What I didn’t expect was his subtle aggressiveness and hints of submissiveness peeking from beneath the mask of rigorous control that he wears like a second skin.
From the outside looking in, he seems too boring and snobbish and like he could use some drugs. Maybe a mixture of them would help loosen up the layer of asshole wrapped around him.
However, something changed when he was put under pressure—his body trembled and he struggled to hide behind his mask, literally and figuratively.
My dick jumps at the memory of him remaining as still as a statue on my lap. I don’t think he noticed it, but he had both his palms flat on his thighs like a well-behaved prince.
But then he left before I could convince the others to add him to our club. Not that they would’ve agreed, and Jeremy looked fucking horrified when he found out his identity, but oh well. I just wanted to toy with him a little.
Use him against his brother if the shoe fit.
Maybe destroy his fantasies about being straight in the meantime. I’ve never played around with straight men, but this was too tempting to pass up.
Blood rushes to my groin and I mutter, “Fuck you, you fucking fuck. You need help.”
“You need help, Niko.” My cousin Killian brushes past me on the way inside, accompanied by his brother, Gareth, and my best friend, Jeremy.
They must’ve finished school and come back together, which I should’ve probably done as well.
But oh well, I forgot.
Jeremy stops a few inches away from me. He’s an inch shorter than me and definitely the most muscled after yours truly. He’s a few years older, but he’s been my best friend for as long as I remember. I might have pestered him for it, though.
He pushes his dark hair away from his face and narrows his eyes. “Niko, please tell me you weren’t talking to invisible people just now.”
“Of course not. I was having a very frustrating conversation with my dick.”
“That’s even worse.” Gareth shoves my shoulder and chuckles.
My older cousin, twenty-one, is the prince of our little group of mayhem. Slick blond hair, sharp jaw, green eyes like some elf, and fucking dimples. The problem with him is that he’s wiser than should be allowed. It makes him a little boring, just saying.
He’s worlds apart from his younger brother, Kill, who’s my age—dark hair, piercing blue eyes, and possesses the personality of a serial killer. My favorite type of personality. The crazier, the better.
He’s a prick, but at least he’s a prick who doesn’t try to stop me from causing mayhem, and, under certain circumstances, he endorses and encourages it.
“Why would you even talk to your dick?” Jeremy asks, looking half curious, half petrified. Which is pretty much the standard when it comes to me.
“We’re having a difference of opinion. We’ll come to an agreement sooner or later.”
“Or you can take care of that ED we talked about earlier. I can hook you up with one of my professors in the local hospital,” Kill muses as he strolls past me and sits on the sofa, grinning like a fucker who’ll have that Colgate smile smashed when I knock out his fucking teeth.
“If you wanna see my dick again, just say so.” I grab my belt, ready to die on this hill.
Gareth slams his hand on mine, a terrified expression covering his features. “Don’t show us your dick, Niko. Seriously, why do you feel the need to get naked whenever someone mentions your dick? We’re cousins, for fuck’s sake.”
“Well, your brother keeps running his mouth about ED and I want to prove that I don’t have it.”
“We believe you,” Jeremy grunts with obvious displeasure. “Keep that thing in your pants. No one in this room wants to see it.”
“I don’t believe you.” Kill lifts a shoulder as he toys with the remote.
“Kill!” Gareth growls. “Stop encouraging his crazy or he’ll be walking around naked for a couple of days.”
“Good idea.” I snap my fingers at him. “You’re so smart, Gaz.”
His face falls. “Please don’t.”
Killian throws his head back in laughter while Jeremy sighs for the thousandth time since he got here and then sits beside him. His state of bubbling displeasure might have to do with me, but I honest to fuck don’t know what I did or am doing wrong.
“Oh, right!” I snap my fingers again and sit opposite Kill and Jer.
Gareth disappears in the background and I catch a glimpse of him going up the stairs, probably to escape my pending exhibitionism.
But that’s a thought for another time.
“What now?” Kill asks with visible amusement. “You going to tell us a tale about your dick?”
“Tempting, but I’ll have to take a rain check on that. I’ve been thinking.”
“You actually do that? Maybe we should check that head of yours when you receive that treatment for the ED.”
“Haha. Hilarious,” I deadpan. “Now, shut the fuck up. I have a very important question to ask. Have you ever been attracted to a guy?”
Kill crosses his legs at the ankles. “You do know that I hook up with anyone, right? Gender doesn’t matter as long as they have a hole I can use.”
Right. He did go on a spree similar to mine, but that was different. I don’t think he’s genuinely attracted to people in any shape or form. He just loves the power.
I do, too, so fucking much that the fact that I haven’t had my fill in a while—the while being thirty-six hours—is causing Kolya’s friends the infamous blue balls situation.
Kill is useless. Next.
“What about you, Jer?”
“I don’t find men attractive.” He frowns. “What’s this about?”
“Yeah, Niko. Don’t tell me you’re having a sexuality crisis after you’ve been bi for over four years?”
I ignore Kill because he’s too manwhorish to offer me the angle I’m looking for and sit on the coffee table, leaning into Jeremy’s space. “Why have you never been attracted to men?”
“Because I prefer women. What kind of question is that?”
My face is so close to his, anyone else would be intimidated and jerk back, but Jeremy doesn’t even breathe differently or attempt to move. He’s so confident in his straight sexuality that he’s not fazed by my outwardly weird behavior.
“You got a boner for Jeremy?” Kill asks from the side like a witch that will be burned in hell while Satan cackles manically.
“Nope.” I push back. “He’s straighter than straight.”
“Thanks?” Jer mutters.
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
He releases that defeated sigh again. “What’s going on, Niko?”
“Get me someone to maim. That’s what’s going on.” I jump up and run up the stairs three at a time, sprint down the hall, then whip the door to Gareth’s room open and shove it against the wall.
He looks up from his desk, pausing on doing homework like a boring prick. Jesus. If he didn’t indulge in some violence on occasion, I would’ve already disowned him.
No cousin of mine becomes boring and gets away with it.
“Gee, thanks for the death scare. Please don’t tell me you’ll start stripping…?”
I stalk toward him, eyes narrowed.
“Don’t you dare, Niko, or I swear I’ll tell Aunt Rai about your annoying habits—”
“Have you ever been attracted to men?”
It’s subtle, and I probably wouldn’t have noticed it if I’d stayed by the door, but Gareth’s eyes widen a little.
He drops his pen on his notebook and exhales loudly. “What are you talking about?”
“You’ve always fucked women, but have you done that because you feel you have to due to peer pressure and what’s defined by society as normal or because you want to?”
“What is this about?” He stands up. “What did you hear?”
“What should I have heard?”
His face falls for a fraction of a second and I step into his space. “So? What? Tell me. Tell me! What should I have heard?”
He pushes me away. “Stop doing that shit.”
“Not until you answer my question.”
He runs a hand over his face. “I love women. Happy?”
“What about men?”
“I…don’t know. Could be.” His eyes spark like a tropical forest before he clears his throat. “Why are you probing?”
“I’m testing something. When did you discover you like men?”
“I don’t like men. Jesus.” He jogs to the door and slams it shut, then leans against it, arms and ankles crossed “I’m not sure. I don’t know. I love fucking women, but…”
“But what?” I walk up to him and then peer down at him until I can see the tiny freckles on his nose. “What changed your mind?”
“I didn’t change my mind and, seriously, stop looking so intense. It’s creepy.”
“Blah fucking blah, just tell me what made your straight ass sway on the line. Figuratively, of course.” I grin. “Or is it literally?”
“Fuck you, asshole.” He closes his eyes with pure exasperation. “If you tell anyone about this, especially Kill, I’ll murder you.”
“I won’t if you just fess up. What made you change lanes?”
“I’m not sure I did—or would,for that matter. It’s just…one person. That’s it.”
One person.
One. Person.
That’s it.
Fucking interesting.
I ruffle Gareth’s hair and offer courses in butt stuff, but I’m not even done enumerating things he should know before he proceeds to throw me out and shut the door in my face.
His groans can be heard through the door as I grin and walk down the hall.
On a scale of straighter-than-straight Jer to fluid-as-lube Kill to confused-as-shit Gareth, I wonder where Brandon King falls.
Not that I’m tempted to find out.
That would be crazy.
* * *
Just kidding.I am crazy.
A week later, I’m lurking by the entrance of the Elites’ mansion at five thirty in the fucking morning.
You know, where Brandon lives with his insufferable brother, Landon, and a bunch of their family/friends.
Believe me, I’d never dream of waking up this early. But I can’t exactly survive on images of him trapped beneath me and wiggling his ass against my cock.
Kolya, the traitorous bitch who’d deserve castration if I wasn’t a major sexual being, still twitches at those memories.
Something he wasn’t interested in despite all the porn shows I presented him with, both live and recorded.
He’s being a dick. Literally.
Which brings me to this amateurish stalking mission. I might have visited Bran’s Instagram and seen all the stories he posts every single day at five thirty like clockwork.
Sure enough, the small gate on the side creaks open and he steps outside, stretching under the hint of sun. He’s dressed in loose shorts and a fitted green T-shirt that clings to his muscles like a second skin.
Fucking hot.
Now, if he weren’t so groomed with his shaven face, styled hair, and general sophisticated appearance, he’d be even hotter.
I love my men filthy, unkempt, and rugged around the edges.
Women are soft and pliant and should be worshipped. Men are to be used.
Who am I kidding? Both are to be used.
And he’s not one of my men. Jesus Christ. The fuck is wrong with my thought process?
Must be the lack of sleep. Has to be.