If It Fornicates (A Market Garden Tale) (15 page)

“We could sort out a quick escape before your friends show up.” Not unlikely the alpha would raise some issues when he tried to separate the weakest from the herd, as it were. That type of guy liked having an audience, and testosterone tended to demand he score first.

“You . . . work here? I mean, you do, right? What . . . are you offering?”

Nick grinned. “Pain, if you want it. Either from fucking you hard, or I could bring some toys to play with.”

The guy cleared his throat. “Should I, um . . .” He looked at Nick’s glass, which was nearly empty. “Should I get you a drink?”

“If you’d like,” Nick said, still grinning.

“Uh, what are you drinking?”

“Cola. Nothing alcoholic.”

“Okay. I’ll be right back.”

Nick stood to let the guy get up, and chuckled to himself as the church mouse hurried back to the bar. He sat back down while he waited, and kept half an eye on the other two guys at the bar. Looked like they were arguing with Raoul over the preparation of a cocktail. Not a pair Nick wanted to deal with tonight. Especially if they brought their chest-puffing crap over here and tried to elbow their way in. Maybe pry him away from their friend, or talk him into some kind of ménage situation.

That thought exhausted him. He could barely muster the enthusiasm to face an evening of entertaining the church mouse. As he turned back to watch said church mouse, who was still at the bar, Nick couldn’t help feeling downright tired. Not even a little into this.

He looked around, keenly thrown off his game. He was bored. He didn’t feel the electric current, that buzz that fuelled him when he needed it. And fucking a guy in that sort of ennui wasn’t going to happen. Dominating him—especially with pain involved—was a bad idea when Nick couldn’t focus, and he wasn’t even sure he could muster the enthusiasm to fuck him well enough to earn his pay.

Talk about buzz. His trouser pocket buzzed, so he surreptitiously pulled out the phone. Just a text.

But a text from Spencer was never just
any
fucking text.

Thinking of you has never been this uncomfortable.

Likewise,
Nick thought,
but for very different reasons.

But he’d had nights like this before. Everyone did. Didn’t mean he was off the hook for satisfying his clients and earning his keep. Especially since nights like this had been happening all too frequently lately.

He slid his phone back into his pocket, took a deep breath, and schooled his face into something that balanced devilishness with flirtation as the church mouse returned with a fresh cola. “Thank you.”

He got up to let the john sit, then sat beside him. “So tell me, what is it you’re looking for?”

The church mouse gulped. “I . . .” His eyes darted towards his friends. Then he picked up his drink and inhaled almost a third of it in a single gulp. He grimaced—Raoul always made them good and strong—and then pushed the glass away. “I’m not sure, to be honest.”

Nick gestured towards Alpha and Sleaze. “Their idea?”

Some colour crept into the church mouse’s cheeks, and he nodded sheepishly.

Nick sipped his own drink. “You like it kinky?”

Good thing the church mouse hadn’t been taking a drink just then. He’d have choked. In fact, he choked anyway, even though he wasn’t swallowing a damned thing. “Kinky?”

“You know.” Nick shrugged. “Handcuffs. Whips. Chains.” He grinned, but wasn’t feeling it. “Being told what to do.”

All that extra colour in the guy’s cheeks went away. “Um . . .”

“Hey, hey, hey,” said a loud, slimy voice, and Nick barely kept himself from rolling his eyes as he turned around. Sleaze smirked down at them. “You’ve already picked one out, eh?”

The church mouse cringed. “Um . . .”

“Actually,” Nick said, “I came to him.” He smiled as sweetly as . . . well, at least it wasn’t a smirk. Not much of one, anyway. “I always home in on the good-looking ones.”

Sleaze’s smirk evaporated. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Nick batted his eyes. “That you have good taste in friends?”

Beside Sleaze, Alpha bristled, glaring at Nick. Then the two of them slid into the booth across from Nick and the bewildered fish out of water.

Nick turned and cupped the guy’s chin, kissed him lightly on the mouth, and paused long enough to watch the mix of horror, arousal, and what-the-fuck on the guy’s face. Then he let him go. “Shall we go sit somewhere else?” He glanced at the others, then turned to his prey. “Somewhere more private?”

The church mouse gulped. “O-okay.”

The other two watched with slack jaws and wide eyes as Nick and their friend left the booth. The church mouse didn’t look at the others, but Nick made sure to offer them the most smug expression he could muster. And just to rub it in, he said, “Good night, lads. It was lovely meeting the two of you.”

He and his soon-to-be john found a booth on the opposite end of the room. The church mouse slid in first, and Nick sat beside him.

“You’ve got your hands full with those two, don’t you?” he asked.

The church mouse shrugged. “They’re not so bad. They’ve just done this sort of thing before. I haven’t.”

Nick arched an eyebrow. “You’re not a virgin, are you?”

“What?” The john laughed and shook his head. “No, no. I’ve just never, um, paid for it.”

Nick inched closer to him, ignoring the heavy, apathetic feeling in his gut. “There’s a first time for everything, isn’t there?”

“T-true.”

“So what is it you want? You just want to get fucked for the night? Or do you want something a little . . . kinkier?”

“I’m not really sure, to be honest.”

Right then he reminded Nick of Spencer. Of the bewildered look on his face when he’d first wandered into Market Garden with a loud-mouthed friend of his own. He shook the thought away. “What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done, then?”

“Craziest?” The church mouse’s eyebrows climbed his creased forehead. “What do you mean?”

“You know.” Nick shrugged with one shoulder. “You ever let someone tie you up and spank you? Ever blown someone on top of the Eiffel Tower? Anything?”

The church mouse laughed and held his drink tighter. Nick expected him to insist he’d never done such a thing, but, with a little colour rushing into his cheeks, the guy said, “I once begged my boyfriend to let me suck him off on the train.”

Nick blinked. “And did he let you?”

Laughing again, the guy shook his head. “No. But he liked watching me beg, so I did it again when we were home. Then he let me.”

“You like begging?”

The church mouse nodded.

“The submissive type, then.”

“Uh, yeah. I guess. But that’s all I’ve ever done.”

“You want to try more, though, don’t you?” Nick schooled his expression, keeping the Dom on his face and pretending that heaviness in his gut wasn’t sinking deeper. “Have someone order you around in the bedroom?”

The church mouse swallowed. Then he nodded slowly.

A fresh, unblemished submissive. One with the desire, the eagerness, but no experience. Exactly the kind of john Nick loved to play with.

And he . . . couldn’t.

He couldn’t do it.

Nick took another drink from the cola, and put the glass down. “You want one of the Doms, then.” He nodded towards the corner of the room where a couple of the other kinky rentboys hung out. “They can show you the ropes, as it were.”

“Really?” The church mouse furrowed his brow again. “You don’t do that stuff?”

Nick shook his head. “Afraid not.”

“Oh. Okay. So, um.” The guy looked at the other rentboys. “So, one of them, then?”

Nick nodded.

“I’ll go speak to them. Cheers.”

Nick got up and let him out, and watched as the church mouse meekly approached the group of Doms. He’d have a good time tonight, of that Nick had no doubt.

But as for Nick, he just didn’t have it in him. Even a more vanilla john than this church mouse was too much for him tonight. The thrill of the hunt, the pre-game mind games, the paid play in a hotel or a flat or the back of a luxury car—none of it appealed to him. For the first time since he’d started working at the Garden, this was the last place in the world he wanted to be. He looked around aimlessly, noticed a look from Raoul that silently asked,
You good, mate?

Nick responded with a half-hearted nod, and the bartender went back to wiping down the bar. Nick glanced at his watch. It was late enough that Spencer would be in bed. No rest for the wicked, and God, but Nick wanted to be there with him, fuck him and then take the cage off to let him come if he begged nicely enough.

There. There was the charge he’d been missing all day. The charge he’d needed to get that connection with the church mouse off the ground.

But shit, thinking of Spencer while fucking somebody else—that felt wrong. Like taking something precious meant for one special person and just throwing it at some random person who happened to be hanging around. No, worse than that. Taking that something precious, and actively seeking someone out so he could just throw it at them. That thought grew barbs and dug in deeper.

God, he was so fucked. That was bad, really bad. He was reeling—because he couldn’t really dominate somebody when his head was elsewhere. When he wasn’t even present. While he was waiting for a goddamned text. Or imagining Spencer tossing around in his bed, turned on and helpless. Nick might hit too hard. Hit the wrong spot. Miss a clue of real distress. People got injured that way. And while he really didn’t mind selling pain or sex, that was simply not safe. Not right.

He rubbed the sides of his nose, then caught Frank’s gaze on him. He lifted an eyebrow, and Frank nodded at him in clear invitation, leaning back in the booth where he’d been going through papers, as he sometimes did.

Nick sauntered over and sat down. “Boss.”

“How you doing, Nick?”

“Doing all right.” Nick inhaled deeply. “Personally more than professionally, though.”

Frank pulled a pen from the inside of his jacket, the motion drawing Nick’s attention to the black T-shirt moulded to the boss’s impressive pecs. His salt-and-pepper hair was buzzed short, and he had the kind of face that went well with pilot shades. Nick always felt he looked like a drill sergeant from an American porn movie about military guys getting it on. Not exactly his scene, though he could appreciate it.

“You going to tell me?” Frank asked.

“You asking as my boss?”

“As somebody who wants to make sure he has an idea what’s going on with people in here.”

“Gotcha.” Nick folded his hands on the table to keep from giving away the hint of nerves he was feeling. “Don’t have it in me at the moment. I think I need a break.”

Frank tapped the pen he’d been making notes with on the table. “What’s up? Need help? Is it about university?”

“No. That’s all going well. I’m . . . I’m good with the workload and the times. It’s just, my head’s not in it. Both heads, I guess.”

Frank grinned wryly.

“And uh. I have a boyfriend.”

“Do you?” Frank’s eyes widened a little. “I had no idea.”

“It’s a fairly new development,” Nick said quietly.

“He got issues with your job?”

“He’s a former client. He knows what I do, and it doesn’t bother him.”
Except he doesn’t like what the job is doing to me lately
. “It’s just—to be perfectly honest and blunt about it, I don’t really give a fuck about the clients. I’m slipping, sloppy, I’m just not myself anymore. Any arsehole can do what I can do at the moment. I’m maybe losing my touch.”

“Or somebody else is keeping it for you,” Frank commented. “Your touch, I mean.”

“Or that.” Nick stared at the table surface. “This is awkward.”

Frank remained silent for a while. “Take time off, Nick. You’ve worked hard, you got a lot going on. Hell, enjoy your boyfriend. You’re not a machine.”

Any other night, Nick would have had some smart-arse comment at the ready. Right now, all he could think was that he’d been fine—well, better than he was tonight, anyway—before he took time off. Before he’d focused completely on Spencer for a few days without either of their jobs distracting them. If he took more time off, he’d gravitate towards the man whose tormented, pleading texts had come in sporadically all day long. Off with the clothes, off with the chastity device, and he could have hot, sweaty, kinky sex with someone who actually held his attention.

That thought jolted Nick like an electric shock. He didn’t think of anyone else when he fucked Spencer. He didn’t think about his job. Whatever they were doing at any given time, that was it. Unlike when he was with the paying submissives he met here. Then his mind kept wandering back into Spencer’s bedroom.

“Nick.”

Nick looked at Frank.

His boss gestured at the front door with his pen. “Go. I don’t want to see your face here tomorrow night, either.”

Nick’s heart skipped. “Are you firing—”

“No, of course not.” Frank laughed. “You practically pay for this place. Just get out of here, recharge, and come back later this week.”

“What about paying for
my
place?” Nick asked. Okay, so he had money stashed away, but he didn’t like the idea of a dip in his income.

Frank pulled out his wallet. As Nick watched, disbelieving, the man pulled a few bills free and slid them across the table. “Three hundred. Not quite what you make in a night, but it’ll soften the blow.”

Nick regarded the money warily. “You’re paying me to—”

“Yes. I’m paying my top earner to go home, get his shit together, and come back so he can earn that money this weekend. When it really counts.”

Chewing his lip, Nick hesitated. Then he took the cash off the table and slid it into his pocket. “All right. Thanks. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

Frank responded with a mock salute, but didn’t say anything.