by Andrew Grey
Lee nodded. “I heard that you go out a lot. Is that what you do? Go looking for sex?” He straightened up. “Is that why you’re being nice to me?” Lee swallowed, but his face didn’t exhibit distress.
“No. I’m nice to you because I like you.” Now it was Dean’s turn to swallow. He hadn’t had this kind of frank discussion with anyone he was interested in since that whole breakup mess with Dumbfuck Chuck the asshole.
“Do either of you want another drink?” Trevor asked.
“I’d like a soda,” Lee said, and Dean asked for the same. Trevor gave him a “seriously?” look, but in the end, he relented and went to the bar.
“Are you having a good time?” James asked Lee. “Trevor told me you are a really good dancer.”
“When I was seven, Mom signed me up for ballet classes. I took them for four years until the guys at school found out. They picked on me, so I quit. I should have told them to go to hell, because I love to dance.”
“You look amazing when you dance,” Dean told him softly. “Do you want to go back out there, dance some more? I’ll be there to watch out for you.”
“I don’t know.”
“Lee,” James said. “I know it’s strange, but people bump into one another all the time on the dance floor. They don’t realize how it’s different for us, because we don’t see it coming. But we shouldn’t let that stop us. If you want to dance, then go ahead and have fun.” James scooted his chair closer. “Don’t let a little fear stop you from doing something you really like.”
Lee seemed indecisive, and when Trevor brought his drink, he took a mouthful, then set his jaw and stood. “Would you dance with me?” Lee asked.
“Of course.” Dean went with him to the floor, and they danced, this time more sedately, with Lee staying close to him. Dean kept watch around them and tensed when he saw a guy in a cowboy hat pass along the far side of the floor. It was hard for him to tell if it was the same man because of the crowd, but he was pretty sure the guy was still there. Dean really wished Lee had asked the bouncer to kick the guy out.
“Are you okay?” Lee asked, and Dean realized he’d been standing still.
“Yup.” He gathered Lee into his arms and snuggled close, his leg parting Lee’s, pulling their hips together. “Now this is really nice.” Hell, Lee was as hard as a poker, the same as Dean was. Fuck, that was sexy. There was nothing more attractive than someone who was attracted to you. Dean’s head swam a little, but he kept his thoughts as level as possible, even if the notion of finding a quiet place where they could be alone raced through the back of his mind.
Lee wound his arms around Dean’s neck, drawing him closer, and holy hell, within seconds Lee was kissing him. This was no soft, gentle, chaste kiss. This was a full-on, lip-tugging, breath-stealing, “I want your body” kiss. Dean continued swaying as he returned the kiss, wanting everything he could get. Then as he remembered where he was and what they were doing, he backed away and held Lee as they moved to the music.
“This isn’t the proper place,” he said gently. “Lots of people are watching.”
Instead of being mortified, Lee giggled. “Yeah. Sometimes I forget that everyone else isn’t blind.” He smiled and lowered his head to Dean’s shoulders. “You kiss really well.”
“So do you, which makes me wonder who you’ve been kissing.” Dean nuzzled the base of Lee’s neck. “Everyone thinks you’re so shy and innocent, but I have a feeling you aren’t either of those things.”
Lee snorted. “I’m not shy around people I know. But it’s hard to relax and be yourself when you don’t know what other people are thinking. You can tell a lot from someone’s expression. Only I don’t get to see that. As for the innocent part, well, I’m kind of innocent, I guess.” Even under the flashing lights of the dance floor, Lee’s blush from neck to forehead was pretty clear. “I mean, I kissed another guy at school. He was gay, and we tried kissing, but it didn’t work out. He wasn’t my type, I guess, and we decided to be friends instead. Then I went on a date once with the son of one of Mom’s friends.” Lee shook his head. “That was a disaster.”
“Why?” Dean asked as the beat softened and they were able to dance more slowly.
“He wasn’t interested in being with someone like me. His mom had set it up with my mom, and he only went out with me to be nice. But I’m too much work.” The song ended, and Lee pulled his arms away and took a step back. The dancers shifted as a number of people headed off the floor and others joined the crowd as the beat once again picked up. Dean took Lee’s hand and guided him off the dance floor.
“Hey, Dean,” a vaguely familiar voice said from behind him, tapping him on the shoulder. “It’s Brad.”
“Hi,” Dean said as brightly as he could, wishing this guy, of all people, hadn’t been there tonight. “You here with friends?”
“Nope. Came alone. I thought maybe you and I could talk or something.” Brad leered, then seemed to notice Lee. “Who’s this?” He leaned closer. “Is he interesting? Maybe the three of us could have some fun, like that time a few months ago.”
Dean growled and stepped forward, keeping himself between Lee and Brad. “No.” Just the thought sent Dean into primal defense mode. Brad wasn’t going to get his grubby hands on Lee. Yes, he’d had a three-way, but that was then, and the thought of anyone else touching Lee had him seeing red.
“Dean.” Trevor was right behind him. “Come back to the table.”
“You have a good night,” Dean said to Brad and turned away. He hated that his sleazy past had come up to bite him in the ass. Damn, he wanted to crawl into a hole and hide. Dean should have known that something like this could happen, but he hadn’t given it a thought. He and Lee had been dancing and having a good time. Dean returned to the table and sat down again, his back straight, tension rolling off him. It was probably time for him to leave and let the others have fun. He certainly wasn’t going to be having any more this evening.
Damn it all, he needed to get his shit together. He’d spent the last three years going from one sexual encounter to another. Granted, he’d told Lee what he’d been, but now Lee had heard about it firsthand, and that was a completely different thing. Lee sat straight in his chair, talking with James and Trevor, his arm locked with Scott’s.
“Shit,” Dean mumbled under his breath. Maybe he just wasn’t good enough for a guy like Lee, who deserved someone who wasn’t an emotionally stunted basket case.
“Hey, man,” Brent said from next to him. “Sorry about that.”
“Lee’s freaked out.” Dean said it as though it was a fact.
“I think this entire field trip was a bad idea. First some guy hits on him and won’t take no for an answer, and now another one wants him in a three-way. I don’t think this was what Lee was envisioning when he asked to go out dancing.”
“I’m okay,” Lee said. “Just a little shocked. That guy seemed like some character from a bad movie or something.” Lee bit his lower lip. “Did you really do the thing he said you did?”
Now all eyes were on him, and Dean shrugged for their benefit. “Yeah. That was a few months ago, and it wasn’t very nice. I think he thought it was hot, but I ended up leaving.” He wished he’d ordered a stiff drink so he could down it and take some of the edge off.
“Is that the kind of stuff you like?” Lees asked, clearly nervous.
“Not really. Sometimes….” There was no sense rationalizing. “I did stuff that I told myself I was trying. Most of it didn’t turn out, and….” He spoke directly to Lee. “That isn’t the kind of thing I’m into.” He was being honest, and that was all he could do.
“Do you all want to stay?” Trevor asked.
“I’m ready to go,” James said.
The others agreed, with Lee nodding as well.
“I need to use the men’s room,” Lee said. Scott spoke to him softly, and he and Lee stood, crossed the dance floor, and headed toward the back of the club.
“Man, I screwed up,” Dean groaned.
“No, you didn’t,” James answered. “You’ve been living this life for three or four years. Lee knew that, and it’s best that he finds out what you were doing now rather than later. Let him digest it, and he’ll be fine.” James patted his hand. “The guy is strong. He seems timid sometimes, so everyone gets protective, but Lee has a backbone of steel. He’ll bounce back.” James really had a way of cutting to the heart of things.
Dean stood and made sure they had everything from the table, taking a few steps away so he could get a better view through the writhing crowd, watching for Lee and Scott to return so they could go.
“Hi, Dean!” a familiar velvety voice crooned, and he slowly turned around. “It’s been a few years.”
He stiffened and then forced himself to relax. There was no way in hell he was going to let Chuck see anything but aloof coolness. “How is it going?” He had to swallow the urge to add “dumbfuck.” “Are you having a good time?” He smiled. “Of course you are. Looking for another plaything?”
“I’ve heard you’ve spent your share of time here too.” Chuck stepped closer, the deep blue eyes that had first attracted Dean sparkling in the laser lights of the club. “This isn’t the life for either of us. I know that now. I was seduced by the ease of it all. This….” Chuck motioned around them. “This was too damned easy. We were what was hard. The two of us, making it last. I had to work at it—we both did.” He came even closer. “Things aren’t so simple now.”
“No, they aren’t. But they weren’t then either. You just wanted them to be. I was prepared to put in the effort. You weren’t.” Dean wasn’t going to get into this now. Chuck had put him through hell, but he’d gotten past that. Sure, it had taken him years of trying to forget, realizing he couldn’t, and burying himself in other men, to realize what he wanted, but he’d done it. And the last thing he needed was Dumbfuck Chuck to show up again, spouting this philosophical bullshit.
He glanced around for the rest of the guys.
“Come on, Dean. I’ve done things, and so have you. From what I’ve heard, you slept with half the town. How was what I did any different?”
“I wasn’t with anyone,” Dean growled. “So don’t compare my actions to what you did. I may be a lot of things, but I’m not a cheat,” he added pointedly. This conversation was already getting old. Chuck was still the same self-centered asshole he’d always been… or at least the one he’d become. Hell, maybe that was partly his fault.
He and Chuck had been good together when they’d first met. Chuck was just starting out as a stockbroker, trying to get his business going and building a portfolio of clients. They had been happy together for almost four years. At least, that’s what he’d thought. Then one day, Dean had come home early from a trip he’d taken with his dad. They had been checking out an auction that showcased rare car parts, but the weather had turned so they’d cut their trip short. And Dean had walked in on Chuck and his latest plaything.
“Things weren’t working out—you had to have felt it. But we’re older and wiser now. We’ve been through the meat grinder and know the grass isn’t greener.” Chuck flashed that hundred-watt smile that usually got him what he wanted, and Dean felt his belly flutter the way it always had—but only for a second. Then the butterfly wings stopped midstroke. What in the hell was he doing?
“Go away, Chuck. We can’t go back. It’s over.” He turned to leave, but Chuck grabbed his arm.
“You know you weren’t a bed of roses to live with, any more than I was.”
That was probably true. The thing was, if Dean looked back on their relationship, he knew he wasn’t totally innocent. Sure, he could blame Chuck for cheating, but maybe the problems in their relationship had been because of him. Maybe if he’d been different, things between him and Chuck would have ended some other way. Dean growled as the old guilt welled up inside him. What if he’d been more attentive? He had loved Chuck deeply, and now…
And now he needed to move on. “I don’t know what your game is, but we can’t turn back the clock. What’s past is past. That’s just the way it is. I’m sorry.” He turned his back on Chuck and walked back to where Brent waited, drumming his fingers impatiently on the table.
Brent’s phone vibrated on the table, and he snatched it up. A pained expression crossed his face as he turned to Dean. “Scott can’t find Lee.”
“DO YOU need something to drink?”
As Lee stood outside a bathroom stall waiting for Scott, someone pressed a glass into his hand. At first he’d thought that Scott had finished before him and that his voice was just muffled with all the noise and bustle around him. Lee’s throat was dry and he drank once, then spit it out. The liquid tasted funny, and he handed the glass back, but no one took it. It crashed to the floor. His head started to swim. He was lost and tried to find Scott, but calling for him would be pointless. Lee found a partition and followed it to a stall door, which opened. He went inside and locked it, but all the audible cues as to what was around him became jumbled. For a moment he thought he was going to be sick.
Lee’s head spun and he tried to keep his balance, but it felt like the world was going in circles and kept trying to rise up to meet him. He lifted his foot but wasn’t sure where to put it. This whole feeling was pretty awful, and without visual cues and references, it was terrifying. Lee reached out for anything to steady him and found a hard surface. Lee held it and searched for the latch, managed to get the door open, and stepped out of the stall, still holding the partition.
A pair of arms engulfed him, and for a split second, Lee was relieved that one of his friends had come looking for him. “I got you.” The voice was strange and not one he immediately recognized, but that sharp, nose-crinkling scent? That he recognized. Fear washed through him, and Lee’s mind told him he needed to get away, but his body wouldn’t cooperate. “It’s all right, I’m going to get you out of here.” The words might have been comforting under different circumstances, but Lee had just enough self-awareness to know that he was in trouble but had no way to fight back. It was like his arms and legs—hell, his entire body—wasn’t his own.
Lee grew cold as he was propelled forward. He thought of just letting his legs collapse out from under him, but the man was strong and already half holding him upright. All he knew for sure was that he was blind, music filled his ears, he couldn’t get any sense of where he was, and a strange man controlled where he was going. Lee had never felt more helpless in his life.
DEAN TOOK off, damn near parting the water of guys in a rush to get over to the restrooms, with Brent right behind him. Brent met Scott, and they began signing in earnest, with Brent translating.
“Lee was in one stall, and Scott in the other. He came out and waited for Lee, but he wasn’t there.”
“Spread out and look for that asshole in a cowboy hat.” Dean was willing to bet that the guy had decided to try to turn a no into a yes without permission. Dean didn’t wait for Brent to translate, weaving through the crowd toward the door. It was the only way out, and Dean had to hope that the cowboy hadn’t managed to get past the bouncers.
“He’s a little sick.”
The Texas drawl caught his ear, and Dean turned and saw the cowboy just about to leave. Dean grabbed the guy’s shoulder, pulling him back, and saw the asshole was holding Lee upright. Dean reached for Lee and caught him as he slumped in his arms.
“What the fuck did you give him?” Dean demanded, and turned to the bouncer. “Call the police. This guy tried to kidnap him.”
“Dean,” Lee said, gripping his arm. “I just want to go,” he whispered, and Dean held Lee closer.
“But he…,” Dean sputtered.
“I’ll be okay. I’m just a little groggy.” Lee slowly got up, leaning on Dean, holding his arm as though it was a lifeline.
“It was just a drink, for God’s sake, and he spat most of it at me.”
Dean ground his teeth. He needed to get to the bottom of this, but it seemed whatever had been in that dr
ink, Lee hadn’t gotten much.
“I feel stupid and want to leave.”
“Okay. We’ll go.” Dean pushed the guy aside and ushered Lee toward the door.
It was Brent who marched up to the cowboy. “You’re damned lucky my friend isn’t pressing charges.” He kneed the guy in the nuts, and he collapsed in pain. “I’m not so nice.” Brent hurried away, and as soon as they got outside, Trevor and Brent damn near doubled over with laughter.
“That put an end to whatever plans he might have had for the evening,” Brent cackled. “Are you okay, Lee? Did he hurt you?”
“No. I was stupid. I thought it was one of you who gave me the drink. He’d changed his voice, and in the bathroom, I didn’t smell his yuckiness until it was too late. And I was thirsty, so I took a sip. Then I tasted it, and heard his accent, so I tried to spit it out. But I had already swallowed some. He told me that my friend was gone and that he’d take me back to the table. I got turned around, and then suddenly, you guys were there.” He seemed better already.
“He’d doctored the liquor and meant for you to drink it. He must have heard someone in the club mention that you were blind. My guess is that he used a lot of whatever he put in it, so it wouldn’t take much.” Dean’s heart was beating a mile a minute. He took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. If he hadn’t caught the cowboy going out the door…. But Lee was okay. Still, Dean wondered if they should take him to be checked out.
“I didn’t know what to do. I got all turned around.”
“It’s okay. Scott came and got us right away. We were all looking for you,” Dean said as they gathered near the cars, giving Lee a chance to breathe in some fresh air. “There was no way he was going to get you out of the club.”
