The minutes pass, and the only thing providing any sense of comfort is the gun in Nate’s hand, bolstered by the knowledge that he can easily get up, open the window, and shoot those two fuckers inside. Unless someone walks around at the exact time on the nearby road, the gunshots shouldn’t be loud enough to draw attention.
But then what? He can’t fuck Will’s ghost.
Will isn’t loud during sex, but Owen sure is. When Will does make a sound, it is to tell Owen how amazing he feels.
Nate can’t take it anymore. He’s not going to shoot anyone, but he is going to have a peek. As quietly as he can, he turns around and raises his head above the window edge. The curtains are in his way, but there’s a gap between them which provides a good view of the bed. He can’t see their faces, which likely means they can’t see him, but he can see Owen’s pale legs as Will lies on top of him. He’s rocking his hips back and forth, his cock sliding in and out of Owen.
Nate’s cock presses painfully against his pants until he lets it out. He should go back home and stop torturing himself, but he ends up stroking his cock and ejaculating on the wall, his cum trickling down onto the ground.
Until he can once more make Will Thomas his own, this will have to do.
Chapter 14
Will
“How do you know which one to choose?” Owen asks as they walk between the trees.
“I’ll show you. First, you need to decide which type of customers you want to focus on. There are two main ones: those who are looking to work on furniture and those who are doing construction. In my case, I focus on the ones making furniture because they care more about quality, and most of my competitors don’t bother with that.”
“You’re a boutique business,” Owen says.
“Hmm, I didn’t think of it like that. Doesn’t boutique mean chic or something?”
“Will Thomas, you are very chic. You even got me wearing flannel.”
Will smiles as he watches Owen in one of his shirts. They spent the night together, and Owen didn’t have spare clothes. That blue flannel shirt matches Owen’s eyes, but it’s way too big for his lean frame.
He feels self-conscious about bringing Owen out here so he can show him how he works and assesses trees. His job is considered boring and simple by most people, and he expects it to be the same in the eyes of someone like Owen, who’s from a much bigger city and has studied art.
But Owen was the one who asked for this, and Will saw it as an opportunity for them to spend time in private away from prying eyes.
Gossip in this town is like polluted water—it flows quickly and poisons everyone who takes a sip.
They can gossip about him as much as they want—there’s nothing he hasn’t heard before—but it’s not just about him anymore.
“Hold on,” Will says. “This is a good spot.”
Owen looks around as if searching for something that makes one tree different from another.
Will smiles and strokes the trunk of the tree next to them. “This one has potential. It has minimal sweeps and curves. It means longer and cleaner boards.” He looks up. “You see how the branches are spread? If too many of them are clustered together, it can mean weak points in the wood. We don’t want that.”
Owen strokes the tree as well with his long and delicate fingers. “Can you tell if it’s good inside without cutting?”
“Yes. You need to check for fungal growth, cracks, oozing sap, and then…” He takes out a hammer from his backpack and strikes the base of the tree. “Hear that? A heavy thud. No echo. It means that the trunk is not hollow. That’s good.”
“So this is the tree you would have chosen?”
“There are more things I would have checked, but this one’s a strong candidate to be worth the effort. You also want to make sure you have enough space to work with. If it ends up going down and tangled with other treetops, you’re in for a massive headache.”
Owen looks up at the tree. “I wonder how long it’s been here.”
“Decades. I used to feel bad about cutting them down.”
“Now you don’t?”
“I think of the beautiful furniture they’re going to end up as, and it’s also healthy for the forest if you cut down some trees. It gives more resources to the other trees to grow, and they become healthier.”
“I didn’t think of it like that. I really like the way you talk, Will.”
