by Jo Adler
I gulp in some air. “That’s what I’m worried about. If I show him the real me, maybe it won’t match the version from last week.”
Dede smirks. “What do you mean? There’s only one version of the real you.”
I slump back in the chair. “I know, but I’m talking about…” An image of Adam naked on the bed flashes through my mind: muscles, ink, the massive cock, the blue-gray eyes. “…uh, I’m talking about when we first met, you know? It was mysterious and this perfect kind of magic. Like, no expectations or history or—”
“Just call the man,” Dede commands, drinking some of her coffee. “Because if you’re not going to get on with it, I’ve got some bookkeeping that I need to take care of.”
I swivel around to face her. “Maybe I should go. I’m taking up too much of your time. I mean, this is your office and everything.”
She glowers at me. “Dial the phone, Nick,” she says, getting up from the chair. “Just dial the fucking phone already. I’ll be back in twenty minutes. If you haven’t called Mr. Delicious by then, I’ll do it for you!”
When I’m alone again, I get up, close the door and sit back in the chair. I don’t even need the piece of paper. I memorized Adam’s number earlier. But the anticipation of being rejected is starting to make me nauseous and dizzy.
He won’t even remember me. A guy that hot probably has a new boy every night and two more during the day.
I get to my feet and pace the room for a few minutes. I run through the list of reasons Adam would be interested in someone like me. Then I reverse course and consider the reasons he wouldn’t want to see me again.
Don’t be a freak. Just fucking call him. What’ve you got to lose? Maybe he’ll be happy to hear from you.
After a few final deep breaths, I sit down again, pickup the desk phone and dial the number. Barely ten seconds later, there’s a click, a slight metallic sputter and then a voice.
“Coleman residence,” says a woman with a British accent.
A woman? Is he married? Holy fuck. What do I—
“Hello?” she says. “Coleman residence.”
“Uh, may I...” My voice breaks. “May I speak with Adam, please?”
I expect her to laugh. And then hang up. Instead, she asks for my name.
“It’s Nick,” I say, feeling my heart thunder in my chest. “Nick Hardy.”
“And will Mr. Coleman know what this is concerning?” she asks.
I think about a few ways to answer her question: It’s about him fucking me. It’s about me sucking his cock. It’s about kissing his lips. And sliding my body against his as we—
“Mr. Hardy?” She sounds very nice. And very patient. “Are you still there?”
“Yes, s-s-sorry,” I falter. “I met Adam last week, but I forgot to give him my contact information. I was wondering if he might have a second or two to talk.”
When she doesn’t say anything right away, I start to panic again. She’s going to hang up. He’s going to howl with laughter when she tells him about the call.
“Very good,” she says, slicing into the skittering thoughts in my mind. “Just hold the line for a moment.”
My heart pounds even harder—clattering in my chest so fast that I can’t catch my breath—and I start to feel like I might faint.
Hang up. Don’t do this. You’ll make a fool of yourself and—
“Well, hey there, stranger!” Adam says suddenly, sounding bright and cheerful. “What a great surprise!”
I swallow hard. “Hey.”
“Hey? Is that all?”
“Uh, how are you?” I sit up in the chair, pressing both feet against the floor to stop them from trembling. “It’s good to hear your voice.”
His laugh is light and warm. “Well, it’s good to be heard,” he says. “Why did you wait to call? I thought that I might’ve heard from you over the weekend.”
“What do you mean? I just got your phone number today from my friend Richard.”
The line is quiet for a few seconds.
“Richard? What’s his last name?”
“It doesn’t matter. But you shared a summer house on Fire Island with his husbands.”
“He’s mistaken about that,” Adam tells me. “I know this makes me less of a gay man in the eyes of some people, but I’ve never even been to Fire Island.”
“Well, that’s bizarre,” I say, trying to make sense of the discrepancy. “Richard told me that he’d talked to Tate and Alec about it. They told him you were all friends who met twenty years ago.”
“Husbands?” Adam laughs. “As in, more than one?”
“It’s a triad marriage,” I tell him. “Probably not for everyone, but it works for those three.”
“Three times the fun, huh?”
“I guess so,” I reply, starting to feel like the call was a massive mistake.
“How did your friend Richard get involved?” Adam asks. “I left my business card with the note last Friday night so you’d have my number.”
“Oh, well…” I begin. “Maybe it fell out or something.”
Adam chuckles. “I sealed the envelope.”
“Okay, so I don’t know how to explain that,” I say. “I mean, I got your note. And that was cool. But I didn’t see—”
“It doesn’t matter,” Adam interrupts. “We’re talking now, so let’s not worry about the card, okay?”
“Sounds good.”
“How are you, Nick?” he asks. “It’s really good to hear from you.”
My cock jolts at the sound of his voice: deep, warm and strong. I reach down and grab my crotch, pulsing my fingers and closing my eyes.
“It’s good to hear from you, too,” I say, instantly regretting the inane comment. “I m-m-mean, it’s good to hear your voice again. And I’m sorry about the business card. Maybe I accidentally dropped it when I opened the envelope.”
He sighs into the phone. “No apologies,” he says. “I’m just glad that you called.”
“And I’m glad that you answered,” I say, feeling my face flush with nerves. “Um, I mean, I’m glad that she answered. Or that somebody answered. Because I—”
“Whoa, slow down,” Adam says. “That was Hayley. She helps me out around the house with laundry and cooking.”
“Oh, you have a maid?”
He snorts a laugh. “Don’t ever let her hear you call her that,” he says. “Hayley’s an actress and playwright. I met her through a woman at my firm. She was looking for part-time work, and I needed someone to keep my house running smoothly.”
My cock throbs as I listen to Adam. I bite my lower lip to keep from moaning, but then realize that he’s gone quiet.
“Uh, that’s…that’s really great,” I say quickly. “Sounds like it works well for you both.”
“Definitely. I like those types of things.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, hoping his answer will be long and involved so I can keep rubbing my dick through my pants and sink deeper into his voice.
“I mean that this arrangement works well for Hayley and me,” Adam explains. “We fit together perfectly, in terms of personality and schedules and expectations.”
“Like it was meant to be?” I pose the question tentatively, not wanting to make the comparison too obvious.
“Yes,” Adam agrees. “Like it was destiny or fate.”
“Has that happened to you before?” I ask.
“A time or two,” he says. “I believe in those things. And if my path crosses someone else’s and feels right from the get-go, then I figure it’s that whole written in the stars thing.”
Like you and me, screams the voice in my head. Because I felt that way the night that we met. And I’ve been going crazy hoping to—
“What about you?” he asks.
“I’m sorry?” My voice trembles again. “What about me what?”
He laughs. “Has that ever happened in your life? Where you met someone and it felt like it was—”
“Written in the stars?”
I say quickly.
“Yes, like that.”
“Maybe,” I reply. “But then other things happen that are hard to explain.”
“Such as?”
Like how you knew so much about me the other night. And how Oliver denied telling you those things.
I take a moment to steady my nerves. Then I say, “Well, I actually wanted to ask you about one of them.”
“Really?”
“Yes, like the night that we met,” I reply. “I was curious to know—”
“I’ll tell you what,” he interrupts. “I’d love to hear all about that later over dinner. Would you mind if we talk then?”
For a split second, I try to decide if he actually spoke the words or if I somehow imagined them to be real. But then he repeats the question, adding the name of a restaurant.
“It’s one of my favorites up near my office,” he tells me. “If you haven’t been there yet and don’t mind going to Midtown, I bet it becomes one of your favorites, too.”
“When?” I ask excitedly. “What time?”
“What about seven o’clock tonight? I have a call with a client in Honolulu at ten, but I’m free until then.”
“Tonight?” I feel a giddy flash of excitement race through me. “Is that what you mean?”
“Yep. Does that work for you?”
“Absolutely,” I say. “I’ll see you at seven.”
22
▬ ☼ ▬
ADAM
I’ve been sitting alone at the table in my favorite French restaurant on Fifty-Seventh Street for the past twenty minutes, sipping a glass of wine and wondering what the fuck I was thinking. I don’t have time for games or bullshit, and it looks like Nick might be teasing me with both. He’d sounded so sincere on the phone, but now it looks like he’s not going to show for dinner.
“What the fuck,” I mutter under my breath. “I’ll go back to the office and—”
The sound of footsteps and someone panting pulls me out of my grumpy reverie.
It’s Nick, pushing the bangs from his eyes as he stands beside the table. His face is red, his hair is tousled and he looks frazzled and anxious.
“I’m so sorry,” he gushes. “I was running late. Then I couldn’t get a cab. And then I realized that I’d somehow left my phone at home.”
I push back from the table, walk around to the empty chair and pull it out so he can sit down.
“Relax,” I say, giving his arm a good squeeze. “I’m really glad to see you, handsome.” His cheeks turn a brighter shade of pink. “I was starting to wonder if you were fucking with me earlier.”
His eyebrows hitch higher. “I’d love to,” he says in a husky tone that I haven’t heard yet.
“Well, well,” I tell him. “Sounds like somebody’s feeling frisky and confident.”
He smiles. “My friend Dede told me to take the bull by the horns,” he replies.
I scoff. “Is that a real person or someone in your apparently very active imagination?”
“Oh, she’s totally real,” Nick says. “She’s my sage counsel. I actually work for her part-time, but we’ve become really close friends. She’s probably about your—”
When he stops in midsentence, I laugh at the look of panic on his face.
“My age?” I say. “Is that what you were going for?”
“Yes,” Nick answers. “But I don’t want you to think that I consider that old or anything.”
“Forty is old,” I say. “To some people.”
He squares his shoulders. “Not to me. I like older guys.”
“I gathered as much,” I reply. “I suspected it when I first saw you at Dirty Secrets. But when I was balls deep in your ass and you were calling my name, there was no guessing.”
He glances around the room nervously.
“Don’t worry,” I assure him. “They can’t hear me. And if they could, they’d probably be jealous.”
He glances down before taking the napkin from beside his plate and putting it on his lap.
“That should help,” he whispers. “I’m getting hard just sitting across from you.”
I smile. “Join the club, boy.”
Our eyes lock for a few seconds before the server walks up to the table. Once she has our beverage orders—another glass of pinot for me and a merlot for Nick—she heads for the bar.
“I’m really nervous,” he confesses. “I’m kind of glad this all happened so quickly. You know, you just asked me to dinner a few hours ago. If it had been longer, I think the anticipation would’ve killed me.”
“It’s strange, isn’t it?”
He frowns slightly. “How do you mean?”
“I think that we’re both feeling the same things,” I tell him. “Excited to see one another. Nervous to get together. Wondering what this is all about.”
The frown fades quickly, replaced by a playful grin. “I’m not wondering about part of it,” he says, lowering his voice. “I just can’t wait until it happens again.”
I lean forward. “Fucking?”
He nods. “And kissing and sucking and just feeling you on top of me.”
“Or beneath you,” I add. “We didn’t get around to that last week, but I sure would love to give it a try.”
“Me straddling your cock?” He smiles. “I was fantasizing about that in the shower the other day. I mean this in all seriousness; yours is the biggest that I’ve ever seen or enjoyed.”
The confession makes my dick lurch in my pants. I can feel the first drops of precum wetting my boxers.
“What else did you fantasize about?” I ask.
Nick closes his eyes and slowly licks his lower lip with the tip of his tongue. He’s about to answer my question when the woman returns with our drinks.
“Here you are, gentleman,” she says. “Another glass of pinot for you, sir. And a glass of Duckhorn for your son.”
It’s an innocent assumption, but I find it difficult to keep from laughing until she’s gone from the table. As soon as she’s back at the bar, I slip my right foot out of my loafer, raise my leg carefully and gently slide it between Nick’s legs.
“Oh!” he exclaims when it feels it pressing against his erection. “I didn’t…” He pauses to take a breath. “Wow! I’ve seen that in movies, but nobody’s ever done it to me before.”
“Stick with me, kid,” I say in my best Humphrey Bogart impression. “I’ll show you everything that you’ve never seen or tried before.”
He laughs. “Oh, yeah? Like what?”
“You name it.”
“The list’s pretty long,” he says. “I haven’t done all that much, if you want to know the truth.”
I stare at him in disbelief. “You’ve got to be kidding me. After what we did last week, I’d guess that you’re well versed in pretty much everything.”
“Well, I suppose so.” He flutters his long lashes. “I definitely loved what we did, but I’ve been thinking about how hot it would be to meet a daddy who’s into trying some less mainstream stuff.”
I feel my cock press up against my jeans. Nick was making it increasingly difficult to stay on my side of the table. Half of me wanted to lunge over, slide my tongue in his mouth and my hand down his pants. The other half pressed for more decorum.
“Tell me,” I say, moving my napkin to my lap for the same reason that Nick did. “What do you want to do?”
He smiles. “In life?” he asks. “Or in bed?”
The fact that he asked about life first makes me realize that this boy is not solely focused on his cock. He’s interested in more than fucking and sucking. He wants to explore more than just the things that two men can do in the bedroom.
“I like that answer,” I tell him. “Why don’t you tell me what you want to do in both?”
The follow-up grin is infectious. In no time at all, I’m listening carefully as Nick discusses his painting aspirations and favorite galleries and the destinations that he’d like to visit. When he finishes a long and breathless story
about his first trip to Miami with his parents as a young boy, I press my foot against his crotch again.
“And what about the other half of the equation?” I say. “What do you want to try with a daddy?”
After a lingering silence, Nick surprises me again.
“Everything that’s of mutual interest,” he says, sounding more mature than his years. “Spanking and pony play and toys and bondage. But I’d also like to just cuddle and watch Netflix. Or take long walks by the river and go for a carriage ride in the park.”
I smile. “And then go home and cook…what was it Oliver mentioned last week?”
Nick’s laugh is loud and rugged. “Quinoa burrito bowls,” he answers. “I’ve been teaching myself to cook lately, but it’s not all super healthy stuff. I can also make a mean chicken fried chicken steak and mashed potatoes loaded with bacon, sour cream and cheddar cheese.”
“Hayley’s going to love you,” I say without thinking. “She’s a huge fan of chicken fried anything.”
Nick arches one eyebrow. “Oh, yeah?”
“But some of the things you just mentioned sound really incredible,” I tell him. “I think that you might be a bit of an old romantic, Nick.”
“You’re the veteran romantic,” he says with a wink. “I’m the newbie that’s eager to learn.”
23
▬ ☼ ▬
NICK
Two hours later, after dinner and a leisurely stroll down Sixth Avenue, we turn the corner onto Forty-Second Street and Adam stops in front of a building across from Bryant Park.
“I need to review a file in my office before I call my client,” he says. “Do you mind if we go up for a few minutes?”
“Not at all.” I angle my head back and look toward the top of the high-rise tower. “It will actually be nice to see where you work.”
A few minutes later, after he greets the security guard and we make our way to the top floor, Adam unlocks the door to his company headquarters and steps aside.