I liked it. I liked watching him jerk off.
And in my mind, I was only thinking one thing: would this be what Harlan would look like, getting off? How would he sound? And God, was his cock thick like that when it was impossibly hard?
I gently closed my laptop and sat back on my bed. My heart was pounding in my chest. I looked down at the tip of my dick and saw that there was a bead of precum there.
I wasn’t that into the gay porn.
But I was really fucking into the idea of watching Harlan get off. Seeing him that satisfied. Knowing he was going to come.
“Fuck,” I whispered as I wrapped my fist around my cock. I didn’t know if I was losing it, but at this point I didn’t care.
I pumped hard and fast, not hesitating. It was only a couple of minutes before I was lying flat on the bed, the wave of my orgasm crashing down on me out of nowhere. I came so hard I shot all over my stomach, my chest, all the way up to my goddamn shoulder, hitting my own skin like a projectile.
I groaned, sinking back onto the mattress and letting go of my dick.
I knew I should have felt guilty.
But instead, all I’d felt was immensely turned on. I’d just come to the thought of my best friend, and I’d craved it like a drug.
7
HARLAN
“Oh, it’s coming,” Chase said as he walked inside through the doors that led out to the back deck. His hair was dusted with a layer of fresh white snowflakes. “Only in Colorado. April blizzards.”
“I don’t think Colorado is the only place that gets snow in April, but I get your drift. Thought they said the snow wasn’t starting for at least another hour,” I protested.
Chase sat down at the bar. “They predicted six o’clock, but it’s already starting. Usually when I’m covered in white, it isn’t snow, if you know what I mean.”
I rolled my eyes. “Good one.”
I’d been lost in my work all afternoon. Every day this week I’d been coming into the brewery early and leaving late, throwing myself into small test batches of new beers and endlessly brainstorming ideas for this year’s summer and fall ales. The work kept me over on the far side of the brewery, tucked away among the brewing tanks instead of up front bartending and interacting with customers.
Sometimes I needed that space. Alone time. Especially now that the Fixer Brothers crew, and sometimes their TV cameras, too, were always here, in and out of the brewery and the back deck and lawn.
I wasn’t hiding from Sawyer.
No. Definitely not.
But this week, ever since he’d texted me to say our kiss was a mistake, I found myself taking more alone time over by the brewing tanks. I agreed with Sawyer, and I knew he was right. It would be better for both of us to just go back to how we’d always been. Best friends, without any complications. In reality, all I wanted was for both of us to feel normal again. Things would settle, and we could forget about the moment by the hot tub.
Before I fell asleep each night, though, in the moment when my head hit the pillow before I dozed off to sleep, all I could think about was his kiss. It was still the first thing I saw when I woke up, and the last thing I saw before I went to sleep.
Today was no exception. I’d been hiding-but-not-hiding over by the brewing tanks again all afternoon. Now, I’d just come up behind the bar to help out the other bartenders as the evening rolled in, and I was surprised to find myself relieved as Chase walked in from outside.
For some reason, Chase had cracked through my defenses pretty quickly. He certainly wasn’t my type, but he seemed like a good enough guy now that he knew I wasn’t interested in him. I could see us becoming friends.
And maybe I felt like I needed an uncomplicated friend, right now. A little break from my lone man on the mountain ways.
“Are those new pavers out back going to be screwed up if a foot of snow falls tonight?” I asked.
“The guys are out back tarping everything up so the snow doesn’t fuck it up overnight,” Chase said. “We already got all of the cameras into the vans. It’s beer time for me.”
“You’re not going to head home before the snow really starts?”
Chase gave me a wicked grin. “Production company offered to get us hotel rooms right here in town for the night,” he said. “Some of the crew already headed home, but I jumped on a chance for a free hotel room at the inn.”
“Very nice,” I said. “I’ve heard Jade River Inn is a great place to stay.”