“Eric’s a lucky man,” said Kieran.
Langdon’s face lit up at the mention of his fiancé. “I’m the lucky one.”
“Are you going to be gushing for the next three hours? Some of us are perpetually single, you know.”
“Isn’t that your personal choice?”
“I really should talk less to my clients.”
Langdon chuckled before lying face down on the bench. Given Langdon was happy, it didn’t take long for Kieran to get the stencil ready. It wasn’t a large piece, but there was colour in it, so it wasn’t a simple design.
“How’s the wedding planning going?” asked Kieran,
“We’re not doing anything elaborate, so nothing stressful.”
“Is that because you’ve delegated everything to Eric?”
“That’s what he wanted, and I’m trying to keep my stepdad from interfering.”
“I didn’t know you had a stepdad,” said Kieran, remembering his own and shuddering with embarrassment.
“We hadn’t spoken in years, but he came back onto the scene last year.”
“Ah, I see.”
“What?”
“I’m sensing some bad blood.”
“It’s . . . complicated.”
“Isn’t it always?” Kieran replied before starting the tattoo gun.
He couldn’t help but think of his own stepdad. It had been ten years since the man had betrayed him in the worst possible way. Sometimes he wondered if Derek still worked in London. Thankfully, their paths had never crossed. Kieran knew he wouldn’t be able to control his anger if he ever saw the man again. Hopefully, he never would.
CHAPTER 2
DEREK
“Where the fuck is Neil?” barked Derek.
He was in no mood for any shit from his staff today. He saw himself as a fairly laid-back boss, always willing to be flexible, and he paid them well, but when they took the piss, the old corporate lawyer came out.
“Not heard from him,” said Omar, their newest recruit.
Omar had made a great start in his first bar job. If there was a rush at the bar, he could handle it with no problems, which was impressive since he’d only been here for three months. The challenge was when one of the customers came on to him. There were rules and lines, but a flirty comment was the norm here, especially with someone who looked like Omar. He was twenty-two years old, short, with a slight build, and his features were almost feminine with how delicate they were, so he attracted a lot of attention. If a customer tried to touch any of the staff without permission, though, they’d get marched out the door and banned. But if Omar couldn’t handle “Whisky and Coke, handsome” without getting flustered, then he shouldn’t be working in a gay bar, let alone The Back Room, which was effectively a sex club.
Neil was his assistant manager and the complete opposite of Omar. He didn’t just flirt back at the customers; Derek had found him coming out of the back rooms with a big grin on his face, usually followed by some twink hobbling behind him looking happily defiled. Derek was all for people enjoying the facilities on offer, but not when they were on the clock. The problem with Neil was that when he was here, the guy was brilliant. He took a lot of pressure off Derek by managing the rotas, dealing with suppliers, and all the operational crap that came with running a club.
After his second divorce, Derek had quit his job as a corporate lawyer, where he was earning a quarter of a million a year plus bonuses. His best friend, Edward, had described it as a midlife crisis. Derek was just done with getting rich from making other white men even richer than himself. He felt as though there was no purpose in it anymore. He went travelling, fucking his way across every continent, and he meant every continent; the scientist in Antarctica had been a screamer. When Derek had returned home, he’d bought a run-down gay bar and turned it into The Back Room.
There was a cabaret bar on the street level, where they held drag shows, and that had a local pub feel to it. The place opened in the late afternoon, and they got people who came in after work since they were based in King’s Cross. It was downstairs that people really came for, though. The club area itself wasn’t large and could hold a hundred people before it got too busy, but people didn’t come for the club– the labyrinth was where the fun happened. There were six private rooms that people could use to fuck in, or whatever else they wanted to do. They were wellstocked with supplies. They then had two walls. One had all glory holes, and there was always someone on their knees just waiting for a dick to suck. On the other side, were the “pizza ovens,” as people referred to them. They had a mechanism which allowed aperson to lie in a bent-over position with their arse at the perfect height for someone to fuck them. Given how they were positioned, they’d have no idea who it was. They were more popular than Derek had predicted, and he’d doubled the number of ovens from two to four a year ago. In the far corner of the labyrinth was the “spotlight,” so called because it was the only part of the labyrinth that had any form of lighting, and it housed a sling for people to lie in and be defiled with an audience. There were also several corners for people to fuck strangers if the rooms weren’t available, or if they preferred being out in the open in the hope a third or fifth would join them.
Derek loved the space he’d created here. This wasn’t a BDSM club with people putting on shows and catering to those sorts of kinks. It was simply a safe space where people could fuck without judgement. Because despite how much more open people were with their sexual expression these days, it was still taboo to tell your friends you were happy to take ten dicks in a night without a condom and not know who any of the people were. Even the most open-minded allies would clutch their pearls at what went on in this place.
There was a solid community of regulars, and many visitors who were curious or had heard about it from their friends. People had made trips to London just to visit The Back Room, which was flattering. Despite being the owner of this place, Derek had never indulged in using the facilities himself. That was a hard line for him. His staff were welcome to do what they wanted, though, as long as they weren’t on the clock, which brought his thoughts back to Neil.
“I’ll check upstairs and call him,” said Derek. “Are you okay to finish setting up, Omar? I’ll be down here with you by the time we open.”
