by Lynda Aicher
“What do you know about Asher?” The question was out before he could second-guess the wisdom of it.
Grady froze, hands slapped together around a chunk of ground beef. His brows edged up, mouth working into a smirk. “Why?”
Why? His sigh gusted from his chest in a desperate wish to retract what he’d started. “Never mind.” He stood, the walls closing in so fast he could hardly breathe.
“Wait,” Grady blurted in a rush. He set the patty down, tone and expression serious. “What do you want to know?”
What didn’t he want to know? Yet asking for information on someone, outside of how it related to his job, was so foreign to him he had no clue what he was doing. That corkscrew of shit in his stomach twisted another notch.
“Forget it.” He waved a dismissive hand at Grady. “I’m going to head out. Have fun tonight.” He had to get away. Run. Breathe.
He was at the stairs when Grady spoke. “For what it’s worth, Ash is cool. He can be a bit standoffish and he talks like a prick sometimes, but he’s direct and smart as hell.”
Sawyer waffled between bolting down the stairs to the exit and learning more. His heart beat too fast and sweat collected on his nape. Breathe. Show nothing. Think. He already knew those things about Asher. What else did he expect Grady to know? How he played in the dungeon? Who he played with? How often? None of those things had ever mattered to Sawyer before.
“Yeah,” he said, nodding at Grady. “I got that much.”
“He’s single, with a solid reputation for hardcore pain play.”
He knew both of those things too. “So?” What was he hunting for? Validation or a flaw?
“Thought you might want to know.” Grady shrugged, pointing at the burger patties. “I have plenty if you want one.”
The idea of food had his stomach revolting even more. Acid crawled up his throat, burning a path of lies based in want. “Nah.” He rubbed his abdomen. “Lunch didn’t sit well. But thanks.”
He bounded down the stairs and out the door before Grady could say more, berating himself the whole way. This wasn’t like him. He didn’t ask questions or dig for insight into a guy. Any guy. He took the pain and walked away.
Yet he wanted to know more about Asher. Wanted to see him again. To play and talk and fuck.
He sucked in a long breath, head spinning, but he pushed through the dizziness to get to his car. He was outside, safe, free. The trapped sensation faded slowly, each layer falling away until his lungs expanded with a full inhalation.
None of his normal defense mechanisms had kicked in to keep him from setting up tonight’s…date. Meeting? No. It was a date, but he had no idea what kind. He hadn’t asked for details after Asher had agreed.
He started his car, checked the time when it lit up on the dash display. One hour before he had to be there. An hour to drive around while his safeguards crumbled beneath the weight of this new desire.
Getting closer to Asher would hurt. He had no doubt of that.
But staying away would leave him exactly where he was, and he was so damn tired of where he was. Of the solitude that kept him safe and confined. Of the restrictions he’d placed on himself in order to survive.
Of the life he had but still didn’t know how to live.
And he never would if he didn’t try. If he didn’t take a chance and, for the first time since the fucking fire, let someone in.
But could he?
He’d come here searching for something to shake him out of his solitary existence, but he hadn’t expected to find Asher or the connection with him that’d escalated so quickly.
Asher was waiting outside for him when he pulled into his driveway. He’d barely shifted into Park before Asher opened the passenger door and got in.
“Hey,” he said by way of a greeting. “I’m starved. Let’s get dinner first.”
His stomach did a double somersault at the thought of eating. His hour of leisurely driving through the streets of Portland and the neighborhoods around Asher’s home had done nothing to settle his nerves.
“Sure.” Sawyer focused on backing out of the drive instead of on the man beside him. It was harder than it should have been. The car filled with Asher’s deep musky scent, and his nerve endings were crackling on high alert. “Where to?” he asked, his voice thankfully normal.
“There’s a great little place down a side street near Northwest Twenty-Third. Hot sandwiches, burgers, tacos. Salads too. That work?”
“Sounds good.” He stopped at the end of the drive to check for traffic. “Which way do I go?”
Asher was silent until Sawyer looked at him. He smiled, a slow shifting of his features until the warmth shone from his eyes. “I wasn’t sure if I was going to hear from you again.”
Sawyer cringed, the truth tumbling out. “I wasn’t sure either.”
“What changed?”
He searched Asher and found only curiosity, along with a touch of vulnerability. He could give a glib response, brush it off, and pretend it wasn’t important. But it was, and something inside him couldn’t let it mean nothing.
“I think it was you.”
“Me?”
The air thickened around him, his pulse kicking up a notch. He wet his lips, choked back the panic turning his skin to lava. He’d said too much and not enough and couldn’t get anything else out. His throat ached, and swallowing didn’t help.
Shit. He jerked his gaze away, made a pretense of looking behind them for street traffic, then backed out. They had to return to Portland, and he only knew of one way to get there.
His palms were clammy, and he tried to casually wipe them on his shorts. “I didn’t dress for anything nice,” he said as a topic change, forcing a laugh into his voice. He made a pointed glance over Asher’s button-down shirt and khakis. He ripped his gaze forward when it lingered too long on his crotch.
Asher gave him the same once-over. “You’ll fit in better than I do.”
He didn’t have a comeback for that, so he didn’t give one. Focusing on driving while acting casual sucked up his normal supply of witty responses.
“Turn left here,” Asher said as Sawyer slowed for a stop sign. “You’ll follow this road into Portland.”
The rest of the short drive was quiet except for Asher’s additional directions as they left the residential neighborhoods. He could’ve filled the silence with chitchat about the week and Kick, but the quiet was surprisingly comfortable. Instead, he used the time to calm himself down. Long deep breaths that slowed his pulse. A shuffling of thoughts until he was steady in the moment.
Don’t think about what this means. What it could mean.
Just be.
He’d perfected that state years ago. Why was it so hard to find it now?
He pulled into an open spot on the street a block past the restaurant. The evening was still warm, so he left his flannel in the car.
“We should be done with rain for a while,” Asher said as they walked.
“How do you know?”
“I don’t.” He shrugged. “But I’ve lived here my entire life. July and August are the only months I dare to predict that.” He squinted up at the clear blue sky. “My mother would say I’ve jinxed it now. So if it rains for two weeks midsummer, it’s my fault.”
Sawyer chuckled, letting the lighter notes fill him. “I won’t rat you out.”
“She’d only admonish you for being a tattletale.” He opened the restaurant door. “Then she’d get me alone and remind me of how words become truth.”
“I hope all of them don’t.” Sawyer would be in hell for sure if they did.
“Right?” Asher scanned the room and led the way toward the back. The restaurant narrowed and darkened the deeper inside they went, the mood probably meant to be intimate or cozy, with candles on every table. Each step had the walls closing in on Sawyer, the hairs on his arm rising as the candlelight danced over the table surfaces and walls.
Fuck. He grabbed Asher’s arm, searching for another t
able. “How about up here?” He pointed to one near the door, next to the front window.
“It’s quieter back here.”
And darker. “I like the light.”
He didn’t wait for an answer, just headed to the open table and took a seat. He blew out the candle before Asher sat down, the smoke wafting between them.
He shrugged at Asher’s quizzical look and tried to brush off his strange behavior with a slice of truth. “I get claustrophobic in close spaces.”
At least he could go in buildings now without panicking. The years of therapy forced on him before he’d turned eighteen had managed to work that fear out of him. Living in a tent the first winter after the fire had been a bigger motivator, though. Mick had finally hauled his ass inside to sleep when the temperature had dropped below freezing.
“That’ll be good to know when we play.” Asher rested his arms on the table. “We haven’t done a formal contract or list of limits, injuries, et cetera. We probably should—if we’re going to play again.”
“If?” When had “if” come into the situation?
Their waiter chose that moment to greet them with a flirtatious smile. He placed two glasses of water on the table, his gaze appreciative as he cruised them both. “Are you ready to order?”
Sawyer made a quick glance at the menu, then opted for a basic cheeseburger. He wasn’t sure if he’d be able to eat much of it anyway. The screw in his stomach was lodged tighter than ever.
“I didn’t know there was an ‘if’ about that,” he said when the waiter left, picking up the conversation where they’d left off.
Asher tipped his head in a side nod. “I didn’t want to assume anything.”
“Of course you didn’t.” He leaned in, arms crossed on the table. “But in case you missed the signals, I’m definitely in for more scenes with you.”
“Something more formal?”
“Whatever you want.”
“Where?”
“What do you suggest?”
“I rarely play in public anymore.” Asher narrowed his eyes, lips compressing. “And I don’t think we should play at Dane’s.” He glanced out the window before looking back to Sawyer. “I told Rig about us—that we’d played together,” he rushed to say before Sawyer could question what he meant. “Not the rest.”
The rest. That they’d fucked like two crazed men against his bedroom window? That they’d connected on another level besides pain?
“Did he lay into you about breaking company policy?” He didn’t have the balls to dig into Asher’s definition of “the rest.”
“No.” He shrugged, a half smile going with it. “He just said to be careful and to let him know if you go wacko and decide to threaten the company because of my fucked-up needs.”
A laugh burst free before he got his hand over his mouth to muffle it. “Your fucked-up needs? Like any of us have room to throw stones.”
“It wasn’t a stone, really. More of a fact we’re both aware of.”
“All right.” He sat back, questions blooming when he usually had none. “When did you first realize you had those”—he glanced around for random listeners and lowered his voice—“needs? You said you’d realized the gay part while you were married. But the other? The sadist part? How’d that come about?”
Asher sat back as well, contemplation darkening his eyes and tugging his brow low. He tapped his fingers on the table, a soft beat Sawyer couldn’t hear.
“There wasn’t a single moment of enlightenment,” Asher finally said. “The gay thing took a few years to fully acknowledge and accept. During that time I focused on school, did my best to be the husband I’d promised to be, and used Internet porn to get hard.” He grimaced, took a drink of his water, fingers lingering to play with the condensation on the glass.
His voice was lower when he continued. “The porn shifted from ménage to just guys to gay BDSM over time.” He glanced up from his focus on the glass. “I wasn’t raised in an environment where sex was talked about, much less kinky sex.” He chuckled softly before he pinched the bridge of his nose, wincing. His sigh was weighted and long.
Sawyer reached out to offer comfort. What the fuck? He retreated just as quickly. He fisted his hand, shock breaking through his confusion. He didn’t offer comfort. That emotion hadn’t touched him since he’d numbed himself to feeling anything. For anyone.
Asher adjusted his glasses, sniffed. “Praying did nothing—surprise.” His pretend shock pulled a smile from Sawyer, mostly because it was expected. “More years, a divorce, and many mistakes later I finally balanced who I was with what I wanted. I realized that one wasn’t distinct from the other, but neither did one define the other.”
“What do you mean?” Sawyer frowned, completely in the conversation but lost.
“I’m gay. I’m a sadist.” Asher paused, his expression giving away nothing. “I’m a son, brother, uncle, entrepreneur, friend. I’m also prickly, anal, controlling, and overly analytical—or I wouldn’t have dissected myself so completely.” The sarcasm dripped from his mock smile. He sobered, lips compressing. “Pain has always fascinated me.”
His words trailed off as he stared out the window again, his gaze unfocused. “I was the king tooth-puller as a kid. Everyone came to me if they had a loose tooth, and I loved how they’d squirm and plead as I rigged up a way to yank the tooth out, knowing they wanted me to do it even though they were scared. The aftermath was even more enlightening. Did they cry, smile, run to Mom?” He blinked, looked to Sawyer. “That sense of discovery and analysis led to more.”
“How so?” Sawyer prompted when the pause lengthened. His own path to pain was straightforward, and probably textbook if he dug into the psychology of it. He’d never once stopped to wonder what drove a sadist, despite his years in the scene. He’d never needed to know, yet with Asher, he wanted to understand.
A sad half smile lifted Asher’s cheek, then fell away. “I provoked others into doing dangerous things so I could study the outcome.” He chuckled softly, but it was bathed in sadness. “I think every one of my siblings and cousins have at least one story of how I instigated them into doing something crazy that resulted in them getting hurt—fortunately, not seriously. But I can claim responsibility for almost every trip to the ER. My older brother’s broken leg, my sister’s wrist, a cousin’s collarbone, my younger brother’s arm burn, and more stitches than I can recount were a result of what I talked them into doing.”
He shook his head, sighed. “The confessional was hell. I wore the paint off my rosary beads reciting my penances, but nothing the priest—or my parents—said could make me stop. Not even my own guilt.” His shrug was wistful, eyes sparking with his brow quirk. “What none of them understood—or me either, at that age—is that it wasn’t the instigating that drew me, but my fascination with how people responded to the pain.” He leaned in, tone deepening. “Did they scream or hold it in? Curse me or themselves? Cry or laugh? Were there tears, and how much? Would the strong kid crumble and the weaker one be stoic? If there was blood, who’d freak out and how? Who’d rat me out and who’d refused? It was a gigantic puzzle I could never solve yet couldn’t stop trying.”
Passion blazed from Asher, his intensity enthralling. More than a few hours of thought had gone into defining the why of his needs. Sawyer wasn’t exactly surprised by that, but he hadn’t expected to be so impressed.
Asher sat back, voice leveling out. “Inflicting pain on others and analyzing how they respond is layered so deeply within who I am it’s impossible to separate it out. But it doesn’t change who I am. It doesn’t make me a monster or evil or a sociopath. Just like wanting a guy doesn’t make me a pedophile or a sinner.”
“No,” Sawyer murmured, his response flowing from him on a breath of understanding. “It doesn’t.” Tingles of empathy prickled over his skin. His heart lurched at the nakedness of Asher’s words and the bald acceptance laid out so succinctly.
“And yet,” Asher continued, sadness descending over
the soft turn of his lips and uneasy swallow, “my family knows nothing about the two things that’ve caused the most pain and biggest regrets in my life.”
“You’re not out to them?”
“No.” His soft admission barely reached Sawyer. His suffering was etched in each line on his brow, the desolation shining in his eyes before he blinked, glancing away.
Sawyer reached out then, closed his hand around Asher’s wrist. The ache to do more, to pull him into an embrace and give him the acceptance he so desperately needed, dug into his heart and closed down his voice. But he got it. He understood everything Asher was saying, even though his life was so different.
Sawyer hid so much from everyone, he doubted anyone really knew him. Not even himself. Asher’s level of self-awareness was both humbling and terrifying. What would he find if he looked that deeply at himself? If he let anyone else see beneath the layers to who he really was?
Asher looked to him, questions and doubts shifting through his eyes. He placed his hand over Sawyer’s, squeezed. “If you want to run now, I get it.”
He should. Hell, he should’ve run after the very first night in White Salmon. “Why would I do that?” He wouldn’t be running from Asher’s baggage, but his own.
Asher laughed, pulling away from Sawyer’s touch to stretch his arms back. He rolled his shoulders, his chuckle dry. “Because I think too much and laugh too little.”
“Laughing is overrated.”
“Is it?”
Sawyer sat back, hand clenching before he rubbed the back of his head. “It is when it’s only a cover for the pain hiding beneath it.”
“Here you go,” their waiter said as he approached, oblivious grin cutting through the seriousness. “Sorry about the wait.” He set their meals in front of them, smile never faltering. “Can I get you anything else?”
Sawyer shook his head and Asher responded with “We’re good.”
The scent of his food churned Sawyer’s stomach and did nothing to stimulate his appetite. He nibbled on a fry anyway, steam billowing out of the inside when he set it back down.
Would he ever be that comfortable in his own skin to expose what was beneath it so completely? Could he do it even if he was?