Page 8 of Dropping Like Flies

“Hey!”

“After my shift’s over,” he continued, my protest falling on deaf ears, “let’s go to a club.”

“A club?” There was no holding back my snort of laughter. “Can you see me at a club?”

Flynn’s once-over was slow and considered. “Yeah, I can. Bet I can even get you on the dance floor if I try hard enough.”

“I sincerely doubt that.”

A group of slightly inebriated women arrived at the bar and Flynn moved off to serve them, tossing “challenge accepted” back over his shoulder, the wink that accompanied his words the second of the night.

I shook my head. Maybe it would be good to get out of my comfort zone. After all, it wasn’t like I’d never been clubbing before. It had just been a while, my life narrowing to a dark tunnel where nothing existed except work and whiskey, and there had been rather more of the latter than the former. A lot more. I toyed with my empty glass. Normally, I would have asked for another, but maybe it was time to do something different. Time to live again. Perhaps this newfound friendship was exactly what I needed.

Flynn won his challenge, getting me on the dance floor in under an hour. I couldn’t claim to be the world’s best dancer, but then neither was he, and it didn’t seem to bother him. What he lacked in technique, he more than made up for in sheer enthusiasm, plenty of men responding to his animal magnetism by dancing closer, keen to catch his eye. I would have forgiven him for straying, but he remained resolutely focused on me.

When I found myself crammed in a bathroom stall with him, with his lips against my neck, it seemed like the evening had reached its natural progression. “I thought we were friends,” I managed as he dropped to his knees, his fingers busy with my zipper.

He craned his neck back, his eyes shiny and his lips glossy. Lips that would stretch around my cock if I didn’t put a stop to this. The flesh was weak, though. So weak. And so fucking needy. Flynn laughed as he eased my stiff cock out of my jeans. “We are.”

I leaned my head back against the wall, vaguely aware of the sounds outside the bathroom stall: talking; someone washing their hands; someone laughing; the click of the door as someone entered the stall next to us and locked it. “Won’t this ruin it?”

Flynn grasped my cock at the base. “Don’t tell me you’ve never had a friend with benefits before, Griffin?”

“Is that what we are?”

Flynn didn’t answer. Probably on account of him having his mouth full. A bubble of drunken laughter escaped my lips as I considered whether Flynn’s good upbringing had taught him not to speak with his mouth full. Right. Like his mother had taught him blow jobs 101. And then I gave myself up to the pleasure. I might have many faults, but turning down a free blow job wasn’t one of them. If this was what Flynn wanted, the least I could do was lie—lean—back and think of England.

Afterwards, we returned to the dance floor for another hour of dancing, the activity making us sweat enough that by two in the morning, we were gulping down glasses of water at the bar rather than anything alcoholic.

“You’ve had a good time, right?” Flynn asked, the slight smirk on his face saying he already knew the answer, but wanted to hear me say it.

“I have,” I agreed, not churlish enough to lie through my teeth. Given how good he was at reading people, he would have seen through it, anyway.

“Good.” He smiled and then hooked a hand behind my neck to pull me forward. The kiss surprised me enough that I didn’t immediately respond. In the bathroom he’d sucked my cock, and I’d given him a hand job because it would have been rude not to, but we hadn’t kissed. I finally got with the program, Flynn tasting of sweat and youthful exuberance as we learned each other’s mouths, the combination heady.

“Friends with benefits,” he said as he pulled back.

When he laughed at my expression, I played it cool, gulping down another half a glass of water while I regained my composure. “I’ll admit,” I said, “that I’m beginning to appreciate some of those benefits.”

He pressed a hand to my chest and leaned closer. “I bet you are. I bet you’re thinking about what it would be like to fuck me.”

I hadn’t been, but now I was, my cock straining against my zipper. Would that happen tonight? Flynn had already turned to peruse the dance floor. Have you got any brothers and sisters?” he asked.

“What?”

He turned his head to snare me in his gaze. “You’re a mystery man, Griffin. I’d like to know a bit more about you. I thought we could start with some background detail. Family seemed as good a place as any. So have you?” When I continued to stare at him, he repeated the question. “Brothers and sisters? It’s not a state secret, surely?”

It was like being at the end of a dark tunnel. I could hear what Flynn was saying, but it was just noise. And the rest of the club had ceased to exist altogether. What was I even doing here when I would be thirty-seven in a few months’ time? I was too old to be reliving my youth. What was next? Would I buy myself a red sports car and drive around London with my elbow hooked over the door, playing obnoxious music at a volume loud enough to burst eardrums?

Deep down, I knew the club had nothing to do with any of these feelings, and they were linked to the word Flynn had just used. If ever there was a trigger word for me, it was that one. Sister. Such a simple word. Only two syllables. But bringing with it such a rush of complex feelings, it might as well have been one of those activation words you saw in films. The ones where brainwashed soldiers went from being perfectly normal people to embarking on a massacre of gigantic proportions.

“Griffin? Hey, Griffin? Are you okay? You’ve gone pale.”

Hands pulled me toward him. To do what, I didn’t know. Hug me? Shake me? Take me somewhere else in the club. Back to the bathroom stall, maybe. I struggled free, needing to put some distance between us.

“I have to go home.” My voice didn’t sound like it belonged to me, both hoarse and clipped at the same time.

“Yeah, sure… It’s late. I get that.” Flynn’s expression didn’t say he got it, though. His expression said he didn’t know what the fuck was going on. He struggled to get his phone out of his pocket, the denim tight enough to make it difficult. “I’ll call a cab.”

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