I tore my gaze away from him and scrubbed my hands over my face. My bare hands. “I don’t…I don’t know what to think about any of this. I can’t do it. This is…” I leaned against a pillar, pressing my fingers against my temples and exhaling. “I don’t even know what I was thinking.”

  “That you were curious.”

  “But I shouldn’t have come here.” The weakness in my voice made me cringe, and I doubted he believed me. Now that I’d said it, I wasn’t so sure I did either.

  “Look, it’s always a lot to take.” He moved toward me, narrowing the distance to something reminiscent to the way we’ve been inside the club. “I sometimes forget how overstimulating it is for someone who’s never been here. I’m sorry, I should have warned you.”

  “You did.”

  “Maybe not enough. It’s been a long time, and it’s hard to remember what that first time was really like.”

  I closed my eyes and let my head fall back against the post.

  “Tell me it didn’t turn you on, though,” he said.

  “Of course it did.” I glared at him. “But that doesn’t mean I should.”

  His voice softened. “Why shouldn’t you?”

  “Besides the fact that it’s—”

  “Yes, besides the fact that it’s illegal.” He gestured back the way we came. “Everyone in there, including the two of us, is scanned. No one’s passing diseases around. We’re not hurting anyone.”

  “But it is illegal.” My defeated tone did nothing to back up my feeble argument. “It’s…”

  “Give me a reason besides the ludicrous law that’s been shoved down our throats for decades.” He came a step closer, boot crunching on debris-littered concrete. “Give me a reason, Keith.”

  I released my breath.

  “Why are you so afraid of what you want?” he whispered. “I’m perfectly fine, and I’ve fucked plenty of men here. And women.”

  I stared at him, certain he was joking.

  “I’ve had wireless sex. With men, women, sometimes more than one at a time. It’s pure goddamned ecstasy, Keith, and look at me.” He put his arms out to the sides. “I’m healthy. You’ve scanned me yourself, time and again. No diseases. No wounds. No psychosis that makes me a threat to anyone else.”

  Oh, you’re a threat to at least one man.

  “Then why—” I licked my lips. “Why do you come to the simhouse?”

  “To keep up appearances. You know how suspicious they get if they see a drop in sim sessions.” Lowering his voice, he added, “And no, that’s not the only reason.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “I saw you there the first time, and I wanted you.” Aiden was nervous now. Unsteady. More so than I’d ever imagined he could be, and it was unsettling. “I couldn’t get you out of my mind, and I hoped every time I came in that you’d give me some sign that you were attracted to me, and that maybe, just maybe, you’d be willing to take this risk.”

  All the air left my lungs. I wanted to shove him away, tell him he was out of his goddamned mind.

  Fuck you, for thinking I’d be willing to gamble everything I have in exchange for this.

  But I couldn’t, because he was right. I had been curious. And the reason for my curiosity was standing here in front of me, perfectly willing if I’d only put my fear aside long enough to touch him. To touch him again. To let him really touch me.

  “If you don’t want this,” he said softly, “then leave. No one’s keeping you here against your will.”

  I didn’t move. I wasn’t sure I could have if I’d wanted to, not with the ghosts of Aiden’s touch still skittering across my skin. I’d spent my whole life shrouded in thick protective layers, and after just a few minutes of peeling back those layers and letting someone else’s flesh touch mine, I itched from head to toe. Itched with the need to get out of this suffocating shell.

  “Keith?”

  I released my breath, all too aware of the material that clung to my contracting rib cage and my slumping shoulders. “It’s not that I don’t want it.” I swept my tongue across my lips and stared up at the shadowy rafters because they were easier to look at than Aiden. “But if I get caught—”

  “Precautions are taken. No one in there wants to be caught any more than you do.”

  “Yeah.” I looked him in the eye. “And how many of them are simhouse employees? Fuck, if someone even thinks I’m here…”

  He came closer. Both our suits squeaked softly as he rested a bare hand on my covered waist, and the faint pressure through the thick layers made my breath catch.

  “There’s no one else here, Keith.” He spoke so softly I could hardly hear him. “No one knows you are. No one knows I am.” He leaned in closer, and his warm breath grazed my lower lip. “Let me show you why I brought you here.”

  I couldn’t breathe. Not when he was this close, when we walked such a razor-fine line between temptation and a crime. Not when my familiar suit held on to me so tight I couldn’t move.

  Aiden’s hand pressed against my abdomen. For the first time in my life, I was aware of the lack of heat, the lack of actual contact, but even through all those layers, the dull pressure sent electricity coursing through me that a sim electrode couldn’t even begin to replicate.

  “If you want me to stop,” he murmured, his voice thrumming against my lips, “all you have to do is say so.” His hand slid lower, inching toward my erection as my muscles contracted beneath my suit. “Do you want me to stop?”

  Everything I’d ever known screamed inside my head, telling me to shove his hand away, to shove him away. This was wrong. It was dangerous. What was I doing?

  I grabbed his wrist.

  His hand stopped.

  Our eyes met.

  His hand lightened against me, like he’d lifted it away as much as he could without fighting my grip, and I tightened my fingers around his wrist.

  Holding my gaze, Aiden moistened his lips. “Just tell me what you want. We can stop here, or I can show you what I brought you here to show you.”

  I swallowed hard. Then, hoping my knees didn’t tremble right out from under me, I pushed his hand lower.

  He sucked some air through his teeth. As his hand slid over my groin, pressing against my rock-hard erection through my suit, I shivered against the pillar.

  Aiden leaned in closer, cupping my face with his other hand. “I want to show you what pleasure really means.” He let his lower lip graze mine, and my knees almost trembled out from under me. “There are some things you just can’t get with electrodes and machinery.”

  I tried to speak, but a choked moan was the only thing that escaped.

  “This, right here, is the point of no return.” He ran the pad of his thumb over my cheekbone. “The machines will never be enough once you’ve crossed this line.”

  “I think…” I swept my tongue across my lips. “I think we’ve already crossed it.”

  “No.” He pressed the heel of his hand against my clothed erection. “You’ll know when we’ve crossed it.” He released a warm, ragged breath. “Just tell me if—”

  I kissed him. The instant our lips touched, he squeezed my cock harder, and I grabbed his shoulders to keep from crumpling to his feet as my spine liquefied. Oh God, his lips…his mouth… Before tonight I’d never even thought about what a kiss might taste like, and this…

  I gripped his shoulders tighter, and he pressed his hard cock against me, pinning me against the concrete pillar.

  His lips left mine. “Forget what you’ve been taught.” He paused to kiss me again. “Forget the law, forget everything.” Another kiss, longer this time. “And give me one good reason why I shouldn’t get down on my knees and suck your cock.”

  I couldn’t. I couldn’t even breathe.

  “Talk to me.” Aiden let his lips brush mine. “If you want me to stop, all you have to do is say the word.”

  I slid my hand up into his hair and kissed him again.

  He tugged at the zipper of my suit, and as cool air and warm skin brushed my newly exposed flesh, my heart beat faster, and I held on to him tighter.

  He broke the kiss and met my eyes. “I’ve wanted to do this so long, I can’t even tell you.” With that, he knelt in front of me, and I had only seconds to be confused before his mouth was around my cock. The wet heat was like nothing I’d ever experienced. No simulation had ever come close to this squeezing, stroking, sucking, and it had damn sure never duplicated the low vibration of his voice as he groaned against my dick.

  I put a hand on the back of his head just for something to hold on to and kept the other flat against the pillar. My sanity was gone. My balance, not far behind it. Something in the back of my mind screamed for me to tell him to stop, that this was too much and I couldn’t handle any more, but even if I’d wanted to tell him to stop, I couldn’t breathe or speak or think or do anything except surrender to the most deliciously overwhelming sensations imaginable.

  My back arched off the cold concrete. There wasn’t an electrode anywhere on my body, but electricity coursed through my veins anyway, and with far greater intensity than I’d ever experienced in a sim. And when his eyes flicked up and met mine, I nearly came apart. There was that hunger my sim had never shown, that smoldering desire for me, my flesh, my body, and in that same moment, he groaned softly, his voice reverberating across my nerve endings, and that was when I lost it. I came so hard I thought I’d shatter, and Aiden didn’t stop until I begged him to.

  He released me. I pulled in a few gulps of cool air before he kissed me and took my breath away all over again. His mouth tasted salty-sweet now, and he too was out of breath.

  My insides had turned to liquid. I gripped his suit and his hair, struggling to stay upright. My whole body tingled with a degree of intensity I’d never even imagined, the fading aftershocks of my climax rivaling the peaks of most orgasms I’d ever had.

  “It only gets better than this,” Aiden murmured. “I won’t overwhelm you with more tonight, but I promise you, there are so many things you haven’t experienced yet.”

  There was no point in insisting this was my last walk on the wrong side of the mech tracks. That I’d never set foot in a place like this again or strip off protective layers to get my skin close to Aiden’s. He probably knew it as well as I did.

  This wouldn’t be my last visit to the wireless lounge.

  Chapter 6

  Just before midnight, I returned to my apartment.

  I couldn’t strip fast enough. Boots off. Gloves off. With shaking hands, I unzipped my suit, and I got out of the thing as quickly as I could, but not so fast I’d draw attention if my apartment’s cameras were audited. As soon as everything I’d worn tonight was in the sanitizer, the machine scalding away every trace of Aiden and the Old City, I got in the shower.

  My heart pounded. I wanted nothing more than to lie in my bed and just breathe in the lingering scent of Aiden on my skin and on my clothes, but I didn’t dare. Not when someone from housekeeping might notice the pheromones. I had to scrub away every trace so no one caught on.

  And damn it, why was I still so turned on? Just the thought of Aiden’s touch—of his mouth, holy hell—made me shiver. I was more aroused right then than I usually was before a sim, and sure as fuck more turned on than I could ever imagine being for hours after a session.

  So much for the real thing being more satisfying. It was more intense by a long shot, but so far it had only left me wanting more. More. Oh God, more.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about Aiden kneeling in front of me, groaning in ecstasy as he sent me hurtling toward an orgasm that still had my knees unsteady. Could anything have been more overwhelming? A man’s mouth on my cock. The sounds he made. The sight of him there in front of me, my fingers in his hair while his lips and tongue and hands did things I’d never before imagined. Sure, I knew what a blowjob was, and I’d had more than a few in a sim, but the real thing was… Holy fuck, the warmth, the wet, slick warmth, the way his hand twisted just so and his tongue fluttered and swirled and oh God, the way he moaned like he was ready to come himself.

  Hot water slid down my torso and onto my very hard cock.

  No. I couldn’t. Not with the cameras looking over my shoulder. Masturbation was the first step toward putting my hands on someone else, and that would only lead me down the road to wireless sex. No one monitoring those cameras needed to know I’d already been down that road. That I could still taste Aiden, could still feel him, could—

  Keith. Get it together.

  There was a suppressor in the top drawer just outside this shower stall. Arm’s reach. Grab it and take a breath off it. Maybe two, in this case. Calm the fuck down. Relax.

  I pressed my forearm against the wall and rested my head on it. No, a suppressor wouldn’t help me now. Yeah, it would kill my erection, but for how long? It wouldn’t clear my mind. And I didn’t have a sim session scheduled until later this week. Even someone like Graeme, who had sessions whenever he felt like it, drew attention when he added to his regimen. Someone like me, who had them on a schedule that never varied? Or at least hadn’t since Aiden started showing up? Yeah, people would notice if I came strolling in for a midnight session out of the blue.

  But if I didn’t relieve some of this tension, I’d go out of my goddamned mind. Either that, or I’d relieve it for now, and in twenty minutes I’d need to do it all over again.

  Oh well. It was worth a try.

  I resisted the urge to glance up at the camera bubble in the middle of the ceiling. If the cameras were audited, I’d be fined. Maybe even suspended.

  Right then, I really didn’t care.

  Biting my lip, I reached down and closed my fingers around my erect cock. Instantly, my eyes rolled back. A groan escaped my throat before I’d even completed a single stroke.

  My body acted of its own volition. I didn’t know if I was thrusting with my hips, stroking with my hand, or both, only that my vision kept blurring and my cock felt incredible.

  I tried to think of my sim fantasies. Of the realistic images the computer used to stimulate me along with the electrodes.

  Yeah, right.

  My mind kept sliding right back to that parking garage. I swore to God I was as turned on by the moments leading up to that blowjob as I was the blowjob itself. There wasn’t a sim on the planet that could replicate the undeniable, smoldering need in Aiden’s eyes, or the way his voice had shaken as badly as mine had while I’d begged the pillar behind me to hold me up so I didn’t sink to my own knees on the cracked concrete.

  The slick, hot friction of my hand moving up and down my cock was nothing compared to the warmth and skill of Aiden’s mouth, but it was more than any electrode could ever do. And for the second time tonight, a powerful orgasm rocked my entire body, curling my toes against the floor and drawing a helpless groan from my throat.

  I slumped against the hard, cold wall. I was still shaking. Hands, knees—hell, even my teeth chattered. I’d never come like this in a sim. The only time I’d ever climaxed harder than this was in that deserted parking garage after Aiden had worked his magic on me.

  I glanced up at the camera bubble in the corner and then closed my eyes and rested my head against my arm again. I didn’t care if they fined me. Or suspended me. Whatever. Because I felt fucking amazing.

  Eventually, I got out of the shower and dried off, and as I did, guilt and fear both crept in. There was no erasing what the camera had seen. If anyone audited that footage, I was in deep shit. And if they asked questions about where I’d been earlier tonight…

  Shivering, I continued drying off. Then I pulled on a clean suit so I could go to sleep.

  Naturally, sleep didn’t come easy. I lay back on my bed, laced my fingers behind my head, and stared up at the ceiling.

  So, now what?

  I was a felon. If anyone found out where I’d gone and what I’d done, I’d be in a world of hurt.

  But the damage was done. I’d tasted a man’s kiss. I’d felt his mouth on my skin. He’d assured me there was plenty more where that came from. I couldn’t even begin to imagine what another visit to a wireless lounge would bring.

  I scrubbed a hand over my face and sighed. This was how it started. Always. One little taste, and the next thing you knew, you were hooked.

  I could see why—it was unbelievably intense. Nothing could replicate that, not even the most advanced sim technology. There was no substitute. There was only more. Going beyond Aiden kissing me or sucking my cock. God, I was fucked.

  I’d had a taste, and it wasn’t enough.

  I wanted more.

  Chapter 7

  Two weeks never took as long to drag by as they did between my visit to the wireless lounge and Aiden’s return to the simhouse. Finally, though, right about the time I was on the verge of losing my mind, his appointment rolled around, and forget being on the verge. I was out of my mind. Just walking down the hall to meet him in the waiting area, I was a nervous, excited wreck, eagerly anticipating the sight of him and at the same time queasy as hell at the thought of it.

  And there he was. Oh fuck.

  My heart pounded, and my stomach turned. No one in the room gave either of us a second glance, so it wasn’t like any of them could see right through us and know we’d touched illegally. Or that I wanted to do it again. Or that I was terrified of doing it again.

  Aiden offered a polite smile and brief eye contact but said nothing. I stayed silent too as I took him back into the room. The silence was strange. Loaded. Lines had been crossed, and that asphalt strip carved between the Old and New Cities had only been the first of many. And the least dangerous by far.

  I closed the door behind us.

  Aiden faced me. “How are you doing?”

  “I’m all right.” I think?

  Small talk had never felt quite so out of place.