Cock and Balls (Handcuffs and Lace) by Mia Watts (8 page)

“Say what you mean, then.”

Monty searched the other man’s eyes. “Take your own advice.”

Hank pushed his plate back from the table. “Okay. I don’t fish.”

“You will today.”

“I buy fish. I cook fish. I eat fish.
I
don’t fish.”

“Today, you will.” Monty stood his full height. “I’ll teach you.”

“In the real world I only have to know where to find the grocery store.”

“You think so?” Monty folded his arms across his chest. “Because the way I see it, this is real, and if you plan to eat, you’ll plan to provide. Get your ass up from the table, toss the bratty attitude and let’s get moving.”

Hank stood up from the table so fast that his chair fell backward. He glared at Monty as though he thought Monty would back down. He’d have been wrong. Monty waited him out until Hank pushed past him, muttering under his breath about control-freak jackasses and presidential minions. Monty hid his smile as he left the tiny corner kitchen to get his fishing supplies together.

Less than five minutes later, they stood on the front porch. Monty inhaled deeply, loving the moist salty smell of the Gulf as it met the verdant decay and growth of coastal flora. The bitterness of swamp water carried in just enough to remind Monty that it was there, a few miles off, and already the cicadas were singing within the shadows of every kudzu-covered tree trunk. God, he loved Alabama in the summertime.

Hank stepped up beside him. Monty held out the tackle box blindly, waited for the other man to relieve the weight of it from his hand and moved off toward the shoreline.

“Are we taking the boat?” Hank asked.

“Nope.”

He heard the unmistakable slap of Hank swatting a mosquito. “Can we?”

“Nope. Not everything has to be done from the boat.”

“But it could be.”

“C’mon citified sissy boy. Earn some man-stripes today.”

“Do those come in army green or just
West Nile
?” Hank snapped.

Monty chuckled. “Mind the ticks.”

“Ticks?”

Monty shot him a backward glance. “More things out here suck than just you.”

“Fuck you.”

He chuckled and kept trudging through the undergrowth to get to the part of the shoreline he wanted. The part his dad cleared under large shade trees where the fish liked to hang out to get away from the summer heat. A short, wide deck extended over the water.

Monty put down the Styrofoam container holding the nightcrawlers he’d picked up from the supply store and kept in the fridge. He looked from where he squatted.

“Don’t just stand there. Put the tackle box down, and get a rod ready.”

Hank shifted his weight from foot to foot. “Aren’t they already ready?”

“Release the hook from where it’s secured and put a section of worm on it.”

“I have to go dig up worms?” Hank asked, horrified.

Monty sighed, held up the Styrofoam container. “We have the worms. Cut one in half, and thread it onto the hook.”

Hank thought he might get sick. Mosquitoes. Ticks. Worms. Fishing. Next thing, Monty would be having him gator wrestle. They had gators in Alabama, right? He looked at the water’s edge suspiciously.

“What’s wrong?” Monty asked.

“Nothing.”

Monty held up a wriggling worm. “Bait it.”

Hank tried not to gag as he baited his hook. Never in his life had he felt so much like a ten-year-old girl. First, he tried wrapping the hook with it. Was it more humane to do that and then drown the worm before it was eaten alive or stab it with the barbed end? He barely quelled his shiver of revulsion.

Fortunately, Monty saw his dilemma and baited the hook for him. It was then Hank decided he’d pretend never to hook a fish. If it ate the bait—even if a gator nabbed it and dragged him into the water in some kind of death roll—Hank was going to play it off like nothing was on the line to avoid touching the slimy nightcrawlers, or in the case of gators, death by chomping.

Monty showed him how to cast his line. Hank fumbled it until Monty made a scoffing noise and stood behind him. Suddenly fishing seemed like a lot of fun. At least this part. Monty tucked Hank’s body against his own. His big hand wrapped around Hank’s on the rod and depressed his thumb on a lever-thing. Then swinging it behind him slowly, Monty whipped the rod around and fishing line zipped from the reel, plunked in the water and the float bobbed happily on the gentle waves of the inlet.

“Now, you wait,” Monty murmured, stepping away from him.

Monty’s cock no longer pressed Hank’s ass. He decided he needed to rethink his
I got nuthin’ on the line
plan. The more times he had to bait the hook, the more often Monty would show him how to cast the line, right? He looked at the sexy agent next to him who busied himself setting up his own line. Hank didn’t think he could get away with it too many more times, but damn, he though looking down at lift in his jeans, who knew fishing could be sexy?

Monty settled on the side of the decking, removed his shoes and socks. He rolled up his jeans legs and careful not to disturb the water too much, he dipped his tanned, hairy calves into the blue water. Hank stared at the way his skin glistened around hardened calf muscles.

Hank groaned.

Monty cut him a glance. “Sit.”

Hank sat. He hurried to get his feet in the water next to Monty.

“Don’t splash. You’re scaring the fish.”

“Sorry,” Hank muttered too busy eying Monty’s thighs and groin.

He didn’t know what it was about the man that kept him in a tailspin. He wanted Monty like no one he’d met before. He thought it might be because he could
get
other guys. Not just understand their very basic drives to fuck—there was always that—but he couldn’t seem to get under Monty’s skin the way he could with club fucks.

Monty made him want to do things. The guys Hank had been spending time with lately, mostly made him yawn after he’d gotten off. But even that wasn’t completely right. The last guy, the guy Monty called the Goth, hadn’t done it for Hank. As much as he hated to admit it, he suspected that it was because Monty had been right outside the door. With the sexy, lean agent nearby, all of Hank’s thoughts had been on him, not the guy in his bed with Hank’s dick in his mouth. And that had been the first moment Hank realized that maybe he was a little bit in trouble.

“My dad used to bring me here. We’d spend a couple weeks every summer just fishing and camping,” Monty revealed.

“Hm.”

“Did you and your dad ever have something like that?” Monty asked.

Hank narrowed his eyes on the end of the fishing pole. “Not really.”

“But there was something you two did together?”

“Is this therapy?” Hank countered.

“It’s conversation. I share something. You share something. We talk, and nobody gets defensive. Normal people do it all the time,” Monty explained.

“Gee, thanks for the clarification.”

“No problem.”

Hank tugged on his rod, watching the red and white float bob gently on the water’s surface. “He used to take me sailing at Martha’s Vineyard when I was a kid.”

“Do you like sailing?”

“I used to.”

“What changed?” Monty asked.

“My dad,” Hank answered flatly.

“He stopped taking you?”

Hank shrugged, not comfortable with the direction of the conversation. He had no interest in getting personal about his relationship with his father. Not with Monty who was clearly on the “Mr. McClaren rocks” team.

“My dad and I could sit for hours without talking and be completely at peace,” Monty told him.

“That sounds like a plan. Let’s try that.”

Monty snorted.

“Or we could fuck,” Hank offered hopefully.

“You go from zero to sixty faster than a stock car.”

“What’s the hold up? I like cock. You like cock. Let’s use the rods nature gave us and catch some real fun.”

Monty shifted to the side to look at him more fully. “Slow down.”

Hank huffed impatiently. “Why? So you can psychoanalyze me some more?”

A ghost of a smile touched the agent’s lips. “I’m trying to understand you.”

“That’s easy.” Hank licked his lips and spoke slowly like Monty was mentally challenged. “I. Want. To. Fuck. You.”

Something hot flared in Monty’s eyes, something that teetered between hunger and anger. “You want to fuck. I got that. You know what gets me in the mood?”

“A hard dick?” Hank tried.

“The guy I’m with. Maybe it’s old-fashioned, but I want to know the man I’m plowing.”

Hank put down his fishing pole. He leaned sideways on one locked arm. “My favorite color is green. I’m an only child with commitment issues. I hate slow kisses because they take too damn long, and I’m always up for rough sex. Hi.”

Seemingly despite himself, Monty laughed. He picked up the discarded fishing pole and handed it back to Hank. “Hang onto this. If you get a bite, I don’t want to lose a piece of my childhood because you’d rather be choking down a cock right now.”

“Yours.
Your
cock,” Hank specified.

That seemed to get Monty’s attention. “Why mine specifically?”

Hank gestured to the empty clearing and the expanse of the inlet. “Do you see another cock in sight?”

Disappointment pulled at Monty’s brow. “Go jack off. Come back when you’re ready to have a real discussion.”

Hank groaned. Probably the thing he hated most about how things were going with Monty was that the man made Hank feel like a complete asshole. Hank never kept his one-nighters around long enough to let them form an opinion of him. The problem was he couldn’t get away from Monty. Monty had not only been in his dad’s service for the last couple years, and he’d been there through the death of Hank’s mother.

It wasn’t that he cared what Monty thought of him. It was more that Monty kept calling Hank on his shit, which no one did. And that sucked because no matter what Hank did or said, Monty wasn’t budging in his assertion that there was more to Hank than he let on. A one-nighter didn’t question what he saw. He didn’t
care
what he saw so long as the promised fuck occurred.

Monty cared, which meant Hank had to scramble to make him stop. He needed Monty to
stop
. It shook Hank up. He didn’t want it analyzed. He didn’t want to explain himself or how he felt. He just wanted Monty to stop chipping away at him. It didn’t take a genius to know Hank had his defenses up. It didn’t take a lot of self-awareness either. He knew he pushed people away. He just wished Monty would accept that and leave him alone—emotionally. Physically? He wanted Monty every which way he could get him. The man was a walking orgasm.

Maybe coming clean would finally shut the agent up. Maybe if he stopped skirting the elephant on the dock, he’d lock the door and Monty would finally respect his need for privacy on the subject.

He watched the slightly older man from the corner of his eye. Monty had turned back to the water at some point when Hank wasn’t paying attention. He decided to do the same. If he didn’t look at the other man while he spoke, maybe it would all be easier to say, and they could move on.

Hank cleared his throat. It took him a couple seconds to form the first words even though Monty hadn’t yet recognized, or acknowledged, that Hank was on the verge of speaking. Or maybe he did? It was hard to tell as he continued to sit in silence, looking out at the water with eyes the same gorgeous blue as the water circling his calves.

“I know what you’re trying to do. You want me to talk about my dad,” Hank said.

He waited for Monty to say something. He didn’t.

“You want me to talk about my relationship with my dad, to be specific. There isn’t one.”

Monty gently swished his legs in the water. He didn’t speak. His fingers touched the transparent line, let it rest on the side of his pointer finger as he change grips.

“He stopped being interested in me and Mom when he ran for office,” Hank said sharply.

Monty reeled in his line. Hank watched as he applied fresh bait to an empty hook. Obviously the bait had been nibbled off. Monty swung the rod to the side and flung it. The whir, click, click, click, splash landed the hook far off into the water. Hank watched it for a few minutes. Watched Monty adjust his line, his hold. Monty took a deep breath and let it out like he had all the time in the world to sit and wait for fish to come.

Hank licked his lips. Without Monty sparring at him, Hank felt his defenses drop a little. It was like being alone without being alone.

“Mom used to grab my hand at public events. We’d stand behind him at the podium, and she’d give me a double-squeeze. She told me that was code for
I love you
.”

He shot a sideways look at Monty. Monty didn’t move. Didn’t comment. He didn’t even look like he was listening. Hank felt himself relax a little more. He hadn’t talked about his mom since the funeral. His heart pounded a little faster to be doing it now, but no one was around to hear. No one but Monty, and Monty was Secret Service. He wouldn’t be talking to anyone about what he heard.

“She said that no matter what was happening out there—in the audience, in the media—no matter what they saw, we’d always have that secret squeeze. It started when I was a kid and being in the public eye scared me. I got older, and she didn’t hold my hand anymore, but sometimes she’d see me tense up, or I’d see her tense up, and we’d give a double-squeeze and let go. Just so we knew we still had the support of one other person there who loved us.”

Hank picked at the wrapped grip of his fishing rod. He supposed he should pull in his hook, check the bait like Monty had, but he didn’t. He let it sit out there on waves that had already taken it to shore.

Monty cast his line farther out again.

“I don’t know when it happened,” Hank said, lost in thought and not caring to provide a beginning line of conversation.

The words flowed easier now. He hadn’t said them aloud, ever, and there was a relief in it.

“He went from dad to politician so gradually that I didn’t really notice at first. He had this duty, and Mom supported it. I supported it. It’s just how things were. We all played our parts. I watched Mom get sick. He left for functions and dinners, while I took her to the doctors and through chemo. He’d pat her hand, but I held it. She withered away!” Hank said, suddenly angry. “And he
let
her. He let her die and never bothered to show up!”