Chapter 3 Dom
Dom
The pounding music beat through my body. It helped get my blood pumping and put me in the mood for a night of wild debauchery. Read: getting drunk and finding a decent lay.
I was through the club door when I spotted my regular friends in the mesh of sweaty dancing bodies under the strobe lights. We usually ended up at the same clubs, and they always promised a good time.
I’d been trying to get Harry out of his flat for an evening with something more tame, such as a night at the pub, but every time I brought it up, he usually vanished before I could even finish my sentence. At least we were having conversations, although he looked trapped every time I spoke to him.
The flashing lights and EDM had me dancing across the floor towards my friends. The four of them laughed as we said our hellos and found our rhythm.
This was the best way to start the night. A bit of fun before I found someone else who’d be interested in something more. I could have fucked one of my friends, but I avoided sleeping with the same person twice. I wanted easy—getting stuck in feelings was too messy; I gave that shit up years ago.
Until a certain neighbour became a permanent feature of my thoughts.
Harry Fischer was from a richer-than-rich family, who were usually splattered across the internet, with people constantly crowding around him and cosying up to him.
I always saw strangers eyeing him up whenever I caught him out on campus.
So I wanted to hang out with him more and beat the fuckers back, even though I was one of those said fuckers.
But it was difficult when he ran away every time we talked.
There was a method to studying Law. My mum taught me to pursue a very specific set of skills, including learning all the legal cases directly related to her.
It was all for her benefit, so she could continue running her scams, knowing that her darling son would swoop in to save the day if she got nicked.
I defended my first case in court at fifteen, getting her off on the charge of petty theft.
Mainly because I was tall and confident enough to get away with posing as an adult.
Mum and I scammed the fuck out of people for a living, and I’d loved it.
No one was off limits. I was at Cambridge to do the groundwork for her.
The other plan was for me to use my degree to scope out rich targets, gather information, and get close enough to them to hand them to her on a silver platter.
And Harry was her ideal mark. Which was one of the reasons why I was fucking the gig up as much as possible, hoping they’d kick me out of uni. Because I didn’t want to play her games any longer.
The only reason she still had me in a chokehold was my baby sisters. The twins were three years old and they were so fucking precious that even Mum had reigned it in a bit. But that didn’t mean she wouldn’t use them to keep me on a leash.
By the end of the third song, I was ready for a drink, and it was my turn to buy. The guys yelled out orders, and I dodged past a sea of armpits to reach the edge of the crowd.
A cheer went up as my favourite song blasted out of the speakers, but there was no way I was going back to the dancefloor with a throat like a potholed road.
They’d lined the club with booths along the back, far away from the huge speakers, there for people to talk and relax. Like that’s what anyone came to the club for. Most people just used them for drugs and handies.
I gave it a quick scan, just in case anyone my type was taking a breather from dancing. Though, to be honest, ‘easy’ was my type.
My eyes landed on three familiar figures in a central booth pressed up against the wall.
Harry was caged in by two shithead regulars I ‘worked’ with, one of them pushing a cup up to his mouth.
I stopped dead, focusing to get a better view through the flashing lights.
It was clear from the way he was slumped that Harry was out of it.
There was no way he needed another drink.
Unless the pair were feeding him water, though, from the eager looks on their faces, I was going to say no.
I was at the booth instantly, standing over the two dickheads, gracing them with a wide grin. They kept Harry trapped; Knuckles supported him, while Pip forced the mystery liquid down his throat.
“Evening, boys.” I swung my gaze between them. “Everything alright?”
Pip and Knuckles were the main dealers at the club, along with two other guys who'd be out scoping the crowd.
I'd been dealing drugs on the side for extra cash since I arrived in Cambridge, and these idiots were my suppliers.
There were people like them working every club in the city, all under the same large distributor.
While I mostly dealt ecstasy and acid, they were always offering the students the stronger stuff to pick up more cash.
I said I refused to sell crack or dope because I wanted to protect the students, which was utter bullshit. I just wasn’t after the extra jail time if I got caught.
My heart instantly clenched as Harry swayed in the booth as these two creeps tried to do God knows what to him. My protectiveness kicked up to max, and I slid into the seat without thinking. Fucking with scum was my hobby, even though scum was my middle name.
I wouldn’t exactly call Pip and Knuckles ‘friends’, but we’d drunk enough together that it was normal for us to hang out.
They looked alarmed that I’d just shoved myself in, but there was no way I was leaving Harry alone with these two.
His breathing was heavy, his eyes glazed, and his hands curled up against his stomach as if he were going to throw up any second.
“Harry doesn’t seem to be doing too well tonight,” I said.
Pip’s surprise was obvious as he leant back from the table, cup clasped in hand, his ass dropping onto the black leather cushion next to me. Going from the brown tinge through the clear plastic, it definitely wasn’t water they were feeding him. I was pretty sure they didn’t expect me to know him.
They shot each other a worried look. I had to get these fuckers away from Harry.
“Nah, he’s having a great time,” Knuckles said from the other side of the table, wrapping his arm around Harry's shoulders. “He just needs a break. He’ll be ready to party again soon enough.”
Their gazes hopped around like fucking rabbits on meth as they did everything they could to avoid my death glare. The simple fact that they were even touching Harry sent me into overdrive.
I had to wonder if it was my fault. I usually collected my supply from them at a quiet bar four streets down from my flat.
And, really, thinking about it, they were so lazy there was no way they would tail me back to my place and find out Harry was my neighbour.
Plus they were too dumb to consider creating a contingency plan if I ratted them out.
They were both stoned most of the time, so they weren’t exactly a threat.
“Harry!?” I shouted across the table, competing with the music. Harry blinked heavily, giving me a goofy grin that I’d devour him for in any other situation.
It wasn’t good.
“How you doing, mate?” I called out to him again.
“Dom?” he slurred, his lips barely forming the words. “Is that you?” His voice was almost drowned out by the music.
“Are you okay?” I asked loudly, making sure Pip and Knuckles could hear me as well.
“Yeah, I feel great.” Harry's head bobbed forwards as he spoke, like he was fighting sleep.
“And these two?” I said, nodding at the idiots beside us.
“These are my new friends. This is, uuuuugh, Pup?”
Yeah, that was enough. There wasn’t a single fucking chance he was staying at the club. I wasn’t sure what they were plotting, but he was coming home with me.
“You two.” I glared at them. “You have two minutes to get your asses out of these seats before I beat you out of them.”
Knuckles actually grew a pair and snapped at me. “Alright, look, you know who this guy is, right?”
“He’s Harry fucking Fischer,” Pip said, pointing straight at him as if I needed a clue.
I gave both of them a once-over, waiting for them to explain why that had anything to do with Harry being stuck in a booth at a gay club with them at 11PM on a Tuesday night.
I’d spent years learning to school my expressions. One wrong move around Mum’s boyfriend usually earned me a smack, or something worse. So it was easy to pretend to be disinterested, despite the urge to yank their nuts up through their lungs until they choked on them.
“And?” I finally supplied. These guys had never been heads of the bloody brain department.
“And his family is a fucking goldmine.” Pip smirked, leaning closer to share their big secret. “Someone takes a wrong picture, or leaks information, and they swoop in to pay them off. I’ve heard some people get hundreds of thousands for the really bad stuff.”
“So we just need to get a few shots of him like this,” Knuckles said with a shrug. “That’s all.”
The music still pounded around us as white noise filled my ears.
Even though they were always in newspapers and magazines, I googled the Fischers when I met Harry just to check out the situation. And from their estimated fortune, they’d happily shell out. Though that was so far from the fucking point that I brushed the thought away immediately.
“And what’s Harry said about it?” I asked them.
There was an awkward pause. I was ready to flip the table over and pull Harry out of here. But I had to know how far they were prepared to go first.