Houston
“I’d recognize that ass. There’s no way he’s one of the models.” Andrew’s words were low as he hunched over the phone, claiming to be researching while really just using Reece and his buddies as an opportunity to look at the site.
When they’d walked in, I’d been floored. Not only were Reece’s friends dressed even sluttier than he was, Eli was clearly wearing pink panties under his jeans. A few of the other customers didn’t get it and made some comments, but most of them didn’t even seem to care.
Until he started teasing and writhing on the table, trying to outdo Rand.
Then they cared a lot, and if the wave of dirty comments was any indication, they loved it. Reece was just grinning and laughing at their antics, then adjusted his cock, clearly turned on by the two flirty men.
He was turned on by the men.
Eli’s panties didn’t even seem to give him a second’s pause, either.
Watching him—them—made it hard to think. Andrew had caught my attention as soon as they’d walked in, and in seconds had the site up, giving me all the information on their work. When he’d started guessing about Reece’s role, I’d explained that he was my new roommate and had said he did the computers and web stuff for the site.
Andrew had enthusiastically exclaimed that Reece should be in front of the camera…and he just needed to poke around to find him on the site. I had to agree, just not out loud. I was trying to maintain some composure, but I wasn’t sure it was working. He’d said he worked on computers and website design. That was it.
“You planning on abducting him or something? Should I be worried?” Jake finally made his way over to us. When Rand was just chatting with the guys, enough customers had gotten bored with what Andrew called “the floor show” that they’d swamped the bar, looking for new drinks.
“No. He lives with me.”
That had his curiosity going because he ignored calls from customers and the crazy sounds coming from everyone as the Dom carried the little server off to the back of the bar again. Those two went at it like rabbits.
Jake lifted one eyebrow. “Care to explain?”
“No.”
Andrew giggled. “He’s Houston’s new roommate. Houston has a huge crush on him, but hasn’t seemed to have done anything about it.”
I just shrugged. “I kinda thought he was straight. I asked about his last serious relationship, ’cause he said he was single, and it was a woman.”
Jake snorted. “He’s clearly not straight.”
Grinning, Andrew nodded, then looked over at me and gave me a you’re-an-idiot expression. “What rock have you been living under? He’s got to be bi or something like that.” Shaking his head, he held up one hand. “Gay.” Then, holding up his other, he started talking like I was a five-year-old. “Straight.”
Making sure he had my attention, he paused, then kept going. “It’s not just gay or straight. You know this. There’s all those fun options in the middle.”
“I—” I honestly hadn’t thought about it. Shrugging, I felt slightly bad. “He didn’t say anything about guys.”
“Because you’ve been sooo approachable.” Andrew rolled his eyes. “I bet you barked out something like ‘I’m He-Man gay guy, I’m bad-ass and aggressive,’ huh?” Andrew didn’t even wait for a response. “He probably thought you wouldn’t understand.”
Possibly.
“You’re nuts.”
Andrew smirked. “That doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”
Ignoring that part, as well as the passionate cries from the back that sounded like Rand had finally gotten out of that cock cage, I went back to watching Reece. He knew I was staring. He didn’t make any attempt to hide it. His friends kept laughing and looking in my direction, then he’d glance down at the table and peek back at me.
They were clearly teasing him about something that had to do with me, but I had a feeling I wasn’t the butt of their jokes. Could they actually be teasing him about liking me? Or at least being curious about something? I still wasn’t sure he had any experience with men.
“We’ve established he’s clearly not straight. That doesn’t answer my question.” Jake gave me a long look, but I couldn’t remember what he’d asked. I just shrugged, and he sighed, clearly finding my intelligence lacking. “Should I be worried?”
“No.” I shook my head. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but it didn’t involve anything creepy.
“Yes,” Andrew sighed, contradicting me. “Because he’ll go back to ignoring whatever is going on between them. It’ll be tragic.”
Jake snorted, shaking his head. “This is not a free live porn show just for you, or the naughty gay version of the Hallmark channel. Leave him alone.”
Andrew started to sulk. “But—”
Jake shook his head. “No buts. Leave him alone. If he wants to blow off a hot guy just because he’s scared the sexy, clearly curious guy who works with half-naked male lingerie models all day won’t like his panties, that’s his decision.”
I snorted. “Asshole.”
“Yup.” Jake nodded, giving me a wicked grin. “But this asshole gets to go home with a horny lover who’s been fantasizing about all kinds of dirty shit for the past hour and you, my friend, are probably going to end up with that right hand because you don’t want to take a chance.”
Low blow—but he was right.
As Jake walked to the other end of the bar, barking at people to calm down, Andrew laughed. “He’s right. I love coming on nights Rand works. Best free porn ever.”
Shaking my head, I leaned back and watched Reece. Was he over there thinking the same thing? As much as I wanted to ask, I couldn’t. He was my roommate. I didn’t want him to think that he’d get tossed out if things didn’t work out between us, but I didn’t want to live with him if he was attracted to me but couldn't handle the domination.
Rock, meet hard place. It’s horny and attracted to someone it probably can’t have.
****
When Andrew started giggling, I should’ve known something was up. In my defense, he was hunched over his phone texting someone, so that wasn’t a strange enough sight to raise my suspicions. When Eli started laughing across the room, however, that was enough to make me curious.
“What are you doing?”
Andrew gave me a quick “Nothing.”
Right. “I wasn’t born yesterday.”
Andrew snorted and started to say something, but then started laughing and nodding. Texting furiously and doing something with some kind of drawing app, he took a few seconds before he responded. “You're blind enough you could’ve been.”
“Ass.”
“That’s my nickname, sweet cheeks. What’d he do?” Jake finally made his way back over and leaned against the bar. Rand and his master were back from their fun, with Rand having just enough of a sleepy, tousled look that everyone knew what they’d been up to. The customers were having a wonderful time ribbing him about it, but they were still keeping Jake hopping.
“I don’t know, but he’s up to something.” Leaning over, I tried to see what he was doing, but he moved the phone out of my sight as Eli started laughing again.
Jake just leaned over and grabbed it from Andrew’s hand. Andrew started sputtering and whining, but he didn’t protest too loudly. He mostly was trying not to laugh as Jake started skimming back through the messages. Jake finally snorted and looked up at Andrew. “Does Reece know what you two jokers are doing?”
Andrew finally stopped giggling and sighed. “Not exactly, but Eli started it.”
“Andrew.” Jake growled the word out.
Andrew just blinked at him innocently. “But it’s funny, right?”
Jake shook his head, but his eyes were dancing. “Houston’s going to kill you, and I might let him.”
What the fuck had he done?
“What? Why would Reece be involved? What the fuck is going on?” When I didn’t get an answer right away, I stood up. I was too old for this shit. As I pushed away from the bar, Andrew reached out to grab my arm.
“Don’t go. I’m sorry.” He seemed slightly contrite, but I wasn’t buying it.
“Not going to ask again. My patience for this is shot.” I’d been the butt of enough jokes to recognize when I wasn’t going to like what would happen next.
Jake gave Andrew an I-told-you-so look and handed the phone over to me. “Scroll through.”
The first part didn’t make sense, some kind of picture attachment that he’d received in a text. I looked at the top of the screen and saw it was from Eli. Refusing to glance across the room, I scrolled up to see what it was.
Check yes or no?
It had two boxes in the picture, each with a “yes” and “no” option. “What is this shit? Are you in elementary school again?”
Jake’s firm voice cut through my frustration. “With those messages, you might want to guess older. Keep going up.”
Dread was creeping up on me as I moved my finger down the screen. Shit. It was exactly like one of those old letters that were passed around when I was a kid. Do you like me? Check yes or no.
However, in this case, it had a decidedly more adult tone. Does he want to do something kinky with Reece? Then the obligatory yes and no boxes. Yes was checked, and he’d sent it right before Jake had grabbed the phone.
“Fuck.”
“It only gets more interesting. You might want to start at the beginning.” Jake’s voice made it clear he was trying not to laugh.
Forcing my finger to move, I went to the start of their conversation. Andrew was right about one thing—Eli had started it. The first one was a bad picture of Reece with the caption, Does Houston like me? on the bottom. Andrew had texted back, LMAO yes. From there, it’d just kept going.
Does he want to hold Reece’s hand?
Does Reece want to kiss him?
Does Houston want to fuck him?
Does Reece want to top?
The messages went on and on. Fuck. “What the hell were you thinking? He’s going to think I’m nuts.” Especially with the kinky one.
“Um, probably not.” Andrew shrugged and pointed to one I hadn’t gotten to yet. Does Houston want to dominate Reece? It was the little comment after that which caught my attention. Because Reece would love that, he’s a sub.
What. The. Fuck.
“Um, read the one under that too.” Andrew’s excitement was starting to show again.
I didn’t even want to look. “Andrew, I’m gonna—”
He broke in, smirking. “Love me forever and ever.”
Now I had to see. I glanced down again and saw the question part half-covered. Adjusting it so I could read what he’d messaged, I bypassed the yes answer he’d sent Eli and went to the next one. Is Reece bi? My finger moved on the screen before I even thought about what I was doing. The response made my heart start pounding in my throat.
Yes. Now ask me if he’s been with men.
That answer was clearly no by the next image that came up on his phone. I was having a hard time wrapping my mind around everything I was seeing. According to Eli, Reece was bi, attracted to me, had never been with a guy, was kinky, and looking for a Dom.
It had to be a lie.
“Don’t fuck with people. Next time you two pull this shit someone is actually going to believe you. Then what are you going to do?” I wasn’t going to fall for this.
Andrew’s head tilted, and he gave me a look like I was an idiot. “Um, congratulate them for being smart and wish them luck with their newly found curious kind-of-virgin, who wants to be spanked and do kinky shit?”
He gave me a little nod, looking very serious. “Yeah, Eli’s not being a shit. Well, he is, but he’s an honest shit. And you should totally play up the virgin thing because that could be a hot scene.”
For fuck's sake.
“Andrew!” I’d had enough. My whole fucking life was out there on his phone and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. At that point, I didn’t even know how to respond. Sure, Reece was going to want the panty-wearing Dom who was kind of an ass sometimes and who clearly didn’t have the right kind of friends. “I’m just done.”
Stepping back from the bar, I turned and walked out, refusing to look at Jake, Andrew, or god forbid Reece. I was going to have to find a new roommate again, new friends, and fuck—even worse, a new bar.
Andrew called out and there was a commotion behind me, but I didn’t care. They could go fuck themselves. I didn’t want or need that kind of drama in my life, and I wasn’t going to set myself up for even more.