Getting in Too Deep

"She's hot for you, you know," I said.

Keith just grunted. I was hoping for a laugh.

Mila Monahan from the Marketing Department stalked away down the hall between the cubicles with her back stiff. I'd just watched her desperately trying to chat Keith up. She must have humiliated herself badly.

"She's a bit too obvious," he said.

Keith was a shareholder on tour. He'd been wandering through the office for the past four days, when he wasn't being wined and dined by Marketing. Not that I knew much about the company finances; I'm not in the Legal Department or accounting. But rumor had it that Keith held twenty-five percent of the stock or something like that, so it behooved our president to make him sweet. What I didn't understand was why Mila would be throwing herself at him. I mean, yes, she was one of those carefully made up blondes who spent every spare minute at the gym or out in the mall shopping for clothes. And she was single, as she had taken pains to point out, so I could see her being on the make for a man. Keith had the bucks and Keith was hot. But he also lived on the East Coast someplace, so what in the world did she think she'd get out of it except for a three- night stand?

Keith was at the photocopier. I was queued up behind him waiting. I'd sent down a print job and while I was pretty sure that heap of white papers inside the machine was mine, I wasn't going to crowd the VIP enough to lunge in and grab them while he was still trying to process his job. And that was how I'd gotten to see poor Mila's desperate display.

There're a lot of good looking guys in the world. What's another one? I see a hundred of them every day. Keith was six foot several inches, built on broad lines and had one of those square smooth-skinned Slavic or Germanic faces. He was wide in the shoulders and trim in the body. If I knew anything about clothes I'd have predicted that his casual pants and shirt were expensive. However I don't, so all I could honestly say was that he carried off the same look as I saw in some of the celebrity magazines. He had a nice tight square ass too. It was no hardship for me to stand there and admire. It was that or lurk in my cubicle waiting until he went away so I could rummage in the sorter.

The photocopier groaned and whirred softly, while Keith glanced back at me.

"Let's see," he said. "You're in the IT department, right? But I don't remember the name."

"Jude," I said. I was keeping about six feet back, out of respect. He kept smiling at me. He'd got the tour three days ago, getting introduced to everyone, and I'd had the privilege of getting to shake his hand, along with the other four guys in our IT section. Small wonder he didn't remember my name. He'd met all 87 people that work in the office.

However, Rocky Daniels, our President had been at pains to make sure the Keith knew he was welcome to ask anyone anything at any time. "Get to know us!" said Rocky heartily. So that meant being shy would be poor etiquette. I didn't imagine that Keith was the least bit interested, but I offered some background anyway.

"I work on the websites, for the on-line orders and for Marketing," I supplied.

Keith nodded. "You did the graphics with the blue turtle whirling around?"

"Uh, yeah." Dortmund Growth Investing, has a catchy web site. Tiny pictures of that blue turtle show up in corners of the business section of a lot of newspapers and magazines. The idea is that we'll be branded, and the turtle will be recognizable like the big yellow arches. I think it's working. Anyway, when I was told to make the opening page show a turtle moving fast I'd come up with one that whirled. Glamour my job is not. Most of it involves tinkering with the fields on our on-line order form.

Keith collected a stack of papers and gave me a nod. It felt to me like his eyes rested on me a bit longer than most guys' do, but that was probably his important visitor to the office prerogative. "Catch you later, Jude," he said. He strolled off leaving me in possession of the photocopier-printer-fax.

I found my print outs, no problem. They were right in the stack where I'd suspected, mixed in with some sheets of code one of the other guys had printed out before me, but forgotten, and a page of accounting. The accounting page had the words 'balance sheet' on the top and had a lot of large numbers on it.

Now when we find stuff forgotten on the printer we usually just toss it on the sorting table beside the printer, which is what I did with the code. It's usually stuff that belongs to the IT department, of course. But in this case the paper was from accounting; it was most likely one of the sheets that Keith had just photocopied and all those big numbers were probably something that Management would consider confidential information.

I had a couple of options. If I tossed the paper into the shredder Keith might realize he was missing it and come back to look for it. If I left it on the table anybody might come along and peer at it and that would be irresponsible. The appropriate thing to do was to take it to Keith. So I set off down the hall after him, with my own print job in one hand and Keith's confidential company figures in the other. I was a bit embarrassed. Like, how was I going to get a chance to give it back to him? He was probably shut into the boardroom in a meeting again.

However when I got down the hall the boardroom door was open and I could hear the voices settling in casually. I still tried to give the paper to Tina, the Executive Assistant.

"Uh, I think maybe this got left on the copier by someone in that meeting."

Tina however got up and led me to the boardroom door. I followed holding the paper.

Four guys in suits and two women all turned around and gave us a cold look. One of the women was Mila and she probably had reason to look cold. I'd been a witness to her embarrassment. But the others were just irritated that a peon would interrupt them. All except Keith that is. He was at the far end of the teak boardroom table and got up right away, smiling. "Thanks, Jude."

The Director of Finance made a reach for the paper but aborted his motion as Keith was on his feet working around the table. Keith came around to me.

"I think it's just a duplicate page," Keith said. "I appreciate it." He took the paper from my hand and said the same thing he had down the hall, "Catch you later." Tina left, I left, and the boardroom door was closed firmly.

Back to my cubicle, I mused that I'd done the right thing, but I'd mildly offended management anyway. Oh well. They had to be pretty tense and cranky to resent the interruption like that. I'd hadn't been like they'd shut the door yet. I didn't waste any worry about it. I would be forgotten by now.

That's what I thought until I looked up at three o'clock to see Angelina, the head of my department looking over my cubicle wall. She got to the point, "Do you have any commitments this evening?"

"Uh, no," I said. Overtime, I thought. I couldn't imagine what kind of overtime she wanted out of me. All our projects were on schedule and not considered urgent. But she didn't explain. She gave a nod and turned away without a word.

I didn't have to wait long to find out what it was about. I had hardly started wonder when she was back again three minutes later, "We'd like you to join Rocky and his team for dinner tonight, Jude," she said.

Me? I raised my eyebrows. She gave a nod. "Keith would like to get to know our department and he's already met me," she said. "Rocky figures you'd be a good member of our team to explain anything that Keith wants to know. He said your graphics are great. The dinner is at seven-thirty, at Hugo's. You can make it, right?"

I just nodded.

"Great. You can a lift over with Mila. You don't have to go home and change."

"Why me??" I said.

"I dunno," said Angelina. "I think maybe Keith is just being a bit difficult. We only have reservations for eight, and they've had to dump Carol so that you can go. You'll get a good dinner out of it anyway."

So that was that. My plans for the evening had involved cutting out a bit early and maybe taking a hike up on Naughton Bluff and buying a hamburger from a street vendor, or maybe doing some heavy net surfing, while eating home made hamburger in front of my computer. I'm out of school less than a year and I'm not made of money. Medium lean has been featuring prominently in my diet. Three years of that and I'll have a handle on my student loans, but in the meantime fine dining was not even an ambition.

By the time seven rolled around, I had finished half my work scheduled for the next day and I was ravenous. Mila came down to get me and she was managing the easy friendliness of the Marketing Department again. "Almost time to go, Jude." I followed her out to her car.

It was a short drive to Hugo's. Hugo's is right down town and there was no parking to speak of. Mila found a spot in a lot that charged 20$ for the evening, and then I followed her down the sidewalk. Beautiful people were queued up outside of a dance club blocking the sidewalk. Then there were a bunch of limousines letting off people in front of the hotel and we had to thread our way through that too, but then we got to the rust colored awning where the doorman in his gold buttons gave us a measuring looking and opened the door for us. I began to be sorry that I had not gone home and got my suit.

Inside the air was different, stiller, sweeter and cooler somehow. My one suit would not have been as expensive as the one the maitre de was wearing. Mila went up to him and said, "Daniels" and we got led inside to a large round table with a white table cloth and a view of the harbor growing dark. Keith hadn't got there yet, but Rocky and the Vice President, and the Director of Marketing were all there. Despite my ordinary clothes I was beginning to enjoy myself. A grand dinner doesn't come my way too often and this one had every prospect of being fantastic. Ben got up and held a seat for Mila and I saw that it was going to be very formal. I sat down beside her and kept my mouth shut and listened.

I didn't know anyone at the party to speak to casually. They were all management except for Mila, and they had never exchanged more than ten or fifteen words with me except when I'd been hired seven months ago, when Rocky had shaken my hand and welcomed me to the company. They were all talking about stock and shares and issues and none of it was stuff I understood much, let alone being interested in. When Keith came he said he'd like to put his back to the window, so we all ended up jockeying around changing places. He ended up where Mila had been sitting, and she ended up in my seat and I ended up on the other side of Rocky. That meant I had a view of the harbor after all. I spent a lot of the evening glancing out at the twinkling lights.

Oh, it was a fantastic dinner. There were aperitifs and hor d'ouvres and I tried octopus for the first time in my life. The waiters all wore black and had long white aprons and were like automatons, very swift and polite. The sommelier suggested some kind of a Veuve Cliquot -well, the wine was wasted on me. There were no prices on the menu or I would have tried to order the cheaper dishes. But the main thing was how good the food was. The chicken was as tender as blancmange. I don't know what kind of sauce there was on the fish. I'd never been a fan of whitefish, but this stuff was good. The salad had some kind of nut in it that I couldn't identify but it was incredible too. I might have been bored but I was getting some gorgeous food to make up for it.

Rocky Daniels was the host of course, and everyone was friendly enough, but it was Keith who sometimes seemed to be directing things and who remembered the most to include me in the group. "Do you like a sweet wine or dry?" he asked.

"Sweet, I guess," I said. I don't drink wine much.

"Les bons tresors?" said Mila. "What's that?"

"Seafood medallions," he answered her without looking to his side. "Do you think you'd like that, Jude?" he prompted.

The funny thing was, although I'd been invited along as the IT department representative, apart from Keith asking me if I worked with the Marketing Department to come up with ideas for the web site, I didn't have any of the business talk directed at me. And even then it was Rocky who answered for me, swiftly telling Keith that our wonderful IT Department could implement anything our dynamic Marketing Department proposed. Certainly I could see my bosses hanging on every word that Keith said. It made me grin a bit to see the normal confident guys so intent. I did my best to relax and enjoy myself and not step on any toes socially. All I had to do was keep my mouth shut and to smile agreeably

Between soup and salad and entr‚es and bottles of wine, and lemon sherbet and a platter of cheese and more bottles of wine the dinner ran late. It didn't start until seven thirty. It was well after nine, probably after ten before the headwaiter brought the bill to Mr. Daniels to sign. Rocky was at least a bit drunk, Mila had demolished at least three- quarters of a bottle herself, and I was probably the only one sober. I'd had two glasses of wine and then just stuck to water. I was starting to wonder how I'd get home. If I was going with Mila, she wasn't driving.

"Where shall we go to next?" asked Keith.

There was a pause and I saw Rocky look at Ben, their smiles mechanical.

"Not too late for you?" said Rocky.

"Oh no, There's still a couple of hours 'til midnight," said Keith. "Maybe a decent music club?"

There was a ragged chorus around the table. Mila said she had to go home, Rocky suggested that Smokey Wonder had good jazz, Ben said a music club was a great idea, Travis said he could only stay until eleven and I said, "Thanks, It's been wonderful but I'd like to head home too."

But I stayed at the table because people were still there, making up their minds where to go. Travis said he'd stay until midnight, Rocky asked, did Keith prefer rock or something contemporary to jazz and I looked at the harbor lights. And then we all got up to piss because by then we were overloaded and besides Rocky was going to ask the restaurant staff what club would be right.

I strolled down the hall. One of the guys had got up to follow me so I glanced back to see who it was. It was Ben. But when I looked back to see who was coming after me and I saw Keith at our table, standing now looking after us, staring hard. Again, I didn't think he was looking at me in particular. I thought just as likely he was looking at Ben, wanting his confirmation of their club plans.

I'd just zipped up when Rocky came in. He went straight up to me, opened his mouth letting me smell the scotch on his breath and then closed it again sharply, and looked at Ben. Ben knew a signal when he saw it. He left right away, leaving Rocky staring hard at me.

"Listen," said Rocky. I don't think he would have phrased it quite so directly if he wasn't drunk, "Listen..." He took my arm and steered me into the hall, down near the deserted coat check. He had his lips together and didn't look any too happy.

"You got asked along here 'cause Keith said to."

"Yes, Sir," I said. "I know that." I thought I was going to be told off for intruding somehow.

"Yeah, well Keith finds you interesting, you understand? He likes you. Fuck knows how you let him know you were a faggot, but he can tell and it's you he wants to party with him tonight."

My jaw didn't drop but it came close.

"Piece of shit..." Rocky muttered. I couldn't tell if he meant me or Keith. "Here we are all bending over backwards to keep him happy and he wants to spend his evening with a fruit at our expense. And it ain't an escort service he wants. I told him, anything, put it on the hotel bill..."

I was goggling, "Uh, Mr. Daniels..."

"Listen, we told you," said Rocky. "Make our visitor feels at home, right? We told you, everybody. Mila woulda done it. Anything. You understand what I mean, anything."

"Mr. Daniels, I really doubt..." I started.

"Look. He fucking told me. You. It's you he likes. I shoulda known when we hired a fucking faggot. But it turns out you can be useful. So don't fucking turn around an' walk out on us right now. Go with him, get drunk, do what the motherfucker wants. Can't you understand that?"

It wasn't that Keith didn't look like the kind of hunk I could picture stripping off for me in my most wistful dreams. If Keith had tried to chat me up, I suspect I'd have been flattered enough to throw discretion to the winds. However it was quite another thing to have the boss of the company telling me who I ought to have sex with. From disbelief the expression on my face had gone to disgust.

"Listen," said Rocky again. "How long you been with us? Five months, right? Five fucking months? Well it's performance review time in September. We don't never give a bonus to anyone been with us less than a year, but this time, this time we'd make a fucking big exception. Mila knows. I'm talking an extra thousand for your bonus this year. You want to spend the night with him, you'll get an extra thousand. You don't want to spend the night with him? Well, I knew it was a fucking mistake to hire a fucking tit of a faggot. Guess who won't be working here in September if Keith the asshole Dortmund tells me he didn't get a hearty party like he's wanting?"

Rocky broke down, "Why don't you fucking understand?"

"Ah... I didn't understand," I said. My job was in jeopardy. He'd just put it in so many words. If I went with Keith and serviced him I'd get a thousand dollar bonus and if I didn't I get fired. I was so stunned by the situation that I didn't think clearly. I didn't really believe it. "He likes me?" I drew a breath. "Oh. He wants to... And you want me to...?"

"Like I told you," Rocky was getting a grim smile on. "I'm not saying what you have to do with him. Entertain him. Keep him from being lonely. Bonus. Company representative doing a good job to further the company interests. Big bonus."

I blinked. I stood blinking. Some part of me knew I ought to haul off and sock Rocky for using that kind of talk with me. He'd called me a fucking tit of a faggot. It was supposed to be a secret at the office. I had never come out of the closet to anyone there, yet somehow he knew. His contempt was clear. He didn't like me, he didn't like faggots and my job was in jeopardy and Keith, hot, drop-dead gorgeous hunk Keith, apparently was turned on by me.

Rocky didn't say anything else. He turned and walked away. I stood for another ten seconds. I watched him join the group talking to Ben and Keith. I stared. Keith had his profile turned, smiling down at Ben talking easily. Slowly I walked back towards the group. Somehow my upper chest had gotten kind of sore, like I'd swallowed something that was too big and my breathing wasn't catching quite right.

The funny thing is how ordinary everything was after that. Finally the guys decided that we'd hit a bar called The Black Cat and it would be Travis and Keith and me. Mila was going to be taken home. Rocky was adamantly avoiding my eye so hard that I didn't get to see his profile, but Keith's eyes flickered over on me and when they did it made a smile curve on his lips. I agreed I'd heard that The Black Cat was good, had good contemporary music when in fact I'd never heard of The Black Cat at all. And then we all got into a taxi together because the other three guys were all too drunk to drive.

The Black Cat turned out to be an ordinary fairly quiet looking bar with a young man playing a guitar and a normal crowd. I saw one of the bartenders was a shiny young man with his right ear pierced wearing a lavender satin shirt, and I thought he was pretty flaming gay, so most likely the Black Cat catered to a mixed crowd. There seemed to be some girls out clubbing in pairs and some guys but it certainly wasn't a gay bar. Rocky stayed just long enough to give his credit card to the bartender, and presumably to tell him that all the drinks all evening for our party were on him, and then he went back out. The three of us, Travis, Keith and I sat in a corner booth. I was right under Keith's arm but he didn't touch me. Travis was telling some long, funny story about getting booked into the wrong hotel for a convention. Keith was smiling and nodding and I was surreptitiously looking at Keith.

I was just enough together to conclude that Travis's story was funny but that the guitar player was mediocre. He was bad when he played someone else's stuff, but intense in a sad kind of way when he played his own stuff, which was mostly about making bad decisions. "Why did I do it?" The guy sang, "Why did I do it? Why did I do it? Why did I screw it?" Travis had a scotch, I had a beer and Keith had a 7-Up.

"I'd better sober up a bit if I want to stay conscious," Keith told me with a smile.

I nodded and grinned.

"You ever travel, Jude?" he asked me. He was making conversation.

"Yeah, I did some backpacking in Britain," I said.

"Backpacking?" laughed Travis. "What, you did hiking in the Scottish Highlands or Wales, or something?"

"I went youth hostelling," I said. "I did a few cities. It was really great. Some day I want to travel all over Europe, see Scandinavia, Germany, the Baltic..."

"You're not going to do much business traveling out there!" Travis laughed. I laughed too. Of course I wasn't going to do any business traveling. My job didn't entail any business traveling.

"That's cool," said Keith. "What did you like most?"

"Oh, just getting out in the world, I guess. Seeing different things." I faced him smiling. "You ever travel someplace interesting?"

"I've been to Europe," Keith allowed. He didn't enlarge on it. I was racking my brains to keep the conversation interesting.

Travis swallowed down the last mouthful of his scotch. "Mind if I take off, guys?" he asked. "I just remembered, the wife wants me up early in the morning to get some work done on the place. We've got workmen coming, you see." He stood up. He'd drained his scotch pretty quick.

"No, sure, head home if you've got to get up early," I rattled off, as if my permission really made any difference.

Keith just smiled without saying anything. His arm was around behind me on the back of the booth. It occurred to me as I watched Travis lunge off between the tables that he was ill at ease and relieved to be bailing. I looked around at Keith. He still said nothing but now his arm dropped to around my shoulders.

I drank another swallow of beer trying to think of something to say. I ought to let him know he can go ahead, I thought. But my just sitting here with his arm on my back was telling him that. I couldn't bring myself to reciprocate. After all I might have rested a hand on his thigh or something under the table, even if I was nervous about making openly gay gestures in a public bar. It wasn't like his arm was attracting any notice. But the real reason was that I was supposed to be being his evening's entertainment. I didn't know how to do that. I stared into my beer.

Say something, you stupid fuck, I told myself.

"You going to finish that?" Keith asked.

"Um, I don't really want to." Maybe he likes the tongue-tied inarticulate dweeb type I thought savagely. Um. Uh. Er.

"Let's take me back to my car," he said.

We both got up and went out. The Black Cat was in a neigbourhood not remotely as trendy as Hugo's Restaurant. As we stood on the street, Keith punched buttons in his cell phone to call a cab. Two black guys came strolling down the street and checked us out, measuring us both with flat non-committal eyes. I couldn't tell if they were cruising us or sizing us up for faggots. But Keith wasn't touching me here on the street.

"You been working for Growth Investing for long?" Keith asked.

"Seven months."

"Where were you before that?"

"School."

"Just out of college?"

"Yeah."

"Where'd you go?"

"Windsor."

He shook his head.

"It's a little, local place. You'd never have heard of it."

He looked at me steadily.

"How about you?" I tried.

"I went to college a few years ago," he moved closer. I stood my ground but then after a moment my eyes dropped. I found myself checking out his package. What I saw was a huge bulge in those neatly cut looking trousers. Right, I thought. He's hard already. There is no way Rocky made a mistake about this. I looked up again. C'mon, fucking touch me if you're going to.

He just moved in so we were shoulder to shoulder. The street was too public.

Then the cab he had called came, and so we both got into it. He gave the name of his hotel. I hope he has rubbers, I thought. I smiled at him. He smiled at me. I couldn't tell if his smile was predatory or not. Most likely within an hour I'd have blown him. Yeah, whatever else happened that would probably be it. Give a little head and then slip out home and leave him to sleep the booze off. He didn't seem too drunk though. It was almost like he'd been faking drunk at the restaurant so that he could look as drunk as the average.

In the taxi his hand wandered, not over my shoulder again, like it had before, nor over my leg to my crotch like you'd think. He touched me on the waist and his hands worked under the bottom hem of my shirt. Those fingertips touched my skin, traveled on the bare skin under my shirt an inch or two along my back. I looked at him. I couldn't help it. Immediately the hand behind me went relaxed and slipped away.

Why the fuck am I so nervous? I asked myself. I've given head before. So I'm going to give this guy head too. Whatever. But I was still very nervous and that was because Rocky and Travis and Ben had been nervous. They had all acted like they were a afraid of him...

"Why are the managers so afraid of you?" I blurted.

"They want my money," said Keith like it was a normal question. "They want me to put more money into the company. And then they'll have a lot more money to spend, make a big expansion, probably double their salaries, maybe."

"Oh!" I said.

I wondered what Rocky made. Probably he made a lot more than me. I was making 28 thousand, so he was probably making about a hundred thousand, maybe something like that. I had no idea what someone like Rocky made. But two-hundred thousand instead of one hundred thousand, that was a big jump.

"That was a great dinner!" I said. "Just great!"

"It was pretty good," Keith was staring at me.

The taxi pulled up in front of his hotel. It was a great big one, with another uniformed doorman out front. I followed Keith in to the lobby. It was late enough that it was pretty quiet there. The desk clerk was a woman who stood with a wide-awake attentive look taking us in like a pointer dog, ready to spring into action. But a pair of people were sitting on one of the couches in the lobby looking like they were falling asleep. They had suitcases at their feet. The hotel lobby was two stories tall inside. It was a vast building. Keith turned to me.

"Is there anything you need before you come up?" he asked.

He meant drugs, I supposed. Poppers. Whatever some guys take. I shook my head. He led me to the elevator. It was only after we were in the elevator going up that I thought to ask, "You've got condoms, I suppose?"

He just nodded.

I'm going to be fine, I thought. Damn, I feel stupid, being a prostitute. If I'd gotten an urge to pick the guy up and then been so lucky as to score a guy like him I'd have had my hands all over him. I have wanted to cop a feel of his package, maybe kiss him. Yeah, I'd have been all over him, trying to kiss him. He was fucking cute. But I was trying to do what he wanted... I didn't want to take any liberties with him. It wasn't like I was necessarily going to get it off.

You're not going to get it off, I told myself. I had a hard on already. You're going to suck him, service him, give him what he wants and then go home. Likely he isn't even going to take his clothes off, just whip his dick out of his fly so you can give it a suck. Even if you want to, all you'll have to do is wait until you get home and beat off. He's not going to do it to you. You're going to do it to him. Jesus, I could be coming down in this elevator again in twenty minutes.

His room wasn't a room. It was a suite. I looked at the sitting area in confusion and thought, where's the bed, before I saw the open doors. It was a four room suite with a huge bathroom, a huge double bed in the bedroom and a little office set up with a lap top plugged in on the desk.

He just held the door open for me and I went in. I turned around and looked at him. He shut the door and stared back.

"You're very cute, you know that?"

It was nice of him to say so. I guess I'm cute. I'm okay. Mostly I would say average. At one point when I was in college I did some working out and it hasn't all worn off yet, but I know I've got between five and ten pounds more than I should that isn't muscle. If you want to be critical you can spot it on me. Also, I was wondering uneasily what he would say about the fact that I was pretty hairy. I had a clean shaven chin and he might be expecting the rest of me to be shaven. No, he probably wasn't, because after all he probably wasn't going to expect me to take any of my clothes off.

Right, suck him.

I came forward and reached for his fly. To my surprise he moved his hips back and intercepted me. He twisted my hand up and put his mouth on mine. Since he was taller than me he was leaning down just a little. I felt the firm softness of his mouth and tilted back. His kiss was good. His kiss was savoring, warm and sensual. I also kept my eyes open and when we ended up meeting eyes while in the lip lock he gave a laugh and broke it apart.

"You're nervous," he said.

"Yup," I agreed.

"You're not at all drunk," he added.

"Neither are you," I said.

"All the better. I'll get to enjoy you for longer."

"Uh... what did you want?" I asked. "I mean, I kinda, sorta expected you maybe'd want me to blow you, something like that."

"That would be nice," his eyes twinkled.

"So why don't I..." I reached towards him again.

Once again he put his mouth on mine and tilted my head back. This time he took the back of my head in his hand. His lips moved hungrily and his breath inhaled as he kissed me. Now I had a real hard on. Just a couple of kisses and I had a rock solid boner that was making me feel like a puppy dog. I wanted to start begging for his bone.

"I'd like to spend just a bit of time with you," he said. His voice had gone slightly hoarse. "We don't have to hurry. I want to inspect your ass," he said. He was still holding my head with his arms encircled around me. "I'd like to see you jacking your cock, maybe give me a chance to suck on it. I want to drill you. Fuck you from the front and from behind. And I'd like to see you stripped off naked. How about it, Jude? Willing to let me have an evening to remember?"

"Sure," I said.

"Cool..." That smile was almost predatory again. He started undressing me.

I tried to reach for his shirt while he was working on mine but his hands were up and in the way and he didn't move them, so I understood that he wanted to call the shots and do the work right now. Since I was doing it all to please him, I stayed where I was and let him do it. He slid my shirt off, got my belt unbuckled and dropped my pants. There I was in all my furry glory. Well I'm not werewolf fuzzy, but I've got hair on my chest and belly and crotch and thighs enough that if smooth boy flesh is your thing I'm not. It didn't seem to bother him. He sucked in a deep breath of admiration and grinned all over his face. My prick was saluting him. I didn't have any nervousness in that department. I stood there with my pants around my ankles like hobbles while he felt over me.

"Man, you're a fucking cute little bear," he said.

He put his hand on my ass and felt me there, squeezing the muscle first one cheek than the next. "You're fucking beautiful," he said. One hand cupped my balls, the other squeezed my ass cheek. Then he made me shuffle over with him to the couch and sat down and put me over his knees.

Weird, I thought.

But he was just getting a really good feel of me. He took the time to pull on my prick and to slide his hands around on my back and thighs but it was my ass that really got his attention. He used both hands to knead and cup and rub and by and by I knew there was a drip of pre-cum going to drop and make a spot on his fancy designer trouser leg.

"You've got a gorgeous ass," he told me. "That's solid muscle. Fucking hot." And then he dumped me off his lap so that I was on my knees leaning on the couch and he got down on the carpet behind me. He began to lick and bite on my ass cheeks, rubbing his hands on me and rubbing his cheeks against me nuzzling.

Wooo, I thought. This isn't so bad. I might be nervous but by then I had gotten so turned on that I wasn't worrying about it. It wasn't like he was humping me oblivious to how I felt, or that I hadn't gone up to his hotel room all of my own accord. He was just giving me some real hot sensations. To fuck with being nervous. This was great!

After awhile more Keith decided it would be better on the bed, so I kicked my pants off and went into the hotel bedroom. It was a king sized bed so even with two guys there would be a lot of room. He got me to lie on my back and got between my knees. He put both hands under my ass, squeezing upward and began to nuzzle my crotch. He didn't actually suck me because I was bare but he managed to make my cock begin twitching all of its own. There were beads of pre-cum swelling up out of my slit and he used a finger tip to massage the slippery fluid in. I was breathing hard.

It got so intense that I was beginning to buck, thrusting upward into the air beside his face and then backing my ass down to his fingers. As yet he hadn't started really digging into my crack but it was enough to make me think all I'd need was half a dozen strokes to bring me off. Probably if he had started poking my crevice I would have clenched up but he wasn't doing that yet. He was just getting me ready and more than ready.

Okay, I'm going to get ass fucked, I wasn't able to think straight. Good. Fuck me. Fuck me. "It... uh, it feels good, Keith," I said. Fuck me. Wait! No, if I blow him I don't have to take his prick up my ass. His fingers held me open, but nothing entered my crack. I squirmed for the sensation, writhing with expectancy. Poke me! Poke me! Even if I'm scared. Do it. Oh, man! Maybe there was an angle that would make getting my ass fucked feel right. I was breathing like a steam train and my eyes rolled around.

Keith was breathing deep too. He didn't put his mouth on my cock and bring me exploding and he didn't send his fingers grinding up to my asshole. He sealed his mouth up, taking self control and moved back, away from me. I watched him take two, three slow careful breaths. "How about something to drink, anything like that?" He was remembering to be the good host.

"Uh..?" I said pathetically. Oh yeah. I was the whore here. I was going to cum, I was certain of that by now, but I needed to save that cum for him, to do it the way he would like. "Right. Yeah."

"What did you want?" He got off the bed.

"You having anything?"

He shook his head. I was at a loss. I didn't know what I wanted. I really didn't want booze but then again, this guy was an ass man. One thing for certain he wasn't turned off by my ass, so most likely I'd have to take his cock in my chute and that meant it would be better to have a drink. I might not clench up so bad. It would be more comfortable like that.

"Whiskey?" I said.

He went to the bar, walking just a bit funny leaning forward to give his cock some room in his pants. He poured me a glass of Glenfiddich. "Water, ice, peanuts?"

"Thanks!"

Whiskey?? Where was my mind? I wasn't sure if I'd ever even had whiskey before. It certainly wasn't my drink of choice, just the first one that had popped into my head. However he brought me over a glass of the whiskey mixed with ice and water and a dishful of peanuts besides. He put them on the nightstand beside the bed.

Then he looked at me, "Have I mentioned that you are really, really cute?"

"How did you know I was gay?" I asked.

"I wasn't sure," he grinned. "But I figured you were checking out my ass at the photocopier so I left a piece of paper behind as bait to see if I could bring you after me."

"Oh," I said.

"I'm glad you are gay," he said joining me on the bed. This time he ran his hand onto my chest, letting his fingers flatted the hairs and then taking my tit between his fingertips. His other hand went to my crotch. "Let me know when you're ready to get a condom on."

"How about..." I gestured at him. "You get some of your own clothes off." Up until them he hadn't taken a stitch off. He was still in his shirt and shoes and everything.

Keith grinned and sat on the side of the bed and pulled his shirt off. He was a weightlifter. God! He was perfectly sculpted. Two pecs like a work of art tapered into a perfect six pack. My breath caught. There wasn't a flaw there. Perfect proportions. And I had to be blackmailed into this? Man, why did he keep calling me beautiful when he had the body to die for?

He kicked his shoes off but left his pants on and then he began kissing my belly and hand-cranking my dick. He got his left hand under me again so that he could squeeze my ass while he jerked me. I was just about in heaven there. A few cranks and I was gasping again. This was really good. Oh, do me more. Yes, do me more. Pump me. Fuck. He squeezed my ass so that I was grinding downward and upward at once. "Keith!!"

"What?" he said. "Then, how do you want me to bring you over? What do you like."

"Jesus... I'm so fucking turned on!" I panted. I had never been turned on like this, never with none of my previous partners, not even when I thought I was in love. "Oh Jesus!"

"Want it up my ass?" Keith asked steadily. "How do you like it? Fuck me and then I fuck you? Wanna get sucked? You can have it whatever way you like it."

"I'm... I'm here for you." I could hardly talk. "However you like it."

"I'm fond of sucking it," he said softly. "I'd kind of like to suck it on you, but then I'd like to have it in your ass. How about it? What do I have to do to get your ass turned on?"

"What you're doing already is pretty good," I said with a swallow.

He climbed on top of me and started kissing my mouth. He kept his crotch against the mattress and not on me. Funny. Man, he was a good kisser. Then he started cupping and playing with my balls. And then he broke the kiss again, "How about some of that whiskey?"

"Right." I crawled over to the bedside table. That meant flipping over on my side so that he could see my ass and he immediately shifted over to watch it. I took a drink of the whiskey. It didn't burn as much as a lot of liquors do. He started rubbing my ass again. He got a rubber and rolled it down my cock. Keith's eyes glowed and his stroked the rubber onto my shift. He opened his mouth and took my prick inside: heat, his mobile moving tongue.

"Oooh..."

It was when he started sucking my cock that he pushed his finger into my crack. It was an odd sensation, and then as he slid his fingers gently up and down it was an okay sensation. I lay back fingertips in his hair while his head bobbed as he sucked my prick. My knees were up and his hands were stroking my ass cheeks and working into my cleft.

Right, he's getting me ready to fuck me. Right. Oh, that feels so good. Oh. Yes. Mmm... If he wants to fuck me, why isn't he humping me? Yeah, it's good, good. Keith was starting to grind his hips now, but down on the bottom of the bed and only slightly. In the mean time he was making love to my ass, using both hands, getting my ass feeling really good. He sucked me steadily. If the condom hadn't numbed some of the sensation I'd have blown but this was making me last longer. He got my ass feeling good and relaxed. I started pushing against his fingers, knowing he wanted that. And when his finger went inside me it felt real good.

Jesus! Maybe I will like ass fucking.

"You take it up the ass very often, Jude?" his voice was quiet.

"Uh, once or twice."

"That's what I thought," said Keith. "I'll go good and slow." He worked me patiently, slowly, lovingly. He used some lube and I didn't even realize it at first because he had warmed it up in his palm. He got so he was driving two fingers into me and not sucking on me hardly at all. He was using his fingers to turn me on, finger fucking me. I was dazed by the intensity of the sensations.

I can do this, I thought. Fuck, I can even enjoy this. Yeah. Oh. He touched something, triggered something inside me. It was like nothing but an electric spark, like something had quivered inside me. Oh! Every time his two fingers went fully deep he rubbed over something that felt good.

I moaned. When I opened his eyes he was grinning. He finger fucked me twisting his fingers a bit more to get more sensation. "Keith... man! Fuck! You can fuck me. Yes you can! Oh Jesus, you're making me feel good."

"Right, lots of lube, uh-huh..." he was watching me closely, like I entranced him. " Make you feel really good, really, really good."

Why the fuck doesn't he have his own prick out?

"What about you?" I said.

"I want to get you good and wide first," he said. "Make it comfortable."

But he had me ready. My cock was as hard as steel and my ass had never felt so good before. "Get it wide..." he breathed. He got a third finger in. That was pretty close to too much. My body lurched with the increase of sensation.

"Oh," I said. "Oh... Keith. I'm ready. Do me. If you really do want to fuck me, do me."

"Get on all fours," I was the one breathing hard but he was the one having trouble talking. At his order I switched over kneeling. I got on all fours and looked behind. He still didn't drop his pants. He switched to finger fucking my ass in the position. "Move your hips." I started thrusting air and pushing back onto his slippery fingers. What the fuck is he waiting for? What the fuck is he doing? Is he really going to pull his cock out? Fuck, is he setting me up for something some how?

"You're clenching."

"You're making me nervous."

"What did I do?" he asked softly.

"What are you doing?" I said, "Show me your prick. I want to see your prick," I demanded.

"Okay," said Keith. He moved a little way back and now he was unfastening his pants. I was watching and he was watching me, waiting for my reaction. He had his cock stuffed down one leg of his trousers and it was hard. It came up as soon as he peeled the pants back, big, bulbous headed and swollen.

"Oh, shit!" I said I was looking at a hard cock that was maybe fourteen inches long.

It wasn't just fourteen inches long. It was thick. I'd seen some showy cocks in porno movies before. I might even have seen one that long. But this one wasn't flexible looking like the ones I'd seen in porno. Those ones had been kind of snakey. This one was like a hammer. I got off the bed.

Keith just stayed there kneeling on the foot of his bed with his pants at his knees. I stared at the jumbo member and he let me look.

"You might have warned me," I said.

"I've tried that before," he said. "But the guys just think I'm bullshitting them." He waited to see what I would do.

I got back on the bed cautiously and then put my hand on it. It was hot, firm and solid. There wasn't much give in that shaft. It was a wonder he'd managed to keep it tucked down his pant leg. Standing up it was big enough it would have poked way out the top of his waistband.

"Alright, now. That's..." I was at a loss for words. I checked out his face again.

"It's a trifle over average."

"Yeah," I said.

"I can fuck you really slowly," said Keith. "I'll take it out as soon as you tell me to take it out."

"Shit, man," I said incoherently. "Does that get you more dates or does that make you the number one schlong king or what? Oh my God. What happens when you go into a gay bar and unzip?"

"I get a funny reaction sometimes," he said.

"How long is it?"

"Thirteen inches,"

"Really?" I looked up at his face again.

"It doesn't intimidate, you does it?"

"Well, I've only ever tried getting fucked up the ass once before," I said. "And that wouldn't be my number one favorite experience... I don't suppose you like being blown as much as you like fucking?"

"I love your ass, Jude."

"I'm in for a real rough night," I sighed.

"You'll let me try?"

It was the word try that did it for me. Try implied that he knew it might not work and if it didn't he'd back up again. He didn't lie and tell me for sure it was going to work, and I didn't figure I'd get into a wrestling match with him. Rocky Daniels might think he was a prick - Rocky didn't know the half of it. -But with me Keith was going at the speed he thought I could handle.

"Sure," I said with an entirely artificial shrug.

Keith reached out and took me so we were belly to belly and his big cock stood up beside my average size one. He cupped my ass. And now I could cup his ass too because he wasn't keeping his prick away from me.

After a bit of rubbing he put me on my front again, elbows down by the pillow and ass humped up. He let his prick bounce gently against the back of my leg while he worked lube into my ass and massaged my hole again. I was kinda aroused but just as much scared. I smiled at him over my shoulder. "Go for it, Dude."

It was a bit too much for me when he got three fingers in. That hurt me. But then he got my prostate again and the little internal electrical zap gave me something else to think of than would I tear in a place that would be no fun getting stitches. And he worked those fingers in slow, and kept it greasy with the lube. So after awhile I could take the three fingers. But mostly I didn't feel like I could take them for too much longer and I wanted to get his prick boring me. I was of the mind to get it started before I started to chicken out.

I was aroused. I was pretty turned on, just not out of my mind turned on. Keith placed the rounded tip of his cock at my hole. "Okay..." His thumbs dug into my tissue keeping it loose. "Okay." And then he started pushing.

Oh Jesus! That was too much sensation. You are a fucking wus! I kept my head down, pushing back. Keith breathed out in a long soft ragged groan. He got the head popped inside me and kept pushing steady and slow. Man. Oh God. Inch by inch went in and then another inch. Jesus! I was in pain but in a cool sort of way I was turned on. He had the most fucking beautiful cock I'd ever seen. It was gigantic, it was thick, it was perfectly proportioned. God, Keith was just about the most fantastic looking guy I had seen. What I have in my butt some guys would die to get. Keith took it real slow and careful.

There was the moment when the head of his dick rubbed across my prostate and that electric jingle made me aware of strange places inside me. But then his dick head was past that point and it was going deeper and deeper. And then ugh! It felt really weird deep and what am I doing, putting up with this shit? I'm fucking out of my mind.

And then Keith made a sound that was like a cross between a sob and a sneeze and I suddenly resolved to hold perfectly still and not try to get it out. He was fucking me. He pulled out, pushing in, pulled out. They were tiny motions at first, more the rocking of his hips then the sliding of his cock. But then he was making them a little deeper and then he was really getting a short careful stroke.

"Hmmmm!" said Keith in a wobbly voice.

"Fuck me," I said in a whisper.

I guess it was what he really wanted to hear. His breath came out in a total explosive gasp. "HuAHH!"

He fucked me, maybe thirty strokes, steady and careful strokes but real strokes shoving that alpha male prick into my butt. In and out. In and in and out and in and oh God, it's so big, it's gigantic, oh God there is nothing but that huge, big, immense monster prick. Oh God it's killing me. Fuck me. "Keith! Fuck me... Keep fucking me! Yes, Keith!" Oh. Oh Christ!

He didn't vocalize words. He just grunted and groaned and grunted. And then before I could quite collapse, and before the pain quite had me screaming, and also before my cock could quite make up its mind that this killing incredible sensation was a type of pleasure, that was when Keith made another soft groan and I felt his prick twitch in a way that was beyond his careful control. He held onto my hips so tightly when he came, that he left bruises.

Afterwards he was really careful drawing it out. And then afterwards while I was still turned on and stunned on it, overloaded, Keith went down on my cock in a motion that started as a kiss and then opened up wide so that it took me right down his throat. I lay on my back. Oh my, he deep throats too...I watch Keith suck me hard and urgent and hungrily, watching him slide his lips right down to the tuft of fuzz . It didn't take too long. In about two minutes I was convulsing. I made a grab for his ears, missed fortunately and then felt the pulse going. I came with long aftershocks, exploding out.

It was one thirty in the morning. I lay flat on my back on the hotel bed with my heart thudding. Keith lay grinning beside me. He dropped a kiss on my stomach. "You are so fantastic."

He likes me, I thought in a daze. "You okay, then?" I said.

"Better than okay," he grinned.

"I gave you what you wanted?" I asked.

He nodded and kissed my belly again.

"I think you fucked me silly," I said. I did it. I took it. And even though he had a monster prick, much too big, unfairly big, I took it. God... Keith was rich, handsome, hung, way out of my league. But in the afterglow of being fucked silly and then cumming I was half in love with him. I'll never forget this one night stand. I did it. I felt my eyes close.

Jesus Christ, my asshole hurts.

I opened my eyes. Keith had been watching me. But now I started to move to see just how sore I was. "Ow."

I didn't let more than that one word out, but I got so I was sitting on the side of the bed. My ass felt like I'd run a freight train through there, backwards and forwards. Ow. Sitting was going to be tricky for a bit. I rolled over on one hip seeking a comfortable position. It made sense to take the condom off since I had deflated most of the way and I found myself sweaty, sticky and walking bowlegged. Keith pulled his own spent condom off. He had to take awhile at it, peeling away because even though his dick was shriveling down to about eight or nine inches long that still made it pretty big in the condom.

"How's your butt?"

"Wrecked,"

I thought about another go at the Glenfiddich. That would take some of the soreness away. I stood up properly on purpose, overriding the nerves that told me I should let my pelvic floor tilt back. It was no real damage, of course, just bruised tissue. I looked down at myself and of course couldn't see anything there, although that was when I found the hip bruises.

"How about a soak in a hot tub?"

I might be a pro but Keith wasn't edging me firmly towards the door. So I didn't mind getting into the water. Keith got in too. It was a great big, have-a-small-orgy type of hot tub, fitting six people easily. With only us two I could let my legs float out into the center of the tub and float a little bit hanging onto the rim of the tub behind me.

Keith leaned down and mouthed into the water above my floating prick, "I hope you know how sexy that looks,"

I didn't know it had. I was just stretching out like in the bathtub. Anyway, the main thing was that it was hot comfortable water. A bit embarrassed I got my feet down on the floor of the tub again and sat down on one of the benches.

"Hey, Fuzzy Bear, come here," said Keith.

I didn't know quite what he wanted but he wanted me on the underwater bench beside him. I ended up straddling his lap which made me a bit taller than him, but not by much. He kissed me.

"You've got the cutest teddy-bear of an ass," he told me.

"You've got the biggest bullet train of a prick I've ever seen," I returned.

"Well, my train is so grateful that your teddy bear let me hide in his cave," said Keith and broke up laughing.

"Okay, now that is getting too silly." I tried to get off his lap.

He hung onto me, "Seriously now, you think you could hang out with me a day or two more while I'm in town?"

I was still trying to get up. "Uh... I don't know. I'd have to check with Mr. Daniels. I mean, they're the ones setting up the entertainment."

'He'd go along with it if I asked him," said Keith

"I know." I managed to get off his lap.

"I'm not talking about more ass fucking," said Keith. "I know you may want to take a day or two to get over this one. But maybe you'd let me rub your butt a bit."

"I can't believe I did let you fuck me," I said. "I am so sore I feel like I might have sat on a railroad spike. Jesus!"

"You're not hurt, right?" said Keith.

I nodded. It was wearing off. I might be uncomfortable now, but that was the extent of it.

"Why did you?"

"Let you fuck me?" I sat down on the bench again. "Rocky Daniels told me I'd be fired if I didn't."

Keith didn't say anything.

"Rocky hinted that I might get a pay bonus this year. Mila, too. He told her if she put out for you she'd get a thousand dollar bonus for it. No wonder she was so hot to land you on a date," I told him. "Not that I'm so sure I will get the bonus. It's not like I have anything in writing."

I looked over at Keith again and it occurred to me that he was suddenly looking truly pissed off. "He offered you money?" Keith demanded.

Shit. I am so stupid. "Hey, I'm not a pro." I said. "I need my job. I've got like over twenty-five thousand dollars in student loans to pay off. If I get fired I am out on the street and there is no more grace period. Four-hundred and eighty-one dollars in payments every month, no excuses. I couldn't even afford my shared apartment and I haven't been working long enough to get UI."

Keith climbed straight out of the water and got one of the big white terry cloth hotel robes that was hanging nearby. His jaw was tight with fury. Even though he was only out of the water for a moment I saw that he had an erection thirteen and a half inches long again. He was one of those guys that gets a woody when he gets mad.

"I wouldn't have done it just for the money," I said. "I need my job."

"That was it," he stated. "Job security."

"Well, yeah." I said. "Didn't you tell Mr. Daniels you were hot for my ass? I know you asked him to set up something. So what's the diff? It was all unwritten job description either way." I got out of the water myself. I am so wonderful at fucking things up. There he was happy, asking if he could land me for another evening's male escort work, and somehow I run off at the mouth so now he's pissed at me. Just wonderful, Jude.

He just stood there looking at me, so I said, "I think I want to leave now," and I went and got my clothes.

The next morning I was somewhat worse for the wear. I'd gotten to sleep by four- thirty which meant I'd had three hours of sleep. Three hours of sleep is a lot more than none at all. And while if I sat down my ass felt sore as hell, it was actually better if I did sit down. Something about reverse pressure I guess meant that I didn't feel quite so swollen while my weigh was pinning the battered area to the padded seat.

I stood for awhile, long enough to see Keith in the distance going into the board room with Rocky Daniels again. But nobody came and said anything to me about last night so I sat down to at least pretend to work. I sat in my cubicle and went through the code I'd written for the last two weeks, checking that I had put clear comments in so the next person to go through lines would know what I had been doing. I was not too surprised when Angelina came down to my cubicle half an hour later and spoke to me quietly.

"Jude? May I see you in my office for a moment?"

I was telling myself it might not be what I thought it was. She brought me inside, shut the door and looked at me, almost helplessly. Then she said, "I'm sorry. I've been instructed to terminate your position immediately."

"Right," I said. Like I'd mentioned it was not a complete surprise.

"You'll get a week's pay in lieu of notice," she said.

The way I figured it once they start calling you a useless tit of a faggot and threatening to fire you, you probably don't have long in a place. And you probably don't want to work there anyway. That is, not if you have any other job prospects. Of course young graduates who can write HTML are not exactly in hot demand.

"Ah..." she plowed on, clearly suffering. "I'm going to have to ask you to clear out your desk immediately.

"I understand, Angelina," I said. "Really I do."

So there I was two days later. I had been fucked over good, both literally and figuratively, I mused, but the sad thing was I really didn't know how I had fucked up. I was sure there would have been a point where I could have done something different and protected my tail, but I didn't know what it was. In the mean time I was taking inventory of my possessions for stuff that I could sell.

One three year old computer. I could probably get about 400 bucks for it. It would make a good kids computer or something. University text books... No, I'd already sold any of my university text books that I could sell. They might cost a couple of hundred dollars apiece but the text book publishers had it set up so that they had no lasting value after their immediate acquisition. Kinda like a University diploma. With a poor work history the diploma started to become no more than a hindrance. Maybe I could find a job driving a taxi...?

I was sorting out stuff like this when my phone rang. I picked it up praying that it wouldn't be anyone I actually knew. It wasn't.

"Who?" I said, and then although he repeated it, "Who?" I said again

"Babtunde Danladi," the other man repeated for the third time with patience, "From Delcourt, Firsk, Danladi and Hussaina."

"I'm sorry," I said. "Who did you say it is again?"

"Babtunde Danladi." The guy had some kind of a foreign accent which didn't help any. "I'm a lawyer."

Oh, shit. I didn't say anything.

"Sir, this is concerning your recent termination from Dortmund Growth Investing," he explained.

"Oh, shit," This time I did say it audibly, "Those bastards aren't trying to sue me for something on top of firing my ass! What is this?" I demanded. "What the fuck is this?" I felt like I might puke.

"No, Sir. No." Rounded African syllables tried to calm me down. "This is regarding a settlement prior to suit. This is not a suit being presented against you. It is settlement."

"What are you talking about?"

"A settlement against suit for wrongful dismissal."

"I still don't know what you're talking about," I said.

"Money. We're offering you money."

Of course I wasn't contemplating a suit for wrongful dismissal. For one thing I wasn't going to go up in court and say, oh yes, they ordered me to turn a trick for some visitor and when I did they fired my ass for being queer. That would be too humiliating. For another I knew a friend who won a suit for wrongful dismissal four or five years ago. And she had gotten three weeks salary. At my salary range three weeks would have covered only a small part of any lawyer's fees. But Mr. Danladi explained to me that this was a settlement, cash being offered to me in exchange for waiving my right to sue.

"It is very common," he assured me. "You sign papers saying that you agree to be terminated and my client gives you a cheque. So. It's like severance."

"I see," I said slowly, "And if I don't sign?"

"Then you may retain lawyers for yourself and present suit, if you prefer to."

"And all the papers say is that I accept my termination?"

"That is so, exactly."

"How much is the settlement?

He told me.

"One year's gross salary!" I said. I nearly dropped the phone.

"Gross salary with benefits," he stressed.

So the next week I went down to the lawyers' office and signed. Mr. Danladi was a great big black man who looked like a football player, but he wore another one of those suits that came from well above my income bracket. I might have asked around to find out if they were bum rushing me into something smaller than a day in court would have got me, but I was better than sure they weren't. I just couldn't figure out why they were giving me the settlement out of court anyway. I was just glad of it. Twenty eight thousand dollars would give me a lot of breathing space to find a new job. Also, it would have covered my entire student loan debt, but that was before taxes. So I decided to just keep paying the student loan and put the cash in the bank until I knew how soon I could be employed again. There was also a note with my name on it and that note helped solve the last problem, how could I actually find a job?

The note was simple and to the point: "Jude, I have instructed Personnel to give you the best possible references. Warm wishes, Keith."

So the next thing I did, apart from re-reading the note a couple of dozen times, was be confused. Okay, so I'd been fired. Why? Well, Keith had been disappointed to find out I was a pro. He'd complained about me to Daniels and Daniels had my ass flung out of there. Right?

Or, no, that couldn't be right, not if Keith were sending me his warm wishes. Because he didn't have to send me his warm wishes. That wasn't something I could have sued out of him. So maybe Keith hadn't complained about me.

Then did Daniels order me fired, just for being a faggot, or something? Well, he hated me. I think.

I thought about calling Angelina and asking her, but then I thought she probably wouldn't know, I couldn't explain things to her and even if she did, calling her was likely to embarrass her badly. If not me.

Then it was two days after that, I was going up the steps into my house around ten after six in the evening, I'd just put the garbage out, if you wanted to know, when I heard a voice calling cheerfully behind me, "Hey, Baby Bear?"

I stopped dead on my top step and then turned around slowly. Keith was there on the sidewalk smiling up. I was shaken, but not too unhappy, you understand.

"Mind if I ask you one question?" he said.

"Shoot," I said.

"That room mate of yours, he's not a boyfriend is he?"

"How did you know I had a room mate?" was all I said.

"You told me you had a room mate," he said. "You told me you shared an apartment," he reminded me.

"I have two room mates," I told him. "And they are a couple."

"And how about you?" he said.

"No, I don't have a guy right now," I said.

His eyes twinkled again, "So if you don't have a guy friend right now, how would you like to go out for an evening,"

"I think I'm really not in your class," I said.

"No, but you really are my type," he said. But then he added, "Listen, there's no pressure this time. You understand that? I want you to come with me, but only if you want to come with me."

I came down my steps slowly, "What are you doing in town?"

"I had to stay around a bit longer. Management reorganization. Did you hear Rocky Daniels got fired?"

"No, I didn't hear that," I said.

"Yeah. Serious leadership problems there. He was a fucking loser when it came to handling his personnel."

"You fired him?"

"I nearly put his head through the wall when they told me you'd been fired," he said. "I came that close to grabbing the fucker and putting him right into the wall. He got so scared he ran right out of the room to get away from me."

"Woo. Sounds like I missed a lot of excitement."

"I think so," he said. And then he moved in where he could take my arm. "Baby Bear, if ass fucking is not your thing, I'd really like to just squeeze it, you know what I mean? You have got the most perfect ass I have ever seen. I love your ass. I want to fuck you but I know super bone here is not the easiest cock to ride on. So if all I can get from you is another evening maybe of just playing with your ass... Do you have any idea how much I want that?"

"Nope," I said, grinning.

"I felt like shit when I found out you'd only put out for me so you wouldn't get fired. And I felt like even worse shit when I found out you had been fired... Forgive me?" said Keith.

We went back to his hotel room. This time we started in the hot tub and then ended up on the bed. He used both hands to massage over my ass and to knead my muscles there. But he didn't neglect any other part of me. At one point that evening he had me lying on my back chuckling while he knelt above me, my leg sticking straight up in the air and him sucking on my toes. He used his mouth on my cock again and I used my mouth on his.

It wasn't complete unalloyed bliss.

"Eagghh, I hate the taste of latex!"

"But I love the shape of your cock."

"Oh, my god!!"

"Wow, your nipples really are sensitive."

"Oh, oh, Christ! Don't stop doing that!"

He put his mouth back on my tit and tweaked it with his teeth.

"I don't suppose you'd run away to Europe with me and grow a beard?"

"Grow a beard?!" I half sat up.

"Yeah, then you'd be my complete little baby bear. No?" said Keith. "How about just running away to Europe for awhile?"

"I don't even know if I can grow a beard," I said. "I never have."

"Mmm..." He caught my face in his hand. "I'd say you'd be perfect with a beard, but you already are." We sucked face for awhile.

"Did you ever get over having a sore butt?" he asked.

"Yeah,"

"Oh, Good!' His eyes were definitely gleaming in a predatory way. "How about it? Nice and slow, lots of lube..."

"Okay," I said.

End of story by Ruthless@nbnet.nb.ca