The Hired Man Read Free Page B

hat set sexily back on his wavy black hair, denim jacket open to the navel, no shirt, incredibly tight Levi’s jeans, a silver belt buckle the size of a small hubcap, scuffed cowboy boots.
    I couldn’t help but grin from ear to ear.
    “My God, man!” I said, “You’re incredible. You did this just for me?”
    He put one big hand easily on my shoulder while he pulled up the empty stool next to mine with the other.
    “Mostly,” he said with a grin. “Actually, Billy’s meeting me here around seven. We’ve got a Double Shit-Kicker Special on for tonight.”
    Still grinning, I shook my head.
    “Lost me,” I admitted.
    “I’m not surprised,” he said, motioning to get Bud’s attention. “I guess we’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”
    “I’m all ears,” I said, and he grinned again.
    “Like shit you are,” he said, giving a rather obvious eye-slide down my body to my crotch.
    “Glad you remember,” I said.
    Bud came over, and Phil ordered a Miller. Bud nodded without a word and moved off to get it. Phil started to reach into the very small front pocket of his Levi’s, but I waved him off, taking another bill out of my pocket.
    “You hustler,” I said, putting it on the bar. “Me john. John pay.”
    He gave me a quick, raised-eyebrow grin.
    “So, fill me in,” I said when Bud had put Phil’s beer in front of him and left.
    Phil clicked the top of his bottle against my mug and took a long drink before beginning.
    “Long story,” he said.
    “I like ‘em long,” I replied straight-faced, which produced another of his raised-eyebrow grins.
    “Well, about six months ago now…maybe seven,” he began, “I was working Beech Street one night around eleven when this Jag pulls up. Older guy, average-looking, nice grey hair, obviously not worried where his next meal was coming from. We go through the usual, and I get in.
    “But instead of taking me someplace, or him even making a pass in the car, we just drove around for about half an hour talking. That’s a little unusual, but not unheard-of. He’s asking me all sorts of questions on all sorts of things. Mostly about me, but a whole bunch of other things, too. Seemed like a pretty nice guy.
    “Finally, he says ‘How would you like to work for me?’ I told him I thought that’s what I was doing, but he smiled and said, ‘No, a real job. Same line of work, but it will pay a great deal more.’
    “I was a little leery, but he asked me to hear him out, and I agreed. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘But first, I’d like you to meet my wife.’”
    Now I was the one with the raised eyebrows, and Phil grinned and held up his hand.
    “Yeah, I know, that was my reaction, too, but it wasn’t like that at all. I told him I didn’t do that kind of kinky stuff, and I sure as hell didn’t do anything with anybody who doesn’t have a cock. He just looked at me and smiled again. ‘My dear boy, you misunderstand,’ he said and then explained the whole thing.”
    Phil looked at me then took another long drink from his beer, draining it. He set it on the bar and pushed it toward the far side. I did the same.
    “Am I telling you more about penguins than you care to know?” he asked.
    “Hell, no,” I said, and meant it. “Tell all.”
    I waved at Bud and took another bill from my pocket and put it on the bar. Phil shook his head, reached out and handed the money back to me, then fished in his own pocket, coming up with a folded hundred. He picked up his story where he’d left off.
    “His name’s Arnold Glick,” Phil said. “He’s bisexual and a retired stock market analyst from New York. If he’d been giving me this line in a bar, I’d probably have thought ‘uh-huh’ and dozed off, but when I’m driving around town in a brand new Jaguar with less than a thousand miles on the odometer—I looked—I tended to give the whole thing a little more weight. Though why he chose me is still a mystery.”
    Gee, I wonder? I thought. Six-three, a body and