Not All as It Seems

Dirk Cameron had become the King of Manhattan. As public attention went, he'd attained a hat trick. It didn't hurt that he was a gorgeous, well-educated, glib young man of twenty-seven, with a perfectly proportioned, fit body, movie star good looks, golden-blond hair, and a dreamy smile. Everyone wanted know him and be with him, and everyone wanted him to succeed. This Friday was the day he did very publically succeed, his fame and talent spread across the media. Everything he touched turned to gold. Everyone he looked at smiled at him.

Managing to become a top male model while he was putting himself through art college and earning a fine arts masters degree, he had, separately, established himself in the fashion industry. The lunch-time runaway show of his season's fashions launching on 38th Street in Manhattan's Garment District had been such a guaranteed success that contracts were signed with the H&M and Gap clothing lines as the models were strutting their stuff. Expectations had been such that newspaper and magazine photographers were there to snap Cameron, standing between a movie star and Miss America, being buzzed on the cheek by both, before going directly from there to the taping of an "Entertainment Tonight" featured interview. He was even rumored to be one of New York's leading playboys and most eligible bachelors, if not a bachelor for long, as he was matched with Stacey Travers, the daughter of billionaire Max Travers.

The successful fashion show and the media interviews were the first two trophies of the trifecta for the day. The third was that this Friday night was the first of two for the opening of his own art exhibition and sale at Ian Douglas's exclusive and very pricey art gallery on 42d Street, near Times Square.

The first of the two nights was for the high society of New York City, the people with connections and overflowing wallets. The next night would be the media event opening. By then Douglas, a commanding god of personality and good looks in his own right in his early fifties, had projected that at least half of Cameron's paintings and lithographs would have been sold. He was wrong. Two-thirds of them had been spoken for before the opening closed down at 11:00 p.m.

"That's it then. Can I stop smiling and coaxing friends to buy now, baby," a beautiful raven-haired Stacey Travers whispered in Dirk's ear as she clung to him while the last of the patrons were departing. She was draped in diamonds and dressed in a sexy, slinky, clinging black satin dress with a leg slit "up to here" and a plunging neckline "down to there." She was the possessive type and had been touching and fondling the King of Manhattan all evening, clinging to him like glue. Stacey was well bedded and demanding of her lovers. Dirk had passed muster.

She glowed like this was her night rather than Dirk's, and she had partied hard. She'd been careful to keep one hand available to hold a champagne flute, though, and was far gone by 11:00. "I don't want to drive out onto Long Island tonight," she whispered, not that she drove anywhere herself. Daddy had a collection of cars and drivers to transport her. "Take me back to your place and bang the hell out of me."

"I don't think that's such a good idea, Stacey," Dirk said. Your dad is still here. I think he'll know if you don't go home with him. Max Travers was a possessive man too. He'd already made a deal with Dirk on what exactly the young man and his daughter could be seen doing until Dirk had been bought to join the family. He was so possessive of his daughter that Dirk had more than once suspected the old man was banging her himself. He didn't care. This wasn't a love match.

The media night at the gallery wasn't until the next night, but Dirk had had such a high-profile day that the place was crawling with reporters and photographers. They'd know exactly who Dirk had taken home that night, if anyone. He wanted to keep the Stacey part of his life as one of the minor highlights.

The gallery owner, Ian Douglas, would also like to be the one to take Dirk home tonight. He'd like to bang the hell out of the beautiful and enchanted young man himself, and he wouldn't have hosted this art exhibition if he didn't have hopes of doing so, regardless of Dirk's reputation as a woman killer. Douglas was a long-time player. He prided himself in being able to smell out a submissive. He had decided that Dirk was submissive gay material. But he knew the place was crawling with press, and he knew he'd have to bide his time and cultivate the young man for possibilities.

"I'm exhausted too, Honey," Dirk murmured as he smiled and waved to the departing. "I don't think I could do you justice tonight, and there's more of this for me to face tomorrow." He was just being diplomatic. Stacey was too drunk to do more than just lie there with her legs open. Under the circumstances, that would be good enough for him, except not tonight. Tonight he was keyed up and full of tension. He wanted something else, something more, something risky and exhilarating.

"You fuck me just fine with that big cock of yours," she said, loud enough for the couple then leaving to hear. But Dirk didn't know anything about that couple other than they'd drunk the champagne, eaten the hors d'oeuvres, and hadn't bought a damn thing, so he didn't care what they'd heard. If the quote was in the

Times

in the morning, it would only enhance his reputation.

"But not tonight, Stacey. Your father is bearing down on us and he is glowering. Tomorrow night, after the second opening, we'll stay in the city. Your dad won't be here tomorrow night. I hear he's off to London in the morning."

Once Max Traves showed up, Stacey went all docile for him and left with him without making a scene.

From across the room, Ian Douglas took it all in, undressed Dirk with his eyes, and bided his time.

* * * *

Dirk got to his 9th Avenue apartment by 11:30 and was showered and in bed for a quick nap by midnight. His alarm went off at 1:30 a.m. He rolled out of bed and dressed in the clothes he'd already laid out--tight black leather pants, a black mesh athletic half-cropped T-shirt that followed the curve of his pecs but left his washboard abs exposed, and black leather ten-inch laced boots. He slipped the wallet he kept fake ID and some cash, and nothing else, in into his back pocket, and by 2:00 a.m., he was riding the service elevator down to the alley access and slipping out into the night.

He walked to 52d Street in Hell's Kitchen, ignoring cat calls and smiling off propositions, never slowing down enough to engage with anyone. But he didn't ignore them all. It was a section of the city in which seeking gays roamed openly, and Dirk was man candy. On a street corner deep in Hell's Kitchen, his eyes went to a big, strapping black man, bringing football or basketball player into mind, who, garishly but confidently dressed, identifying himself as at the top of the game, was leaning against a lamppost with a broken globe but a working lightbulb. He had an unlit cigarette in hand and his eyes bored into Dirk as Dirk approached the corner. A small, knowing smile formed on the man's lips. He maintained the capturing of Dirk with his eyes. Dirk slowed down as he passed and the black hulk snaked out his hand and grabbed Dirk's wrist, arresting his movement. The hand was beefy, the grip was not to be ignored or easily turned away.

"Hey, pretty boy. You gotta a light?"

"I don't smoke," Dirk said. But he didn't try to disengage and walk on. It wasn't clear that he could have broken off contact if he wanted to. He made the snap decision that he didn't want to.

"I don't know. You look pretty smoken to me."

Dirk laughed, and again, he didn't move away.

"Maybe you have something else for me then," the black stud said.

"Maybe," Dirk answered.

"Oh, never mind on the light. I got matches. You can light me up."

It wasn't a request, and it got to Dirk.

"If I release your arm are you gonna stay in place with me?" The hunk asked, and when Dirk lowered his eyes and murmured ascent, the man laughed and released Dirk's arm.

"Turn around. Let me see your butt."

Dirk did so and the black stud weight and stroked the young man's buttocks with a hand. "Nice. I'd like to get my hands on the flesh of this."

This was what Dirk was out here for--something to bring balance to day that had overpowered him. He was the King of Manhattan, at the top of the pyramid, everyone doing his bidding. Deep down, though, he didn't want to be ever at the top, making the decisions. He was a submissive--the bottom--at heart. He reacted to being commanded--used even. This is what he'd come out tonight for.

"No one's stopping you," Dirk said. He stood there docilely as the black dude fished a match box out of his pocket and he then lit the guy's cigarette. The black stud took a drag and blew the smoke up into the lightbulb.

"How much?"

"Excuse me?" Dirk said.

"I'll give you fifty for a blow job."

"Is that what you think I'm out here for?"

"Dressed like that? Yeah. You want a man. You want to be my bitch."

Dirk laughed. Fifty dollars. Patrons paid more than that each just to get into the fashion show he'd put on this afternoon and sit the third row back from the walkway. He was the King of Manhattan. But he blushed, because this was exactly what he'd come out in the dark of the night dressed like this to get. Being at the top scared him. He was most comfortable being commanded to do the bidding of others--to be the other's bitch. That's why he was marrying Stacey. She commanded him to fuck her, so he did. That didn't mean he liked anything about it other than that she took command and treated him like her bitch in bed.

If her father commanded Dirk to lie down for him, Dirk would have done that too. But, where he had risen, no one thought about what he might like anymore. They had decided what he was, and it wasn't what he wanted to be.

He didn't answer. He turned and started walking toward what had been his goal, 52d Street. It wasn't the money that was offered. Dirk was looking for more than giving a blow job in an alley--so much more tonight.

The black bull followed him along the deserted street. Dirk picked up pace, but so did the black guy. He caught up to Dirk by the mouth of an alley and pulled the young man into the darkness. Grasping Dirk's throat in a chokehold in one beefy hand, he flashed two twenties and a ten in front of Dirk's face with the other. He stuffed the banknotes in Dirk's pants pocket and growled, "Suck me."

It wasn't a request. It was a command. He let loose of the chokehold, put both hands on Dirk's shoulders, and, leaning back against the cinderblock wall, forced the young man to his knees. Dirk went down easy. He'd received the command. It was bringing the balance back. He wasn't at the top of the heap; for the moment this black bastard was. If that's what the dude wanted, that's what Dirk would give him. Panting and whimpering, he unzipped the man and fished out a honking big mambo of a black cock on its way to rock hard.

He gave the guy choking head for a few minutes, but the black dude wanted more. So did Dirk, and he said so, "Yes, yes. More than that. Fuck me."

With a low, guttural laugh, the black dude put his hands under Dirk's armpits and lifted him up, turning him cheek to the cinderblock wall.

"You want more, you'll get more. Be my bitch. Jut your ass out to me," came the command. And it was a command. Whimpering, no longer alone at the top, Dirk did as commanded. The man reached around, unbuckled and unzipped him, and jerked Dirk's pants down to his knees. He wasn't wearing briefs, which made the black guy laugh.

"Knew it. Just a bitch looking for tricks." He grasped Dirk's wrists and raised his arms, pressing the wrists against the wall above. "Keep them there," he growled. It was a command, to be obeyed, by someone higher on the command pyramid than Dirk was. When it came to sex.

The young man gasped as the black stud grasped his butt cheeks in his hands and squeezed and separated them. He slapped Dirk hard on the buttocks and the young man flinched and moan. The butt cheeks were manipulated--squeezed and spread several more times before Dirk heard the snap of the condom. Then one black hand palmed his belly to keep his pelvis jutted back and the other moved the head of his cock into position, the shaft slapped on Dirk's buttocks a few times and the underside of it rubbed over the moaning submissive's hole before it was put in position.

Dirk yelped as the man entered him, but he held steady, panting and whimpering. Ten hard, deep strokes and it was done, The black dude tensed, released, tensed and released again, and then let loose a deep sigh as he relaxed.

"That's a good little bitch," he growled.

The condom was slipped off and dropped beside Dirk's foot, and the black man had turned, zipped up, and melted out of the alley. He'd been excited about what Dirk would and did give him.

Dirk held in place for a few minutes. Everything had come a bit back into balance. But just a bit. He'd been King of Manhattan today. He needed to be brought down. This had started the descent. There was at least one big, black bull, with confidence by bad fashion sense, who was there on the pyramid above him. But it had been a big day. Dirk was still feeling alone, at the top.

He could have turned and gone back to his apartment now, ready to face another day at the top in the morning. His TV interview would run in the morning. But he didn't go home. He still felt so alone at the top of a false pyramid. This wasn't him. He was scared. It was lonely up here.

Putting his clothes back into order, he stumbled back onto the street and continued the journey toward 52d Street.

* * * *

He entered The Falcon, a gay leather club and Turkish bath on 52d, where he was recognized as a member at the reception cage in the club foyer and, after marking a short check-off list, was waved through to the bar.

He went into the smoke-filled bar and nosed around there, looking over who was there that night and letting them ogle him as well. Very few of the men who came into this club would have any idea who Dirk was in the high-rise world of Manhattan. Here it could just be his body that got attention. And Dirk's body got a lot of attention here.

Three muscle men in black leather, chains, and harnesses surrounded him at the bar, front side, and back, and folded his body into theirs, making free with their hands--and he melded to their demands. They ordered beer and put it on Dirk's tab. As they fondled him, the three whispered how their night was going to go with him, and he didn't object. For a submissive, all command would be given over to dominators at The Falcon. That was why he was here--to work his way to the bottom of the pile for balance. To keep his sanity.

He was one of The Falcon's favorite submissives. He did what was asked and took what was given.

While they drank their beer and worked Dirk's body between them, the four watched two pole dancers on stage and two guys fucking on an ottoman between them. The three guys felt him up in the bar. They could have laid him right there in the bar, but they didn't. That wasn't on the menu for the bar.

Others in the room were humping and being humped. Most were watchers, but some were giving or taking it all. The little guy on the ottoman at center stage was still being fucked by a big, black brute looking a lot like the dude who had covered Dirk in the Hell's Kitchen alley. The pole dancer at one side had come to the edge of the stage for men in the audience to load up his jock strap with banknotes and to cop a feel. A guy had come on stage and was fucking the other pole dancer from behind as he continued to sway on the pole to the cadence of the loud bump and grind music oppressing the room.

One of the three manhandling Dirk drew his attention to a beaded-curtain doorway in the wall next to the door. They'd finished their beer. Dirk knew where the doorway led. Upon command, he submissively unfolded from between them and headed for the door. They followed him into the locker area for the Turkish bath section of the club, where he had a locker holding gym clothes and an assortment of Speedos. As he was stripping down in the locker room and pulling a Speedo out of his locker, one of the muscle men said, in a gruff voice, "You won't be needing that."

"I'm not ready yet for--"

"Yes, you are, cutie," a second muscle man said, and he pulled his hand back and slapped Dirk across the face, both in one direction and the other, bruising one cheek around the young man's right eye, and sending a surprised, naked Dirk down on his knees in front of the third leatherman, who had his cock out. He grabbed Dirk by the hair and arched his head back. Giving a mean stare down into Dirk's face, he growled. "Understand, bitch? You're going to be our bitch."

Whimpering, Dirk responded, "Yes, sir." The man slapped Dirk's face twice more, and, with that, the pecking order was established. The leatherman engorged while Dirk gave him head and the other two crouched beside Dirk, their hands on him to show he wasn't going anywhere.

They laid him on his back on the narrow bench in front of the lockers, with his head arching over one end. The leatherman who had slapped him grabbed his ankles, wishboned his legs, slid in between his thighs, worked his cock into Dirk's asshole, and fucked him. A second leatherman grabbed Dirk by the hair, arching his head painfully over the end of the bench, forced Dirk's lips open with the head of his plump cock, and fucked his throat. The third one crouched beside Dirk, tweaking his nipples and running his hands over the young man's writhing body.

After a few minutes of this, the three picked him off the bench, carried him into the communal shower and, one after the other, the two who hadn't ass fucked him before did so, one standing behind him and bending him over, Dirk grasping his ankles while the leatherman doggy fucked him, and the other pressing Dirk's back against the tiled wall, with Dirk's knees hooked on his hips, fucking him up against the soap-slicked wall under cascading water.

With a "See you again, later," they left Dirk collapsed there on the shower room floor when they were done.

This would have been the point at which Dirk, earlier in the evening having been anointed King of Manhattan and now being shown as just a leathermen's bitch, would drag himself back out of danger.

But this was what Dirk had come here for.

Returning to the locker room, he checked out his face in a mirror. The bruise wasn't too bad. He could cover that so that no one would notice at the art gallery the next day. And, thankfully, he didn't have a gig to walk the fashion runway for a couple of weeks. He pulled on a Speedo, grabbed a towel, and entered into the Turkish bath section, which, indeed, was decorated like a Turkish palace bathing area with a large tile-lined pool in which men were sitting and moving around, singly and in groups. A lot of the men were old and heavy. Some were young and fit, like Dirk. The young and fit ones were the center of attention. The heavy men mostly were watchers, hopers, and one-hand strokers. When he entered the chamber and sank down into the pool, Dirk received more attention than most and the swirling of men gravitated to him.

Men weren't just sitting around in the pool or swimming slowly around in a desultory way. That obviously wasn't what the men were in the pool for. Some were also there to watch; enough were there to be watched.

Taking a swim or a look wasn't what Dirk was here for either. The King of Manhattan didn't want to be at the top of the chain tonight. Dirk wanted to be the used bitch of commanding, dominating, hung muscle men.