“We’re here aren’t we?” The sharp symmetry of Shaw’s face closed into hurt, and North’s need for a cigarette doubled. It was going to be one of those nights, one of the nights when Shaw’s precious feelings were stretched out like spider silk and just breathing on him could leave a bruise that lasted a week. “Where were you? What took so long?”

“Soulard.” Shaw wiped a slick of water from his high cheekbones and stared at his fingers as though the mist were some sort of fucking miracle. “Matty got spooked, and I had to—”

“You were at Matty’s? At our client’s house?”

“He thought somebody was following him—”

“Somebody was following him. You. You sniffed after his cute little ass all the way to his house.”

Grinning, Shaw said, “He thought somebody else was following him. All day, he said. So I went back to make sure he got settled in ok.”

“He wanted you to do more than get him settled.”

“He’s just a kid, North. And he’s a client.”

As though on cue, a stringy blond boy slunk past them, his chest so scrawny that he was practically falling out of the leather vest he was wearing. “That’s a kid,” North said, jerking a thumb. The kid stopped, looked, brightened. “Keep moving. I’m just making a point.” The stringbean slunk down the block again. “That, that’s a kid. What you’ve got is a Bengal tiger pretending to be a kitty.”

“That is a very interesting metaphor.”

“I mean, Matty is hot for you, and he might be new to the scene, but he knows what he wants.”

“I knew what you meant. It wasn’t that complicated of a metaphor.”

North blew out a breath; it was like talking to a brick wall sometimes. “This is a gay club. Are you ready for that?”

“That’s great. I happen to be gay.”

“It’s not Rivets. It’s not some metrosexual, hipster, pour-over coffee and we-also-serve-draft-beers hangout.”

Shaw wiped at those ridiculously high cheekbones again. “What’s gotten into you tonight?”

“Forget it, ok?”

“Forgotten.”

North rolled his shoulders, trying to loosen up. He just needed to say something casual. He just needed to blow past the last five minutes like they hadn’t happened. Reset.

“Lot of doms in there tonight,” he said as they started toward the club entrance. “Lots of them looking for a boy like you. Maybe you’ll even find someone you like.” He laughed. “That’d be a change.”

And there it was again: the hurt in Shaw’s eyes, the little-kid-lost expression that made North want to chuff his way through a whole pack of Lucky Strikes.

“You’re being a real asshole tonight.”

“Fine.”

“To me. You’re being a real asshole to me.”

North shook his head and kept going toward the club, and after a moment, Shaw followed. As he always did. As North had known he would. This was the part of himself that North hated, the part he absolutely hated, and even as part of his brain recognized this fact, even as part of his brain tried to turn off and reboot and spin around and apologize, he kept walking.