Page 64 of Play Dirty

And then he double-slaps my cheek. Not hard, but not soft either. And walks out of my office. Leaving me there with a hard cock sticking up out of my pants, a rumpled shirt, and desire for him I didn’t have when he walked in.

I’ll give him one thing. I don’t exactly forget about my father, but Alexander’s visit definitely pushes it to the back burner of my mind for the rest of the afternoon.

I give the deposition my full attention because it’s my job. Plus, it’s my father’s client and letting him down in any way when he’s so busy with other issues just isn’t an option.

But that’s the last appointment of the day and by the time I go back to the office, answer a few emails, and then head home to waste time before I meet up with Alexander and Augustine, I’m… fucking nervous.

I’m nervous to walk back into the club. I’m nervous to see it with them. I’m anxious about what comes next.

I was in there a couple months back. Broke in with Darrel because Augustine has owned it for over a year and a half now and the place has been sitting empty. I was dying to know what was happening in there.

That was a big fat nothing. The whole place was still… our place. The Turning Point Club. Except there was plastic sheeting over things and layers of dust.

God, why did Bric ever sell it?

Why didn’t I just buy it back then?

And how long have Augustine and Alexander been planning this little reunion?

I pour myself a drink, sit on the couch in my office bedroom, and think about Alexander’s visit today.

I wonder what Augustine was doing while he was with me?

My mind wanders with possibilities. Strange ideas pop into my head. Things that have more to do with that Hungarian accent Alexander sprang on me this afternoon. Things that have to do with our life back in LA. The memories of a too-hot summer, and the broken AC, and the sweaty sex.

And of course, how I fucked it all up with that little plot to use Ixion to break Augustine and Alexander apart.

It’s weird too. Because I was the one with the fixation on cameras and filming people. Watching them in private moments. But Ix was the one who took that and made it into a career.

First with film school. And he and Augustine had a little production company going. They made shorts, ya know? The artsy kind you enter into film festivals.

And even though he dabbled in our little quasi-quad we had that summer, he was always the watcher. Always the one behind the camera.

I knew Augustine loved him, just in a different way. He was always the most important member of our… team. They were best friends. By that time Ixion and I had gone separate ways, but we kept in touch and he was the one who invited me into his tight-knit world.

I was the one who pulled it all apart. Found that unraveling thread and pulled on it until there was nothing but a chaotic pile of what once was.

I set him up. I set up the cameras, and the date with Augustine. I set up the sex. I set up Alexander. Had him walk in. Set up the reveal. The fact that the whole thing was on film. All of it.

And Augustine freaked the fuck out.

Not on me, like she should’ve. Would’ve, had she known back then I was the one responsible.

But Ixion.

I tore them apart with my bullshit.

What I did was a felony and if Ixion hadn’t just sucked it up and took the charges Augustine filed against him… if he had told her it was me… well, let’s just say I wouldn’t be a lawyer right now. I’d have done some time, probably.

She only dropped the charges on Ix because his whole family died in that car crash. He was in jail when it happened—his dad flatly refused to bail him out. Ixion always did have that bad-boy persona and I guess this was the last straw. So he was left in jail to await the trial.

Then he missed the funeral.

Then she dropped the charges.

Ixion’s mother, father and little sister died thinking he was a pervert who makes sex tapes with unsuspecting women.

But he wasn’t.