Can Blaise coming back to Montana turn Owen’s blue Christmas into a warm, shared Christmas of white?
Owen never thought he'd see the all-too tempting veterinary intern from the previous summer again, until his brother drops the bombshell that not only is Blaise returning, but he'll need to stay in Owen's house again until he gets settled. He's the bachelor uncle in their ranching family, and if people know what that means, no one talks about it. He can't be gay, no matter what happened in the barn last time Blaise was here…
Blaise made the life-changing decision to relocate to Montana for many reasons but with one clear goal in mind—to convince Owen of what they could share if he would only let Blaise in. He's prepared himself for a long siege, but with the help of his scheming best friend, Owen's brother, a donkey and a lot of snow, an early Christmas present might just be in store for them both.
General Release Date: 27th December 2013
Blaise was coming back.
Apparently for good.
The usual din from his nephew and nieces eating Thanksgiving dinner around the kitchen table faded into white noise as the world receded around him. Owen struggled to process Kent’s unexpected news—not only was his brother taking on a partner in his up-until-now solo large animal veterinary practice, but it was to be the very man Owen’d thought of every day for the past year. Or should he say, tried not to think of every day.
Blaise Wilcox.
Before Blaise, Owen’d had no idea men like him existed outside of movies and books. Long and lean, as tall as Owen but much slimmer, he kept in shape by running—even marathons, Owen had heard. He’d surreptitiously watched Blaise running the ranch roads during his internship that summer, those fit legs chewing up the distances, and had to admit it was obvious he was a natural. Just how he planned to keep it up in the forbidding Montana winter, Owen had no idea.
Blaise had landed in his house for the summer a year ago. Since Owen had plenty of room living alone on his part of the ranch, he usually housed the veterinary interns his brother periodically took on. Owen could tell from the first hello that Blaise was different from the rest—for one thing, he was around Owen’s age and had already been a practicing DVM for years. But that was the least of the differences. He’d had no idea that every facet of his existence was about to be turned on its ear.
Blaise had bullied Owen into keeping recyclable goods lying around for weeks until he could faithfully and happily run them into the city to the recycling center. He drove a hybrid, didn’t eat meat—this mystified Owen, who’d grown up in a family that ate meat three meals a day, how could that be healthy?—and walked around barefoot whenever he could get away with it. Blaise always bypassed the general groceries for the very small organic foods selection and had spoken with pleasure about his composting and year-round gardening back home in Oregon.
His shoulder-blade length, dark blond hair was usually pulled back into a ponytail at the nape of his neck, and he wore wire-rimmed glasses through which his sky-blue eyes invariably regarded the world with humor and interest—when he wasn’t wearing his stylish prescription sunglasses, that was.
In other words, he was the antithesis of every man Owen had ever known.
And he was gay.
It was this last fact which had, surprisingly, been the easiest to deal with when Owen had gotten to know Blaise. After all, it wouldn’t affect him any—but trying to plan meals without meat? Rinsing out cans and crushing them instead of tossing them in the trash? That was a pain in the ass.
And Blaise was unrepentantly gay. Oh, he didn’t swish or anything. In fact to look at him, he was as masculine as any other guy…other than the longish hair. But he openly talked about boyfriends he’d had, admired athletes on the television when Owen had a game on, and had been nothing more than polite to every woman Owen had seen him interact with.
And then there had been that time in the barn…
The air between them had been simmering all day long, and the hot weather didn’t help one bit, because while they were both in work jeans and boots for the task, they’d long ago lost their shirts. Blaise might look slim with clothes on, but he had a tight, defined musculature that was definitely masculine and made Owen a bit self-conscious of his own slightly beefy torso.
It was Sunday and technically a day off—at least as much a day off as a rancher and a vet could get, that was—but they’d quickly gotten stir crazy. So Owen had decided to work on clearing out one of the extra stalls he’d been using for storage in the barn. Most of the stuff that had been tossed in there had another home or didn’t really need keeping, plus an extra stall might come in handy as overflow if Kent needed him to keep an animal for observation while Blaise was still here. Blaise had soon wandered out and joined him. He was a hard worker and there wasn’t much conversation between them, but every once in a while Owen would catch himself staring at Blaise as he lifted and stretched… It was like his eyes had a mind of their own. Not even the fear of getting caught ogling kept his gaze from repeatedly straying to his house guest.
Fuck.
Devon started reading and writing at an early age and never looked back. At 39 and holding, Devon finally figured out the best way to channel her midlife crisis was to morph from mild-mannered stay-at-home mom to erotic romance writer. She lives in Oregon with her family, who are (mostly) understanding of all the time she spends on her laptop, aka the black hole.
Reviewed by Joyfully Jay
There is a reason I love the writing of author Devon Rhodes. It all stems from her amazing ability to write the most complete and satisfying short stories around. Christmas of White is perhap...
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Reviewed by Sid Love
This was a lovely short story. There was just that perfect balance of tension and mystery, so that I was pleasantly surprised by the few twists offered, and the story gave me enough time to f...
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