by Piper Scott
And it was empty the morning after that, too.
The last two texts Adrian sent his little brother remained unread.
Gabriel never came home.
1
Sterling
Dimmed overhead lights cast stretching shadows across The Shepherd’s second-floor hallways, interrupted by the mass of individuals craning their necks to look through the door of room nine. Throbbing bass rattled the floorboards, but the melody was lost, stolen by distance. The bodies clustered by the door made music of their own—different notes of quiet conversation blending with gasps and moans and crisp laughter to create a cacophony of chaos. Friday nights at The Shepherd were always crowded, but tonight’s crowd wasn’t typical. The men and women who frequented Aurora’s premiere kink club didn’t come to gawk outside the rooms—they came to play within them.
Something was going on.
Sterling took up a spot against the wall across from the door, surveying the crowd. Fitted leather harnesses and skin-tight latex neighbored lace low-rise panties and garters. One submissive Sterling recognized stood, nude, by his Master du jour, a tail dangling between his legs. Its other end was plugged firmly in his ass, holding it in place. There was no clear link between those that stood outside the door. At least, none that Sterling could decipher—and if anyone was in a position to figure out the correlation, it was him.
The Shepherd was his kingdom, and its members his flock.
The only explanation he could come up with was that someone had to be putting room nine’s chains to good use.
Amused and intrigued, Sterling pushed off the wall to find a better vantage point, but as it turned out, none was necessary. The crowd in front of the door shifted, and Sterling was able to watch the happenings in room nine over the shoulder of a Dom he knew by face, but whose name eluded him.
In the center of the room, suspended from a metal frame, was an omega who had no place being where he was.
Lucian Bracknell, The Shepherd’s newest bartender.
His head was hung, and although his white-blond hair fell in front of his eyes, there was no hiding the release he’d found. Sterling studied him for a moment, taking in the way his body stretched as it rebelled against the chains that bound his wrists and forced his arms high over his head. If he wasn’t already in subspace, he’d be there soon.
There was no mistaking a look like that.
And there behind him, ready to drive him further, was none other than a man Sterling was well acquainted with—Marcus Hayes.
Sterling’s lips tightened. His back met the wall once more, and he watched as Marcus fitted Lucian with a black, eyeless hood. The material, whatever it was, stretched to fit the shape of Lucian’s head. Blond hair vanished, covered up by black.
The crowd made sense now.
The men and women who visited The Shepherd were contractually obligated to obey a certain set of rules. Rules were essential. They kept employees and club members safe, and laid out consequences for any breaches of contract.
There was no doubt that, in the eyes of those clustered by the door, the contract was being breached tonight, and in the grandest way possible. Fraternization between employees and club members was strictly prohibited. Work and play were to be kept separate at all times.
Sterling knew because the rules were second nature to him—he was the one who’d written them, after all.
The scene before him changed. Lucian’s body trembled. Marcus leaned over his shoulder, his eyes lidded in a way that spoke not only of obscene arousal, but of tremendous love. There was delicate affection between them, and it struck Sterling in a way that made him understand Lucian’s recent resignation. What brought them together was more than kink—what Sterling saw in that moment was an act of commitment.
Of love.
Sterling knew the men and women who frequented his club. The small, tightly knit community he’d united on The Shepherd’s dance floor was intimate. From all backgrounds and walks of life, they came to him. Some found what they were looking for and moved on, but men like Marcus? Men like Marcus were lost.
Tonight, it looked like Marcus had found his way.
The crowds shifted again, filling the gap Sterling had been using to observe the play scene. He didn’t mind. The moment Marcus shared with his new lover was his to enjoy, and Sterling had other matters to tend to. Clarissa needed help. When the front doors were locked and the music had died, Sterling would take the time to assess the standing of Marcus’ membership. Playing with a staff member meant an instant revocation of membership privileges, but technically, Lucian wasn’t a staff member anymore. He’d quit the week before. Still, there was a gray area there that Sterling needed to consider. The look he saw in Marcus’ eyes wasn’t one born from half a week of dating.
A flash of bright white light cut through the shadows and drew Sterling’s eyes before he’d taken his first step down the hallway. On the outskirts of the crowd clustered around the door to room nine was a shirtless young man, his back to Sterling. Tight black jeans rode low on his hips and hugged his ass like they’d been molded to his body. Golden-brown hair shone as it was struck by the bright light emitted from the device in his palm.
Sterling recognized him immediately.
For the last two years, Adrian Lowe had been a fixture at The Shepherd on weekend nights. He knew better than to use his cellphone while on club grounds.
Clarissa would have to wait—Sterling was needed elsewhere.
Without hesitation, Sterling crossed the hall. The sharp clack of his dress shoes was drowned out by the thud of the bass from the dance floor downstairs, the mass of bodies separating him from Adrian making his approaching shadow inconspicuous. Adrian, unaware of his approach, remained hunched over his phone, shoulders pinched. Sterling took hold of one of them and spun him around, and as the whites of Adrian’s eyes broadened and locked on his, he shoved Adrian against the wall.
In the two years that Adrian had been visiting the club, Sterling had engaged him in polite conversation once or twice—never long enough to get to know him on a personal level. Most omegas who came to The Shepherd were in search of the same thing, and Sterling had grown tired of the narrative. Entertaining those who wished to mindlessly submit had been fun for the first few years, but constant reiterations of the same tired dynamic turned it bland. Sterling was hungry for something more, and he didn’t expect to find that something in a delicately beautiful omega—at least, not until the wide-eyed fear in Adrian’s eyes turned into unmasked, unmitigated hatred.
No omega had ever looked at Sterling like that before.
Sterling’s hand tightened not out of anger, but out of surprise. Adrian’s glare didn’t falter, and his mouth remained a straight, stern line. There was no guilt in his expression, no desperation, and no shame. If anything, he looked upset that Sterling was inconveniencing him.
“Can I help you?” The question tore into Sterling, all fangs and teeth and snark. Those same words ripped down Sterling’s spine, leaving behind a tingling, thrilling sensation that came to a stop in his groin. One venomous look was all it took.
Adrian wasn’t like Sterling had imagined from their brief conversations—not by a long shot—but kitten claws weren’t enough to keep Sterling from addressing his blatant infringement of club rules.
Keeping his tone low and steady, Sterling spoke. “What were you doing?”
“Nothing.” Adrian’s gaze didn’t so much as flicker. His pale irises were gray, tinged darker by shadows. They were the kind of eyes that locked Sterling in and refused to let him look away.
“Nothing?” The repetition afforded Adrian the chance to correct himself before Sterling did it for him, but Adrian didn’t take it. Sterling watched his lips for the telltale twitch that preceded speech, but it never came.
Adrian was going to stick to his lie.
He left Sterling with no choice but to correct him.
The offending phone was still clutched in Adrian’s hand—Sterling
hadn’t given him time to put it away before pinning him to the wall. Without breaking eye contact, Sterling’s free hand darted forward and tore the phone from Adrian’s palm. Adrian’s gray eyes widened, and he struggled against the hand on his shoulder to snatch the phone back.
If Adrian wasn’t going to behave, Sterling wouldn’t behave, either.
His hand left Adrian’s shoulder, and in one deft movement, he pinned his forearm across Adrian’s collarbone and pushed. Adrian hissed, not with pain, but with frustration. Sterling read it as plainly in Adrian’s eyes as he did the tone of his voice.
So Sterling pushed harder.
A puff of air escaped Adrian’s lips, and he looked up at Sterling with such outstanding hatred that Sterling began to doubt his recollections of their previous encounters. Was Adrian really an omega? Eyes like that didn’t belong to bashful, subservient creatures—they were too wild, too unpredictable.
Sterling didn’t realize his heart was racing until his next breath wasn’t deep enough to sate his starved lungs.
“This doesn’t look like nothing.” Sterling held the phone up so Adrian could see it, but Adrian refused to look. He kept glaring directly at Sterling, unafraid. “This looks suspiciously like a phone.”
Adrian narrowed his eyes. “And you look suspiciously like an idiot, holding me here, telling me what a phone is.”
The mouth on him. Another pulse of arousal struck Sterling square in the gut and made it hard to cling to stern dominance. It wasn’t often anyone talked back to him, but an omega?
He’d never met an omega with a lashing tongue before.
What other things could a tongue that clever do?
“Really?” Sterling’s hand tightened around the phone, and he lowered it until he knew it was outside of Adrian’s line of sight. While he kept Adrian pinned, he leaned forward until their noses were almost brushing. The scent of rain clung to Adrian’s skin. His cologne was subtle, but paired with the sweet notes of his underlying scent, it hooked Sterling like a fish to a lure. “I wouldn’t have to look like such an idiot if you were honest. What’s in my hand, Adrian?”
Adrian’s eyes flashed, the anger behind them captivating. His irises darkened like storm clouds, not so much because of a change of pigment, but because of the emotion that charged them. Energy arced through them, untamed and dangerous. It made Sterling want to come closer, if only so he could discover for himself how uncontrollable the storm raging in Adrian’s soul was.
“A phone. A phone with important information I was about to send to you. I was trying to—”
“And what is the rule about phones, Adrian?” Sterling pressed against his collarbone a little more firmly, if only to see the storm in Adrian’s eyes gain force. How far could he push before the storm clouds burst and the downpour began?
Some of the club members who’d stopped to look in on Marcus and Lucian had turned to watch what was going on between Sterling and Adrian. Sterling felt their gazes, and he welcomed them. The no phone policy was enforced to protect privacy—it was fitting that he should take Adrian’s away.
“There is a zero-tolerance policy on the use of phones or other electronic devices while in the club.” Adrian’s voice was tight with anger, like if he let himself relax, the true force of his vitriol would spill out and decimate whatever was in its path.
Sterling wasn’t afraid.
Storms never lasted forever.
“And so what does the fact that I’m holding your phone in my hand right now mean?” Sterling spoke low, allowing the force of his voice to rattle the air between them. Still, Adrian did not look away.
“It means that you’re not interested in listening to me explain myself.”
“It means that I’ll see you in my office so we can discuss the condition of your membership. I look after the wellbeing of all the men and women who play here, and if something is threatening their enjoyment, I don’t take to it very kindly.” Sterling leaned so close he could feel the inward pull in the air between them when Adrian drew breath. “I will see you upstairs. Don’t keep me waiting.”
It was hard to hear over the sounds from the dance floor downstairs, but Sterling could have sworn he heard Adrian’s breath hitch. The tiny noise was delicate, stretched like spiderwebs weighed down by dew. But when Sterling pulled away from Adrian and let his arm drop from his chest, there was no sign of fragility on Adrian’s face. Thin lips and narrowed eyes hadn’t given way to a wide-eyed, timid stare. Adrian was every bit as enraged as he’d been seconds before.
Omega or not, he wouldn’t fold.
Sterling took a step back, holding Adrian’s gaze for another prolonged moment before he cut contact entirely to walk away. With the spectacle going on in room nine, Clarissa wouldn’t need help until later. It would give Sterling long enough to figure out exactly what he wanted to do about the situation with Adrian.
The night hadn’t gone as he’d anticipated—but that didn’t mean that it had gone wrong. The situation was more than unfortunate, but what he’d learned from it excited him in ways he wasn’t ready to fully understand.
Adrian was gorgeous—he’d always been—but the mouth on him? The passion in his eyes and the confidence in his soul? That was what set him apart from any of the other omegas who called The Shepherd home. It made him stick out amongst a sea of other beautiful bodies, and it was what made Sterling want him.
He’d guide his black sheep home.
2
Adrian
Two wide, solid wood doors barricaded the short hallway atop the landing from The Shepherd’s third floor. Adrian stood before them, taking in their rich mahogany color and their exquisite carpentry. Semi-circular frosted glass rings on either side of the door joined to form a complete circle, bisected by the minuscule gap left where the doors met.
Light shone through the frosted glass from the other side, but Adrian couldn’t make out anything more than that. He didn’t need to—he already knew all he needed to know.
What lay behind the mahogany doors wasn’t a secret. The Shepherd’s second floor was the last floor accessible to club members. What lay above was accessible to one man, and one man alone.
On Adrian’s second week at The Shepherd, while exploring the hallway that housed the public rooms, he’d found the very same staircase he now stood on. A face he couldn’t remember had told him, in passing, that the space beyond those doors belonged to the shepherd himself.
Sterling.
He’d built a home above the debauchery happening just a floor below. A throne for a god. For a while, Adrian had been under the impression that Sterling really was all-powerful.
Now he knew better.
Sterling flitted around the club from time to time, making sure everything was up to his standards, but Adrian rarely saw him play. Whatever secrets Sterling housed, and whatever private parties he threw behind locked doors, Adrian had never been privileged to. Adrian had never been important enough to so much as ping Sterling’s radar. It had always gotten under Adrian’s skin, stinging in a subtle, inexplicable way when Sterling nodded to him or exchanged pleasantries before moving on—like Sterling didn’t think he was important enough for his time. And now, with the phone debacle underway, Adrian thought even less of him than before.
Fuck Sterling.
Fuck him for not wanting to listen.
Fuck him for jumping to conclusions.
The footage on Adrian’s phone had been taken for a purpose. Marcus was skirting the rules, and Adrian wasn’t going to let that fly. Men like Marcus and Sterling—men of power, of influence, and of blessed genetic origins—didn’t know what it was like to be the underdog. They didn’t know the horrors of being bound by an inflexible set of rules while others were waived of their sins.
But Adrian knew, and he wasn’t going to stand for it.
If he had to call every last one of them out, he would. The Shepherd was an escape—a place where he could be who he wanted to be without the reminder of the failure he was
. He would not allow a place so dear to his heart to be polluted.
He would not let another person ruin his life. Not ever again.
Adrian’s fist met the door. Three sharp raps echoed through the stairwell. The small landing Adrian stood upon was wide enough for three people to stand comfortably, and the acoustics of the empty space provided excellent amplification. He only hoped the sound carried as well on Sterling’s side of the door.
A moment passed, then grew long and awkward. Adrian shifted his weight from one leg to another, then clenched his fists. Sterling had invited him here, so why the hell wasn’t he answering the door?
Just as Adrian was getting ready to leave, the door clicked, then swung open. Light streamed through, flooding Adrian’s eyes and depriving him of sight as his pupils adjusted to the stimuli. There, bathed in a halo of light, stood the sturdy figure of the man Adrian had come to see.
“That was timely,” Sterling remarked. His form was still hidden by shadow, and Adrian struggled to make out his details. “I was just about to pour some drinks.”
“I’m not here to have a tea party, Sterling.”
“And I’m not here to entertain you.” Sterling stepped back from the door. “Now come in. Let’s get you seated. We have a lot to talk about.”
Adrian didn’t bother to bite back. He stepped through the doorway and found himself in a small entryway, barricaded from the rest of the penthouse by doors not unlike those in The Shepherd’s first-floor lobby. It looked like Sterling had gone through the expense of soundproofing his haven. How quaint.
“There’s plenty of room in the living room, if you’d care to sit.” Sterling opened the heavy door opposite Adrian and held it open. Long, narrow strips of dark, glossy wood flooring laid in square herringbone patterns across the floor on the other side. The walls were a dark, muted brown and bore delicate, vertical woodgrain designs. Had it not been for the abundance of light and the impeccable eye for decor, the room would have been dreary. Either Sterling had hired a top-notch decorator, or he had an outstanding eye for detail and design. Adrian’s gaze flicked to the fitted suit Sterling wore and the way it filled out his shoulders and lent sturdiness to his torso, then the way the upper limits of his pants shaped themselves to his thighs. If Sterling’s jacket hadn’t been in the way, Adrian was sure those pants would have highlighted a phenomenal ass.