THE GENTLEMEN'S CLUB Rhys Written by Lady Poetess egiggles at moose-mail.com /~bbp Please do not reproduce on any website without permission. This story has no resemblance to anyone dead or alive. PROLOGUE There was something odd about Jonathan Rhys-Meyer today. It took Hugh Jackman a few minutes to realize that Rhys was actually smiling today. Rhys never smiled in the five years Hugh had seen the man practically being an indentured slave to his father's debts, but today the man was all smiles. Rhys had a beautiful smile, Hugh realized with a start. The smile wasn't beautiful in its appearance as much as the emotion it conveyed. Always a quiet and withdrawn man, Rhys' appearance was borderline beautiful and repulsive, and the man's almost prismatic blue-green eyes seemed to be able to cut into one's soul. If one took apart Rhys' features one by the one, the eyes would seem too far apart or too flat, the nose too long and narrow, the lips too wide, and the face too angular. But combined, Rhys was mesmerizing. Not exactly beautiful, but it was a face one wouldn't forget easily, especially with those brilliant, mysterious eyes. And today, when Rhys smiled, he made Hugh's own lips curl upwards in response. "Good morning, Rhys," Hugh said, getting onto his feet as Rhys closed the door behind him. This was Hugh's way, and he would sit only after Rhys had done so. Rhys just reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a check. He placed it before Hugh. "The last two hundred grand my father owed you, Hugh." He gave a wild, exuberant laugh. "I'm free now. I'm finally fucking free." He tossed another envelope onto the table. "And this is my resignation letter, Hugh. I don't owe this company anything anymore." Hugh silently took the envelopes. There were only a few years separating the two men, but Hugh had become protective over Rhys over the years. James always teased him that he had a soft heart under his tough exterior. "What will you do now?" he asked Rhys. He wouldn't ask Rhys to stay, because he knew Rhys spent five years working in a job he never wanted in the first place just to pay off his father's debts. "I don't know," Rhys confessed, his lilting Irish accent still strong despite his years of living in New York. "I've waited all these years for today, but now, I just don't know." Hugh had followed how Rhys' father bankrupted himself in a series of bad business decision, and how Rhys had to be the one to solve the family's financial situation. Over the years, Hugh had learned that while Rhys had a business administration degree, the man's first love was mechanics, judging from the man's activities on campus and off-campus during his university days. Hugh never pried, but he could only imagined how much Rhys gave up to take this job and to see his life past as he made up for his father's mistakes. "I have an offer from several engineering firms and toy companies," Rhys said, confirming Hugh's suspicions. "I don't know, I'll look over them later. I just want to go home and... I'm free, Hugh, I'm free!" Hugh had to laugh at the man's childish exuberance. "You know, Hugh, you're alright," Rhys said suddenly. "I never think you as bad as all the rest." "Thank you," Hugh said simply. "Anyway, I have to go. See you again, well, whenever." With a vague wave, Rhys bounded out the door. Hugh watched after the man, bemused. Rhys was this animated before, and there were times when he thought the man incapable of emotion. But now, hell, Rhys was completely changed, a new person even. Who would've thought? Feeling lighter in his heart, Hugh started to resume reading the documents before him. He caught himself humming the tune of the new Nickelback song, and he couldn't help it. His hearty laugh gave the people outside the second surprise of the day. ONE Timothy Maxwell Adams recognized a fellow inventor's handiwork the moment he saw the door. The door looked like a door, but his eyes detected the subtle improvements made to the door. He grasped the door handle, and noted that it was redone to improve the grip. He touched the door, and noted the level of the peephole and - he peered into it - the improved visual through the use of an altered glass piece. Fascinating. Maybe this blind date wouldn't be such a dull affair after all. He tried to remember what his friend Thomas Gibson told him about Rhys. "He's the only other guy I know who could take apart any device and explain how it works under an hour. Come on, Tim, you need to get out more," Thomas had said. He wondered what this Rhys would think when the man saw Tim for the first time. Tim knew he didn't look like what people thought a physicist looked like. They usually felt more comfortable with Thomas, who looked like a comfortable version of a stereotypical handsome nerd. Tim, with his strapping physique, looked more like a construction worker. When he wasn't in his lab or in his personal workshop, he spent a few months each year performing extreme sports. "Rhys?" The man that opened the door wasn't what Tim expected. Tim felt heat exploded in the depths of his stomach as he gazed on what seemed to be a borderline repulsive/mesmerizing face. Rhys' nose was too long, those lips too fleshy, the eyes too flat and far apart, and the face too angular and bony, but put together, he looked, to Tim's eyes, like a fascinating tapestry. Whether Rhys was beautiful or ugly, one would never forget that face. The most beautiful of Rhys was those eyes, too bright emerald eyes that seemed to lure the unwary to drown in their limitless depths. Tim looked down the man despite himself, and swallowed. Rhys was thin, almost painfully so, but clad in simple white shirt and dark trousers, he exuded such raw virility that belied his lanky frame. Tim yearned to run his fingers through the short dark sandy hair, to plunder those lips, and to ram his aching cock in the depths of Rhys' quivering heat - mouth or asshole, he wasn't picky. It gratified and reassured him when Rhys ran a trembling hand along Tim's chest. The other man's face had taken on an expression of being struck by uncontrollable lust that he couldn't contain as his hand, apparently on its own accord, squeezed over Tim's right nipple. Tim groaned, and pressed forward so that his throbbing erect nipple could leave an imprint on Rhys' hand. "Tim?" Rhys breathed, a low, almost monotonous baritone that Tim found irresistible. "Yeah. I'm your blind date," Tim whispered. His hands caressed Rhys' cheeks and he bent his head forward for the kiss he needed so badly. "This is crazy," he admitted. Rhys slowly let the tip of his tongue trace Tim's lower lip. "Yeah," he said breathlessly. "I don't usually act like this." "Me too." "You're kidding," Rhys breathed as his hands touched and discovered Tim's well-muscled shoulders. "I bet you have lots of people throwing themselves at you." "But I don't want them," Tim said smoothly, "only you." The piercing whistle interrupted them. Rhys laughed as the spell was broken, relieved actually, and Tim joined him. He was relieved too, for the intensity of this instant attraction unnerved even him. But there was also no hiding the disappointment in him that this magic ended so soon. They would rekindle it before the night was out, he vowed quietly to himself. He had his share of men and woman - too many, some would say - but he knew something good when he saw it. And Rhys, he realized instinctively, was good. "That's my coffee-maker," Rhys said with a clear of his throat. "Can I see it? I made mine such that you can improve the quality of the blend." "Hey, me too. What did you do? I took out the motor and..." Tim listened and chuckled as they began exchanging tips and ideas. He closed the door behind him. Here they were, talking as if they were old friends, when only a moment ago they were close to fucking each other's brain out. Who would've thought? "I'm sorry we missed dinner," Rhys said as he watched Tim try to put back the radio Rhys had made so that it could receive almost every transmission in the Northern hemisphere. "I know it's not easy getting a reservation at Le Chatelaine." "This is better," Tim just said, looking up from his dissection of the radio. "Okay, damn it, I give up. Tell me what you did to this baby." Rhys grinned. He had never felt this easy with anyone before. Sure, he could communicate with people, but it took a conscious attempt on his part. As his equally shy mechanically inclined friend Greg Lee told him, he was a shy guy who just happened to be very good at pretending to be gregarious. Since he quitted his job, it was bliss just being alone and not having to wheedle, flatter, and bargain with other people. But with Tim, his words came out naturally, and he even touched Tim easily, and Tim let him. Sure, he'd lovers before, but he was just as reticent with touches as he was with words. But Tim's banked desire in those eyes encouraged him, and even now, Rhys let his fingers run absently along Tim's powerfully muscled upper arm. Tim was a classically rugged man with strong square jaw and light brown hair, and with his physique, he could only be described as a stud in every virile implication the word offered. The shirt and trousers fitted Tim like second skin, and there was always the way Tim's crotch seemed to stretch the fabric to the limit the same way his arms and thigh muscles did that implied that Tim was powerfully muscled... everywhere. Even now, they were both very aware of every button loosened in the casual atmosphere. Rhys knew that Tim's eyes never missed how his shirt lifted slightly to expose the waistband of his Calvins when he bent over to reach for the screwdriver. As Tim moved his arms in his dismantling the radio, Rhys noted heatedly how the man's muscles moved fluidly underneath tanned supple skin, and he had to clamp his thighs urgently as he almost came on the spot in imagining the fluid motions of Tim's thigh muscles as the latter heaved and thrust between Rhys' thighs. Oh, they would have sex tonight. Soon, maybe later, they were both deliberately playing it slow just to prolong the pleasure of anticipation. And also because they really enjoyed this, the simple act of discovering the other's shared joy in taking apart and putting back together things. Tim revealed that he made his father very angry when he was ten because he pulled apart his father's lawn mover, and he laughed as Rhys related how he caused the school lab to burn down in a too- ardent experimentation of raw potassium with water. They told each other anecdotes and jokes and memories, good and bad, with their toolbox and laptop devices, that Rhys could easily imagine that the last five hellish years of his life was just a dream. Somehow, as they talked, they had moved closer to each other by instinct. As the last chuckle from Rhys' lips died, they both found Tim's lips just inches away from Rhys'. "I'll try to take it slow," Tim murmured as he touched Rhys' lips reverently with his thumb. "Don't be slow with me," Rhys said. "I haven't touched anyone for so long, I want it raw and hard tonight. I need to feel alive. Please." He closed his eyes and pressed his lips to the back of Tim's hand. "We're talking about sex, right?" Tim asked nervously - nervously! Jesus, he had never been nervous in sex and dating for a long time now. "No, cookery." Rhys smiled crookedly, a smile that made him indescribably beautiful in Tim's eyes. "Don't be gentle with me, Tim. I'm a big boy, I can take anything you got." TWO Rhys screamed in maddened pleasure when Tim raped his ass savagely with each brutal thrust. His hands wildly touched, squeezed, and raked every hard-muscled flesh he could find purchase, and his moans and obscene curses were guttural sounds to his own ears. Never been this aroused before, he screamed again as yet another explosion of fiery climax ripped his being apart. Tim was virile clothed, but nude, he was enough to drive Rhys incoherent with lust. That obscenely huge and thick cock should have ripped him apart with agony, but Rhys instead climaxed so hard the moment the wide cock top speared through his pucker. Every hard brutal plunge of that cock sent another red-hot spear of pleasure up Rhys' spine, and after just ten minutes, he thought he would go insane from the insurmountable pleasure. One hour later, he was screaming for mercy, begging for more, and biting and licking every part of Tim he could find. Determined to hurt Tim as much as Tim was hurting him, he made his anal muscles clamp Tim as hard as he could, until Tim howled with pleasure, his foreskin threatening to be torn apart each time he withdrew, so hard as a vise was Rhys' tight anal embrace. Tim's cock only hardened and lengthened as the blood in his cock veins rushed with the surging semen in his tubes, and he thought his cock would burst when the scorching jets of his orgasm spurted out of his burning urethra to flood Rhys' rectum. Their moans and curses blended with the wet sounds of their slapping flesh and the harsh rhythms of their breathing, and as Rhys convulsed in another climax under him, Tim thought that he had never found anyone this responsive to his fucking. That cocksucker was fucking good, Tim thought as he tightened his fingers into a bruising grip on Rhys' head and let loose his spunk into the man's voraciously sucking mouth. He deliberately made sure that he pressed his cock head against the roof of Rhys' throat so that Rhys couldn't swallow, instead forcing his spunk to flood and spill out of the man's mouth. Rhys gagged, but his eyes told Tim that the man was enjoying this. What a slut. What a fucking perverse slut Rhys was to enjoy cleaning Tim's soiled cock after their initial wild fuck and then sucking Tim back to full hardness until Tim had to fuck the man's mouth. He pulled out of Rhys' mouth roughly and kissed the man hard, tasting and sucking blood, come, and ass juices from Rhys' mouth. Rhys made a hungry sound, not wanting to relinquish his dessert, so he too sucked and swallowed as much as he could. Their tongues met and mated, and soon Tim was pushing the man back down on the bed, and even as they kissed and tasted each other, his once again hard cock was pushing its way up Rhys' well-educated asshole. "You call this rough?" Rhys taunted as he clawed on Tim's buttocks, urging the man on. "My swimming coach was rougher than you, and he was fifty when he fucked me." "Shut the fuck up!" Tim shouted, violently jealous of the thought of anyone doing what he was doing to Rhys, that glorious slut. "You want rough? I'll fuck you rough." "Yeah?" Rhys gasped and managed to continue only after his sudden climax. "Yeah?" he said weakly. "Big talk, nancy boy. I could barely feel your tiny dick." Tim growled, wracked in his powerful climax, and his hands tightened around Rhys neck, but not enough to hurt. "Slut. Whore. Bitch." "What tired compliments. Think of something else to call me, will you?" Rhys mocked when he could control his breathing. Tim grinned, but there was no mistaking the fire in the man's jetty black eyes. "At loss for words?" Rhys taunted, answering laughter in his eyes. "How about cicisbeo? Narcissus? Endymion? Ganymede?" "What the fuck are those?" Tim asked despite himself. "Why, legendary gay tempters of history," Rhys told him. "I tempted you, didn't I? I'm a fucking hero." "Yeah you are," Tim said with a sigh of pleasure. "Slut." "And you love it." "Naturally." Tim rolled off the other man and headed to the bathroom. Rhys casually followed, enjoying the feel of Tim's sultry liquids coating his inner thighs and making his slippery flesh rub each thigh. "So, how was it?" he asked through the glazed glass door. Damn, even Tim's silhouette looked good. "Was I good enough for you?" Tim didn't answer, but Rhys heard the water being turned off. He smiled when Tim opened the door. "Now do you believe me?" Tim asked, kissing Rhys' chest lazily later. "Oh yeah." Too sated to do anything but to enjoy each other's warmth, Rhys let Tim cuddle him closely so that he was cocooned in Tim's powerfully muscled body, Tim's right thigh and arm pinning him to the bed. He loved the feel of Rhys' half hard cock tip pressed against his ass crown, and he occasionally clenched his ass so that his ass pucker would caress Tim's sensitive tip. "And do you believe me?" Rhys asked back. Tim nodded. "The first boy I fucked burst into tears and told everyone I was a brutal monster," he told Rhys. "I was known as the monster all through high school. Those who wanted to fuck with me did so because they wanted to be hurt. Others tried not to be even in the same room with me." "But you're okay now," Rhys said, turning around so that he could face Tim. "And I loved it when you play rough." "I can also play it gentle," Tim told Rhys, begging the man with his eyes to believe him. "I can be slow and sensual, too. I've had years to refine my control, and if I was too rough previously, or if my obscene words scare you..." "I love it when you call me those obscene names," Rhys told him. "I can do gentle." "I like it rough as well as gentle." "I can do gentle," Tim said urgently, too scarred by his experiences to take Rhys' words at face value. "I can be gentle with you," he repeated as he began kissing Rhys to prove it. Rhys willing accepted him, and as Tim this time made love to him gentle and slow, and they both collapsed in a heap of breathless laughter, Rhys saying, "Yes, yes, I believe you, you wimp!", Tim believed Rhys. "This is the best blind date I've ever had," he told Rhys sleepily. "That's because I let you fuck me on the first date." "No." After all, there were many who'd let him fuck them on the first date too, not that he'd tell Rhys that. "I think you are the other half of me." Rhys snuggled close and smiled, his eyes closed. "A year ago that will have sent me running the other direction." "But now?" "I think that is what I need to hear so that I can sleep easy tonight." Tim nodded and kissed the man's forehead. "Thank you, Tim," Rhys muttered sleepily. "You have no idea what you did tonight to me. I... I..." "Tell me tomorrow morning," Tim urged Rhys. "You're tired, Rhys, so sleep now." Rhys nodded, and in each other's arms, they slept. THREE Rhys watched his mother sleep on the rocking chair. Estelle didn't recognize him at all today, but he had long learned to cope with Alzheimer fast ravaging his mother. He still hurt, but he had learned to cope with the pain, as he had with the disappointments in his life. But today, he had to tell her, even if she would never remember. "Mom, I'm sorry I never made true on the promises I made you," he said softly as he rested his chin on his right fist. "When dad lost his business and you pawned everything you have for my college fees, I promised that I will buy them all back for you. I promised to buy you your own place, take you on the world trip you always wanted, and pay for your flower arrangement classes. I'm sorry I'm too late, mom." He bit his lower lip until he could taste his own blood. "I'm sorry I couldn't solve dad's mess long enough to make it worth your sacrifice for me. "I still feel guilty playing with mechanical stuff, as you calls it, mom. I went through business school because you paid for it and because dad wanted me to, and I didn't have the heart to tell you how I hated it. It feels that if I'm happy, I'll be betraying you now. I don't know, mom, I really don't know, because right now I've met a nice man, but I feel so guilty feeling happy with him. What shall I do, mom? How I wish you can tell me something." But she was lost in her own private world, and he received no answer. He sat there and watched her sleep, until the nurse came and asked him gently to leave so that Estelle could rest. Rhys walked the streets afterwards, numbed as he always was after his daily evening visits to his mother. He didn't know where he was going, but it wasn't any surprise when he found himself standing outside Tim's apartment door. It was still early, and Tim hadn't come home from his lab yet. Bereft of anyone to talk to - a common situation Rhys found himself in too many times - he finally rested his forehead against the door and closed his eyes. No tears fell, for he had been drained of his tears long ago. He just stood there, eyes closed, unmoving, a ghost the way he felt in his very soul. "Rhys?" Tim dropped his briefcase on the floor and walked up to the silent man. "Are you okay?" Rhys opened his eyes, and Tim was struck by how lifeless they were. "Yes, I'm okay," Rhys said in a flat monotone. "You... how long have you been standing there?" Tim asked as he steadied the man in his arms. "I thought I'd finally be happy when I paid off the last of my father's debts," Rhys just said instead. "But I think I will never be happy." "Stop talking like that," Tim said as he opened his door and guided Rhys inside. "My mother will die soon. My father is dead. It doesn't seem fair that I'm alive," Rhys said dully as he let Tim guide him to a couch. "It is not right that I was so alive last night when I didn't even have the money to buy my mother the apartment she always wanted. How can I be alive when she was dying? After all she gave up for me? And I couldn't even do anything now, because she's fucking dying." Tim knelt before Rhys. "We can take care of her," the words came out unthinking, but as Tim said it, as he looked at this beautiful, wonderful, and hurting man, he knew he meant it with every fiber of his being. "You and me, Rhys." "You can't stop Alzheimer. I don't think you're that powerful." "No, but I can make you feel alive. I think your mother will want that for you." "You don't know her." But that was spoken mildly, with no heat, a sigh rather than castigation. "So don't use that hackneyed line on me, Tim." But he placed his arms around Tim and rested his chin on the man's strong, sturdy shoulders that could carry the weight of the world, and he held Tim hard. "Maybe you can fuck me, Tim? Please?" Tim nodded, and unbuttoned Rhys' shirt with fingers that trembled slightly. Rhys had tears rolling down his cheeks when he climaxed, and Tim kissed them. He was lying there, dazed on the couch, when Tim gently eased himself out of him to make them both some dinner. Something had changed, Rhys thought as he unsteadily sat up on the couch. Something in him felt different, loose and free, and he didn't know if he liked that. Was it just he or the world felt warmer at the moment? He pulled on his jeans and walked, not knowing where he was walking. He found himself staring at a cabinet housing Tim's CD collection: opera and classics - not exactly Rhys' type of music. He noticed a complete absence of switches in the house, and on instinct he clapped his hands. Nothing happened. "You use this," Tim said, picking up what seemed like a TV remote (that was what it was until Tim tinkered with it). "I did the rewiring and all myself," he said proudly. "Clapping hands seemed like a clich‚d innovation." He placed two trays of hot ham, eggs, and salad on the dining table. "Maybe I can show you my improved food processor and my automaton collection." "You have an automaton collection?" Rhys asked, perking up noticeably. "It's nothing compared to your clockwork toy inventions," Tim said modestly. They didn't speak of Rhys' emotional breakdown, and there was no need, for they both knew it was there, and as people who communicated best with their hands, they stayed up until two thirty in the morning tearing apart Tim's robot valet in an attempt to improve its memory circuits. Even if Tim had an early morning the next day, he stayed with Tim, slowly making love to him the remainder of the night, until he spilled his semen for the last time that night in Rhys' convulsing ass at six in the morning. He didn't leave the bed until he really had to. His mother was lucid today, and while she didn't remember Rhys anymore than she could take in her surroundings, she was noticeably enamored of Tim. Rhys grinned, not blaming her mother for warming up to the man who looked like an all-American superhero. He was embarrassed by his show of weakness, and he tried to tell Tim that he would never be clingy, but Tim didn't seem to mind. In fact the man seemed pleased that Rhys let him accompany him to visit his mother today. Rhys still didn't know what it felt like, for letting Tim meet his mother was a big step to blur the boundaries between his life and Tim's. Letting Tim take wheel-chaired bound Estella around the gardens of the home (well-maintained thanks to the fees people like Rhys spent almost their entire paychecks paying the home), Rhys just watched those two in silence from his place at the bench. How did he meet someone like Tim? Someone who shared his same interest and who fit into his life like a hand in glove? It was enough to make cynical Rhys almost believe that there was someone up there looking out for lonely souls like he. He heard Estella talk. She had been talking like her old self, before she lost everything, and Rhys was grateful for Tim to bring out that aspect of her mother. "Have you met my son Rhys? He's a good son. He is too busy being a wonderful businessman, I know. I just hope he will be happy," he heard his mother tell Tim, and he froze. "He's trying to be happy, Mrs Rhys-Meyer," Tim said, unaware that Rhys could hear every word. "And I'll make sure of that." "I wish he will understand that he isn't like his father, and he doesn't have to spend his life making it up for his mistakes," Estella chattered on. "The other day, I remember he telling me a long time ago how he wanted to buy me a house. Silly boy, I'd tell him. Just seeing him grown up to be a man I can be proud of is enough for me." "I'll tell him," Tim said quietly. They moved out of Rhys' range of hearing, but Rhys had heard enough. He just watched those two, the most important person in his life bonding with a man who was fast becoming just as important even though she wouldn't remember Tim always, lost in his confused jumble of thoughts. "Rhys?" Tim gently called his name later. Rhys nodded. He smiled at Tim, a smile of acceptance, and maybe more. A smile borne of emotions he was only slowly starting to comprehend. "Yeah." He placed his hand in Tim's, and Tim squeezed it briefly before they walked towards his car. The evening sun set low, and Rhys rested his head against Tim's shoulder. Tim understood. "We'll be okay, Rhys," he said softly. "I'm sure of it." "I know," Rhys just said. "Tim, I know."