Be There
Excerpt
...7 P.M. The corner of Churchill Street and Victoria Avenue. Be There. (Wear a tie.) As Scott read the latest note he’d received from Joe, he realized it contained three things that he obviously needed to worry about. Firstly, there was the time of day. Dates with Joe damn near always started at midnight at the earliest. Standing around on a street corner waiting for Joe in broad daylight simply wasn’t natural. Robbed of the shadows he’d become used to over the previous few weeks, he felt strangely exposed. Scott stared down at his shoes for a few moments. When he looked up, he was immediately reminded of his second concern—the location. A street lined with fashionable bars and restaurants and situated in the most expensive part of the city really wasn’t Scott’s natural habitat. Hell, a polar bear in the Sahara would have had more chance of blending into its new surroundings. Every expensively dressed person who walked past him seemed to instinctively know that he didn’t belong there, and none of them bothered to hide their disapproval as they stared down their noses at him. Scott took a deep breath. This wasn’t Joe’s part of the city either. Joe belonged to a world full of noisy bars, leather, and clubs where men did kinky, painful, glorious things to each other. Tucking two fingers down his shirt collar, Scott tugged at the restrictive fabric, feeling very much like a schoolboy who’d been forced into his Sunday best to visit his posh relatives. That brought him very neatly to the third and final problem inherent in Joe’s commands. Wear a tie. That was all. Joe’s note hadn’t actually included permission to wear any other garments along with his tie. Scott swallowed, his Adam’s apple fighting its way past his shirt collar with great difficulty. He had a nagging suspicion that Joe’s orders were always intended to be followed precisely. Scott looked down at his neatly pressed black trousers and his well-polished black shoes—both of which hadn’t seen the light of day since the last time he’d had to attend a funeral. If Joe turned up and told him he had to strip them off there and then, right in the middle of a nice polite street, surrounded by couples out on nice polite dates then… Then Scott had the horrible feeling that he’d actually do it. He’d probably get slapped by a passerby for his cheek, then arrested for indecent exposure to boot, but God help him, if Joe issued the order, Scott knew he’d do it, and— “I should have guessed you’d be here ridiculously early.” Scott spun around. Joe stood less than a foot away from him. Scott took a clumsy step back. His gaze slowly moved over Joe’s body. He looked…not like Joe at all. “You’re not wearing any leather.” Scott pulled his gaze up to Joe’s face just in time to see the other man’s lips twist into an amused little smile...