Playing to Win (5 page)

“You fell half a kilometer? Off of what?”

“A bridge. It was…” He gazed at the edge of the storage container from which they’d just plummeted. “…not as thrilling as this.”

Colin began to laugh again, this time a deep, burbling delight. He tugged Andrew’s hand to press it against his chest. It was still heaving, and so, so warm.

God, I need you,
Andrew thought.
I need you now, while we’re still insane.
He tucked his fingertips inside the collar of Colin’s ragged black T-shirt. “Come home with me.”

Colin’s head jerked back, and his eyes turned guarded again. “I cannae leave my mates. We come together, we leave together. That’s how we all stay safe.”

“You think I’ll hurt you?”

“No,” Colin said, too quickly to be believable. “But you’ll keep me up late. I’ve my first full practice session tomorrow with the Warriors.” He started rubbing his left arm, over the unicorn tattoo. “If I’m not at my best, Charlotte’ll think my knee’s worse than it is, and then it’ll set everything back, and I might not start the first match. I need to start, I need—”

“Okay. Okay.” Andrew pressed a finger to Colin’s lips. “We don’t have to go back to my flat.” It was a foolish idea, anyway, bringing home someone he barely knew. Too bad the hotels were chockablock with Commonwealth Games fans. “Perhaps we can find a place here to be alone.” He edged closer and put his mouth to Colin’s ear. “Long enough for me to suck you until you come down my throat.”

“Och.” Colin leaped to his feet. Andrew watched him stride up to Katie and take her aside for a quick conference. She laughed at first, but then her face turned aghast. Then she shook her head, backing away. Colin pressed forward, cajoling.

When he pointed to his knee, her shoulders finally slumped in defeat. With a quick word to Siobhan, Katie and Colin beckoned Andrew to follow.

The three of them left the dance floor area and hurried toward the back of the warehouse, using their phones to light the way. Rows of storage containers formed narrow streets and narrower alleys, like a dystopian abandoned city. Passing small culs-de-sac, Andrew could hear noises of substance abuse and sex. One unfortunate couple was far too quiet, discovered only when he shone his light down the slim passage.

“Fuck off!” the guy yelled, squinting into the beam, holding his bleary-eyed date’s skirt above her waist.

“Dreadfully sorry.” Andrew moved on, continuing the search.

Finally near the back entrance to the warehouse, they found a suitable alcove, between two towering metal storage containers emblazoned in Cyrillic with the name of a Russian company. Deliciously sordid, just the way Andrew liked it.

“I’ll keep watch over there, and I’ll yell if someone’s coming.” Katie scowled. “If someone
else
is coming.” As she walked away, she said over her shoulder, “I like you, Lord Andrew, but you are not good for him.”

I’m not good for anybody
, he thought as he turned to Colin, who smirked and stepped back into the darkness.

They found each other there, and clung, mouths locked in ferocious, famished kisses that sent earthquakes through Andrew’s body. As the techno music pounded around them, Colin’s strong hands crawled over Andrew’s back, then descended to cup his arse. Andrew ground against him, finding a long, thick hardness that matched his own.

“I want to fuck you.” Colin gripped Andrew harder, lifting him onto his toes. “I won’t, but I want to.”

“Me too. Maybe next time.”

Colin let go of him with a scoff. “Aye, right, next time. I’ll never see you again after tonight.”

Andrew wanted to protest, but it was true. On the whole, Colin’s friends weren’t fans of Andrew, and he hated to think what his own mates would say about a lad who lived on benefits and studied at GCU. Commoners were acceptable only if they were rich or famous. If they
gave
to food banks, not took from them.

This was their last moment, and Andrew intended to make the most of it.

He dropped to his knees and undid Colin’s belt, button, and zipper, using only his hands to see in the pitch blackness. What they found made his mouth water.

“Och…” Colin pushed his jeans and underwear over his hips. With one hand, Andrew pulled them down to his ankles, past the knee brace’s coarse material. His other hand stayed where it was, beginning with slow, confident strokes.

He wanted to tease, wanted to bring Colin to the edge a thousand times so that his eventual orgasm would leave him a gibbering fool who would forever measure every blowjob against this one. But there was no time for teasing. It had to be quick.

That didn’t mean it couldn’t be good.

Steadying Colin’s cock with one hand, Andrew wrapped his lips around the base of the shaft and used his other hand to cup Colin’s balls. When Colin sighed in appreciation, Andrew moved down instead of up, dancing the tip of his tongue across the rough surface, finally drawing one thick sac into his mouth.

“Fuck.” Colin shifted his weight, and there was the sound of nails scrabbling against metal as he searched for something to grasp. “That’s…oh God.”

Andrew moaned, sending vibrations against Colin’s most sensitive territory. There was an answering whimper from above.

Yes, you’re mine now.
He was taking back the power Colin had stolen when he’d leapt off the edge of that storage container. The power that rightfully belonged to Andrew.

As he savored the delicacy in his mouth, giving it every edge of his tongue, he continued to stroke Colin’s cock, slowly shifting its sheath up and down, feeling it stiffen further in his grasp. He ran his other hand over Colin’s taut, muscular thigh, imagining how it would feel between his own legs, nudging them apart, how it would strain and flex with each deep, quick thrust.

Andrew’s own prick rebelled at the confines of his jeans, and though he usually showed more restraint in this situation, he couldn’t help reaching down to stroke himself. The slightest touch was torture, so he quickly undid his jeans to reach his throbbing erection.

“Yeah,” Colin whispered at the sound of Andrew’s belt. “Touch yourself. I want to feel your mouth on me when you come. I want to feel it get as tight and hot as your arse.”

My God, this lad
…How could one encounter ever be enough?

Releasing Colin’s ball with a soft pop, Andrew straightened up and angled the head of Colin’s cock against his mouth. Then he swept his tongue over his lips, making them soaking wet before moving forward to slide Colin inside.

“Christ…” Colin slapped his hand against the storage container to Andrew’s left, making a hollow clang.

Andrew put his tongue to work, sliding side to side over the ridge of Colin’s head. Both hands continued their steady stroking, one on Colin and one on himself.

Colin’s hips began to rock, easing his cock in and out of Andrew’s mouth. Andrew imagined it stroking him inside, the bulging head passing over the nub of his prostate again and again. He imagined those pale-green eyes skewering his own, those tattooed arms lifting his legs up and apart, so high and so far that he’d be left helpless, with nothing to do but soar over the edge.

Feeling pressure build at the base of his own shaft, Andrew pumped harder and faster. His mouth moved quicker too, gulping every inch. He drew in air around his tongue to make it wrap and vibrate around Colin’s cock.

“Aye,” Colin cried, “just like that. More. Oh God…” He doubled over, and his whole body began to tremble as his knees buckled.

Andrew groaned as he felt himself near the point of no return. So close, so close. He had to win this race. So close, so—

A metallic bang sounded behind him. Andrew froze, hoping something had fallen, that the noise had not been that of the warehouse’s back door slamming open.

“Shit!” Katie’s strident American voice rang out. “Police! It’s a raid!”

A bright white light shone into their tiny corridor. Colin jerked back as if to turn and run. From here on his knees, Andrew could see there was no way out but the way they entered.

“Oh, lads,” said a gruff voice behind Andrew. “Sometimes you make our jobs too easy.”

C
OLIN
COULDN
’
T
SEE
the face of the man shining the light in his face, but his neon yellow vest was unmistakable.

“Police!” Katie’s voice faded as she ran farther into the warehouse toward the rave. “Pahleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeece!”

I am dead.
Colin reached down to pull up his jeans and knocked his skull against Andrew’s. “Ow! Fuck.”

“Just keep the head, lads,” the officer said. “Get yourselves together and come on out.”

Keep the head
, Colin repeated to himself as he fastened his jeans.
Keep the head. Do not panic.

In the distance, as Katie’s warning spread, the music stopped suddenly, replaced by shrieks and shouts.

“Let me handle this,” Andrew whispered to Colin as they buckled their belts. Then Andrew’s phone screen glowed in the darkness, illuminating his serene, stoic face. He put the phone to his ear and waited a moment. “Hi Reggie. I’m afraid I’ve got myself into a spot of bother.” He explained the situation dispassionately.

Colin’s head swam. How could Andrew be so fucking calm about this? Would an arrest not destroy his life? Or perhaps he knew he could simply pull a few strings and ensure his freedom. The only question was, would he save Colin, too, or let him hang?

A criminal record could cost Colin everything. His education. His place in the Warriors. His family’s trust.

Gonnae learn to control yourself, ya wee bam, or you’ll end up in the jail.

Mum had been right. Colin was pure crap at resisting temptation.

“Thanks, I’ll do that.” Andrew recited the warehouse address into the phone, then hung up. “My security man will be here shortly,” he told Colin. “Don’t worry, okay?”

Unconvinced, Colin followed Andrew out of their alcove. Every step magnified the pain below his waist. He’d been so close to coming, his balls felt like twin fists, and his gut was a knot of unrelieved tension.

A stream of Police Scotland officers were striding past them into the warehouse. The one who’d found them, a short, burly guy with white hair, took Colin and Andrew aside. “Look,” he said, “I don’t care what youse do in the privacy of your own homes, but in public, it’s pure illegal.”

Colin’s pulse spiked. “Are we being charged?”
Please just give us a warning. Please please please…

Andrew put a firm hand on Colin’s arm, then turned to the policeman with a gentle smile. “Constable…Lawrence, is it? I’m afraid this has all been an unfortunate misunderstanding.” He opened his wallet and pulled out his driving license. His
real
driving license, with his true name and photo.

The officer shone his electric torch on Andrew’s identification, then up into his face. “So you think we make exceptions for toffs?”

Andrew’s smirk vanished in the harsh glare. “I—sorry?”

“It’s people like you,” Lawrence said, “thinking the rules don’t apply to them. That’s what’s keeping this country in the Stone Age.” He swept his hand toward the back door. “I was gonnae give you just a warning, but you need a lesson.”

“This is impossible!” Andrew sputtered as they were led outside. “You can’t do this to me!”

“You’d best come peacefully,” the officer said, “cos I’d love to tell my pals at the pub I put an aristocrat in handcuffs.”

Colin wished he were witnessing this scene from afar. Not just so he could avoid arrest, but so he could relish Andrew’s comeuppance. It almost made this worth it.

As they headed toward the police van, passing a pair of glassy-eyed rave girls still dancing to the music in their heads, a black car with tinted windows pulled up to the curb across the narrow street.

Andrew stopped short at the sight of it. “Oh thank God.”

Out of the black car emerged a tall, muscle-bound man with a shaved head. He swaggered across the street toward them like a lion taking over a new pride.

“Who’s that?” Colin asked Andrew.

“Our savior, that’s who.”

The man approached Constable Lawrence, pulling a card from the inside pocket of his dark blazer.

Please let that be a get-out-of-jail-free card
, Colin thought.

The big guy nodded to Andrew, then spoke to Lawrence as he handed over his card. “Evening. I’d like to speak with the officer-in-charge, please.”

The constable gritted his teeth. “Just a moment.” He beckoned to one of his fellow officers, and together, they led Colin and Andrew to a nearby police car.

“What’s going on?” Colin asked Andrew after they were left inside the back of the vehicle. “Did Reggie just make it worse?”

“They put us here so they can release us quietly, away from the others.” Andrew waved a dismissive hand at the police van, into which several of their fellow ravers were already being loaded. “It causes resentment and gossip if those people see us getting special treatment.”

“How do you know all this?”

Andrew gave a harsh sigh. “How do you
think
I know?”

Great. Colin wasn’t the first man Andrew had sucked off in public, which meant he probably wouldn’t be the last.

Silence fell, broken only by the occasional squawking of the police radio and the thumping of Colin’s pulse in his ears.

Finally Andrew cleared his throat. “Would it be obnoxious to mention that, had you accepted my original invitation, you would at this moment be lying naked beneath my sheets, and that I would be lying naked beneath
you
?”

“Shut up.” Colin rubbed the thick scar beneath his left arm’s tattoo as he watched Reggie speak into Constable Lawrence’s radio. “What’s he doing?”

“Talking to the officer-in-charge, remember? No doubt they’re mates from back in the day when Reggie was a detective with Strathclyde Police.” Andrew crossed his legs and laid his arm across the back of the seat. “Reggie’s probably convincing him or her that we’re not worth the hassle.”

“What hassle? Won’t those yins in the van need the same of paperwork as us?”