Wild Trail (Clean Slate Ranch #1)(9)

“Make yourselves at home.” Mack waved at the bunks. “Look through your packets. Meet the other guests. Look around outside but don’t wander yet. Cold lunch will be ready downstairs at noon.”

Canned speech, but Mack’s gruff voice rolled over Wes’s skin like butter on a hot steak. Sizzling and delicious. “If I wander, will you rescue me?” Wes asked.

Mack hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his jeans. “Don’t reckon I’d have to with the flare gun you’re wearing there.” His gaze dropped to Wes’s T-shirt, which yeah, it was lime green and really tight, but Wes didn’t own subtle clothes. “Everyone on the ranch could see you from a mile away.”

Before Wes could defend himself, he noticed something new of interest—Mack’s gaze went even lower, before returning to Wes’s face.

He cruised me. Grumpy bear cowboy really did cruise me.

Wes cocked his hip. “Well, then, I guess I’ll have to take the shirt off.”

Mack’s eyes narrowed.

“Wes, quit.” Miles poked him in the ribs. “Do you have to flirt with everyone?”

“I don’t think he can help himself,” Conrad said. He walked over, hand extended toward Mack. “Don’t pay my future brother-in-law any mind, he doesn’t have a self-edit button. Conrad Massey.”

“Nice to meet you,” Mack replied as he shook.

Conrad introduced Derrick and Miles, and saved the best for last. Except Wes could introduce his own damned self. “Wes Bentley, not the American Beauty actor,” Wes said.

“Not who?” Mack asked.

Miles snickered.

“Anyhow, I’ll leave you folks to settle in,” Mack continued. “If you need anything or forgot your toothbrush, the main office has a small canteen for such stuff.” With a tip of his head, Mack left.

Wes stared at the empty doorway, hands on his hips, a little stunned. Sure, the other Wes wasn’t a big name anymore, but it usually got some sort of reaction. Then again, he was in hick country, not the city.

“Pick your jaw up off the floor and put your stuff away,” Miles said. “You want top or bottom?”

“Bottom,” Conrad said with a laugh.

Wes flipped him off. “Whatever, I’m not picky.”

Conrad raised an eyebrow. “Since when?”

“Shut up.”

Okay, so maybe Wes was picky about the guys he chose to date, but he was also a natural-born flirt. And Conrad had never been dumped as spectacularly, or publicly, as Wes. Sophie had been Conrad’s first serious relationship, and now he was marrying her, the lucky bastard. Sophie got a husband, and Wes got a little brother to bust on as often as possible.

“They always like this?” Derrick faux-whispered to Miles.

“Pretty much, yeah,” Miles replied. “You’d think they were actual siblings or something.”

“We will be soon,” Wes said. “Besides, I’m like this with Sophie, too, and we aren’t blood-related, either.”

Derrick blinked hard. “You aren’t?”

Had Conrad not told his brother this story? “No, our parents adopted me when I was an infant because they were told they couldn’t conceive. Four years later, Sophie shocked the world by showing up the old-fashioned way.”

“Huh. Guess that explains why you don’t really look alike.”

That was putting it mildly. Wes was tall and slender, with a metabolism that let him eat anything he wanted without gaining weight, and wavy white-blond hair, depending on how much sun exposure he got. Sophie, on the other hand, was five-foot-nothing, and had their mom’s dark brown hair and curvy figure. She constantly complained about fitting into her wedding dress.

She’d done it again last night after they’d pigged out on brie and wine. Apparently, suggesting she should have waited to buy her dress until the day before the wedding was not good Best Person advice.

“Guess what they say is true,” Derrick said. “Blood don’t make family.”

“I second that,” Wes replied. He threw his suitcase onto a bottom bunk that no one had claimed, not surprised when Miles took the one above his. “Who wants to explore before lunch?”

“I’d love to take some pictures,” Miles said, raising his camera, which had been looped around his neck since they got on the wagon.

“You guys go, I’m gonna find Sophie,” Conrad said.

“I’m with you, bro.” Derrick slung his arm around Conrad’s neck. “Your girl is in a room full of other perky young ladies.”

Wes rolled his eyes. “Whatever. Go perv on the girls. Come on, Miles.”

Movement in the room across from theirs caught Wes’s eye. The dude-bros. Wonderful. Not that he expected to be able to avoid them all week. The place only had so many rooms. Oh well. The ranch had rules about bullying other guests, so Wes pushed those guys out of his mind and went out to explore his home away from home for the next seven days.

And maybe get another Mack sighting. A gay boy could dream.





Chapter Three

As much as Mack wanted to go into his office, close the door and hide, today was orientation day, and he had to remain available to the guests in case they had questions or wanted to see the horses. Mack wasn’t the only horseman on staff, but he was in charge and he’d picked up the guests, so he had to be sociable on the first day.