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Connor stops too, eyes wide. People go around us. “I didn’t mean to freak you out. Look, I know I just got here a few months ago, but the thing is—”
“Leave? Fucking leave??” I can’t blink. I can’t seem to decide whether to be hurt or angry. “Do you have any idea in that tiny brain of yours how many terrible fucking roommates Brett has gone through before finally finding you?”
“But you didn’t hear me out!” Connor protests, scooting out of the way as a pair of drunken idiots pass between us. “Skylar would replace me! I’m at Alan’s half of the time as it is, really, so it’s only natural that I—Oh.” He winces. “No, no. It’s … It’s way too soon to move in with my boyfriend, huh? We’ve barely known each other three months. Oh, God, I’m one of those guys who moves too fast, aren’t I? Maybe this was all a bad idea …”
“Yeah, it was,” I snap. “A bad fuckin’ idea. And not your first bad idea. I heard about the pill.”
“How’d you hear about that?? Ugh, Brett. We should probably move before we’re hit by a bus.” Connor grabs my hand—surprising me—and pulls me with him to the other side of the street as a car whizzes by, honking angrily at us.
We slip through the doors of our last resort: a place I just remembered suggesting to the kid called Club Spades, the logo of which has the name over a diamond with a broken heart next to it. We take a pair of seats on the side, not wanting to mess with the throng of sweaty, hairy men conglomerating in the middle. Some pair off and go through a curtain in the back which, for a brief moment each time the curtain’s pulled, reveals a room lit in dim red light.
“What’s back there?” asks Connor.
“Exactly what you think’s back there,” I reply vaguely. “It’s Fetish Friday. Freak flags are flyin’.”
“Oh, cool!” Connor lights up, finding it all to be so entertaining, apparently. I’m still combing the club with my eyes. On a night like this full of bears and daddies, that poor kid is going to stick out like a swan in a murderous den of leather-clad sharks.
Why in the actual fuck did I suggest this humid hellhole to the kid? Even jokingly?
“I’m not really thinking of leaving Piazza Place so soon,” Connor says suddenly. “I didn’t mean to freak you out.”
Now that it isn’t news anymore, I put on my cool face a lot easier. “It ain’t me you’re gonna freak out when you go. It’ll be your fragile roomie-bro.”
He blinks, as if realizing. “Oh. He’ll implode.”
“He’ll implode,” I agree grimly.
We gaze out at the crowd of men, with special interest at whoever’s pouring in from the streets. I feel my heart sinking with every passing second. I just know I’m not gonna ever see him again.
I don’t even know his name.
Connor leans toward me. “I think you brought me with you tonight for a reason.”
I don’t take my eyes off the entrance when I grunt, “And what reason’s that?”
“Twink bait.”
I snort, cracking a smile despite myself. “Is that it? Using you to fish out my runaway client like some kind of twink magnet?”
“Brett told me he’s young. Wait … Would he even be able to get into any of the bars here? Heck, aren’t most of them twenty-one and up?”
“Most of them don’t care,” I point out.
“Maybe you should just forget about him. So many guys are hitting on you. Why don’t you—?”
Suddenly my view is eclipsed by a round-faced, pale-skinned bear in a leather vest with a chest full of curly dark hair. He tugs on his leather cap and asks, “What’s a beauty like you doing all alone?”
For the first second, I assume he’s talking to Connor. When I realize he’s addressing me, I lift my chin at him. “Huh?”
“What’s a beauty like you—?” he repeats.
“I ain’t alone,” I say. “Do I look alone to you?”
Then Connor goes and helpfully puts in, “Oh, but we’re not together. We just came here together. I do have a boyfriend, but he isn’t here.”
I sting Connor with my eyes.
Connor winces apologetically and spreads his hands, as innocent as buttered toast.
The bear, taking our awkward exchange for an invitation I guess, sits down next to me. “So do you come here often, sexy? I haven’t seen you before.”
When I say nothing, Connor nudges me. I give a roll of my eyes, then face the guy. “I know a few people. The owner is an old client of mine who—”
“Okay, I just gotta ask,” the bear cuts me off. He squints at my face. “You’ve got, like … such an exotic look. Like, you’re just …” He lifts his hands, as if to put my face in a frame, then drops them to his lap. “Your eyes are … so exotic.”
