STORY EXCERPT

“What the fuck are we doing here? I thought we were going to Captain Jack’s for dinner,” Ben Chambers asked as his brother, Seth, pulled into the parking lot of Sex Gods, the local gay bar and strip club.

“Plans changed,” Joey Prentice, his business partner and best friend, answered from the back seat. “Bachelor party has been postponed until next week, if…”

“If? If what? What’s going on?” Ben’s tone grew sharper as Seth parked.

“If you still want to marry bitchzilla,” Seth said bluntly. “Now come on, the show will be starting in a few minutes and we don’t want to lose our reserved table.”

“But—” Ben wanted to argue, but the two men had already left the car.

Moving slower, he climbed from the car and engaged the locks before shutting the door and following his two best friends across the parking lot. He had secretly wanted to visit Sex Gods since it opened, but had never followed through on the urge because of his mother’s overbearing influence.

But, as usual, Seth and Joey didn’t give a shit about what other people thought. They lived their lives out and proud and ignored anyone who did not like their ways. Which was how Ben wished he could live his life. He decided that for tonight, he would silence his mother’s voice in his head and enjoy the experience of doing the forbidden.

“Hey, wait up.” Ben had to jog across the parking lot to catch up with the two troublemakers.

At the doors, they stopped and turned to face him. They stood shoulder to shoulder and, for a moment, looked deadly serious. When Ben merely raised an eyebrow at their confrontational stances, Seth cleared his throat while Joey took a deep breath. Something else was going on.

But what?

“If you can go the rest of the evening without throwing wood or drooling, we’ll stop trying to break down your closet door and you can marry Candace without any further interference from us.”

Ben hesitated only a moment before nodding. “You guys are crazy. Why would I drool in a gay club?”

His two best friends laughed as they opened the front doors. They then pushed him through first before following a step behind. Ben glanced around as he led the two across the lobby toward the curtained doorway where the music and accompanying hoots and hollers were loudest. After having his hand stamped, he trailed behind his best friends through the curtain and into another world.

The walls, tables, and booths around the room were made of various types of wood. There were three small stages spread around the room made of chrome and glass, giving the room a retro look. The bar ran the length of one wall, with a second, smaller one on the opposite side of the room. In front of them was the main stage with blood-red curtains hiding whatever lay backstage.

After taking inventory of the club’s décor, Ben turned his attention to the main stage, where five men stepped out from behind the curtain as the crowd went wild. They were dressed as cowboys, but it was the one on the far left who captured and held Ben’s full attention.

Puma.

Puma Roberts.

Was dancing in a gay strip club.

What the fuck was Puma doing taking his clothes off in a gay strip club?

That was as far as Ben’s thoughts got before Seth grabbed his arm. His brother pulled him down into the circular booth closest to the stage. Joey followed him onto the seat, effectively trapping him so he couldn’t get out and run for the door.

As soon as they were settled, a Speedo-clad waiter sashayed up to the table. “Welcome to Sex Gods. My name is Lane. What can I get you gentlemen to drink tonight?”

While Joey flirted hot and heavy with the waiter, Ben could not take his eyes off the man dancing. He fought the urge to go up onstage and drag Puma behind the curtains behind the line of dancers. He didn’t want the rest of the rowdy Friday night crowd to see the smoking-hot body that had only gotten better since Ben had seen the man last. Shifting in his seat, he licked his lips and swallowed, praying the men on either side of him were so busy watching the show they wouldn’t notice that Ben was having a reaction to seeing his high school lover performing.

And he was definitely reacting.

Not to the show itself, but to the green-eyed man with the strawberry-blond curls that were longer, but no less entrancing than they had been seven years before. Curls that glinted gold and deep red under the bright stage lights. Ben fisted his hands as he remembered the feel of running his fingers through that hair. It had been like playing with silk.

“And there he goes.” Seth leaned forward and grinned at Joey. “You owe me fifty bucks.”

“Bill me,” Joey responded with a smirk of his own as he looked Ben up and down. “Damn, boy, you fill out the front of those jeans nice.”

Gritting his teeth, Ben refused to acknowledge either man’s comments. Instead he continued watching the performance until Puma ran offstage, picking up his jeans, shirt, and cowboy hat as he went.

Once the man was out of sight, Ben took a breath to try and calm himself. But there was no calm to be had. Puma was here and for some God-only-knew reason was taking his clothes off for money.

What happened to the computer geek who was going to create learning games that would change the world?

He was so lost in thought, he jumped when the waiter set a bottle of beer in front of him. “Thanks,” he muttered as he picked up the bottle and drank down half of it without taking a breath.

“I’ll bring another,” Lane said with a toothy smile.

Joey stood and pulled Lane to a stop and talked to him for several minutes. The waiter nodded with a wink and a smile before heading to the bar while Joey returned to the table.

“What was that all about?” Ben asked, half-afraid of what the man was planning.

Seth shrugged with a shit-eating grin. “Nothing.”

Ben knew better and wondered if he should shove the man out of his way so he could escape. Problem was, Seth had convinced him to leave his phone behind, and he didn’t have another way to get a ride home without begging the staff for help.

And asking strangers for help had always rubbed Ben the wrong way. Instead of making a break for it, he drank down the rest of his beer while trying to mentally prepare himself for whatever Joey had just set into motion.

ADULT EXCERPT

“Would you dance for me? Not like you do at the club, but like you used to?” Ben asked after a long, awkward silence.

Puma nodded, his cock immediately perking up at the idea of seeing Ben naked. “Only if you’ll dance with me,” he said softly.

Ben huffed a laugh and then nodded. “You know I don’t dance, but for you, I’ll try.”

“Give me a few days and I can have you stripping with the best of them,” Puma said with a giggle, his anxiety bleeding away.

Puma crossed to the small stereo system he had bought at a pawn shop after getting out of jail, then flipped through the small CD collection he had added to each payday over the past few months. After finding the one with music he knew would get Ben’s hips to swaying, he put it in and hit play. Turning back, he found Ben had kicked off his shoes and was bending over, pulling off his socks. Barefoot, the man straightened and just stood there, listening to the music.

“Teach me,” he said as Puma toed off his shoes and began to sway with the music that swirled around the room, an audio aphrodisiac.

Ben started swinging his hips side to side, looking stiff and uncomfortable. Puma giggled as he danced his way across the room, circling Ben once before moving in behind him.

“You need to loosen up,” Puma said as he edged in until his front brushed against Ben’s backside. “Relax. Listen to the music. Stop thinking so hard.”

Wrapping his hands around Ben’s hips, he pressed against the back of Ben’s body and swung his body left and right. He continued until Ben relaxed and began to move with him.

Sliding his hands around Ben’s middle, Puma rubbed his hands up and down Ben’s body. With each stroke upward, he pushed Ben’s shirt a little higher. When he reached his armpits, he whispered, “Take off your shirt, nice and slow.”

Once Ben’s shirt was off, Puma slid his hands down and opened Ben’s pants. He slipped a hand inside the pants, but staying out of his boxers, and rubbed up and down the generous erection that was pressing for release. “Keep moving,” he whispered when Ben froze as Puma cupped his hand around his balls.

At that moment, the music stopped.

Ben stepped away, turning to look at Puma as he shoved his pants down his legs before stepping out of them. Wearing only a pair of bright red boxers, he sat down on the edge of the bed. “I’m done. Dance for me, wildcat.”

As a new song started to play, Puma closed his eyes and began to move with the music. Dancing had always been an outlet for him, a way to get out of his brain and away from his worries. While dancing at the club was fun and earned him a nice income, dancing here, in his bedroom, for the man who had held his heart for the past seven years turned him on like nothing else.

The music entered him, filled his soul, and directed his movements as he slowly worked his shirt up his body and over his head. He tossed it out of the way as he turned a circle and opened his eyes just enough to check on Ben’s reaction.

The man had shifted up the bed to lean against the headboard, his legs spread wide. At some time in the last minute, he had stripped off his boxers, and the long, thick erection rising from his groin had Puma missing a step.

Slamming his eyes shut again, he continued dancing, quickly stripping off his jeans and skintight boxer-briefs. Finally, he was as naked as Ben. As his jeans hit the floor, he began dancing around the bed, twitching his hips so his own erection danced in front of him playfully.

“Come here, wildcat. I want to taste that,” Ben said, nodding at Puma’s cock as he shifted so his head was at the side of the bed.

Puma danced over with a grin, which slipped away when Ben licked across the tip of his cock. Puma stilled as Ben licked and slurped the head between his lips. He moaned when Ben wrapped his hands around Puma’s hips and pulled him closer so he could take Puma’s cock to the root.

“Oh, shit,” Puma whispered as Ben sucked and swallowed on the entire length of his aching cock.

It only took a few minutes before Puma’s hips were moving back and forth, driving his cock in and out of Ben’s mouth. In the next instant, he screamed as lightning shot down his spine, gathered in his balls, and then exploded out the end of his cock.

It had been seven years since he had experienced Ben’s special brand of loving, and it didn’t surprise him that it felt just the same. Only even better.