Page 61 of Cattle Stop

Cooper grabs the bundle, sticks them beneath his thigh, and turns the key. Whit fishes for them, like he’s going to snatch the wrenches back, then just rests his hand on Cooper’s leg and keeps it there as they drive back home.

Chapter Eleven

The truck falls silent as Cooper shuts off the engine. Outside, the air’s filled with the chirp of crickets and croaking frogs. The gravel crunches beneath their boots as Cooper and Whit walk toward the house. The hinges squeak on the kitchen door, and Sadie’s slow, rhythmic snores come from where she’s sprawled on her dog bed, one ear inside out.

Drew’s still out for the evening, his Jeep missing from the driveway and his shoes gone from next to the door. Cooper carefully turns Sadie’s ear over, gentle so as not to wake her.

It’s just him and Whit, then. Nobody else to bear witness to the creak of the stairs as they climb nor the soft snick of their bedroom door as Whit presses it closed behind them.

Whit kisses him open-mouthed and eager, drawing Cooper close, crowding against him in the narrow space between the dresser and door. Cooper presses into him, the pull of Whit’s mouth better without the sludge of too much beer dampening his senses. There’s just the clear crispness of the spark of Whit’s lips tugging at his, how his arm wraps low around Cooper’s waist, and his good hand cups Cooper’s ribs.

What a delightful mistake to be making. An absolutely wonderfully terrible idea. Whit’s fucking gorgeous and Cooper’s got the stillness of their room, the emptiness of the house, and the evening ahead to make damn well sure he enjoys it.

And then his phone buzzes in his pocket. It’s the longer vibration of a phone call, not the quick hum of a text. Cooper fishes into his pocket, slips his phone out, and tosses it onto the dresser.

“Your phone’s ringing,” Whit says, hot breath against Cooper’s ear.

Cooper tilts his head so Whit can kiss his neck and slips his hands higher under Whit’s shirt, tracing over warm, strong muscles. “Ignore it.”

But Whit’s Whit, so what he ignores is Cooper and reaches for Cooper’s phone, tipping it so he can see the screen.

“Oregon’s calling.” Whit steps back, his lips shiny and wet.

“Oh goddammit.” Cooper rubs his face, straightens his shirt, plucks at his pants. He doesn’t give a flying fuck about anything other than the bulge against Whit’s zipper and the handful of steps to Whit’s mattress. Hell, his own mattress, too. He’ll sacrifice his sheets to get fucked again, hard and firm, and probably better this time without the tipsiness and the shocked horror of what they’re doing.

Cooper slides his hands over the swell of Whit’s ass. “I’ll call them back.”

Whit just waits, holding out the phone.

Cooper sighs. Knowing Whit, what’s coming is probably a lecture on professional responsibility. It’d probably get Whit all hot and bothered, too. Cooper takes the phone and slides his thumb across the screen. “Hello?”

“Cooper? This is Cheryl, so glad I caught you. I wanted to talk to you about offering you a position. Is this a good time?”

Cooper shoves his hair back and smooths his shirt. “A great time.”

Lying to a new employer, really starting this off right. Cooper slips into the hallway before Whit can levy one of his cool, assessing looks.

“Listen, we’d love to have you. I just have a couple questions first. Well, mostly just one question, about your previous employment.”

“Is there a problem with it?”

“It’s…thorough.”

Cooper edges a couple steps farther down the hallway. “Thorough?”

“You’ve got a lot of experience, I mean, a lot of jobs over the years. It seems like all of these places you’ve worked, it’s six months at most and nothing even lasting a year, unless I’m reading your résumé wrong.”

“No.” Cooper glances back at the bedroom door and slips down the hall to Drew’s room, empty and the lights off. He presses the door closed and sits on the edge of Drew’s bed. “No, that’s right.”

“Well, clearly, you’d be a great fit here, and we’d love to have someone with so much experience, but come September, would you be off somewhere else, and we’d just be rehiring for your position?”

Cooper’s cheeks heat. “No, no,” he says, “I really liked the look of your farm and our interview, I—it’d be a good fit, yeah, like you said.”

“Well, we’d really be looking for that commitment into the fall, at the very least.”

“Fall, right, that makes sense.”

“And it’s already getting close to summer, so we’re aiming to have someone in this position quite soon.”