At dawn, barefoot and sleepless, Jesse wanders into the paddock, and finds Luke already there. Shirtless. Golden in the mist. What begins as a glance deepens into something primal. Something that tastes like sweat, soil, and surrender.
In the hush before the sun fully rises, two men meet in the grass, and everything changes.
The morning wasn’t silent. It listened.
A hush lay over the paddock like warm breath on skin. Not absence but presence. Everything trembling just beneath stillness. The last threads of night clung to the grass in dew-laced pearls, glinting with the first fingers of gold. The sun hadn’t yet cleared the trees, but the sky blushed for it.
Jesse stepped through the fence barefoot.
Not to look for anyone. Not to find.
Only because something inside him was already moving, pulling him forward before his thoughts could catch up. The porch behind him groaned under its own stillness. He didn’t close the screen door. Let it creak. Let the old wood sigh.
The house had been too quiet. Too warm. Sheets tangled around his legs, skin damp with something he hadn’t named.
So he walked.
The grass wet his calves. His shirt clung soft and worn against his chest. Loose shorts, no underwear, the hem brushing where he already felt too much. His skin buzzed like the air before a storm, his breath shallow but steady.
He hadn’t meant to go far. Just down past the fence. Into the haze. Into the hum.
Then, he saw him.
Luke.
Half turned away. Deep in the tall grass. Shirtless. Bare chested. His jeans riding low and wet against his hips, the fly unbuttoned halfway like maybe he'd rolled out of bed and into the earth.
And his body. It wasn’t just strong.
It was earned.
Shoulders broad and tanned, sunbitten. Veins rising subtly along thick forearms. His back was a study in motion, every muscle moving with slow grace, as if the land belonged to him, and he belonged to it. Not a man who walked through the world. A man who wore it.
He turned then.
And Jesse saw his face.
The beard was thick, golden-brown and unruly. Lips full and sun-cracked. Blue eyes, pale and steady, with a kind of gaze that didn’t ask permission.
He didn’t speak.
Just looked.
And Jesse... stopped breathing.
Because there, in the early light, Luke looked like something half-remembered from a fever dream. All strength and sweat and summer.
And Jesse was caught.
Not by surprise. Not even by lust.
By that aching, sacred stillness.
That split-second before anything touches.
Where everything could.
Luke didn’t look away.
His gaze pinned Jesse with the same quiet certainty he used to break horses. No words. No rush. Just presence. Like a weight across the chest that didn’t hurt but held.
The light caught in the dew on his shoulders. Tiny suns scattered over golden skin. His chest rose slow, deliberate, like he was breathing the whole paddock in. He didn’t move toward Jesse. Didn’t smile. Didn’t flinch.
But his eyes said something.
Jesse felt it low, beneath the ribs.
Not a question.
An invitation.
The air between them thickened. The morning heat climbing inch by inch. Jesse’s shirt stuck to the curve of his lower back. A drop of sweat slipped down the back of his neck.
He shifted. His thighs brushing together beneath damp cotton.
Luke watched.
Eyes dark now. Lips parted just enough to catch breath. One hand rested against his hip, fingers flexing once, slow.
His body didn’t beg for attention. It commanded it.
The kind of strength that didn’t need to raise its voice. That just stood there, full of quiet violence and stillness at once.
Jesse’s tongue flicked across his lips before he could stop it. A heartbeat later, Luke’s gaze dropped.
To his mouth.
Then his throat.
Lower.
The wind stirred.
A few wildflowers bowed in the grass between them. Nothing else moved.
Jesse took a step forward.
And Luke shifted his weight. Just enough to be noticed. One boot planting deeper into the earth. A silent signal.
Come if you want.
No smirk. No swagger.
Just... him.
Raw and open in the dawn.
And Jesse, aching, barefoot and sleepless, kept walking.
Each step into the paddock felt heavier than it should.
Not with fear.
With want.
That slow-dragged hunger that lives behind the bellybutton. That curls itself into your spine and waits for permission to unfold.
Jesse didn’t blink. Couldn’t.
The space between them narrowed. Not just the physical, but the ache. The part of Jesse that had spent too long pretending not to look. Not to notice how Luke’s hands curled around fence posts. Not to feel how the man’s voice dropped low when they were alone.
The heat licked higher now. The sun lifting itself like a secret being revealed.
Luke didn’t speak.
But his hand lifted, slowly, from his side. Fingers half-curled, as if reaching not to touch, but to test.
Jesse stopped in front of him.
Close enough to feel the warmth pouring off Luke’s bare chest. Close enough to smell him. The sweat, hay, salt, something wild and male and unwashed.
His breath caught.
Luke tilted his head, just barely. The movement felt... inevitable. Like a branch bending under the weight of its own fruit.
His eyes met Jesse’s, and for the first time, they held.
Not just looked.
Held.
Jesse’s mouth opened. Nothing came.
Luke’s hand rose higher. Not to grasp. To hover. A ghost of a touch, like he was memorizing Jesse’s shape without contact.
Fingertips paused beside Jesse’s jaw. Not brushing. Just near.
Jesse’s skin flamed beneath it.
“Didn’t think you’d come down here this early,” Luke said, voice like smoke in the throat.
Jesse swallowed. “Didn’t plan to.”
Luke’s mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. Something quieter. Warmer.
He stepped in.
The space between them gone now. Nothing left but the air caught between chests, and the pulse Jesse could feel in his groin.
He was sure Luke could see it.
Sure the man knew.
And still, Luke waited.
Not for permission.
For surrender.
The wind passed over them like breath. Slow. Trembling. Thick with scent.
Jesse didn’t move.
Luke did.
Just a tilt of the head. Just enough to let his gaze fall lower, across Jesse’s mouth, his throat, the damp press of his shirt against his ribs.
His hand came up again. Closer this time. Fingertips grazing Jesse’s shoulder.
It wasn’t a touch, not really.
It was a test.
And Jesse let it happen.
Luke’s knuckles dragged down, soft and deliberate. Not pressure. Presence. A whisper of skin on skin. He caught a piece of straw clinging to Jesse’s shirt. Pulled it free without a word. Let it fall.
His hand lingered.
Brushed the edge of Jesse’s collarbone. The curve where his neck met shoulder. His fingers warm. Dry. Firm.
Jesse exhaled, too hard. Too fast.
Luke noticed. Of course he did.
His palm came to rest flat against Jesse’s chest. Not pushing. Not pulling. Just... resting.
Like he wanted to feel the heartbeat.
Or prove that it was real.
Jesse’s hand moved on instinct. Just a twitch. A shift. He didn’t even realize he’d done it until his fingers brushed Luke’s waistband.
Warm denim. Wet from the dew. Clinging.
The button undone, the zipper halfway down. Not exposed, not yet. Just suggestive. Just easy.
Luke inhaled. That deep kind of breath that stretches the ribs and doesn’t let go.
“You look like you didn’t sleep,” he murmured.
Jesse’s voice came low. Hoarse. “Didn’t.”
Luke’s thumb slid slowly against Jesse’s chest. Over fabric, over heat. Not urgent. Curious.
“You come out here to find something?”
Jesse didn’t answer.
Didn’t have to.
Luke already knew.
Jesse’s breath snagged in his throat.
Luke stood so close now, the heat coming off him was dizzying. His skin smelled of hay and sweat and sleep, like he'd risen straight from the earth and walked into Jesse’s morning.
No words. Just that look. Like he already knew every part of Jesse’s body that begged to be claimed.
His hand moved again, slow and deliberate, and this time he touched. Flat palm against Jesse’s sternum. Fingers spreading across his chest. Warmth sunk in like sunlight through cotton.
Jesse bit the inside of his cheek. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to.
Luke’s other hand brushed Jesse’s waist, knuckles grazing just above the waistband of his shorts. A soft stroke, but it lit every nerve in Jesse’s stomach like a match dragged across skin.
“You came for this,” Luke said, voice low, dangerous. “Didn’t you?”
Jesse nodded, barely. It wasn’t surrender. It was admission.
Luke leaned in. His mouth so close Jesse could feel it, not quite touching. His lips hovered by Jesse’s jaw, warm breath spilling down to his throat.
“Say it.”
Jesse’s voice cracked. “Yes.”
Luke’s fingers hooked the hem of the shirt.
Slow.
Measured.
He lifted it, inch by inch, revealing smooth, hairless skin. A chest that caught the light, lean and hard and trembling under his hands.
Jesse’s abs flexed when Luke’s knuckles skimmed them.
“Fuck, you’re pretty,” Luke whispered. “Didn’t know you looked like this underneath all that loose fabric.”
The shirt cleared Jesse’s arms. Luke dropped it to the grass.
Now he stood there, bare-chested, flushed, slick with sweat and dew. Jesse’s body was small but defined, cut in sharp lines, his skin hot to the touch. There was something tender in how he carried it, like he didn’t quite know he was this fuckable.
Luke knew.
Luke’s hand slid around his waist. The other cradled the back of his neck.
“You still sure?”
Jesse’s chest rose. “Please.”
