Watching River come had been titillating in a way Ash had never thought possible.
Ash ran his fingers through the come cooling in his bellybutton. Not his own, and sexy as hell. If he hadn’t just had the most impressively overwhelming blowjob of his life, he’d be getting hard.
River shifted as if to leave the bed. Ash grabbed him by his broad shoulders and pulled him back down on top of him, wet patch rubbing between them be damned.
River’s eyebrow hitched up as Ash wriggled under him. He clamped his feet either side of River’s. “Can I use you as a blanket? You’re so warm.”
“I can get you a blanket.” But River didn’t hurry to roll off and follow through on the offer, and Ash liked that it had been half-hearted.
He liked everything about their tangled limbs. Everything except for the nagging need to do it again. And again, and again.
He’d hoped coming with River would relieve the fervent curiosity, not increase it.
“What’s racing through that brain of yours?” River asked, staring down at him.
Ash fought the urge to kiss him.
Kiss him like he hadn’t done during their moment of passion.
But kisses were too intimate. Too much heart.
Friendship. He should concentrate on what was sustainable.
He dug his fingers into River’s upper arms. “This won’t affect us being friends, will it?”
River rolled off Ash with a tight laugh. “Of course not.”
Ash wanted so badly to believe it.
His stomach gurgled, interrupting his thoughts. River heard it too, his pensive expression morphing into amusement. “Hungry, are you?”
“Like a wolf.”
“Better get something in that stomach of yours.”
River leaped off the bed in cock-jiggling glory and bent over, smooth, ass tight in the air as he picked up their clothes.
Ash swallowed and scrambled off the bed.
He grabbed his things and scurried into the bathroom to clean up and change.
He met River in the kitchen downstairs. No sign of Ben or Landon anywhere. No sign of the fight that had quaked the walls with their yelling.
Ash slid onto a bar stool and eyed River pulling supplies out of the cupboard. Saucepan on the stove, simmering with water.
“What’s happening with the other two?”
River bowed into the guts of the fridge, out of sight. “That’s what I’d like to know. I love them. They’re my brothers. But they need to get their shit together.”
“Ben’s your chosen family too?”
“Yes.”
“When did you choose Lester as your granddad?” Ash asked softly.
Finally, River emerged from the fridge, a soft smile pulling at his lips. “Pretty early on. We clicked.” River eyed him, and a flurry of warmth soothed Ash’s gurgling belly. “Perhaps there’s something in the Mallory line that I connect to.”
The Mallory line.
Ash picked up a pepper grinder and fiddled with the silver knob. Did that mean maybe one day they would be that close too?
An overwhelming thought. Danielle excluded, he didn’t have friends.
To have one he might choose to call family?
Jesus. He couldn’t fuck this up. He couldn’t mix sex into this again. That had to be it. A one-time thing. Something they would one day shrug off and laugh about.
He gripped the grinder so hard that the silver knob shot off, bouncing across the counter and hitting River against the chest.
River caught it with a palm over his heart. He winced like the metal had hurt him. Maybe he’d slapped it too hard.
“Of course I managed to break something,” Ash muttered. “Will you be okay?”
River’s gaze lifted to the pepper grinder, which Ash held. Held rather obscenely, if he thought about it. Damn, he had to stop letting his mind dive into the gutter like that.
River rubbed his chest, voice raspy. “Let’s hope it can still work.” He smiled and handed Ash a jar. “Can you open it?”
“Are we having pasta and tomato sauce?” Ash asked, accepting the jar. “To check off your list?”
They looked at one another, acknowledging the sore point between them. River held his eye a fraction too long, making sure Ash knew he wasn’t just a box to be ticked.
He quietly nodded.
“It’s Lester’s sauce recipe,” River said, with a relieved smile. “Every year he made a batch with the tomatoes from his garden.”
Ash loved the beautiful rose garden and the wild vegetable patch. “He liked his garden, didn’t he?”
“Loved it. This is the last of his sauce.”
“I’m glad you’re sharing it with me,” Ash said.
“I’ll share a lot more with you in the future.”
Ash caught his breath. Shook his head. He was getting too used to the idea he’d have all the time in the world to learn everything about the Mallorys. He stiffened on his stool.
A week enjoying Silver Pines didn’t mean he could forget his other responsibilities. Even if he earned a modest income and he and Danielle had free accommodation, running the bookstore would never offer Danielle’s college tuition in an easy lump sum.
On the other hand, running the store meant he could quit his cleaning jobs. Work normal hours. Get some honest to God sleep.
Have enough time to live his own life . . .
Ash shifted uncomfortably on his seat. Was it selfish if he chose what helped him the most?
River was watching him carefully, trying to read his mind. “What are you thinking?” he finally said.
Ash grabbed the jar and twisted the lid until it popped. “I can’t keep playing hooky. I need to get back to my regular gigs.”
River dropped pasta into bubbling water and set another saucepan on the stove. He hesitated, glancing at Ash as he stole the opened jar of sauce.
“You want to ask something. What?” Ash asked.
“It’s personal.” River banged the bottom of the jar until all the sauce poured into the pan.
“Go on then,” Ash said, curious what River was curious about. It sent a warm thrill through him knowing River wanted to know something personal about him.
“Danielle. You share a mom, does she know her father?”
“No.” It came out colder than Ash had wanted.
The wooden spoon River pushed around the saucepan stilled.
Ash wished he had something else to fiddle with. He clutched the edge of the counter instead. “Mom’s way was to meet a man, fall head over heels for him at the expense of everything else in her life, and obsess over him until he couldn’t bear it and left. When he did, she turned icy. Never talked about him again, like it had never happened. She chased after them, then chased them away.” Ash tried to shrug and grin, but River’s frown said he didn’t believe that one iota. Ash lightened his tone. “Danielle grew up not knowing who he was, so I tried to find him. I was nine when he left, I thought I could figure who her father was, even if I couldn’t figure out my own. But nothing.”
“I’m so sorry, Ash.”
Ash shrugged.
“What about your mother’s parents?” River asked. “Were they ever around?”
“They abandoned her in much the same way she did with me. There’s something cursed about us Heartfords.”
River processed this with intense concentration on Lester’s sauce. “You’re not like that though, are you? You took in your sister and fought hard to look after her.”
The gentle words had a lump forming in Ash’s throat. “I want to break the cycle.”
“You sound uncertain.”
“She is already sleeping with guys!” So was Ash.
River spoke with calming assurance. “She’s taking every protection. She won’t end up pregnant.”
“A part of me wishes I could stop her.” Stop himself.
“That would only drive her away. You’re doing the right thing by supporting her and being there for her.”
“You make me sound like I have this all under control.”
“I admire what you’re doing, Ash.”
Relief broke in his chest, warm and tingly. It might not be entirely true, but he loved that River thought so. “How’s dinner coming along?”
River lifted the wooden spoon as if to give Ash a taste. His grin widened and he turned the spoon to his own lips. He exaggerated a hum. “Coming along beautifully.”
He licked the spoon in a way that had Ash thinking of their moment upstairs, River’s mouth around his leaking cockhead.
Ash averted his eyes, fumbling for another topic of conversation. Anything to rid him of these thoughts. “Tell me about your family.”
He waited until he caught the spoon dunking back into the saucepan before he looked back at River.
“What do you want to know? My dad is a vet—I followed in his footsteps.”
Ash gestured to the marble counter, the tiled floors, the ceiling to floor windows. “Tell me to butt out if this crosses the line, but I didn’t think a vet earned enough to afford this lifestyle.”
“That’s because the wealth comes from my mother’s side. This is their house, which Landon and I live in now. Mom and Dad have retired to our second place on the farm.”
“Farm? You have a farm?”
“My parents do. I sometimes stop in for lunch during rounds to tend horses in the area.”
“A whole other side of River I’d be fascinated to see.” River’s eyes brimmed with eagerness that Ash felt endearing. “Maybe you could take me there?”
“Name the time.”
“Next week? Thursday is a light day.” Sort of. He’d be getting back to work, so he would have to shuffle one cleaning gig around. “You could pick me up after I finish at Beauview Library.”
River smiled and starting serving them Lester’s tomato sauce on pasta. “It’s a date.”
* * *
The next morning—after a night in their separate rooms—they drove past Silver Pines to feed Chucky.
River had to check on his newborn foals, so he couldn’t stay long. When Ash had finished setting out fresh bowls for Chucky in the crypt, he ambled into Silver Pines to find River hadn’t left.
He was leaning against the counter in his working clothes and boots. Face cast upward in the golden light that filtered through the alabaster window.
Ash moved toward him, each step sending a shiver through him. “Can’t bear to leave me?”
River looked over with a hard swallow. Ash’s eye was drawn to something white in his hand. An envelope. “This came to Silver Pines.”
Ash’s fingers trembled around it. “It’s from my father, isn’t it?”
“Do you want me to wait with you while you read it?”
Suddenly, reading it seemed too momentous. He moved to the mailbox and slipped it inside. That made two unread letters in there.
“I’m not ready yet,” he said simply.
“Really? Because I can call—”
Ash shook his head. “We’ve both got work to do.”
River seemed to understand Ash didn’t want to make it a big deal. He kept his voice light and teasing. “No climbing ladders while I’m gone.”
Ash quipped, “You have an uncanny knack of showing up whenever I’m on one, so maybe I will.”
* * *
River drew in a sharp breath, and his heart did a dangerous dance. He wanted to take Ash in his arms and kiss him. Wanted to say to hell with this friendship bullshit. Go out with me. Let’s make it work.
He wanted Ash to say he was more than just having fun. That he wanted River.
Was this how Landon felt about Chance?
Was this how unrequited obsession began?
River drove out of town.
He should curb these feelings. The insane bolting heat whenever he looked at Ash. The tender flutter in his chest as he admired Ash’s generosity and determination. The crazy, carefree laughs that Ash drew out of him with his quick quips.
Ash was supposed to be off-limits. A promise he should never have broken.
A promise he wanted to break again.