Stockton County Cowboys Book 3: Roping Cowboys

Chapter 3: Other Men

Chapter 3: Other Men

Cabella Hall

7:51 P.M.

But I did have one major worry about the cowboy and our marriage: infidelity. He was a popular queer man, and he’d once frequented The Poppycock Bar almost every night in search of the man of his dreams—me. Gray was selective about the men he dated and had intimate relationships with. Unfortunately, those men all lived in Stockton County and kept “in touch” with him. I wasn’t about to suggest to anyone, particularly his sister, that he was sleeping with those other cowboys, but I found myself convincing myself on a daily basis that he was just a “playful flirt” with three men, on whom I kept very close tabs.

Twenty-seven-year-old Adam Drywer was an Englishman who worked as a full-time hand at Riding Ranch (owned by Pax Raulton and Cal Hoke), where he lived. His duties included caring for the ranch’s sixteen Palominos, and he rarely had time off. But when he did have time off, he visited The Poppycock Bar. And, like me, he’d met my future husband-to-be there. Adam was adorable, and he looked exactly like the actor Sam Caflin. He could get any cowboy out of their tight jeans with just a smile. And I also knew that Gray just happened to be one of those cowboys who’d fallen under his s****l spell.

Gray and Adam had dated, joined at the hip, for over a year. Marriage was a bright and shiny star in their futures—but neither man had proposed. Their fourteen months of cowboy-with-cowboy intimacy was a bittersweet romance. There were two big differences between them. Adam enjoyed his drugs, and Gray didn’t. Adam also had a very difficult time keeping his c**k in his denim, which Gray wasn’t pleased about, especially since Adam never used protection. They argued a lot while they were together, and they threw their fists more than a few times. Black eyes and swollen lips weren’t unusual during those months. When their relationship fell apart, the ruins smoldered heartbreakingly around them.

I knew they stayed friends and still saw each other occasionally. Sometimes I couldn’t help picturing them holding hands, or even kissing, over coffee. As far as I know, they didn’t sleep together after their coffees, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t. So I closely watched Gray when he’d been with the attractive Englishman, fearing that he’d inevitably stray and break my heart.

* * * *

Jake Hollings was another man I tended to keep my eye on. He was another old boyfriend whom Gray was still friends with. The Justin Timberlake look-alike (add some salt-and-pepper to his hair) was dashing, but in all the wrong ways. Jake was about fifteen years older than my beloved, and he’d had every intention of keeping Gray for the rest of his life. They’d always been talking marriage. The beefy older man owned his own trucking company, seemed to have a solid bank account, occasionally worked out, and only had eyes for Gray.

But their relationship was nothing to write home about. They met at The Poppycock, dated off and on, and eventually became lovers, but their six-month relationship then ended abruptly. Jake worked diligently to lock Gray to his side, half-suffocating the cowboy, leaving him no personal space.

Gray couldn’t do a damn thing without the older man interrogating him; he had no freedom in that relationship. He felt like Jake’s caged pet. Some Stockton County people might have called it abuse, but the people who knew them that well rarely gossiped. In the end, Jake dumped Gray, calling him “out of control and unloving.”

I knew things about Jake Hollings that I didn’t really want to know. He often called Gray’s cell phone and left raunchy messages about what he wanted to do to my future husband in bed—or over a couch, or on the floor. I regularly checked Gray’s texts and read things like sit on my c**k and bounce up and down, use your skin with my tongue, spank your cowboy bottom and ride you. Never did I ask Gray about the texts, because I knew that he didn’t respond to any of Jake’s nasty messages. But that didn’t mean Gray wouldn’t respond someday, especially if he grew weary of our relationship. Though I hoped that that would never happen. If Gray began another s****l relationship with Jake, I would have heart failure. And that was why I watched Jake and Gray discretely but closely, troubled by the thought that they’d hook up again without my knowledge.

* * * *

The third man that I watched closely—and feared the most that Gray would cheat on me with—was Toby Chambers, my nemesis. Toby was six-two and a muscular 190 pounds at forty-one years old. He always sported black stubble on his chin and cheeks, except for a half-inch scar on his right cheek, the reminder of an accident with a .22 rifle when he was just thirteen. The man’s chest was Herculean and covered in thick black curly hair. Toby had the reputation of being a heavy drinker and something of a slut, jumping from one naked man’s bed to the next. Many county boys called him a player, including me. Just one of the rumors about him involved details of his massive, uncut c**k, supposedly ten inches long and two inches thick. Some queer cowboys in Stockton County said that Toby, the owner of The Long Ranch Road Inn, knew how to use his d**k. Others said he’d drugged and raped them. Few said that Toby Chambers was soft and smooth in bed.

Of course Gray met Toby, like all his previous boyfriends, at The Poppycock. History always repeats itself, and Gray was no exception to that rule. I knew that the two had f****d right in the bar after meeting each other: raw, unprotected, porn-perfect s*x. After that d**k-in-ass performance, the two couldn’t stay away from each other. They shared bliss and good s*x for the next ten months.

Unfortunately for Gray, Toby got interested in a new hire at his inn. The six-three electrician was Brandon Binks, a lanky, handsome, and witty gentleman. He was twenty-one years old and sported a fresh and fuckable ass. So Toby had two boyfriends. But once Gray found out about Toby’s affair with the electrician, he promptly dumped Toby. To my understanding, Brandon Binks gave Toby a dose of his own medicine some three months later. Bobby met a waiter his own age, fell in lust, and dumped Toby.

The things that concerned me about Toby were simple: He was alone again and he f****d like a bull, which I knew Gray enjoyed. I wasn’t rough and wild in the sack, and I feared that Gray would abandon my gentle lovemaking for Toby’s animalistic performance in the bedroom—among other places. Toby had an overwhelming attraction about him that made men—including Gray—drop to their knees for him. If he was around a man, most likely that man ended up sleeping with him. And I knew that he wasn’t above f*****g around with two or more men at the same time, which he had proved during Gray’s relationship with him. Toby wasn’t safe in Gray’s company, any more than any other married or single man. Bottom line: Gray was unattached, single, and wanted to aggressively bang my fiancé’s bottom—which I’d prevent at all costs, even if I had to get physical with the guy, putting him in his proper, distant place.

* * * *

No, Adam Drywer, Jake Rollings, and Toby Chambers were not invited to our evening’s faux ceremony. In fact, I made sure they stayed off the guest list. The last thing Gray and I needed was an uncomfortable moment at our gathering. But honestly, Gray was through with the three men, wasn’t he? So what did I really have to worry about, right?