by Willa Okati
He’d give anything to recapture one of those golden hours spent sipping mead and listening to the songs of Ireland. On the other hand, the thought of tarting himself up in leather and bondage gear was just about as appealing, startling even himself. But really -- talk about hiding in plain sight! Once he’d dressed himself up and even applied a light coat of makeup the way the shop boy had instructed, no one would recognize him as Lawyer Simon.
They might even cast a glance his way and think, Fuck, he’s hot. Wish I could get lucky with someone like him.
Grinning, Simon began to unbutton his neat, white linen shirt, folding it carefully to go in the bag. One hour, he’d promised himself, and one hour he would have. He’d be Cinderfella at the ball; he’d dance, laugh, and perhaps even share bittersweet, yeasty, beery kisses with some of the beautiful men he’d seen.
For one hour, he would shine.
And after that, he’d go back to being his old self in every way that mattered. But he’d be all the happier for it because he’d have the memory to keep him warm at night in his lonely bed. He’d know that for one moment, he’d been wanted. He’d been golden. He’d been a god.
A memory like that could keep a man going for the rest of his life.
Simon sighed happily in anticipation, and began to dress himself in the finest of the skimpiest submissive gear available in the Charlestonian gay-friendly markets.
He didn’t even flinch when he fastened the cock ring into place.
Tonight would be a night to remember.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
Finn glared up at the bell over the bar. Then he turned his gimlet eye out on the crowd of Last Chancers, all of whom were quiet as little mice. He hadn’t let up on the song ill-wishing until after the third chorus of “How Great Thou Art,” and none of them wanted to be in that particular set of shoes, thanks very much. But all the same, they knew what that sound meant.
Someone was definitely coming their way tonight.
Trey glanced at the bell, then at Finn. He raised one shoulder, ennui radiating off him in nigh palpable waves.
Finn bristled. “No one says a word,” he bit out, quickly following it with, “Everyone speak up!”
Mouths that had flown open snapped shut. A barful of terrified eyes were riveted on Finn. One man slowly raised his hand. Finn rolled his eyes, but nodded. He could speak, since he’d shown a bit of manners.
“Finn, we can’t help him,” the guy ventured, tugging at the hem of his glow-in-the-dark, light-saber T-shirt. “I mean, whoever he is, the club knows. The bar knows. He’s gonna end up here, and we can’t do anything to help him.”
Finn bared his teeth. The man stumbled over his words, trying to backpedal but hold his ground at the same time. “Look, it might not be one of those guys who came in with Liam. I know you want them to have a good time. I don’t know why, but, hey, not questioning you there, buddy. I wish everyone could have fun. But some of us ...” He lifted his shoulders in a helpless shrug. “Some guys just belong here. It’s where Fate puts us.”
Finn glared at the geek, then deliberately turned his back, watching the screen. He could just pick out Liam dancing in the midst of a crowd, his laughter soundless in the midst of the chaos, but oh, he could imagine the joy it held.
Well, he didn’t know why he was rooting for the lot of the incubus’s men, either, but be damned if he’d go changing his mind about them now. No matter who, no matter what.
Simon stepped out of the Amour Magique rest room and stopped to shiver. By God, it was colder in the club than it had felt when he’d been swaddled up in a three-piece suit! Bits of leather and non-warming plastic didn’t lend themselves to keeping a fellow toasty -- that was, until he got out on the floor to dance.
He glanced down at himself, silently approving. The shop boy had told him he looked good enough to lick up, and while he’d gone red and embarrassed at such frank wording by a stranger, he’d secretly ... agreed.
He wasn’t in bad shape at all for a man his age, although it wasn’t quite so awfully advanced. He had yet to see forty for another couple of birthdays. He jogged and occasionally lifted weights -- he’d seen too many other lawyers either grow sour and painfully thin from living on coffee, or bloated with lunches at their local diners, and dreaded the thought of ending up in that condition. Therefore, while he might not make the cover of Fit Monthly, he had nothing to be ashamed of with his tone and tautness either.
He straightened up with a brisk shake and tested out a bold stride toward the doors that would lead him back onto the main dance floor. As he passed a bank of pay phones, out of the corner of his eye he saw a ripped young ebony man and his partner, skin tone rich as butterscotch, twined about one another. The dark man glanced at Simon and grinned as their eyes met, letting out a low wolf whistle. His partner dropped his eyelids to half-mast and blew Simon a kiss.
Simon had to laugh for glee. Fortunately, he thought they understood he wasn’t amused at them. The dark man said in a heavy Jamaican accent, “Pants like that, I can tell a man’s religion.” He gave Simon a cheerful leer. “Jewish, no?”
Simon winked, rocked his hips, and sailed on, proud as he could be. The men’s appreciative laughter behind him gave him all the hope he felt he was possibly able to hold.
Opening the doors to the dance floor, he took a deep breath of men, sweat and sex. The aroma washed over him in a dizzying wave.
Oh, yes.
This is my moment.
The bell above the Last Chance bar sounded like a damned dinner gong. Finn glared fiercely at Trey, who, without so much as a blink, took it down and wrapped it in a towel, then shoved it underneath a box of empty bottles. They could still hear the chimes, a sort of damned tell-tale heart, but at least they were somewhat muffled.
“Finn ...” the light-saber shirted twit dared to venture. “Come on, man. Be reasonable.”
Finn winged an empty martini glass at him. Well, a plastic glass, if that was even a viable phrase. It didn’t hurt the guy, just splashed him with a bit of leftover day-glow strawberry juice, but it got his point across. He hoped his glare conveyed the message. Not another word. Not another single word from any of you.
Gods, one would think they were happy to have another poor bastard join their ranks.
Reasonable? Fuck reasonable! Simmering, Finn turned back to the screen. He couldn’t bear to look away for long -- the need to seek out Liam or one of his groupies had almost become an obsession. He jonesed after the sight of the men like a hooker after grade Z street crank.
The camera angle switched suddenly and Finn groaned, wishing he had something else to throw. It had trained its all-seeing eye on the opening doors to the main dance floor, through which was entering ...
Finn’s mouth fell open. By gods, by gosh and begorra, if that wasn’t the most delicious looking piece of sub candy he’d ever seen in his hundreds of long-lived, bad luck-filled years. Dressed in straps of leather and barely there PVC pants with clear plastic windows that displayed one shapely ass cheek and lengths of thigh and calf, as well as a seriously impressive package right where it should be -- oh, sweet Patrick, have mercy!
He ignored the tortured, longing groans going up from the Last Chancers behind him. Anything besides the sight of that man, every bit of him on display from kohled eyes to trim black boots, from tousled hair to bulging cock -- which had to have a ring or a cage on underneath those pants -- wasn’t anything Finn wanted to be distracted by.
He lifted someone else’s glass to his mouth and gulped to ease the dryness. He fidgeted to take off the pressure in his suddenly aching cock. That man was an invitation to boner-dom on legs, he was, and if there was one piece of good fortune ever due to come Finn’s way in the past present, or future, he’d have wished for it to be that gorgeous, drool-worthy hunk of man, on his knees before him.
“Ah, gods,” he whispered, completely forgetting himself. “May you have the best night of your life, laddie.”
The Last Chance bar
went utterly silent and still.
They all heard the Loser-Bell pop out of its hiding place and hit the floor, chiming like a cuckoo clock gone mad.
Finn shut his eyes and groaned. Oh, shit. Oh, gods. Oh, no. He looked up, praying he could fix the damage before it was --
Nope. Already far too late.
Chapter Four
The music hit Simon like a thousand volts of electricity, straight to the chest. An anti-heart attack. He arched backward, supple as he hadn’t been in years, feeling the sounds of men and drums racing through him better than any drug he’d normally counsel the desperate not to use.
Tonight, he needed this fix. No, more than needed it -- he craved it, was desperate for the roll of lust as powerful as a blast of uncut cocaine, or so he imagined. He’d never dabbled in the real pharmaceuticals, but if they gave a man a rush like this, he thought he might begin to understand why others so often fell into their trap and craved them.
But no, he didn’t want to think. He didn’t want to be Lawyer Simon, analyzing and weighing each fact before formulating a cunning strategy to beat the others at their own game. He wanted to play the game. Play to win, yes, but not to defeat the other contestants.
With a wild laugh of abandon, feeling as unlike his three-piece-self as he could possibly be, Simon threw himself bodily into the crush of dancers, moving as best as he was able to the beat. He hadn’t danced in years, but this wasn’t like a tango or a foxtrot, was it? This was more making love -- no, fucking -- with your clothes on, or what little clothes one did have.
It’d been a long time since he’d done that, too, but he decided he’d give it his best possible shot. And, hey, it seemed as if he wasn’t making too big a mess out of it. He felt the weight of eyes landing on him everywhere he thrust and whirled. Saw smiles, bright and white and approving, on men’s faces when they looked at him in his leather and plastic.
One man in particular, young, hair buzzed so short as to be almost not there at all, caught Simon’s eye. Too muscled and too brutish for his everyday taste, but then, this wasn’t every day, was it? Rocking to the beat, the man held out a hand and beckoned Simon to him. A Dom calling his potential sub? Simon’s heart beat fast enough to hurt -- such a delicious pain.
Smiling back, coy and seductive, he danced his way toward the one who called him.
In the Last Chance, every man Jack sat fastened to their seats as if they’d been bolted in place, staring at the “D”-for-“delicious” sub as he made his way through the crush of dancers on Amour Magique’s main floor.
Finn fumed at the whole of the viewing audience, each member bearing the same expression of scorching lust and cringing pity, with a dash of shame for spice.
The poor bastard submissive might have thought he was doing well, dancing like a practiced seduction artist, but in truth he was living proof of the time-honored axiom ... white men truly, absolutely, could not dance. He jerked like a spastic puppet on a set of epileptic strings, each move clumsy and uncoordinated, all but knocking down and out several men as he passed them by.
Finn’s teeth were gritted so tightly he thought they might crack. It wasn’t fair, by gods, not fair at all! This man, whoever he might be, was a tasty enough candy that he deserved far better than he was sure to get. He needed someone to teach him how to use his body as a weapon in a sexual war, not fling himself about like a whack-a-mole hammer.
A physique like his, a smile like the one he wore, full of childlike glee, glowing with happiness -- it’d all but kill Finn when the inevitable came crashing down. Amour Magique’s dancers on the main floor were very, very good at what they did, and they knew the power of dance -- which were originally the tools with which gods were summoned and were now a physical prayer to the deities of lust for getting lucky. They wouldn’t take kindly to the uncoordinated and ignorant man crashing into their midst. If the sub got off with his life, he’d be lucky. But Finn knew he might well wish he hadn’t been so fortunate when they were done with him.
He took a sip of bitter beer and shuddered as it washed down. He’d all but begged Trey for something seriously hard and alcoholic, like Jaeger or Absolut, but the bartender, with his usual blank-faced apathy, had given him a longneck Bud Lite instead.
Finn knew better than to argue, but as he sucked on the grain-flavored water he thought Trey might have been trying to make a subtle point with his choice. The beer was as salty and stinging as tears.
Rolling the bottle against his forehead, Finn sighed. He’d tried to take the ill-wishing off, really he had. But it hadn’t worked. No idea why. Perhaps the club had been well and truly determined to make sure the sub ended up in Last Chance. He wouldn’t mind seeing the man in person, not at all, but he couldn’t bear the blows that would fall to drag him down into their depths.
“Oh, no,” he heard someone mutter behind him. Finn glanced up at the view screen and froze in dismay.
Ah, crap, crap, shit, crap! His sub, as Finn had begun to think of him at some unknown point, had fallen into the trap of a nasty sorcerer, Zachary, who loved nothing better than playing vicious little tricks.
Even as he watched, Zachary beckoned, and Finn’s sub danced spastically straight for him.
I can’t watch. But how can I look away? Miserable, Finn stared at the screen, and watched the scene play out before him.
Come on.
Simon read the young stud’s lips, as he couldn’t hear his voice for the din of the crowd and the blasting, pulsing thump of the music.
Over here, boy. I want to dance with you. His leer, and the added twist of emphasis on “dance” told Simon exactly what the man had in mind but, giddily, as if drunk, he found he didn’t mind or care a bit about what a foolish idea it might be.
He shimmied his way up to the muscled god and found himself to be several inches taller. That wouldn’t do. Savoring the thrill of playing his role, he sank to one knee in front of him -- only realizing a moment too late what the move made it appear he intended to do. He quailed briefly, wondering if the dancer -- a Dom, definitely a Dom -- would take him up on the unspoken offer. Instead, he heard the man’s laughter, audible now that they were close together.
“Stand up,” he said, grabbing Simon by the straps crisscrossing his shoulders. “I want to see what kind of man you are.”
Simon let himself be manhandled, pulses of excitement throbbing through his heart and shocking down to his groin. He’d been hard before, enough to make sure his cock ring fit snugly, but now he began to ache. His mind might usually have better sense, but his dick wanted hard, fast, and now. He let his head tilt to a side, coy and teasing, his lips parting slightly. The heat of the Dom’s eyes felt as if it were literally scorching his flesh and, oh, God, he could die happy right there, right then.
The Dom looked smug as he ran his thick, tough hands down Simon’s forearms. “You’re a normal,” he said, sounding absurdly pleased by the equally absurd statement. “A mundane.”
Normal? Mundane? What did he mean? No matter, though, and no time to think on it, for the Dom was leaning in to nip at the nape of Simon’s neck. “You couldn’t hurt me if you wanted to,” his lips buzzed against the sensitive skin. He sounded ... smug?
The first twinge of wrong tingled through Simon. Automatically, he tried to pull back a little, but the Dom’s grip tightened, leaving him without the choice. “Oh, no,” he said. “You’re not going anywhere. You’re staying right here, Shamrock.”
“It’s -- it’s Simon, actually,” Simon said, small-voiced, almost feeling as if he were breaking the rules by correcting this Dom.
It seemed his supposition was correct. The Dom shook him once, hard, like an annoying kitten in a lion’s jaws. “You’re called whatever I want to call you, Shamrock,” he warned. “Do you understand?” He pressed his overheated body close to Simon’s, letting him feel the rock hardness of a solid erection. “I said, do you understand?”
Simon sagged. Easy, it was so easy to play the game if he only let himself
go. “Yes, Master,” his lips formed. The words were barely audible, but they appeared to be good enough.
“That’s what I like to hear,” the Dom purred. “Just so you’ll remember me, my name is Zachary. But from you, I never want to hear anything but ‘Master.’” He licked a wet stripe up Simon’s neck to his ear and bit the lobe. “Say it again. Call me Master.”
Simon’s knees went weak under the lustful touch. “Master,” he whispered. “Please, Master, please ...”
Hard fingers seized him by the jaw. “Please what?” Zachary asked, far too innocently. “There something you want, Shamrock?”
Simon shivered, reality melting away to the rules of the game ...
Finn could feel his temper rising, mounting to a boiling point. Since he was keeping his mouth shut for fear of cocking up the situation even further, the Last Chancers were making the most of it and being bold. Behind his back, he heard someone running a pool on how long it would be before Zachary humiliated the sub -- Simon, he’d said his name was -- into running straight into the arms of their Bar & Grill. Cold, unwelcoming arms, the chilly embrace of men who found Simon just as ridiculous as Zachary obviously did.
Finn’s grip on his empty beer bottle tightened until he felt it start to creak under the pressure. Bleeding and gashes were not his favorite look, so he eased up. Besides, his words had been bad enough. Spill a little anti-lucky leprechaun blood and who knew what would happen? No. He had to be careful.
“Twenty on Zachary dragging in his friends!”
