“I don’t want to keep you from whatever you were in the middle of.”
“I’m just laying down some hay. I can get back to it. Let’s head over to the house.”
He passed Chase and approached his pa’s truck, right at the door to the stable.
He grabbed a black tee off the side of the bed and threw it on.
Disappointment raced through Chase as that body became hidden from his view.
He was glad they were heading to the house to get a drink. The emotions that flooded back to him from being back at the only real home he had, even for such a short time, overwhelmed his senses. He wanted to be numb, to avoid feeling. And being near his husband again brought up so many feelings.
* * *
When Mason first saw Chase standing in the stable doorway, a rush of excitement swept through him. He’d been waiting for his husband to arrive. He needed to see him again—had needed to see him for so long. But the sadness in Chase’s expression discouraged him. Was he sad because he didn’t want to see him? His own husband? Well, his sort of husband, really. For many years, their license wasn’t recognized throughout the country. It wasn’t until the Supreme Court decision to legalize gay marriage that suddenly they’d found themselves legally married once again. While they may have been married in the eyes of the law, to one another, they were just exes, free to see other people as they wished and live as if their marriage had never even happened.
Because of the unusual nature of how they found themselves united once again, neither had rushed to file for divorce. Mason figured Chase wanted to ignore the mistake he’d made when they were eighteen, and Mason never said anything, if only out of fear that Chase might want to push to destroy the one thing that kept them bound together, if only by law.
Pa had warned them to be careful, but they’d been stubborn and confident about the love they shared. His confidence had since dissolved, however, and the only thing he could really believe was that even something as beautiful and magical as the love they had for one another could fall apart—burn like wildfire before fading into ash.
Mason remembered the fighting. The tension. The insecurities.
And a cold winter’s night when it all came to a bitter end.
On the walk to the house, they chatted about mundane things, the sort of conversation either of them might have had with a stranger.
Mason offered curt responses to all of Chase’s questions. They were the only way he could lash out at Chase, as he continually asked without speaking, “Why did you leave me?” But more than that, the more questions he asked, the more Mason realized there were too many subjects to cover. Chase had missed out on so much that they could never really catch up on over the course of his short visit. A week and a half wasn’t enough time, but was still much longer than the usual weekend trips he’d make to see them—surely at Emery’s insistence, not his own.
Mason opened the back door to the kitchen, and they walked in together.
“How’s Pa?” Chase asked. He’d already asked the question, but Mason’s quick reply apparently wasn’t satisfactory, and Chase was always one to press.
“He’s stressed about the transition,” Mason replied. “Won’t be easy going from three hundred cows to a thousand.”
“Where are they building the new milking parlor?”
“About a mile away on the other side of the pond. There’s more space, and that way, we can keep running this milking parlor in the interim.”
“I’ll have to check it out while I’m here. Emery was telling me it’s massive.”
Mason couldn’t help but notice Chase’s drifting gaze, which nearly settled on his crotch before he turned his head.
Mason approached the kitchen bar. “What’ll you have?”
“A Long Island Iced Tea, please,” Chase said, his tone dripping with sarcasm.
Mason turned back to him as Chase gave him a cheeky grin.
“Vodka and whatever you’re having,” Chase said.
Mason’s heart warmed as he enjoyed Chase’s humor—that humor that had a way of diffusing tension and lifting his spirits even during some of the most difficult moments in his life. Chase wore a button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a pair of pants that must’ve been tailored to sculpt perfectly around that incredible ass of his. Chase’s light-brown hair was gelled to the side, not a strand out of place, it seemed. He wasn’t the kid he used to work with at the dairy in jeans and a tee—if that much, even. He was a man who was off living a very different life than Mason and had been for eleven years.
“So this new dairy,” Chase continued. “Sounds like it’s gonna be a lot of work.”
“Pa’s not thrilled about the upgrade. This is going to be a whole lot more automated. But it’s the only way we can compete in the market right now. And if we don’t get on it, the Howards’ll be doing it before us, and we’ll be struggling to keep up.”
“You have enough employees for that?”
“We’re working on it. Shorthanded now, but it’ll be fine until we get the bottle cows for the new place. It won’t be too bad, though.”
