Page 40 of The Twins

“I’m not learning how to respect women more if that’s what you’re getting at,” I intercept. My commanders haven’t exactly arrived in the twenty-first century just yet.

Daily, I hear things that scare me and that I distance myself from. Abuse happens everywhere in the office, where my female co-workers are still scarce and easily teased by men in higher positions.

“Exactly.” Mr. David deposits his bag near the closet with his shoes and jackets in the hallway. His eyes are restless. “You respect women, men… Anything you come across. You hear me?”

“Yes, Daddy,” I respond, comically rolling my eyes.

I’m a tech nerd. My defensive skills are lacking. That’s how Mr. David manages to shove his elbow in my face, choke-holding the fuck out of me. “Don’t ever say that word to anyone who hasn’t consented to it.”

“Okay! Whatever.” I yawn, tapping at his arm around my neck. “Let me go.”

Instead of letting me go, Mr. David pushes harder, and his warmth touches me above our clothes. “Promise me.”

“Promise you, what, exactly?” My body pulses with a need for this man and everything he has to teach me.

Mr. David says, “That you’ll always be a good boy.”

“You’ve seen my parents, right? They’d kill me if I were anything but a good boy,” I say, my arms growing weak from my feeble attempts to shove him off me. He works out more than I do, and I’m supposed to be in the military. Early on, my supervisors discovered my talents for tech, so they sent me to Fort Mote in Georgia, where I also go to college in Atlanta on the side. I’m office-bound, and it should make me happy. But the offices I work in are nothing compared to what Mr. David experiences in his work life.

“A day will come when you’ll protest your parents and everything, they taught you. I need to know that you’ll never stop being a good boy,” he insists. His hot breath tantalizes my skin, and I smell the mint gum on his breath.

He’s a smoker, but he avoids smoking in my presence. Hence, he chews a lot of gum when I’m around.

“I promise, Andre. Now, let me go. I can’t breathe when you hold me like this,” I tell him, refraining from revealing that his closeness ends me.

Mr. David drops me, and he disappears into his room. The door shuts behind him when he opens the window in his bedroom. I wait in the hallway for a couple of minutes, and then I wash in the bathroom. Long travels test my brain, making me fuzzy.

Once I feel refreshed, I swap shorts, and I make my way out of the cabin.

I don’t check on Mr. David. He needs a moment of privacy, and I’m proud to say that I know him well enough to acknowledge it. I pass by his door, and I swear that I hear him pant from the inside. It breaks my heart that I can’t console him the way that I want to.

The route to the tiny private lake on his property is glazed with streams of sun and a light breeze. The first time we came here, I asked if Mr. David had the lake built for his private use, but he denied it. He claimed he structured his cabin around the lake. Nobody touches the water here; courtesy of the fence Mr. David maintains around his property.

He allows nature to run its course, and he’s especially intimidating if I ever carelessly misplace a plastic straw or a bottle of water. I don’t have any of that with me right now, just a towel and my slippers. I place my stuff on the boardwalk, and I sit down by the edge, dangling my legs in the cold water.

The water is clear enough for me to observe the fishies. I’m not a pet person. I grew up with a naughty twin who always needed supervision, so I’m not keen on being responsible for others at the moment, but the little fishies by my feet excite me. The variety of colors and shapes keeps me busy until I dare to join them in the water.

Mentally, I promise the fishies that I won’t crowd their space for too long and that they can bite me if they feel like I’m mean to them. This is their habitat, and I’m a visitor. I respect that.

“You forgot the sunscreen. Again.” Mr. David’s standing by my towel on the boardwalk, staring down at me with a yellow bottle in hand. I can’t lift my eyes to meet his. I focus on his feet. He walks around barefoot when we’re here, and fuck, it makes me want to suck on his toes.

They’re too pretty.

I researched the kink, and it’s a thing that people do, apparently. Perhaps one day, I’ll suck somebody’s toes. I know that Mr. David isn’t ready for that from me. I’ve never even sucked on a dick, and I’m already thinking about toes.

Perhaps one day, I’ll admit to myself that I’m a hoe waiting to be unleashed.

“Didn’t you say sunscreen is bad for the ecosystem?” I remind him about the conversation we had last time we were here. “I don’t want to hurt the fish.”

Fishies. They’re fishies to me like I’m a character in a Pixar movie. I don’t want to be like that in front of Mr. David. He might get the wrong idea. I want him to think that I’ve matured.

“Come here,” Mr. David says, taking a seat by the edge of the boardwalk. His thick thighs spread for me, and I fight hard not to gaze at him inappropriately. I distract myself by swimming in his direction. I almost bump into his gorgeous legs, but I manage to divert my body right on time. “You can come closer.”

I swim between his legs, and I’m instantly hard. Sorry, fishies. Mr. David took off his shirt while he sulked in his room, and now, he’s out here shirtless, wearing swim trunks that leave little to my imagination. Sure, they cover his private parts, but I can view the outline, damn it. Who designs these things? They need to be fired.

I suck in a breath, glancing up at him and waiting for my next instruction.

Mr. David sets aside the sunscreen bottle, and he leans forward. I flinch in surprise when he reaches out to comb back my non-existent hair. “It’s a shame they made you cut your hair.”

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