22. 22

22

Ant Decker

“I was right,” McGuire says as he saunters to my car. He’s wearing pale denim jeans and his white puffer jacket. The jacket makes his skin look more tan than it is and his teeth whiter than they already are. It’s the last thing I need. “It’s definitely a date.” He rests an elbow on the open passenger window casually and leans his head in. “Know how I know?” I don’t answer, but that doesn’t seem to matter. “’Cause I changed my top twice before you got here, and I got butterflies when I heard the doorbell.”

My stupid belly erupts in a flutter of its own. They’re not my butterflies, okay? They’re his. I’m having sympathetic butterflies, for fuck’s sake.

It’s a thing. I’m sure it is.

I have less than no idea how to reply, and it feels like it’s my turn to talk, so I say, “Get your ass in here, Princess, before I change my mind about this.”

He hops in and buckles, filling the small space with the smell of his hair.

“Don’t talk dirty to me.” There’s a husk in his voice. A soft purr. The kind of sound that spins around and around and burrows into my brain. It makes it so I can’t help but look at him. A hooded green gaze meets mine. It’s soft like his voice, but there’s a fine film of mischief, or mirth, draped over it. “I’m serious, Ant. Don’t, or I’ll come.”

I tear my eyes from his and stomp on the clutch. I shift the stick into first and then realize it’s too quiet. Dammit. I’m trying to drive without starting the car first. I scrabble, feeling around the steering wheel and center console, as I try in vain to remember where the hell the ignition button is.

Look, I have a lot of cars, okay? Ignition buttons are dotted all over these days. They’re in a different place in each vehicle. It’s not as easy as you might think to remember shit like this.

McGuire reaches out and takes my hand in his. A new burst of sympathetic butterflies is released, only partially tempered by humiliation, as he guides my outstretched finger to the ignition and presses it firmly.

I indicate and start driving, keeping my hands at ten and two and my eyes on the road .

I take him to Redmond Town Center. There are a few furniture stores that I like here, and I think the area meets the brief. He’s not impressed with the first store I take him to, but fortunately, he seems to like the next one. It’s a store that stocks Italian-made furniture and the sales assistant, Alessia, is Italian too. She exudes style from every pore on her body, and she’s a huge hockey fan. She’s very, very friendly. Maybe a little too friendly, if I’m being nitpicky.

Obviously, it doesn’t bother me. She’s just doing her job.

It’d be insane if it bothered me. McGuire isn’t my boyfriend. And we’re not on a date.

Alessia places a perfectly manicured hand on his upper arm and says, “You simply have to see this one, Robbie. You’ll love it.” She drags his name out, rolling the R and spitting it out like something she’d like to swallow instead.

She shows him a plush, cream U-shaped sofa with padded headrests. He sits and adjusts a few throw pillows to make himself comfortable. He crinkles his nose. Alessia moves him along swiftly. Next up is a large semi-circular smoky gray leather affair. It looks like something that would be at home in a retro conversation pit with low lighting and a selection of bright-colored hookah pipes.

McGuire and I test it out together. I do it in the manner of a man with social graces, and he does it without any at all, throwing himself onto it and putting his feet up. Alessia doubles over, laughing at his antics. It’s clear she’s never been subjected to so much as a mediocre sense of humor her entire life. Poor thing.

“It’s comfy,” says McGuire, “but I don’t love it. Looks like something I’ve seen in someone else’s house, you know?”

“Ah,” says Alessia, as if that not only makes perfect sense, it’s just the sort of well-thought-out feedback she needs to excel at her job. “I know exactly what you want.”

She shows McGuire a massive chocolate-brown leather four-seater and a midnight-blue twill three-seater. She has a couple of male sales assistants move the pieces around so her new favorite client can see them together without the strain of having to use his imagination. She suggests placing two oversized love seats across from the blue one to finish the look. Nothing matches exactly, but I have to hand it to her, it all goes together with effortless style .

“ Very chic,” she says with a flourish of her hand, making it look like she’s scattering invisible fairy dust over the sofas. Or, more likely, attempting to cast a spell on McGuire. “Very chic.”

He seems happy with this selection, thank fuck, because I’m milliseconds away from telling him he doesn’t need a goddamn sofa at all. I don’t know why I ever thought he did. I have no idea what sparked my preoccupation with his seating arrangements.

If he needs to sit on something that badly, he can sit on my fucking face.

Alessia rings up the sofas, and McGuire mournfully tells her about his plight. He name-drops a few popular players and mentions they’ll be coming over the weekend after next. I can tell Alessia doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the other players or their families or the fact they sat on flattened boxes the last time they visited his house. She does, however, care greatly about the fact that McGuire has been suffering, seatless, for weeks. She can’t let it stand. She has a long, loud word with her manager and comes back victorious and not at all surprised about it.

It’s official. The sofas will be delivered, white-glove service included free of charge, to McGuire’s house by next Friday at the latest .

When it’s time to pay, McGuire steps out of the way, and I hand her my card. She raises a brow and drops her gaze from my eyes to the collar of my jacket and back up again. I’m not one hundred percent sure because I’ve been wrong about this kind of thing before, but I see an accusation in them. If not an accusation, a strong question, at least.

“Lost a bet,” I say curtly.

“Ah,” she says.

As we leave the store, McGuire says, “There’s a great place around the corner. They make this hot chocolate that’s basically pure, melted chocolate. It’s so good. It’s so rich that when you order it, the server gives you this cautious look and says, ‘Are you sure?’”

“I didn’t know that,” I say a little too quickly.

The Chocolatrie has an old-world candy store vibe and every conceivable type of chocolate on display. It has black-and-white checkered floor tile and the walls are swathed in walnut shelving. There are large copper pots laden with truffles and trays and trays of handcrafted treats under the counter. Everything in sight is gold, cacao, or opulent shades of cream. If heaven has a scent, this is it.

Our server recognizes us the second we walk in. He doesn’t make a big deal of it, but he straightens his posture slightly and quickly shows us to a booth. We take our seats, scooting into the far end of the booth with McGuire sitting directly across from me.

I’m pleased with where we’ve been seated as the booths are tucked away in the back of the store and are much more private than the tables near the entry. I understand that running into fans is part of the job. It comes with the territory, and I’m used to it. But I don’t love it. Peopling is hard enough when it’s people you know. Perfect strangers talking to you as if you’re an old family friend? It stresses me out.

“I’ll have a Death by Chocolate, please,” says McGuire, ignoring the strenuous warning printed directly under the item on the menu—the drink contains no less than seventy-five percent chocolate and is not recommended for the faint-hearted, people with high or low blood pressure, or, reading between the lines, those with common sense.

The server raises a pale hand to his throat and says, “Are you sure, sir?”

McGuire kicks me lightly under the table and doesn’t move his foot away even after he’s made his point and I’ve successfully managed not to smirk at what a dumbass he is .

“I’ll have the…” Shit. I can’t remember what the drink I want is called. It was described as a great option for normal people on the menu. “…uh, same.”

There’s another kick under the table as the server gives me the same treatment he gave McGuire, only this time it’s less of a kick and more of the arch of a foot sliding slowly up and down my calf.

“I love this place,” McGuire says, leaning forward and resting his chin on his hand. “Thanks for bringing me here.” The way he says it is so sweet and sincere. I honestly can’t tell if he’s a mastermind with a talent for freaking me out or if he’s so delusional he really does think this is a date. “Hot chocolate was always a big thing for us growing up. My mom used to make it for us sometimes, and she and my dad would tease us by forcing us to say, c hocolat , like this”—he tilts his head back and does a truly awful, phlegmy impression of a French accent—“or we’d only get one marshmallow.”

He looks wistful when he says it like he’s about to tell me something meaningful and deep. It makes me uncomfortable, but I’m acutely aware it’s my turn to talk, so I say, “They sound fun.”

“Yeah, they are. My mom and dad are both fun parents. My mom’s a doctor and my dad stayed home to take care of us. It was pretty wild growing up with the two of them in charge of us. If there’s anything they can do to make a situation ridiculous, you better believe they’re gonna do it.” He looks down and smiles to himself. “And once they land on something stupid, they commit to it. Beth got snarky about the chocolat thing and refused to do it the first time they suggested it, so they exacted revenge by doing it every single time we had hot chocolate for the next fifteen years.” He smiles again, but this time, it’s for me, not for him. He’s trying to connect. To share something about himself with me. It makes my palms sweat. “It drove Beth crazing growing up, but I loved it.”

There’s a lag. It’s my turn to talk again, I can tell. “What’s Beth like?”

“She’s pretty great. She’s three years older than me, but for most of our childhood, it felt more like ten. She’s super mature. She has a very serious limit to the amount of shit she’s prepared to put up with. She’s one of those people that’s kind of scary but also good to have around because she makes it physically impossible for you to have a big head. She’ll call you on that BS so fast your head will spin.”

“Are you sure about that?” I’m not sure where I’m headed with this comment, but I don’t like my tone. It’s conversational and friendly. If it was coming from anyone else, it would pass as flirty. “’Cause last I checked, you had a pretty big head.”

What the fuck? That was definitely flirty.

He doesn’t miss it. He nods, and the smile in his eyes changes from pretty boy to pure sex. “I guess it depends on which head you’re talking about.”

Thankfully, the server appears with our hot chocolates, placing them on the table with austere reverence. He steps back and observes us for a moment. When he’s satisfied we’re suitably mind-boggled by the works of art he’s presented, he disappears from view.

Our drinks look incredible. The hot chocolate is served in oversized bone China teacups with pastel roses painted on them. The soft pinks and greens provide a stark contrast to the decadence of chocolatey goodness they contain. There’s a dollop of freshly whipped cream on top with lashings of nuts and crushed truffles. The drink is so thick I doubt you could drink it through a straw if you wanted to. It’s clear at a glance it’s the kind of beverage you have to attack with a spoon.

McGuire dips the bowl of his spoon into his hot chocolate and scoops up a decadent serving. He levels it and smiles at it like it’s the exact thing he’s been missing all his life. He raises it to his mouth. His head tilts and his lips part, giving me a slight hint of teeth and tongue. Wet pink and white enamel. The spoon slips between his lips and they close gently around it. Soft flesh on chocolate and steel. His eyes slide shut when the taste finds him.

“Fuck me,” he says softly.

Don’t tempt me, says my dick.

I shake it off and have a sip of my drink as well, though I make a concerted effort not to make out with mine like McGuire just did. It’s a thick, hot, bittersweet combination that hits my taste buds and lights up parts of my brain usually activated by an entirely different set of stimuli. It’s a little harder than I thought it would be to stay silent as it runs down my throat.

“What about you? What’s your story? Family? Siblings?” McGuire asks.

Holy shit. I don’t think he’s fucking with me. I think he thinks we’re on a date.

“Uh, I…parents. I have two. No siblings.”

“You’re from Chicago, right? Do your parents still live there?”

“Yep. They love it there. Either that, or they’re so set in their ways they can’t tell the difference. They’ve lived in the same house since they got married. No way I’m getting them out of there in any way other than in an urn. ”

I put myself on notice as I don’t love the urn talk or the fact I’m volunteering information for no good reason.

“Are you close?” he asks.

“No. Not really.”

“How come?” His eyes are big. Wide hazel circles with swirls of concern in them.

For a really weird moment, I can’t tell if I love or hate it.

Hate it.

I hate it. Of course I hate it. I don’t want or need his pity.

“Not for any major reason,” I say defensively. “Nothing big or bad happened. We’re just a random group of people who happen to share DNA. We don’t have much in common. It’s no big deal. They’re okay. My dad sends me screenshots of articles he reads about hockey now and again, and he follows my team like a hawk. He comes to my games when I play in Chicago, and my mom calls me every few weeks. She tries to stay in touch. We’re just both shitty at coming up with something other than the weather to talk about. It’s no one’s fault. It is what it is.”

McGuire looks at me, eyes still wide, unease etched deeply into them. His hand twitches on the table as though he’s considering reaching out to touch me and is having to actively stop himself from doing so. Concern ripples and pools, forming dark shadows in mossy pools. He’s saddened by what I’ve said. In his world, families like mine don’t exist, and if they do, they need to be fixed.

“Do your family know you like dick?” I ask to deflect the weight of his gaze and aim it at anything other than myself.

He isn’t expecting the question, and it makes his hot chocolate go down funny. He takes another sip to smooth things down and says, “I didn’t know I liked dick until the night you bit me. I’d wondered about it, thought about it a lot, you know, but I wasn’t really sure how I felt until you got hold of me.”

“Y-you weren’t?” The pitch of my voice rises worryingly. “But, but you said you’d sucked a ton of dick. You said…”

He grins and shrugs sheepishly, showing the palms of his hands. “I, uh, I’m not sure why I said that. It’s not true.” His voice trails off and is softer and quieter when he speaks. “I think I was feeling embarrassed, in case you could tell I hadn’t done it before…” His eyes blaze and fill with humor. “Or maybe it’s because you were kind of an ass to me.”

I scratch the back of my neck and cover my mouth with my hand as I race to organize my thoughts .

There’s a pit in my belly as a couple of feelings come rushing at me. A heavy weight tugs at my insides, gnawing uncomfortably. I was rough with him that first time. Heavy-handed and careless. I spoke to him in a way I’ve never spoken to anyone, and there’s really no other way of putting it. I fucked his throat with gay abandon. It was bad enough when I thought he’d been with guys before, but this makes it way worse.

The second feeling makes its home lower. It’s dense and hot, roiling inside me, and for some hard-to-explain reason, it doesn’t regret a damn thing. It likes the fact I was his first. It likes that I was the first man to lay hands on him. The first man to hold his dick in my hand. The first one to put my fingers, tongue, and dick in him. It likes that I’m the first man—the only man—to make him come apart at the seams.

It likes it so much that the room around me swims, and when he burrows his knee between mine, I not only let him, but I squeeze his leg gently under the table as a peace offering.

“D’you think they’d mind?” I ask.

“My family? Nah, no way. They’re not like that at all. They’re woke as fuck. They didn’t raise us with set expectations about our sexual orientation at all. Quite the opposite. They were so open-minded about it that when Beth was thirteen, she felt the need to come out to them as straight.” He chuckles softly. “It was kind of the best because they took it so seriously. We were all sitting in the living room, upright and formal, and my mom said, ‘Well, sweetie, I hope you know that we love and support you no matter what. The only thing that matters to us is that the person you date is kind and treats you well. Their gender is neither here nor there.’ So, yeah, they’d never be upset about me being with a guy. Knowing them, they’d probably just treat it as a reason to add some flair to what they already do to celebrate Pride each year.”

I’m stunned into silence. I’ve never heard of a straight person coming out to their family. I didn’t know it was a thing.

I didn’t know I wanted it to be a thing, but from the way my heart’s beating right now, I do. I really do.

“What about your family? Do they know about you?”

“Yeah, they know. I told them I was gay when I was sixteen.”

“Were they okay with it?”

“Yeah, honestly, I’m not sure how much they cared. My mom said she had a feeling I was. It was kind of annoying, to be honest. It was probably dumb, but at the time, it felt like she was stealing my thunder. I was nervous to tell them, and I was like, just let me have my moment to talk about this without minimizing it, you know?”

I’ve said more than I intended to, so I take a sip of my hot chocolate and hope like hell he’ll change the subject.

No luck there.

“And your dad?”

“Oh, him. He was fine. He just said, ‘Oh.’” McGuire is listening to me in a way that makes me feel unsteady. Wobbly inside. Loose from my lungs, up my throat, and all the way up to my tongue. “He came to my room later that night and said, ‘It’s fine to be gay, Anthony, just don’t tell anyone.’”

McGuire’s head jerks back in shock and he floods me with a stream of sympathy. A river. An ocean of it.

I fucking hate it.

“It’s not like that. They aren’t homophobic. Well, they aren’t majorly homophobic. They care about what people think, that’s all. They care about me too, I guess, or at least, they care a fuck-load about my career. My dad mainly, but my mom does too. They’ve never wanted anything to get in the way of me going pro.”

“Is that why you’ve never come out? Because of your career? Do you really think it would make a big difference if people knew you were gay? ”

Oh, that’s priceless. “Yeah, baby bi boy, I really do. How many out and proud gay men do you see in the NHL?”

He twists his mouth to one side and looks off into the distance. “Umm,” he says when he finally lands on the information he’s looking for. “There was that defense player for the Rockies a few years back…”

“Noah Adams? Yeah, I remember him. Nice kid. Most people don’t remember him, though, ’cause guess what—he went nowhere fast. Got signed, hardly saw any ice time, and retired early.”

“I didn’t know that,” he says quietly.

“That’s the thing. It’s not a big deal. All you have to do as a queer player in the league is understand that you don’t talk about it. It is what it is, and I don’t care. I’m fine with the way things are. The last thing I need is people up in my business anyway.”

“Is that why you don’t think you’re a relationship guy? Because you’re in the closet?”

“No.” Yes . “I’m not a relationship guy because I’m not a relationship guy. Told you. I don’t catch feelings, and I only do casual. That’s how I roll.”

He gives me a devilish grin and scoots around to my side of the booth. He sits so close to me that we’re almost touching and the heat of his body burns the side of my face like I’m sitting too close to a furnace. “That’s how you used to roll.”

“Stop it!” I hiss, panicked by his sudden proximity. He spreads his legs so his thigh presses against mine. My hiss fizzles and fades, doing a one-eighty, changing from something urgent and breathy into something that gurgles out of me and makes my shoulders shake as it leaves me. “Stop.” He ignores me and moves closer, grinning like a fucking Cheshire cat. “ Sta-ah-p !” It comes out in three distinct syllables, each sounding a little more unhinged than the last. He puts a hand under the table and gropes my inner thigh. I bat him away. It does nothing to deter him. He goes in for a jab on my side, hitting me right where I’m ticklish. I’m left slapping at his hand, wriggling wildly to escape his grip. “What’s wrong with you?” I giggle like a schoolgirl. Exactly like a schoolgirl. “You’re so unserious, Robbie.”

I say his name like Alessia did. Like that, but worse. I draw it out longer than she did, keeping it in my mouth and tasting it for as long as possible.

He doesn’t miss it.

He stops moving.

“That’s the first time in a really long time you’ve said my name, Ant.” One of his hands is stretched out on the table, curling loosely around his hot chocolate, and the other rests in his lap. His fingers are relaxed. His palm is faced up and open. It’s such a sudden shift from the ridiculousness of the hand slapping and giggling that it makes me stop moving too. Stop laughing. Stop breathing. For all I know, it makes the whole fucking world stop turning. “Say it again,” he says.

“No.”

He leans in and growls in my ear. The sound trickles down the side of my neck and raises a rash of goosebumps on my sides. “Say it.”

“Noooo!”

Fuck me sideways. The schoolgirl is back.

“Fine,” he says, leaning back innocently and giving me just enough space to leave me gulping for air. “Guess I’ll just have to make you scream it later.”

Silence and sounds converge. They spin in a circle and ring in my ears. I hear the words he just said over and over. Only, I don’t just hear them. I feel them.

I’m not sure I mean to do it. In fact, I’m pretty sure I don’t. Regardless, I find myself dropping my hand under the table all the same. I touch his knee first, running my hand down his thigh and holding on to his kneecap like it’s the rough edge of a cliff. Something to cling to. The last port between me and a big fall. I hold it forever. He watches my face as I do it. His expression is peaceful. Passive. Serene. His legs are parted slightly and his hand still lies outstretched in his lap. A gift, an offering.

At last, I can’t hold on anymore. My grip loosens. My fingers slip. I accept my fate and let go.

I don’t fall though.

I can’t.

I can’t because he has me. He catches me without hesitation. His hand is in my hand. My hand is in his. His grip is firm and certain as he laces his fingers between mine. My grip isn’t certain. It’s tentative and loose.

Then it isn’t.

From there, things take on a dreamy quality. A lazy, hazy blur of chocolate and sweet things. Hot, runny things. Things that make us both laugh and turn inward for no reason.

A floodgate is opened.

We talk about everything and nothing. We talk about hockey and sofas. People we know and people we’ve never met. He talks about Bodie. How they met and became friends. He tells me Bodie has had a crush on his sister since they were kids.

“He has no idea I know,” he says. “It’s kind of hilarious because it’s the most obvious thing ever. You’d love it, Ant. You’d get a huge kick out of it. He makes a complete ass of himself every time he sees her. ”

In fairness, it does sound like something I’d enjoy.

“You should come home with me for Christmas,” he says after we’ve jumped around from middle school embarrassments to college days back to Bodie’s crush on his Beth. “Bodie’s coming, and Beth will be there. They haven’t seen each other for a few years because she’s been traveling, and he’s been asking about her a lot. I’m willing to bet it will be a total cringe-fest.”

Like always, our schedule is packed, and with the way Christmas falls this year, we only have a few days off for the holidays. I wasn’t planning on going home. It’s a mission to get there for such a short time and we aren’t really big holiday people to begin with. I was planning on chilling at home like I did last year. And the year before that.

I catch myself thinking it would be kind of nice to see Bodie making an ass of himself.

It shocks me. It goes against every fiber of my being. Everything I stand for. Who I am as a person.

“Definitely not,” I say firmly. His mouth forms a small, tight line and he draws his chin down. I know that look. I recognize it instantly. I’ve seen it before. More than once. Every time I’ve seen it and tried to ignore it, things haven’t gone my way. It’s not that it strikes terror into my heart as such. It’s just that I’m a practical guy. I know that sometimes in life, you have to choose your battles. The main thing is not to provoke Robbie McGuire when he’s like this. I’ll have plenty of time to deal with it later. “I mean, uh, yeah, no…maybe…you know what, let’s wait and see what happens.”

He smiles and hooks his ankle around mine, and for some reason—most likely abject relief that he hasn’t made me commit to Christmas with his family by signing a legal and binding contract—I find myself telling him about Stacey. I start off blabbering and talking too fast.

It takes a while, but I slow down eventually and start telling him the real stuff. That we were close growing up, best friends, and Stacey was moody and difficult, but she made sense to me. She wasn’t demanding of my time or attention. I found it easy to be around her and that’s not something I’ve experienced very often. I tell him about the good times we’ve had together.

When I try to move the hand he’s holding, he holds on to it harder, and I find myself telling him how much I miss her. I tell him how sorry I am that I haven’t done a better job of staying in touch since my career took off.

“All the travel isn’t easy,” he says. “Living out of a bag, never being sure where you are when you open your eyes… It’s hard and makes it difficult to stay connected with people who don’t live the way we do.”

It’s exactly that. That’s exactly what happened. We didn’t fall out or have some major friendship breakup. Time passed. A lot of time. I was tired, and my body was battered and bruised. A week here turned into two weeks there. I tried for a long time. She did too. It’s just that we’re both major introverts. Neither of us is comfortable making an effort.

We both have our walls up way high.

Basically, we let a really great friendship slip away from us because we were both too dumb to realize that some things are worth fighting for.

“I should have tried harder,” I say.

“You can try again.” When he says it, he squeezes my hand in a way that makes me believe anything’s possible.

Anything’s possible?

Anything’s possible !?

Oh, hell no! What’s going on, and who has taken control of my mind?

Ah, I see.

I get it now.

I’m tripping. I’m high. I’m chilled out and happy. Chatty as fuck. I’m not myself. It’s clear I’m delirious. The sugar has gone to my head. Yeah, that’s what’s happened. I’ve consumed a truckload of chocolate, and my system has been flooded with glucose. It can’t process all of it at once, and thus, I’m experiencing a rush that’s affecting my mood.

It’s fine. It’s all fine. No need to worry. I’ll crash in a minute.

I don’t though. We keep talking for hours. McGuire’s head is close to mine, his chest turned toward me. When we’re not laughing uproariously at nothing, we talk quietly. Words bounce around between us, staying close. Contained. Like there’s a thin, glistening bubble around us that makes us impervious to others. Everything that isn’t him or me recoils off it and ceases to exist.

It isn’t until the light in the Chocolatrie changes, growing dim and shadowy, that it occurs to me what’s happened.

Robbie McGuire isn’t delusional. Or if he is, he’s not the only one.

This is a date.

We are one hundred percent, for sure, unequivocally, on a goddamn date.

I tense bodily from the thought, and he feels it. He must because he lets go of my hand. Before I have time to feel any relief about having my extremities back to myself, he traces the outer seam of my jeans with the back of two of his fingers. A tremor runs through me that makes my legs lame.

He talks quietly, face so close to mine, his nose all but touching my neck. I scan the room to see if anyone’s looking. A reflex so old I don’t even need to think about it. I just do it. We’re safe. The place has emptied and the only other people here work here. They’re in the kitchen or at the front counter, packing up for the day.

“I think I need to go home, Ant,” he whispers. “I need to go now…I’m having a really hard time not touching your dick. It’s really hard not to. Too hard. I don’t know how much longer I can stop myself.”

A now-familiar switch flicks.

It brings with it the usual storm of arousal. A thunderous surge heats my blood and makes it run thick. I look into McGuire’s eyes and see the same thing I feel written all over them.

“Sit on your hands, Babygirl,” the man in control of my voice tells him.

His expression goes lax and he does as I say. Lifting one hip at a time and sliding a hand under each of his cheeks. He sits perfectly still, catching his bottom lip between his teeth and letting go of it slowly as he waits for my next instruction.

“Spread your legs. ”

His chest rises and falls sharply, but he does as I say. He opens his legs so his knees are shoulder-width apart, and the leg closest to me is pressed hard against mine. I flick my eyes left and right. There are people nearby but not looking. We’re alone but not alone. It’s madness to be thinking of doing something like this, never mind doing it. Robbie’s right. We should go home.

That’s what I’m thinking. That’s what’s going through my mind as I watch my hand reach down and cup his dick through his pants. It’s hard against my palm. A thick rod swollen solid and stretched out against his groin. Sinew and muscle strain under a zipper and denim. I run my fingers up his length and then all the way down to his balls. He adjusts his position, face lined in concentration, as he shifts his hips forward to give me more access. I curl my fingers around him and squeeze his cock hard. He presses his lips together and swallows a whimper. I alternate between stroking and squeezing until he moves his hands onto the table, fists are balled, and his legs are visibly shaking.

“Home time,” I say.