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That Armin would be the best man in Eren and Mikasa’s wedding was a no brainer. The three of them had been inseparable since they were little kids, best friends from kindergarten all the way to college, platonic soulmates their whole lives. And when it turned out two thirds of their trio were not-so-platonic soulmates after all… Well, who else was there that knew both the bride and groom so intimately that would do half so good a job as Armin? No one.
Yet, now, as Jean and Connie were shoving him towards the bar of the dimly lit strip club Eren had chosen to celebrate the end of his bachelor life, urging him to arrange a VIP dance for his best friend—which they would all collectively pay for—Armin vehemently wished he had refused the duty.
“Why does it have to be me?” he whined in a manner unbecoming of a man in his mid-twenties.
Jean placed a solemn hand on his bicep. “Armin, you already asked us to find the venue for the party. Now it’s your turn to pull your weight.”
He was right of course. The moment Armin had learnt what Eren wanted for his last night as a ‘free’ man, he quickly assigned the job to Jean and Connie, who he had assumed were more experienced with this type of thing—or at the very least bold enough to ask around, unlike his shy self.
It wasn’t like he was shirking his responsibilities. No, it had been a strategic choice on his part. Armin excelled at many things: he would never forget the rings, he could be the perfect soldier when it came to attending rehearsals, he could ensure Eren didn’t show up at the ceremony wearing a hoodie, and he was confident his best man’s speech would move people to tears. But choosing a strip club? Yeah, not his area of expertise.
Connie massaged his shoulders encouragingly. “Yeah, man. Besides, you’re his best friend, you know what he likes.”
Did he though? In all their years of friendship, Eren hadn’t expressed any romantic or sexual interest in anyone. That was until college, when he had started dating Mikasa. Armin had honestly believed him to be asexual up until then, and even to this day he still hadn’t ruled out the possibility of Eren being at least demi.
With a final push from his friends which caused him to stumble forward a few steps, Armin decided to bite the bullet. He took a minute to right himself before approaching the lone barmaid, who had been watching the entire exchange and finding it extremely entertaining, judging by the sardonic slant of her mouth.
“Um, hi,” he opened awkwardly.
The barmaid smirked at him, not even pausing from where she had been wiping the polished counter. “Hi, cutie.”
A furious blush broke out on his face. “Right. Uh… so I would like to book a private dance for my friend—” he gestured over his shoulder at their table— “could you tell me to whom I need to speak to?”
“That would be Reiner. He’s the buff guy over there.” She pointed to a bulky, blond man, who was standing in a corner with his thick arms crossed menacingly over his chest.
Armin gulped and turned back to the barmaid. She was also built and half a head taller than him, but she had a friendly, kind of rakish, demeanor that set him at ease.
“Do you have any suggestions on who I should request? The others assumed I know his taste in women, but honestly I have no idea.”
Her already amused expression morphed into a full out grin. She leaned over the bar, resting an elbow on the wooden surface. “All right, I’ll help. Who’s getting married?”
Armin hadn’t mentioned anything about a wedding, but he supposed bachelor parties had to be a common occurrence in this kind of establishment.
“The one in the middle with the ponytail.”
She studied Eren with narrowed eyes. “Hmm, he looks like an average bloke.”
“He is. In every way imaginable,” confirmed Armin.
“All right. Well, you can never go wrong with Krista.” She directed his gaze to an extremely pretty girl, who was currently in the middle of writhing atop a middle-aged man. “But she’s the most popular among the dancers, so there’s a good chance she’ll be fully booked for the night. Also, she’s expensive.”
Armin nodded. They would pool their resources to pay for the dance, but that didn’t mean they should go overboard if they had another option. “Who else?”
The barmaid scratched her chin thoughtfully. “Hitch is a fun time, from what I’m hearing. And if you want someone versatile, you should go with Pieck.”
His eyebrows drew together, a little confused. “Versatile?”
“You know—” she winked— “she can play the kitten, she can play the tigress.”
Embarrassment flooded through him. He shouldn’t have asked—his curious nature be damned. Armin knew the limits of his comfort zone and speaking plainly about sex wasn’t in it. Oh, he wasn’t a prude. He’d had multiple partners in the past—in the strictest sense of the word, meaning more than one—but his reserved nature never allowed him to be entirely comfortable talking about matters that were considered taboo. His association with Eren growing up, who, as mentioned, had never voiced typical teen boy sentiments, and Mikasa, who—though more confident in her desires—had never been open with him due to their different genders, hadn’t helped him dispel the last remnants of his uptightness.
Armin was about to thank the helpful barmaid and leave, when the lights of the stage dimmed. A slow, seductive beat started to play. In the darkness, the music sounded more melodious, more dramatic, more intimate. He could swear his heartbeat followed along with the rhythm.
A spotlight shined from above, illuminating a pale, scantily clad figure. The figure—no, the woman—was already draped sensually around the pole, the cold rigid metal accentuating the shapely lines of her body. She swayed on beat, circling around the stage like a predator ready to strike, commanding the audience’s attention. Then, just as the beat dropped, she fell to her knees, contorting her back beyond human capabilities as she shed the thin outer layer of her outfit, revealing nothing but a flimsy thong and tempting flesh beneath. The woman twisted backwards with an impressive, mid-air split, and at the next moment she was back on her heel-bearing feet. Her gaze swept over the audience, but her eyes were unseeing, like she was dancing in her home alone instead of in a room full of strangers. She did a few warm up holds on the pole—that looked by no means anything less than magnetic—and then threw herself at it, climbing higher than Armin had seen any other dancer do that night despite her short stature. Her body was upside down as she shifted into yet another impossible split and drifted leisurely towards the ground.
By the time she reached the bottom, Armin was in love.
“What— What about her?” he enquired, sounding a little breathless even to his own ears.
The barmaid eyed him doubtfully. “Annie?”
“If that’s her name, then yes.”
She hummed. “I don’t know. She’s great at the pole, don’t get me wrong, our best dancer I’d say. But I’ve heard she’s rather frigid in private sessions.”
Armin couldn’t imagine how the sylph before him could ever be characterized as frigid. She was sublime, a vision to behold, her graceful movements could lure men to certain doom and they would trail behind her blindly, entranced by her ethereal beauty as she—
“Listen, kid,” the barmaid thankfully interrupted his waxing lyrical.
“I’m twenty-four,” he corrected automatically. Too many years of being carded at bars had trained him to reflexively defend his adult status when it was brought into question.
She didn’t pay him any mind. “Listen, mate. You’re clearly more into her yourself. Maybe send someone else to bounce on your friend’s lap.”
The barmaid was crass, but she was also right. Armin thanked her, left a note in the tip jar that was sitting next to the register and went to find that Reiner bloke.
In the end, he asked for Pieck, since he had no clue whether Eren was kitten-inclined or tigress-inclined, paid for her services and returned to his friends. When a young woman with long black hair and dark, bedroom eyes appeared at the table asking who was the lucky boy, Armin was certain he had made the correct choice.
Eren’s jaw slackened comically. He muttered the usual ah-you-shouldn’t-haves of a man receiving a present and followed obediently after Pieck, eyes already fixed on her languorously swaying hips.
“What the fuck?” exclaimed Jean, when they were gone. “Why were you whinging earlier? That chick was so hot I wish I was the one getting married.”
Marco draped a lazy arm over his bigmouth boyfriend’s shoulders. “You know, that can be arranged, if you really want to.”
Jean leaned further into his embrace and smiled smugly. “Oh, har har, what would you do if I said yes and then we had to explain to our grandchildren that we got engaged at a strip club?”
“First marriage, then grandchildren… you’re moving fast, Kirstein.”
Connie started singing. “Jean and Marco sitting on a tree K-I-S-S-I-”
Jean jumped on him before he had a chance to finish his chant.
“Guys, please,” said Armin. “Let’s at least try not to get thrown out.”
It was no use. Once they got started there was no stopping them. Armin threw a glance at Marco. He had pulled his phone out and he was playing Tetris. No help from that front then. Armin sighed dejectedly. He supposed his friends wanted to blow off some steam tonight. He couldn’t fault them. It had been a tiring few weeks, what with all the wedding preparations.
He rose. “I’ll get us a new round of drinks,” he announced.
Connie dislodged his wrist from where it had been pinned under Jean’s torso to give him a thumbs up. “Cheers!”
Armin shook his head in exasperation. At least they hadn’t started filling their mouths with water and spitting it onto each other in thin projectile streams like they had done last time they’d all gone out.
He flagged down the freckled barmaid that had come to his aid earlier and ordered a fresh round. As he waited for the drinks to be served, he took a look around. Though he could barely see anything. The air was thick and humid, both from the patrons’ breaths and the overheating fog machine that was operating during the performances. The dancers were moving around the tables using cheap tricks to tempt the patrons into paying for a lap dance; a teasing smile here, a lingering caress there. Armin noticed the petite blonde the barmaid had pointed to him earlier. She was working again, this time for a tall woman in a three piece suit who seemed keen on stuffing her underwear with bills. Judging by the ludicrous amount of money that was currently residing in the woman’s bra, Armin was positive he had acted on everyone’s best interests. What he and his friend’s had paid for Eren’s gift was pennies in comparison.
Finally, his eyes fell on the small figure sitting a few stools away from him, scrolling on her phone. She had a different outfit on—no less revealing than her previous one—and her hair was slightly damp as if she had taken a shower, but it was undeniably her. The sylph.
Without even realizing what he was doing, Armin stood from his seat and sidled up to her.
“Hi!” he said, a doubtlessly dumb-looking grin stretching his lips.
The sylph—Annie, he remembered—threw a quick, annoyed glance his way and ignored him. Armin found himself at a loss for words. The cold—but slender and delicate—shoulder she was giving him was a clear sign that his presence was unwelcome. On the other hand, Armin had no intention of bothering her, only to express his admiration of her skill. He knew most artists appreciated being complimented on their work, he doubted strippers were any different. It was probably a thankless job in regards to being recognized for your talents, no matter how awe-inspiring those might be.
He decided to power through. “Um, I saw you on the stage. Your performance was breathtaking!”
That earned him a tiny curl of her lip. For some reason, the more she refused to speak the more he wanted to blabber on.
“Really! It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen! Not that… I’ve seen many performances of the kind— this is the first time I come to this sort of place actually. It’s my best friend’s bachelor party,” he explained. “But you’re definitely the most impressive dancer in here.”
The sylph—it felt invasive to use her name when she hadn’t offered it to him willingly, even at the privacy of his own mind—brought a glass of clear liquid to her mouth and took a few large slow gulps. Armin hoped it was water otherwise she’d be nursing a nasty hangover tomorrow.
She lowered the glass back on the counter. “If you want a private dance, you should talk to the floor manager. Tell him it’s for Annie,” she informed him casually.
Armin turned beet red. “N—No, that’s not it at all! I just wanted to congratulate you.”
Annie eyed him for a moment, then shrugged and turned back to her phone screen.
Armin felt like a proper tool. This woman was working, he was being disrespectful. “I’m sorry to be a bother. I really am. Um, I just have one question, and feel free to tell me to sod off if you don’t want to answer, but are you a trained dancer? My friend, Mikasa, does ballet and I got the sense that the way you moved was somewhat similar.”
The woman huffed and put her phone down, turning to him properly for the first time that night. Oh, but her eyes were as enchanting as the rest of her—despite the glaring.
She parted her pouty lips and said: “A hundred and fifty for fifteen minutes, two hundred and fifty for half an hour.”
Armin blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I don’t volunteer information to strangers. If you want to keep talking, book a dance. Otherwise you’re wasting my time.”
“Oh, of course, I haven’t introduced myself. I’m Armin.”
A thin, stately eyebrow quirked upwards. “That’s your takeaway? Are you being purposefully obtuse or are you just stupid?”
Her words cut like the sharpest swords. Armin wasn’t trying to be impolite. It was just that he was so out of his depth in this situation—talking to a stripper, hell, talking to a woman in general—he was coming on much stronger than he intended.
He rubbed the tip of his nose, eyes falling to the ground. “No, I’m not doing this on purpose. I just haven’t done this before and I’m nervous. I’m sorry.”
When he looked up again, Annie’s expression had lost some of its frostiness.
“Look,” she told him, “if you book a dance, I will answer your question. How does that sound?”
His heart fluttered in his chest. “Really?”
“Yes. That way we both gain something out of this.”
“That sounds fantastic!” he said eagerly.
“Yeah, well, it is what it is.”
It would cost him a pretty penny, but Armin didn’t worry about it too much. He had inherited some money from his grandfather when he passed away a few years back that had been still sitting untouched in the bank. He wasn’t exactly ecstatic to be spending the funds he had saved for a rainy day, but this wouldn’t ruin him financially.
Armin jumped from his stool. “I’ll go talk to Reiner swiftly.”
An iron-tight grip on his wrist stopped him in his tracks. “Wait a moment. You said earlier that you hadn’t done this before. Are you lying to me?”
“No!” he hurried to deny. “I booked a dance earlier for the groom, that’s how I know the manager’s name. I’m the best man, so I had to do it.”
Annie was still peering at him with suspicion in her gorgeous eyes, but at least her fingers on his wrist relaxed by a fraction.
“Who did you book?” she asked.
Armin got the impression that she would double check his answer with Reiner and maybe even the barmaid. Good, this was a smart policy to have.
He replied honestly: “Pieck.” He gestured in the vague direction of the barmaid. “I was informed of her, uhh, feline capabilities.”
Annie cracked a smile. It was only a smirk and yet it sent Armin’s pulse through the roof.
“All right, I’ll bite. Now, off you go,” she urged and he obeyed.
Reiner was just where Armin had found him last time, brooding in a corner with his arms crossed over his chest. When Armin reached him, he cocked an eyebrow. “Your friend had fun?”
“Um, sure. I mean, I don’t know. I haven’t talked to him.” He wiped his sweating palms on his pants. “I’m here to book another VIP show actually.”
Reiner nodded, all business, and took out an electronic agenda. “Okay. Do you have someone specific in mind?”
His lips stretched into a giddy smile. “Yeah. Annie. For half an hour.”
The man’s finger froze a few millimeters short of the screen. He looked at him skeptically, then back to his notes and tapped the necessary icons decisively. Once he was done, he grinned broadly at Armin. “Okay. It’s her break right now, but she should be available in ten. Cash or credit?”
“Um, credit.” He should probably keep his cash to tip later.
After the payment was settled, Reiner handed him a ticket that he’d have to show to gain access to the private rooms. “Have fun,” he told him, still grinning. His teeth gleamed despite the dim lighting of the club.
“Thanks! I will!”
He heard Reiner mutter something imperceptible. Armin couldn’t make out the words over the music, but he thought it sounded suspiciously like ‘your funeral.’ Odd. It was almost like the entire staff were trying to discourage clients from hiring Annie. No wonder she was frigid during dances if that was the kind of hostile work environment she was dealing with!
Upon returning to the bar, he discovered Annie had shed the thin robe she’d been wearing before and was now perched cross-legged on the stool, clad only in a pink metallic lingerie set. She must have been getting really hot if she preferred her nearly bare bottom touching the seat over keeping her layers on.
“Hey,” called the barmaid. “Don’t you want your drinks?”
The last thing Armin cared about as of this moment was getting the drinks back to his friends’ table.
“Um, keep them,” he muttered carelessly without even sparing her a glance. His brain was still processing Annie’s defined thighs.
“Yes,” hummed the barmaid. “I see you’re very busy.”
Armin didn’t bother answering, making a beeline for Annie.
“I booked the dance,” he said, showing her the ticket.
Annie examined the proffered piece of paper briefly and then flashed him a wicked smile. “Good boy.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed the excess saliva that suddenly pooled in his mouth. Annie got to her feet and gestured for him to follow her. Which he did, like a lost puppy ready to imprint on the first kind stranger who gave it a couple of pets.
They were the same height, he noted as she led him further deeper into the club, though Annie was wearing the same towering heels all her colleagues wore, so she was probably a good head shorter than him. Still, despite her small stature, she was captivating, with an imposing presence that commanded respect. So much so, that when Annie closed the door of the private room behind them, Armin was overwhelmed by the sudden urge to fall to his knees. He sunk into the available loveseat instead. It was low enough for Annie to loom over him, so Armin figured it was just as good as kneeling.
Annie traced the edge of his jaw with her fingernails and tilted his chin up, forcing him to meet her eyes. “So what will it be, pretty boy?”
“I thought the deal was that you’d answer my question.”
A blink. “For real?”
“Uhh, yes?”
She dropped his face like it was burning. Armin wished he had ripped his own tongue off instead of saying whatever he did to make her break the contact.
Annie stepped backwards, a good foot away from him, and started swaying to the music.
It was his turn to blink. “What are you doing?”
Annie dragged her hands seductively over her curves. “There are cameras in here. If someone checks, I want it to look like I’m doing my job.”
“Oh,” he uttered, more than a little distracted by her enticing movements. God, she was majestic. Every rock of her hips, every twist of her torso, even the most minimal curl of her wrist was utterly beguiling. Her dancing seemed simple and effortless, but Armin could tell that this woman had absolute control over her body. This was a level of skill mastered after years of strenuous practice, it was plain to see, and somehow this commitment to her craft made Annie all the more attractive.
“To answer your question—” her voice snapped him out of his revelry— “yes, I’m a trained dancer. I’m surprised you could spot the ballet, though. Haven’t done that since I was a child.”
As she finished talking, she twirled around to showcase her glorious behind, so it took him a moment to respond. “Oh? What kind of dances are you trained in then?”
Annie hummed, drawing closer by a fraction. “After ballet, I did modern for a few years. Then my dance school started teaching aerial and pole. They offered free classes for the long-time students to promote the courses. Turns out,” she said as she placed a knee either side of him and climbed onto his lap, “I really like the view from above.”
Armin was also enjoying the view and had no issues with it being from below, thank you very much. As close as she was, he could smell the flowery scent of her perfume. Annie’s skin had a mesmerizing shine to it, but whether it was from the sweat or some glittery body lotion he didn’t know. He wanted to lick her and find out.
He gathered at his scattered wits. “So what made you quit ballet?”
Annie’s head jerked, her first uncoordinated move of the night. “I don’t remember agreeing to an interrogation,” she snapped. “I said question. Singular. You’ve already got more than that.” She grinded down on him as if to remind him she was still in control.
“Rah— Right.” He had clearly hit a nerve. “I’ll keep quiet then.”
Annie nodded and continued her performance.
One minute passed. Then another and then another. By the time the fourth minute rolled around, Armin was starting to feel like he was wasting his money. Not that watching Annie wasn’t an experience akin to religious rapture, but what was the point of sitting around, getting hornier and hornier without being able to do something about it?
In the end, he broke. “I’m sorry, but isn’t this awkward? It’s totally fine if you don’t want to tell me about yourself but do we have to sit in silence?”
Annie didn’t even pause her dancing. “Some men like to dirty talk.”
His face erupted into flames. “I was thinking more in the lines of me telling you about myself instead.”
She shrugged, “I don’t care either way.”
He sat up a little straighter as he realized he had melted into the loveseat like an overcooked noodle. “All right.” He cleared his throat. “Well, as I said, my name is Armin. I’m twenty-four years old and I’m a doctoral student of Marine Biology in the university of—”
“Are you seriously going to recite your resume?”
He halted his speech. Shoot, he’d messed up already. “I thought you said you didn’t care.”
Annie rolled her eyes dramatically. She reached behind her back and undid the clasp that was holding her bra together. The garment loosened as she slid the straps off her shoulders, dropping it to the floor. Delicate pink nipples entered his vision, barely an inch away from his face. Armin’s mouth dried up. Her breasts were small, but shapely and so soft-looking he wagered they felt like velvet on the tongue. And oh how he wished to place his tongue on them. That would be utmost improper though; this wasn’t by any means part of their deal.
When he managed to drag his eyes back to her face, Annie was smirking at him.
“By all means,” she drawled, “you may continue.”
With an audible gulp, he rose to the challenge, finding the most depressing subject he could think of to distract himself from her naked chest. “I don’t have any family left. It’s just me and my two best friends, Eren and Mikasa. They’re the ones getting married actually, which admittedly is making me quite nervous. What if they forget all about me, you know? I imagine they’ll have their own lives moving on. They’ll probably want to have children as well, and then we’ll definitely drift apart, they’ll be too busy. Sometimes it feels like I’m falling behind in life. Do you ever feel like that?”
He didn’t expect her to answer, but she did. Sure, the nonchalant “sometimes” she muttered wasn’t exactly an opening for a heart-to-heart, but Armin took it as an encouragement to continue.
“Yeah, I feel like that all the time. I’m the only one of my friends who isn’t in a committed relationship. I mean Connie isn’t either, but Connie doesn’t care for this kind of thing. I used to have a girlfriend back in college, but it didn’t work out, and then I used to hook up with this guy from my Bioethics class, but that also didn’t go any further than that.”
“How many friends do you have?”
Her question surprised him. He blinked a few times. “What?”
Annie cupped her breasts, making them more pronounced. He lost the first part of her answer. “…many friends do you have?”
“Um, six. Why do you ask?”
“I’m guessing they're all paired up, right?”
He nodded. “The four of them, yeah. Sasha is dating Niccolo.”
“Then, they’re not really a measure of success now, are they? I mean, you’re all pretty young, you’re just friends with two couples. That’s a ridiculously small sample size. Don’t they teach you statistics in college?”
Huh, he’d never thought of it like that. He smiled slyly. “And are you familiar with statistics, Annie?”
She sniffed indignantly. “I have layers.” His eyes drifted to her breasts. She snorted. “I don’t have layers on, but I do have them.”
His lips stretched into a grin. He’d made her laugh. It was a small thing, but it felt like a triumph. “You’re right I suppose,” he returned to the previous subject. “It still gets pretty lonely though.”
“You really shouldn’t be saying that to a stripper.”
That made him laugh. “No, probably not. But I guess you could infer that from the context of my earlier statements.”
She hummed, flicking her hair over her shoulder. “Probably.” Then she did something utterly surprising; she continued the conversation. “Do you like your work? Studies? Whatever it is.”
“A mix of both really. I mean I am getting paid for my research. Not well, but I am.”
A powerful roll of her hips caused him to lose his line of thinking. It annoyed her. “So?”
His eyes snapped back to her face. “My work, right. It’s all right I suppose.” Just the reminder saddened him. “It’s a shame really. I used to love it. Studying the ocean, all ecosystems honestly, but the marine one has this extra layer of mystery added to it that always intrigued me. Especially the benthic zone. That’s the deepest—”
“I know what benthic means,” she cut him off.
“Right.” This woman proved to be quite the enigma. Armin was enthralled. “As I said, I used to love my field of study, but I guess as soon as something turns into a job it loses some of its charm.”
She smiled at him. A full smile this time. “Cheers to that.”
Emboldened by her positive reaction, Armin decided to push his luck. “What about you?” he said. “Do you enjoy your work?”
Surprisingly, she didn’t go cold on him again. “It’s all right.”
“Hey,” he teased, “don’t throw my own words back at me! You have to say something else.”
She rolled her eyes, unamused. “Whatever. It’s fine. Is that what you want to hear? Cause you won’t be getting any sob stories out of me. I chose this job fully aware of what it entailed.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.” He shook his head. “You seem like a very independent woman. I’m sure you can take care of yourself.”
She shot him a look. “Flattery will get you nowhere.”
Armin giggled at that. “Oh, I know. You certainly weren’t impressed when I complimented you earlier.”
Annie pouted. It was a sight almost as majestic as her naked form. She cocked an eyebrow at him. “You’re getting awfully comfortable,” she remarked and then she grabbed his hand that had been resting on the loveseat’s arm and placed it on her breast.
Armin’s breath stuttered, his pulse raced. His fingers squeezed down automatically, testing the soft flesh’s firmness. It was the most perfect breast he’d ever had the honor of holding. Admittedly, he hadn’t touched that many of them, but still. The lust was getting to his brain so fast it addled his faculties, so when the most idiotic notion on planet Earth occurred to him, he was too preoccupied with Annie’s tits to stop himself from blurting it.
“Can you move your breasts by flexing your pecs?”
Annie eyed him funnily. “You have weird kinks.”
He shook his head with vigor. “No, no, it isn’t a kink,” he said, trying to save whatever remained of his dignity, which wasn’t much, considering he was still clutching Annie’s boob as if it was some precious archeological artifact. “I just got curious. You seem very fit, that’s all.”
She let out a resigned sigh. “Yes, I can do it.”
Armin perked up. “Truly?”
Annie nodded. “You want me to demonstrate?”
Armin bit his lip. It was something he’d only seen in videos; he’d never met a real life woman who could do it. Well, he imagined Mikasa probably could, but he couldn’t just ask his childhood friend and best friend’s fiancée to flex her pecs for him.
“I mean,” he said shyly, “not unless you want to.”
She didn’t answer. Without uttering a word, she leaned back, bore her weight on his knees and started working her chest muscles. Her tits jiggled delightfully. Armin found himself clapping, impressed.
Annie burst out laughing. A beautiful, melodic sequence of notes that Armin wished he could keep hearing for the rest of his life. When she was done, she wheezed, trying to get her breath under control. “This is the most fun I’ve had on a private show, not gonna lie.”
He smiled back. “I’m glad,” he murmured, caressing the outside of her knee with his thumb.
“You almost make me want to do my job.”
His brow furrowed. “But I thought you said you liked it.”
“I said it’s fine.” She shrugged. “Like you said, I used to enjoy pole more before it became my source of income.”
“You don’t enjoy it at all?” he asked, suddenly feeling like a disgusting creeper for taking pleasure in something that made this woman uncomfortable.
Annie pondered on it for a bit. “I enjoy the attention,” she said at last. “When I’m up on the stage, I feel like a goddess. I can do whatever I want and everyone still throws themselves at my feet. But you can’t make a living off of that alone, so I have to do other shit. Like lap dances and private shows. Those I don’t like so much.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Well—” she graced him with a rueful smile— “the clients. They get too handsy.”
A wave of shame crashed into Armin, and he lowered his eyes to the floor.
“Hey,” she told him, lifting his chin with her knuckles. “I didn’t mean you. I put your hand on me myself, remember?”
Still reeling from the embarrassment, Armin nodded gently.
Annie settled more fully into his lap. “Now, let’s see what I can do for you.”
“Wha— Ah!” The moan broke out of him as Annie lowered her body and rocked against his hard dick. Armin almost hadn’t realized how aroused he had gotten until this very moment, when her sinful hips rubbed over his crotch, creating delicious mind-numbing friction.
With a wicked grin, Annie leaned close. “You can touch me if you want,” she crooned into his ear.
Hands trembling with desire, Armin reached out to rest his open palm on her waist. It was so small, accentuated further by the steep flare of her hips. He mewled pitifully as he felt her powerful muscles moving under his fingers, and he dug his nails to her sides instinctively, leaving thin red crescents behind.
She cradled the back of his nape, pushing him down so he could rest his forehead at her collarbone. Her nipples were so close, within biting distance, but Armin knew that taking one in his mouth like he longed to do all night would be crossing a line, so he only gritted his teeth together and buried his face deeper against her clavicle as she grinded against his painfully hard cock.
Her cheek was smashed into his temple. “You can touch me more than that.”
“I— ah, I don’t think that’s proper.”
She drew back to pin him with her glacial gaze. “Proper? Armin, you’re at a strip club.”
“Yeah, but that’s not what we agreed on when I booked this dance, so I think changing the boundaries established earl—” the rest of his sentence was lost in an abrupt inhalation so sharp that had him in a coughing fit as soon as he finished taking it. Annie had sneaked her small hand between their bodies and was stroking him through his pants.
“Do you still think it’s improper?” she said huskily.
He did, because it was, but he also didn’t have the heart to tell her to stop. He didn’t want to tell her to stop. Because if he did, she would remove her devious fingers from where they were wrapped around his length, teasing him with generous pressure, touch muffled by the fabric that felt coarse and unyielding against his tender cock, and frankly he couldn’t think of a worse fate than losing the maddening sensation, leaving him cold and aching and abandoned, so he bit his lip until it was raw and kept his stuffy protesting mouth shut.
Annie cocked an eyebrow. “Nothing to say?” Another languorous rub, another desperate whimper from Armin. “I guess I found your weak spot. Took a while.” She reached lower to caress his scrotum, feather-light and gently, igniting tingling sparks of heat that only served to rile him up further. Her hand traveled upwards again as she traced over the shape of him with lazy curiosity. “You have a nice dick,” she proclaimed. “I bet it’d fill me up just right.”
Fire broke out across Armin’s cheeks. He’d wager it’d feel amazing too, to be sheathed deep inside of her, her wet heat enveloping him, gliding over him, driving him crazy, he’d bet it felt like home. “Thank you,” he stuttered out, both proud and embarrassed by her praise.
Taking courage from the compliment, he reached out to touch her breast again. Just a soft caress with the pads of his fingers over those pesky nipples that had been tormenting him all night. He watched as one rosy bud turned tight and menacing under the attention of his exploring thumb and he toyed with it some more until it glared at him imperiously just like her owner. Annie’s eyes were searing ice, burning with intensity. A guttural groan escaped his chest at a clever twist of her hand.
She bent over him, tipping her head down so their noses touched. From this distance, Armin could almost taste the air that puffed out from her parted lips. “Are you close?” she asked sweetly.
If he wasn’t before, he definitely was now. Now that the idea had been planted in his head, he could think of nothing else than her deft fingers working him to completion, warm come dripping over her delicate knuckles, her annoyed tut of disapproval at him finishing too quickly, the vengeful look in her eyes as she’d bring her palm to his mouth, feeding his own semen back at him.
“Yeah,” he breathed, licking off a drop of sweat that had gathered at his upper lip.
“So soon?” Her voice was laced with mockery and pretend detachment as if she was his lab partner making a disappointing observation over their failed experiment. The coldness of it made him squirm with mortification, but it was also in a weird way liberating. The judgment had been passed and he was deemed unworthy; he couldn’t keep up with her—he never could—he might as well give up.
His eyes widened as he realized too late what that giving up meant, finally recognizing the signs that the building pressure in his loins was threatening to break. He clutched at her waist frantically, trying to warn her. “Annie—” he panted— “we should slow do—ooh!” She silenced him with a final squeeze.
It wasn’t her strokes that pushed him over the edge though, but the soft press of her butterfly lips on his cheek, right on the corner of his mouth. Armin had always found the act of kissing incredibly erotic—the closeness of the act, the sensuality of it—so just the sound of it now, so crisp and sudden and intimate, stripped away the last vestiges of his control, leaving him vulnerable and helpless against the onslaught of pleasure that coursed through him as his balls drew up and his cock twitched, jerking and spilling in his pants, soiling his underwear with bursts of thick hot come.
When he returned to himself, Annie’s gentle fingers had migrated from his spent crotch and were caressing his sideburns, petting the soft tufts of hair there.
“Back with me?” she asked.
He nodded, not trusting his voice quite yet. Annie reached down and produced a box of tissues out of seemingly nowhere. Armin didn’t question it further and pulled a few free with a grateful smile to sort out the messy situation in his pants. Annie looked politely away and took advantage of the downtime to put on her discarded bra.
After everything was in order—or as much as they could be considering the circumstances—he glanced at Annie with uncertainty. “So… can I see you again?”
“I can’t stop you from coming over.” Annie shrugged indifferently, the cold exterior back firmly in place.
He bit his lip. “No, I meant outside of work.”
She froze, still as water. “Oh.”
He didn’t need her reaction to realize it was a bad idea. Annie probably had a million creeps asking the same of her every night. He raised his hand to halt her indubitable declination. “No, it’s fine. I don’t know what I was thinking. This is your job and I’m overstepping.” He ought to give her a tip really, a big one, after everything she did for him, but the thought of taking out his wallet and handing her money seemed completely tactless and uncouth. Oh well, he’d leave it with the barmaid, she was obliging enough before. Instead, he paused for a minute to take in her lovely face one last time. “I’m glad I met you though. I had a wonderful time and it was nice getting to know you, even as little as I did. You seem like an interesting person.”
Annie was regarding him coolly, her expression unreadable and her posture stiff. She didn’t say a word. Armin nodded, the message loud and clear, and, with his head hanging low, sidestepped her to get out of the small room.
Outside the door, another stripper was waiting for her, nervous fingers twirling a strand of hair with excitement, probably impatient to gossip with Annie about some weird thing a client did. A quick glance confirmed it was the woman they’d hired for Eren, Pieck. He smiled bitterly, thinking about his best friend being equally awkward around women as he was, and walked away to leave them alone in the darkened corridor to talk together in peace.
He hadn’t made it to the end of the hallway, when Annie’s voice stopped him in his tracks.
“Armin!” she called.
He stumbled in his haste to turn around. “Yeah?”
She rushed towards him with purpose, wobbling precariously in her gigantic heels. When she reached him, he held his arms out to steady her. She rested her small hands at the insides of his elbows to find her balance. Then, without warning, she kissed him.
It was a small, fleeting thing. A peck, really. And yet, it made Armin’s heart balloon twice its size.
Annie was smiling when they parted and he beamed right back like a huge idiot. She pushed something into his palm. He glanced down. It was a square piece of paper with a phone number written on it. His grin widened even more.
“Don’t lose it,” she warned. “Cause I’m not handing those out to just anyone.”
He shook his head a million times. “I won’t.”
“And if you do—which you shouldn’t—my last name is Leonhart, so you can look me up on social.”
This time, he nodded a million times. “I will.”
She pulled him close by his tie and kissed his lips again. “And don’t—” her eyes sharpened dangerously— “make me regret this.”
He smiled, nuzzling her nose with his own. “Never.”
With a stiff nod, she released him. “Now off you go.”
Clutching the precious note tightly in his hand and grinning like a fool, Armin pivoted on the spot and headed to the main area of the club. His friends greeted him like a soldier returning from battle, with roaring laughter and playful nudges, but he barely registered their enthusiastic ravings. His mind was still stuck on that square piece of paper, tucked away safely in his pocket, and the earth-shattering potential it might hold.
Perhaps they’d meet again under the harsh reality of sunlight and realize they had nothing in common. That in fact, the attraction they felt was nothing more than an ephemeral fever dream woven by the enchanting cover of the night. Perhaps they’d hit it off like two lost soulmates, fitting together perfectly in every crook and opening of each other’s lives. Perhaps they’d get married and have three children and grow old and bitter in that terrible nightmarish manner couples who refused to part always did.
No matter what, one thing was for certain. For the first time in his life, Armin was ready to fall in love.