CHAPTER TWELVE
Nate
Maybe I’m weird, but hook-ups are an alien premise to me.
I’m an emotional guy, and I don’t understand how strangers can go from hello to fucking in the blink of an eye.
Sex is more than physical for me; it always has been.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a prude, I’ve had a few no-strings hook-ups a when I was in college.
My friends were doing it and I’d wanted to know what the fuss was about.
But they left me feeling hollow, dirty and a little used.
Being a monogamous married man suited me.
For ten years, I’d taken my vows seriously.
It never crossed my mind to go looking for sex outside of my marriage.
Maybe I let fear mask my desire for sex, or maybe I wasn’t as mindlessly horny as my husband!
My boyfriends before Erik were dudes I’d known through sports, and at college.
I’d been friends with each of them for months, years sometimes before anything sexual happened between us.
After the orgasms, relationship stuff was too much of a distraction.
I was focused on my career, and relationships never lasted.
Jack and I decided on a no-strings fling, and I’d agreed because I trusted him and I wanted him so damn much.
But the reality is there’s no such thing as no-strings sex, not for me, there are always strings.
I had deeper feelings for Jack Boyd than I’d dared admit to myself before Erik’s betrayal.
But who the hell was I fooling now? I’d never have done what I did with Jack on the video call unless I’d felt a deep connection with him, trusted him.
The jerk-off session was intense, erotic, and not nearly enough to quench the desire that Jack made me feel.
I wanted to see Jack in the flesh and pick up where we left off.
Fulfil all of those dirty fantasies we’d talked about.
Something was changing inside me. The walls in my vast empty penthouse were closing in and everything reminded me of my mistakes, my losses, and Erik.
New York City didn’t feel like home. I needed to be somewhere new, somewhere that Erik and I had never travelled together, so that I didn’t have to be reminded of the failure of my marriage.
The video call with Jack convinced me to get out of my comfort zone, live a little.
He’d made me feel seen, feel sexy, made me laugh, and for a few heady, hot, and horny minutes I’d forgotten that my personal life was a burning dumpster.
His suggestion that we should go to Berlin ahead of the entourage was the perfect distraction.
I was excited about my first trip to Berlin, and of course, the magnetic lure was that I’d be spending time with Jack as my personal tour guide.
After the stress of being home and dealing with my lawyer, shrink, agent and my family’s dismay at the divorce, I now felt removed from my old self, as if by leaving New York I’d put on a new skin and I could be a different person, and this Nate Linden was a single, sexually adventurous person.
I don’t like to flaunt my wealth, but my one outrageous luxury, now that Erik’s jet was no longer available to me, would be in travelling by private charter jet so that I didn’t have to deal with looky-loo’s and paparazzi desperate for a candid shot of me in public.
I arrived at Westchester airport, drove in, and passed my keys to the valet at the VIP entrance.
I was taken to a private suite, my luggage tagged and taken to my charter, and my passport checked.
Then I relaxed in the lounge until the jet was ready for departure.
A VIP attendant collected me and I was driven across the tarmac in a black SUV, and then I boarded.
It was a seamless, stress-free way of travelling, although I’d had my fair share of slumming it in Economy before I married up!
The flight was uneventful and on arrival at Berlin Brandenburg, the time was coming up to eight a.m. on Monday.
I adjusted the dial on my Rolex to reflect Berlin time as the jet taxied to a separate terminal that provided an exclusive service, separate from the main passenger terminal.
I exited the aircraft and was again collected by an SUV and taken to a suite to await my luggage and receive my documents.
At this juncture a VIP client travelling alone would generally be collected by their security entourage, or taken by car to collect their vehicle or a rental.
I didn’t want Jack to think me extravagant, pulling up at arrivals with a bullet-proof SUV for a simple city break.
No, here I wanted to be anonymous and ordinary, just for a few days, and so I asked to be taken through to the public terminal arrivals so I could exit with the regular travellers.
Ten minutes later I hopped off the golf buggy that had driven me through the back corridors of the airport terminal to arrivals.
I pulled-down the baseball cap I wore, a poor attempt at a disguise!
I collected my suitcase from the VIP attendant and passed her a tip.
Then I joined the stream of people moving through the arrival’s doors and into the vast concourse.
I scanned the faces of the people waiting at the barricade, and there, like the sun on a balmy day was Jack Boyd.
When our eyes met, I knew things had irrevocably changed between us.
I was kinda winded, like I’d been hit on the chest by a football.
Jack wore a cheeky grin, his whiskey brown eyes blazed with desire, and as I gazed at him and caught my breath, I decided, yes, whatever he had to give I was so ready for it!
We didn’t take our eyes off one another as I rounded the barrier.
When I reached him, Jack stepped up, slid his hands around my waist, and drew me in.
His embrace was a homecoming. I let go of the handle of my suitcase and melted into him, my arms twining around his neck.
I breathed in the familiarity of his bay leaf scent and just held on.
I’d left the US filled with nervous anticipation and uncertainty.
It had settled, to be replaced by a feeling of rightness, deep contentment, and excitement.
Jack pulled out of the hug. He cupped my face tenderly and said,
“Your mouth, my god, I’ve dreamed about your mouth,” before he placed a soft kiss on my lips. It was like a burst of golden sunlight in my chest and I was stunned by how romantic he was.
“Hi handsome,” Jack said softly when he eased back.
It was such a simple, joyful greeting, but my heart wanted to explode with all of the feelings that had lain dormant inside me.
We gazed into one another’s eyes before being dragged back to the reality of our location—we were in the arrival’s hall at an airport with a crowd of people around us.
“Good flight?” Jack asked with a lopsided grin.
“Yeah, I slept for most of it,” I said as I fingered a stray frond of hair behind his ear. Now that we were touching, I didn’t want to stop. This raging lust had bloomed in me and we needed to get to the hotel so I could strip him out of his shorts and tee!
“Ready to go?” Jack asked.
“Uh, yeah,” I replied dazedly as he hooked his arm into mine and led me down the concourse toward the exit.
“Berlin has a very efficient transport system. We’re getting the train; it’s just a thirty-minute journey into the city centre,” Jack informed.
It was then that we both halted and looked up at the huge advertising board in the arrivals area.
Personally, I shouldn’t have been as surprised by what I saw.
Among the ads for McDonalds, Dunkin, and the international and German clothing brands, were ads for The World Security Technology Conference, beside movie posters for Need to Know, featuring us as smouldering hot spies, standing back-to-back.
“The juxtaposition of the movie posters right beside an ad for the security tech conference is curious don’t you think?” Jack observed.
“Yeah, it kind of makes it look like we’re the special guests.” We laughed at the ridiculousness of that scenario and continued, dragging our luggage down corridors, and onto escalators with thousands of travellers who’d just arrived and were heading into the centre of Berlin.
At the ticket machine, with a few clicks and a swipe of Jack’s credit card we had train tickets.
Jack then led the way towards the correct train platform and validated our tickets.
It was lucky Jack was leading me because I wasn’t paying attention to my surroundings.
I couldn’t take my eyes off him. With a couple of minutes on the train platform to catch our breath I sent messages to my sister, mom, and to Roz to let them know I’d arrived safely.
The train pulled up and we got on. I stowed our luggage and Jack found us seats facing one another.
I relaxed into my seat opposite him. It was strangely intimate and so…
ordinary. It had been years since I rode a train like this, preferring to drive myself or using a car service.
An elderly man sat beside me, and a young woman with green hair and piercings sat beside Jack.
We travelled silently, but Jack and I shared intermittent smiles as we watched the city pass by.
I wondered what his smiles were telling me.
Mine were self-satisfied that I was with Jack, alone, and we had three days to kill!