Unruly Cowboy

1. Cash

CASH

Something wet and warm drags across my cheek.

Then my nose.

Then my open mouth, which—okay, that’s enough.

I jerk awake, scrambling upright, the morning sun shining directly into my eyes. Fuck. I’m in the bed of my truck. I turn my head and find Pixie, with her front paws on the open tailgate, tail going like a propeller, completely unbothered by the fact that she just woke me up with her entire tongue.

“You’re the worst,” I tell her.

She barks, making my head scream.

“Pixie. I swear to God.”

Of course the damn dog ignores me as she jumps into the truck bed, demanding I pet her until she’s satisfied and runs off.

I climb out of the truck, shaking myself off and notice that my belt is off by a loop. What the fuck happened last night? Pretty sure my dick got sucked, but I can’t tell from who. I’m sure they will text me later today.

I sit on the edge of the tailgate, squinting out at the field.

The bonfire pit is still breathing—thin threads of smoke curling up from the ash, gray against the pale morning sky. Someone left a lawn chair on its side.

We do this every summer—have since before I was old enough to be invited.

The Thornwood Bonfire is one of those things that happens at the beginning of every summer, and half the county was out here last night.

Neighbors, ranch hands, people I’ve known since grade school, and people I couldn’t name if you paid me.

I don’t remember a lot of the back half.

I pick up my hat from beside me in the truck bed, turning it over in my hands. There’s a grass stain on the brim that wasn’t there yesterday.

I put it on anyway.

The ranch looks the way it always does in the morning. The main house is sitting square and solid against the tree line, and the barn doors have already been pushed open, which means somebody’s been up for hours, and I’m the last one to know it.

And then there’s the fence lines running out toward the east pasture, the south field, and the long, flat stretch of land that my grandfather broke his back over and called the best decision he ever made.

Ben.

I glance toward the main house.

He wasn’t at the bonfire last night—first one he’s missed in as long as I can remember. Pixie trots around the front of the truck and sits at my feet, looking up at me like she’s waiting for me to explain myself.

“Don’t,” I say.

She tilts her head.

A water bottle hits me square in the chest, and I grunt at the impact, the bottle falling in my hands as I look up.

Dawson is standing ten feet away with a mug of coffee and the expression he reserves specifically for me.

The one that says he’s already done with this and it’s not even seven in the morning.

“Drink it,” he says.

I crack it open and drink because my body is begging me to. The water is warm, and I don’t care even a little.

“Rhett’s up,” Dawson says, and his voice drops just enough to make it a warning. “He’s already in a mood—something about the south fence line. You need to be cleaned up and useful before he comes out here and sees you like this.”

I look down at myself and chuckle. “Define useful.”

“Cash,” he says, annoyed.

“I’m up, I’m up.” I finish the water and crush the bottle. “Who’s he pissed at?”

“Currently? Everyone. But you’re the easiest target this morning, so I’d move fast if I were you.”

That tracks. Rhett in a mood is its own weather system. You don’t argue with it, you don’t try to reason with it, you just get out of the way or you get wet.

I pull my shirt off, turn it right-side out, and pull it back on.

“The belt, too,” Dawson says.

I look at him as I fix my belt without a word. “How drunk was I last night?” I ask.

Dawson’s expression doesn’t change, but something behind his eyes shifts in a way that tells me I don’t actually want to know.

“Tell me,” I say.

“You let someone suck you off behind the barn.”

“That explains my pants being fucked up.”

“I only know because she came back around the corner with the biggest grin I have ever seen on a human face. And then, about two minutes later, you came stumbling out with your hat sideways.”

“So, she had a good time,” I say, shrugging. I remember the sound she made more than anything else about her.

“Cash.”

“That’s a good thing, Dawson. That means I did something right last night.”

“That is not the takeaway I would have gone with.”

“Noted.” I can’t help it, the laugh comes out before I can stop it, low and a little rough around the edges from the hangover. “Was it at least after midnight? Tell me it was after midnight.”

“It was after midnight.”

“Then it was a solid night.”

Dawson stares at me for a long moment. “You are almost twenty-two years old.”

“I know how old I am.”

Old enough to know better. Young enough not to care yet. The gap between those two things is where I live.

“Start acting like it. Fucking girls just out of high school is not for you, Cash.”

I open my mouth to say something else but the screen door bangs open before I get the chance, and whatever easygoing version of this morning exists evaporates on the spot as Rhett comes off the porch, heated.

He doesn’t look at me, doesn’t look at Dawson. His jaw is set, his eyes forward.

Two steps behind him is Colt.

Colton Dawson. He’s got his head down slightly, hands in his pockets, and the look of someone who has already read the room and made his peace with it. He’s here for his vet internship, starting today—his first real day on Thornwood land in any official capacity.

I like Colt—have since we were younger.

Rhett blows past us without a word.

Colt meets my eyes for exactly half a second as he passes. He acknowledges both of us and I give a small nod back.

Then they’re both gone, swallowed by the barn doors, and the yard is quiet again.

Dawson and I stand there.

“Start at the fence line?” I ask, finally.

“Sure. Let’s get this day over with,” Dawson says.