Page 19 of Not Your Golden Boy

“I’m twenty-five,” Nikky answered with a touch of defensiveness that Harry never would have guessed he had in him. But if what he’d heard about actors finding their characters once they had their costume on was true, Nikky was probably deep in his own world.

“I can vouch for him,” Harry told Freddy.

Freddy grinned in a way that made him look less like a medieval executioner and more like the teddy bear he was and said, “I know who he is.” He turned to Nikky and said, “I loved you in Cooked.” The way Freddy swept Nikky’s body with a hungry look told Harry just which scenes from the steamy show Freddy had liked best.

“Thanks,” Nikky said, smiling briefly, then slamming back into character.

Harry had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. The night was already shaping up to be a ton of fun. And if all went well, it would be exactly the photo op Nikky needed to cause a scandal on social media. What diehard fan of Hollywood’s latest golden boy wouldn’t balk at dark, grainy pictures of him living it up at a seedy gay BDSM club?

That was the whole point of the night’s adventure, but as soon as they made their way into the heart of the basement venue, things veered off course. The brash, flashing lights and bass of the dance music that blared from speakers placed all over the room throbbed its way into Harry’s gut and cock. Most of the men dancing and gyrating to the savage beat were shirtless, and some trouserless and wearing nothing but thongs or jockstraps. Heat permeated the place, and the scent of sweat and sin was thick in the air.

“You gonna be okay?” Harry asked, glancing sideways at Nikky as he took in the heaving motion of the club and its black-lit ambience.

Nikky’s expression had widened out of the serious, borderline hard look he’d worked himself into as they’d entered the club. Now he looked around like he was seeing art for the first time. His gaze didn’t settle long on one thing. He drank in the sweaty bodies of the dancers, the pair of twinks festooned in chains who danced in matching cages near the front of the room and seemed to be seconds away from orgasm, and the mini playtimes that were taking place in some of the darker corners of the room.

Those play scenes gave Harry pause. Some nights people got more into the BDSM aspect of the club than the dancing. Tonight appeared to be one of those nights. Through the crowd of dancers, Harry could just make out a guy strapped to a St. Andrew’s cross at the far end of the room who was being flogged by a massive man wearing a leather hood and mask, his bare, barrel chest gleaming with sweat. It wasn’t what he would have chosen for Nikky to see right off the bat, but it would help to dent Nikky’s image if Harry could get a few pics for social media with that in the background.

“What are you curious about?” he asked Nikky, nearly shouting to be heard over the thumping music.

“Everything,” Nikky told him in return, gaze still sweeping the room.

Harry couldn’t keep his smile inside. His idea was definitely going to work. Nikky already swayed slightly, like he was itching to get involved in the club’s activity. All of it. They would dance for a while, he’d take a bunch of pictures, and then head out to someplace a little quieter so the two of them could get to know each other better. And who knew? Maybe they could take a few make-out pics to really drive the point home that Nikky wasn’t what Dean Albion wanted to force him to be.

“Can I dance?” Nikky asked, dragging his wide-eyed gaze away from the activity all around the room to look hopefully at Harry.

Harry clapped a hand on Nikky’s shoulder. “You can do whatever you want, baby,” he said. “You’re twenty-five, after all.”

Nikky burst into a sheepish smile that was every bit as bright and beautiful as the image the world wanted to have of him, then stepped away from Harry and into the edge of the dancers. He blended seamlessly with the swaying, moving men who immediately turned to him and fell all over themselves to grind against him.

Flashing jealousy warred with the arousal Harry felt at the sight. Any gay man with blood pumping through his veins would be turned on by Nikky. He was perfection on so many levels and sexy as hell once he got over the crippling anxiety Harry was beginning to see was as much a part of his personality as the star power. It was encouraging to see Nikky embrace whatever fun and adventurous part of himself was willing to let go and throw himself into the new experience.

Harry was so caught up in watching his young friend let go and so turned on by the sight of Nikky’s svelte body moving to the pounding music, that he almost forgot to fish out his phone to take the pictures that they’d come there for. As he snapped away, going for shots that would make Nikky look as hedonistic as possible, a part of him hoped he was doing the right thing. He still had more than a few reservations about allowing Nikky to destroy what could be an incredible career.

His photography exercise was interrupted as a guy he vaguely knew from other sojourns to Crushed, waved to him and gestured for him to join the dance. Figuring he had enough pics for the moment, Harry tucked his phone away, then caught Nikky’s eye. Nikky craned his neck a bit to show he was paying attention, and when Harry gestured to the guy who wanted him to dance, Nikky gave him the thumbs up before throwing himself back into dancing with even more abandon. Harry grinned at him, then headed for his friend, what’s-his-name, and lost himself in the spirit of the night as well.

He wasn’t entirely sure how much time had passed before he looked for Nikky again. He’d been keeping an eye out for his golden boy while dancing with half a dozen different guys. Each time he’d looked, Nikky was dancing his heart out and seeming to have a good time. The second Harry checked in and didn’t spot Nikky on the dance floor, his fun and games were over.

He stepped out of the heart of the dancers and looked around, heart pounding from more than just exercise as he looked for his too-innocent charge. He was supposed to be Nikky’s boyfriend, the guy who looked out for him and protected him from the snakes of the world. He shouldn’t have let Nikky go off on his own.

Those feelings of guilt intensified when he spotted Nikky at the bar with two of the rougher regulars pressing in on either side of him as they watched him down a shot.

Harry wasn’t having any of that.

He marched straight over to the bar, not caring how big the guys moving in on Nikky were, and said, “Everything good here?”

The two guys glared at Harry, but Nikky finished a second shot, smiled like it was the best day of his life, and said, “Yeah, this place is great.” His eyes shone enough to make Harry wonder how many shots he’d downed, other than the two empty glasses on the bar, and whether Nikky was used to drinking.

“You don’t have to spend it all in one place,” Harry advised him, resting a hand on his arm, mostly to signal to the two oafs trying to lay some sort of claim on Nikky that he was taken.

“Okay,” Nikky said, though Harry wasn’t sure if he understood what he’d meant. “John and Gerry here are going to show me around some of the stuff,” he went on, his grin way too wide.

Just like that, Harry wanted to leave. But he also didn’t want to be a killjoy or get in the way of Nikky exploring something he might actually like. “They can show me, too,” he said, smiling threateningly, first at one guy, then the other. Nikky had come in with him and he would leave with him as well.

“Come on,” one of the guys said, pushing away from the bar and nodding for Nikky to follow him.

The other guy grabbed a drink off the bar and handed it to Nikky as they all headed toward the corner with the St. Andrew’s cross. Harry stuck to Nikky like glue, watching him like a hawk for any sign that one of the two brutes had slipped something into Nikky’s drink. It wasn’t likely, since Crushed had a strict code of conduct and people had been banned for life for trying shit like that in the past, but anything could happen.

Anything could happen, like Nikky’s glassy eyes going wide as he watched a man being flogged for what had to have been the first time in his life. The more Harry got to know Nikky, the more he was convinced that, despite living in L.A. and being part of the entertainment industry for the past several years, Nikky was way greener than he let on.