Kieran #2
When I got there, the parking lot was fuller than I’d ever seen it.
I’d only been here a few times, picking Jordy up or dropping him off.
I’d never been inside, but as soon as I burst through the double doors at the entrance, I could hear the raucous sounds of the auction from a few rooms over, and headed that way.
In a large event room, my eyes were immediately drawn to the stage, where bright lights were beaming down onto the three people on it.
Jordy, and a middle-aged man and woman. I barely had time to take in his appearance and body language, nervous and defensive, before the woman next to him barked out a dollar amount and pointed toward someone off to the side of me in the crowd.
Some of the people who had noticed me rush in started murmuring about me, looking shocked and bewildered and judgmental.
I noticed most everyone was dressed up, and the room was sparkling with fancy jewelry.
My ripped jeans and black t-shirt, printed with the logo of one of my favorite metal bands, an aggressively spiky font stylized with skulls and medieval swords, were incredibly out of place.
As usual, being noticed in public wasn’t doing me any favors.
When the lady on the stage asked if anyone was willing to bid just a bit higher, in that annoying too-fast auctioneer way, I shot my hand up.
She started to verbally acknowledge my raised hand, and then stopped, squinting a bit as she took in my appearance.
“Uh, sir,” she started. “This isn’t a public auction. You have to be registered to bid.”
I watched as Jordy’s eyes locked onto me, wide with shock. He cleared his throat, which I could barely hear because he was a few steps back from the mic, and tugged at her sleeve like a nervous toddler trying to get their mom’s attention.
“Um, a-actually, as long as it’s okay with you, then… It’s okay with me,” he stammered out. “I, um… I know him.”
The woman glanced at him, then back to me, then over to the other guy on the stage who was holding a clipboard. He shrugged, raising his palms up to demonstrate he didn’t have a problem with it.
“Well, alright,” she conceded, though she sounded apprehensive. “Since the participant consents, then I’ll allow it. For this auction only,” she added, to which I had to suppress a scoff. Like I’d have any interest in bidding on anyone else. But I guess they wouldn’t know that about me.
She started the process back up from the interruption, this time giving a quick head nod to my bid.
When someone off to the side outbid me again, I automatically raised my hand on the next call as I nudged through the crowd, most of whom were still muttering about me, to get a look at who I was in a bidding war with.
The second I did, I immediately regretted it, the hairs on the back of my neck pricking up and a wave of anger crashing into my bloodstream.
Andrew, that creepy fucking alpha from the party that had ended up stalking Jordy and blowing up his phone with all those fucking texts.
I’d basically forgotten his existence since I’d taken Jordy with me to the beach for the weekend, and as far as I knew, there hadn’t been anything else for me to worry about.
About two heartbeats after I noticed him, he seemed to sense that he was being stared at, and slowly turned to face me. With my eyes locked on him, I raised my hand once again to confirm my bid for the next dollar amount.
I watched his hand twitch as she asked if anyone wanted to bid higher, like he wanted to raise it.
My lips peeled back into a snarl, but I didn’t let the growl I felt building up in my throat rumble out.
The last thing I wanted was to embarrass Jordy.
As far as I was concerned, he had enough to feel embarrassed about when it came to me.
But the need to flatten this asshole and rip him to shreds was like a siren’s call, taunting and beckoning me.
I wasn’t sure if anyone else in the crowd could sense the charged tension pulsing and radiating like a living creature between us, but I didn’t care.
If he raised his hand to outbid me one more fucking time, I was going to tackle him.
He, at least, seemed to be able to sense my intense anger, as he regarded me with obvious caution.
I remembered the way he’d backed down from me at the party, which had been lucky for him.
He stayed still as a statue, his arm frozen at his side as she did the going, going, gone thing they did at auctions.
There was very light applause, punctuated with more shocked murmuring, as she proclaimed me the winner, and shooed Jordy back through the big curtain behind them to let a tall brunette guy take his place.
My adrenaline was crackling and rushing inside me, and it felt like there was nowhere to direct my anger, until I felt someone’s soft hands grip onto my forearm.
“Hey, Kieran.” Dani’s pleasant voice was kind, but pointedly drawing my attention away from Andrew. When I glanced over to her, she gave me a sweet smile and tugged at my arm a bit. “Let’s go hang out over here. I’m sure Jordy’s going to be coming back out soon.”
“… Yeah.” Letting her gently pull me away and out of the crowd, I saw her gaze dart to Andrew once, quickly, before returning to me.
“He didn’t say you were coming,” she commented.
“I wasn’t supposed to be here,” I replied. “I decided at the last minute.”
“Aw,” she cooed, giving me kind of a gooey, sappy look like I was the hero in a romance novel. I was sure Jordy had regaled her with all kinds of stories of stupid, sappy crap I’d done with him. And probably ones that involved my cock, too. “I bet he’s really surprised.”
“I bet,” I said, but getting away from the crowd, and especially from him, was starting to cool me off. Minimally.
Dani stayed clinging to my arm, looking at me expectantly.
I was pretty sure she just didn’t want me to haul off and attack the guy who I considered to be Jordy’s stalker.
I was pretty sure I remembered that he was related to someone important to the center or something, so that would have caused a lot of problems.
As she stared at me with her dark eyes, her black hair pulled into a thick ponytail high on her head, I considered how close she was to Jordy and how eternally loyal they were to each other.
She’d been there for him for longer than I’d known him, and would probably be in his life (and therefore mine, hopefully) for a really, really long time.
“So, uh… Jordy’s shown me some of the stuff you guys picked out for the dorm room. It’s cute.”
It was all sort of unapologetically cutesy, with polka dots and ribbons and lots of pink and white, but Jordy seemed thrilled with it, calling it coquette or something. When I googled it, it said it meant flirtatious and playful, which I guess tracked for him.
“Yeah?” She asked, looking pleased with my assessment. “You’re going to come visit him sometimes, right?”
“Sometimes,” I confirmed. “But he’s going to come home some weekends too, so… It’ll be kind of a trade-off thing for a while.”
“Yeah, he told me!” She said, and I was glad she didn’t seem bitter or annoyed that I’d be taking up a lot of his weekend time. “We’ll probably ride down together sometimes, since my parents are all emo about me being gone all the time, too,” she sighed.
“That’s good,” I said honestly. “I’m really glad he has you around.”
“Aw! Thanks, Kieran,” she said. “I’m glad he has you, too. I was kind of starting to worry you guys would never get together and he’d be all weird about it forever,” she sighed.
My eyebrows drew together as I cleared my throat. “I mean… Has he really liked me for that long?”
I knew he’d mentioned having a crush on me long before I’d drunkenly stumbled into his room and made my own feelings apparent, but the way she said it made it feel more extreme.
When I looked back at when he’d been a kid, I couldn’t picture it.
Being fawned over at school by his peers and teachers alike, and then coming home late most days because of all the clubs and extracurriculars he was in, I’d thought I’d been the last thing on his mind.
But when I really stopped to think about it…
Even though he’d always had so much going on, he’d get so excited to spend any time with me.
The way he’d beg me to take him with me sometimes, even if I was just running to the store to pick up a couple things, or the delight in his eyes and voice when I’d agree to just sit on the couch next to him and watch a movie.
Kieran, you are my prince.
He’d told me that after I’d taken his virginity like a careless asshole on the beach, and I’d sort of blown it off at the time, embarrassed and not able to believe it yet.
But maybe he really meant that. Maybe he felt the same way about me that I felt about him.
It felt impossible and insane, but… the way that to me he represented that beautiful sparkling angel figurine that I’d always been too afraid to touch, no matter how desperately I’d wanted to…
Did I represent some pinnacle in his mind that he’d always considered untouchable until now, too?
“You mean you don’t know?” Dani questioned, tilting her head at me a little, looking surprised. “It’s always been kind of obvious.”
“Not to me,” I denied, feeling a tiny curl of guilt in my stomach.
“Well… Yeah,” she finally said, after a pause. “It’s been a long time. Don’t tell him I told you that,” she tacked on.
“Nah, I won’t,” I said honestly.
It wasn’t like I could rub it in his face or tease him about it without feeling like the world’s biggest asshole anyway.
I felt a little bad, only because the idea of someone like him actually pining over someone like me was ludicrous in its own right, but in a way, I was glad.
I’d had enough anxiety about being attracted to him, and if I’d known he’d felt the same way…
there was no way we could have peacefully co-inhabited until now.
When he finally emerged from the backstage area, bouncing down the steps and heading over to us, he gave me an affectionate look similar to the gooey one Dani had given me.
“Shouldn’t you be at work?” He questioned, and I shrugged a shoulder, vaguely embarrassed by the question. I didn’t want him knowing I’d been so obviously devastated by his participation in this dumb shit that my boss had taken pity on me and let me go.
“I wanted to make sure you were okay,” I said. “I didn’t plan on, uh… You know.”
“Paying someone else money to be allowed to take me out on a date?” He finished, snorting a little.
“Not exactly my most economically viable plan,” I admitted. “But… That fucking guy.”
“Don’t worry about him,” Jordy said quickly. “Just forget it, and let’s get out of here.”
He’d probably been able to tell from the stage how pissed off I’d been and how close to losing my temper I’d gotten. As I was gently but firmly dragged out of the event room by the two of them, I glanced back behind me to see if Andrew was watching us, but I didn’t see him.
“So I’m guessing you don’t need a ride home,” Dani observed teasingly, and Jordy winced slightly.
“Um… Are you going back to work?” He asked me, and I shook my head.
“Nah, I can take you home. Or wherever,” I tacked on.
“Then I’m going to head out,” she said, giving me a wave as Jordy gave her a quick hug. “I’ll text you,” she said to him, and he nodded.
When the two of us got to my truck, he wrenched open the door and collapsed onto the seat like a puddle once he’d lifted himself inside.
Before walking over to my side, I leaned in and hovered over his limp body for a second.
He smelled so fucking good and looked so fucking cute in his dressy little outfit.
When he noticed the way I was staring down at him, one of his eyebrows perked up before he reached out for me, curling his fingers into my shirt collar as he dragged me into a kiss.
“God, that was so stressful,” he whined, when we broke apart. “I wanted to die before you showed up.”
The thought of what would have happened if I hadn’t shown up made me feel like a feral wolf ready to rip my prey apart, so I just nodded.
“Well, it’s over now. And you only have to go out with me, so…”
“You did pay Dave, right?” He questioned.
“Ahh… Shit,” I said. The adrenaline of everything had made me forget the number one rule of purchasing something. Actually paying for it.
“Kieran! You basically stole me! I’m stolen goods!”
“I’ll pay!” I said quickly, snorting at his description of himself. “Let’s just run back inside.”
He groaned, curling up on my ratty truck seat. “But I’m so tired.” He blinked his long eyelashes at me, poking out his lower lip in a deliberately pitiful expression.
I’d had to park all the way in the back because of all the cars in the lot, and it was a bit of a walk back to the building.
Also, besides the intense stress he’d experienced over the whole thing, it was probably mostly my fault he was tired, seeing as I’d gone to town on his ass and face-fucked him before he’d headed over.
“Alright, I’ll take care of it,” I promised. “Just hang out here for a second. Who do I need to talk to?”
After Jordy described the guy and where he’d be waiting for me, I opened my door to hop out.
“Wait!” He said, holding out his hand to me. “Can you leave your keys? I want to listen to music.”
Digging them out of my pocket, I tossed them over to him. Before I could even get far enough away from the truck, I could already hear his bouncy, peppy pop music bursting out from his rolled-down window.