Other people were getting together. No one had ever thought Adam would find a sub he could tolerate in a long-term relationship, and now he was going to be a daddy soon and begging the sub in question to just hurry up and marry him already. Everyone had bet Patrick would never actually make a move on Lexie either, but now they were together and glowingly happy. Even the most unlikely-to-be-in-a-relationship, commitment-phobic Andrew, was in love and completely exclusive with his second-chance love.

It was enough to make even an ultra-cynical pessimist like Ellie start to feel hopeful. Especially when she managed to get through an entire first scene with a man without even a tiny moment of panic, and ending it feeling like she wanted more from him... something she didn’t think she’d ever allowed herself to feel before.

“So what do you think?” Claudia, one of the subs who came to Stronghold regularly with her husband and Master, asked proudly, waving her hand around to indicate the full space.

Apparently, when Patrick decided something, he decided something. Michael probably shouldn’t be too surprised; after all, he was pretty decisive himself, but he still hadn’t expected Patrick to move quite as quickly as he had. They’d hashed out an agreement for going into business together on Monday, signed it on Tuesday, and now here they were looking at properties on Wednesday. It just so happened Claudia was a real estate agent specializing in business properties, and Patrick had contacted her on Monday as soon as they’d agreed to open the second club.

They were now in the third space Claudia had lined up for them. Originally, it had been the fourth on her list, she’d told them, but after getting their impressions from the first two, she’d bumped it up.

She was good too... because Michael thought it was pretty fucking perfect.

Completely different from the warehouse district where Stronghold was located, this building was right in the center of downtown. The entire four-story building was now available, although it needed a bit of fixing up. The main floor used to be a speakeasy restaurant, while the upper floors had held offices. The main restaurant area wasn’t very large because the main floor was divided between the front restaurant and the “speak easy.”

“What do you think?” Patrick asked, turning to Michael after a careful look around. They were back in the main dining area after having explored the upstairs.

Michael raised his eyebrows at the other man.

“Sure you don’t want to tell me what you think first?” he joked. Patrick just grinned back at him, arms crossed over his chest and totally at ease. He knew he was a bossy bastard. Fortunately, Michael was pretty easy-going in most ways.

“I think it’s fucking perfect,” Patrick said. “But since you’re the one who’ll be running it, I’ll let you have a say.”