Chapter 7: The Nude Butler of Berlin
Adrien's car was black. Not the kind of black that came from a factory, but the kind that swallowed light whole—matte and bottomless, like a hole cut into the shape of a Mercedes. Gerard sat in the passenger seat with his hands on his knees and watched Berlin slide past the window.
His wrists were bandaged. His nipples still ached under his shirt. His ass was a dull, persistent throb that had settled into something almost familiar. Twenty-three men. He'd stopped counting after the first three, but Adrien's number felt right. It matched the soreness. It matched the emptiness.
"You slept," Adrien said.
It wasn't a question.
Gerard nodded anyway. "Six hours. Maybe seven."
"Good."
They crossed the Spree. The river was black too, reflecting the city's lights like broken glass. Gerard watched a tourist boat drift past, its windows glowing, its passengers laughing at something he couldn't hear.
"Where are we going?"
"Konrad's. He's an art dealer. Old friend." Adrien changed lanes without signaling. "He's hosting a party tonight."
"And I am—"
"You're serving."
Gerard turned his head. Adrien's profile was sharp against the dashboard lights, his silver hair catching the red glow of a traffic signal.
"Serving what?"
"Whatever they want."
The penthouse was on the fourteenth floor. The elevator ride was silent except for the hum of machinery and the soft chime as they passed each floor. Gerard watched the numbers climb. His reflection stared back at him from the brushed steel doors—a hairy man with a shaved head, a thick beard, and eyes that looked older than twenty-six.
The doors opened.
The foyer was marble. White marble, veined with gray, polished to a mirror shine. A chandelier hung overhead—not crystals, but something darker, something that caught the light and held it. The air smelled like money. Not perfume. Not cologne. Just money.
Konrad was waiting.
He was tall, silver-haired, with the kind of tan that came from yachts and ski slopes. He wore a linen suit and no socks, and when he smiled, his teeth were very white.
"Adrien." He embraced him—one arm, quick, practiced. Then he turned to Gerard. "And this is the famous Gerard."
"Yes."
Konrad looked him up and down. "Big boy."
Gerard said nothing.
"The rules are simple," Konrad said. "You serve. You don't speak unless spoken to. You don't refuse anything. And you don't touch the art."
He gestured at the walls. Gerard hadn't noticed them before—the paintings. Huge canvases, splashed with color, hung in frames that probably cost more than his apartment. Or whatever apartment he'd had before Adrien.
"Understood."
"Good." Konrad clapped his hands together. "Adrien, you owe me for this."
"I know."
"You always know."
Adrien turned to Gerard. His expression hadn't changed since they'd left the cabin. "Strip."
Gerard didn't hesitate. He pulled his shirt over his head and folded it. Then his pants. Then his underwear. He stacked them neatly—a small pile of fabric on the marble floor—and stood naked in the foyer, his body a map of everything that had happened.
Konrad's eyes lingered on the bruises. The welts. The raw, swollen nipples.
"Christ," he said. "What did you do to him?"
"Nothing he didn't agree to."
"Still."
Adrien ignored him. He reached into a cabinet and produced a silver tray. It was polished to a mirror shine, and when he handed it to Gerard, the metal was cold against his palms.
"You're a nude server tonight," Adrien said. "If anyone asks you to do anything, you comply immediately. No hesitation. No questions."
Gerard nodded once.
"Anything?"
"Anything."
He stepped into the living room.
The party was already loud. Music—something electronic, something with a heartbeat—pulsed through speakers hidden somewhere in the walls. Guests clustered in groups, laughing, drinking, pretending not to notice the naked man with the tray.
Gerard moved through them.
He held the tray steady. Champagne flutes, filled to the brim, catching the light. He offered them to anyone who glanced his way.
Some people stared. A woman in a red dress looked at his cock and then at his face and then back at his cock. She didn't say anything. Just took a glass and turned away.
A man in a suit grabbed his ass as he passed. Squeezed hard, fingers digging in. Gerard kept walking.
Another man—older, gray beard, smelling of cigars—flicked his nipple. The pain flared, sharp and immediate, and Gerard's step faltered. But he didn't stop. He didn't spill a drop.
"Good boy," the man said.
Gerard kept moving.
The champagne ran out. He went back to the kitchen, refilled the tray, returned. The music changed—something slower now, something with words he didn't understand. The lights dimmed. The laughter got louder.
A woman stopped him.
She was young. Blonde. Pretty in a way that felt practiced. She held a phone to her ear and looked at Gerard like he was a piece of furniture.
"Kneel," she said.
He knelt.
"Hold this."
She handed him her purse. Black leather, gold clasp, heavy. He held it with both hands, the tray balanced on his knees, and waited.
The phone call lasted six minutes. She talked about someone named Marcus and a gallery opening and something that had happened in Paris. She laughed twice. She didn't look at Gerard once.
When she hung up, she took her purse and waved her hand.
"Go."
He stood. He kept serving.
A man in a velvet jacket asked him to bend over. Gerard bent over. The man ran a finger down his crack, pressing just enough to feel the rim.
"Still loose," he said. "Someone's been busy."
Gerard said nothing.
"You like it?"
"Yes."
"Say it."
"I like it."
The man laughed and walked away.
More champagne. More hands. A woman asked him to open his mouth, and when he did, she dropped an ice cube onto his tongue. It melted slowly, and he stood there, mouth open, while she watched.
"Swallow."
He swallowed.
Another man—drunk, loud, with a British accent—ordered him to fetch ice from the kitchen. Not with his hands. With his mouth. Gerard went to the kitchen and knelt by the ice bucket and filled his mouth until his cheeks bulged. Then he walked back through the party, ice water dripping down his chin, and dropped the cubes into the man's glass one by one.
The man clapped.
"Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant."
Gerard wiped his chin with the back of his hand. Then he picked up his tray and kept moving.
By midnight, he'd served forty guests.
He knew the number because Konrad had been keeping track. There was a whiteboard in the kitchen, and every time Gerard went back for refills, Konrad added a tally mark.
Forty.
He didn't know what the number meant. He didn't ask.
The party started to thin out. Guests left in pairs and trios, laughing, calling cabs, promising to call each other tomorrow. The music softened. The lights came up.
Gerard stood by the window. The city sprawled below him, a grid of light and shadow. The Spree was a black ribbon, cutting through it all.
His legs ached. His arms ached. His jaw ached from holding ice and champagne and, once, a woman's shoe while she adjusted her strap.
He was still holding the tray.
Adrien appeared beside him. He didn't look tired. He didn't look anything. Just Adrien, silver-haired and smooth, holding a glass of whiskey he hadn't touched.
"Forty," he said.
Gerard nodded.
"You didn't hesitate."
"No."
"You didn't refuse anything."
"No."
Adrien took a sip of his whiskey. "Konrad's impressed."
Gerard said nothing.
"He wants to keep you."
Gerard turned his head. Adrien's expression was unreadable.
"What did you tell him?"
"That you're not his to keep."
The words hung in the air. Gerard felt something shift in his chest—something small, something he didn't have a name for.
"Come," Adrien said. "We're leaving."
He walked toward the foyer. Gerard followed.
His clothes were still folded on the marble floor. He looked at them—the jeans, the shirt, the underwear—and then at Adrien, who was already at the elevator.
"Leave them," Adrien said.
Gerard left them.
The elevator doors closed. The city dropped away. And Gerard stood naked in the mirrored box, his tray still in his hands, and watched his reflection break apart into a thousand pieces.
The car was cold.
Gerard sat in the passenger seat with his hands on his knees. His skin was covered in goosebumps, and the leather was slick against his thighs. Adrien didn't turn on the heat.
"That was forty," Adrien said.
"Yes."
"You exceeded the task."
"I did not know there was a number."
"There wasn't." Adrien pulled onto the highway. "But forty is good."
Gerard stared at the dashboard. The speedometer climbed. The city lights blurred past.
"What happens now?"
The highway stretched ahead, dark and empty, and Gerard watched the reflectors flash past like a string of dull stars.
"What happens now?"
Adrien didn't answer immediately. He drove with one hand on the wheel, the other resting on the gear shift, and his eyes stayed fixed on the road.
"We sleep," he said finally. "Then we drive."
"Where?"
"South. There's a place I want to show you."
Gerard waited for more. Adrien didn't offer it.
The motel was the kind of place that rented by the hour but didn't ask questions. Adrien paid cash and got a room on the ground floor, and Gerard followed him inside with the wool blanket wrapped around his shoulders like a cape.
The room smelled like bleach and old cigarettes. The bed was too soft. The carpet was the color of dried blood.
Gerard didn't care.
He slept for twelve hours.
When he woke, Adrien was already dressed. Jeans, boots, a gray henley that made his silver hair look brighter. He was sitting at the small table by the window, scrolling through his phone.
"Eat," he said, without looking up.
There was a paper bag on the nightstand. Gerard opened it. A breakfast sandwich, cold but edible. A bottle of orange juice. A banana.
He ate standing up, the blanket still around his shoulders, and watched Adrien scroll.
"We leave in twenty minutes," Adrien said.
"Where are my clothes?"
"You don't need them."
Gerard finished the sandwich. He didn't argue.
The drive took four hours.
The city fell away first. Then the suburbs. Then the farms, the fields, the long stretches of nothing that made up the space between places. The road narrowed. The trees got thicker. The sky got bigger.
Gerard sat in the passenger seat with the blanket around his waist and watched the world change.
Adrien didn't speak. He played music—something classical, something with strings that rose and fell like breathing. Gerard didn't recognize it. He didn't ask.
They stopped once for gas. Adrien went inside and came back with two bottles of water and a bag of jerky.
"You want anything else?"
"No."
They kept driving.
The campsite appeared out of nowhere.
One moment there was forest. The next, a gravel road, a wooden sign, a clearing full of tents and RVs and the smell of woodsmoke. Families. Couples. Kids on bikes. A campground in the middle of nowhere, full of people pretending they were roughing it.
Adrien parked at the far end. The spot was isolated, tucked against a wall of pines, far enough from the other campers that voices were just murmurs.
"Get out," Adrien said.
Gerard got out. The blanket slipped from his shoulders and fell to the gravel. He didn't pick it up.
The air was cold. Clean. It smelled like pine and dirt and something green. Gerard filled his lungs with it and felt something loosen in his chest.
Adrien opened the trunk. Inside were supplies—a tent, a cooler, folding chairs, a camp stove. He handed Gerard the tent.
"Set it up."
Gerard had never set up a tent in his life. He stared at the bag, then at Adrien, then back at the bag.
"How?"
Adrien's expression didn't change. "Watch."
He did it himself. Pulled the poles from the bag. Snapped them together. Fed them through the sleeves. The tent rose from the ground like a thing being born, and when it was done, Adrien zipped the door open and stepped back.
"Now you know."
Gerard nodded.
They set up the rest together. The chairs. The stove. The cooler, filled with ice and beer and sandwiches wrapped in foil. A lantern, hung from a branch. By the time they finished, the sun was low and orange, and the shadows were long and soft.
Gerard was still naked.
He'd been naked for hours now—through the drive, through the gas station, through the walk from the car to the campsite. He'd felt eyes on him. Campers staring. A woman on a bike had nearly crashed. A kid had pointed and asked his mother a question that got shushed.
Gerard had kept walking.
Now he stood by the tent and watched Adrien open a beer and settle into a folding chair. The fire was crackling. The air was cooling. The pines whispered.
"Go get batteries," Adrien said.
Gerard blinked. "What?"
"The lantern needs batteries. I forgot to pack them. Go ask the neighbors."
Gerard looked down at himself. At his bare chest. His bare legs. His bare everything.
"You want me to—"
"I want you to ask the neighbors if they have spare batteries." Adrien took a sip of beer. "There's a group three spots down. They look friendly."
Gerard didn't move.
"Something wrong?"
"No."
"Then go."
Gerard went.
The gravel was cold under his feet. He walked past the empty spots and the occupied ones, past a tent shaped like a teepee, past a couple arguing over a map, past a dog that barked twice and then lost interest.
Both hands. He kept them at his sides. He didn't cover himself. He didn't hurry.
The group three spots down was sitting around a fire. Four of them—two men, two women—passing a bottle of wine and laughing at something on a phone. They were maybe thirty. They looked like they did this every summer.
Gerard stopped at the edge of their site.
"Excuse me."
The laughing stopped. Four heads turned. Four pairs of eyes went wide.
The man closest to him—beard, glasses, a sweater despite the fire—opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
"Are you... okay?"
"Yes. I am fine." Gerard's accent was thicker than usual. The cold made his jaw tight. "I am looking for batteries. For a lantern. Do you have any?"
The woman next to the man—dark hair, silver earrings—let out a sound that was half laugh, half gasp.
"You're naked."
"Yes."
"Why are you—"
"It is a bet." Gerard said it flatly. Without shame. Without apology. "Do you have batteries?"
The four of them exchanged looks. The kind of looks people gave each other when they weren't sure if they were being filmed.
"Uh," the bearded man said. "I think we have some double-As. In the RV."
"May I have them?"
"Sure. Yeah. Hold on."
He got up and walked to a Winnebago parked behind the tent. The other three stared at Gerard. The dark-haired woman was blushing. The other man—younger, shaved head, a cautious smile—looked like he wanted to ask a question but didn't know how.
"So," the cautious one said. "A bet, huh?"
"Yes."
"What's the bet?"
Gerard didn't answer.
The bearded man came back with a small package of batteries. Double-A. Duracell. He held them out.
"Here."
Gerard took them. His fingers brushed the man's fingers, and the man flinched.
"Thank you."
"No problem." The bearded man hesitated. "Do you need... anything else? A blanket? You look cold."
"I am fine. Thank you."
Gerard turned and walked back.
He didn't look at the other campsites. He didn't look at the family by the RV or the couple by the teepee or the dog that had barked at him before. He walked through the gathering dark, naked and steady, and the batteries were cold in his hand.
Adrien was still in his chair. Still drinking his beer. He watched Gerard approach, and there was something in his expression—something that might have been approval, or might have been nothing at all.
He held out his hand.
Gerard gave him the batteries. Adrien opened the package and fed them into the lantern. The light came on—a soft, yellow glow that pushed back the shadows.
"Eat," Adrien said, gesturing at the cooler.
Gerard knelt by the cooler and opened it. He took out a sandwich wrapped in foil and unwrapped it. Turkey and cheese. The bread was slightly squashed.
He ate it sitting on the ground, his back against a log, the bare soles of his feet turned toward the fire.
Adrien didn't speak. He just watched the flames and drank his beer and let the night settle around them.
The fire burned down to embers.
Gerard finished his sandwich and licked the grease from his fingers. His body had stopped shivering an hour ago. The blanket was still in the gravel where he'd dropped it, and he didn't ask for it back.
Adrien crushed his empty beer can and stood.
"Inside."
The tent was smaller than it had looked from outside. A dome of nylon and mesh, barely tall enough for Gerard to kneel upright. Adrien had laid out two sleeping bags, side by side, and a single pillow between them.
"You sleep on the left," Adrien said.
Gerard crawled in. The nylon was cold against his skin, and the zipper sounded loud in the quiet. He lay on his back and stared at the ceiling, where the mesh panel showed a square of stars.
Adrien climbed in after him. He zipped the tent closed and settled onto the right sleeping bag, still dressed, his boots off but everything else on.
"You're not going to—"
"Sleep," Adrien said.
Gerard closed his mouth. He turned on his side, facing away, and pulled the sleeping bag up to his chin.
The sleeping bag smelled like cedar and dust. It was warm, or it would be warm, once his body heat filled it. He lay there and listened to Adrien breathe and watched the stars through the mesh and waited for sleep.
It came slower than it had at the motel. His mind was still turning over the drive, the campground, the four strangers who'd stared at him like he was something from another planet.
The batteries.
He almost laughed. Almost.
Instead, he closed his eyes and let the dark take him.
Gerard woke to cold air and an empty tent.
The zipper was open. Sunlight poured through the gap, pale and thin. He crawled out and found Adrien crouched by the fire pit, coaxing flames from a pile of kindling.
"Eat," Adrien said, without looking up.
There was a protein bar on the cooler. Gerard ate it standing, watching Adrien work. The fire caught, crackled, grew. Adrien added larger pieces of wood and then stood, brushing ash from his knees.
"We're hiking today."
Gerard nodded.
"Put on your boots."
Gerard looked down. There were no boots. He hadn't had boots since—he couldn't remember. The oak tree. The platform. The penthouse. All of it barefoot, or nearly.
"I don't have boots."
Adrien pointed at the trunk of the car. "Back seat."
There was a pair of boots. Hiking boots, brown leather, worn. They fit. There was also a pair of socks, thick and wool, and Gerard pulled them on and laced the boots and stood.
He was still naked. The boots went up to his ankles and no further.
"That's it?"
"That's it."
Adrien shouldered a backpack and started walking. Gerard followed.
The trail cut through the pines and then climbed. The ground was soft with needles, and the boots gripped the dirt, and Gerard found a rhythm—step, step, breathe—that let him stop thinking about everything except the next rise.
They walked for an hour.
The forest changed as they climbed. The pines thinned. The undergrowth thickened, ferns and brambles and things with thorns. The air got colder. The sun stayed behind the trees, a pale disc that never quite broke through.
Adrien stopped at the top of a ridge.
Gerard stopped beside him. Below, the valley spread out—a patchwork of green and brown and silver where a river cut through. It was beautiful. It was the kind of view that made people take pictures.
Gerard didn't have a camera.
"This way," Adrien said.
He turned off the trail. Gerard followed.
The clearing was hidden. Tucked behind a wall of rock, invisible from the trail, invisible from the valley. The only way in was the way they'd come, and the way they'd come was narrow and winding and easy to miss.
Gerard stepped into the clearing and stopped.
Two trees. Thick oaks, old and gnarled, standing about six feet apart. Their branches intertwined overhead, forming a canopy that filtered the light into green and gold.
Between them, on the ground, a cup.
Adrien walked to the trees and turned. His face was calm. Businesslike.
"Spread eagle," he said.
Gerard's stomach dropped. He looked at the trees, the cup, the empty space between them.
"You want me to—"
"Arms to the branches. Legs to the trunks." Adrien pulled rope from his backpack. "You know the position."
Gerard knew the position.
He walked to the trees. He stood between them, facing the cup, and lifted his arms. Adrien tied his left wrist first—loop, knot, tighten—and then his right. The branches were low enough that his arms were stretched but not suspended. He could stand. He could breathe.
Then his ankles. Adrien knelt and wrapped the rope around each ankle and tied them to the trunks. Gerard's legs spread wide, wide enough that his knees had to bend, wide enough that his ass was exposed to the empty air.
He was spread eagle between two trees.
Adrien stood. He picked up the cup—a small tin cup, dented, maybe four inches tall—and set it on the ground directly beneath Gerard's cock.
"Your task," Adrien said, "is to fill the cup."
Gerard looked down. The cup was small. The distance between his cock and the rim was maybe a foot.
"With what?"
"Precum."
Gerard blinked. "You want me to—"
"Fill the cup with precum. To the brim." Adrien stepped back. "You can ask for help. If you do, your next task increases in length. Double."
Gerard stared at the cup. At his own cock, soft and unconcerned, hanging above it.
"That is not possible."
"It's possible." Adrien leaned against a tree. "You just have to want it badly enough."
"How long do I have?"
"Until sunset."
Gerard looked up. The canopy was thick. He couldn't see the sun.
"That could be hours."
"Yes."
Gerard took a breath. He looked down at his cock. Soft. Useless. Hanging there like it had no idea what was being asked of it.
"How do I—"
"That's your problem."
Adrien pulled out his phone. He sat on a rock at the edge of the clearing and started scrolling. The message was clear. He wasn't going to help. He wasn't even going to watch.
Gerard was alone.
He looked down at himself. At his hands, tied to the branches. At his legs, tied to the trunks. At the cup, patient and empty.
He started to move.
His hips rotated. Slow circles, grinding the air. His cock swung, heavy, brushing against nothing. He closed his eyes and tried to think of something—anything—that would make this work.
The platform. The men. The hands. The mouths.
His cock stirred. Not much. Just a twitch. But it was something.
He kept moving. Slow, steady circles. His thighs burned from the position, spread wide and bent, and his shoulders ached from the stretch. But he didn't stop.
Time passed.
A bead of precum formed at the tip of his cock. Clear, small, trembling in the cold air. Gerard watched it, willing it to fall.
It didn't fall.
He moved faster. Circles became thrusts, his hips pumping the air, his cock bouncing. The bead grew. Another joined it. Together they hung at the tip, a single drop that refused to let go.
"Come on," Gerard muttered.
The drop fell.
It missed the cup. Hit the ground an inch to the left.
Gerard closed his eyes.
He kept going. Thrusting. Grinding. Thinking of the platform, the men, the way they'd touched him, the way they'd used him. His cock hardened. Not fully, but enough. Enough that more precum formed, enough that drops began to fall.
Some hit the cup. Most didn't.
An hour passed.
The cup was still empty. The bottom was damp, maybe. A film of moisture that might have been precum or might have been sweat dripping down his body.
Gerard's legs were shaking. His hips ached. His arms had gone numb, and his shoulders felt like they'd been pulled from their sockets.
He couldn't stop. If he stopped, nothing happened. Nothing fell. The cup stayed empty.
He kept moving.
Another hour.
His cock was raw. Not from friction—he wasn't touching himself—but from the constant motion. Every thrust sent a small shock through his body, and his balls had drawn up tight, and he was starting to feel the ache that came before release.
But release wasn't the goal. Precum was the goal. He couldn't come. If he came, he'd fill the cup with the wrong thing, and Adrien would know, and the task would be failed.
He couldn't fail.
The cup had a quarter inch of liquid. Maybe. It was hard to tell from this angle. Hard to see past his own cock, still moving, still dripping, still trying.
He was so tired.
Footsteps. Gerard opened his eyes. Adrien was standing in front of him.
"How's it going?"
Gerard didn't answer. He couldn't. His mouth was dry, and his throat was raw, and his hips kept moving because stopping felt like defeat.
Adrien looked down at the cup. "That's not much."
"I know."
"You've been at this for two hours."
"I know."
"You're not going to make it."
Gerard's jaw tightened. "I will."
Adrien crouched. He was close now—close enough that Gerard could smell him, soap and cedar and something warm. Close enough that his presence was a physical thing, a weight in the air.
"You could ask for help."
Gerard's hips stuttered. Stopped.
"I could."
"One word. That's all it takes." Adrien's voice was soft. Almost kind. "I could touch you. Make it easier. You'd fill that cup in ten minutes."
Gerard looked down. The cup. The tiny film of precum at the bottom. His cock, still hard, still dripping, still not enough.
"What would happen?"
"Next task doubles in length."
"That is all?"
"That is all."
Gerard closed his eyes. His body was screaming. His legs were shaking so badly he could barely stand. His arms had gone past numb into something worse. And the cup was still empty.
"No."
Adrien was silent.
"I will do it myself."
"Stubborn."
"Yes."
Adrien stood. He walked back to his rock. He sat and pulled out his phone and started scrolling again.
Gerard kept moving.
The sun moved overhead. He couldn't see it, but he could feel it—the light shifting, the shadows changing, the cold creeping in as the afternoon wore on.
His second wind never came. He got weaker. Slower. His thrusts became shallow, his circles small. The precum kept dripping, but most of it missed the cup, and the cup stayed stubbornly empty.
He thought about the platform. The men. The gratitude. He thought about the oak tree. The clamps. The cold. He thought about Adrien's hands on him, washing him, feeding him, wrapping him in wool.
His cock twitched. More precum. A drop fell. Hit the rim of the cup and rolled down the side.
Gerard screamed.
Not loud. Not dramatic. Just a short, sharp sound of frustration that echoed off the rock wall and faded into the trees.
Adrien didn't look up.
Gerard kept moving.
The sun set.
The light faded. The clearing got dark. Adrien pocketed his phone and stood and walked to the trees.
He looked at the cup.
Then he looked at Gerard.
Gerard had stopped moving. His body hung between the ropes, limp and exhausted. His cock was soft now, spent, still wet with his own precum.
The cup was empty. Still empty. A thin ring of dried liquid at the very bottom, not enough to cover the metal.
Adrien crouched. He picked up the cup and tilted it toward the fading light.
"Not enough," he said.
Gerard didn't answer. He didn't have words.
Adrien set the cup down. He reached up and untied Gerard's wrists, one at a time, and Gerard's arms dropped to his sides. Then his ankles. Then Gerard was free.
He collapsed.
The ground was cold. Wet. His body hit and stayed there, face down in the dirt, and he didn't try to get up.
Adrien stood over him.
"You failed," he said.
Gerard's fingers curled into the dirt. He didn't lift his head.
"Yes."
"The next task increases in length. Double."
"Yes."
"You understand what that means?"
Gerard lifted his head. Just enough to look at Adrien's boots, at the dirt between them, at the dead leaves scattered across the ground.
"It means the next task will be harder."
"It means the next task will be twice as long as whatever I decide." Adrien's voice was flat. "And I haven't decided yet."
Gerard pressed his forehead into the dirt.
"I am sorry."
"For what?"
"For failing."
Adrien was quiet. Then he crouched down, close, and his voice was softer when he spoke.
"You could have asked for help."
"I know."
"You chose not to."
"I know."
"Why?"
Gerard lifted his head. His eyes were red-rimmed, his beard full of dirt, his lips cracked and bleeding. He looked up at Adrien and didn't blink.
"Because a bet is a bet."
Adrien stared at him. For a long moment, neither of them spoke. The trees whispered overhead. The cup lay on its side in the dirt.
Then Adrien stood.
"Get up," he said. "We have a long walk back."
Gerard pushed himself to his knees. To his feet. His legs shook, and his hips ached, and his cock was raw and red. But he stood.
Adrien handed him the cup.
"Bring it," he said.
Gerard took the cup. It was cold in his hand. Empty.
He followed Adrien into the trees.