A Cowboy's Heart

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Gus Sharpley prided himself on the way he managed his ranch. “Like a family,” he would tell other businessmen when they met in his drawing room over brandies and scotch. He was a kind, older gentleman, still spry in his sixties, whose whipcord-thin body held no ounce of fat and who could still spring up into a saddle when necessary. The ranch hands at the Triple S would often see Sharpley and Hal riding together, checking the cattle or the fences, sometimes heading into town. Sharpley’s lined skin was a stark contrast to Hal’s smooth features—time had been unkind to Gus, and his tanned skin only made him look older, like a torn piece of worn hide left to weather in the sun. The flyaway mop of white hair on top of his head and the white handlebar mustache he favored only enhanced his leather-like appearance. But he had a quick grin, sparkling eyes, and a way of talking to a man that made him feel they were cut of the same cloth, he and Gus. The ranch hands liked him because, even if they weren’t, he treated them in the same manner he did those businessmen in their starched suits.

Supper at the Triple S was a shared meal eaten in the Sharpley home. A large dining room housed three long tables; the Sharpleys sat at one with Hal, and the cowboys split themselves up among the other two. Tommy had assumed this was common practice on other ranches, dining with the family, but his fellow workers only laughed the one time he mentioned it. “You sure ain’t from around here,” Jose had said with a laugh. “Most of the time, the family wants nothing to do with the likes of us. Rancher gets up in arms if you so much as look at his muchachas bonitas. He keeps you in your place, in the bunkhouse, and he keeps his daughters under lock and key.”

At the first table, Sharpley ate at one end, his wife at the other. She was an odd woman, petite, with a permanent scowl on her delicate features, as if she smelled something unpleasant but had been raised too proper to mention it. She looked down her nose at everyone—the cowboys, her daughters, Hal. How she managed to do that when she stood a good foot shorter than most people, Tommy didn’t know. She rarely spoke, and spent most of her days sequestered in the study. Dinner was the only time the cowboys saw her, but she kept her gaze very firmly on her plate and deterred any pleasantries whatsoever.

Between the Sharpleys sat their daughters, the ten-year-old twins with their backs to the other tables and the much older Sarah, who faced the cowboys. Beside Sarah sat Hal. As he ate, he’d occasionally look up from whatever conversation Gus made to cast a glance around the room. His hair was combed back and slicked down, and his gray eyes kept the cowboys in check. There were some shuffling feet, some cleared throats, maybe a whispered word or two followed by a quickly stifled laugh, but for the most part, the ranch hands ate in silence.

Tommy always chose the seat farthest from Hal, two tables over, and furtively watched the foreman while he ate. Hal’s stern gaze never settled on anyone for long, but every so often Tommy liked to think the man stared his way. At those times, Tommy flashed him a grin, just in case. Then he’d play it off, grimacing as he cut into the food on his plate, before any of his friends could mention it.

Was it just his imagination, or did Hal seem to look over at him more this evening than he had previously? By the time he was finished slurping his soup, Tommy wasn’t sure any more what Hal had said to Sarah that had made him so upset. Maybe Hal didn’t mind that Tommy thought of him in that way. It hadn’t stopped him from draping an arm around Tommy’s shoulders as they came in for supper. Maybe the foreman had a thing for Miss Sharpley, true, but maybe there was a part of him flattered by Tommy’s attraction. And maybe, just maybe, that part would be open to a few intimate moments with someone who, unlike Sarah, wouldn’t slap his hands away and say no.

The cowboy beside him nudged Tommy in the ribs. “How about you, Tom?”

With difficulty, he pulled himself back into the present and frowned at Jim Joe, a portly kid his own age whose round cheeks were potmarked with acne scars. His black hair stood a mere inch off his head, and the pinked, sunburned scalp showed through like the earth through badly cut grass. He’d paid the sheep shearer two pennies to run the razor over his head the last time the man came to the ranch. Cheapest haircut he’d ever had, he boasted. Ugliest, too, in Tommy’s opinion.

As Tommy frowned at him, Jim Joe asked, “You coming?”

“What?” Tommy frowned harder and glanced around the table. All eyes were on him. Had he missed something? “Where?”

Across from Jim Joe, Slim laughed. A tall, skinny guy two years older than the rest of the greenhorns at the table, Slim was all sharp angles and long limbs. Even his face was long—pointed chin, pointed nose, high forehead above which a forelock of blond hair was combed back. He had large eyes with heavy lids, and looked as if he were on the verge of falling asleep. He always laughed, and no one but Hal was safe from his snide remarks and sometimes mean-spirited jests. “Tommy,” he drawled, shaking his head. “Tommy, Tommy. When will you learn? She’s out of your league.”

She?

Slim looked over his shoulder and the other cowboys followed his gaze, Tommy included. For a second, his heart stuttered in his chest—he was so sure Slim would say something about Hal, something inappropriate and God, so damn true, that Tommy would have no other choice than to start a fight.

But he was looking at Sarah, and his words hung between the guys like a mist that hadn’t yet dispersed. She’s out of your league. Slim didn’t honestly think Tommy spent his meals staring at the main table just to look at Sharpley’s daughter, did he?

A giddy wave of relief washed over Tommy. So they didn’t know, they had no clue. Beside him, Jim Joe sighed. “She sure is pretty, though.”

“Whores are pretty,” Slim replied, turning back to his dinner. “A lady like that, she has class. That’s something you can’t buy for a couple dollars down at the Wildhorse Saloon.”

Tommy poked at the food on his plate with his fork. “I ain’t eying Miss Sarah.”

Slim winked. “Sure you ain’t. None of us are. So you in tonight, or what?”

“I wasn’t following what y’all were saying,” Tommy admitted.

Across from him, Jose laughed. “That’s ‘cause you busy not eying Miss Sarah, si?”

Tommy glared at him, but before he could answer, Jim Joe explained. “We’re heading into town later. You should come along, Tommy. You know we’re gonna get paid after dinner. We’re thinking a few rounds of drinks, some faro down at the Wildhorse, maybe see what the girls look like over there…”

He nudged Tommy again, eyebrows waggling suggestively. “Eh?” he asked, nodding. “Sounds good, no? Come with us.”

“I don’t—”

“Come on, amigo,” Jose cajoled. “With the lights out, any one of them soiled doves could be Miss Sarah. They’re all the same in the dark.”

Tommy shook his head. “I’m not real interested—”

“Trust me, you are,” Slim said, ending the discussion. Tommy gave him a dubious frown that only made Slim laugh. “Wait, don’t tell me. You ain’t never been with a woman before, is that it?”

While that was the truth, Tommy didn’t feel it necessary to add he didn’t exactly want to be with a woman, either. What would he do? He liked the hard planes of the male physique; firm muscle and strength turned him on, not soft padding and feathery touches. He was in love with the p***s—all shapes and sizes, all lengths, fat, short, uncut, long, hard, veined…he liked d**k. At nineteen, he knew this on a visceral level, just as he knew how to breathe. It was that innate, that uncontrollable. Something he’d die before he gave up.

Can’t give it up when I haven’t even had it yet.

That frown stayed in place as his friends tried to convince him to tag along into town. Tommy was a virgin, in every sense of the word. At nineteen, he hadn’t even been kissed, let alone intimately touched by another. But he knew what he wanted, and it wasn’t Miss Sarah like the other cowboys thought. It was Hal, definitely, and everything that made him a man was everything Tommy wanted in a lover. An evening at the Wildhorse for him meant drinks and cards, nothing more. He still had a date with his hand, a bottle of lotion, and the memory of Hal’s arm around him. If the bunkhouse were empty, he could really draw the moment out, savor the feel of his own hands on his c**k and balls, maybe work a finger between his buttocks for that sweet burn he’d managed to get once or twice before…

But Slim set his fork down on the table with a clatter. “You’re going. We’ll get you a girl—” When Tommy started to protest, Slim held up his hand. “Someone cheap, don’t worry. You’ll come back here a changed man, my boy. Don’t shake your head. You can’t say no.”

Tommy glared across the table at his friend, but Slim only laughed. “You’ll thank me in the morning, trust me.”