12. Lance
Chapter 12
The day was warming up when we woke again.
Part of me wanted to stay cuddled in that cramped bed with Hudson forever.
But we had businesses to run and lives to live, plus, I’d hopefully made it clear that this wasn’t something I was walking away from.
That damn little shed would forever hold a place in my heart.
We cleaned ourselves the best we could, dressed in our mostly dry, stiff clothing, and headed home.
At the door to Hudson’s old farmhouse, I kissed him long and slow. Longing to hear him tell me he loved me, but knowing he had to come to it in his own time, I poured everything into that kiss.
“Come over later?” Hudson murmured against my lips.
I nodded. “Try to keep me away.”
His cheeks pinked. “Bring a bag.”
With my lip between my teeth, I nodded again. “See you in a bit.”
A couple hours later, I’d checked in at the Sweet an absolute Golden Retriever with the very best heart.”
“Kinda sounds like you love him,” Hudson whispered.
“I do.” I cupped his face and kissed him softly. “Kinda hopin’ if I show him I’m here for good, he’ll figure out how to love me back one day.”
A strangled sob escaped Hudson’s chest and he kissed me fiercely. “He’s a lucky guy to have someone like you.”
“I’m the lucky one. He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me and I plan to spend the rest of my life proving that to him.”
Hudson shook his head. “You don’t have to prove anything to me, Lance.” He swallowed thickly. “I’ve never trusted anyone the way I trust you.” He brought those beautiful blue eyes to mine. “Never thought I could trust enough to love someone, but then you came home and my whole world changed.”
With our foreheads pressed together, we stood there, silently sharing the same air with each breath. “My heart never left Haven Grove. Just took coming home to figure out I loved you in a whole ’nother way than way back then.”
“I love you,” Hudson choked out. “It scares the ever-lovin’ shit out of me, but I love you, Lance.”
Tears stung my eyes, and I dotted kisses all over his face. “Forever, Hudson. I wasn’t lyin’ when I said I’m in this forever.”
He shook his head. “I may suck at this; I don’t have a single clue how to be someone’s boyfriend.”
“We’ll figure it out together,” I said, wrapping him in a hug.
We held each other for several heartbeats before I groaned.
“What?”
“Casey Joe is gonna fuckin’ kill me.”
Hudson chuckled, wiping his eyes and sniffling. “We’ll break it to him easy. Let him know it’s not just fuckin’ around.”
“Come on, let’s go see Henry. Might as well get a good meal before your dad cuts off my dick and feeds it to his dog.”
Hudson put me in a headlock. “He doesn’t have a dog. And let’s get back here quickly.”
I wrestled my way out of his hold. “Why?”
“Because I need as much of that dick as I can get before it’s gone,” Hudson teased.
We were still laughing when we walked into the roadhouse.
Henry was behind the bar as usual, but the frown on his face wasn’t his normal grumbly frown. He seemed lost in thought. When he finally looked up and caught sight of us, he brightened and waved us over.
“You finally talk my baby brother into a date?” Henry asked.
“I did. Date and boyfriend all at once,” I said, throwing my arm around Hudson’s shoulders.
“Damn, boy,” Henry said. “When you go in, you go all in.”
Hudson’s flush was pretty in the dim light. “Yeah, well.” He shrugged.
Henry whistled.
“Yeah, I know,” I said.
“Been good knowing you,” he said, sticking out his hand to shake.
I slapped his hand away. “We’ll figure it out. Two beers and two of the specials.”
Henry laughed. “Gotcha. It’ll be right up.”
He was still laughing as he pulled our beers from the tap and hollered to the kitchen to plate up two specials. Hudson and I settled at the far end of the bar where we could talk and watch people come and go.
When Henry brought our food and replaced our beers, he slung the towel over his shoulder and propped himself against the edge of the bar. “The trees okay?”
Hudson nodded. “Yeah, luckily the hail wasn’t huge. Even more reason to get the rest of that netting rigged up. Saved a lot of the fruit.”
Henry gave a small nod.
“Someone still sleeping out back?” I asked.
Henry wrinkled his brow. “Yeah.”
“Nothing missing?”
He shook his head.
When he didn’t go on, Hudson and I continued eating and Henry lumbered away. I’d known the guy long enough to know he was worried but hadn’t figured out exactly how to handle the situation just yet.
“He’s worried,” Hudson said.
“Yep.”
“He’ll figure it out.”
“Yep.”
“My boyfriend, a man of such eloquent speech,” Hudson teased.
I elbowed him. “I’ll show you eloquent.”
Hudson laughed, but then sobered, his eyes on someone at the door.
“What’s wrong?”
“Just figure maybe we should make sure we tell Dad before anyone in town gets to him first.”
“Good call. What about tomorrow night? It’s my usual night to have pizza and beer with him. We could both go over?” My stomach soured at the thought of pissing Casey Joe off—honestly, I wouldn’t even be able to blame him for being mad.
“You think plying him with pizza and beer every week is the best thing for his health?” Hudson asked with twin worry lines between his brows.
“I get light beer and he hasn’t figured out the pizza has a cauliflower crust. My next step is sneaking some broccoli into the toppings.” I shrugged and took a swallow of beer. “Figure he’s gonna get the beer and pizza either way, this way it’s halfway healthy. Not sure how to get rid of the smokes.”
Hudson laughed. “Well, maybe tomorrow night you can take them away before he chops off your dick.”
“Very funny.” We could laugh, but I really had no clue how Casey Joe was going to take the news of Hudson and me together. Maybe getting him to stop smoking would need to wait until another time.
I needed Casey Joe to understand I’d gone and fallen in love with his son. Yeah, I was fucking Hudson, but it was so much more than that, and I needed my best friend to understand that. This wasn’t a hookup. It wasn’t random and temporary.
I needed him to know I’d spend the rest of my life loving and cherishing Hudson. But before we dropped our bomb, I wanted to make sure Hudson believed me. Because he was the one who counted.
Hudson needed to know.
Needed to never fear me leaving.
As we settled up the bill—Henry never charging and me always leaving a chunk of bills on the bar—I checked my phone to make sure I had what I needed. Once we were outside in the dusk of evening, I pointed my chin toward the orchard.
“Wanna walk off dinner?” I asked.
Hudson nodded and I secretly sighed in relief that he never turned down the chance to be in the orchard.
When we reached the tree line, I took his hand. He looked at our entwined fingers and smiled. “Shit I never thought I needed or wanted,” he muttered.
“Yeah well, you’re stuck with them now.”
As we rounded one row, Hudson gasped. “Oh my god, I didn’t know it was a full moon.” A large orange globe hung on the horizon.
“Looks just like a peach,” I said. Pulling out my phone, I threw my arm around him and positioned the camera to capture us with the moon in the background. Then I kissed his cheek and took another shot.
When Hudson turned his head, our lips meeting in a sweet, hot kiss, I clicked another picture before pocketing my phone and pulling him into a full-body embrace. He tasted of beer, steak sauce, and ranch.
And he was mine.
I was the luckiest bastard alive to spend the rest of my life loving this man.
We finally broke apart and I guided our wandering toward the middle of the trees. Earlier in the day, I’d made a quick trip to the orchard and stacked three bushel baskets near a tree in hopes we’d make it out there after dinner.
“What the hell,” Hudson muttered when he saw the baskets.
I pulled the song up on my phone and turned it up as loud as it would go.
When the very first notes rang out in the silent orchard, Hudson whipped to face me. I smiled, placed my phone on the stack of baskets, and held out my hand.
His chest heaved and for a split second I thought he’d refuse, but Hudson let me pull him close as Savage Garden’s “I Knew I Loved You” played.
“Goin’ a bit old school on this one,” Hudson mumbled into my neck.
“Don’t act like you don’t know this song,” I teased. “You’re not that young.”
“It’s a good song.”
We listened to the lyrics as we swayed in the soft breeze, the heavy scent of grass and peaches decorating the air.
“Thank you,” Hudson whispered as the song started over.
“For what?”
“For giving me the chance to fall in love under the moonlight in the peach orchard.” He rested his head on my shoulder. “I thought they’d ruined that for me, but you gave it back.”
“What made you change your mind?” I asked.
Hudson snorted. “Like you gave me any choice?”
I pulled back and cupped his face. “You always have a choice.”
He shook his head. “I think it was just you being you. Having you back in my life and realizing how much you meant to me. My heart hurt for so long—all I’ve ever wanted to do was protect it. But that pain helped me see how good love can be. Like being hurt made it easier to see when I had something real right in front of me. Doesn’t mean I figured it out very quickly. And I still have no idea how to do a real relationship.” He pressed a kiss to my lips. “But I also don’t know how to be without you.” Hudson frowned. “No, that’s not true. I know how to be without you. I did it for eight years. It’s just,” he paused, swallowing, and meeting my gaze, “having you back made me see how much I need you in my life.”
We danced through one more repeat before wandering back to Hudson’s place hand-in-hand under the moonlight.
Making out in his kitchen led to two big guys squeezing into his shower.
“Damn ol’ farmhouse bathroom,” Hudson muttered. “Maybe I’ll remodel.”
Turning off the water, I handed him a towel. “It served its purpose.”
He cocked a brow.
“It got us clean,” I said. Grabbing his flushed, wet body I pulled him close. “And now we can get dirty all over again.”
Round one started with great intentions, but mutual blow jobs later we chuckled sleepily and admitted defeat.
“Sleep first, then dirty,” Hudson mumbled into my chest as I pulled the soft quilt up to our waists.
Pressing a kiss to his temple, I breathed him in and smiled.
When I woke, pale morning light streamed through the windows and Hudson grinned down at me from where he straddled my thighs. His hands gripped my chest, and he rocked his hips, the delicious friction between our cocks bringing me fully awake.
“Good morning,” I croaked.
“Good morning.”
“We have time?” I knew he was opening the store today since Wanda needed to take her mother to a doctor’s appointment.
“For us? Always.”
Swallowing thickly, I reached for the lube. “Get on your back and spread your legs for me.”
Hudson’s pretty little groan of pleasure was music to my ears as he rolled off me. Kneeling between his legs as I slicked my cock, his dick plump and smearing pre-cum against his belly, I sent up a prayer of thanks to anyone listening for bringing the two of us together again.
“Lift up,” I demanded in the quiet room, shoving a pillow under his hips when he complied. Working a lube-covered finger into his ass, loving the way he gasped and rolled his hips, I kept my eyes glued to him while stretching his hole. Two fingers had him moaning, and when he begged for my cock, I knew I’d never be able to deny this man anything he asked for.
Lining my throbbing cockhead up with his hole, I inched into him. His grunts and whimpers danced on the air as the early morning sunshine washed the room in orange and pink. Exquisite tight heat welcomed me into his body, and I groaned when my balls pressed against him. Dropping to my elbows, bringing us chest to chest, I anchored my arms under him and gripped his shoulders.
“I love you,” I whispered against his lips, pulling out and gliding back into him in one long, slow thrust.
Hudson let out a sob and wrapped his legs around my waist. “Fuck, Lance. Fuck.” He cried out when I pulled out and thrust in again. “Oh god. Fuck. Love you. So fucking much.”
We lost ourselves in our lovemaking as Haven Grove came alive that morning. Sweat-slicked bodies, soft, dirty words, and fingers entwined on faded blue sheets would forever be my favorite way to welcome in the day with Hudson.
His fingers dug into my ass, urging me to thrust faster and harder as ragged breaths ripped from his chest. “Please, Lance. Fuck. Please. So close.”
Devouring his mouth, our tongues writhing together as I pumped into him, I gripped his shoulders and increased my speed. He exploded between us, the friction of our bodies bringing on his release, and I groaned into his mouth. Each pulse of his orgasm tightened his hole around me, driving me toward my own.
With a final thrust, I froze and buried my face in his neck as my hot, thick load spilled into him. Loving the way Hudson whimpered with each pulse of my dick, I sucked on his collarbone and rolled my hips, pushing my throbbing cock deeper.
When I could finally breathe almost normally, I slid gently from his ass and gathered him in my arms. Kissing the back of his neck, chuckling as he squirmed when I hit a sensitive spot, I silently counted five more minutes before we had to get up and face the day.
The boots on the front porch didn’t register at first.
Even when the knock sounded at the screen door, my brain wasn’t worried.
The old door squeaked open and slammed shut and Casey Joe called out, “Hudson? You okay?”
Then, I panicked.
My body froze.
My brain sounded alarm bells, but the rest of me couldn’t move. I lay there with Hudson in my arms doing nothing.
As if his dad wasn’t about to find us blissed out and smelling of sex.
Like my best friend wasn’t going to find me soaked in sweat and cum after thoroughly dicking down his baby boy.
Arguments of He’s a grown man and This is between the two of you flew out the window as Casey Joe’s heavy boots made their way to Hudson’s room.
“Hudson?” he yelled again. “Everything okay? Thought I heard?—”
Time stood still.
I was a dead man.