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Jesse looked into her deep caramel eyes, welling with love and concern. Like always, he didn’t know how to handle it.
“Get back inside. It’s freezing. Tell Olly I’ll see him around, yeah?”
Sareena nodded. “Of course. And come back soon. Your brother misses you, too.”
Jesse clenched his mouth of his response, nodded and turned away before Sareena could say anything more.
He soon found himself at the end of Chestnut Avenue, looking left along Heworth Road toward the university district and his poky flat then right toward the river and the city center. He searched through his pockets, found a crumpled fiver and headed toward town.
The Evil Eye was crowded and steamy, the air thick with the smell of warm humans and spilled spirits. He made his way to his normal stool at the bar, weaving between the usual mix of townies and tourists, laughing and sipping elaborate cocktails. He ordered a Dark and Stormy then sat, sipping his drink and searched the crowd.
It wasn’t long before a guy hanging on the edge of a group near the door caught his eye. He weighed Jesse up a moment with seeming interest building in his square-jawed face. He leaned in to shout something to his friends then made his way over, carefully steering his whiskey sour ahead of him in an exaggerated attempt not to spill.
“I’ve seen you here before, right?” the man said, overly loud.
“I dunno, have you?” Jesse said, trying to gauge if the guy really had big arms under his hot-pink shirt or if it was just a trick of the light.
“Pretty sure I have. And on Grindr, too, yeah?”
Jesse’s blood started to thrum. “Maybe.”
The man glanced back at his friends, who were all laughing raucously over something on a phone. He leaned in to talk into Jesse’s ear. His breath smelled like whiskey and mint gum.
“Yeah, I remember your listing. Said you like it a bit out-there, huh?”
“Yeah,” Jesse said, meeting his eye. “Think you got it in you?”
Dark heat lit the man’s eyes. “Yeah. I reckon I do.”
“Okay then…?”
“Tyler,” the man said, grinning and showing straight, white teeth.
Jesse set his glass aside. “Okay then, Tyler. Your place or mine?”
“Yeah, I, uh…” He looked back at his friends. “Gimme five minutes?”
“Four.”
Tyler hurried back to his friends, downing his drink as he went. He conversed insistently with them, and they looked over, sniggering and clapping the big guy on his back.
Jesse checked his watch then jumped when someone slammed a shot glass on the bar at his elbow.
“He’s not gonna give you what you want.” A girl with hair the same electric-aqua as the liquor sat beside him and downed her own measure. She made a face and coughed. “And you know it.”
Jesse eyed her narrowly. “And you know what I want?” he said and drank.
“You want a man who can make you feel like a whore and a prince, all at once.” She grinned, her teeth very white against her dark lipstick. “You’re asking too much of human beings, Jess. No such man exists. Believe me, I’ve looked.”
“What doyouwant, Trixy?”
“Iwant,” she said, holding up her hand to order two more shots, “to discuss a business proposition.”
“This isn’t really a good time.”
“From the state of those,” Trixy said, nodding at the holes in Jesse’s jeans that were clearly not part of the design, “I would say it’s the exact right time.”
He sighed, lifting the second shot. “What’s the job?”
