Jesse #2
“Yeah, I was little,” I interrupted, the words coming out rough.
“I had this stupid, huge case of hero worship for Hoyt. I wanted my brother to stay and show me how to ride a bull.” I dragged in a breath.
“It was my fucking birthday. Ten years old. I remember that part as clear as day.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out my penknife and held it in the flat of my hand.
“Hoyt wrapped it up all fancy, with a bow and shit, said I was old enough to have one, and I was so proud of it, and of myself, and so excited that he’d come back… fuck.”
“It’s okay,” Lucas murmured and stepped closer until he was within reach, and I could inhale his citrus scent above the scent of coffee. “You’re okay.”
I swallowed hard—I wish I were okay. “Back then, I didn’t understand how much hate Dad carried.
I mean, he was sad and ornery and shouted a lot, but I didn’t know any better.
But when Hoyt visited, and Dad saw him talking to me, he came outside.
It was wrong. Dangerous. He spilled everything, every curse word, said Hoyt was corrupting me, and I gripped that fucking knife so hard, and I wanted it to stop.
I wanted Dad not to kill my big brother. ”
My chest ached. “I stepped between them because I thought I mattered enough to both of them to make them stop. I wanted to fix it, and I’ve spent every year since knowing I only made things worse.”
Lucas shook his head and stepped in closer, slipped under my arm, and wrapped his arms around my waist, right into my space.
The solid warmth of him hit first—chest to my side, forearms locked around me—then the quiet steadiness of his breathing, slow and sure.
This house had only just started to feel mine, and without meaning to, he’d turned it into something steadier, something that had shifted my whole world before I’d even realized it was happening.
I rested my chin on his curls. I needed this.
For a split second, panic flared. This feeling, him holding me and letting me fall apart, could disappear.
Hoyt coming back, Dad stirring up the past, one wrong word, and this fragile, borrowed safety could be ripped out from under me, too.
I went still, afraid that if I moved or breathed too hard, it would all break.
“You were ten, cowboy,” he said. “How could you have made it worse?”
I pressed my mouth into his hair and kept my forehead tucked to his so he couldn’t lift his head. “Because what Hoyt said about Dad, hell, he thought I picked a side,” I said, so softly I almost took it back, the words barely leaving me, “and that’s why he never came home.”
The words sat there between us, ugly and exposed.
I held my breath, braced for the shift I’d learned to expect, the moment when someone pulled back or tried to fix it or told me I was wrong.
My shoulders locked, waiting for the weight of it to land back on me, for him to step away, for this to end the way things always did.
He didn’t say anything.
That pause was all it took. Too much. Wrong thing to say. I started to pull back, already bracing for the distance, for the careful kindness that came right before someone left.
Lucas swore under his breath and tightened his grip, fierce and sudden. His hand slid up my spine, firm, unyielding, done with letting me retreat. “Don’t,” he said, low and rough, pressed to my temple. “Don’t you dare take that on yourself.”
I froze.
He leaned back enough to speak into my hair, his voice steady but edged with something hot and protective.
“You were a kid trying to survive in a house that wasn’t safe.
You didn’t choose sides. You chose not to let your brother die.
” His arms stayed locked around me, no space, no escape.
“And if Hoyt walked away, that was on your dad, who failed you both. Not on you.”
My hands curled into the back of his shirt, and his thumb traced a slow line at my side. Then, I cradled his face, tilted it to mine, and brushed a hesitant kiss to his lips.
I rested my forehead against his and closed my eyes. “What did I do,” I murmured, the words rough and disbelieving, “to end up with you in my life, Lucas Barrett?”
“You know I have feelings for you, Jesse,” he said, but I don’t think it was a question.
“And I have feelings for you, however complicated this all is.”
He didn’t answer; instead, his hands were on my waist, his fingers digging into my skin through my shirt. “Lift me,” he ordered, his voice low and commanding, sending a jolt of heat straight to my groin.
I blinked; my brain fogged with want. “Huh?”
He huffed in impatience, his cock hard and obvious through his jeans. “The counter. Lift me onto it.”
I hesitated for half a second, my cock throbbing at the thought of him spread out in front of me, at my mercy.
The shift was instant, my thoughts dropping out from under me, as want hit hard and unfiltered.
Then, I was moving, my hands sliding down to his ass.
He made a sound—something between a gasp and a laugh—as I hoisted him up, his legs wrapping around my waist, his weight solid and perfect in my arms.
He didn’t wait for me to set him down, but pushed me back a step before he hooked his heels behind my thighs, pulling me flush to him, his cock pressed against mine through our jeans.
I groaned, my hands finding his waist again, my thumbs brushing the hem of his hoodie, teasing the bare skin beneath.
Lucas didn’t give me time to think. His hands were in my hair, tugging enough to make my scalp tingle before he pulled me into another kiss. This one was slower, deeper, his tongue sliding in a rhythm that had my hips rocking, seeking friction.