in the dark of night. Kendrick had said the same, said he still trusted me. It didn’t change the fact that I’d let my dick control my brain at the wrong moment. “Doesn’t matter what they did.”
“I think it does.” Austin cut himself off. “Bottle’s about empty.”
“Good.” I pulled the needle out and pressed over Ebony’s side for a minute so there wouldn’t be bleeding. “Put all the stuff in the bucket.”
He did as I instructed. “Now what?”
“Now we clean up.” I felt Ebony’s ear, noting the warmth. She flicked it in annoyance. “Then we’ll see if she can get up and—” I broke off as the cow peed a lake into her straw. “That’s a good sign, too. Come on.”
Austin didn’t mention Miguel or anything I’d said as we got the supplies set to rights in the feed room. When we came back out, Ebony had already heaved herself up and the calf was on her feet, nursing.
“Yay!” Austin smiled at me. “It’s like magic.”
“Can be.” I tried to be blasé, but relief eased my strung-tight nerves and I couldn’t fight the beginnings of a smile.
“She’s looking good. We’ll want to supplement her feed with calcium for the next couple of weeks at least.” Figuring that out would be John’s job, or the boss’s next time I called him. “But she should do okay.”
“And are you okay?” Austin asked softly.
“Huh?”
“That was some pretty tough stuff you told me.”
Heat flooded my cheeks. “Was just the truth.”
He nodded slowly. “So, if I tell you I’m not Miguel, will that make a difference? I don’t need to flirt with you on the job. I know when I’m on the clock and when I’m off, and I can be professional.”
I couldn’t explain how I was still messed up with this. “Tonight, I was about to, well, whatever we were doing back in the cabin. We almost missed seeing Ebony go down.”
“If we’d gone to sleep, we’d have missed her too. If we’d taken the dogs out or read a book, whatever. The next time you looked, you’d have noticed. You can’t be on duty twenty-four seven.”
“Stop being logical.”
Austin laughed and reached out, gripping my shoulder, then stroking a finger up my neck. “Maybe we should make out right here, where you can watch her out of the corner of your eye.”
“You said you knew when you were on the clock.”
“Yeah, but it must be after eight and we started at six a.m.” He slid his finger to my lower lip. “The cow’s on her feet. Does that clock ever stop?”
“I…” I met Austin’s eyes, the deep blue of an evening sky. His mouth drew my gaze lower, held it. “I don’t know.” I shivered.
He lowered his hand. “You have to make the next move. I’m good at following orders. You tell me to stop and I’ll stop.”
I wondered if Austin knew how much that appealed to me. “Let’s clean up the stall and head back to the cabin. We’ll have a couple of hours before I want to recheck Ebony.”
“I can do a lot with a couple of hours.” Austin didn’t follow that comment with a smile or an eye-fuck. He simply grabbed a pitchfork and began sorting the wet straw out from behind Ebony. Taking care of the cow, like I asked, keeping his eyes on his work.
By the time we’d trudged through seven or eight inches of wet, still-falling snow, I’d second-guessed myself half a dozen times.
The dogs greeted us when we entered the cabin, tails wagging, but pretty quickly, the lure of the blanket I’d put down for them near the heater outdid humans, and they curled up together.
Austin shook the snow off his parka and slipped it onto a hook. He tugged off his boots one by one and wiggled his toes. “Wish I’d had time to get my snow boots out of Dad’s house, but I didn’t dare go back.”
“Fuck. I should’ve noticed.” The snow was well above the tops of those cowboy boots. Austin’s feet were probably soaked. “You’re gonna get frostbit if you don’t watch out. Do you have dry socks?”
“Yeah, I guess. I ran some through the laundry.” He bent and slipped the wet ones off, straightening with them in one hand. “Your floor’s not that cold, though.”
I stared down at his bare feet on my tile floor. Shouldn’t have been sexy at all. Was, in some way I couldn’t define.
“Seth?” Austin was using that gentle tone again.
I’d probably been staring too long. I raised my gaze. “Yeah?”
“You okay?”
“Fine.”
He gave me a crooked smile. “Been a long day. Want to go to bed? To sleep, I mean? We’ll have a longer day tomorrow, getting hay out to all those cows.”
“Yeah. Maybe. Good thought.” I headed to the bedroom and he followed along. We each used the john, washed up well, changed into sweats and T-shirts. Austin started to walk around the bed to his side. No butt-wiggle, no sexy side-eye. He’s not Miguel. I stopped him with a hand on his arm.
“What?”
I swallowed half a dozen starts. What I really wanted was… “Suck me?”
“Fuck, yeah.” He grinned. “Want me on my knees?”
My throat went Sahara-dry. I nodded. Austin dropped a pillow off the bed and knelt on it. He gazed up at me, all bright blue eyes and eagerness. “You want me to stop, you just say so.”
“Shouldn’t that be me, saying those words to you?”
“You’re the one who’s spooked, but okay. If I tap your thigh three times, you pull out.”
“I will.”
Austin grabbed the waistbands of my sweats and underwear together and pulled them down.
My cock bobbed free, half hard and rapidly rising from the nest of my pubes.
He left my clothes at my thighs, trapping my legs together, and rubbed his face on my generous treasure trail.
His cheek felt cool against my heated skin.
“I’m kind of hairy,” I apologized. Miguel hadn’t been a fan, but the ranch wasn’t a place for more than minimal manscaping.
I kept things tidy, but I wasn’t going to wax.
Miguel’s chest had been naturally hairless, smooth brown, with small dark nipples, where I had dense blond curls, a scar from a pitchfork encounter, and random freckles and moles.
Austin didn’t seem to care, though. He nuzzled into my groin. “I love how you smell here. So good.”
“Got a thing for sweat?” I couldn’t resist putting my hands on his head. That black hair was as silky as I remembered.
“Yours, yeah. Honest sweat and musk of a man. Love it.” He inhaled and ran the light stubble of his cheek along my shaft.
“Gonna suck it, or scratch it?” His teasing shortened my breath and blasted heat through me, but I tried to seem chill.
“Suck. Sure.”
Austin started slowly, taking just the head into his mouth, licking and teasing me. God, that felt incredible. I’d almost forgotten how much I loved the heat of a man’s mouth on my dick.
I figured out pretty quick that Austin might not be a beginner, but he probably hadn’t gone on his knees for a man often. He fumbled, then bobbed too deep, coughed, and had to back off, his cheeks red.
“I’m pretty big,” I told him. “You don’t gotta deep-throat me. Use your hand on the bottom half and suck on the head. I like that.”
“I know!” Austin snapped, but he wrapped his fingers around my shaft like I told him and went back to sucking eagerly, wet enough that the spit ran down my cock. He used the lubrication to begin jacking me, working his hand and mouth together.
I stroked the hollow of his cheek, and he moaned at my touch. “Good job,” I told him. Better than good. So hot my knees might not hold me for long. “Good boy.”
He pulled off and threw a wild, wide-eyed look up at me. “Don’t call me boy. Please?”
“Sure.” Fuck, I hadn’t meant to trigger anything. “Sorry.”
“S’okay.” Austin went back to trying to suck my brains out my dick. He got a C-plus for technique, but damn, he got an A for effort. I leaned my shoulder on the wall to stay upright and cupped his head between my palms, not forcing anything, just holding him steady.
“Pull my hair,” he mumbled around my cock. “Wanna feel it.”
Pulling was tricky with the short length he wore, but I’d do whatever Austin wanted. I managed to thread my fingers into the back and tug. He moaned and the vibration made me shiver. My cock twitched eagerly and I clenched my teeth not to come yet. “Fuck. Holy fuck.”
Austin raised his head to wipe his chin with the back of his hand and gave me a smile so wide and happy I couldn’t help grinning back. I palmed his cheek, slipped my thumb in his mouth, and he suckled eagerly.
“Don’t worry about sloppy and wet,” I told him. “Part of the fun. Can you go faster?”
He nodded and dove back onto my cock, bobbing his head, huffing short breaths through his nose.
I began to steer a little with my hands on his head.
“So good. So fucking good.” Those plush lips wrapped around my dick were the stuff of fantasies.
The enthusiastic obedience was even better.
So hot, so damned perfect. Climax rose from my balls, my body heating, ready to spill. “Off unless you want it!” I warned.
Austin hummed and sucked lower. Fuck, that was it.
All she wrote. Pleasure flooded my body, my balls drew up tight, and I shot pulse after pulse into Austin’s hot, wet, willing mouth.
He swallowed hard, but cum ran down his chin and his eyes watered.
Still, he grabbed my ass and pulled me forward, not backing off, taking every inch he could until I had to tap his cheek, as pleasure tipped past the edge. “God, fuck, done. Wow.”
Austin let my cock slide from his lips and sat back on his heels, his eyes wet, cheeks red, chin a mess. “That was okay?”
“Jesus fucking Christ.” I grabbed Austin’s chin, bent, and kissed him, tasting myself. “A hell of a lot better than okay.”
“I haven’t actually done it very often.”
I didn’t say I could tell. “Natural talent, I guess.”
His smile was my reward, happy and wide.
With another kiss on his forehead, I told him, “Now clean your face, take off those sweats, and get on the bed. Time for me to return the favor.”