“Oh wow,” he laughed softly. “It looks a lot bigger when it’s not packed with dancing kinksters.”
“People today don’t dance. They…hump and grind up against each other.” Dancing was a lost art. Not that I could claim any trophies in that arena either, but I’d grown up to my parents sharing a quiet moment with some dancing in the living room when they thought we’d gone to bed. In reality, we’d been sneaking in and out to go to parties and raise hell.
Archie slipped me a little smirk. “Your age is showing, Sir.”
“Good. It’s annoyin’ havin’ to tell people.” I pointed to a spot at the center of the floor, then set my duffel next to where I was standing. “You can take off all your clothes and kneel for me.”
He didn’t react much, and definitely not badly, so I deduced public nudity didn’t bother him. That boded well for future demos.
As he removed his fitted pullover, he stepped closer to me. “Just so you know, I would dance with you.”
I felt my mouth stretch into a smile. “Oh yeah?”
We were a lost fucking cause. How were we ever going to get into a TPE dynamic if all we did was act uncontrollably sappy around each other? Because there I was, pulling him close as soon as he’d dropped his shirt, stealing a page from my parents’ book. No music, just the two of us in the middle of a kink club, dancing slowly, forehead to forehead, to an imaginary beat.
“You’re gonna ruin my reputation, little one,” I joked with a soft grin.
He chuckled. “You actually have a reputation too. Some of the things I’ve read online don’t make one lick of sense. Quiet, brooding, calculating…?”
Well. The last part wasn’t untrue. It was a hobby of our brat community to profile the Sadists around here, and it’d become a constant push and pull between us all. To see who was scheming, to guess who might take the next step. It was all fun and games.
I reckoned the other two weren’t far off the mark either. I had my quiet moments, and I liked to observe before I got involved anywhere. Brooding—sure, that too. I couldn’t always hide my personal misery. Past misery, I should say. Things were looking up.
“If you ask the brats, we’re menacing and always plotting their suffering,” I replied. “That’s only true half the time.”
Archie snickered and peered up at me. “I still can’t picture you brooding, though.”
Of course. That kinda stopped at his arrival.
“I think you can figure out why.” I dipped down and kissed him, and I slowed us to a stop. “But we’re not here to discuss brats and Sadists. I’ll have a weekend of that soon enough. Take off the rest of your clothes and kneel.”
“Aye-aye, Sir.” He smiled to himself and made quick work of removing and folding his clothes, saving his briefs for last. “Are you still awfully upset I can’t be there on Saturday?”
I glanced around us just to make sure we didn’t have any eavesdroppers nearby. “I’ll hold it against you till the day I die.” Half a joke. Okay, it was a joke, and I hadn’t been surprised to hear he couldn’t make it.
We had our next themed Game this Saturday, a date we were keeping to ourselves in order to catch the participating brats by surprise. Obviously, I wasn’t joining for myself, but I was one of the organizers, and we’d been running errands to the future scene of the crime the past couple of days for preparations. I’d show up, I’d beat some brats, and I’d go home. Home to where Archie would be waiting for me because finding a babysitter on such short notice was impossible when the only person he knew in the area so far was his sister.
“I’ll make it up to you as soon as you get home, I promise.” Archie dropped his underwear on his pile of neatly folded clothes, then sank to his knees before me.
I took a big breath and just stared at him. No trace of shyness—I loved that. He had a beautiful body, slender but not overly so, muscled but not blatantly. His abs showed when he tensed up.
He clasped his hands behind his back and lowered his gaze to the floor, as I’d instructed. But we were adding to that pose today.
After shedding my hoodie, I left it next to my duffel and smoothed down my tee.
“I truly wish I could be there, Sir.”
I cocked my head, deciding at the last second not to silence him. I could tell he had more to say, and I wanted to hear. Us being together but showing up at events separately was something that needed further discussing.
“Speak your mind,” I reminded him patiently. I headed over to the nearest wall, where I grabbed a chair, and then I positioned it in front of him and sat down.