Simple Man, Simple Dream Read online

  Chapter Two

  “Do you want fries with that?” Ryland Goodwin asked the drive-thru customer through the headset’s mic. He haaaated working Saturday night closing shifts, but he was the manager, and they were down three people due to a gastrointestinal bug.

  That meant his ass was working overtime this week.

  “Yeah, large fries, please.”

  “That’ll be $6.42. Please pull forward to the second window.” He didn’t have the manpower to split the crew tonight, which meant it took a little longer to get orders out, but overall he could process the line faster than anyone else he had on the shift. He was actually doing double duty, running the drive-thru window register and a counter register.

  Triple duty if you counted getting drinks for the drive-thru customers.

  Quadruple duty if you counted he was the damn manager.

  This is not how I want to spend Saturday nights for the rest of my life.

  Normally, he didn’t have to work Saturdays nights, because he had seniority. He was the fucking manager, for chrissakes, and when he’d received the promotion, the owner told him one of the perks was being able to take most Saturdays off, if he wanted to. He worked about one or two Saturday mornings a month, on average, usually taking Saturdays and Sundays off, alternating a Friday or Monday off for when he had to work a full Saturday.

  He’d worked there for fifteen years now—which was depressing as fuck, when he thought about it. He’d started there even before he’d graduated high school. But college wasn’t in his budget, and he hadn’t had the grades to get a scholarship.

  And the longer he stayed, the more promotions he earned, until he was finally the last man standing.

  Good or bad, he wasn’t sure.

  Now, at thirty-one, it looked like this was his career. It wasn’t the world’s best pay, but he had health insurance that wasn’t too crappy, he didn’t need a roommate to afford his small apartment, he usually could tuck a few dollars into his savings account every month, and he’d just bought a good used car last year that was paying for itself in the money it saved him on gas and repairs compared to the beater he used to own.

  There were people a lot worse off than he was, and he damn well knew it.

  Plus, in addition to that, he earned on average anywhere from fifty to a hundred bucks a month between his blog, “Dishing the Grill,” and his YouTube channel. That income came from Amazon affiliate fees and monetizing videos he posted of him cooking stuff at home, or demoing cooking-related items, unboxing things, those kinds of videos. Never with his face visible, and never identifying himself, or where he was from, except to say he was on the Gulf coast of Florida. On the blog, he also posted funny and true stories from work, changing enough of the details to make the stories unidentifiable to his coworkers.

  And he thought about the cookbook he’d like to maybe write one day. He had hundreds of recipes he’d customized or come up with himself, but he really didn’t have time for that, or even know how to go about writing and publishing it.

  In some ways, he felt guilty about griping, even if only to himself, because he had an admittedly decent life. Not exactly the kind of life that sold magazines or made the headlines, but nothing to be ashamed of, either.

  What really aggravated him was tonight, for the first time in forever, he was supposed to go to a private party.

  A guys-only kind of party.

  An anything-goes kind of party.

  A couple of guys who owned a software company around the corner from the restaurant, a married couple who ate lunch there a couple of days a week, had stopped in after the lunch rush one day, pulled him aside, and quickly sussed out he was gay.

  Apparently they and their third hosted these parties on a regular basis, and they were curious if he was interested.

  Hell, yes, he was interested.

  It was tough finding dates, even through apps, beyond getting out that he was a manager at a fast-food restaurant.

  Then he usually received radio silence from that point on when the guy ghosted him.

  What’s wrong with being an honest blue-collar worker?

  Shit, he made good use of his apartment complex’s workout room. It was free, meaning no gym fees to pay, so he had a decent body, if he did say so himself.

  Although, in retrospect, going to a gym might have opened up another dating stream to him, but now he wasn’t going to worry about that.

  He had a lot of fantasies he’d like to work his way through, including finding an experienced Top to take him for a few turns around the block. He’d wanted to join Venture, the BDSM club in Sarasota, but he hadn’t been able to make himself do that yet. So a private party seemed to be the perfect answer.

  Until everyone started getting sick around him that week, and he’d had to cancel.

  Figures.

  There was going to be another private party next weekend, a smaller one, that they’d also invited him to.

  Come hell or high water, he was going to be there. He didn’t want to get dropped from the invite list before he’d even attended his first one because they thought he was a flake.

  I just want to get spanked and laid. Is that too much to ask?

  * * * *

  By three a.m., Ryland was standing in his own shower and groaning as the hot water soothed his aching muscles and washed the smell of fries off him.

  Ugh.

  The irony was he rarely ate the food there, unless he didn’t have time to make his own lunch to bring with him. His body was one of the few things he did have complete control over, and he liked the way he looked. He wasn’t massively musclebound, but he had good definition and low body fat.

  And a six-pack that actually looked like one.

  Wasn’t like he had a lot of hobbies, and the exercise room was, again, free.

  He’d also noticed that the videos he posted where his abs were visible usually had more hits, meaning more ad revenue.

  The apartment complex had even upgraded and added an extra recumbent bike and a better treadmill when he’d asked about it six months ago after taking an informal poll of some of the regular users he bumped into there.

  After his shower, he thought about dragging his laptop into bed with him and beating off to some leather Daddy porn, except he was sooo tired, and his feet ached like crazy.

  Time to invest in new shoes.

  That was an expense he knew he needed to stop begrudging so much, because good shoes made a world of difference when he was on his feet anywhere from fifty to sixty hours a week, on average. He went through this every time he needed to buy new ones, too. It took him a good couple of weeks of increasingly sore feet and lower back pain before he finally broke down, took the money from savings, and spent close to a hundred and fifty dollars on a pair of shoes.

  Then he’d spend another week calling himself stupid, after his foot and back pain disappeared, for waiting so long to break down to do it.

  And the cycle repeated every few months.

  He finally decided no on the porn, and that he was too tired to rub one out. So he lay there and closed his eyes, happy that he could at least sleep in tomorrow. He’d approved overtime for one of the assistant managers, who’d volunteered to cover the shift.

  Maybe next Saturday I’ll meet someone.

  It wasn’t very likely, but he could hope. Sure, he expected he could easily meet someone to fuck him and maybe even beat his ass, but relationship material?

  Doubtful. He wasn’t that lucky.

  He was never that lucky.

  How sad was it that the truth of that didn’t even shock him anymore?

  * * * *

  “Well?” Kent asked. He’d donned shorts and sat on the edge of the hot tub. All the other guests were gone, and the clean-up had concluded.

  Deacon was currently lounging in the hot tub. He was spending the night tonight, since he didn’t have to be home, and had come prepared to do just that. “That was fucking amazing, man. Not rest-of-my-life amazing, but
if the guy you’re introducing me to next week is a fraction as good, then I am in your debt, my friend.”

  “We’ll see. I can tell you it was a work-related issue that kept him from coming out, and he was very disappointed to miss tonight.”

  “Yeah, well, can’t blame a guy for that, I suppose.”

  “No. Just wanted you to know he didn’t randomly flake, or have drama.”

  Deacon shrugged. “No worries.”

  “Me and the boys are heading to bed. Feel free to help yourself to anything in the kitchen. We’ll have brunch at some point tomorrow morning.”

  “Thanks. Can’t stay real late. Need to head for home by noon, probably.”

  “Cool.”

  Kent headed back inside, leaving Deacon alone on the lanai. As the lights switched off in the house, leaving the soft glow of a few lamps to light the way to the guest bedroom, Deacon stared up at the stars. He’d fucked “slut” another time after tying him up, beating him, and edging him, then got the guy off.

  All in all, one of the better nights he’d spent, in an adult fashion, in years.

  Damn sure better than at the Toucan, where he needed to be super-careful of who he played with, and negotiate within an inch of his life before he even touched them.

  Here, everyone started out with a few basic assumptions and rules in place that cut through some of the red tape of his usual negotiations. Kent did the screening, so better than good chances everyone was neg. No worries about someone getting butt-hurt if you insisted they wrap, or that you would wrap.

  Red, yellow, and green were standard safewords, regardless of the activity going on.

  In short—a lot less stress and a lot less work for a far greater return on his energy investment.

  And I don’t have to drive to fucking St. Pete to get my rocks off.

  Tonight, he’d ridden his Harley. With lovebug season in full bloom until recently, it’d been a few weeks since he’d taken the bike out. He never rode it over the Skyway, because that was just asking for trouble, and he wasn’t a young man.

  There was a local riding club he went out with a few Sundays a month, sometimes Wednesday night meet-ups at local restaurants for bike or car shows. Mostly older folks like him, a few younger ones mixed in, people who rode for fun and weren’t looking for anything except a peaceful ride and maybe a burger and fries.

  Still, he’d worn his leathers tonight, and his cock had throbbed at the appreciative looks he’d received from a few guys when he’d walked in.

  Yeah, he wouldn’t deny it fluffed his ego having younger guys looking at him as if they were hungry for what he was serving.

  Although it was growing increasingly tough to deny he wasn’t feeling as fulfilled as he’d hoped he would by this point in his life. He loved Winter and Del, no mistaking that, but he needed to be more than PopPop and Dad.

  Finally, he dragged himself out of the hot tub, switched off the outside lights that were still on, and headed inside. He showered before heading to bed, naked.

  No, he wasn’t a hard body anymore, but he was still in pretty darn good shape for his age, a few minor and easily controlled medical conditions notwithstanding.

  Hell, slut had left a happy camper, so he couldn’t be too horrible.

  Except as he lay there and played the evening over in his mind, he couldn’t deny the one troubling thought that kept percolating to the surface time and again.

  It’d be nice to have someone to wake up with, for a change.

  To cook dinner with.

  Someone who was an adult and not related to him by blood, thank you very much.

  Still, someone who’d like to call him Daddy when they were alone.

  Someone he could call his.

  Chapter Three

  Early Monday morning, Deacon was awakened by a finger poking him in the forehead.

  “PopPop. Wakey up.”

  He pried his eyes open to see Winter sitting there next to him on the bed, her eyes about four inches from his.

  “Where’s Mommy?”

  “Getting my stuff outta da car.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Mommy’s early.”

  No shit. He rolled over and squinted at the clock on his bedside table. 5:03.

  Oh, holy shit. Two hours early. No wonder he wasn’t awake yet.

  He groaned. “Okay, Pumpkin. Go push the button on PopPop’s go-juice for me, and wait for me there. I’ll be right out.”

  She blew a wet raspberry in the middle of his forehead. “I’m on da job!” Then she climbed off of his bed and ran out of the bedroom.

  Oooh, this was going to be a looong day. He could see it already. Fortunately, he’d pulled on sleeping shorts last night before he went to bed.

  After turning his alarm off, he dragged himself out of bed and into the bathroom. Then he grabbed a pair of sleep pants and pulled them on, and a T-shirt, before he emerged from the bedroom to find a very exhausted-looking Delaney carrying in Winter’s stuff for the day.

  “Sorry, Dad. I got called in early. I didn’t want to call to wake you up even earlier.”

  “It’s okay, honey.” She worked as a CNA at a nursing home, and it was shitty hours, but at least she had decent health insurance for her and Winter, and the pay wasn’t too bad. Eventually, Del wanted to go back to school and get a full nursing degree. For now, at least she had a job, which was the important part.

  Especially since the shitty loser who’d knocked her up was doing twenty years in prison for armed robbery. Fucker would never know Winter, either, because Deacon had paid the attorney out of his own pocket to file to revoke the fucker’s parental rights.

  He didn’t want the bastard in any way affiliated with his little Pumpkin. Probably a good thing the fucker was in prison, too, because it meant Deacon couldn’t kill the sonofabitch.

  Which is exactly what he’d wanted to do.

  Once again, he resisted the urge to tell Del to just fucking move back in with him and end this bullshit once and for all.

  Except the last time they’d lived together as adults, they’d nearly killed each other. Granted, she’d been pregnant and extremely hormonal and upset at the time, because the bastard had gotten arrested and she broke up with him, but it was more than that.

  He loved his daughter. He loved his granddaughter. He’d kill or die for either of them.

  But he and Delaney were too damn much alike. Their relationship was much better when they lived in separate abodes, able to get away from each other. Then, they were like the best of friends. That meant it was too easy to forget about wanting to wring each other’s necks when living together.

  He found Winter standing in the kitchen, bouncing up and down in front of the coffeemaker where it was now bubbling and brewing. He left a step-stool right there, in front of the cabinet, specifically so she could hit the button when she arrived.

  Normally, he was already awake and just lying in bed, waiting, when Del arrived to drop Winter off. Then, Winter would run into his bedroom to greet him and announce their arrival before running back to the kitchen to hit the button. A mug’s worth of coffee would usually be ready by the time he made it out.

  Everyone was a winner.

  Normally.

  His little granddaughter seemed to be a morning person. Probably taking after her shitty father, no doubt. At least everything else about her seemed to be more Deacon and Del, including her looks. She had their brown eyes and brown hair.

  Well, his hair had been brown, before it started falling out and turning grey, which was why he now shaved his head, something else Winter loved to help him with.

  Del dropped Winter’s things on the couch and hurried over to hug him and kiss him good morning. “Sorry, Dad,” she said again.

  He caught her arm, waiting until she stopped and actually focused on him. “It’s okay, honey. I’ll never say no to her. I’m glad I can do this for you.”

  “Did you poke yerself yet, PopPop?” Winter asked.

 
Del tiredly smiled as she glanced down at her. “That’s good, honey. Make sure you remind PopPop to check his blood sugar.”

  “For crying out loud, I got this, honey. They put me on that new medicine. It’s leveled my blood sugar out.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m still going to worry.” She pecked his cheek once more. “I’ll text you at lunch to check in.”

  “Heck, we might be on the open road, taking the Harley out for a spin,” he said, dropping Winter a playful wink that made her giggle. “Then we’re thinking about going and betting on the greyhounds this afternoon.”

  Del laughed and poked him in the stomach, making him laugh. “At least she’ll be able to take care of herself by the time she’s in school.”

  “Hopefully I’ll have taught her how to carve a shank out of a number two pencil by kindergarten.”

  Del stuck her tongue out at him, then turned to go. “Hopefully I’ll be here by seven,” she said. “Depends on how short-handed we are today. Stomach bug going ’round, through staff and patients.”

  “Ick. Okay, seriously, honey, why don’t you let me keep her for a couple of days? I’ll run by your place this afternoon and grab clothes for her. Last time, we almost had to put her in the hospital when she got it.” Poor Winter had been borderline dehydrated until they’d gotten her symptoms under control.

  She paused. “You sure? I was kind of worried about that.”

  “Honey, it’s okay.” He looked down at Winter. “You want to spend a few days with PopPop?”

  She jumped up and down. “Yay!”

  “See? Problem solved. And Mommy can have a few days to herself, like a mini-vacation.”

  It looked like a weight lifted off his daughter’s shoulders. She returned and hugged him, hard. “Thanks, Dad. I love you.”

  “Love you, too, sweetheart. Go on, we’ve got this.”

  Once she’d left, he walked over to where he kept his blood sugar meter and checked his blood. He was within acceptable ranges. His diabetes wasn’t severe. It’d finally shown up a little over a year earlier, and it wasn’t like he was obese or anything.