I don't let strangers in easy. Not in my shop, not in my town, not under my skin. But that blizzard didn't give a damn about my rules. It dumped him here - mud-slick driveway, sleek city rig high-centered like a challenge. Him: all calculated edges and ruthless drive, mapping land that nips at my family's garage. Older, buttoned-up, fighting to prove something to ghosts I can't see. I told myself I'd tow him out come dawn. Keep it distant. Professional.
Days dragged. Forced inside my cabin, proximity turning the air thick. Tow truck headlights sliced the white chaos first, pulling his sorry ass from the ditch. His hand gripped the dash, knuckles white, eyes meeting mine in the rearview - defiance mixed with a hunger he hid behind sarcasm. The gap between us yawned wide: his world of surveys and suits, mine of grease and legacy. Younger by years that shouldn't matter, but they do. Small-town eyes would call it wrong. My blood calls it dangerous. Still, his laugh cut through my gruff silences, his vulnerability peeking like sunlight on thawed mud. I fought it. For the garage. For the whispers waiting if word got out.
Nights blurred the lines. Denial snapped after one too many shared whiskeys by the fire. Him on his knees in shadowed corners, mouth hot and yielding. Me pinning him to the wall, claiming every inch till he shattered under me - raw, unguarded, the control he clings to in ruins. It's obsession now, this ache where protection twists into possession. His career hangs by the land deal. My shop by the town's loyalty. Trust? Fragile as fresh ice. One wrong move, and it all cracks.
But walking away feels like losing the only man who's ever seen past my stoic shell. Is this stranded spark worth burning everything down?
A full-length age gap forced proximity slow burn gay erotic romance featuring a guarded small-town mechanic and a defiant older city professional.
