They sat down next to one another, as Adam had said, but Luke actually didn’t need him. He kept his hand on Adam’s knee throughout, something that Adam liked a lot more than he should have, especially considering that this was supposedly a professional meeting. Nobody could see though, and the fact that Luke didn’t need to use their signal even once…

He could tell that Luke was fumbling at the beginning. Adam jumped in, handling the introductions, and apologizing for the short notice. By the time he got everyone’s sympathy with Luke’s story, Luke seemed to have settled in a little. He had probably been able to tell that the three investors—two men and a woman, all of whom Adam had helped out in a case earlier that year, and one of the Chicago clients that had prompted Nash and Forest to consider opening a partner branch—were now rooting for Luke.

And who wouldn’t? A guy who had dropped out of school to take care of his brother after the tragic death of their parents. It was enough to pull anyone’s heartstrings. Of course the investors were ready to hear what Luke said.

With the feeling of sympathy on his side, and having settled while Adam introduced him, Luke launched into his pitch. He started, surprisingly, with the story of how his grandfather had built Joe’s back when he and his wife had first moved to the town.

It was a clever move. It allowed Luke to show that his bar was already a part of the community and had a built-in customer base that they could use to expand. He also pointed out that while his friends loved the bar, they had often wondered if there could be food served there, and it had long been a plan of Luke’s to add a kitchen, although he’d figured it would take a few more years to convince his dad to come around to the idea.

Luke launched into his plan for what he wanted the bar to become, a place that was easier for people to hang out in, with proper food and booths and an area for people to dance if they wanted to, the kind of place that people pictured in the movies.

It was a little poetic, in Adam’s opinion, but that was what investors needed. They wanted the dream of it, the poetry of it, because if you reached for the moon you always failed—but you would still land among the stars. Luke sounded like someone with real vision, and while Adam and Luke himself would probably never peg Luke as a visionary on a regular basis, this was obviously something that he’d been thinking about, something that had been near and dear to him, for some time.

There were of course words of, “We’ll think about this,” and “We’ll be in touch,” but Adam could see the enthusiasm with which they gripped Luke’s hand and the soft smiles on their faces—the kind of relaxed, genuine smiles that people had when they knew they had a good deal, rather than the forced, fake smiles that people wore when they knew that they had to be polite.

Adam shook hands with them as well, thanking them for taking the time and for doing this on such a short notice.

“We understand,” said Lorraine, the woman of the trio. “It seems that thanks to the court case he’s on a bit of a time crunch, but if he has you representing him, then I’m sure he’ll come out on top.”

Adam hadn’t told them the exact circumstances of his meeting Luke or that he worked for the opposing side, since that would only complicate things and wasn’t necessary—and might get back to his boss. As such, he didn’t bother to correct Lorraine, just nodded and thanked her.

They waited until they were in the elevator, and then Luke all but tackled Adam, crushing him to him in a hug. “I didn’t have a heart attack!” He said, giddily.

“You did more than that, you were awesome.” Adam hugged him back, feeling a rush of triumph in his stomach. “You totally convinced them.”

“I don’t know about that,” Luke said, pulling back a little, but his arms were still around Adam.

“Trust me, they liked you. They want to invest in you. I know how these guys think and operate,” Adam assured him.

“You mean it?” Luke sounded hopeful and terrified all at the same time.

Adam laughed. How could someone like Luke project such confidence when it came to things like flirting and be so unsure of himself when it was about things like business? “Yes, I mean it.”

Luke hugged him again, almost picking him up this time. Damn, he was strong. Then he pulled back, still grinning. “C’mon, this deserves a drink, there has to be a good bar around here somewhere.”

“We could just go back to your bar.”

The elevator opened with a ding, and Luke pulled away, grabbing Adam’s hand so that he could yank him out through the lobby and onto the street. “I can’t wait that long. And besides, I kind of want to keep this little celebration between us. Just in case—I don’t want to get everyone’s hopes up for no reason. This was something you did for me, and I want this first drink to be just the two of us.”

He sounded so charming and earnest when he said it, with his soft gray-blue eyes and his pouting lips, and Adam was absolutely helpless. He couldn’t possibly say no.

It was pretty early in the evening still, anyway. Their meeting with the investors had taken a couple of hours. They’d talked with Luke about numbers, contractors, how long such a project would take, possible returns on investment, that sort of thing—that had been where Luke had really settled, as Adam suspected his college classes started to come back to him, but Adam had jumped in here and there as well, despite Luke’s not squeezing his leg, just to offer up his own knowledge.

Besides, if they tried to get home, they’d run into rush-hour traffic and they’d be stuck in that for an extra hour. Might as well wait and have a little celebratory drink while they were at it.

Adam let Luke drag him into a bar/club type thing—it seemed to have a place where you could dance, and even some sort of stand for a DJ, but it wasn’t a club exactly, either, especially given that it was open and serving people before midnight.

They settled at the bar top, where Adam let Luke order for him because only one of them was a professional bartender and it sure as hell wasn’t Adam. “Does it ever bother you?” He asked, curious. “When you sit down at a bar and it’s another bartender? Do you ever get the urge to just… jump up and do it yourself?”

Adam was pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to handle it well if he was ever for some reason on trial and he had to have another lawyer defend him. He was kind of controlling that way when it came to his job.

“Not really,” Luke said. He turned, which pushed their knees together. That was enough contact to have Adam’s entire body stand at attention, electricity buzzing along his skin, but then Luke put his hand on Adam’s knee the way that he had during the meeting, and that just made Adam’s brain try and short-circuit. “It’s nice to relax and not be the one in charge of the drinks for once. I haven’t been out to drink since… everything.”

Of course. Luke wouldn’t have time to go out and be in a bar just for fun, he had to be running the bar every night. “I’m sorry.”

“Hey, no, it’s fine.” Luke shrugged. “I mean, you probably felt the same way about your mom, but… yeah, it sucks, but it’s all right to mention it. People don’t know how little things tie back to the big things.”

It was true. Adam could remember when Enid had asked him why he always was so paranoid about grocery shopping, unaware that being out of milk one night was why his mom had run out to the corner store and gotten hit crossing the street. Enid had been understandably horrified when Adam had explained, but how could she have possibly known? And it hadn’t upset Adam to mention it—it had given him a sad lump in his chest, but it hadn’t sent him spiraling into despair or anything. It was just a part of how this one aspect of his life sucked.

Adam nodded. “I get that.” He paused. “Still, I think I should say I’m sorry. I don’t think I’ve… expressed my condolences this entire time. I should have done that, when I first told you who I was.”

“I’ve had enough condolences to last me a lifetime,” Luke admitted, his voice going low and intimate—not in a sexual way, but like he was confessing. “Honestly, I think everyone around me wants to dwell on it more than I do. Everyone knew me and knew my parents, since everyone in the neighborhood goes to the bar after work. I just want to move on. I miss Dad and Lyla, I do, every day, but I also don’t want to just be stuck missing them.”

“You get tired of it,” Adam acknowledged. “The missing them, it takes up so much of your energy. After a while you need to just keep going and stop. Doesn’t mean you don’t love them or that you don’t wish they were still around.”

“Right.” Luke sighed. “I’ve got so much to think about, I almost… I can’t keep mourning them. I do, I mean…” He let out a quiet, harsh laugh. “It feels like every night I come home and I’m shocked they aren’t there. Or it feels like they’re alive, and I’m dead, or a ghost, or something.”

Adam wondered if that would have been how he felt if he’d stayed in the apartment after Mom had died and hadn’t been carted off almost immediately by child services.

“I’ve got to take care of Seth though, and run the bar, and all of that.” Luke shrugged. “So most of the time—when I miss them, it hits me like a punch, y’know? It’s usualły when I’m locking up the bar or something. But I don’t spend all day on it, and it feels like that’s what everyone expects of me, and I feel bad that I’m not… that it’s not how it is for me.”

“You can’t spend your life in mourning,” Adam pointed out. “I kind of tried to. The whole reason I got so determined about being a lawyer was to make my mom happy. I wanted to be one before, but this was the kick in the pants. It was just exhausting though, missing someone all the time. I had to live my life as well.”

“Right, exactly... and when you’re living life, you just can’t miss them all day. You miss them sometimes but it’s okay.”

Adam nodded, and Luke gently squeezed his knee, smiling at him. “Thanks. Nobody’s really lost anybody close to them, among my friends. Bill and Nancy are older and they were my dad’s friends so they get it, I think, but Jake and all the others… I don’t think they know exactly what to do with themselves. All their parents are still alive and stuff.”

“I’m glad I can help, in some way,” Adam said, and he meant it. It was kind of selfish of him, in a way, because it reminded him that he wasn’t the heartless shark he’d seen so many other lawyers become. Even the most idealistic of his classmates, he found, eventually lost that and became as ruthless as the rest of them. That, or they became bitter and left to go do something else.

His desire to help Luke and Seth was genuine, but it also reminded him that he had a heart somewhere inside of him, one that could still bleed when he saw somebody in trouble.

“It really does mean a lot,” Luke said. Then he grinned. “Would it be bad of me to say that I’m kind of glad that it worked out that we met? Even if the circumstances… I mean, I wish it were under different circumstances, but still.”

Adam felt himself blushing again. God dammit, was he never going to stop looking like an idiot around Luke? He took a gulp of his drink instead.

“Even if you have to work for people that you don’t like.” Luke’s grin didn’t waver, even though he was talking about the people who were trying to take his brother away from him. “I’m sorry you have to put up with their special brand of entitlement.”

“It’s fine.” Adam shrugged. “I’m used to it.” He sighed. “It’s not like—Enid’s all about crusading, you know? I was never into that. But I was hoping for more than representing all of these rich people who are just using it to get back at one another or to make themselves even richer. It’s ridiculous.”

“Have you thought about quitting?” Luke asked. “Maybe starting your own firm?”

“Maybe.” Adam shrugged. “I was never really good at the… building clientele sort of aspect of things. Enid was always really good with people, but I’m… they like me because I win them cases, not because of my personality.”

“Well I like you because of your personality, not just because you’re helping me win this case,” Luke assured him, winking at him. They were close enough now that their shoulders were touching. Luke’s body was a long line of heat up Adam’s side, and he had to stop himself from leaning farther into it and doing something stupid like rest his head on Luke’s shoulder. He wasn’t nearly drunk enough for that. Yet.

“Don’t say that. You haven’t won the case yet.”

“But I’ve got a lawyer now, and possible financial stability. I’m doing a hell of a lot better than I was this morning. It’s all thanks to you. Now I actually have a chance at winning this.”

“It’s too bad that I’m losing this case,” Adam admitted, and maybe they’d gone through more alcohol than he’d been paying attention to, or maybe it was just Luke himself who made Adam open up, but… “Because I think if I’d won it, my boss was going to transfer me to Chicago.”

“Oh?” Luke perked up. “What do you mean?”

“There’s a rumor that they’re going to open a partner branch to cater to their Midwestern clients,” Adam explained. “Given that this case meant I had to come to the Midwest, and I was being given some hints that I should look around, get to know the city, I think they want me to head it up.”

“But you don’t want to?” Luke asked, tentative.

“I wasn’t liking the idea of leaving New York,” Adam admitted. “But now…” Enid was out here, and so was Luke—although that was ridiculous, because he’d only known Luke for a day. Less than. “I don’t know.”

“But you’d have to keep working for those guys,” Luke added.

Adam sighed. “Yeah. And I’m not sure—I couldn’t turn down the Harpers, even though I wanted to. It was assigned to me. I want to be able to choose my own cases and stop working for all of these entitled pricks. I’ve spent all this time around wealth and I keep fearing that I’ll grow used to it and I’ll become like one of them. I want normal people in my life again.”

“But if I quit, then what do I do? Where do I go?”

“You could come here,” Luke said, holding up his fingers at the bartender for another round. His voice was quiet, tentative. “I mean, I can think of a few great things about Chicago.”

“I don’t know,” Adam admitted. “I’ve become… complacent. I don’t want to be stuck like this again. On the wrong side, on the wrong team, where to do the right thing, I have to go behind people’s backs and break the rules and possibly get myself into trouble.

“I also don’t know if I’m really ready to start out on my own, because I’m kind of a coward.” Luke laughed, and Adam couldn’t tell if he genuinely thought it was funny or not. “I mean, I lied to you, that kind of shows you the cowardly part of me.”

“I think you’ve more than made up for that,” Luke replied. He was looking at Adam with an expression that could only be described as fond.

Adam downed his drink when it was set in front of him, turning a little away from Luke. He felt like a boat that had been left unmoored and was drifting out to sea, and not just because he wanted to wrap his legs around Luke’s waist. It was because this case, and being with Luke, was making him realize how dull and empty his life had become, and how much he wanted to keep being a lawyer, but not in the same way that he had been all this time.

He had no idea what to do with thatso he changed the subject.

“You really were great in there,” he said, turning back to Luke and feeling that his blush and his stupid racing heart were a little more under control. “It was great. You didn’t need me at all.”

“I totally did,” Luke replied. “Having you there was what helped. You didn’t say much, I know, but it was just really helpful to have you there... to know that there was somebody on my side who’d catch me if I started making an idiot of myself.”

“Well, you did the opposite.”

“It got kind of easier as the meeting went on,” Luke acknowledged. “I didn’t realize that I’d remembered so much from college. It felt like every time I finished taking a class, everything just flew out of my head, y’know? And then with all I’ve been doing the last six months, I haven’t had a chance to even think about any of the stuff I was doing before. It was like I had still remembered it all though, somehow, underneath.”

Adam grinned at him. “It was great.” It was unbearably sexy as well, seeing Luke all confident and competent, but that was something else altogether.

Luke seemed to have read that in his voice, however, because he leaned in a little. “Great?” He asked. His hand slid just a little farther up Adam’s leg.

“Yup,” Adam said, sounding like an idiot, at least to his own ears.

Luke chuckled. “You sure that’s the only word you want to use?”

Adam rolled his eyes. “Somebody sure went from being unsure to being full of himself.”

He turned back to his drink again, but Luke reached over with his free hand, cupping Adam’s chin in his hand and turning him back so that Adam had to look into his eyes again. “None of that. Don’t think I haven’t seen the way you’ve been looking at me all day.”

Adam’s throat went dry, partially because Luke’s voice sounded unbearably filthy, all low and rough like that, but also partially because he was appalled at himself to learn that he’d been so obvious that Luke had noticed all day. Why hadn’t Luke said anything? Was Luke annoyed? Embarrassed? Did he think Adam horribly unprofessional?

All of Adam’s tentative thoughts that maybe he and Luke could have this, that maybe Luke did want him and he should chase it, flew out of his head as his usual lack of self-confidence reared its head. He had to be mistaken. Luke was going to gently let him down now, and things would be awkward for the rest of the night.

But then Luke leaned in more, his hand sliding from Adam’s chin up to his cheek, his thumb gently swiping back and forth across Adam’s skin.

“We shouldn’t,” Adam blurted out, instinct for preservation kicking in, instinct that told him that they could get caught—even if he, logically, didn’t know how or by whom.

Luke pulled back a little, dropping his hand from Adam’s cheek, but that only meant he put it on Adam’s hand, which Adam had been resting on the bar top. “I won’t tell if you won’t,” he said, grinning. “It’ll be our little secret.”

“A secret that could get us in trouble.”

“But how would anyone find out?” Luke countered, and well, there he had a very good point. There wasn’t really any way that this could get back to his bosses, not unless one of the investors saw fit to call Nash up and chat about their meeting which, why the hell would they?

“It’s against the rules,” Adam protested anyway. It sounded weak, even to his own ears.

Luke leaned in again, until his mouth was right at Adam’s ear and Adam could smell him, could feel the heat radiating off of him. All he had to do was turn his face just a little and they could kiss properly.

“Tell me you don’t want this,” Luke told him, his lips catching on the edge of Adam’s ear, making him shiver in spite of himself. “And we’ll go back to being… whatever we were. But I’ll know if you’re lying.”

Adam wanted to lie. He wanted to tell Luke that no, he wasn’t attracted to him, their make out session the night they met notwithstanding. But he couldn’t. Not with his blood rushing in his ears and his skin feeling too hot and too small, not when his fingers itched to sink into Luke’s soft light hair and the thin cotton of his t-shirt. Not when Luke could hear Adam’s breath catching and feel the heat of his skin as a flush worked its way over his face yet again.

“I do,” Adam admitted, because goddammit, he did want. He wanted to slide into Luke’s lap right that second and get those thick arms around him again, feel the play of muscles under his hands, suck the alcohol off of Luke’s tongue.

Luke pulled back, which seemed to be the opposite of what he’d said he wanted and was definitely the opposite of what Adam wanted. Then Luke grinned at him and gestured out at the bar around them.

While they had talked, it had gotten dark outside, and more people had filtered into the bar. Now music was playing, a little more loudly than it had when they’d first walked in, and people were dancing.

“I did say I’d take you out to a club, didn’t I?” Luke asked, grinning at him like someone had told him that Christmas had come early.

“This isn’t a proper club,” Adam replied. “And we can’t do that right now.”

“Why not? Seth’s busy with homework and sports and whatever the hell thing he’s volunteering for now. Matthew’s watching the bar. We have no place to be.”

Luke was right, but Adam still felt reluctant. He’d never done this before. He’d never been the crazy party guy, and it wasn’t just because of social awkwardness. He genuinely didn’t like the idea of going out and being surrounded by strangers.

He figured he owed Luke enough to say as much. “I’m just—not good with lots of people. I don’t see the appeal.”

“And I’m going to show you that when you’re with someone that you know, someone who can be your partner, that it’s actually quite enjoyable.” Luke winked at him and slid off his barstool—which meant he was standing right between Adam’s legs. “C’mon, gorgeous, you’ve done all this for me and we’re celebrating. Let me show you a good time.”

Adam was probably a very weak man for this, but he couldn’t say no to Luke when Luke was all pressed up against him like that and smiling softly like Adam was something special to him.

So, when Luke held out his hand, Adam took it.

The dance floor wasn’t too crowded yet, which was nice. It gave the two of them plenty of room as Luke led Adam out and into the middle of things. The music was just loud enough that Adam could feel the vibrations of the bass as it thrummed in the floors, making his body shake in time with the beat of the music. It was kind of exhilarating, actually, especially since it wasn’t so loud that it was making his teeth rattle in his jaw.

Turned out, Luke could actually dance. Maybe not anything that would be considered professional or strictly ballroom, but enough to put his hands on Adam’s hips and guide him around the dance floor. Luke would occasionally catch Adam’s hand in his, twirl him around, and do some complicated back step thing that Adam was only able to keep up with because he was too busy looking up into Luke’s face to freak out and look down at his feet.

“See?” Luke said, his voice just loud enough to be heard over the music. “You’re doing great.”

Adam grinned, feeling a little giddy. Yeah, this wasn’t so bad, he had to admit. He would even dare to say he was having fun, but he’d kind of already known that, seeing as he was doing this with Luke and he seemed incapable of being stern or his usual self when he was around Luke.

As more people filled in on the dance floor, they had to stop doing the more ballroom/Latin dance style thing they were doing (Adam honestly had no clue what dance style they’d been doing) and fall in close to each other. The music started to get more club-like, with more of that insistent beat working its way through the walls and the floor.

Luke grabbed his hips and pulled him in that last inch. They were facing one another, with Luke’s hands now sliding up to his back to make it so that their bodies were pressed almost completely up against one another. Adam had no choice but to put his arms at Luke’s shoulders, holding himself back just a bit, trying to keep some distance as his body started to go from just tingling in enjoyment and anticipation to being full-on lit up, charged with what was about to become arousal if he didn’t stop this.

“Relax,” Luke said, leaning in so that the word ghosted over Adam’s mouth.

“We are in public, in case you forgot,” Adam replied, keeping his tone completely even.

He should have known that Luke would sense the tease in those words, even though Adam tried to keep it deadpan. Luke chuckled and slid his thigh in between Adam’s legs, hitching it up so that it brushed in a dangerously intimate spot. Adam gasped, his hips grinding downward instinctively. It felt like all of his blood rushed down to pool low in his stomach and he wrapped his arms around Luke’s neck for leverage.

“That’s it,” Luke murmured. “Just let yourself go. Nobody’s watching. Nobody cares.”

It was true. There were several couples around them who seemed to be doing the same or similar steps out on the dance floor and everyone was overall too tipsy or caught up in dancing or their friends to pay attention to two random guys in the middle of the crowd.

Adam all but fell into Luke as Luke jolted his thigh up again. He groaned and Luke’s hands slid down to his ass, helping to guide him into a rhythm.

“I wouldn’t say this is dancing, exactly,” Adam breathed out, his mouth right at Luke’s ear. Thank God they were practically the same height despite the difference in their frames. It meant that they didn’t have to crane their necks to talk to one another and be heard over the growing din of music and chatter.

“It’s club dancing,” Luke assured him, and Adam groaned again as he felt the evidence of Luke’s own arousal bumping up against his own. “This is what you do at clubs.”

Adam dropped his forehead to Luke’s shoulder, his groans getting swallowed up by the music as Luke continued to move them together, the bang-bang-slide of the music becoming the rolling of their hips and bodies together until Adam couldn’t quite tell where the music ended and their dancing began.

He forced himself to pull back, to see Luke’s face, and ended up grinning when he caught Luke’s delighted expression. Luke hooked two fingers underneath Adam’s chin and tilted his head up so that they could rest their foreheads together, both of them smiling like idiots as they continued to move.

It wasn’t sex, not quite, although it was damn close to rutting against one another. It wasn’t quite enough pressure or speed for that though. Instead it was teasing, almost but not enough to do anything except drive Adam slowly crazy as one song slid slickly into another.

He couldn’t say how long they had been dancing. Time seemed immaterial. There were what felt like dozens of songs playing, but he couldn’t tell enough difference between them to really know. They honestly all sounded the same to him. And what did it matter, anyway, how long they’d been there? They had all night, as Luke had pointed out. He’d been out of town for barely a day, and so Nash would have no reason to be concerned or to check on him. Luke’s responsibilities were taken care of for now.

It was just them and the music, and they could do this for as long as they wanted—so they did.

With Luke holding him and guiding him around the dance floor, Adam could finally see why people liked clubbing. He didn’t understand how someone could find a total stranger and do this with them, but with someone he knew and trusted and was attracted to—someone like Luke—Adam was enjoying it. He could press up against Luke, instead of being jostled by strangers, Luke’s strong arms and their close proximity keeping everyone else just far enough away from them, creating a little bubble just for the two of them.

The state of arousal that Adam was in only heightened everything, and made it better. There was the thick slide of alcohol in his veins, making him a little buzzed, but he definitely hadn’t had enough to get fully drunk. He was coasting on it, and on the sparks of pleasure that flew every time that his and Luke’s hips connected and their bodies ground against each other’s.

They would kiss occasionally as well, hard, fast, brutal kisses when the music was pounding, and slow, sucking ones when there was a dip. Luke kept laughing into Adam’s mouth, like he was surprised and delighted that Adam was doing this with him. Luke’s hands were roaming all over Adam’s back and sides, squeezing his ass, one time even dipping him like they were in a romance film.

Luke only laughed harder when Adam punched him lightly in the chest as he drew Adam back up.

After what felt like hours, but could very well have only been forty-five minutes, Luke spun Adam around so that Adam’s back was plastered to Luke’s chest. One of Luke’s arms came around like a vise at Adam’s waist, pinning him up against Luke, while the other slid up Adam’s inner thigh to thumb open Adam’s fly.

Adam’s breath hitched and his head fell back against Luke’s shoulder. “Luke, we’re—” He gasped as Luke ground up against his ass, letting Adam know just how turned on he was. “We’re—anyone could—”

“Nobody’s looking,” Luke reminded him. He slid his mouth over Adam’s neck, his lips wet and swollen from all of their kisses and his breath hot against Adam’s sweaty skin, making him shiver.

This was the kind of ludicrous thing that Adam never did. He’d always played it straight—the irony of that phrase notwithstanding—getting all his homework turned in on time, following curfew, getting plenty of sleep, and so on. He had sex in a bed, in someone’s bedroom. He didn’t have sex in the kitchen or against the wall and certainly not in a club.

But he really, really didn’t want to stop.

He liked that Luke was so daring about this, holding onto that kind of bad boy edge that Adam never indulged in himself and wouldn’t have thought to do on his own but was happy to give in to if Luke was leading him there. They could so easily get in trouble for this and Adam didn’t care, because Luke didn’t care. It made Adam feel reckless.

It was also pretty damn flattering that Luke was so hungry for him that he couldn’t wait a second longer to get his hands on him. That was intoxicating in and of itself.

Then Luke’s hand slid inside Adam’s pants, gripping Adam’s hardened cock.

Adam arched up into the touch, eyes flying open, the sensation painfully good after teasing and the sort of rutting against each other had gone on for so long.

“Yeah, that’s it,” Luke growled, moving his hand up and down. It wasn’t much, with both Adam’s cock and Luke’s hand still trapped inside of Adam’s pants, but it was enough to have Adam’s body on fire in the best way. “Let go, just like that.”

Adam moaned helplessly, one hand wrapping around the back of Luke’s neck to tangle in his hair and the other tightly gripping the arm Luke had around his waist.

Luke gave him a squeeze around the base and Adam panted harshly against Luke’s neck, struggling to maintain some kind of composure.

“Gorgeous,” Luke murmured. “Be as loud as you want, nobody can hear over the music.”

The dirty-wrong edge of it, of doing this out in public, was just making everything so much hotter. Somebody could look over. Somebody could hear them... but nobody was. It sent a wild thrill up Adam’s spine.

Luke sped up a little more and Adam began to moan obscenely, his hips jerking without finesse as they tried desperately to set up a proper rhythm.

“Not yet,” Luke growled, withdrawing his hand. Adam let out a very undignified whine, one he’d definitely deny making if Luke brought it up later. “I want to see you completely undone.”

“Oh God,” Adam choked out as Luke’s hand stroked soothingly up and down Adam’s thighs.

“Do you have any idea how hard it was to keep my hands off of you all day?” Luke asked, his mouth right at Adam’s ear. “Even when I wanted to punch you this morning, you were so damn hot, I kind of wanted to take you over my knee instead.”

The idea of that—of Luke’s hand sliding over his ass only to smack it a second later, of Luke making him beg—it made Adam shiver all over.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Luke asked, sounding a little wrecked at the realization. Adam was pleased to know that he wasn’t the only one affected by this. Although the hard bulge rubbing obscenely against his ass was pretty good proof in and of itself.

Luke’s hand came back to rub Adam’s cock through the fabric of his slacks, not dipping inside this time. The feeling of the fabric rubbing over his sensitive cock just made Adam want to yell with pleasure and frustration. He needed a proper hand or a mouth on him, something, to relieve the pressure building in the base of his spine.

“You sound so desperate,” Luke practically cooed, sounding far too pleased at how he was managing to take Adam apart. “I wondered if this was how you’d be. When we were kissing last night, you were so responsive. You were practically shaking in my arms.”

Was it only last night that they’d first met and kissed? It felt so far away. In fact the entire rest of the day felt far away, as if dancing together on the edge of pleasure on the dance floor was all that they had done and all that mattered. Adam could feel himself shaking now, just like Luke had described him doing the night before. When Luke’s hand came up to thumb at his nipples through his shirt, Adam let out another whine through clenched teeth.

“Oh, very good,” Luke said. “You’re just so into this. I could make you come apart right here in front of everyone, couldn’t I?”

Adam tried to talk, but Luke’s hand slid into his pants again and all he could manage was a kind of strangled grunt.

Luke sucked lightly at Adam’s neck for a moment before speaking again. “Would you let me? Can I? Can I take you apart right here?”

Adam closed his eyes. A part of him was rearing back in horror at the idea of coming like this right in the middle of a crowd. But another part of him was reveling in it, in the taboo of it, the naughtiness of it. With Luke muttering filth in his ear and encouraging him, Adam could so easily see it as those bad boy fantasies he’d had when he was in high school, idly dreaming, but they’d never been something that he’d ever act upon. He’d never seek someone out like that.

Until now.

Luke’s days of being a player might be behind him, partially through his own choice and partially because of what had happened with his parents, but he seemed more than happy to slide back into old habits to make this unbelievably hot for the both of them. That gave Adam the foundation of trust he needed to just let go. Luke in this club, right now, was sexy and dangerous and rule-breaking. The Luke that Adam had already seen was also concerned for other people, responsible, thoughtful, capable, and willing to stand up and fight for what was left of his family.

The responsible Luke underneath the bad boy Luke he was seeing now let him trust, and give into what was happening, and let go, because unlike some anonymous bad boy he’d run into by chance at a club like this, he knew that Luke would catch him if he fell.

Metaphorically speaking, of course, Adam wasn’t planning on actually falling.

Then Luke nipped at his earlobe and his knees went weak and he thought hey, maybe he would actually fall after all.

“Say this is okay,” Luke said, his voice rough and raw. His hand was still moving slowly over Adam’s cock, the grip tight but not fast enough. Adam could feel himself leaking, liquid sliding over his cock and over Luke’s fist, making the movements easier and more pleasurable—and harder to resist.

“I need to hear you say it,” Luke growled. Adam arched helplessly, moaning as Luke sped up. “I want to see you fall apart, c’mon, Adam, you need to tell me if you want me to stop because I don’t want to—”

“Don’t,” Adam choked out. He thought that he just might die if Luke stopped now. “Please, don’t, I want—keep going, don’t stop—”

Luke let out a hiss of triumph and angled his head to pull Adam into a hot, bruising kiss. His hand sped up and he twisted his wrist, and Adam couldn’t help it. He went stiff, his hips jerking twice before shuddering to a halt as he completely ruined his pants.

He didn’t think a quick ironing was going to fix this.

Adam sagged back against Luke, who groaned in response, finally pulling away from Adam’s mouth to take in the sight of his face. “Holy shit,” Luke murmured. His eyes tracked Adam’s gaze, his slack mouth, and then trailed along his body to take in Adam’s heaving chest and twitching hips. “That was—fuck you’re hot.”

Then he was spinning Adam, turning him around to crush them together and kiss him properly and there was really no way that anyone around them could mistake what they were doing for dancing now.

Luke pulled away, both of them breathless. Adam felt kind of like the world had gone blurry around the edges, but he could feel that spike of arousal coming back. He wasn’t a teenager, he wasn’t getting it up right away, but his body was making a valiant effort to try, especially when he could feel how hard Luke was, and the desperation edged in the way that Luke grabbed at him.

They broke apart, gasping. “Follow me,” Luke growled, taking his hand.

As if Adam would have done anything else.

Luke led him through the crowd, and Adam tried very hard not to look like someone who’d just gotten a hand job in the middle of the dance floor and was now probably headed somewhere else to get more than just a hand job.

Adam almost balked when he saw the bathroom door. “Are you trying to be a cliché?” He demanded, but there was no bite to his words.

Luke threw him a look that was both amused and hot as fuck. “They’re clichés for a reason, you know,” he told him, then yanked Adam inside and whipped around to lock the door behind them.

Adam wasn’t sure which one of them moved first, him or Luke, but it didn’t matter because then they were kissing in earnest, tongues sliding hot and insistent into one another’s mouths, arms and legs intertwining around each other like they were sex-starved teenagers. Adam was glad that nobody else was in the bathroom at the moment, although he supposed that locked door was going to start pissing people off pretty quickly.

The thought made him laugh, and he pushed his chuckles up into Luke’s mouth, fingers spearing into his hair to hold him in place so that Adam could better lick at the corners of his mouth.

“What is it?” Luke asked, grinning, his fingers trailing teasingly over Adam’s sides.

“Nothing.” Adam shook his head. “Just—I feel like I’m finally acting on all those stupid teenage fantasies I had about being reckless and…”

“Making up for all of that lost time when you could have been breaking rules?” Luke finished for him. He was grinning at him, but not like he was laughing at Adam for being a rule follower. It was too fond for that. Adam tried not to read too much into it. If he did, he feared he’d be chancing more of his heart than he cared to.

“Something like that,” Adam replied, grinning back at Luke and hoping that his sort-of besotted feelings didn’t leak through. It was ridiculous that this of all things would be what got him to start having butterflies around Luke, but there it was. He just had to tamp those butterflies down.

It was really hard to, though, when Luke thumbed at his dimples like that. Adam could see Luke clearly thinking ‘adorable’ even if he didn’t say it out loud.

“C’mere,” Luke said, and for a moment it was like they weren’t in a club-slash-bar bathroom at all. It was like they were somewhere else entirely. Luke kissed him slow and deep and kind of sweet, the kind of kiss that Adam could just go pliant in. He let Luke slowly work his tongue into his mouth and leaned all of his weight against him, letting Luke hold him up.

It was the sort of kiss that Adam would expect to have on a beach somewhere, or maybe in a fancy European city like Paris, with soft lamplights shining everywhere and maybe some ridiculous romantic music playing in the background. It was easy to sink into it and give over to it, to the feeling of it.

However, they weren’t somewhere out romantic and public—they were in a restroom at a club, and a locked and empty restroom at that. It was only a matter of time before the kiss started to turn filthy as they remembered where they were.

Luke’s hands had fallen to Adam’s hips but started roaming again, sliding up to untuck his shirt and slide up underneath. He turned Adam, or Adam let himself be turned, he wasn’t sure, until he was propped up against the edge of the sink and all but bent backwards as Luke pressed him down, down, down.

Adam spread his legs, trying to get Luke to move things along, but Luke seemed to be a bit lost in sucking a determined hickey into Adam’s neck, just above his collar. “You and your suit,” Luke growled, “and your goddamn tie, looking so put together. Makes me want to just mess you up properly.”

“Go on then,” Adam said, rutting against Luke to make his point. His cock was starting to show an interest again, and the more he pressed against Luke and snapped his hips, the harder he got. “Mess me up, country boy. Show me how it’s done.”

Luke pulled his head back so that he could give Adam a savage grin. It made heat shoot through Adam and he shivered violently, practically panting at the force of pure want that hit him. Fuck, this felt dirty and so, so hot.

They didn’t even bother really getting their clothes off—Luke all but attacked Adam’s pants, helping him to shove them down, while Adam did the same with Luke’s pants, laughing as his fingers fumbled. Luke pulled a small package of lube and a condom out of his wallet, playfully batting Adam’s hands away as Adam mock-fought him for it.

“I should probably chastise you for having supplies,” Adam said, trying for stern and failing completely, since Luke was turning him around and pressing sucking, open-mouthed kisses along the back of his neck.

“What can I say? I’m generally an optimistic person,” Luke replied, tearing open the lube. He was using his bulk to pin Adam to the sink, and Adam really, really shouldn’t be so turned on by Luke’s casual use of his strength, but dammit he was.

“Just relax for me, city boy,” Luke purred in his ear, his hand sliding down to spread Adam open. For a moment he just teased, fingers circling the rim, catching on it, until Adam was pushing back into him.

“We’re in a goddamn public restroom, Luke,” he reminded him. “If you won’t get down to business, then I’ll take care of it myself.”

Luke growled and bit the back of Adam’s neck, sliding a finger inside. “Maybe next time,” he whispered, voice thick and low and distressingly attractive.

Adam wriggled his hips, clenching around the one finger inside of him. It felt good, far too good—it had been a long time since he’d liked a guy enough, or had a guy like him enough, for it to end in sex—but it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly all that he wanted.

Luke groaned behind him, gently placing a hand on the middle of Adam’s back. Despite still having his shirt on, it felt like he could feel the heat of Luke’s hand seeping into him, branding him. “Eager, are we?”

“It’s been a while, okay?” Adam snapped, feeling defensive.

He could hear Luke inhale sharply, and then let out a sound that was almost a chuckle, something fond and low. “You’re going to be the death of me,” he said, and it was just dirty talk, but it sounded a little like a promise of some kind.

Adam rolled his eyes in response, but he couldn’t fully suppress the smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. Luke added a second finger, working him a little more quickly than Adam was used to, but he didn’t mind. There was an urgency to this, a frantic edge to things, what with the possibility of being caught and their location. It meant that it felt right for Luke to work him open quickly like this, for Adam to feel the pleasure-pain of it, that burn around the edges that he hadn’t properly let himself feel in a long time.

It also helped that he was so turned on he could hardly think. When he looked up in the mirror, he could see himself, and Luke standing behind him. None of his previous dates had gotten him so turned on, not even when they were actually in the middle of the act. Somewhere along the way, sex had become routine, something pleasurable but nothing that made his blood sing.

He’d all but forgotten how sex, or the possibility of it—or even, really, the possibility of doing anything physical whatsoever with another person—had made him almost uncontrollable when he was a teenager. Back then, the idea of sex had been exciting. It had been new and unexplored territory, and nearly everything had gotten him hard.

Now he was feeling a little like that again. Okay, a lot like that again. But there was none of that franticness that had come with being young and inexperienced, that desperation that you had never had this before, and might not get this again. This was anticipation and desperation because he knew what was coming, wanted it, craved it, had felt it before and therefore knew just how damn good it could be... how good Luke was going to make it.

Adam didn’t really like looking at himself in the mirror. He wasn’t a narcissist, and he wasn’t all that into looking at himself while he was in the middle of sex. He did like that the position gave him a marvelous view of Luke—but also Luke and him together. Somehow it was different when he was looking at the both of them.

Luke was standing over him, t-shirt rucked up, hair mussed beyond all recognition, and his lips red and thicker than usual from kissing. Adam could see how broad his shoulders were, and how the sweat made his shirt stick to his skin, outlining the muscles underneath. Adam could also see, really, for the first time, how they fit together. How large Luke’s hand looked spread across Adam’s back. How Adam’s dressy clothes and Luke’s well-worn casual ones complimented and contrasted one another. How Luke’s tan skin looked against Adam’s paler complexion.

They made quite a scene. In fact, if Adam could have taken a picture of it, he would have been tempted to, just so that he could keep this moment fresh in his mind and could go back to look at it whenever he wanted. He looked so completely claimed in the mirror. Luke’s fingers were sliding in and out of him, slick and easy now, his body accepting them greedily. He could see the strain in Luke’s arm, the way he bit his lip in concentration, how his breath huffed in and out of his nose as he tried to rein in his arousal. Adam looked completely at Luke’s mercy and he loved the image that it made, getting all dirtied up and owned, just a little bit.

Luke added a third finger and Adam groaned, trying to spread his legs wider as Luke scissored him open. It was a little rough but Adam made pleased keening noises. Sparks were flying up and down his spine, and Luke’s fingers kept brushing up against his prostate, making Adam’s eyes try and roll back into his head. Fuck, it had been a long time.

“Please,” he groaned out, all but shoving himself back onto Luke’s fingers. “C’mon, Luke, please, I’m ready.”

“You sure?” Luke asked, leaning over him. He moved his hand from Adam’s back to cup his chin, tilting his head up so that their eyes met in the mirror. “You look so good like this,” Luke admitted. “All gorgeous and strung out. You’re starving for it, aren’t you?”

“What do you think?” Adam asked, because he might say ‘please’ but he wasn’t about to completely roll over and beg just yet.

Luke kissed his temple and removed his fingers. Adam clenched reflexively, upset at the loss, but then he heard the rip of the condom and—oh fuck, Luke was opening it with his teeth, why did he have to make everything ten times sexier than he had to—and then he felt Luke’s cock nudging at his entrance.

“Finally,” Adam sighed out, willing himself to relax. Luke slid in slowly, inch by inch. “This might be the most gentle restroom fuck ever.”

“And I’m sure you’ve had many other restroom fucks to compare it to,” Luke replied, scattering kisses up and down Adam’s spine so that the words ended up mouthed against Adam’s skin.

“Oh, loads,” Adam replied, but his voice sounded strangled as Luke pushed himself in another inch. “Totally—every weekend—”

The rest of his snarky sentence died with a nngh sound in the back of his throat as he felt Luke bottom out inside of him. Luke shifted, exploring, and Adam was about to ask what the hell he was doing and why didn’t he get on with it when he felt Luke press right up against that perfect spot.

Adam’s mouth fell open and he gasped. Luke’s grin in the mirror was wicked. “There it is,” he murmured, and oh, Adam could see the filthy promise in Luke’s eyes even before Luke began to move.

Luke pulled out and slammed back in, hitting that spot perfectly. Adam all but yelled, his hands scrambling to find something to brace himself with. Now it felt like one of those anonymous dirty club fucks, Luke’s pace punishing and hard and fast, but Adam was far from complaining. He craved it, loved the jolt as Luke snapped his hips, the pleasure spiking up and down his body. It was almost like when he was sick and had a wildly fluctuating fever, but so, oh so much better, heat rising and falling within him in time with Luke’s thrusts and all of it pushing him closer to the peak.

He finally had to brace himself by pressing his hands up against the mirror. It meant that he could shove himself back, meet Luke thrust for thrust, which had Luke’s eyes sliding shut and his mouth falling open. Luke was kind of silent as he moved, but Adam could see his chest heaving in the mirror and the sweat sliding down his temple, and after a moment, he began to pick up on the little ah ah ah noises that Luke made on each exhale.

Yes, he thought, clenching around Luke’s cock to make him stutter and swear. Perfect.

Adam locked eyes with himself in the mirror momentarily. He looked like a mess. His hair was flopping all over the place and his face was going pink with exertion. There was sweat everywhere. His eyes were glazed, like he couldn’t really see what was in front of him.

He looked completely undone, and Luke had done that to him. He felt a surge of pleasure and oddly pride, as if he was proud that Luke had managed to do what pretty much no other person had, taking him apart like this and making him drop every part of his straight-laced persona.

“I’m—” Luke warned, but then he just reached around and grabbed Adam’s cock.

Adam gave a yelp that quickly turned into a moan as Luke began to pull him off, thick, hard strokes that matched how his hips sped up. Yes, Adam thought, pleasure assaulting him from all sides, making him writhe uncontrollably. Yes, yes, yes.

It took him a minute to realize he was saying that out loud.

“Beautiful,” Luke said, finally starting to get vocal again. “Just—gorgeous, like this, Adam, please, I want to see you—show me, show me, want to see you come undone for me—”

Luke leaned down, biting at Adam’s shoulder, and that was another kink that apparently he had that either he hadn’t known about or only Luke brought out in him, but either way it didn’t matter. He came with a shout, clawing at the mirror, everything whiting out around him as his hips jerked wildly.

He could hear Luke swear again and then an arm was wrapping like a vise around his waist and Luke was shoving into him, hips jerking a final time and then going stiff and still as he spilled into the condom.

Part of Adam was disappointed that they’d used protection. He kind of wanted to feel Luke filling him up properly, get the sensation of that hot liquid sliding out of him, down his inner thighs.

Maybe next time.

That jolted him. There wasn’t going to be a next time, certainly not—even if there was a next time, it wasn’t like—they had to wait for that kind of thing, and he and Luke weren’t going to be together long enough for that to happen.

Adam silently cursed himself for obviously getting more attached than he should be to this. This was something that shouldn’t have happened in the first place, this was just him and Luke having fun and Adam giving in for once and actually doing the ‘bad’ thing. This wasn’t anything else and it couldn’t be and it was stupid of him to start thinking of it that way.

He pushed himself up off the sink and turned, nearly falling into Luke. Luke’s chest was still heaving, and he gave Adam a dopey, blissed-out grin, the edge of it still a bit sharp. His hands came up, wrapping around Adam to help him stay upright, and what was Adam supposed to do with that except put his hands on Luke’s chest to steady himself? And when Luke leaned in and kissed him, messy and satisfied, how could he do anything except kiss back, his hands coming up to slide into Luke’s damp hair once more?

“I say…” Luke murmured, each word making his lips move against Adam’s, “we head on back. You stay at my place for the night.”

His hand pushed up underneath Adam’s shirt, mapping out the planes of his stomach. Adam trembled, feeling oversensitive, helpless against Luke’s hands and mouth. He was a complete mess, inside and out. He kind of hated Luke for it, but he also really didn’t mind. He even dared to think that he would have loved it, if only he’d known that it would last much longer than it was going to.

“I have to warn you, though,” Luke went on, and he kissed the damp, delicate skin just behind Adam’s ear. “I don’t plan on us getting a whole lot of sleep.”

Adam shivered. He was weak. This was the part where he should say no, he really had to go back to his motel and get some sleep and book his flight, and generally go back to being the professional that he prided himself on being. He’d helped out Luke immensely, which cleared his conscience, and he’d indulged himself in this little tryst at the club. That should be enough.

He was weak though... and greedy. He didn’t want Luke to stop touching him. He wanted Luke in him again, this time above him. He wanted to do this properly, on a bed, where they could each take their time. He wanted to get his mouth on Luke’s cock and suck it down until Luke was crying out his name.

He wanted more of Luke, any way he could get him.

“Okay,” Adam said, letting Luke all but manhandle him and kiss him all over. Someone was pounding on the bathroom door and yelling something about hurrying up, but for a moment, Adam just let himself drift. In that moment, nothing was real except for Luke’s hands and mouth, the warm solid heat of his body surrounding Adam. “Okay, let’s do that.”

Luke pulled back, and his grin was nothing short of delighted.

Adam kind of thought he’d do almost anything to keep that grin on Luke’s face.