The Problem Client Read online

  Damien feels his face heat, but tries to keep a neutral expression. “Just keeping him warm for you,” he says sweetly, and Sebastian rolls his eyes.

  Kaz looks very interested all of a sudden.

  “I sense gossip!” he says, sitting up quickly. “So you’ve got a man?” He elbows Damien, and Damien’s glad he’d already set his hot chocolate down.

  Damien shakes his head. “Nothing like that,” he says, very firmly, but Sebastian scoffs.

  “Hmm, I wonder,” Sebastian says and turns to go into his rooms. Kaz watches him leave with interest, and then looks to Damien again, as if Damien’s going to continue the explanation.

  Damien doesn’t. He pointedly pushes the laptop over so it’s in between them, where they can both watch it. He can feel Kaz’s gaze on him for another moment before Kaz looks away, and Damien tries to focus on the screen, not really hearing any of the program. Instead, he’s playing last night on a loop in his mind, thinking about his client, and suddenly he stands up.

  “Ah, you can keep watching,” he says, gesturing to the laptop, and Kaz looks at him oddly but shrugs.

  “Nah, I’m not really into this sort of thing,” he admits. “Reality TV and all that.” He wiggles his fingers as if that means something and stands as well.

  “Sorry if I hit a nerve,” he says, looking actually apologetic, and Damien’s surprised by it. He feels his cold attitude towards the other man melt a little at that.

  Damien shakes his head. “It’s fine, have a good night.” He folds up his laptop and takes it back to his room, not bothering to see the look on Kaz’s face as he leaves.

  Damien has to admit that he wouldn’t mind another go with Kaz.

  Or Jake.

  Or Kaz and Jake.

  They’re both incredibly fit and seem open to all sorts of fun things. But after a night with his favorite client, everyone else just feels a little… lackluster. Which is why he re-arranged his schedule a few months ago so that he had a few days off afterwards. And now that he’s cutting back to only one client, well...

  He really doesn’t even need to keep this client.

  He’s been working at the café for a few years now, paying off some old student loans from some bad choices in a past life. But hosts at the café don’t have to pay rent or anything like that, and they get paid really well depending on the types of clients they take. Damien’s favorite client, for example, pays some astronomical amount of money that Damien gets a large cut of. So his loans are all paid off now, and he’s not really sure what he wants to do with himself, or where he wants to go from here.

  The thing is, he sort of likes his life at the café. He’s actually really good at both of his jobs, but taking clients is definitely not something he’s interested in going back to. He does think he might just stay and continue helping Melanie manage the café’s day-to-day affairs. But whatever he does, he has to figure out what to do about this one last client.

  He sprawls across his bed and props himself up on his elbows to watch the rest of this episode that Kaz so rudely interrupted, but he can’t really focus anymore. Instead, he finds himself thinking more about the past. Specifically, the first time he found the café...

  There was a door.

  He had just left Seattle, dropping out of his law school program, completely burnt out. A friend he doesn’t even talk to anymore let him stay on their couch for a week, and he was walking back to that apartment, drunk off of too many drinks bought by a stranger trying to get into his pants at a club.

  What the fuck was he doing with his life?

  The door looked like something he’d seen once in a hotel hallway, but without a room number. It definitely didn’t look like it belonged on the grungy brick wall, surrounded by graffiti, smelling like piss and probably worse things. Damien found himself half-tripping over himself to reach it. He thought maybe he’d just touch the handle, see if it was real. But then he found himself turning the handle, almost as if the door did it for him and his hand was just going along for the ride. The door swung open without a sound.

  His vision was too blurry. He rubbed his eyes, and he still couldn’t see beyond the doorway. He was drunk. Too drunk, perhaps, he thought, and hallucinating things besides. He was so drunk that it seemed like a good idea to try to walk through the door anyways without being able to see what was on the other side. It seemed amusing at the time, like he was walking into someone else’s hotel room, and he had half a thought that maybe he was. Maybe the alleyway was the hallucination, because when he made it past the threshold, he was, in fact, in a luxury hotel suite.

  He turned back to find the door to see if the alleyway really existed outside of it, but the door was gone.

  And then he realized that he must be dreaming. He must have passed out in the club, or perhaps he had already made it to his friend’s house and blacked out. He hoped it was the latter. Something like this – this sort of thing couldn’t happen, right? None of this could possibly be real.

  He made his way to the bed, some small part of him hopeful that everything would resolve itself if he just slept it off a little bit. Or maybe if he tried to go to sleep in this dream, he would wake up. But instead, he just slept.

  Some amount of time later, Sebastian found him, but Damien didn’t know the pastry chef at the time.

  “How did you get in here?” a voice asked him, and Damien opened his eyes to find some tall, blonde, absolutely gorgeous man glaring down at him. Damien blinked sleepily up at him, confused as to where this handsome stranger had come from.

  “No, seriously,” the blonde said, but then held up a hand, waving it as if it would erase Damien’s memory of him. “Forget it. I’m just getting Melanie.” He walked out of Damien’s line of vision, and Damien heard a door open and close again.

  Damien sat up, and the entire room was spinning. He had such a terrible hangover, and he realized that he had absolutely no idea where he was or how he got here.

  The door opened again. This time a beautiful woman with long brown hair and dark eyes walked in. She was dressed casually, though, not like a hotel’s staff might be, which is what he had half-expected.

  “Oh my,” she said, an interested expression crossing her face. “Look what we’ve found.”

  “Where am I?” he asked, hating how rough his voice sounded. He cleared his throat. The lady smiled.

  “You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be,” she said, and sure, that wasn’t creepy at all. “Why don’t you get cleaned up, and we can talk afterwards?”

  Damien was too hungover to protest. This all felt like a dream still anyways, and if it wasn’t a dream, well, being clean was definitely going to improve the situation. So, why argue? Instead, he found himself nodding, waiting for her to leave. What else was he supposed to do? Why not take a shower in the luxury hotel suite while he had the chance? She paused for a moment in the doorway, as if waiting to see what he would do, and then laughed, pointing to the connecting bathroom on her way out.

  “You can use whatever you find in there,” she said, and then she was gone.

  The bathroom was just as gorgeous as the rest of the suite. The shower was roomy enough to fit several people with two rainfall showerheads. Damien took his time.

  When he was finished, he walked out into the bedroom in a robe, hair still damp because he couldn’t find a hair dryer. He was surprised to see yet another unfamiliar face. The barista he now knows as Liam was sitting on the bed. The man grinned at him with a completely open, friendly gesture, a relief after his first interaction with Sebastian and the bizarre chat with the lady from before.

  “Hi!” the man said, cheerfully. “Melanie told me to bring you to her when you’re ready.”

  “Melanie?” Damien asked, and Liam tilted his head in confusion, but then he nodded.

  “I see. She’s like that sometimes,” he said, apologetically. “The lady you met earlier. She’s Melanie Selinofoto, the Lady of the house, and the owner of this place.” He gestured to
the room.

  “And I’m Liam O’Connell,” he said, extending a hand, and Damien took it, shaking once, feeling a little bit better to at least get an introduction. He followed Liam into the hallway that leads to the shared living space.

  Liam took Damien up to the third floor, a place he rarely goes now, and he met Melanie in an office that she only uses for these specific business purposes.

  “What is this place?” Damien had asked, and Melanie shooed Liam away before answering. Liam gave Damien a comforting grin as he left.

  “What’s your name?” Melanie asked, ignoring his question, and Damien was half-surprised that she didn’t either somehow already know or at the very least steal his wallet to check his identity while he was passed out drunk.

  “Damien,” he said, and when she had continued to look at him expectantly, he clarified, “Damien Lambert.”

  “Ah, Damien. Welcome,” Melanie said in reply. She looked at him carefully for a moment, as if reading him for some sort of reaction.

  “You found your way here through a Door?” she asked after a moment, and the way she said the word door was odd like it was something special.

  “I sort of remember that,” Damien said, but his head was still pounding, right behind his eyes. Melanie grinned sharply at him.

  “I made it,” she said, simply. “It brings me things. Interesting things, like you.” She tapped her fingers together at this as if deciding whether or not to trust him with the specifics.

  Damien said nothing, mostly due to his terrible headache, but through this he must have passed some test, because she continued.

  “I run a very specific type of business here,” she said, those dark eyes watching him closely. “Liam and Sebastian are hosts. They found their way to me through various means, just as you did. And they work with clients at this establishment.”

  Damien felt a shiver of fear as he started to realize just what kind of establishment this might be, but Melanie held up a hand.

  “Don’t flee yet,” she said, laughing. “You have every choice in the matter, as to whether or not you want to accept my offer. You’re not a captive here. And there will be an offer.”

  And the way she said this made Damien think of all of those myths about trading your soul for the thing you’ve desired most. He remained silent, waiting to hear her out at this point. At this low point in his life, there were a lot of things that he desired to be different. Change. Because wasn’t that why he came to Portland in the first place?

  “Sometimes the client doesn’t even know what they want, but deep in their heart there is some yearning for something,” Melanie continued. Her eyes gleamed at this in a slightly unsettling way. “The door provides an opportunity for them. It’s not necessarily about sex, but humans being what they are, it’s often about sex.”

  Damien noticed, quite pointedly, that she did not appear to include herself in that group. Humans. He’s never forgotten this conversation, or that one small detail.

  “What do you get out of this?” he asked.

  “Plenty of things,” she replied. “Of course there is usually financial compensation. Some of our clients are quite wealthy.”

  But the unspoken hint was that money wasn’t all that was exchanged. Damien wasn’t sure he wanted to ask about the other benefits at the time, but now he knows that Melanie likes a good trade. A service for a service. That sort of thing. She has that sort of arrangement with several of the clients.

  In the end, Melanie gave him an offer. And it was a good one. Damien accepted it with very little hesitation.

  What else did he really have going for him in his life? Especially at that lowest point. She made him wait a day to decide to move in, to give him a chance to clear his head, but he had brought over all of his belongings by the end of that day anyways.

  And now, only a few years later, he’s made enough to pay back all of his debt. Enough to start fresh.

  If only he didn’t have this one last problem client clouding up his plans. If only he still wanted a fresh start...

  Chapter Five

  Before their first week at the café is over, Kaz and Jake have already started taking clients. Together and separately. Damien’s not quite sure how the logistics of the door works in that case, but their flexibility opens up new clientele opportunities for Melanie, so she is naturally thrilled.

  Since Damien doesn’t have any clients until his favorite client on Thursday, the week drags along for him. He helps train Kaz and occasionally Jake when Sebastian has had enough of him. Both men seem to take to café life naturally, although the early hours must be rough for them for the first few days.

  When Thursday finally arrives, Damien wakes up with every cell in his body lit up with excitement. Tonight. He should probably be ashamed of himself, but he’s too far gone in his crush to care at this point.

  Damien is not usually a morning person, but since he’s worked at the café, he’s had to get up before opening hours for years now. Today it’s much easier to drag himself out of bed to the bathroom to start getting ready for the day.

  He takes very few days of vacation other than Sundays when the café is closed for the day. In fact, he’s possibly never taken vacation, now that he thinks about it. This is completely by choice. He doesn’t have an exact role around the café, and he could probably ask for days off, but he honestly enjoys the day-to-day work to make sure everything in the café runs smoothly. He likes the feeling of orchestrating the day, helping the other hosts with any issues that arise, running errands for Melanie, even. Although now a lot of those things are going to be Kaz’s job. Something about the idea bothers him, but he’s been trying to remind himself this week that this is what he’s wanted. Kaz will eventually replace Damien, and Damien can get that fresh start.

  But first, his client tonight.

  And before that, his hair. Damien is not one of those people who wake up looking flawless first thing in the morning. His light brown hair is a mess, and he runs his hands through it ineffectually.

  After some heavy encouragement from styling product, it’s good enough to go out to the shared living space.

  Liam is sitting on a stool at the island in the kitchen, and Kaz is grabbing a carton of milk out of the fridge. Sebastian and Jake are probably already downstairs.

  Sebastian has to get up even earlier to get all of the breads and breakfast items ready for the morning, and now that Jake is helping him out, Jake has to do the same. It can make it tricky to take clients in the late evenings, but Sebastian seems to manage it just fine. At the very least, he seems to look flawless every time Damien sees him.

  “Coffee?” Kaz asks, and Damien nods gratefully. Kaz gestures over to a pot as he pours milk into his own cup. “Just made some of that stuff,” he says, “Unless you want espresso?”

  “Coffee’s fine. Thanks,” Damien says, making his way over to the pot. They do have a nice machine up here on the second floor, but he’ll have enough espresso later.

  “So tonight’s the night, eh?” Kaz asks, as he sits down next to Liam, their shoulders almost touching. Liam’s face turns pink at the motion, and he nearly chokes on the cereal he’s eating. Kaz grins at him in a predatory fashion, and Damien has to wonder how long that’s going to hold out before the two of them end up fucking. Or perhaps they already did, he thinks, intrigued. He’s not really sure what ended up happening with the Kaz-Jake-Liam situation over the past week.

  Liam had been so interested in Kaz and Jake before they had joined the café, but this week, he’s been oddly shy with the two of them. It is different somehow when you’re coworkers, Damien thinks. But perhaps it’s different for a much more interesting reason...

  Damien shrugs belatedly at Kaz’s question, and Liam looks up at him, recovered from his coughing fit.

  “Your last remaining client?” Liam asks, and then takes another huge bite of his cereal, and Damien nods.

  “The infamous Thursday client,” Kaz says, and there’s a lot of loaded
meaning behind the words. Everyone’s been talking about the fact that Damien only has the one client left. “Wouldn’t mind a go at him myself.”

  Liam splutters again at that, and Damien has to restrain himself from laughing at his reaction. Kaz is really laying it on thick. Damien rolls his eyes and grabs a mug down from the cabinets above the coffee pot. He doesn’t bother to reply to Kaz’s comment as he fills the cup. As much as Damien’s giving up all of his other clients, he doesn’t like the idea of Kaz or Jake taking on this one in particular. It doesn’t seem like a good fit, for one. And, anyways, he’s not planning on giving this one up, yet.

  “So you don’t even know his name, right?” Kaz continues, and Damien’s grip tightens around the coffee mug. He feels angry all of a sudden at the teasing. He turns to smile at Kaz in his coldest possible manner.

  “That’s right,” he says, and Kaz returns Damien’s smile with one of his own, but it’s more confused than anything.

  Liam laughs, “You’re kicking a hornet’s nest.” He stands up, grabbing his cereal bowl and taking it to the sink.

  “Ah, sorry,” Kaz says, and he suddenly seems so actively apologetic that Damien relaxes a bit.

  “Is this the guy you like?” Kaz asks. “The one Sebastian teases you about?”

  Damien shrugs, and grabs his cup of coffee. “I have to get down to the café,” he says, and Kaz stands up, too.

  “Wait up, I’ll join,” he says, and Damien kind of wishes that he wouldn’t, but Damien’s still showing him the ropes and helping him figure out what kind of work is available to do around the café. Other than being Melanie’s personal errand boy, of course, which she seems to take an unnecessary amount of pleasure in calling him.

  Damien’s still not sure how to deal with Kaz. Jake, at least, is straightforward – what you see is what you get, as far as Damien can tell. Kaz, on the other hand, seems like he’s walking some sort of line between friendliness and competition with Damien. In a way, it reminds Damien too much of his best friend he left in Seattle.