"You know what it means, though, as well as I do.” I fidgeted with my fingers in my lap.
"It means I have a talented assistant this summer with a great career ahead of him. Your future colleagues know how good you are, too." He leaned against the doorway. "Is there more?"
I tried to suppress the growl that wanted to escape from my throat. “Of course there is more. If I accept this, I have to leave here." I cringed at the weakness sounding in my voice.
He nodded. “Yes, of course, I think that’s what's known as stating the obvious. Wasn’t this your plan in the beginning?"
A wave of emotion welled up inside. Sir's calm was unnerving. He sounded like he was ready to shove me out the door and put me on a plane back home from Miami. "But what if I don't want to go?" My stomach tied itself in knots, and I cursed myself for complaining. Sir hated whining.
He stepped closer to me. “Relax. I don't want you to leave at the end of the summer any more than I wanted you that yesterday or the day before. Let me explain why I think this is excellent news."
My eyes were glassy and wet as I stared up at him. I was close to tearing up, but I wanted to hear what he had to say. "What's the good news?"
"The good news is that you’re out of bad decisions. All of the choices are good ones. I see a lot of positives down the road for any path you choose. Most people would be very envious of your situation. Too often in life, people end up with choices between something bad and something worse. Let me see you revel in your good fortune." He beamed at me, and I found it hard to ignore his optimism.
"I guess you’re right about that. If I’d gotten this news in the days before I first heard from you, I’d have been bouncing off the walls with excitement. I don't know if I want to go right into writing my dissertation, and this position would give me something positive to do while I'm giving myself some intellectual time off.”
Sir stepped closer and let his fingers glide through the short hair on the top of my head. His touch conveyed support and reassurance. When he cupped the back of my head in his palm, he added a hint of mischief. "That's my boy. Remember, I'm not leaving your life wherever you go. Now let’s take our minds off the decisions and celebrate.“
I looked up at him. "Do you promise not to leave? I don't think I could handle it if you did."
"I promise. Now, let’s do something fun. There was one more thing I bought down at the leather store in Key West. Do you remember?”
When Sir said he wanted to do something fun, it was impossible to know what he had in mind. It could be going for a swim, or it could be a road trip elsewhere in the Keys. In this case, I immediately knew what he was thinking. I bit my lip.
He gripped my head and tilted it back exposing my neck while I swallowed hard. “What was it? I’m sure that you know.”
I mumbled, “It was a leather paddle, Sir.”
“Good boy. Has anyone ever spanked you, Joel?”
I nodded yes. I’d only been spanked twice in my life, and the incidents were one day apart at the hands of my grandfather and not my parents. I spent a week with my grandparents in the summer, and Grandpa spanked for taking candy from my grandmother’s cut-glass dish in the living room without asking. The second time he spanked me for trying to cover it up when Grandma asked me about it.
“Yes, Sir. It happened when I was a little kid.”
“No one’s ever reddened those beautiful round cheeks as an adult?”
I shook my head. Thinking about the paddle was enough to make me already feel a stinging sensation on my backside.
Sir turned toward the living room and gestured for me to follow. "Come with me. Maybe we can count this as book research, too. You never know when a character might turn into a bad boy who deserves punishment.“
I couldn’t see it as I walked behind him, but I knew there was a smirk on Sir’s face. Without hesitation, he pulled a straight-backed chair out from a corner of the room and patted it saying, “Drop the shorts. You’re going over my knee, boy!”
I’d been fully obedient to Sir since he returned the collar to my neck. I didn’t ask questions when he gave me an order or made a request. I focused on how to comply. I pulled my shorts down and stood naked before him as he sat on the chair.
Sir looked up at me. “Take the position. I’m sure you know how.”
I looked down seeing my cock hard and pointing straight out away from my body. I groaned, “Fuck, it’s like that even when it’s going to hurt.”
“Language, Joel. That’s two more swats and maybe hurting is part of it. Do you think pain is hot?” He slapped his thigh. “Over my knees, now. Stick that hard cock between my legs.”
I lowered my body across Sir’s legs and positioned my hard cock between his thighs. I wiggled to try and avoid crushing my balls against his flesh. I didn’t know what to do with my long arms. Sir took care of that issue.
“Hands behind your back.” Sir rested one hand on the back of my neck exerting some pressure to keep me in place while he gripped the paddle tight with his other hand. I gritted my teeth in anticipation. I didn’t know if I would only feel a sting, or if the pain would be something more intense.
I closed my eyes and whispered, “I’m ready, Sir.”
“There is a reason for this. Do you know what it is?”
“No, Sir.” I tried to search through my recent memories to figure out something I’d done wrong. It was possible that I put something back in the wrong place in the kitchen, or I got the burgers for dinner a little too well done, but I couldn’t think of something that justified a leather paddle.
He chuckled. “I’m toying with you. There’s one simple reason for the paddle. I’m having fun, and I bet before it’s over it will be fun for you, too. You know what they say about all work and no play, and I never want life here to be dull.”
“Of course, Sir.” The anticipation was getting to be too much. I wanted to feel the paddle on my ass. It was going to happen sooner or later, and I was impatient. I wiggled in his lap and requested, “Spank me, please.”
The paddle came down, and the impact was swift and sharp. I yelped, “Fuck!”
“Language! I think we need to work on that.” The paddle came down again, and the sting was intense. Heat spread tiny spidery fingers out across my right ass cheek. “Tell me how it feels. We always have to keep our literary research in my mind.” Another swat connected with my ass.
“It hurts, Sir, but…”
Before I could finish my comment, he whispered, “Fuck…what the hell is that?”
Sir’s language surprised me, and I tried to turn my head to look up at him, but his hand remained clamped tight around the back of my neck. He asked, “Do you hear that?”
I listened carefully. At first, I didn’t hear anything but seagulls and the waves. It was the background music of every day on Rusty Door Key. Sir was silent, and a few seconds later I heard the sound of a boat motor in the distance. It was gradually getting louder meaning that it was heading our way. "It's a boat, isn’t it?”
“That’s what it is, but what the hell? No one sent a message or called me. My gut doesn’t feel good about this.” He pulled his hand back from the back of my neck and said, “Get up. Get dressed. We have to see what this is about.”
I was disappointed as I crawled off Sir’s lap. Although the paddle hurt, there was something intoxicating about it, too. I wanted more. I wanted to feel Sir’s bare hand on my ass.
Sir stood up, and he raced to the kitchen rummaging through drawers until he returned with a large knife in his hand. There were no firearms on the island. He growled, “Don’t worry about shoes. Just pull on a T-Shirt and meet me at the dock. Unless it's Rita or Hank on that boat, we might have a problem on our hands.”
By the time I joined Sir at the end of the dock, it was easy to see that the boat belonged to the local police. As they pulled up to the pier, I spotted three cops aboard, two men and a woman. One of the men called, “Good afternoon, Tom. You can put the weapon down.
I’m sorry we had to show up on the spur of the moment unannounced. You know how police work is.”
Sir dropped the knife to the dock and stood on with his legs shoulder-length apart. He looked strong and powerful. He was a man guarding access to his land. “I know how it can be, but I don’t think that has anything to do with me.”
All three cops climbed out of the boat, and the one who issued the greeting said, "I'm sorry Tom, but we've got to take your guest in. It’s regulations. He’s under arrest for assault and battery. You’re welcome to come along, too, and with any luck, we just need to assign bail, and you'll both be headed back out here to the island in a few hours. There are eyewitnesses saying he laid into a guy at a bar. We have no choice. We have to follow procedures.”
My eyes opened wider. I’d never been arrested before, but I’d never slugged a guy in the gut in public either. I didn’t get into fights. I reached up and touched the collar around my neck.
Sir's face flushed. He said, "You know Cal has it in for me, and he was asking for it. Come on, Les. He wasn't hurt at all. He’s trying to trap us into something."
Les shook his head. "Tom, I'm sorry, you're going to have to tell that to a judge. I’m doing my job. Please don’t give me a hard time over this.” He turned to the woman. "Jamie, we’ve got to put the cuffs on him. Use the plastic ones."
Les read me my rights and told me the arrest was for assaulting the pudgy man named Cal in the bar parking lot. Sir looked down kicking at the dock as Jamie cuffed me. "Tom, we have to take him in our boat, but you can follow right along. I’m honest when I say I do think you can have him back here in a few hours. They might even release him without bail.”
"It's nothing about the money, Les. You know that I've got enough of that to bail him out ten times over. It's the principle involved.”
Les said, "Well, hopefully, the judge has a sympathetic ear, and it's just a bunch of nothing. I have to do my job. We keep the peace. That’s all I’m saying.”
Leaving the island riding in a boat without Sir felt entirely wrong. There was nothing fun or exciting about the arrest. Jamie talked to me all the way to the shore. She was friendly. She asked me if I was enjoying my time in the Keys. She didn't say anything about the incident at the bar. Instead, she asked about the work I did for Sir. I grinned and nodded yes when she asked if he was as nice of a guy as everyone says that he is.
Jamie couldn't believe that such a famous celebrity lived right there in Marathon. She said most of the time the big names headed down to Key West, and they weren’t Florida Keys natives. She was happy that the local residents could claim Sir as one of their own.
The route to shore in the police boat was longer than riding with Sir. The cops headed to a different dock and parking lot. At one point I had to wave goodbye to Sir while he steered his boat to the other dock to retrieve his car while the police boat headed in the opposite direction. Once the cops and I reached the shore, they led me to the back seat of a police car for the short trip to the local detention center. I exhaled with relief when I saw Sir’s convertible in the parking lot. He arrived before we did.
Les was right about everything. They didn't charge any bail, but I was still officially processed, and they even took a mugshot. I received a court date before they finalized my release. I’d never seen the inside of a jail, and I spent the entire time hoping it would be the only time. The procedures took at least two hours, maybe more. I left my cell phone in my shorts at the house, so I had little to do but stare at the walls and watch people. Sir sat at my side brooding.
Finally, Jamie stepped out of an office and told us that I was officially released. She wished us luck in the court hearing. I followed Sir as we left the jail. As soon as the door closed behind us, he grumbled, "We're going to see Hank. The nuclear bomb explodes right now."
14
Artifacts
Sir pounded his hands on the steering wheel. He was agitated, but he didn’t look worried. He was excited about the future. “You're never going to court. We're getting the charges dropped, and we're getting them dropped right now." Just before we reached the Seven Mile Bridge, he handed me his cell phone. "Find Hank's number, dial it, and tell him we're on our way."
I was nervous about what to say when Hank answered, but I followed Sir's directions without question. Sam answered the phone instead of Hank, and I smiled. He said, "Joel, hi! Master is floating out in the pool, and I'm brewing iced tea. Do you need me to take the phone to him?"
"I don't think so." I pulled the phone down from my ear and told Sir what Sam said.
"No, there is no need to haul Hank out of his precious pool just yet. Tell Sam we're on our way, and I have my finger on the button to launch the nuclear option. Tell him to share that news with his Master." Sir pounded the steering wheel again. He had the steely resolve of a general leading troops into a climactic battle.
I delivered Sir's message to Sam. He verified that he would tell his Master, and he closed the brief conversation by saying that he was looking forward to seeing me again. I assured him the feeling was mutual.
Sir told me to call Rita, too. “Tell her that we’ve launched the bomb, and I would like to see her at Hank's." She didn’t answer my call. After listening to her cheerful recorded message, I explained that we were on our way to Key West and wanted her to join us. Goosebumps began to spread up my forearms. I didn’t know the details of what was happening, but I trusted Sir’s confidence that we would come out on top.
When we arrived at Hank’s house, he was out of the pool and sitting in a lounge chair sipping iced tea. Sam knelt on a cushion at his side in his swim trunks. Jimmy Buffett's "Volcano" played softly in the background.
"Ahh Tom, Joel! So good to see you again! I didn’t expect it to be so soon, but I’ll never reject good company.” Hank raised his arm and beckoned for us to join him. "And Sam makes great iced tea. He'll even spike it with a splash of rum if you wish." Hank turned toward Sam. "Please, my boy, fetch a tall glass for each of our guests." Sam rose and hurried off into the house.
Sir reached out a hand to shake with Hank. "Good to see you as always. I wish it were under different circumstances. We’ll have to stop for a genuine social call sometime soon.“
Sir sat in the other free lounger, and I shuffled my feet. Hank watched me and shouted toward the house again. "And Sam, bring a cushion for your friend Joel here!"
Sam returned with a cushion under one arm and tall glasses of iced tea in each hand. He set them gently on the table between Sir and Hank before handing the cushion to me. I laid the cushion on the concrete next to Sir's chair before lowering myself to my knees and sitting back on my ankles. Sir smiled at me and ran his fingers up the back of my head. I still felt horrible about losing my temper in the bar parking lot, but his warmth and trust in me after successfully completing his challenge helped chase away any gloom.
As Sir handed me a glass of iced tea, Rita announced her arrival from the corner of the house, "Well, hello there men! And boys!"
Hank looked up. "Rita! It has been far too long since I've seen your lovely face! Come give me a little kiss here on the cheek." He touched his right cheek with two fingertips.
She lifted her sunglasses and pushed them up on her forehead. "You horny old bastard. I'd better be careful. If I get too close, you might start thinking you like girls." She bent down and planted her lips on Hank's cheek leaving a pink print behind.
Hank smiled. "I"ll treasure that mark always."
As she hauled a chair over to join the small group, she asked, "Are you sure you don't want me on a cushion like these handsome boys?"
I laughed softly.
"So, what is the occasion? All I heard was nuclear option from Joel on the phone." Rita folded up the sunglasses and placed them in her clutch.
Sir ran through the story from the bar parking lot, and when he got to the part about me slugging Cal in the gut, Rita interrupted. "You mean the whole place didn't erupt in cheers? I'm disappointed. Is there a v
ideo? I’d love to see it. A bully finally got what he deserved. He deserves so much more, but it’s a start. Joel’s biceps are so sexy.“
Sir continued. "We didn't stick around long enough to observe the reception, but my boy does have a vicious right hook. Cal crumpled to the ground."
Rita reached out to my arm and wrapped her fingers around my muscle. "I do admire strong arms. Yum."
Hank asked. "So you slugged him in a parking lot? Surely that's not enough for Tom to push the whole plan forward so abruptly."
I glanced over at Sam. The conversation riveted his attention. He concentrated hard like he was watching a suspense movie. His eyes opened wider as he listened to the details.
Sir continued his story. "I thought all was good, but this morning the cops showed up at my place."
Rita asked, “At your cute little island? That’s not good news.“
Sir nodded yes. "They came in their boat, and they arrested Joel and took him in. Cal pressed charges. The cops didn't charge bail, so they released him, but he has a court date coming up. I suspect he could win the case with any judge who has a compassionate bone in their body, but I would rather not take any chances if it's not necessary."
Hank smirked. "The day has finally come. I agree with you. It's time to take the pathetic little Marathon cartel down. They don't have a prayer."
Rita turned toward him. "Hank, you've never explained exactly how this is going to happen. You know that I would trust you with my life, but do you have something foolproof?"
Hank smirked, "Do I have something foolproof? You all need to join me in my home office. There are a few boxes in the room that hold my special collection of artifacts. I keep them in a safe. They are much more valuable than any insurance policy."
Sir asked, “Artifacts? I thought you had eyewitnesses, tape recordings or some other sort of verbal dirt on them. There is an object involved?"
Hank reached over and patted Sir's cheek. "Oh, Tom, artifacts indeed. Witnesses can always be questioned and their veracity torn down. Too many trials descend into battles over personal credibility. Or if it's too long after the event, somebody dies. But when you have indisputable objects, that's the gold standard."
My Summer Page 13