So as I donned the cowboy outfit for the next bit, I caught my own gaze in the mirror and made a promise to myself. She’ll know I’m not a kid anymore by the end of the night. It’s time I put my demons to rest.
***
I had a shower after the show, washing off the oil, the glitter, the sweat. A bachelorette party had poured into the club half way through the show and I had the scratch marks to prove it plus more than a few contact cards tucked into my briefs.
I stepped out of the shower, grabbing a towel as Texas walked past me with his cock out and I swiped a dollar bill from between his butt cheeks, waving it in his face. “You missed one.”
He lunged for it and I jogged away with a laugh. “Finders keepers!”
“Asshole,” he laughed and I smirked as I added it to my pile which I’d tucked into my dresser drawer.
Adam was counting his out, now dressed in a white tank and black sweats, his hair damp from a shower.
“What did you make?” I asked.
Every dancer in my club kept the tips stuffed into their clothes and anything left on the stage was divided equally. I paid my guys well, but the real money was in the tips. I sometimes found hundred dollar bills chilling with my balls after a show and if that wasn’t the best way to meet Benjamin Franklin, I didn’t know what was. Adam had his best days to live for.
“Just over three hundred,” he announced, beaming and I grinned. “I got this too. From the bridal party.” He waved a contact card at me with the number four hundred and a question mark scrawled on it.
“Escorting’s not for everyone,” I said, suddenly feeling protective of my little one pussy wonder as I snatched the card from his hand. “Which one was it?”
“I think it was the mother of the bride.” Colour touched his cheeks. “But four hundred dollars…”
I shook my head, dropping into my seat beside him. “Firstly, four hundred dollars is selling yourself short. Secondly, fucking for money costs more than sex.”
“What do you mean?” He frowned.
“Leave the kid alone,” Ruben called over, his copper hair gleaming wetly from his shower. “Stripping is a warm up to the fucking. He’s gonna end up doing it anyway.”
“Shut up, Ruben,” I snarled. “Not everyone wants dick rot like you.”
“Coming from the Escort King.” He smirked.
“I keep a clean house,” I tossed back and his smirk fell away. “Unlike you who has a surcharge for going in bare. You know when I’ll go in bare? Never. Because I’m planning to still have a dick by the time I’m forty.”
“Condoms right?” Adam said and I nodded seriously.
“Yeah, always, always, always,” I pressed. “But just remember, if you wanna start chasing the big money, it costs you-”
“There’s a hot unicorn here to see you, JJ,” Texas boomed and I looked over to where he was standing butt naked, scrubbing his wet hair with a towel while Rogue stood beside him, casually inspecting his dick. Which was still rock hard. A demon rose its head in me and I flew out of my seat, grabbing my sweats and personal shit before I jogged over to her.
“See you later!” I called to everyone, grabbing her hand and guiding her toward the back door.
“I wanna say hello to your friends,” she complained as I towed her along then dropped my towel to get dressed and her eyes fell straight to my cock, killing her line of thought. And most likely any line of thought she’d been having about Texas’s cock. Because mine was a work of art, perfectly aligned, girthy, long, smooth and everything was shaved. It took a fair amount of work to keep it this well groomed, but its looks were all genetic and I guessed I had to thank my sperm donor for the great DNA combo he’d gifted me. The more she stared, the harder I got, especially when she wet her lips and my dick twitched hopefully. I wish, Johnny D.
Remembering I was supposed to be getting fucking dressed, I tugged on my boxers, grey sweatpants and a black AC/DC tank before kicking on my sneakers, pushing my shit into my pockets and grabbing her hand again.
“Did you enjoy the show?” I asked teasingly and she twisted a lock of blue and purple hair between her fingers as she met my gaze.
“The one I just had a private viewing for or the one in the club?” She smirked.
“Both.” I pushed through the back door and led her out into the parking lot, the moonlight washing down on us.
“The strip show was crazy good,” she said, grinning at me.
“And the private show?” I quirked a brow as her shoulder brushed mine.
I didn’t even know where we were walking to. Where the fuck had I parked? This girl fried my head. Whenever I looked at her it was like looking directly at the sun. Totally dangerous but so, so fucking beautiful. I’d let my eyes melt in my head before I stopped staring.
“You’re gonna have to start charging me for those, J. That’s the second time you’ve pointed your dick at me for free,” she taunted, not giving me my answer.
“Why does it feel like I should be paying you for that?” I murmured and she laughed, poking me in the ribs.
I loved when she touched me. It reminded me she was really fucking here, not just some figment of my imagination. I’d woken up thinking she was still in my life a thousand times after she’d left. Over the years, that had happened less and less often, but it never went away altogether. It was cliché, but losing her had been like having a limb amputated. It was a part of me I always expected to be there instinctively, but as soon as I tried to pretend it was, I couldn’t function the same. Because she had been gone. And in some ways, I understood Fox and why he was acting like she was treasure and he was a dragon with the sole purpose to hoard it. But I also knew if we held onto her too tight, she’d run away again. And I would never forgive myself if that happened.
“How did you get here?” I asked. Fox was picking up her new ride tonight so it wouldn’t be much longer before she had something road worthy and I hadn’t realised he had actually decided to let her leave the house alone before then.
“Chase was meant to be watching me but he said he needed to go to Raiders Gym and gave me the option of coming to see you rather than going with him. He dropped me off on the way. I think he just wanted an excuse not to have to stay in my company,” she said with a shrug.
“Well…I’ve got some laundry to do for the club,” I said. “It’s not much fun, but you’d make it miles more interesting. Do you wanna join? I’ll drop you home after, like a good date.”
“Oh you’re dating me now, are you Johnny James?” she teased. “What would your boss think of that?”
“He’d think…I’m making sure his girl is looked after real good.” I flashed her a grin, twirled her under my arm then jogged toward my GT, tugging her along after me as she laughed.
I opened the door for her and she frowned at me like she wasn’t used to that while I smirked. “Don’t go getting any ideas about me being a gentleman.”
“Oh, I wasn’t. I’m trying to work out your angle.” She moved smoothly into the seat and I shut the door, heading around and dropping into the driver’s seat.
“Alright, I’ll come clean.” I turned to her, giving her a serious expression. “There’s an alien living up my butt called Al who makes me do weird shit sometimes.” I lunged at her, pinning her to the seat and tickling her sides.
“JJ!” she screamed, fighting back as I slid my hands under her top and tickled bare flesh while she writhed beneath me. I’d been hard before, but now I was going to have some real issues departing boner city.
“It’s not me, it’s the butt alien!” I cried, my fingers skimming her bra and her screams turned to gasps as my dick dug into her leg.
My hands fell still against her skin and I gazed down at her with my heart pounding harder than it had all through the show. God she was beautiful. Her lips were parted and wet and begging me to just-
“Al’s a pervert,” she said breathily, her eyes sparkling and with her colourful hair tumbling everywhere around her sh
e looked like some kind of mythical creature. I wanted to tame it, catch it in a jar and keep it forever.
“Yeah, he’s a real dirty fucker,” I agreed then pushed off of the seat and dropped back into mine, rearranging my hair just so I had something to do with my hands. I started the engine while Rogue sat upright, straightening her little denim skirt and drawing my gaze to her tanned thighs before I focused on driving.
“I need to make a stop on the way to the launderette,” I told her. “That cool?”
“Sure,” she said lightly like my cock hadn’t just been making itself known about how much it had wanted to join in with our game. If anyone was a dirty alien pervert, it was him.
I drove away from Afterlife, leaving the lights of the club behind as I headed into the hills that rose up on the west of town. I needed something to take my mind off of where I was headed so I glanced over at Rogue and started up our old favourite game. “Would you rather be as small as my thumb or as big as a tree?”
Rogue snorted. “Well how big’s your thumb?” She reached over, taking my hand and her soft fingers wrapped around my thumb. The amount of blood that sent to my dick was unbelievable really. Who needed Viagra when Rogue Easton was gripping their thumb? Sure as shit not me. But I didn’t think turning into a walking boner was a great idea right now considering our destination, so I pulled my hand free and rearranged my pants while she sniggered.
“Big enough for you, Easton?” I demanded.
“Nah, I’d be the size of a tree. Then I could squish my enemies. Squish squish squish.” She stomped her feet in the footwell.
“Who would you squish first? Fox or Chase?” I asked, ‘cause obviously she wouldn’t be squishing me. She might have been angry at me, but she also liked cuddling me naked in the shower and letting me spoon her in my bed.
“I wouldn’t squish either of them first,” she said and my heart jolted as her lips pressed together. I knew she was thinking of the asshole who’d tried to kill her and I dropped my hand to her knee, squeezing and figuring I was a goner for the boner anyways.
“You got a name for me yet, sweetheart?” I growled. I might have been a smiley, approachable bastard most of the time, but I’d spilled as much blood as my brothers in my time in the Harlequins. And I would happily put someone in the ground who’d hurt Rogue. Better yet, I’d chop him into tiny pieces and make a day of it, take Rogue out on a boat trip and feed the pieces of him to the sea life like breadcrumbs.
Chester and Jolene had come up fucking short too, even after Fox had offered to double the pay out for a name. I didn’t get it. Rogue wasn’t the kind of girl to go unnoticed so why weren’t there even whispers going around that could lead us back to the motherfucker who had hurt her?
“No, and you’re not getting one. Would you rather eat a dog turd pie or a pile of Rosie Morgan’s toenails?”
“How well baked is this pie?” I asked and she chuckled.
“It’s really well baked.”
“And is there apple sauce?”
“Sure, but you can have that with the toenails too,” she said.
I mimed gagging. “Dog turd all the way.”
“Glad we still agree on something.”
I wondered what she’d think if she found out that Chase was hooking up with that bitch these days and decided not to bring it up. There probably wasn’t a good time to mention that one of her former best friends had been doing the dirty with a girl she freaking hated. Not that he would ever have something official with Rosie. But I couldn’t help but wonder how Rogue would have felt about it if she’d come back to find one of us shacked up with a girl.
“Rosie asked me out once, you know?” I said, smirking at the horrified look on her face. It was the truth, but I hadn’t been interested. I think for a while she’d hoped to take Rogue’s spot as the girl in our group but that had never been on the cards.
“Ew, gross, what did you say to her?” she demanded.
“That she couldn’t afford me. Would it have bothered you to come back here and find us playing house with girlfriends though?”
“I can’t really picture that somehow,” she said thoughtfully, scrunching her nose in the cutest fucking way. “Have there been girlfriends then?”
I shrugged. “Not really. Fox has kept the odd girl around for a month or two from time to time. I prefer to keep my sex life financial for the most part and Chase doesn’t put effort in to girls since…” I wracked my brain over that. “Well, since never. You were the only one he ever really wanted.” I shrugged, thinking of what Chase had said about Rogue picking Maverick. Had he taken her virginity? Had she loved him? I couldn’t say those thoughts hadn’t been haunting me, because as much as I wanted to write it off as something that happened ten years ago, it still stung.
But back then, I guess I knew I’d never really had a shot with her until I had a growth spurt and managed to grow at least a few facial hairs. And those things were like a bare minimum. What I’d really wanted was to time jump forward to a place where I was a grown ass man who could offer Rogue the world, and I guess I’d finally gotten my wish. So was I really gonna let some doubts over Maverick hold me back? I mean, I probably should have been more worried about the fact that Fox had explicitly told the whole world Rogue was his girl. And as my boss, I definitely should have respected that wish. But as my friend, I was saying fuck no with a spiky dildo. Because I’d loved her just as much, missed her just as much. He didn’t get to swoop down like some possessive eagle and whisk her away before I’d barely said so much as a hello. I’d done my time missing her too, hating myself over what we’d done to her, going over every single thing I’d do if she ever came back. And fuck if I was going to miss my shot because he called dibs. Of course, the element of danger helped. Because I liked the rush of doing something bad, of how fucking good it was to have her this close and have her look at me like I really could fulfil her fantasies these days.
“Would you rather fuck a stripper or a gang leader?” I asked, biting down on the inside of my cheek to hold back my grin.
“Hmm…I’d rather fuck a butt alien called Al,” she said and I roared a laugh, my stomach knotting as I looked at her. I swear I was gonna crash if I didn’t tear my gaze off of her pretty face. But I couldn’t stop.
“Man, I really fucking missed you, Rogue,” I sighed and she smiled sadly at me before turning to look out her window. I didn’t expect her to say it back. Maybe she had, maybe she hadn’t. I was always going to be one of the reasons she’d left, and maybe nothing would ever fix that.
“Did you ever blame me for what Luther made you do?” she asked after a stretch of silence. My throat constricted and I scrubbed at my jaw as I thought over my answer.
“No,” I said at last. “I was angry at what happened. And it took me a while to…accept who I was. After a year in the Harlequins, god this will sound fucking crazy, but I realised there had never been any other life for me anyway. We could have run, but there’s nothing in the world I’m made for better than what I do now. Shit was bad for a long time, but I know I’m where I belong. I just wish things could have been different. That we could have lived out our dream here, got some apartment together, grown together.”
“Yeah, I used to wish for that a lot too,” she said coldly. “But then reality bit me in the ass and it’s made a habit out of doing that ever since.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Doesn’t matter,” she said and I slowed the car as I turned onto Little Street. I parked up at the side of the road beside a palm tree and killed the engine.
“It matters,” I growled, leaning over and gripping her chin to make her look at me. “But I can’t change it, sweetheart.”
“I know,” she said bitterly, pushing my hand off of her. This wasn’t going how I’d planned, though I dunno what the hell I had planned. I just wanted to spend time with her. I wanted to prove, fuck, I wanted to prove so much to her and yet now I realised how fucking selfish that was. Who cared if I’d grown u
p and knew what to do with a girl these days? She didn’t want me anyway because I’d hurt her too deeply, thrown her life off course and was in some way responsible for all the shitty stuff that had happened to her since. And I didn’t need her to spell it out to know there had been a lot of it. I could see it in her eyes, and I knew that she blamed us for throwing her out into the world all alone. Hell, I blamed us too.
I wished she’d had faith that we’d come for her, but we’d had to make sure she left and never looked back until we could figure out what to do. We’d been so fucking afraid for her that it had seemed like the only option. But now I looked back on it, maybe we could have handled it better. I just didn’t know anymore. The rift between us was so wide, so full of dark memories that had passed since, that I wasn’t sure it could ever be crossed. She was never going to trust me like she once had. She was never going to lie on the beach with all of us and slot smoothly back into our lives. I’d been fucking kidding myself hoping that that might have been the case. Her heart was currently pounding inside a fortress built there because of us. So what right did I have to want anything from her?
The problem was, as my eyes travelled across her painfully familiar, painfully beautiful face, I knew I wasn’t good enough to walk away. I did bad deeds for a living, there was no hope for me when I was off the clock.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” I muttered, opening my door.
“Where are you going?” She frowned.
“I just need to drop in on someone,” I said evasively.
“Who?” she asked.
“My mom,” I gave in. “Stay here.” I stepped out, shutting the door and Rogue immediately got out too and pouted at me.
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