Behind Closed Doors

Chapter Three

The room looked comfortable enough, with a large bed, two chairs and one mahogany table on which reposed back copies of the raunchy sex magazine Rebecca. The carpet was worn, though it still looked presentable, and the huge pictures of naked models on the walls were rendered somewhat ethereal by the red lights that shone from the ceiling.

The beautiful dancer was seated on one of the chairs, sipping milk from a plastic cup. He was now wearing a tight-fitting tank top, and he’d divested himself of the long dark wig he’d been wearing earlier, and Henry thought to himself that the guy looked so incredibly beautiful. That kind of beauty had always disturbed him deeply, and even when the dancer waved him into a chair, he was so aware of the guy’s beauty that he looked down so as to avoid looking into his face.

‘So you came here,’ the dancer said. His voice was pitched low, a decidedly feminine voice. ‘You were looking at me as though you were ready to devour me, so I had to get the message across to you for you to come and see me here in this room.’

‘Was my attraction to you that obvious?’ Henry asked uncomfortably, shifting in his chair, his eyes looking everywhere but at the guy. He was not a naturally shy person, but he found out now that he was at a loss for words.

‘Oh, but it was,’ the dancer said, emitting a low laugh of private amusement. ‘There was a way you looked at me. Many men－ young and old, rich and poor－ have looked at me in that way. I know I’m beautiful, I know what power my beauty has over many men and women, and I know when someone is itching to lay his hands on me. And my name’s Phoenix. What’s yours?’

Henry looked up at the guy and saw the red light shinning down on his skin, cloaking his light brown skin color. He felt an urge to touch the guy seated before him, to feel the brush of his lips, to touch his skin. However, in the back of his mind, he was horrified by his reaction, shocked that he could dare to sit down here and be ready to have sex with a prostitute and a male one at that too! But instead he replied, ‘My name is Henry. What’s your price?’

At last, they were getting down to business. It had all boiled down to this very moment: Phoenix and his entrancing sexual dance; his note, their final meeting in this room.

‘Basically, I do not collect money,’ Phoenix said, running long slender fingers through his jet-black hair and flashing a smile at Henry. ‘Let us face it, Henry. What you’re asking of me is totally frowned at in this country and we could be mauled if we’re caught at it. I have to make the benefits worth the risk, so I think I’ll collect that ring.’ He pointed at the ring on Henry’s third finger.

Henry looked down at his hand, thoroughly horrified that the guy would want to collect the ring that was the most prized possession he had on his body at that moment. It was a ten-carat diamond ring that was in an amethyst setting, a birthday gift from his aunt when he’d turned twenty. The ring was nothing to him in terms of money because of the fact that he had access to the expensive jewelry of his parents, but he didn’t want to give it to some low-life male whore simply because of the fact that the guy was a beauty to behold.

But what about what he was about to experience? That was the thought that hovered at the edges of his consciousness. This was perhaps a lifetime opportunity for him to really be his true self, to hold another guy in that way, to really feel the forbidden sensation of making love to another man. There was always a battery of young women that flocked to him; his parents’ wealth made him every woman’s wet dream come true. But there’d never been any single guy to indicate any modicum of sexual interest in him nor had he ever summoned the courage to do the same to another guy because he feared for his life. Now, here was this very stunning young fellow who was offering to him what he’d always wanted in his entire life, and all for what?