“Nope. Trust me,” I say and reach for his hand in the dark. He links his fingers through mine without hesitation and lets me lead him toward the structure despite his apprehension.
We get to the sliding doors Bobby and Ben installed at the one end of the container, and I pray they didn’t lock it. I pull on the slider, and thankfully, it opens. I let go of Tate’s hand to take my phone out of my pocket as I step inside and turn on the flashlight app. It does a decent job of illuminating the small space. Tate’s quiet, but he also turns on his flashlight and walks around the place slowly. “You guys built a house. Out of a shipping container?”
“It’s a micro-cabin,” I explain. “Basically a self-contained hotel room. There’s a bathroom back there.”
Tate follows my finger to go check out the bathroom behind the half wall. The composting toilet has been installed and the sink has too. Ben has tiled two of the four walls so far. It looks really good. “It’s also eco-friendly. There’s actually electricity from solar panels but I don’t want to turn on the lights in case someone sees. It’s a prototype to see how easy it would be to create. We want to build six or seven of them and open a resort. One with an existing house we could turn into a bed and breakfast with a restaurant on the first floor that serves only farm-to-table dishes. And a barn that we can turn into an events hall where weddings and conferences and yoga retreats can happen. And a lake to pepper eight or ten of these units around.”
He’s not stupid and he understands what I’m saying immediately. “My property. That’s where you were hoping to put these.”
“Yeah.”
I don’t know what he’s thinking as he wanders around the place for another couple of minutes. He doesn’t storm off, so I take that as a good sign. I follow behind him like an eager puppy as he paces the space. Finally he turns and looks at me. “It’s a brilliant idea.”
“Thanks.”
“I can see why our farmland would be perfect,” he replies. “So why are you telling me about this?”
“Because I’m an idiot,” I reply and sigh. “I like you and I want you to like me too.”
He steps right up to me, his hands cupping both sides of my face before he gently leans his forehead down to mine. “I do like you. More than I ever thought possible.”
My arms move upward and I press my palms against his back just below his shoulders. He feels warm despite the fact it’s a cold fall night and air is blowing into the room from the open slider. He kisses me. It’s slow and sweet, until it isn’t. Eventually his tongue finds mine and we’re making out like horny teenagers.
“You forgive me?” I ask as his mouth moves to my neck and his hands slide down from my face, cupping my breasts through my sweater.
“I understand you,” he replies. “I would have thought of my farm for this too if I were you.”
“It’s freezing in here,” I walk over to the door. “Let’s go back to the car.”
“Or just let me warm you up,” Tate says and opens the zip up Moo U hoodie he threw on before we left the house.
I close the sliding door so the air stops bustling in, and I walk up and slide my arms around his broad, warm torso as he wraps the hoodie and his arms around me.
“These are amazing and a really great idea,” Tate says after a second of just holding each other in silence.
“It would be perfect for a resort farm,” I say and find myself holding my breath.
“My family doesn’t have the talents to make it work,” Tate says and I feel his lips on the top of my head. “I mean, Jace could probably learn to build the units, but we don’t have the culinary skills to run the catering-slash-food side of things. And Raquel and Louise would love to play hosts but wouldn’t lift a finger to actually change over rooms and all that actual work that would be involved. My grandparents just want to retire. The only reason they haven’t is they don’t have the money.”
“If only our families didn’t hate each other’s guts,” I say, tipping my head back to look at him. A sliver of moonlight is cutting through one of the narrow oblong windows my uncle cut on the side of the container. It’s making him look angelic. “If we partnered, we could do this. George and my dad could tend the goats and apples, My mom could keep up with the bees and goats, keeping the actual farm aspects running and handling the farmer’s markets. Raquel and Louise could run the front of the bed and breakfast, you and I could put our marketing degrees together and handle the marketing and advertising, Daisy, my mom and your grandma could handle the catering, and Jace and my uncles could do the handyman upkeep.”
His lips land on mine in a fleeting chaste kiss. “That would be perfect, but as we both know, there is no such thing as perfect. And our families’ feud is irreparable.”
He kisses me again, but it’s urgent this time, not fleeting. And I respond with passion and need because I need him—and makeup sex—because we don’t have much more time to break up and make up. In five short weeks, the fall market season will end and so will this—us. Because our families won’t allow anything else.
As if reading my mind, his hands find their way under my sweater.
“It’s too cold, isn’t it?’ he whispers as he moves his lips from my mouth to the column of my neck.
“You’ll make me warm,” I say with certainty as my hands reach for his belt.
There’re no more words as we kiss and undress each other. I push his hoodie off his shoulders and he yanks his arms out of it and lays it on the floor. I come up behind him before he can turn back around and kiss a trail between his shoulder blades as my hands snake around his abdomen, and as one slides his zipper down, the other pushes past the waistband of his boxer briefs.
I wrap my hand around his cock and he groans. “I swear I’ve never been as hard as I am with you. The second I see you, you do this to my dick. No matter how much sass you throw my way, I want you.”
He lets me stroke him, long and hard, for two slow pumps before turning around to face me and kiss me, our tongues tangling the second our lips meet. In seconds, the rest of our clothes are all gone, in one big pile on the floor and he lays me on top of them, and then stretches out on top of me. I can’t feel the cold air around us. I can only feel his warm skin, hard muscles and harder cock pushing against my thigh as he nips at my left nipple, causing my back to arch. His eyes shift up to my face. “You look so fucking beautiful like this in the moonlight.”
I feel a flush and he smiles in satisfaction as one of his hands slips between my legs and two fingers graze me. “Tate, I need this. No teasing. Get the condom.”
