The Sanctum was the type of club you had to be a member of, and there were certain perks to joining. One of them being the rooms on the second and third floors. They were an additional fee.
If you wanted privacy, you had to pay for it.
Privacy wasn’t something I needed, so I’d never paid for a room. But I’d been in them, with employees, with other members.
With Tony.
When we first started meeting at the club, Tony had been more than willing to share. We both invited other men into our playtime for a few weeks, but then something changed. Tony became possessive... territorial. I was allowed to watch, but not touch, and I definitely wasn’t allowed to be touched.
Not by anyone other than him.
And like a fool who thought something was building betweenus, I’d let it happen.
In the beginning, I was okay with him keeping us a secret. His club didn’t know about his personal life, and he wanted to keep it that way. I agreed to give him time to work through his hang-ups, all the while believing he would eventually come out.
For me.
I should have known better. Sexuality was a deeply personal journey. It wasn’t something you flippantly gave in to for someone else. If you weren’t comfortable in your body, with your desires, you’d never find true happiness. And if you couldn’t find true happiness with yourself, you’d never find it with someone else.
I knew this going in. I knew this the day I met him at the diner when I learned who he was and where he lived. I knew it when he pretended not to know who I was despite the fact we had been fucking for weeks.
I ignored the red flags, and I fell in love anyway.
Now I was screwed, and not the way I wanted to be, because I was sitting at the bar in the hottest sex club in Colorado, and all I could do was watch. Because the only man I wanted to be with wasn’t here.
“I am.” I smiled at Gary and took a sip of my drink.
Gary looked at his watch and then peered at the door. “I get off in an hour; maybe if you’re still here, we can go upstairs,” he offered as he leaned onto the bar in front of me.
“That is a very generous offer, Gary, but I have to decline.”
“What are you doing, Simon? Why are you with a guy who will never actually be with you?”
I looked down at my drink. Gary was right. I didn’t know if Tony would ever accept who he was, but I’d waited my whole life to meet someone like him. And I was willing to put aside my own wants to have him.
Was our relationship toxic? Probably, but Tony was loving and kind, and when he held me in his arms, when he kissed me, everything felt right. Like my very existence had fallen into place.
Call me selfish, call me stupid and naïve, but I wanted him in my life, and I was willing to take him anyway I could have him.
I shrugged at Gary, not having an answer. He shook his head and moved down the bar to serve someone else. I spun on my stool and looked out over the room.
Why was I here? What was I trying to prove? Coming here without Tony made me miserable. It didn’t have the effect on him I’d wanted it to. I wanted him jealous. I wanted him angry. I wanted him to lie in his bed and imagine me with other men in hopes it would get him to pull his head out of his ass and want me the way I wanted him.
“Hello,” a voice at my back said.
I spun around and found a delicious-looking man staring back at me. Tony might have held my heart and my future in his hands, but I could still appreciate a fine-looking specimen.
“Don’t bother, Rufus,” Gary called from a few customers away. “You’re wasting your time with that one.”
“Fuck off, Gary,” I muttered.
“Am I off base? Are you not interested in men?” the stranger asked.
“Oh no, I am definitely interested in men. But only one.”
The man nodded and looked behind me. “He here with you?”
I smiled sadly and shook my head. “Not tonight.”
