4. Chapter 4

Ollie

I couldn't believe it when I looked up and saw the man from up on the deck here at the meet and greet. I'd been so disappointed when I thought he was with the woman sitting at the table with him, but here he was at the Daddy/boy meet and greet so that must not have been the case.

I wasn't sure what it was about him that drew me in the way it did. There was a room full of Daddies here, but there was something about him that made him different from the rest.

"He's here," I hissed at Carey.

"Who?" he asked, looking around, trying to spot someone he knew.

"The guy from up on the deck that I thought was so hot. He's here."

"Which one? Point him out."

"I'm not going to point at him. He'll see. But it's the hot guy in the blue shorts and the shirt with the stripes." Carey looked around, trying to be casual, but when he spotted the man I was talking about, he let out a little whistle.

"He is hot."

"Right?" I said, just as our eyes met. I could tell by the way he looked at me that he recognized me from earlier as well, and if I were a braver boy, I would go right over to him and introduce myself, but I wasn't brave at all. As a matter of fact, when he started walking towards me, I had to fight the urge to run and hide. Which was ridiculous because meeting a Daddy like him was the whole reason for this trip. So instead of running, I pulled myself up and tried to look confident instead of like a scared rabbit.

"I'm gonna make myself scarce, but don't leave without letting me know." Carey gave me a kiss on the cheek, and then he was gone.

I watched as the man made his way across the room to where I stood, and as soon as he was close enough, I looked at his name tag. Adam. That fit him somehow. Luckily for Adam. I didn't think I looked anything like an Ollie and even less like an Oliver. But Adam, yeah, that fit him with his dark hair, masculine build, and confident stride. If I was to guess, I'd say he was in his late thirties, which was perfect. I'd always been attracted to men who were a little older and who knew who they were and what they wanted. Like Adam at that moment, for example. He just walked right up to me with no hesitation.

He glanced down at my name tag with an amused grin and then looked back up at my face. "Well, hello, Ollie."

"Hi," I squeaked. So much for being confident.

"I saw you up on the deck earlier, but before I had a chance to speak to you, you disappeared." I wasn't about to tell him I took off because I thought he was with someone else.

"Yeah, I wanted to get to the side to wave at the people as the ship pulled off. They always do that in the movies, and it looked fun." Way to go, Ollie. Now he probably thinks I'm stupid.

"And was it?"

"Was it what?" I asked. "Oh, was it fun? Yeah, it was."

"Good. I'm glad you made it up there then, but I'm also glad to see you here tonight. It never occurred to me you might be here as part of the Cuff'd cruise, as well." He stopped and looked around. Then he held out his hand for me to take. "I see an empty spot over there. Would you like to go sit down and talk a little?"

I looked over to where he indicated, and there was nothing I wanted more in that moment than to go sit with him. I placed my hand in his and let him lead me over to the table.

Adam

At first, when I held out my hand for Ollie—what an adorable name, and it totally fit him—he hesitated for just a second, and I thought maybe I'd overstepped. I do that sometimes at work. I get an idea or direction in my head, and I just move forward and don't really give the people around me time to catch up. Harper says I'm like a bulldozer moving forward, and people can either get on board or get run over.

She wasn't wrong, but that was in business, and it worked there most of the time. But people were different, so I didn't want to jump ahead with Ollie. We'd been on the cruise for all of five hours, and while the goal may have been to find someone to spend some time with, I imagined convincing him that he should go with the first Daddy who came his way would be a hard sell.

We took our seats at the small round table. We were on opposite sides, but the tables were small, so our knees touched underneath. Which was fine by me. Contact with the boy was exactly what I was craving.

"So, Ollie, tell me about yourself."

"What do you want to know?"

"I don't know, whatever you want to tell me. How old are you? What do you do for a living? Where are you from? How did you end up on a Daddy/boy cruise?" I shrugged.

"Well, I don't do anything for a living yet. I just graduated from college this month. So, I'm about to start the job hunt."

"That's exciting. What's your degree in?"

"Computers. Web design specifically, but I just have an infinity for computers and the way they work. They've always kind of been my thing, and that's also how I ended up here. This cruise was my graduation present."

"From your parents? That was pretty open-minded of them." I mean, this cruise was a gift for me from my sister, but I couldn't imagine my parents buying me a cruise that was advertised on a hook-up app.

"Not from my parents. It was my graduation present to myself. My parents aren't a part of my life anymore. They couldn't hang with the gay thing." He'd said that so casually, like it was no big deal, but there was a sadness in his eyes that told a different story. "So anyway"—he cleared his throat—"my friend, Carey, and I decided real life would be coming at us pretty quick, so we splurged and treated ourselves to this trip."

"Y'all are right, you know. Life will be coming at you pretty hard. Do you know where you want to work?"

He shook his head. "No, basically, the town we live in is a college town, and there aren't a lot of jobs in my field there. I sent out some inquiry letters and things before graduation, but I worked all year to save up enough to live on for a few months while I figured it out. How about you? What do you do?"

"I work for my family's business. I went to college and got a degree, but I always knew that was where I would work. I practically grew up in the halls of the business, and I love it."

I got us another drink, and we sat there and talked for a couple of hours. He told me stories about the stuff he and his friend, Carey, got into in college, and about the stuff he hoped to do on this cruise. When I'd first seen him across the room tonight, my thought had been wouldn't it be awesome to get laid the first night on the cruise? But at some point in the evening, those thoughts had switched to wouldn't it be fun to have someone to spend the week with. If instead of a week of casual fucks I'd have a full-blown vacation fling, and not just with any boy. With Ollie. Which meant I saw no reason why either of us needed to spend tonight alone.

"It looks like the meet and greet is winding down," I looked into his eyes. "How about if we continue this in my suite."

"You have a suite?" he asked.

I nodded. "I do. Would you like to see it?"

He looked at me and grinned. "You know what, I do believe I would."