A Song for Harlan (Pickup Men Book 4) Read online

  And now there he was, the morning after, with Ben’s chest pressed up against his back.

  He didn’t do overnights. He didn’t do second nights. But then Ben had happened, sexy and charming with a touch like home and a voice like sex, and Harlan had managed to forget all the lines he never crossed.

  Harlan carefully lifted the blankets and quietly made to slip out of bed, but a strong arm slipped over his waist and trapped him.

  “Don’t,” Ben whispered, his voice sleepy and rough.

  Harlan closed his eyes. At another time in his life he might have stayed, but that life was behind him now.

  “I gotta go home and tend to my animals,” he said, surprised by the reluctance in his tone.

  “There’s an animal right here in need of tending to,” Ben said with a press of his morning erection against Harlan.

  Harlan chuckled, tempted, but . . . “My animals don’t have opposable thumbs and need me to feed them.”

  Ben sighed but didn’t release him. “Come back and have breakfast with me?”

  He knew he shouldn’t. More time with Ben was a bad idea. He’d end up liking the guy more than he already did. Which was ridiculous because there couldn’t be anything between them. Hell, Ben didn’t even know Harlan had a son. And he wanted to keep it that way. He didn’t want to see the shift in Ben’s eyes when he found out and suddenly had to be anywhere but there.

  “It’s just breakfast, Harl,” Ben said softly.

  Harlan’s heart gave a lurch at the reverb from Ben’s sleepy, rumbling voice when he’d shortened his name. How could he say no now? Ben was right. It was just breakfast and he wasn’t picking up Tanner from his parents’ house until later in the day. He pulled Ben’s hand to his mouth, kissed his knuckles, and against his better judgment said, “I’ll be back in a couple hours.”

  It had been snowing lightly when Harlan had left town earlier that morning, and it was still snowing when he headed back. Soft, fluffy flakes swirled and twined their way gracefully to the earth, silently blanketing Old Main Street’s tree-lined thoroughfare. Postcard perfect. Ben was leaning against a sleek, yellow, late-model Chevy Colorado with Tennessee plates when Harlan pulled into the motel parking lot. His stomach did a little flip. He parked one spot over and took a second to calm the hell down because the excitement in his belly at seeing Ben again was ridiculous.

  “Thought you said it doesn’t snow much here,” Ben teased by way of greeting when Harlan hopped down from his truck.

  “Pretty sure we rarely get much snow is what I said.” He chuckled. “Guess you picked a unicorn year to pass through.”

  “Uh-huh.” Ben pushed off from his vehicle, grinning, and stepped toward Harlan. Ben’s breath mingled with Harlan’s as snowflakes danced lazily around them. “So where are you taking me?”

  Back to bed. Harlan swallowed, hard, and motioned toward the street. “Santa Bella Diner. Best pancakes in all of California.”

  Ben fell into step beside Harlan as they headed down Old Main Street. Harlan itched to touch him. “Tried ’em all, have you?”

  “Pretty much.” Harlan slanted a sideways grin at Ben.

  “What is it you do for a living that takes you to all the pancake houses in California?” Ben asked, amusement coloring his voice. “Are you a pancake salesman?”

  A hearty laugh burst from Harlan’s chest, catching him off guard. “Is that a job?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe?”

  Harlan shook his head. “No. I’m a pickup man for the gay and pro California rodeo circuits. You know, the guys who help cowboys off broncos after their eight seconds, and get all the horses and bulls safely out of the arena after each event?”

  Ben whistled. “No shit?”

  “No shit.” Harlan puffed his chest out. He was damned proud of the work he did. “And when I’m not doing that I train reining and cutting horses for working cattle ranches and stock shows.”

  “Wow, so you’re a real Old West kind of cowboy,” Ben mused, his eyes alight with mischief.

  Harlan stopped in front of the diner. “But without the handlebar mustache,” he deadpanned. He opened the door and motioned for Ben to precede him inside.

  “Mornin’, Harlan,” Mabel called from the counter where she was taking a customer’s order. She’d been running the diner for as long as Harlan could remember and had always slipped him an extra treat when he was a kid. Usually just a pack of gum or some other candy, but she’d always made him feel special. When he’d come out, she’d been the first person outside his immediate family who had told him that if anyone ever hassled him, she would see to it they never did so again. “Grab a seat anywhere, and I’ll be right with ya.”

  Harlan and Ben both shook the snow off their jackets in the doorway and hung them on the coatrack, and then Harlan led the way to a booth toward the back by the windows.

  “Believe it or not,” Ben said as he lowered himself onto the bench seat across from Harlan, “I grew up on a sport horse ranch. Lots of thoroughbreds, warmbloods, and Hanoverians.”

  “Not a lot of those breeds in rodeo,” Harlan quipped.

  Ben snorted. “Yeah, well, not all cowboys ride quarter horses.”

  “True. Some don’t ride horses at all,” Harlan intoned and raised an eyebrow, hoping Ben would get the innuendo.

  Ben stared at him intently for a long moment. One side of his mouth lifted and a dimple teased his cheek. “I quite enjoyed my ride last night,” he whispered, low and gritty and full of meaning.

  Heat flooded Harlan’s belly. He shifted on the seat and picked up the overturned coffee cup in front of him, righting it on its saucer. As if that would be enough to distract him from Ben.

  Fortunately, Mabel arrived at their table to help pull his mind from all things naked bedroom rodeo with Ben. She leaned between them and poured steaming black liquid into their empty cups, her gaze rocking back and forth between him and Ben. Her hair color, which changed on the regular, was a deep burgundy that made the bright blue of her eyes pop. Even though the years showed in the lines on her face, she had a youthful glow and permanent smile that belied her age. Nothing’s gonna slow me down till I fall into my grave, she often said.

  “Who’s your friend?” she asked.

  “Oh, he—” Harlan checked himself from blurting he’s not my friend because in this moment, Ben kind of did feel like a friend. “This is Ben Marshall. He was performing over at Hannah’s the last few days.”

  “Ahh, right.” Mabel’s grin took twenty years off her. “You’re the one with a voice like sex. Or so they tell me.”

  Oh boy . . .

  Ben laughed, and the sound echoed in his voice when he said, “That’s what they tell me too, ma’am.” He winked.

  Harlan would have sworn Mabel blushed. She smacked Ben’s shoulder playfully. “Call me Mabel. ‘Ma’am’ is for old ladies.”

  “You got it, Miss Mabel,” Ben said, and the kindness in his voice warmed Harlan’s heart.

  This time she definitely blushed, and then she straightened her shoulders. “All right, you two. A couple of pancake specials?”

  “Sounds good,” Harlan said and turned to Ben with a raised eyebrow.

  Ben nodded. “Yes, thank you.”

  Silence fell over the table when Mabel left them, but Harlan found it oddly comfortable. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d sat down for a meal with someone who wasn’t family or a good friend.

  “So, Ben Marshall.” Harlan leaned back on the vinyl bench seat. “How is it a musician from Nashville is playing a small bar in a dot-on-the-map California border town?”

  Ben shrugged. “The short answer is I needed a change of scenery.”

  “And the long answer?”

  “I joined a band because I didn’t want to take over the family business, but it turned out that wasn’t really what I wanted, either.” Ben blew on his coffee before taking a sip, and Harlan was transported to Ben’s motel room. The way Ben’s mouth had wrapped around him, taken hi
m to the root, and brought him to the edge again and again . . .

  “The band fell apart, and I was lost . . . purposeless, I guess,” Ben continued, and Harlan shook himself back to the present. “Figured a road trip to the California coast would be a good way to find what it is I do want. Plus, it’s a good opportunity to see some of this big country.”

  Harlan couldn’t quite relate. He’d always known who he was and what he wanted in life. Being a rodeo pickup man and a father were the most important things in his life. He did understand the clarity one could find traveling across the country, though. Before Tanner, he’d worked rodeos all across the United States and into Canada, and he had loved exploring new locations. Now that he was raising Tanner alone, he stuck to California events only and took Tanner with him whenever he could.

  “And what happens after you reach the coast? Back to Nashville?” Harlan asked, listening intently for Ben’s answer. It mattered when it shouldn’t.

  “I don’t know,” Ben simply said. He looked out the window, his gaze distant, contemplative. “Guess I’ll find out when I get there.”

  Their conversation paused when Mabel returned with their breakfasts—two plates stacked with thick, fluffy pancakes topped with blueberries and whipped cream, with juicy sausage links on the side. “Enjoy, boys,” she said, then refilled their coffees before leaving the table.

  They dug in, and between mouth-watering bites, they talked music and rodeo and the meaning of life on the road. Harlan laughed with Ben more than he had with anyone in ages. He was easy to talk to, comfortable to be around, and for a moment, Harlan lost himself in a daydream where he and Ben were more than a brief interlude. Even after they finished their meals and Mabel cleared their plates and refilled their coffees again, they still kept talking.

  Ben glanced out the window. “Wow! It’s like a winter wonderland out there.”

  Harlan followed his gaze and was surprised to see how much snow had fallen while they’d been in the diner. He glanced at his watch, and his eyebrows rose. Three hours had passed in what had felt like mere minutes, and their late breakfast had stretched into midafternoon.

  “You should probably get going, I guess,” Harlan said reluctantly. He didn’t want today to end, but Ben had to get on the road and Harlan had to go pick up Tanner. “Snow doesn’t look like it’s going to let up anytime soon.”

  Ben nodded just as reluctantly, and after they paid the bill, they headed back out into the snow-covered sidewalk.

  The trip back to the motel was quiet, and when they reached their trucks, Harlan shoved his hands into his jacket pockets. Ben did the same. He rocked on his feet and huffed out a hearty breath of air.

  “Well,” Ben said in that low baritone Harlan was sure he’d be hearing in his dreams for weeks to come. “I enjoyed meeting you, Harlan.”

  “Likewise,” Harlan said softly. What more could he say?

  “Maybe I’ll see you again if I’m passing through some time,” Ben offered. He seemed as disinclined to go as Harlan was in letting him.

  Harlan only nodded. Then he reached out and shook Ben’s hand, which felt wrong after the weekend they’d shared. Ben held on to his hand, the press of skin intimate in a way a simple shake shouldn’t be, and then he gave a squeeze before letting go. With a nod, Ben turned and climbed into his truck. Harlan stayed where he was, watching Ben drive away.

  When the yellow truck was out of sight, a strange sense of loss settled over Harlan. He turned his face to the sky and let the white flakes kiss his skin. A niggle of worry for the man snaked into him. The snow really was growing heavy. But Sacramento was only a little over an hour away. Once Ben cleared the pass he’d be fine.

  Ben kept glancing in his rearview mirror until he turned a corner and Harlan disappeared. He sighed. He really had enjoyed his time with Harlan and would have loved to stick around Santa Bella longer. The place had a good vibe to it. And of course, there was one very sexy cowboy living there. But the show must go on, as the royal “they” said, and he had a gig booked tomorrow night and more all the way to the ocean over the next couple of weeks.

  Except he was still checking his mirror with a sense of anticipation that was quickly dashed every time all he saw was his own tire tracks fading in the falling snow.

  “What are you expecting?” he admonished himself aloud. Harlan to come racing up behind him, flashing headlights imploring him to pull over, turn around, and stay?

  A tiny voice in the back of his mind whispered, Yes.

  He shook his head, berating himself. He was being an idiot, and the snow was getting worse. He flicked on his windshield wipers, for all they helped.

  “Shit.”

  It was getting harder to see the road. He shouldn’t have stayed half the day with Harlan—shouldn’t have even stayed for breakfast. Or he should have stayed the rest of the day and gotten snowed in with the cowboy . . . It couldn’t keep snowing much longer. Once he cleared the pass and the elevation started dropping, the roads would be clear. At least, he hoped it wasn’t going to be snowing all the way to Sacramento.

  Just when he thought he was getting closer to the pass, a yellow road sign flashed ROAD CLOSED AHEAD. Great. He turned around, no choice but to head back to Santa Bella. He tried not to feel a little pleased at the change of plans as he drove around a corner. He glanced away for just a second to find a weather report on the radio, and then everything happened too fast to process while time simultaneously slowed down. There was deer in the middle of the road. Too close. His heart shot into his throat. He shouted a curse that he couldn’t hear.

  Adrenaline exploded into his body, and his knuckles turned white from his death grip on the steering wheel. He braked hard instinctively, knowing at the same time he shouldn’t brake on snowy roads. The truck swerved to the right, thankfully missing the deer, but the tail end swung out. He clenched his jaw hard enough to crack teeth as he torqued the wheel in the same direction. But he overcorrected, sending the truck into a full-on spin.

  The vehicle listed sharply to the passenger side as it slid off the road. The truck bed slammed against a tree, and even with his seat belt on, Ben was tossed like a doll, banging his head against the driver’s-side window. Finally, the truck came to a deafening stop, with the front end lodged downward in the snow and the back end up in the air.

  His hands shook where he still gripped the steering wheel and then full-blown tremors racked his body. His jaw unclenched, leaving an ache he was sure he’d feel for days, and his heartbeat thrashed in his ears.

  When the shakes finally started to ease, he pried a hand free and checked his head. No blood but he was going to have a wicked headache, if the size of the lump forming on the side of head was any indication. He took a few moments to settle his racing nerves and catch his breath before struggling to unbuckle the seat belt. When he was finally free of restriction, he shouldered the door a couple of times before it would open.

  He dropped down into a bank of snow a good foot and a half high and braced himself against the door until his knees solidified enough to walk. He trudged up the short slope to the road to assess the damage. The truck bed was bent from hitting the tree. The front end was probably dented, too, but he couldn’t see it without climbing down into the snow. One rear wheel wasn’t even touching the ground. He wasn’t getting out of there without a winch. Even then, driving it in this condition looked iffy.

  “Great. Just what I need,” he muttered.

  He flipped the collar of his jacket up to cover his ears and looked around to get his bearings. The snow was coming down in fat flakes, creating a sheet of white that obscured the world. He couldn’t see more than a hundred yards down the road. He checked his phone to call for a tow, but there was no signal.

  “Shit, shit, shit.” What was he going to do now? He couldn’t walk back to town wearing cowboy boots that weren’t meant for trekking around in the snow. His feet would freeze before he got anywhere safe.

  He had a basic roadside emergency kit in
his truck, but nothing in it would get him out of the ditch. All he could do was light a few LED roadside flares to alert other drivers and turn on his hazard lights before anyone slammed into him, and hope someone came by soon who could help him.

  But damn it was cold.

  He climbed back into the cab, hoping to turn the truck on and crank the heat while waiting for help, but it wouldn’t turn over. Great. Why hadn’t he left Santa Bella earlier? Or was he not meant to leave at all? A smile ghosted Ben’s mouth. He wouldn’t mind staying longer if it meant spending more time with Harlan. He should be embarrassed about how he’d given himself over so completely to a stranger, but Harlan had felt like anything but from the moment they’d met.

  He shook his head. Dismissing thoughts of anything more with the gruff cowboy than the weekend they had, he grabbed an emergency blanket from his roadside kit, cocooned himself in it as best he could, and waited.

  IT WAS NEAR DARK by the time Harlan left his parents’ house after picking up Tanner, and the snow was still coming down. They’d wanted him and Tanner stay for an early dinner, but Harlan politely declined. They had to stop at Tanner’s friend’s house to pick up a schoolbook, the animals back home needed feeding, and Harlan wanted to spend some time with his son before bed. It had been a pretty full weekend without Tanner, but he’d missed him. Tanner talked nearly nonstop, sharing his adventures from the weekend—Harlan’s dad was teaching Tanner the art of stained glass—but Harlan kept his adventures to himself.

  “Look, Dad!” Tanner pointed toward a world of white beyond the windshield.

  Up ahead, Harlan could just make out three glowing red points of light, flashing intermittently like beacons. As they closed the distance, the source of the light became clearer—a truck had gone off the road and the red lights were emergency flares.

  He pulled over to see if anyone was still there, and hopefully not hurt, and his heart gave a lurch when he noticed Tennessee license plates on a yellow Colorado. Ben. If Tanner hadn’t needed that schoolbook, they never would have driven this route and happened along the accident.