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"My hat!" Aiden cried, scrabbling at the hook by the door for his Stetson. "Don't forget my hat!"
The frigid winter night slapped them as soon as Seth stepped outside, and suddenly, Aiden was grateful for the layers of quilt protecting him. The wind raced through the loose gutter, whistling like a railway engine. Aiden was protected from the cold, but he still shivered. He'd never been carried before—not sober, anyway—and it felt strangely intimate. It was doing things to his heart that he wasn't sure he was ready to examine.
"Hang tight," Seth murmured, breath visible in the air. He locked the trailer and then navigated the snow-dusted path to his truck, ice crunching beneath his boots. The world was upside-down wherever Aiden looked, a smeared monochrome palette that was difficult to make sense of.
Seth carefully deposited Aiden in the passenger seat, ensuring the blanket was still snug before stretching the seatbelt across his lap. He took a moment to brush a fat curl from Aiden's forehead, and their eyes met. Everything else fell away for a heartbeat—the future, but most importantly, the past with all its doubt and fear. There was only this moment, the two of them together…and it was perfect.
When Aiden finally found the words to speak, his voice shook. "I thought you said you were fed up with babysitting me."
Seth's eyes crinkled at the corners, just barely. "It's a tough habit to break," he said, chucking Aiden under the chin obnoxiously and laughing when Aiden glared.
"Get my boots," Aiden protested, but Seth had already slammed the door shut. "Wait—and clothes! I need clothes!"
"Trust me, you won't," Seth said with a chuckle. He ignored Aiden's protests, rounded to the driver's side, and started the engine.
Aiden howled, fighting to get his arms free of his trappings. "At least bring me a pair of boxers. Damn."
But his protests were mostly for show, and Seth knew it. A man who'd once hoofed it into town stark naked wasn't exactly body-shy or picky about what he wore. As the truck eased out of the trailer park and the heating vents began pumping warm air, an unexpected sense of contentment washed over him. He was going home. The old farmhouse that had always felt more like home than his mother's perfectly curated lifestyle.
As Seth opened up the engine and began the long climb into the mountains, Aiden felt the night close around them. There was no ambient light pollution, no signs of humanity, just the way the truck's headlights carved a path for them through the darkness. Despite the icy roads, Seth's hands were relaxed and confident on the wheel.
Aiden relaxed into his seat, feeling drowsy. Seth wrapped an arm around him, pulling him close to rest against his shoulder. Aiden sighed and let his eyes drift closed, bathed in warmth and the promise of Seth's big, soft-looking bed.
"Home," he murmured, already half-asleep. "Always thought of it that way. Missed…missed it when you wouldn't let me visit."
He thought Seth's arm might have tightened around him, but he couldn't be sure. He was already fast asleep.
Chapter Twenty
SETH
Seth hadn't used an alarm since he was a kid. His body instinctively knew when it was time to wake and only ever failed when he pushed himself beyond exhaustion. He hadn't slept a wink last night but was more energized than he'd felt in years. His body hummed. It had been a very, very long time since he'd gotten laid. He'd almost forgotten how good it felt. Or perhaps he hadn't forgotten; maybe it had never felt like this. He'd certainly never taken anyone home when his sister was there.
He was already awake when the first predawn light began to filter through the curtains. He lay on his side, arm pillowed beneath his head, counting the individual lashes that fanned shadows across the tops of Aiden's cheeks.
It was so rare to see him lying still. His expression wasn't exactly peaceful, but something about it wrenched Seth's heart. He looked vulnerable; he was vulnerable, more than he would ever acknowledge. His vivacious good cheer was little more than a protective shell to keep people from targeting his soft underbelly like his mother constantly did. His need for love and approval would always be his Achilles' heel.
Seth brushed one fingertip lightly down the bridge of Aiden's nose, smiling when Aiden twitched and scrunched up his face. It seemed brutally unfair that Seth had to climb out from beneath the warm blankets and leave Aiden alone so soon after discovering the taste of his skin. He wanted to stay in bed all day, gorging himself on this new familiarity, but animals needed to be fed. They always came first.
Besides, Tessa would be awake soon, and Seth wanted to be dressed when he answered her questions.
He felt a pang of regret as he pulled away, slipping out from under Aiden's weight as gracefully as he could without waking him. Aiden would join him in a heartbeat, but Seth didn't see any reason they should both suffer. Besides, it pleased him in some primal way to know his lover would be waiting for him, warm and naked, after a morning of back-breaking labor.
He'd never had a lover—not a real one. It was a spot he'd only ever wanted Aiden to fill.
Seth moved around his dark bedroom with the ease of old routine. He could have taken the master bedroom after his father died, but he'd never seen the point. He knew the precise number of steps to his closet, the exact spot his boots sat beside the door, every creak and shadow. This was his room—his place. Taking his father's bedroom would feel too much like replacing him, and Seth would never be even half the man he was.
He tugged a thick sweatshirt over his jeans and boots, grabbed his hat from a hook beside Aiden's Stetson, and slipped silently into the hallway.
The house was steeped in gloom. The stairwell was so dark he could barely make out the familiar faces of his family from behind the picture frames on the wall. Smiling faces; good people. His mother had been a real beauty. It was a shame Tessa barely remembered her. She was the spitting image of their great-grandmother, laughing out from a sepia-toned photograph while she shucked corn on the front porch. Seth liked to think he was making them proud, putting up a good fight when it would have been easier to give up and sell the land. Then again, maybe they were looking down on him and shaking their heads, wondering how they'd ever raised such an idiot. The kind of sentimental fool who had sacrificed his inheritance for someone else.
He descended the stairs carefully, avoiding the steps he knew would groan under his weight. Strong arms engulfed him suddenly from behind, and he almost jumped out of his skin.
"Jesus!" he yelled, tripping a step before catching himself on the banister.
Aiden's husky chuckle rumbled in his ear. "This is the weirdest walk of shame I ever saw," he murmured, nuzzling the back of Seth's neck with warm kisses.
"No sense in both of us freezing our nuts off out there." Seth gripped Aiden's wrist, lifted it to his mouth, and pressed a kiss to the veins beneath the thin inner skin. Aiden's fingers flexed and then curled in response.
