Mikey did,in fact, regret it. It was clear from the moment they stepped into the horse barn. Luke had always found it comforting to be around the animals, and even now, when he took a deep breath and filled his nose with the scent of hay and horse, he found himself taken back to when he was a kid and his parents used to take him to visit the stables at Oglebay Park. It was one of his most treasured memories, and it had inspired a love of horses he’d cherished ever since. When he’d gotten his first major check one of the first things he’d done was buy two horses, Loretta and Reba, who, even now, were looking over their stalls expectantly.
“I hope they don’t fall in love with you as much as Duke did,” he said. “I think I can only handle one animal betrayal at a time.”
Mikey didn’t take offense at the little barb. Instead, he just laughed.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I don’t think I want them to fall in love with me, anyway. They look like they want to bite me.”
“Not if you know how to treat them,” Luke said, and he proceeded to show Mikey how to engage with horses in a way that didn’t encourage them to bite. He gave each of them an apple he’d brought out with him, and they snuffled his palm and even nibbled his hair a bit, all while Mikey stood there with a look on his face that could only be described as horrified.
“I literally can’t believe what I’m seeing right now,” he said.
Luke just shrugged. “What? It’s just the way they are. It lets them get a sense of who you are. Now it’s your turn.”
Mikey looked, if possible, even more horrified, but he consented anyway, as Luke had known he would. Mikey always liked to put up a big fuss about things he supposedly didn’t want to do, but then he went and did them anyway. Soon enough the horses were both quite smitten with him.
“All right, that was the easy part,” Luke said. “Now comes the hard part.”
He then introduced Mikey to the fine art of mucking out horse stalls. This was something he’d been putting off for quite a while–it wasn’t his favorite thing to do, to be honest–and he had to admit it was kind of funny to watch Mikey Smiles, pretty boy par excellence, actually get his hands a little dirty. To his surprise, though, Mikey took to it like a duck to water. It was almost like actually being able to do something useful with his hands was a liberating experience, like he was finally able to do something that wasn’t just a performance for someone else.
At one point Luke just stood back and watched him shoveling out muck. Sweat made his already tight shirt cling to his chest,his biceps bulging as he lifted the shovel again and again, and Luke’s heart started doing those somersaults. It took everything he had not to actually lick his lips at how much of a snack Mikey looked right then.
Mikey looked right at him, and he tried desperately to look casual.
He didn’t succeed.
“It’s okay if you want to go on staring,” Mikey said, voice ever-so-slightly husky. “I mean, I’ve been doing the same thing.”
Luke swallowed, or at least tried to. Something seemed to have lodged in his throat, though, and he couldn’t think of anything to say, or at least nothing that wasn’t going to make him look like a total tool. Needless to say, he didn’t want to look foolish in front of Mikey, who was rapidly making it clear he was one of those people who could do even the dirtiest of jobs and still somehow end up looking sexy.
Mikey finished up with the bit of mucking he was doing and then, moving almost like a dancer, he approached Luke, an undeniable glint in his eye. All of Luke’s thoughts about not pushing things with him and trying to keep a bit of a distance flew right out the window.
You have to get away from here.
It was a strange thought to have, considering how much he’d been looking forward to just this moment. And, despite his wanting to run as far away as possible, his feet felt like they were glued to the ground.
When Mikey was right next to him, his mind flashed back to the first time they kissed and, as he breathed in the heady scent of Mikey’s sweat and the last faint traces of his cologne, he knew he was going to fall as hard as he had the first time. Mikey Smiles cast the kind of spell no one, no matter who they were or what their history with him might have been, could hope to resist.
Just don’t break my heart again,he thought, as all of his resistance and all of his pain and all of his angst over this weekend fell away. As Mikey’s lips met his, he let himself stop worrying, for a few minutes at least, and just gave in to the sensation of the moment.
Mikey’s lips were as soft and tender as he remembered, but with a hunger to them, too. He hadn’t lost his skills at kissing, and he made Luke feel like he really was the center of the universe.
I can see why I fell for him the first time,he thought.Who wouldn’t?
Then his mind went blank as Mikey reached behind him, grabbed his ass, and pulled him closer, like he wanted to blur the boundary between the two of them and become one.
Holy shit,he thought.
He pulled away for a split second, wincing as he saw the look of confusion on Mikey’s face.
“What is it?” Mikey asked. “Did I do something wrong?”
How to put into words all the things Luke was feeling right then? How to tell Mikey this was the thing he’d wanted for a decade?
“No,” he said, voice thick with desire, “nothing’s wrong. In fact, everything’s perfect.”
They kissed for another few minutes, their hands roaming over each other’s bodies, reacquainting themselves with all of the pleasure points. Luke chuckled deep in his throat when he put his tongue near Mikey’s ear and breathed softly, bringing out the moan he hadn’t heard in far too long. Then it was his turn to moan when Mikey started to gently–and not-so-gently–nip at his throat.
The sound of one of the horses snorting impatiently reminded the both of them the job of cleaning out the stalls still remained to be finished.
