Grant and Karina walked out of the restaurant ahead of them. Grant hailed a taxi and turned to Owen. “I’m going to share a car with Karina and see if I can get some numbers out of her and a verbal commitment to sign with us.” He slipped something into Owen’s hand. “Here’s money for Cary and Monica’s cab. Maybe take them out for another drink or two. There’s some extra cash in there for that.” He clapped Owen on the shoulder. “You did good tonight. I see big things for you at Gamers. Keep up the good work.” Then with a wink, Grant was in the car with Karina and Owen was standing on the sidewalk, holding a wad of money, with Cary and Monica whispering to each other behind him.
He turned around and took a deep breath. “So—”
Monica grabbed him by the arm and hailed a taxi like a pro. “Come on, cutie. We got plans, and Cary and I both think it’d be fun for you to tag along.”
Owen let himself be dragged into the cab as his gaze ping-ponged between his two companions. “Excuse me?”
Monica was applying lipstick in a small compact mirror as Cary shut the cab door, effectively smushing the three of them together. He turned to Owen, and his gaze dipped to Owen’s mouth before popping back up. “You’re off the clock, right?”
“Uh—”
“Because we have plans. Karina doesn’t care as long as we don’t miss our flight tomorrow.”
“P-plans?” Owen stuttered.
Cary just grinned big.
Owen was a big boy. He could say no and get out of the cab, but this was his job, to entertain these clients while they were in town. So he sat back in his seat while Monica mumbled something to the cab driver. He closed his eyes, thinking maybe he’d just have another couple drinks and it’d be okay.
Fun, even.
He hoped.
Chapter Thirteen
Chad ignored the glares Candy was shooting his way, because a) he wasn’t taking lip from someone named Candy, and b) he wasn’t in the mood to get hazed while only wearing his underwear.
So he politely put in the order for his drinks and stood there, smiling at her like a loon while she tried to kill him with purple-contact-lens laser eyes.
So far, the night wasn’t too bad. They were busy, and Chad had been occupied with the bachelorette party. The brother of the bride was there, and he was gay, and all the women thought it was hilarious when Chad served him. The guy was cute and kinda loud and a real lush, so between him and his other customers, Chad was working the floor. And the tips he was getting made the tips at Blue Moon look like pennies. Maybe he should borrow the briefs for work there, too.
The last female dancer of the night had just left the stage, and music was playing as the evening transitioned to testosterone entertainment. Chad liked boobs. And women. And he could objectively say that the previous dancer was smoking hot. But he didn’t want boobs right now. He wanted a dick. Wrapped in a bow tie. Attached to a guy named Owen.
He didn’t flirt around and avoid commitment because he wasn’t straight. He did it because he hadn’t met anyone he wanted to commit to.
It was really that simple.
Until now.
He leaned against the wall in the corner of the room and blew out a breath with a wry chuckle. Owen was the reason he was so unsettled tonight. Since Chad had been on his own, he’d worked hard to have the freedom to do what he wanted, and to now feel this responsibility to someone else was unsettling.
But he did feel responsibility, and it was because Owen was the first person he could actually see himself committing to.
The big C word.
Commitment.
He closed his eyes and groaned. It was inconvenient to figure out he was ready for an actual, real adult relationship while he was standing in a strip club in a pair of skintight briefs.
But then, Chad never did anything at the right time. Owen probably had it scheduled in his planner. To do: Commit today.
He snorted. God, he wanted this night to be over so he was that much closer to seeing Owen again. He missed the way Owen looked at him and made him feel. How they could play around like teenagers one minute and then fuck like men another.
So Chad took the tray of shots from Candy with a smile and made his way to the bachelorette party. That was why he was doing this job, for a better future, to be a better person for himself and for Owen.
The brother of the bride, whose name he still couldn’t understand because of the slurring, accepted the shots with a lopsided grin and a wink. He slipped a twenty in Chad’s hand for a tip, and Chad blew him a kiss.
The guy blushed. Adorable.
Chad was paging through the tips he kept in a case on his tray when Ace walked up to him. “Hey, how’s it going?”
Chad shrugged. “Good, I think. Making killer tips.”
“Told you. And, uh, hey, want to make more?”
Chad raised an eyebrow.
Ace held out his hands. “You can say no, okay, so don’t get worked up, but one of the guys called out. So if you want to take his place on the stage…” Ace’s voice trailed off.
Chad blinked. “You’re asking me to dance.”
“No, I’m offering,” Ace said.
“Why don’t you do it?”
“I’ll do it the first shift. You can take the second.”
“What if I don’t?”
“I’ll just go twice.”
Chad bit his lip. “Are you okay with that?”
“More money for me, man. I was just offering to help you out.”
“Um…”
“You don’t have to tell me now.” Ace glanced at his watch. “In an hour or so.”
Chad nodded. “Okay. I’ll let you know.”
There was a fine line here. He could justify serving drinks, but dancing on stage? Everything he did tonight he was tallying up in his head, because he was going to come clean to Owen. As soon as possible. Delivering drinks? Not so bad. Actually dancing on stage? That might cause some issues.
Damn it, this whole commitment thing was already complicating his life. Because his heart was doing the choosing. Not his head.
Chad watched Ace as he delivered drinks to a table at the far side of the club—where two men and a woman sat. The way one of the men moved his hands made Chad pause.
He squinted in the dim light, thinking surely that couldn’t be right but… Chad’s whole body froze. Yep. That was Owen. Sitting there. With a woman on one side and a man who was kinda handsy on the other.
What the fuck?
Owen was supposed to be at a dinner meeting, not at a strip club, looking tipsy, with a guy who was staring at him like Owen was his last meal.
Yes, their town wasn’t very big. There were two or three other strip clubs that were kinda seedy. This one, as far as he knew, was ultra exclusive. But he’d still never expected Owen to show up here. Not in a million years.
Chad’s pulse raced, and his hands shook. He leaned on the side of his tray and breathed deeply to get himself under control.
As he watched the table, anger shot through him, surprisingly white-hot. What was Owen doing there? Chad had been about ready to hand over his heart on a bow tie–adorned silver platter, and here was Owen, at a fucking strip club with a guy who looked like he wanted to take him into the champagne room. How could they be together when they couldn’t go three days without lying to each other? They hadn’t made promises about exclusivity, either, had they? Fuck, Chad had been an idiot to think otherwise.
He turned around, facing the wall, taking deep breaths to will himself under control. Maybe he would get up on that stage. He’d dance and shake his ass. Owen would disapprove, and that line would furrow between his brows, but fuck him. Chad wasn’t sure why he’d been so hell-bent on trying to impress him.
He was here, working at a strip club. And how many guys could say that? Not many. So Chad would earn all the tips he could and then go home and eat his weight in comfort food. Whatever.
Fuck this.
…
Two shots later,
Owen didn’t even remember what the place was called.
Monica’s name had been on some sort of list at the door. Apparently she’d heard about this place from a friend. It was exclusive, and they hired the best, and Owen kind of zoned out after that. He did think the place did seem a little higher class than he’d expected a strip club to look. He’d only been to one in his life, when he attended a bachelor party for a friend from college.
All he knew was that he’d seen more boobs than he ever cared to see in his entire life. Cary clearly didn’t want to see boobs, and Monica didn’t seem into them, either. However, Owen had to admit that their muscle-bound and very attractive waiter, Ace, made up for all the boob flashing. And apparently the men were dancing soon.
Thank God.
For now, Ace was hot, and these shots called buttery nipples were delicious, so Owen stuck his tongue into the bottom of the glass to get the rest of the liquid out. When he looked up, Cary was watching him with undisguised lust.
Jesus Christ, that was the last thing he needed.
“So, Ace,” Monica said to their waiter. “I’m wondering if I can meet that guy over there.” She pointed somewhere across the floor, but Owen could barely make out the back of some guy in a pair of red briefs. Damn, he’d had a lot to drink.
Ace smiled. “Rod? Sure. I’ll call him over.”
Cary was craning his neck. “Ooh, Mon, he does look nice.”
“Cute, huh? Love the dark hair.”
Owen was licking the rim of his shot glass when two shadows fell across the table. He looked up.
And froze.
Because standing in front of their table, wearing nothing but his unlaced motorcycle boots and a pair of second-skin red briefs that left nothing to the imagination, was Chad.
Owen had no words, literally nothing to say as he stared at a greased-up Chad, looking hot as hell, who stared back with an unreadable expression.
No one caught on. Because Ace was squeezing Chad’s bare shoulder and introducing him as Rod. And Monica was trying to touch his abs, and Cary was tittering, and Owen thought he was going to throw the fuck up.
The buttery nipple was curdling in his gut, and yeah, oh, God, yeah, he was going to hurl.
Because Ace still hadn’t taken his hand off Chad’s shoulder, and everyone in this club could see what Owen had so very clearly understood was his.
Chad was his. That was more clear to him than ever. Right now. In this strip club.
Hell of a time to figure that out.
But Chad wasn’t his, not if he hadn’t thought it was fucking necessary to tell Owen that he worked at a strip club.
I work really late, Chad had said.
Ace was still talking, saying something about Chad getting up on stage because their regular male dancer for the night had to call out sick.
Owen didn’t know what to do, how to react properly, because the last thing he wanted Monica and Cary to know was that he was sleeping with their red-briefed dancer. That was exactly how he didn’t want to be visible at the company. Owen’s head swam, and his stomach rolled. It was all coming up now—his fancy dinner and the wine and those fucking shots. He murmured, “Excuse me,” and stood up, brushing past Chad and leaving the voices of Monica and Cary asking what was wrong. He didn’t want to see that stupid Ace’s concerned face, and he certainly didn’t want to see Chad’s expression, so devoid of emotion.
He made it to the bathroom, somehow, following the neon signs, and upchucked everything into the toilet. He retched until his stomach was empty and his limbs were shaking and he was sweating bullets. He didn’t know if the shaking was from the vomiting or from seeing Chad, or maybe a little bit of both. By the time he was out of the stall and washing his hands and mouth, the bathroom door opened.
Owen ducked his head and pressed a paper towel to his face, wanting to avoid any conversation with a stranger about why he looked like a pale, shaking drug addict, when the familiar squeak of boots made him pause. Slowly, he dropped his hands and looked up.
Chad stood in front of him, eyes red, fists clenching and unclenching.
He still looked sexy as hell, while Owen was a mess, and that pissed him off the most. “You. Lied,” he growled as he balled up the paper towel and threw it in the trash can. “You lied to me! You said you’d be at work!”
Chad’s jaw clenched. “Technically I am at work—”
“Oh, fuck you, Chad. Fuck you.” Owen pointed a finger at his chest and stepped closer. “You know exactly what I mean.”
Chad pressed his lips together. “What about you?” he asked, passing the blame. “You said you were going to be at a work meeting and instead you’re here flirting with some guy.”
“Those are two of the clients I had dinner with. I’m not flirting with either of them. So yeah, I’m still technically at a work meeting. They wanted me to come, and I want them to contract with us, despite the fact that I just wanted to go home and sleep so that I could see you tomorrow.”
Instead of softening Chad’s expression, that only seemed to make him angrier. “Oh, sure, of course you’re going to say that now.”
“Why are you turning this on me? I’m not the one who lied. You are!”
Chad was exposing a hell of a lot of skin, and most of it was flushed red with anger. “Look, I am at work, okay? And I do work at the Blue Moon. I worked there earlier, and now I’m here.”
Owen probably looked like a bull, because his nostrils flared and his lips curled. “And when were you going to tell me you worked at a strip club? When did you plan on telling me that?”
“Come on,” Chad scoffed. “That isn’t fair. We finally stopped hating each other three days ago.”
“Yeah?” Owen fired back. “Well, how am I supposed to continue to not hate you when you lie about something like this?”
Chad’s eyes blazed, and his lips twisted in a cruel way Owen had never seen on the man. “Goddamn it. We’re not boyfriends or whatever. We’re barely fuck buddies.”
That hurt, like a knife sliced across his belly. Why was Chad acting like this? Like they hadn’t decided to have a talk? Like they both knew there was more to this than sex? Or…Christ, had this really been that one-sided? Owen took a step back, and Chad’s face changed, a hint of something, before his angry mask slipped back over, and he spat out a final dagger. “You’re not entitled to every aspect of my life. Even though you think it’s okay to make calls to your professor friends on my behalf.”
Owen didn’t understand where these words and feelings were coming from. He hadn’t realized Chad had the power to hurt him this bad. But God, he did, because this was painful as hell. “I was just trying to help.” His voice shook, and he cringed.
Chad hadn’t lost steam yet. The storm was still raging behind his hazel eyes. “It was a little much, don’t you think? Because Chad’s just a bartender, right? He can’t be trusted to do important adult things. It’s not like I have aspirations to work at a strip club. I need the money to go back to school, and this opportunity presented itself.” He tilted up his chin in defiance. “I think I’m being pretty resourceful. I can handle my own life, O.”
Why was Chad so angry? Why wouldn’t he just listen? “You don’t even wear a helmet when you ride that death trap and perform illegal traffic violations—”
Chad threw up his hands. “Holy shit with the fucking helmet and driving! Is that how this will be going forward, you bringing that up and holding it over my head to show me how irresponsible I am? Because I don’t need that in my life.” When he stopped talking, he gulped in a huge breath and his nostrils flared. He looked like he was running out of steam.
And Owen was completely out. He no longer had the energy to rage. His shoulders slumped and more than anything, he just wanted to be home. “So that’s it, then?” he asked softly. He wasn’t angry anymore, he was defeated. Why had he ever thought he was in Chad’s league, that he was someone Chad would want to keep? “I’ll admit seeing you here made me feel possessive. I di
dn’t like it. But if this is your job and you want to do it, then okay. But you lied to me, and don’t act like it was anything other than a lie. You know you should have told me.”
Chad didn’t answer, his face as expressionless as stone.
“And so, you’re not who I thought you were. Not if you can say those things to me after that night we had. So maybe I read too much into the time we spent together this week. That was me wishing for something I should have known I shouldn’t have wished for.” He swallowed, suddenly so tired he could barely stand up. He took one last look at Chad. “You don’t even care about your own well-being. Why did I think you’d care about mine?”
And that was it. Owen was done.
Chad didn’t stop him as he walked by him and out the door. And Owen really, truly didn’t want him to. He wanted to go home. To his fish and his bed and his job and to not think about the time he tied himself to trouble.
Chapter Fourteen
Chad angrily swiped his key card through the reader. The LED lights didn’t change to green, and he swiped it again with a growl because what was going on with his face? Why did his eyes sting, and why was there something wet on the end of his nose and why was this ache in his chest making it hard to breathe?
Those fucking lights were still red. Chad slammed his palm onto the door. He cried out as pain radiated through his wrist, then kicked the door, too.
A hand rested on his shoulder, and he jumped away from the touch, looking up to see Ace staring at him, frowning.
Ace didn’t say a word as he gently swiped his own key card. The green lights came on and Chad rushed through the doors, eager to get his damn clothes on and get the hell out of this club. Ace stood silently as Chad tore off the briefs, balled them up, and threw them in a corner. Then he tugged on his jeans and pulled on a shirt.
Last was his motorcycle jacket, the smell of leather comforting. He was never taking it off again. Maybe he’d sleep in it.
Ace finally spoke as Chad zipped up his bag. “You okay?”
“I’m not getting up on that stage,” Chad said.
“Uh, yeah, I gathered that. And I don’t care. I want to know if you’re okay.”
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