James Stott #1 - The Protege

MM 18+ | Every room he walks into, someone's got a hand on him.

James got what he wanted from Joe - a confrontation, a denial, an exit with his dignity mostly intact. What he didn't get was the last word. Someone was in the shadows behind the equipment shed, and by the time James makes it to the showers, that someone already has proof. Coach Davidson wants to know what happened on the pitch. Marcus wants to know what's wrong with him. And somewhere in Steel Valley, a phone is waiting to buzz.

The lukewarm spray of the communal showers at Steel Valley Athletics hissed against the tiles, effortlessly removing the muck from his legs yet failing to wash away the ghost of Joe’s eyes, which are now burned into his mind’s eye.

James leaned his forehead against the cold, grime-streaked wall, the steam curling around his broad shoulders. He scrubbed a coarse sponge over his chest, trying to scour off the mud and the memory of that conversation.

“You’re going to scrub away your skin, James.”

James jumped, his feet nearly sliding on the soapy floor. Coach Davidson stood at the end of the row, that monolithic silhouette framed by the mist and luminous overhead lighting. The Coach didn’t wear a towel; he wore a thin, grey tracksuit that clung to his massive legs, the fabric damp and heavy from the rain.

“Sorry, Coach.”

“Sorry doesn’t cut it or fix a lack of focus. What happened out there with that boy, Joe?”

At the sound of his name, James straightened up, water streaming down his hairy torso, tracing the split between his chest and the deep grooves of his abdominals.

“Nothing. He was... talking.”

Davidson stepped forward. James caught the scent of the man - old leather, musk, and a sharp, masculine heat - far overwhelming the chemical tang of the cheap Cool Wave soap.

Stopping inches from James, his obsidian eyes regarded the younger man’s frame.

“You’re shaking,” Davidson observed, “Still worked up from the pitch?”

“I’m fine, sir.”

“You’re a terrible liar.” Davidson chuckled as he reached out, a calloused thumb grazing the pulse point in James’s neck. “Your heart is galloping. Like a horse that’s seen a ghost.”

James swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “I just... I don’t like being watched.”

“Being watched is part of the game, son. The question is, do you like what they see?”

The Coach’s hand didn’t move. The pressure was light, but the implication was huge. James felt the familiar, traitorous throb in his groin, the white fabric of his jockstrap straining. He wanted to pull away, but he wanted the hand to move lower.

“I don’t know what you mean,” James whispered.

Davidson let out a short huff. He stepped back, the sudden loss of contact leaving James shivering.

“Get dressed. I want you in the gym for an extra session tomorrow. And James?”

“Yes, Coach?”

“Stop pretending you’re a victim. It doesn’t suit a man of your build.”

Four hours later, the world shifted from fluorescent white to neon red.

James stood on the door of Pit & Furnace, the repurposed foundry that served as the valley’s altar to raw desire. He wore his standard black tight-fit shirt that strained across his pecs and his heavy rubber-soled boots that anchored him to the sticky pavement. Around him, the city’s grinding pressure was dissolving into the usual concussive thrum of electro-bass that rattled his teeth.

He wasn’t the nervous student here. He was the gatekeeper. In this world, he was completely in control and was never questioned; a man of his stature did the intimidating at this venue.

“ID,” James barked at a group of shivering twenty-somethings.

“We’re on the list, mate. Seriously,” one of them stammered, glancing up at James’s towering frame.

James didn’t blink. He stared through them, his face a stern mask of indifference. “List is at the desk. Move along.”

As he ushered them along, a hand gripped his shoulder. The touch was firm, confident. James turned to find Marcus, a regular and a fixture of the club’s inner circle. Marcus was a burly bear of a man, draped in a leather vest that barely contained a forest of grey-streaked chest hair, his arms corded with muscle and old ink.

“You look like you’re trying to punch a hole through the crowd, Big Jim,” Marcus grinned, his voice a deep, rich and smooth hum like polished mahogany.

“Long day,” James replied, his voice dropping an octave.

“Too long. You’ve got that look in your eye. The ‘I need a drink or a fuck’ look.”

James felt a flush creep up his neck. “I’m working, Marcus.”

“The door doesn’t move if you take five minutes. Come inside. The Pit is humming tonight. I can smell the poppers and musk from here.”

James hesitated, then nodded.

As he stepped inside, the air instantly became a suffocating soup of sweat, spilt beer, and that unmistakable concentrated, metallic tang of male arousal. The bass hit him in the chest, a rhythmic pounding that mirrored the frantic beat of his own heart.

He followed Marcus past the main bar, where the red neon cast long, bloody shadows over the crowd of rubber kids and leather daddies. They approached the heavy black curtain.

“You still thinking about the university boys?” Marcus asked, his voice barely audible over the bass.

“How do you…”

“I see the way you look at the athletes who wander in here. You look at them like you’re starving, and you’re terrified someone’s going to notice you’ve got a fork in your hand.”

James stopped at the edge of the curtain momentarily paralysed. “I don’t know what I’m doing, Marcus. Everything feels... wrong. Or too right. I can’t tell.”

Smiling knowingly, Marcus stepped closer, his leather vest brushing against James’s shirt. He smelled of expensive tobacco and raw, unwashed skin. “That’s because you’re trying to think your way through a physical problem. You don’t think in the Pit, James. You just feel.”

Marcus reached down, his hand grazing the thigh of James’s trousers, a deliberate, heavy pressure. “You’re hard. Right here. In the middle of the lobby.”

“I... It’s just the music,” James lied, though his breath quickened.

“Liar,” Marcus whispered. “Come behind the curtain. Let’s see if we can’t get that tension out of your shoulders.”

James let himself be pulled into the corridor. The noise of the main room muffled, replaced by the sounds of the subterranean world: a wet splutter, a low moan, the rhythmic slap of skin on skin. The air was thick.

They didn’t make it to the mattresses. Marcus pressed James against the rough concrete wall, his bulk overwhelming. The contrast was electric - the polished, nervous athlete and the weathered, confident veteran.

“Tell me you want it,” Marcus commanded, his voice a rasp.

“I do…” James breathed, his head tilting back with the relief of this realisation.

Marcus didn’t waste time. He gripped James’s belt, pulling him forward. The friction of their bodies was a wildfire. James groaned, a sound that was half-sob, half-growl, his fingers digging into the leather of Marcus’s vest before sliding round into a hug. For a few minutes, the world was reduced to the scent of musk and the crushing weight of another man. It was the only place where James didn’t feel like he was playing a part.

And there they stood, James semi-pinned to the wall by Marcus’s bulk, just holding each other. Experience told Marcus not to push his luck; he realised all too well that this young man was going through it.

Minutes passed by but felt like hours. In Marcus’s arms and the anonymity of the darkness, James relaxed his shoulders and buried his face in the thick matt of silver fur. His breathing slowed as he closed his eyes and just gave into the feeling of security.

But as he stepped back into the light of the corridor, his phone buzzed in his pocket.

He pulled it out, the screen glowing a harsh, clinical white in the dimness. His heart stopped.

It was an anonymous message. No text. Just a video file.

James pressed play.

The footage was grainy, shot from a distance behind the equipment shed at the university. It was him and Joe. The video captured everything: the way James had pinned Joe against the beam, the frantic whispers, the raw, desperate anger, and the moment James’s voice had cracked with a need he couldn’t name.

The video ended with a shot of James’s face - exposed, vulnerable, and undeniably wanting.

James felt the air leave his lungs. The neon red of the club suddenly felt like a warning light.

“Something wrong?” Marcus asked, noticing the sudden rigidity in James’s posture.

James didn’t answer. He stared at the screen, the recording looping the moment he had told Joe he was “not like him.”

“I have to go,” James whispered.

“The shift isn’t over, Jim.”

“I can’t... I have to leave.”

James bolted. He didn’t look back at Marcus. He pushed through the black curtain, through the crowd of pulsing bodies, and burst out into the cold Steel Valley rain.

He leaned against the brickwork of the foundry, the rain soaking through his shirt, his breath shaking. He looked at the phone. The video was evidence. It was a manifest of his deepest fear, recorded and stored on someone else’s device.

He thought of Coach Davidson’s obsidian eyes. He thought of Joe’s smug, voyeuristic grin. He thought of the rugby team - the “livestock,” as the Coach might see them - and how they would look at him if this video hit the group chat.

He felt a sudden, violent surge of nausea. He was supposed to be the “Iron Bull” in training, the bouncer who broke spirits at the door, the golden boy of the Pistons. And in this new light that was shown up as simply a veneer.

His phone buzzed again. A second message.

*Currency is only valuable if someone is willing to pay, James. See you on Thursday.*

James stared at the words until they blurred. He slid the phone into his pocket and looked up at the grey, oppressive sky.

His nausea overtook him, and he found himself curled into the nearest wastebasket.

Wiping his mouth on his sleeve and stroking his beard straight with the rainwater accumulated in it, he began to walk back toward the campus, his rubber boots thumping heavily against the pavement. The adrenaline was fading, and the bile burned his throat, leaving behind a hollow ache. He felt grubby. Sticky. Not from the club’s musk, but from the residue of a secret that was no longer his.

As he walked, he found himself thinking of Anders. He remembered the weight of the other man, the confidence, the unashamed way they had embraced. For the first time, the fear of being caught was eclipsed by a different kind of hunger.

He didn’t want to be the man on the recording. He didn’t want to be the boy shaking under the Coach’s thumb. He didn’t want to be afraid.

He reached the university gates and stopped. In the distance, the floodlights of Steel Valley Athletics were still on, casting a harsh, synthetic glare over the waterlogged pitches.

James straightened his shoulders and gripped the strap of his bag. He was terrified. He was exposed. And as he felt the lingering heat of Marcus in his veins, he realised he was also, for the first time in his life, completely awake.

He headed toward the locker rooms, the scent of Cool Wave and boy-stink waiting for him in the damp, and the knowledge that tomorrow, when the Coach called him into the office, the power dynamic had shifted.

He wasn’t just a student anymore. He was a man with a price on his head.

Thursday’s coming.

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Picking up straight after Joe and James’s confrontation at the pitch - the showers, Coach Davidson, the door at Pit & Furnace, and the video that changes everything.

Who’s holding the phone, and what Thursday might actually cost him.

Until next time…

Magnus.

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