“I want to fuck you.” Liam hadn’t known how true it was until he said it, but as he stared at Zac, taking in his slender frame and clear complexion, set off by the greenest eyes Liam had ever seen, he suddenly craved the very thing he’d left the club to avoid.
Zac smirked, like he’d known Liam was a good bet all along. “We need to go over some stuff first, so we both know what we’re getting into.”
“Okay.” Liam chanced a surreptitious glance around what he could see of the flat, taking in the bare walls and basic furniture. “Do we need to sit down for that?”
“Not especially, but I could go for a whiskey. You want anything?”
More booze sounded like the worst idea Liam had ever heard, but he trailed Zac into the sparse living room anyway, and accepted an oversized shot of Grouse, perching on the arm of the couch while he waited for Zac to spit out whatever he needed to say before they got what they’d come here for.
Zac sat on the coffee table, relaxed and nonchalant, like he’d had a stranger over for sex a hundred times. “It’s simple really. Cash up front and no sex without a condom—oh, and I don’t do kissing and small talk.”
“No kissing?” Liam couldn’t suppress a laugh. “Thought this wasn’t Pretty Woman?”
Zac scowled. “Them’s the rules. Take them or leave them.”
Okaaaaay. Liam retrieved his wallet and counted out five twenty-pound notes. He held them up, dangling them an inch from Zac’s face. “I’ll take it.”
Zac took the money and stuffed it, without checking, in a drawer in the coffee table. “Do you have any questions?”
“Me? No.”
“Sure? Don’t want you freaking out halfway through.”
Why not? Surely, if he bolted before they were done, Zac would get paid for half a job, but he kept that theory to himself and considered Zac’s question while Zac topped up their glasses. A million responses sprung to mind, but none seemed appropriate, or anything less than stupid. Zac had covered most of the bases with his Edward Lewis rules: no barebacking, kissing, or talking. What else was there to say? It wasn’t like those things had been high on Liam’s agenda anyway. Jesus Christ, he just wanted—needed—to get laid.
He glanced around again, searching for the bedroom. “Do you live here alone?”
“Sometimes.”
Liam raised an eyebrow. “‘Sometimes’? What does that mean?”
“Exactly what I said. I share this place with a . . . colleague, but they’re away at the moment. Don’t worry. We’re all alone.”
Colleague. It took Liam a moment to catch on. Dear God, was this some kind of brothel? But the notion left him intrigued rather than perturbed, and as Zac rose from the coffee table and stepped forward, it was clear the time for talk had passed.
Zac spread his hands. “How do you want me?”
“Naked,” Liam said without thinking. “Where’s your bedroom?”
“Follow me.”
Zac led Liam back into the hallway and to a closed door. On the other side was a room as utilitarian as the rest of the flat—a bed, a chest of drawers, and a large mirror.
The mirror stopped Liam in his tracks. “Is this the room you always use?”
“It’s my room.”
Fair enough. Liam ventured further into the room, then stopped as he realised he had no idea what to do next. This wasn’t like fucking around with a friend—tumbling to the bed and kissing the hell out of each other until the chips fell as they may. This was something else.
Zac turned to face him. “Do you want me to take your clothes off?”
“What?”
“Your clothes,” Zac repeated. “This works better if we’re both naked.”
“This works better.” Zac’s choice of words got under Liam’s skin. This is a job to him. Strip me, fuck me, then send me on my way. For the first time, a flicker of doubt bloomed in his belly. Was he really going to do this? Fuck a stranger, a hooker, all in the name of distracting himself from old ghosts?
Liam’s mind began to fragment, drifting to places he didn’t want it to go, showing him faces he didn’t want to see: Rosa, Mike, Dad. What the fuck would they think if they knew where he was? And what about Cory? Liam closed his eyes. Till death do us part . . .
