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Chapter One

James

The music was so loud I couldn’t actually hear what was playing, just the steady thud of the bass.

I headed straight to the bar and gave the young guy serving my flashiest smile.

He smiled back, and busied himself preparing a double vodka and soda, just as he always did.

I caught glance of myself in the mirror that ran behind the drinks at the bar and quickly looked down at my nails to distract myself.

Even drunk and from a distance, I could tell I looked haggard.

“Eight quid, mate,” said the bartender over the music, and I passed him my card.

Eight quid? How long has it been that expensive?

I’d been coming here a long time, ever since I’d started uni in London.

How long had it been? Long enough to see several young and sexy bartenders age out of being young and sexy enough to work in this club.

I gave the bartender a tight smile as he passed back my card and I pocketed it, grabbing my vodka and heading into the throng.

The club was sweaty and between the groping and bumping going on, about half my drink ended up either on the floor or on the front of my shirt.

A guy much bigger than me bumped up against my arse a few more times than anyone else did to the point where I knew it could no longer be an accident.

I ground up against him and felt his hands touch my waist, pinky fingers hooking into the waistband of my jeans as he held me possessively like I was his.

Another man, almost identical, moved toward my front.

“You’re a sexy little bastard, aren’t you?” the one man whispered from behind. He pressed a quick kiss to my neck, then kissed the other man. “I’d like to take you home.”

I turned to see him looking at me with hunger in his eyes that I didn’t really like, and suddenly the space between us turned from sexy to uncomfortable and intimidating.

“Just…getting a drink,” I muttered and slipped away from him.

I knew from experience that in such a crowded club it would be very difficult to find me, and if people had had enough to drink, or snorted whatever up their nose, they would lose interest or forget anyway.

Let them find fresher meat than a tired financier nearing 30.

I headed to the bar anyway, and the bartender winked and started getting my drink ready.

I was a regular here, usually Friday and Saturday every week, and all the staff knew me.

It didn’t hurt that I put a tenner on the bar as a tip at the end of some nights.

I skipped the bar queue every single time, and the bar staff knew the one drink that I really liked.

A younger, shorter guy than me with dirty blond hair sidled up to the bar.

He must have been no older than twenty and wore jeans and a denim jacket, buttons open to show he wasn’t wearing anything underneath.

I wished I had been that confident when I was his age.

“Going to buy me a drink, then?” he asked with a sly smile.

“Come to ask the geriatric for a drink? How original,” I said.

If I had a penny for every skinny little twink that had asked for a drink only to disappear I’d never need to work again…

then again if I had a penny taken away for every time I’d done the same to older men when I was a uni student I’d have no money.

“What are you, 23?” the young guy batted his eyelashes.

“Smooth,” I said, flattered even though my job in the City made me feel a million years older. “I’m 29, so I’ve been gay dead for at least 5 years.”

“I’d never have guessed,” he said. One hand crossed the inches between us to stroke my own hand. I rolled my eyes. If he was determined to flirt this hard, then he deserved a bloody drink.

As the bartender came over with my vodka soda, I gestured toward the young man. “Get him whatever he wants,” I said, holding out my card once again.

“I’ll have a double vodka Red Bull and two shots of Sambuca,” he said.

A silence fell between us as the bartender prepared his drink.

The bartender put the drinks down in front of the young guy and slid my card very deliberately in my direction. He glanced awkwardly at the young man and then back at me, as if afraid he was going to take my card for himself.

The young man pushed one of the shots of Sambuca to me and grinned. “Drink up,” he said.

“Oh god no, I don’t do shots.”

“C’mon, or are you older than you look?”

I rolled my eyes and drank the Sambuca down in one, gagging on the burning-sweet taste as it hit my throat.

The young man grabbed the vodka and soda that I had left on the bar before I could and stepped away, jerking his head to ask me to follow him into the crowd.

As I grabbed my card from the bar, the bartender almost imperceptibly shook his head at me.

Did he think the young guy was going to try and steal my card?

I grimaced and put the card back into my wallet with exaggerated motions, then took out a five pound note and put it down on the bar with a wink.

When I turned back, the young guy was standing at the edge of the dancefloor with drinks in his hand and a twinkle in his eye.

Maybe I was still young enough to attract twinks - and if I wasn’t, it seemed that my money was at the very least. What was the point of working long and inhospitable hours if I couldn’t splash the cash for a bit of fun?

I followed him into the throng, and once we’d reached a point far into the middle of the crowd he started to grind up against me to the beat of the music.

I grinned and put my hands on his waist. He held out my drink for me to take a sip and I drank it down eagerly.

He was short and slim, surely no taller than 5’4 to my relatively short 5’8, and his hips gyrated like nothing I’d ever seen.

His skin was pale and beautiful under the flashing lights.

I took another sip and went in to kiss him, but he put a finger to my lips to stop me.

He continued to grind against me though, so my drink-addled brain wasn’t too put out.

I felt thirsty, so took another greedy sip from the glass in his hands, and he passed it to me to continue dancing.

One of his hands strayed to my waist, feeling along the front of my waistband and dipping down to brush below.

“N-not here,” I said, but my words seemed to come out as more of a mumble. His hand reached deeper, grabbing at me in the middle of the dance floor in front of so many people.

“No,” I said again, but my lips didn’t seem to want to move.

I was so thirsty , I took another big gulp of my drink to loosen my lips.

I tried to say ‘seriously, stop’ but my brain and lips didn’t seem to want to work together.

I jerked away from him and his hand slid out from my jeans.

I stumbled and almost fell to the floor, dropped my drink to grab onto the nearest person to hold me up.

They shrugged off my hand with a shouted fuck off and I fell to the floor.

The young guy’s face appeared above me, and alongside him another familiar face - the big guy who had tried it on with me earlier. They smirked down at me.

“C’mon, old man,” the young guy said. “Let’s get you safely to bed.”

◆◆◆

My head hurt, my tongue was fuzzy, but most of all I felt cold.

And wet. And…dirty. What a hangover . I tried to open my eyes, but even that hurt.

It had been a long time since I had been this bad.

How much did I drink last night? I couldn’t remember.

I reached one hand out to grab my phone from the bedside table, but only touched…

hard concrete. What the fuck? I opened my eyes with some effort, and the sun filtering through London clouds felt blinding.

I was laying in an alleyway, my shirt jacket covered in mud and gunk. My mouth felt dry and fuzzy. I’d been drunk plenty of times before, but this time I felt really, really fucked. How was it possible I hadn’t even made it back to the flat?

I got to my feet, and almost fainted. Dark spots danced in front of my eyes as my heart struggled to pump blood to my head.

I braced myself against a the rough brick wall at the side of the alley and searched my pockets for my phone with the other.

It was gone, as well as my wallet and keys.

I cast tired eyes across the dirty ground but couldn’t see where they had gone.

Shit. I stumbled forwards, still bracing myself against the wall to get to the main street.

One side of my stomach was in real pain, like I’d fallen directly onto it.

As I had thought, the alleyway was just down the road from the club. Had I tried to drunkenly walk home and had my stuff stolen after I fell asleep in the alley? Surely not.

And then it hit me. I remembered being on my second drink, the thirst I had, the need to drink more, and falling to the floor. The three gleeful faces looking down at me as I lay there helpless. I stopped the sob even as it reached my throat. Stay strong, I thought. It was easier thought than done.

My best friend Owen lived just a couple of streets away in a flat-share, so I stumbled along the main street towards the block where he lived.

I could see the way that people were staring at me.

“Walk of shame, is it mate?” one builder called and laughed.

I ignored him and walked on. Every time it felt like my throat was about to close up, or my eyes started to prick with tears I stopped for a second and took deep breaths.

It had been months since I had an anxiety attack, and I didn’t intend to start now.

I made it to the swanky building in which Owen lived and rang the intercom. It took a minute before his crackly voice replied.

“Hey, who is it?” he asked.

“It’s me. It’s James.”

“Bloody hell, what are you doing up at eight am? Thought you’d be out last night.”