“Yes, but I also meant for…” He didn’t finish his statement, instead reaching across the counter and plucking at my hoodie.
“For dressing for the weather?”
“For moving on,” he said.
I swallowed hard.
Was that what I was doing? It hadn’t been my plan, and it didn’t feel that way to me, but Damon wasn’t so far off base with the statement.
“He seems sweet,” Damon said, and I nodded, swiveling over the counter and standing up. Stretching my arms over my head, the hoodie in question lifted and Damon teased a finger across my bare stomach. I smacked his hand away, then smacked him in the face.
“He is sweet.”
“Young—”
“—er than me.” I rolled my eyes at my best friend. “He’s on the right side of twenty-five.”
“And you’re almost on the wrong side of forty.”
“I’m thirty-six,” I reminded him. “I’m not that old.”
“No,” he agreed. “You’re not. And that’s why you’re going to come have a celebratory drink with me now, right?”
Groaning, I suddenly felt much older than I was. Tattooing was hard on the body, moving heavy chairs around and scrubbing baseboards didn’t help matters.
“Where?”
“Rapture.”
I exhaled a breath, bracing my hands against my hips. “Why on earth?”
The flush on his cheeks gave him away immediately. “Athena,” I surmised.
“I’m just a man,” he said with a laugh, and I smacked him again.
“I’m only going for a drink.”
“And a show?” Damon arched a brow.
“You just told me you thought Smith was sweet,” I reminded him.
“I didn’t know one precluded the other.”
Sighing, I shoved a few loose strands of hair away from my face and gave Damon a look that conveyed all of the tiredness I felt in my bones. There was no harm in going with him. Smith was at dinner with his brothers, and we didn’t have plans until the next night. I’d already taken care of dinner reservations so there was nothing I had to do to get ready for our first date. I’d even gone to the bother of booking a hotel room, though I hadn’t decided if we’d use it or not yet. The change of scenery might be nice, especially at the end of a long week.
“Okay, fine,” I conceded. “But I’m not staying out late.”
“You rarely ever do.”
The floor to the shop was dry enough then that I didn’t feel bad running upstairs to change into something a little more appropriate for a place like Rapture. I’d never been one of those guys who showed up to the club in slacks, but I dug a pair of clean black jeans out of the closet and paired it with a plain black V-neck. I redid my hair into a loose bun at the back of my head and re-laced my boots before joining Damon back down in the shop.
We took separate cars, since his plan was to go home with Athena at the end of the night and mine was to go home alone and count the hours until dinner the following night. Once in the club, I felt better about my decision to come. The loud music was a welcome distraction from the man who’d become the singular focus of my waking—and some of my sleeping—thoughts.
Damon dragged me to the bar where we both exchanged pleasantries with Callum, and I eyed them with interest when Raf showed up and got in on the conversation. Damon obviously played a certain role with a woman like Athena, but it was beyond interesting to watch him pay the same respect to a man. Most of his experience in the BDSM space had been with partners of a different gender, but his sudden interest in men had piqued my interest.
“Do you fuck Grant and Wes?” I asked him after we’d gotten our drinks and headed toward the patio. The LA evening was warm, but biting when the wind blew. I wished I brought my hoodie, but Damon already thought I was unhealthily attached to it and I didn’t want to fan those flames.
“I’m sorry, what?”
