Page 37 of Not Your Golden Boy

“No,” Harry silenced him firmly. A shiver of something primal raced through Nikky, making his body go slack. He was definitely going to have to learn more about Dom/sub dynamics, because this felt way too natural. “We’ll worry about all that when we get there,” Harry went on. “It might not be as big a problem as all that.”

Nikky didn’t see how that was possible. London and L.A. were thousands of miles apart.

He was stopped from asking more questions or worrying himself into nausea by Harry’s alarm going off. Harry rolled to the side, which separated their bodies, much to Nikky’s regret, and reached for his phone on the bedside table, where he’d put it the night before after taking down the recording set-up. “You need to get going,” he said as soon as he tapped on his phone. “You’re due at the studio in just over an hour.”

Nikky huffed out a breath, then rolled his eyes at himself for sounding like a teenager who didn’t want to get up and go to school. “I guess,” he said, swept a hand over his face, then pushed himself up enough to look down at Harry. “But for the record, if it were up to me, I’d stay here and ride your cock all morning.”

It was more than just flirting. He’d never said anything half as bold or expressed what he wanted like that before. Harry probably said and heard things like that all the time, but for Nikky to state what he wanted outright, then to lean down and kiss Harry hard, was serious progress.

“We’ll definitely do that at some point,” Harry said with fire in his eyes as Nikky climbed out of bed and headed for the hall and the bathroom.

Nikky sent him a hungry look over his shoulder as he left the room, then dropped into a wide-eyed look of shock over his behavior. Everything was changing for him, but maybe things were finally starting to change for the better.

He could only hope.

After showering and dressing in the same clothes he’d worn for two days now, Nikky raced through the breakfast Harry’d made for him. He didn’t just need to get to the studio on time, he needed to rush back to his hotel and change clothes. Albion hadn’t said anything about him wearing the same outfit two days in a row, but he’d definitely notice a third.

At the hotel, Nikky stuffed the backpack he’d used as a carry-on for his flight full of more clean clothes and toiletries. He loved smelling like Harry’s shower gel and shaving cream, but if he was going to spend more time at Harry’s place, which he fully intended to do, he needed to start providing for himself.

By the time he reached the studio, the level of calm and confidence that he’d siphoned off of Harry was still with him, making him feel at home in his own skin for the first time in ages.

People noticed. Albion noticed.

“That was great.” He sounded surprised as he spoke to Nikky through the intercom of the recording booth. Nikky had just finished singing yet another fluffy, ill-fitting song that Albion insisted on trying out for him. Charlotte, his manager, had arrived in London first thing that morning and was there to sit in, but she looked incredibly jetlagged and bleary. “Though something isn’t right about it,” Albion went on with a puzzled frown.

“Oh, yeah?” Nikky replied. He knew what was wrong. The song. It was like trying to wear hand-me-downs a size too small from the kid who had just been moved on.

The urge to say that outright prickled across his skin. He didn’t know what it was, but Albion looked shorter today for some reason. His face looked puffier, too, and he’d missed a spot shaving. Maybe the man was like that every day, but to Nikky, he’d always looked huge and imposing. The kind of guy you couldn’t naysay. Charlotte, too, looked like a tired, middle-aged woman who wasn’t really interested in what was going on around her.

Nikky could advocate for himself to people like that.

“Yeah, it’s too…I don’t know. Too…twee for you,” Albion said.

“Way too twee,” Charlotte agreed, though Nikky barely heard her, since she wasn’t sitting near a microphone.

Nikky brightened, confidence making his heart pound against his ribs. “I could sing something else,” he said. “I’ve got loads of original songs up my sleeve. Want me to pull one of those out for you?”

Albion frowned. He’d pushed back on every original song Nikky had tried to play for him so far. Nikky had given up suggesting them, but the timing felt right for a change.

“I’d love to hear some original songs,” Charlotte said. She glanced at Albion, then gave Nikky a supportive thumbs up through the glass.

Albion didn’t look happy, but he said, “Okay. I’m all ears. How about something upbeat?”

“Sure,” Nikky said, relaxing onto the stool where he sat.

He strummed the acoustic guitar he held a few times, playing chords to decide which of his compositions he wanted to sing. He landed on one of the few love songs he’d composed. He’d written it years ago, when he’d had a crush on a straight guy in one of his acting classes. The crush had gone nowhere, of course, but the song was fun.

As he started singing, he thought of Harry. He thought of the man’s warm, dark eyes, thought of his amazing body and all the things it could do and make him feel. He thought of the way Harry cared about him and how the man made him feel safe without strings attached. He was probably foolish to fall so hard for someone so fast, but he couldn’t help it. Everything felt right.

Albion and Charlotte fell into some sort of discussion as Nikky played. Albion had turned off the mic so Nikky couldn’t hear a word of what they were saying, but it looked like they were disagreeing about whatever it was. If he was lucky, Charlotte was standing up for him and urging Albion to let him record his own music instead of the drivel he was contractually obligated to record.

Maybe his manager was actually on his side after all. Maybe he could record the album he wanted. Maybe the fans would ease up and respect his privacy more. Maybe Holberg would realize there was nothing Nikky could do for him at last and leave him the fuck alone.

Maybe his relationship with Harry was something real and long-lasting.

Maybe everything would be okay.

“That was nice,” Albion said without much enthusiasm once Nikky finished his song.