by Nicky James
I snatched my drink and continued to drag him along with a finger, walking backward until we reached the couch closest to the bar. He went willingly, but the question remained in his eyes.
He lowered himself hesitantly onto the couch. My next move should have been to straddle his lap and ask what he desired, but I stalled, feeling as out of place as he looked.
Instead, I balanced my ass on the edge of the coffee table, removed my boots and kicked my bare feet up to rest beside him, touching and caressing them against his side.
“Can I ask you something?” I couldn’t help it. There was no way I could move forward without at least prying into what I believed to be true.
“Sure.” He watched my feet, uncertainty and confusion on his face, before meeting my gaze again. “What do you want to know?”
“What is your name?”
He flinched and leaned forward, placing his barely touched beer on a free coaster beside me. “I already told you. Remy, it’s short for Remigio.”
I crossed my arms over my chest and narrowed my eyes. “Why are you lying? You are a cop, aren’t you? I know you are. I’m not stupid.”
He laughed and shook his head. “Why don’t you believe me? What have I done to make you so untrusting?”
I pursed my lips and just decided to go for it. “Because that other guy, your brother, calls you by a different name. I heard it. Twice. Giuss or something. Plus, you were with him that night at my apartment with the rest of the cops, and why else would you be here right now? You are undercover or something, aren’t you?”
Remy—or whatever—threaded a hand through his perfect hair as he continued to chuckle.
“You have a very active imagination. Can I explain myself before you weave this story any further?”
“I’d love the insight.”
Our eyes locked as I waited.
“Well, my full name is Giuseppe Remigio Moretti. My brother is the only person besides my mother who insists on calling me Giuseppe or Giuss. The rest of the world calls me Remy. My brother is a police officer. But I am, as I said, an editor for a magazine, nothing nearly as exciting. I was with my brother that evening because he picked me up from the airport and we’d gone for a coffee when the call came in. I explained this. He was my ride, and I went along.” He paused and examined me as I screwed up my face and listened.
“Running into you again that night at your other job was an honest coincidence. However, I did find you incredibly attractive.” His hand came down on my legs, and he ran it for a few inches over my skin before thinking better of it and pulling back. He shifted and continued, “I went back to that pub last weekend, thinking you would be working and your co-worker directed me here. So, my being here isn’t a fluke, but more because I was interested in knowing you better. I asked my brother, Alessio, to join me last weekend because these clubs aren’t really my thing.”
When he finished explaining, he shifted forward and rested elbows on his knees, pinning me with a worried expression.
“I’m not sure how to prove my words to you. I’m not a police officer, but I am curious why you seem to think a police officer might be following you around.”
Chapter Eight
REMY
He didn’t move or speak after my explanation, only continued to dissect me with his eyes. The tension he carried in his shoulders was thick and made my own muscles sore just watching him.
He’d been wavering all night between cocky and self-assured to this edgy, unnerved man who was waiting for me to say or do something wrong. Everything was a contradiction and I couldn’t puzzle him out.
“Does your brother know Donny well? Does he come here often? I don’t recognize him.” His feet at my side pulled away, leaving a few inches of gap.
“Before last weekend, I’d say Alessio has probably never been in here. If he has, it would shock me. He’s not gay and the only time he ventures into gay bars is when I drag him there. I’ve never brought him here before, because I’ve never been here. As for him and Donny. I don’t really know how they know each other. Maybe friends of friends or they met in school. They didn’t seem that close. Last weekend they acted like it’d been a long time since they’d crossed paths.”
Again, Soren mulled this over, worrying his bottom lip. When a few minutes passed, he blew out a breath and shook himself.
“Okay. I guess I’ll believe you, but if you’re lying to me, I’m going to be really upset.”
He dropped his feet to the ground and rose. With a hand on each of my shoulders, he pressed me back onto the couch and leaned in so he hovered only inches away. Blond bangs brushed my face. His body shimmered with glitter and some sparkles had even spread to his cheeks. He smelled fruity and sweet. My breath caught in my throat, unsure what the hell he was doing, but before I could ask, he spoke.
“I need a minute. Make yourself comfortable in here, drink that beer and think about what you’d like from me. In this room, anything goes, apart from the few personal rules we set. Mine are simple. No kissing. Otherwise, I’m easy. Everything has a price, but I get the sense that will be of little concern to you.”
With those words, he lifted up and swung around to a door beside the bar I hadn’t noticed.
What just happened?
It took me a second to find my voice and it came out less steady than I would have liked as I pulled myself off the couch. “Soren, wait. What is going on?”
He didn’t turn all the way back, but took a stance with a hip out and shrugged. He seemed distant, as though struggling to uphold some sort of front. “Special privileges for special customers. I’ll be back.”
Then he was gone.
I shifted and took in the shadowed room, my mind racing. The couches, the private bar, the dark drapes covering the windows. Then, I remembered the secured entrance we’d had to pass through to get upstairs.
“Anything goes. Special privileges for special customers.”
I couldn’t have understood him correctly. What he implied made it seem as though he’d brought me back there for lewd purposes, but that couldn’t be right.
“Everything has a price. No kissing. Otherwise, I’m easy.”
My head spun as I tried to make sense of what had taken place over the course of our evening. His varying behavior. His tension. The way he seemed flirty one minute and on guard the next. Then, his constant questions and mistrust over my career and who I was.
He never did answer my question about why he worried so much over cops. However, I was starting to understand. I think I had my answer.
I paced back to the couch and tried to sort my thoughts. A huge part of me wanted to turn and walk out the door and not look back. What kind of a place is this? What was Soren tied up in?
His questions about Alessio and that Donny character flooded back causing a burning rage to cumulate under my skin. Does Alessio know about this?
“How desperate are you to get laid?”
I didn’t have anymore time to order my thoughts. The door swung open and Soren returned.
But… Something was different.
He was different, although I couldn’t peg exactly how.
Whatever tension and uncertainty he’d carried through that door a moment before was gone. He paused and took a stance, grinning, swaying back and forth with his hands on his hips and devouring me with his eyes. His gaze raked up and down my body, before landing on my face.
“Ashton is going to be seriously pissed at me, you know?” He moved forward on sure feet, and when he stood in front of me, his hands went to my chest. I was guided back down on the couch and before I could find my voice to protest, he straddled me and sat firm on my lap. His warm skin seeped through my clothes and heated me instantly. He sniffed and made a sour face. then scratched his nose with the back of his hand before speaking.
“Have you thought about what you’d like?” The proximity of his body so close to mine caused my synapses to misfire and I choked on my next words.
“What a
re you doing, Soren?”
“Giving you what you came for.” His hands busied themselves over my chest, fidgeting with the buttons by the collar of my rugby shirt and twiddling with the fabric. He smiled crooked and lowered his head to my neck, licking a wet trail to my ear.
Instinctively, I recoiled and caught his wrists where they busied themselves lower and lower. I halted them just short of reaching my belt.
“Stop.”
He twisted his hands from my grasp and slid off my lap to the floor where he kneeled between my legs. His smile facetious.
“Give me a chance to show you. I’m one of Donny’s best. Everyone requests me. Never had complaints. That’s why you came. You like me. You asked for me. Let me show you.”
His hands busied unbuckling my belt as his words raced so fast out of his mouth, he tripped on them.
Again, I stilled him, clamping tighter to his wrist so he couldn’t break free.
“Soren, this isn’t what I want. It’s not why I came here.”
He pulled against my hold and his eyes darted the room in a sudden panic. “You’re a fucking cop, aren’t you? Shit! Oh God, I knew it. I knew it.”
Releasing one of his hands, I took a hold of his chin and held his head still. He was jerking around so much it made me dizzy. When his eyes met mine, they widened with fear. His pupils were so dilated I could barely make out their normal pale blue.
“I’m not a cop.” I studied him. He couldn’t move his head, but his gaze still darted around frantically. Something was off.
“Are you sure?” He wrinkled his nose again as though tasting something acrid.
“Yes.”
I released his chin and squirmed out from where he had me mostly pinned to the couch. Fixing my belt back in place, I watched him. He jumped up, darted his head once to the door where we’d entered before meeting my gaze. He ran his tongue over his top lip back and forth in a frenzied manner as he trailed my body up and down.
Without warning, he launched himself at me, moving quicker than I anticipated. I caught his upper arms to hold him back, but his fingers nimbly worked to undo my belt again.
“I’m really good. I promise. You’ll see. You can cum down my throat, I don’t let everybody do that. Some of the guys here do, but I’m picky. I have skills with my tongue that will drive you mad. Let me show you.”
I slid my hands down his sweaty arms and stopped him again.
“I didn’t come here to have sex with you or to get my cock sucked. Stop.”
He froze, his wide eyes finding my own.
“But… but I have to.”
The vein in his neck pulsed a rhythm like he’d just run a race. A sheen of sweat coated his forehead, glistening and making his glitter sparkle even more.
He was downright wired.
“I don’t want any part of this.”
“You said… I thought you wanted me.” He rubbed his nose again and shot his gaze to the closed door.
“I wanted to take you to dinner. To get to know you. Not to have my cock sucked in a backroom of a nightclub.” I paused. “I think I’m going to go.”
“No! Wait.” He snagged my shirt with two fists and held me in a death grip. “You can’t. Donny will be so pissed. Oh God, I can’t fuck this up. Please.”
Fear swam to the surface and his face paled, showing the pinks of his flushed cheeks even more.
I paused, watching the terror build inside him. “Soren, is this part of your job? Do you do this all the time?”
His tongue darted across his lip again, his gaze looking everywhere but my face. “Yes. Yes.” The words spilled out, one on top of the other. “Please don’t arrest me. I don’t want to do this, but I need work. I hate my job. I really hate it, but there isn’t anything else I’m good at. Shit, you can’t go.”
I felt physically ill watching the horror of my rejection consume him. The details of what went on behind closed doors became more and more apparent as he fumbled over his words.
He continued to ramble and I took hold of him again and shook him to grab his attention. “Soren, listen to me. I am not a cop. I swear to you. But whatever it is that you do here is not legal. It’s not okay.”
He clamped his mouth shut and froze, the dark pits of his haunted eyes stuck on mine. “You can’t leave. I’ll get in shit if Donny finds out. I’m good, just let me show you.”
“No. Just don’t tell him. Play it off as though I went along with it.”
“But—”
The door to the private room swung open and I thought Soren was going to jump out of his skin. Both our heads flipped to Ashton and another man being led in. There was a momentary pause when Ashton’s eyes caught ours, before he pulled himself together and directed the man whose hand he held toward the bar.
Soren seemed stuck in a moment of panic and uncertainty. I turned him back to draw his attention. “Can we go somewhere to talk?”
Soren’s gaze darted again to Ashton, and I wasn’t sure he’d heard me until he nodded and pushed me through the door he’d come out of not that long ago. It led to a narrow, carpet-lined hallway. We passed a bathroom on the right before going through a door at the far end which entered into another room.
That room was smaller, containing a leather couch, chair, and coffee table. The walls were the same dark burgundy and the drapes were drawn closed over the window. The only light came from the same tube lighting around the ceiling.
Once in the room, I closed the door and spun Soren around to face me.
“Tell me what happens if Donny finds out I left without taking part.”
He rubbed his nose and pulled away from me to pace into the room. He flicked on a light and started to fidget with random things around the couch and table.
“He’d be pissed. I’m supposed to give him his cut. There was one time when a guy walked out on one of my friends and didn’t pay. Donny lost it on him. He took the guys pay for like a month, tips and everything, plus he cut off his good jobs. I heard rumors about other stuff but I don’t know if it’s true. A.J keeps quiet about… I mean.” Soren’s eyes popped open and he stilled for a moment as he thought. “The guy… The guy, not A.J. It wasn’t A.J, just another guy. I mean he doesn’t say much and…”
Again, Soren couldn’t seem to organize his thoughts and raced randomly and incoherently as he tried to explain himself. His hands flew again, straightening the three magazines for the fourth time and moving the lamp shade so it shone at different angles. He couldn’t hold still.
I needed to stop him. His energy was tiring. “I’ll pay you whatever you need so you don’t get in trouble. Can you answer me some questions first though?”
His tongue went at his lip again and he stopped moving. He put his hands on his hips and nodded his head at a speed that seemed unnatural.
I cautiously crossed the room and took his chin again, lifting his face to mine. “Are you high?”
Vigorous shaking followed. An adamant no.
I didn’t believe him.
“How old are you?”
“Why?”
I softened my tone, in fear that my own apprehension with the situation might scare him off. “Because I need to know I haven’t misjudged your age. You are serving at two bars, so I assume you are over eighteen, but with what I’ve seen here tonight I feel inclined to ask.”
He swallowed hard. His pulse raced under my thumb where I held him. “Twenty-two. Almost twenty-three…kinda. Well… in December.”
“How long have you worked here?”
He shoved me away and spun, putting his back to me and ran a hand through his messy mop of blond hair. My stomach curdled at his reaction.
“Okay, never mind that question. How about this one. Is this kind of thing expected of you every night?”
“I only work here Fridays and Saturdays.”
Not the answer I was hoping for. It didn’t answer my question either, yet at the same time, it kind of did.
I hesitated, not knowing what to do. The n
ight had taken a turn unlike anything I’d expected. All I’d been hoping for was a possible dinner with the sexy blond who’d served me drinks a few times. The amount of concern I carried over Soren swimming in waters that were way over his head was abundant. How did he get tangled up in something like this? The way he rambled told me he wasn’t exactly happy about where he was either. What worried me most was that Donny guy and what kind of control he held over all the young men working under him. Enough that the simple mention of my leaving had brought an astronomical amount of fear to the surface.
“Soren,” I said as gently as I could, “take a seat on the couch. I’m going to leave you whatever money is sufficient to keep you out of trouble. You seem really out of it, and I want you to relax.”
He turned and watched me skeptically, his tongue racing, his pupils huge. “I’m really good at what I do. You don’t have to pay me for doing nothing. I can… I can maybe like… I don’t know, suck you or something. For real. You can fuck me if you’d prefer.”
I crossed the room and gently rested a hand on his arm. “No. I may be attracted to you, but I’m not that kind of man. Before I engage in anything like that, I’d prefer knowing a little more about someone first.”
He nodded his head rapidly. “Okay. Umm… Let’s see… I’m the youngest child. I have an older brother and sister. My brother is gay too, and I used to live with him, only I don’t anymore. Now I live with Ash. I suck at school and dropped out when I was—”
I jammed my finger on his lips to shut him up and chuckled. “I swear I don’t think I’ve ever had to say this to anyone before in my life, but you aren’t sucking my cock, so shut up and stop offering.”
I waited a beat before removing my finger. Without taking my eyes off him, I removed my wallet and dug out what money I had. I didn’t have a clue what a person paid for services like that, so I just gave him all I had on me and hoped it was enough.
