Chapter 7

He hadn't spoken to anyone since he'd gotten back, simply holed himself up in his bedroom, ostensibly reading the latest of the Discworld novels. Jared lay curled up on his bed, book forgotten, hugging the duvet in the half dark cast by his desk lamp. He'd left Cole, abandoned him in the truck without a word, hadn't let him explain. If he hadn't cared, Jared doubted that he would feel this awful. He hated to admit after the fact, but he felt about Cole the way people in stories seemed to love. It was weird and sudden and so good it was as if he was drowning in honey. And now he had gone and ruined it.

No, Cole ruined it... and it was true in a way. It had been at least half Cole's fault. No matter how good the heady rush of love and lust, it couldn't be reconciled with the fire that rose through Cole, the visible snapping of his temper.

Jared dug around in his pocket and grabbed his phone. He thumbed through the pictures until he got to the one Cole had sent him. He own had been cocky, confident, his best come-and-get-it fuck-me smile, taken right after he'd finished stroking himself to a messy climax thinking of Cole. Cole's picture was markedly different. The boy in that picture was not the same boy who had gone ballistic and tried to kill his younger brother; it just couldn't be. In his photo Cole looked shy, unbelievably sexy in his un-sureness, hair in his face, his perfect chest lit by the blue screen of the phone. He looked younger in the photo, innocent and a little scared. That's the boy I love...

Jared was tapped by a flying foam ball, which his sisters equivalent of a knock on the door. The Parker twins kept a huge number of the soft golf-ball sized projectiles in varied colours about the house and Jared's family used them to get his attention from a distance when he was otherwise absorbed.

'Hey you. You OK?'

'No.' Jared shook his head and went to put the phone away. Not quick enough.

Shelby's eyes went wide as she looked at the photo, then thrust the phone back her brother, looking like the devil in disguise.

'So I can see why you like him now.'

'Shelby!' Jared made a face, 'Don't.'

'So you had a fight, ' Shelby sat and knuckled her brother in the shoulder before she continued, 'You obviously still like him. And he loves you.'

'We didn't fight. He lost his temper with his brother, I was scared of him.'

'Well do you trust him?'

Jared stared at the phone in his hand. He trusted that boy, the one who looked like he might love him, might be sweet and adorable and kinda scared.

'Hang on, ' Jared sat up to make his signs easier, 'What do you mean he loves me? How do you know?'

'He told me.' Shelby's hand signs and facial expression were innocent as spring rain, but Jared knew his sister better.

'Shelby ... what do you mean?'

'Didn't I mention it? He's outside.'

Jared barely let her get to the end of sign before leaping off of the bed, phone in hand, scrambling in socked feet down the stairs of the Parker's modest town house, crashing through the landing and coats, not caring for the noise he didn't know he made, and out of the front door.

Sure enough, the shape of Cole's monster Hilux sat blocking the driveway and Cole stood, hands in pockets, leaning against the door, looking like a dog which had been commanded to stay. Probably by Shelby. Cole look up, opened his mouth to frame the shape that Jared knew was his own name and in the split second before Cole dissolved into tears Jared saw the boy he loved. Half innocent, half afraid, looking a little in love and a little confused by that; there was the Cole that Jared wanted. He stepped forwards, suddenly sure that the snapping flame of Cole's temper was not the real him, and caught the much taller boy as he collapsed in floods of tears.

Jared put his arms around Cole's ribs, took his weight and buried his head into the boy's shoulder. Cole's arms came around him, bone crushingly tight, hanging on to him like he was going to vanish into thin air if he let go and Jared tried to be more solid if such a thing were possible. He worked a hand to the back of Cole's head and rubbed his fingers through the unfairly soft golden waves. For a long sixty seconds everything was still and Jared was hyper aware of all his senses. Cole was heavy and solid in his arms, a collapsed wall of muscle and sinew. He vibrated and shook with his crying and somehow that was a turn on and Jared felt his own cock thickening in his jeans. Cole smelt of hay and rhubarb and molasses, his hair was silky and as Jared scratched the back of his head he felt the vibration of Cole's chest change until he felt like a big version of a cat. He purred. Jared found Cole's face with his hand, moved his jaw so that he could look at the beautiful wild boy who had told his sister that he loved him and smiled. Cole's eyes were an unreal blue, shining with tears, wetness splashing over his cheeks. Jared kissed him, caught up in the hot saline taste of Cole and wrapped his arms around those strong shoulders until Cole stopped crying enough to kiss him back. Jared had the older boy pinned against the side of his truck, one hand wrapped tight in the back of Cole's hair, groaning in his mouth. Cole's hard on pressed into his hip, fantastically proportioned and Jared was so high on the kiss that it took him a long time to realise that they were making out in front of his house.

He dropped back to the ground, no longer tiptoeing in socks and stood leaning against Cole, his boyfriend, for several long minutes until they both reached normal oxygen saturation levels again.

'Come pick me up tomorrow.' Jared made the signs really simple and Cole nodded, 'Ten.'

'O-K.' Cole made the signs using fingerspelling, his fingers shaking so hard that Jared was almost scared to let him drive home. Then he put both hand together, heels touching, fingers curled to make a heart shape. Jared pressed Cole's hands to his chest and smiled, kissing him once, simple and chaste.

'Go on.'

Cole got back in the truck, started the engine and backed towards the road. Jared watched him go. It was only after he'd come down that he realised how painful the gravel was on his feet, how cold it was outside without his jacket, he turned to limp and stumble indoors.

Shelby didn't stop him as he headed back upstairs, just sat there on the upper landing wearing a smug grin. She had obviously changed her opinion of Cole Sathie since she'd slapped him. Jared collapsed on his bed, emotionally exhausted and physically drained. OK, not totally drained. His throbbing erection made a bid for his attention at pretty much the same time his phone beeped. Taking both in hand, Jared looked at the photo that came with the text.

Cole: missing you already.

The photo was taken in the truck, starlight and moon lit trees showing that Cole had pulled up on the verge to take the photo. He looked just like he had when he'd left Jared, leaning against the steering wheel, looking every inch the happy Texas cowboy, fringe falling in his face, smiling so wide with eyes shining so bright with love it was a wonder that he didn't just jump right out of the phone. At that moment, Jared would have done everything to have Cole in bed with him.

Jared moved his hand over his erection, his chest vibrating as he rubbed the silky pre-cum from the slit over and down the length of his cock. Cole kissed like his name, like fire; burning and hungry and all-consuming and Jared felt his heart beat double time as he stroked himself. He twisted his palm in the way he knew brought the most pleasure, applying pressure to the head but not the shaft, thinking of the heat and hardness of Cole against him as they kissed. How good would it be to have the boy here in his bed, stretched out underneath him, writhing and wanting. Or to be in that photo, in the truck with his boyfriend, Cole all shy and blushing, unsure and adorable as Jared reached into his trousers and touched him in way he'd never known.

Jared felt himself tingle at the mental images of Cole he conjured up, and he turned his head to stare at the photo on his phone. Cole's eyes were so blue, his smile so perfect, and Jared almost fought against the vision of those lips wrapped around his cock. It was all too good. He felt the familiar ecstatic tightness in his balls, telling him we had about thirty seconds to keep going. Cole, he wanted to touch the boy who seemed so confident at home and so shy in his arms and the last thing Jared saw before he screwed his eyes shut with pleasure was that picture of Cole in the truck, looking soft and beautiful and missing him. He came in three long spurts, cupping his hand to catch his seed and shuddered as he came back to his senses. He'd kicked off the sheets, lay naked to the knees in his bed and sighed, licking his own essence from his fingers.

Visions of Cole were deeply satisfying. Jared smiled and took the photo with his phone, making it obvious that he had just jerked off, and sent it to Cole.

Jared: sorry, couldn't wait xx

Cole swore and threw the shirt across his room. It was following an ever greater number of his clothes which were beginning to create an amorphous mass on his floor. The problem was the Cole didn't have a huge number to clothes to chuck left and unless he wanted to pick Jared up for their date naked he was going to have to make a decision.

He'd been awake for hours, getting up extra early to see to all the chores and had already done more with his day before nine o'clock than most people did with a whole weekend. The horses had been turned out, the yard skipped out, tidied; the livery horses had their tack cleaned and ready for when their riders came; Cole had fed the fish in the big pond, combed the sand in the riding school, exercised Dune and poop-picked the small field where Bray and the skittish Arab were housed. All the troughs had been filled and there was new hay in the fields. Now showered and dried, Cole had to complete the simple task of getting dressed neatly.

The next pair of jeans to fly through the air were caught be Clayton just before they would have caught Chase around the face.

"And what's wrong with these ones?" Clayton asked, not waiting for an invitation to enter his brother's room, sitting on his bed.

"Oh ... What are you two doing here?"

"Well you obviously need help," Chase, ridiculously sensible for an eleven year old, scooped up the clothes that Cole had dumped, "You can't go out wearing that."

Cole was standing in front of his wardrobe mirror in his rattiest work jeans, falling apart at the knees and all seams, and his only pair of 'good' boxers, which were slightly tighter than usual, black and sort of satiny-shiny.

"Indeed." Clayton laughed from the bed, "What're you doing Cole, you trying to get lucky?"

Cole glowered at his brother in the mirror and motioned to Chase.

"Oh like he doesn't know. We live on a farm Cole and we'll be lambing again in the spring. It's not like-"

" ... I don't know about these things." Chase finished, "We do have sex ed at school you know."

Cole frowned, but turned back to the state of his wardrobe.

"This is hopeless."

"No it's not," Clayton got up from the bed and elbowed his brother aside, "You're proud of being born in Texas right?"

"Yeah?" Cole wasn't quite sure where this was going as his younger brother began to sift through his clothes, "So go for the look. Wear those good riding jeans Mum bought you for your birthday and the rodeo shirt you got in Calgary. It still fits right?"

Cole shucked his jeans and shrugged at the same time, which involved some tripping, and pulled on the light washed blue jeans his sibling handed him. The riding jeans were good, cut well to fit and a little longer than usual, designed for riding with no inner seams and contrast black stitching on the outer leg and pockets. Chase vanished and reappeared with their father's show-belt, black with the big silver buckle in the shape of steer's head. Cole already knew he was going to wear his good boots and it was Clayton who handed him the red pearl button shirt with the white piping that he'd bought at the Stampede Rodeo when he was sixteen. He hadn't worn it in a long time and Cole was surprised to find that the well washed cotton fit him better than it hand before. It was no use for riding, tight in the shoulders now he'd put on muscle, but the shirt looked fitted across his tight abdomen and he stuck his arms out of Clayton to fold-roll his sleeves up.

"Where's your flying jacket?" Chase asked.

"I leant it to Clay here," Cole grinned as his brother rushed off to get the sheepskin that Cole had all but forgotten he owned. Cole settled the jacket on his shoulders when Clayton returned and looked in the mirror. He looked like...

"Like an American dude rancher stud. Hot damn pup, where are you going dressed like that?" Carla Sathie was standing in the doorway, a pile of clean laundry in her arms.

"Cole's got a date..." Chase said in a sing song voice, back to being eleven years old and giggly all at once, "We made him dress nice."

"So you did," Carla handed piles of person separated laundry to her younger sons, "Run and put these away for me now boys." She waited until Clayton and Chase left the room then closed the door with her foot, "Now Cole..."

"Aww Ma..." Cole stared, but his mother held up a hand, "Now pup, calm down. You look like Rodeo week in Amsterdam, Jared'll love it. It's nice to see you look after yourself for a change. Have you got protection?"

"Mum!" Cole covered his face with his hands, turning bright red, ruining his cool confident look, "Og god please don't say anything else right now..."

"Oh pup..." Carla ruffled her son's hair, having to reach up to do it, "I know you're an adult, you're eighteen after all, I don't expect you to behave like a school girl. I was going to buy you something, but I figured you were old enough to do it yourself," she handed him a crisp twenty from her pocket and Cole took it, shaking with embarrassment. His mother had just given him condom money. Oh god...

"Now come here. No son of mine is going out with his hair un-brushed."