Page 13 of Daddy’s Little Chaos Gremlin (The Lactin Brotherhood)

13

ROWAN

“Here we are, you can leave your backpacks in the car, we’ll be getting right back in when we’re through here,” I explained as I held the door open for Zephyr and Tristan.

“Whoa, it’s so old, but it’s so beautiful,” Zephyr gushed as he stepped out onto the sidewalk.

Looking down at the awe on Zephyr’s face and the curiosity in his eyes, I knew I’d found another boy who was going to love being introduced to new wonders.

They were both respectful as they moved along the path, Tristan never stepping off it to take his pictures, while Zephyr was content to follow him and study everything. It wasn’t a big place, but walking any grounds with a photographer was a different experience. We’d found a boy who didn’t whine or get bored. He just eagerly took everything in, even cocking his head and studying the headstones from different angles the way Tristan was doing with his camera. When we finished, he was just as excited as Tristan to see the next site I had in store for them, and skipped to the car, getting his seatbelt buckled before I’d even climbed in. Still, I checked it to make certain it was secure and snug.

“I’m going to make tombstones,” Tristan declared. “It’s going to take a lot of Styrofoam, like big blocks of it, and I’ll have to hit up the craft stores when we get back and see what they have for fake vines in their flower section. I’ll have to practice my airbrush techniques, but if I can make the Styrofoam grave markers look like the ones in the cemetery, we can combine them with the ideas we already had for the moon shoot and create some creepy bondage pieces.

“Ohh, does that mean I get to wear makeup?” Zephyr asked. “I can go full on goth if you need me to.”

“Even your hair?”

“I love going deep black and then dying the tips white.”

“That would be prefect. I’ve got a costume trunk we can dig through, and I’m sure we can find stuff at the thrift stores, too, that’s where I get my best pieces from.”

“Me, too. Those purple and silver jeans with the chains that I showed you, I thrifted everything to make them. The chains were just pet chains that I spray-painted, and the extra loops were cut from another pair of jeans and sewed on, along with the cargo pockets and the patches.”

“They’d be perfect with a mesh crop top.”

“I love wearing them,” Zephyr said. “I keep meaning to get a few more piercings to show off underneath, but I’ve chickened out every time I’ve gone to have my nipples done.”

“Maybe you just need someone to hold your hand,” I offered.

“Maybe,” he said as I glanced down at himself.

I wonder if he was picturing what the piercings would look like, the way I walked beside him with an image stuck in my head of twisting them and listening to him cry out while I fucked him. As exhausted as I’d been when I passed out last night, I’d clearly not gotten enough of my boys.

“Do you have to travel like this often?” Zephyr asked as we walked.

“You mean at the drop of a dime? No, usually I have time to plan a trip out weeks, if not months in advance,” I explained. “The only time I have to rush off the way we did to come here is when someone screws up royally.”

“Did they get fired?”

“You better believe it. My clients trust me with their lives. I hate getting frantic calls telling me their security has been jeopardized. There are many things that I believe in second chances for, but not when it puts someone else in danger. That’s non-negotiable for me. I don’t let the people I love put themselves in danger, either, so you best keep that in mind when you two are planning out your stunts. I’m all for pushing the envelope, but I insist upon every conceivable safety measure being in place and having the opportunity to study any plans or blueprints you draw up, before you start practicing anything.”

“I’m okay with that,” I said. “I’m used to having a spotter when I’m trying anything new, so I’ll stick to the things I know I can perform effortlessly, until something comes up where I’ll need one.”

“That sounds like a good plan. I’ll expect you to keep to it,” I insisted. “I’ll want to vet any spotter that you require to be certain that they have the knowledge and training to do what you need them to do.”

“I will. I promise,” Zephyr insisted. “And I’m perfectly fine with you vetting my spotters. I don’t know anyone outside of Paulie that I trust and could recommend.”

“That’s my good boy,” I said. “And if your friend Paulie is available when the time comes, I’d be happy to fly him in to assist with the project.”

He preened at hearing that. Praise would clearly be the easiest means of encouraging him. With Tristan, there were times when he was so critical of himself that he was unable to hear others when they tried to tell him how spectacular he was. He required distraction and immediate removal from whatever it was that was stressing him out and making him anxious and obsessive. Sometimes I required the same, especially when I was deep in negotiations with a new client’s management team.

Growing a name for myself within the personal security industry had taken a great deal of hard work and sacrifice. I’d spent a lot of time scouting and hand-picking that first team and being cautious about the clients we took. I’d never wanted us to be mistaken for mercenaries, or the kinds of men who could be hired to look the other way when crimes were being committed. We were not enforcers, and we were a hell of a lot more than hired muscle. We were bodyguards. We didn’t just protect. Our job was to ensure that our principals were able to live their lives as uninterrupted by their status as was safely possible. We scouted locations, mapped out routes, and accompanied them on damn near every aspect of their daily lives, right down to checking stalls before they were allowed to piss. We could not afford missteps or momentary losses of focus, something I’d drilled into the heads of everyone who’d worked for me over the years.

We’d had some good ones, too. Ones I’d have given anything to have back now, though I could appreciate Sully’s desire to go out on his own and specialize in guarding rock musicians, who lived a very different kind of lifestyle from those on my own clientele list. His Damage Control Inc. group was starting to be in demand, something that had cost me two guys about five months back, when they’d jumped ship to go work for him. I was still struggling to find the right person to fill one of those slots, and now I’d need two to bring the crew back up to full strength again. Divas, dancers, and society princesses, that’s who made up my client list. High-end engagements required different handling. There were subtilties and niceties that even the guards had to know. Hotheads and social climbers need not apply, though too many of them were tempted to do so. Few made it through the vetting process and the ones who did never lasted long on one of my crews. My long-time people had been taught to keep an eye on the new hires, and I knew damned well that I’d earned the kind of loyalty from them that kept fuck-ups from getting swept under the rug.

Would other firms have let Ryan’s mistake slide? You’re damned right they would have! I’d worked for a few.

It’s what taught me not to let things go, because once you let something minor slip through the cracks, people decided to test how deep the crack was and how much it could withstand. Maybe they didn’t mean to find the breaking point, but it never failed to happen, usually on a catastrophic level. Sometimes it was something so bad that the rest of the team, and even the company, had never been able to bounce back from it.

“What happens when we get home?” Zephyr asked. “Do you go to work each day?”

“Nope, I have an office in the house that you are always welcome to join me in. I have even a bench that pulls right up to my desk if you need a little midday snack,” I explained.

“And I have a studio space,” Tristan explained. “You can join me in there anytime, too. And there is a pool outside that you can swim in.”

“You have a pool?”

“Yup.”

“Oh my gosh, yay!”

He didn’t even ask how big it was, just yay , and a joyful smile, celebrating any chance to be in the water. That kind of appreciation was rare these days.

“We have a big library with all kinds of books and a bunch of streaming services, too,” Tristan said. “There will be plenty for you to do once I organize the projects you’ve already inspired, but there are like five of them. It might take me a couple days to sort them all out.”

“Good, that will give him time to settle in,” I reminded Tristan, cutting him a look.

I knew he’d be tempted to hit the ground at a thousand miles an hour, but we had all the time in the world. We’d found our boy. This was no longer a temporary engagement. I wouldn’t have Tristan frantically running himself ragged because he was afraid of the opportunity being snatched away.

“Because we both tend to get engrossed in our work, we’ve had to institute a daily schedule, of sorts,” I explained. “It’s nothing rigid, but work hours end at seven each night and aren’t allowed to resume until after seven in the morning. Emergencies are exceptions, some things just can’t be helped. Theo serves three meals a day and he does not appreciate them getting cold, so we have set mealtimes, and we are all expected to have our asses parked in our seats for those. The last time we upset our chef we spent the next week eating tuna melts and tater tot casserole. If I never see a tater tot again it will be too soon.”

“I’m not a fan of tater tots, either,” Zephyr admitted.

“I imagine not, with the way you so eagerly give away your potatoes.”

“That’s ‘cause I wanted the extra fish. Seafood is my favorite, but I really loved the carrots and mushy peas, too.”

At least he liked his vegetables. Theo was forced to get creative from time to time, in order to get Tristan to eat them. His latest trick had been to combine them with whatever protein he was serving and stuff the mixture in something else, like a large portobello mushroom or a giant tomato, which Tristan was much more receptive to when they were covered in a cheesy sauce. He’d tried stuffing green peppers, but Tristan had balked after the first bite, not that I could blame him much, I only managed half before suggesting they not make a return appearance on the menu.

As always, Theo accepted the criticism with grace and a reminder that if we wished to have something else for dinner, we’d better send for Door Dash because the kitchen was closed for the rest of the night.

That was fair, and exactly what we’d wound up doing, after a mini debate of what the hell we were even in the mood for. If anyone ever got around to creating a pizza place that also did Chinese food, we’d be their most frequent customers. It seemed like every time I wanted one, he wanted the other, though we had come across a killer crab rangoon pizza that sated both of our cravings.

Wait.

Hadn’t that place been just a few blocks from here?

Glancing around, I took a moment to orient myself then I typed what I thought was the name into my GPS, and laughed, because hot damn, it was just three blocks east, right across the street from the chapel Tristan had wanted to photograph. That’s how he’d discovered it the last time we were here, but we hadn’t had time to stop, we’d barely had time to gobble a few slices before packing up the rest and hurrying to a meeting with my crew.

Two birds, I thought as I guided the driver that way.

Somehow, it worked for them not to have traffic lights on every corner. Traffic flowed, people crossed, and no one lost their fucking minds honking because they were in a rush to get to the next stop sign. I could tell the moment Tristan spotted the chapel, because he started leaning forward, fingers gripping the back of the seat in front of him. It was a good thing we weren’t walking; I’d have had to grab hold of his beltloop to keep him from taking off down the street.

I placed a hand on his knee and patted it gently, a silent urging for him to be patient and wait until the car was fully parked before he went charging off anywhere. My good boy settled down, just as I expected, and the three of us walked together to the chapel.

“Do you see that building right there?” I asked, pointing across the street.

“Oh my gosh, that’s where we got the crab rangoon pizza!” Tristan declared. “Are you going get another one?”

“That’s the plan,” I explained, before I turned my attention to Zephyr. “They have traditional flavors, too. I can get whatever you’d like.”

“I’d like crab rangoon pizza too,” Zephyr declared.

“Perfect,” I said. “While I do that, you two stay together, and I’ll catch up to you once I have our food.”

“Okay,” they replied, perky and cheerful as they hurried off to take pictures.

I’d hired the car to take us to the airport, and with food on board we’d be able to eat before we got on the plane. It was hard sometimes, having to pack a whole lot into a tiny window. Had I been afforded the opportunity to plan a trip over, I’d have cleared at least a week of our schedules, but Tristan was less than eight days away from his next reveal, and there was still a great deal left to be done to prepare for it. At least we had Zephyr to be his display piece. I couldn’t wait to sit back and watch how Tristan and Zephyr interacted when Tristan was tying him up. So far, I’d only walked in on a mini-session, when Tristan had been introducing him to the texture of the ropes he liked to use. He had a woven chain of them that he carried for a stem toy and could practice tying into knots when he started feeling stressed, but it was only long enough for binding hands together.

The look on Zephyr’s face, though. The way his lips had parted, and his pupils had dilated. That had gotten my engine revving even more than when he stripped his clothes off. There would be plenty of practice workshops I’d be privy to, as well as any rigging that would need to be placed. I wondered what Zephyr would think of this part of our lifestyle. Private demonstrations of his Shibari skills and even private lessons were some of the other ways Tristan made his living. Sometimes clients paid him to tie one of them up for the other, a tool in a scene, but never fully part of it. On our dinner party nights, he also auctioned off a few of his sculptures, never more than three, and always ones fitting the theme he and Theo introduced.

They were truly breathtaking evenings and I couldn’t wait to see what Tristan dreamed up for his new co-star. While I’d never been a fan of social gatherings, I always looked forward to seeing Tristan shine. The way his face lit up when he talked about his work and the inspiration behind it, the way he invited all our visitors forward and invited them to look for the hidden things embedded within the sculpture, it all had a real theatrical quality about it. He came to life when the spotlight was on him, and he was a gracious host, welcoming both praise and critique from those who’d come to know his work.

Yes, I was a proud Daddy.

Proud to see twin smiles on their faces when I joined them with our meal. That’s all I ever needed. Just to see happiness on the faces of those I cared for and to know that I had a small part of bringing that light of joy to their eyes.