Simon... Spellbound (Studs & Steel Book 6) Read online

  Once they could see that I wasn’t about to start dating girls again, their whole demeanour changed towards me. Instead of being breezy about it, as they had been in the beginning, things started to get a little nasty.

  They tried everything they could think of – apart from beating it out of me – thankfully they didn’t agree with physical violence... They’d bought me pretty much anything I desired on the understanding I dated only girls and they’d even tried taking me to the doctor – who told them I was as healthy as a horse and that they had problems, not me – but they still refused to accept me for they way I was. They hadn’t been any better when they found out about my older brother, Buzz. Well, obviously Buzz wasn’t his real name – his real name was Barnard – which I always thought was kind of cool but he hated it, so...

  Buzz was sorted out these days. He and Franz just worked... And he’d never given a fuck about what Mum and Dad thought anyway. He was totally my hero...

  I guess part of Mum and Dad’s issue with me being gay was that I was, in their eyes, their only chance for grandkids to continue on the Porter name... I was constantly battling with myself as to whether I should tell them the truth – that I was a raving queer and there was no hope of me ever dating a woman or to continue to pretend. Maybe I would when I’d found somewhere else to live, but right now it was better that I continue to pretend that I’d seen the light and realised that I was straight – even if I had thought I’d met my perfect man this evening – hell, they’d only totally freak out again if I brought a guy home – and probably ground me for the next hundred years or so, too even though I was an adult and had been for the past four years…

  I removed my shoes and stole up the stairs in my socks. I’d just made it into my room and into bed when my door opened. I jumped violently. Fuck. Busted...

  I needn’t have worried; it was only my sister, Darcy. She knew I was gay – as, I suspected, my parents did underneath it all – but they didn’t agree with homosexuality and were therefore perfectly happy to pretend it wasn’t happening. They were good at ignoring what they didn’t agree with.

  Darcy grinned at me, “Meet any hot dudes?” she whispered.

  I shrugged. Bailey would definitely rank as a hot dude and I’d met him – so I could totally agree with her – but I’d hardly made a connection. “There was this one guy that was kind of cool.”

  “And was he gay?” she gazed at me with unmistakable love in her eyes. Darcy had never judged me – well, either of us...

  I nodded, feeling utterly delighted that I hadn’t imagined it. He really had been interested in me… “Yeah, he was – and out and proud too – I felt totally stupid around him.”

  Darcy sighed. “You’ve got to just tell Mum and Dad that you’re not gonna put up with their passive bullying any longer. You’ve got a life to live, Si – they can’t make you straight!”

  I nodded. “I do know that, Darcy,” I said, “I’m just gonna have to leave home again I think – if they get wind of me being out and seeing guys they’ll just throw me out anyway.” They’d thrown my brother out years ago and they hadn’t talked for years. I didn’t want that – despite their ignorance, I did love my parents...

  Darcy nodded, “Yeah, I know.” She said, “But don’t you dare leave me with them – if you go – I’m damned well coming with you!”

  *

  That actually wasn’t a bad idea. I was twenty-two – it wasn’t like I couldn’t move out – and I’d been away from home for almost two years previously anyway. Living with my brother and his friends had been absolutely liberating.

  Darcy was going to university later on in the year – maybe if she rented a place with me instead of going into halls as she’d been planning things could work out for us both nicely. She wasn’t going far and could easily commute from home, but we’d argued pretty successfully that she needed to get the full uni experience by moving out – even though we all knew that it was just to escape the Porter regime...

  It was definitely worth looking into. Maybe we’d have to talk about it...

  Chapter 4 – Joss…

  Bailey

  I woke up with a boner, which wasn’t really all that unusual – but mostly when it happened it was because I had a thing going with someone…

  Sadly, I hadn’t had anything going with someone for a while. My last attempt at a relationship had ended with me nursing a broken heart when my wonderful boyfriend turned out to be a cheating bastard.

  I’d invested a whole lot of myself in the relationship and I’d been absolutely convinced that he was the one – what I hadn’t been aware of was that while he was dating me – he was also seeing this older guy on the side who had a lot of money and owned a gay strip joint. The real stinger was that I was also unaware that my boyfriend Joss performed for him with other guys (and it wasn’t only stripping they were doing) at the strip joint and usually ended the night blowing the owner in front of all the punters.

  I found out by going to the strip joint with a group of friends who wanted to help me celebrate my twenty-first birthday in style.

  Joss had told me he was away on business and that he’d make it up to me. I was so blindly in love with him that I believed every sugar coated word he came out with.

  Imagine my horror when the entertainment was my boyfriend being sucked off by some other guy on the stage and then going on to perform other sexual acts on each other that required condoms. Most of my mates are gay so they were totally into the entertainment. Nathan was a little disgusted but more for the fact that Joss was supposed to be my boyfriend and therefore faithful, than what was actually going down – let’s face it – sex is sex and is therefore a turn-on no matter what orientation you are...

  I’m not even sure if Joss sucking off the owner of the club was the end of the performance because I didn’t stick around long enough to find out, but he confessed to me the next day that he was also in a relationship with him and had been for almost as long as he’d been with me. He laughed when I told him we were over. “Well, I kind of gathered that.” He said, ‘No hard feelings, huh?”

  No hard feelings? Seriously? The guy was truly heartless…

  I felt absolutely devastated and Nathan had been my absolute rock that night and many nights after. I’d cried on his and Sophie’s shoulder for a long time after that night.

  Obviously I finished things with Joss, but every now and then – probably when he’d fallen out with his boss, he’d call me, trying to rekindle things – telling me he regretted everything that had happened. I didn’t want to be anything other than someone’s number one though – so no, thanks – not a chance, buddy... Thankfully, he hadn’t called me in a while.

  My thoughts drifted to the previous evening and that guy that had just appeared from nowhere and shooed away the irritating guy that wanted more from me than I was willing to give. He wasn’t even bothered that the guy was built like a tank – I’m guessing that was because he was built similarly himself – but regardless, he’d taken care of the situation and that sort of confidence did something to my insides. He’d been sexy without even realising it. He didn’t seem to have any idea what sort of an effect he’d had on me. He seemed embarrassed to have even been thanked. It was stupid of me to be interested in him since he was most definitely not out, but damn, he was beautiful… I’d gotten a number from him just in case – I just hoped it really was his number and not a fake…

  *

  I sat up in my bed and started stroking myself. I needed to get a little relief and it wouldn’t take long to do. I allowed my thoughts to drift to the gorgeous blonde guy from last night. Imagining that it was his lips around my dick rather than my own hand, I gasped as I came in my boxer shorts. Damn, that was good… Opening my eyes and blinking a little as my heart rate returned to normal, I reached for my phone. I didn’t even think before I’d hit the call button. I was going to damned well call him and ask him out…

  Chapter 5 – Trouble…

  Simon />
  When my phone lit up and started dancing towards me on my bedside, my first thought was one of alarm. No one ever called me – the guys at Studs knew only to call in an emergency – otherwise we communicated by text messaging. I’d programmed them all with alternative names, apart from my brother and his boyfriend, who, as I’ve mentioned previously, my parents now begrudgingly accepted.

  They wouldn’t accept me working at a gay nightclub though, so they had absolutely no idea I was a dancer and bar tender at the same club as my brother was a bouncer.

  My relationship with my parents, since I told them I was gay at fourteen, had never been the same. Mum had sobbed her heart out that someone had ‘turned’ her little boy. She blamed everyone – including herself – that I’d somehow turned out ‘wrong’.

  It didn’t occur to her that there was absolutely nothing wrong with me – that I was actually a perfectly functioning human being that happened to prefer boys to girls. So fucking what?

  Dad was even worse. He decided to try to shame me out of me. When that didn’t work he tried religion. I decided to let him know at that point I was an atheist, which incensed him even further. He enrolled me in the army cadets to make a ‘real’ man out of me. Well, that was a total waste of time and effort on his behalf. I had absolutely no interest whatsoever in a career with the armed forces and I didn’t enjoy any of the practical subjects. I’d always wanted to go to Art College but Dad refused to let me go there…

  So, like I said earlier. I ended up telling them that I’d been wrong, that I did really like girls and, utterly delighted – even if he was completely in denial about me, Dad starting taking more of an interest in me and tried his hardest to shape my future as a real man. He even ‘helped’ me apply to university. I applied for an engineering course on Dad’s advice (well, instruction was probably a better word). As I’ve briefly mentioned earlier, I dropped out of that course and changed it to the Art and Design course – and I’d never looked back.

  I never told my parents that I’d swapped courses and as far as they were concerned I was looking for a job to do with my engineering degree. It couldn’t be further from the truth. I had no real idea what I wanted to do as a job and I’d been working at Studs and at another pub for months now, trying to get some money together to be able to move out.

  I had a pretty healthy bank balance now but it still wasn’t enough. I definitely needed a better job.

  I’d vaguely wondered about being a tattooist but I wasn’t sure that my designs would be what the general public would want. I wasn’t exactly what you’d call confident in myself.

  I’d been a part of the LGBTQ group at university and had a lot of gay friends. None of whom I’d ever introduced to my parents. Well, what was the point? They’d only be rude beyond all reason to them, anyway. I’d been really lucky to have been close enough to my older brother that he’d gotten me a job at the club he was a bouncer at – and I’d made some really cool friends there while I’d been studying. I stayed over so often that I eventually moved in with him and his mates – things had just fallen apart more recently – since they’d all found love...

  I picked up my phone. It was the guy from the pub the other night. My heart started to beat a little faster. Holy shit! What was I gonna say? What was he gonna say? Was this the moment I found the love of my life, too? Don’t be a dick, like that’s ever gonna happen? I pressed the accept key, “Hello?”

  “Simon?” his deep, melodious voice came through loud and clear, and making my dick twitch with immediate interest. “It’s Bailey.”

  Bailey. That sounded nice, “Uh, hi.” I sat up and ran my hand through my hair. He couldn’t see me of course but I couldn’t seem to help it.

  “I, uh – I wondered if you were doing anything tonight – there’s a movie on at the flicks, I fancied – I uh, I wondered if you’d like to come with me?”

  Would I like to come with him? Hell, yes! I’d fucking love to come with him! “Uh, what time?” I asked pathetically.

  “The showing is at seven – I thought we could meet at around five, maybe we could get something to eat…” he trailed off, sounding nervous.

  “That sounds amazing.” I said, “Where are we meeting?”

  I could hear the smile in his voice as he told me where to meet him and I ended the call with the biggest smile – and the biggest boner – I’d sported in months.

  Chapter 6 – First date...

  Bailey

  To begin with, our first date was a little strange. We met and found somewhere to have a burger before the show and as we sat devouring our food, we somehow managed to get onto the subject of our exes and spent the first half an hour, at least, grumbling to each other about how terrible our exes had treated us – although it wasn’t really to each other, we were kind of lost in our own little worlds as we filled our faces, it was kind of weird...

  “I wouldn’t have minded so much, but he could have spent that time, effort and money on me – instead of his fancy piece…” Simon was glaring at his tall glass of coke and turning it around and around, wiping his fingers down the glass to wipe off the condensation. It was kind of hot to watch. I was totally imagining his hands somewhere else... But to be fair, I was grumbling just as badly about Joss...

  “He didn’t have to lie to me.” I grumbled, not even hearing his lament. It would have just made things easier. I’d have finished with him months before he could have humiliated me. It wasn’t so much that he was cheating – it was that he was cheating so fucking openly and all of our so called ‘friends’ – friends that were actually his friends, not mine – knew about his penchant for performing when I was otherwise engaged. The bastards... Thank God I never trusted him enough to go bareback. I was eternally grateful for my inner voice that sounded suspiciously like my mother...

  “Why couldn’t he just invest that time into us instead?” Simon continued, still glaring venomously at his pint.

  I stared back at him helplessly, finally tuning in. Jeez, he was as fucked up as I was. “I don’t know, man,” I said, “I don’t know…” I let out a massive sigh. “They were just wankers.”

  He nodded, “Yeah,” he said gloomily. “I’ve got a talent for attracting them.”

  I chuckled, “Me too,” I agreed, “What does that say about us two?”

  He chuckled with me, “I guess we’ll find out.” He said. Checking his watch, his eyes widened, “Hey, man,” he said, grabbing his drink and taking a massive swig, “we really need to move – the movie starts in ten minutes!”

  I popped the last bit of my burger in my mouth and took a quick swig of my juice, “Right,” I agreed, “Let’s go!”

  He took my hand, which sent a little thrill all the way through me, right down to my toes, and we headed across the street to the cinema.

  *

  “Did you enjoy the movie?” I looked at Simon, biting my lip. It was my choice of movie and I really had no idea if it had been his bag or not.

  He smiled at me and nodded. “It was really good – I’m a total sucker for sci-fi movies.”

  I grinned at him excitedly, “I have all the Star Wars movies at home – and all the Transformers, all the Marvel movies too...” Please come home and watch them all with me all night...

  He chuckled, “Wow. You’re the perfect man.”

  I grinned. I was beginning to think he was the perfect man for me too. “I’ve really enjoyed myself tonight – can we maybe go for a drink or something before we call it a night?”

  Simon nodded, “Sure,” he said, “That sounds like a lot of fun.”

  Chapter 7 – Perfect...

  Simon

  Oh, my God. Could he be any more perfect?

  Bailey went to find a table for us to sit at while I queued at the bar for the drinks.

  I came back to the table and put his drink down in front of him.

  He picked it up and then put it down again without taking so much as a sip, “So are you uh, out to your folks?” Bailey look
ed me in the eye across the table.

  My heart almost stopped and I swear I started to sweat. I hated talking about my homophobic parents and the fact that I lived a total lie was just totally embarrassing. Bailey had just totally busted me. I had no idea how he knew but I totally got the feeling that he did. Did I have a bubble above my head that shouted to the world that I was in the closet? I shrugged, “Well, they know I’m gay.” I said. I didn’t really know how to tell him the rest and to my shame, I kind of left him hanging.

  To his credit, he changed the subject and we carried on talking about all sorts of other stuff – including my job as a dancer at Studs and Steel nightclub.

  “Studs and Steel?” he asked, his eyes shining, “Wow! I’ve heard about that place.”

  I nodded, “Yeah, it’s really cool and I’ve got a load of really good mates there too – my brother is the doorman.”

  “Bouncer?” Bailey asked.

  I shrugged, “I guess you’d call him that, really – the club needs another one if you ask me – the clientele has doubled in numbers since it opened.”

  Bailey nodded, “Yeah, they’ve advertised for more staff, haven’t they?”

  I nodded, “Yeah, I think so. I was considering taking on more hours, but I’m already committed to a bar-tending job in a small boutique restaurant – they pay’s pretty good there and the hours aren’t all through the night – it can get exhausting working all night every night.”