“We?”
“Oh, the ladies I have tea with. They find you two boys…sweet.” She said it innocently but Wyatt had a feeling she didn’t mean exactly what she’d said.
“Um, thank you?” Now he really had to go. He had no idea how much she’d heard and he wasn’t going to stay and figure it out. Carter could tell him later if he needed to duck under the counter and hide the next time she came in.
Even considering what those naughty little old ladies could be saying about them was going to make his hives worse. “I have to run but good seeing you, ma’am.”
Then he ran—well, walked very quickly.
As he got in his car, he heard Mrs. Jenkins talking to Carter. “He has such good manners. Now it makes sense. This day and age most young men are so rude.”
For the love of…
Wyatt had to take a deep breath. He’d worry about her later. For now, he had to focus his panic on going to Master’s work. That was enough to concentrate on. He’d figure out the rest later.
He was never going to be able to look her in the eyes again.
****
Wyatt still wasn’t sure what he was going to do as he walked up the front steps to Garrett’s office. Normally, he got butterflies because he was so excited at the idea that he would even catch a glimpse of the Dom. This time, the butterflies had changed into man-eating vampire bats determined to eat their way out of his stomach.
Opening the door, he was still debating the best option when the wind came out of his sails completely. Master was standing right there by the receptionist’s desk waiting for him. Thank goodness.
“Hi.” Hopefully he didn’t look too excited, but he’d never been so glad to see the Dom.
“Hello, Sweet. Did you have a good day?” Garrett smiled and took Wyatt’s right hand, pulling him close.
“Yes. The store was busy earlier but things slowed down in the afternoon. We were able to get some of the new inventory sorted out.” This was so much less stressful than he’d feared, Wyatt didn’t know what to do.
“That’s wonderful.” Garrett leaned down a little and gave Wyatt’s forehead a kiss. “Melissa? If you could take a message if someone calls for me. I’ll get back to them later if it’s important. If it’s not, just tell them I’ll call back tomorrow.” Then he turned back to Wyatt. “You ready for our discussion, Sweet?”
Wyatt fought the urge to blush. “Yes…”
Garrett gave him a tender smile and nodded. Wyatt still wasn’t sure about it but Master said it was okay, so he settled with. “Yes, Sir.”
That earned him another kiss on his forehead.
“Don’t let Melissa’s vanilla looks fool you. We’ve seen what’s on her Kindle. She’s got more dirty books than I’ve ever seen.” Then Garrett looked over at her and gave her a wink. “She claims to be innocent but we’re not buying it.”
Melissa laughed and went back to typing something on her computer. “I’m more innocent than the rest of you, that’s all that counts. Besides, you should have never peeked.”
Garrett shrugged not looking repentant at all. “You said you were reading Gone With The Wind. For six months. It was like waving a red flag in front of a bull.”
She shook her head and ignored the teasing. “Some of us have to work and can’t quit early to play with our new…boyfriend.”
That made Wyatt blush, and he fought the urge to pace. Garrett must have sensed something was off. He wrapped one hand around Wyatt’s waist and discreet brought Wyatt’s opposite hand behind his back.
Feeling his master’s tight hold centered Wyatt, the urge to wiggle and fidget faded. He leaned his head against Garrett’s shoulder and waited for instructions. Master was in charge and all Wyatt had to do was relax.
“Perks of being the boss. Come on, Sweet. Let’s head back to my office. I have a present to show you.”
As they walked into Garrett’s office, Melissa called back before they could close the door. “Don’t let him take all the credit. It was Brent’s idea, and I picked out the color. Hope you like it.”
Her innocent comments had the bats doing circles again. Garrett’s pleased expression made Wyatt wary as well. “Present?”
“I think you’ll like it. And she only picked out the color because I had so many late meetings this week I couldn’t get away early enough to surprise you. This is the first day I’ll get off at a reasonable time.” The Dom was so excited Wyatt wasn’t sure what the present could be.
Led around the desk by Master, Wyatt looked in shock.
Sitting on the floor, tucked discreetly behind Garrett’s desk was a small cushion, almost the same brown color as the hardwood floors but with some kind of striped pattern. Wyatt wasn’t sure what to say.
It was what he’d wanted, what he’d fantasized about if he was honest. He couldn’t get over how normal everyone was treating it. Garrett must have guessed something about what was going through his head, because his master sat down and pulled Wyatt onto his lap.
“We’re discreet in the community, my sweet, but we’ve never hid who we were from our friends. It would be too difficult to constantly be worrying about how something would come across or if it gave too much away.” Running his hands over Wyatt’s legs soothingly, his master waited.
“Everyone in the office?”
“In some way or another. I almost didn’t hire Melissa because she looked so vanilla. I was worried she wouldn’t fit in. It wasn’t until the end of the interview she said she wrote romance as a hobby. She wanted to make sure it wouldn’t be an issue. Something about the way she said it made me sit up and take notice. So, I asked a few more questions. More than was probably reasonable. But it turned out she wrote BDSM romance novels.” Garrett laughed and shook his head. “I decided she’d probably fit in.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Right?”
“Then her Kindle…”
“Oh, it’s full of all kinds of dirty books. When she’d accidentally left it in the break room one day, Calen ‘borrowed’ it to see if he could figure out her pen name.” Garrett made that sound entirely too reasonable. “He gets antsy on Fridays.”
There was definitely more to that story.
Garrett turned his sexy smile back on Wyatt. “Would you like to try out your cushion?”
“Yes.” He’d thought about something like it for so long that he was curious to see how it would feel. Climbing off Garrett’s lap, Wyatt waited while his master arranged the little pillow. It looked like it was part of an outdoor furniture set.
Garrett positioned it between his feet. Wyatt wouldn’t be squished against the desk but it gave him some privacy just in case. His master smiled. “There we go.”
Wyatt knelt down and positioned himself the best he could. It was a little awkward because it was higher than what he was used to. Eventually, he made it work and felt like he looked presentable enough. Glancing up at Master, as he tucked his hands behind his back, he was relieved to see how pleased he looked.
“Beautiful, my sweet.”
“Thank you, Master.”
“Are you ready to discuss limits? Then, I’m going to take you out to dinner.”
This was more familiar ground. Even being in Master’s office and still unsure about how to act, he knew what to do now. “Yes, Master.”
CHAPTER 11
Garrett
Garrett was afraid it was going to be Wyatt calling to cancel when the phone chimed on Saturday. He relaxed when he saw it was Brent. “Hey. Everything still on for one o’clock?”
“Yeah. I wanted to make sure you had dessert?” Brent tried to sound like he was teasing, but it was clear he was concerned.
“I only forgot it once!”
“You forgot it once and then brought boxed donuts the next time.”
“Those donuts were not boxed.” A couple of screw ups and no one ever let you live it down. “Stop giving me dessert then.”
“You can’t be trusted with something more impor
tant!”
“Bull shit.”
“Are you saying you have dessert all ready and it’s not something weird like donuts?”
“Yes.” Ha. Well, he didn’t have it ready, but Wyatt did. Wyatt might not have trusted him either. Oh, it was all very carefully worded. However, the reality was Wyatt wanted to be guaranteed to make a good first impression on Garrett’s family.
“A real dessert?” Brent was clearly skeptical.
“Yes!” This was starting to get ridiculous.
“Wyatt made it, huh?”
“My boy, my dessert. Unless you want me to eat all the coconut, caramel covered brownies on my own? If you’re not careful, I’m going to bring something crazy just to make you nuts.” He’d do it too. “Remember the M&M’s?”
“Fine. That wasn’t what I was calling about anyway.” Brent’s voice took on a more business-like tone.
“Nope. Unless it’s an emergency with one of our insureds, I’m not talking about work. I’m going to head over in a few minutes and pick up Wyatt and Carter. That’s it. This is a full day off. I didn’t even bring any work home.”
“It will only take—”
“No. I’m–taking–the–day–off!” He enunciated it clearly and firmly. This was getting absurd. The guy needed a boyfriend, Dom, or even a good weekend fling. He was working entirely too hard.
“Fine.” Brent’s voice was more tired than it should be.
And he’d given up too fast. Especially for their family. “You need a vacation or to get laid. Pick one but do something besides work.”
“I’m fine.”
No one who ever said those words was actually fine. Even Garrett knew that. “Sure. Maybe we should give Mom a call and see if she’s having fun. She might be ready to come—”
“I will schedule some time off! You call her and I’ll tell her about Wyatt. I might even mention I hear wedding bells and a collaring ceremony.”
That was just mean.
It didn’t mean he was wrong though. Besides, Garrett had that covered. “I already told her, genius.” He knew a secret like that was perfect blackmail material so he’d tackled that conversation right away.
And luckily, she was only half-way through with her current trip. There was no way to cancel and come home early without inconveniencing too many people. He’d promised to send pictures and had to agree to give her Wyatt’s email address. He still hadn’t told Wyatt about that part yet. He figured he needed to get his sub in the right frame of mind before he sprung that on him.
His sweet sub was a little nervous right now.
Brent made a frustrated huff as the wind came out of his sails. “I’ll look at the calendar on Monday and schedule some time off.”
Ha! Victory.
“We’ll see you in a little while.” A little smirk in his voice, Garrett really did have to go. He was due to pick up Wyatt and his friend in a few minutes.
For the past two days, their evening phone calls had been filled with more worries and less flirting. Garrett didn’t mind more real conversations with his boy. However, he was starting to get concerned about how nervous Wyatt was. Inviting Carter seemed to have helped somewhat.
Maybe.
According to Wyatt, Carter was concerned about what to wear and how to act around the rest of the family. It was distracting Wyatt from his own fears, but now Garrett had two worried subs on his hands. Which was one more than he was prepared to deal with.
He’d said repeatedly Carter should wear whatever he was comfortable with, but neither sub had absorbed it. Finally, when they were talking last night, Garrett had tried to take a different approach.
He’d interrupted the stream of worries with a question. “What do you think he should wear? If you guys were just doing something fun and there was nothing to worry over, what’s your favorite thing?”
Garrett was already well aware that Carter was more flexible in how he dressed. The rest of the family wasn’t going to care, but there had been no way to make the subs believe it. Wyatt had paused for a minute and then spoke hesitantly. “Let me show you. I have a picture on my phone. This is my favorite outfit. I think he looks great in it.”
The picture had been some kind of a simple sundress. Wyatt had been right. Even Garrett, whose fashion sense was limited to suits, could see that Carter had felt fabulous in the dress and it suited his frame. To Garrett, that made the decision simple. “Okay. Tell him to wear that then.”
Wyatt had been uneasy, but Garrett had tried to soothe his nerves. “Would I tell you to do anything that would make things harder on you?”
His sexy sub had found that terribly funny, but it seemed to stop the worries.
“You told everybody to be nice to Carter and not mention the clothing, right? I want Wyatt’s friend to be comfortable.” He might be starting to obsess like Wyatt but he wanted this to go smoothly.
“Yes. Message sent and received. We want to make a good impression on Wyatt. We can behave. We just choose not to when it’s only us. Company manners this time.”
“Or I’ll tell Mom.”
“Still fighting dirty, I see.”
“Yup.”
“I’ll pass the message on.”
“Thanks. All right, I have to go, time to go pick up Wyatt.”
“See you. Don’t forget dessert!”
Garrett hung up on him. The donuts hadn’t been that bad. That bakery was good and considering he’d gone in there at the last minute, he’d been glad they had anything he could bring. Grabbing his keys and phone, Garrett headed for the door. Fingers crossed Wyatt was calm and ready to have a fun afternoon hanging out with everyone.
****
Evidently, crossing your fingers didn’t help once you got to be an adult.
His sweet sub was bouncing off the walls. Carter seemed cautiously resigned. Garrett thought he looked good, and that they were both worrying too much. There wasn’t anything he could do about Carter’s emotions but Wyatt was another story.
He hadn’t been in the house five minutes and he knew he had to help Wyatt relax. Wyatt was doing some last-minute fussing over the brownies and kept saying he was almost ready. He looked ready. Garrett was convinced it was a delaying tactic.
“Wyatt.” That one word stopped his sweet sub in his tracks.
Reaching out to restack the brownies again, he froze. “Yes, Master?”
Carter was leaning against the counter, watching them. Garrett wasn’t concerned about the other man. Wyatt had already said he hadn’t hidden anything from his friend.
“We are going to talk. We can do it in here or we can have some privacy. Which would you prefer?” Garrett could see that Wyatt understood they were going to probably do more than talk right away.
His boy sighed. “Private.” Then he turned to Carter. “We’ll be right back.”
Wyatt took Garrett’s hand and led him back through the house to his bedroom. It was the first time Garrett had seen Wyatt’s room, but he didn’t have time to look around. His sub needed his attention, and they needed to leave soon.
There were only two places to sit, the bed and a small side chair. Garrett thought the chair was a safer option. Temptation and all. Sitting down, he spoke to Wyatt. “Come kneel, Sweet. I want to talk to you.”
Wyatt slowly walked over and knelt, presenting beautifully for his master. “Yes, Master?”
Garrett watched as Wyatt took a deep breath and settled into his submission. It was like a warm blanket wrapping around his boy. Something that made him feel secure. Posture straight and legs spread, Garrett watched as his shoulders lowered and the stress melted away. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a long way from his behavior in the kitchen.
What to do?
If they’d still been in the kitchen then this discussion would have been different but now he had more options. “I know there is nothing I can say that will take all your worries away. You just need to see that they’re going to love you. However, I am worried that you’re going to make your
self sick. You look more nervous than when you used to come into the office. That can’t continue.”
Wyatt needed something else to focus on that would keep pulling his mind back from his worries. “Where are your toys?”
“Master?” The rising blush on Wyatt’s face made it clear he’d hoped he hadn’t heard Garrett right.
“Toys, Sweet. Where are they?” Wyatt was a sub who’d been alone too long. He had toys. Lots of them more than likely.
Looking down at the floor, the cute sub mumbled, “Bottom drawer of my dresser, Master.”
Standing, Garrett walked over to the dresser and crouched down to see what fun things his boy had. Perfect. It was no wonder he’d been embarrassed. His boy had fun things in all shapes and sizes. Plugs, cock rings, massagers, and even several types of cuffs were mixed in with different impact toys.
Picking out a small slim plug, lube, and a flexible cock ring that looked like it wouldn’t cause a problem for his boy to wear for a couple of hours, he went back over to his kneeling sub. Wyatt still wasn’t looking at him but that was okay. He liked how cute he looked when he was all bashful. “I have a cock ring you will wear while soft. You have two options. You may go in the bathroom and put it on yourself or I will do it for you. Which would you prefer?”
That had the sexy sub curious. His head came up, and he looked at what Garrett was holding. “Um. I…I pick?”
“Yes, Sweet. Do you want me to put it on you or do you want privacy? This is not a discussion on if you will wear it…we are simply discussing privacy.”
Garrett watched as Wyatt swallowed and seemed to consider the options. Once he’d made the decision, he looked even calmer. “You, Master. Would you put it on me?”
“Of course. Stand up.”
Still with that incredible grace, Wyatt rose and took a step closer to Garrett. Placing his arms behind his back, he waited to see what Garrett would say. The change was startling. Gone was the worried, almost frantic behavior. His sexy sub was now centered and focused.
Garrett: A M/m BDSM Romance (Bound & Controlled Book 1) Page 9