[sometimes hawk wonders if embry even remembers that night - but then he must if these are the digs he sustains when he's actually trying to do his job and care about his fucking well-being. there'd been a very long string of one-nighters hawk been in the midst of pushing himself through post-tim that embry had gotten mixed up in, and if he had any idea the pretty face he'd watched contort every which way as hawk utterly ruined him was going to be the future vice president and his boss - well, he might have thought twice.

(is that what his life is destined to be reduced to? life before and life after tim laughlin? the center of it all, the boy that made him break both their hearts? so much for all the milestones of a career in washington.)

the undercurrent of tension that highlights each of their interactions has just enough of an unpleasant zing that hawk knows there's no way embry has forgotten that night. which means they're both just trying to be professional about it - as they should. and yet: working as an aide, for all intents and purposes, is the equivalent of being administrative assistant, therapist, blackmailer, maybe hitman, and then some all rolled into one extremely close and personal role that often veers farther left than the only democrats left with bite in the senate. this is bound to come out at the worst possible time, or blow up in both their faces if they don't deal with it somehow. what that means and how they do it - hawk doesn't have a goddamn clue.]

I'd really rather you didn't.

[because it would be tim, and with the way embry nearly downs his gin and grabs for his cigarette again he cannot get mixed up thinking about that right now when something self-destructive is in their midst.]

Besides, I think you'd have some trouble tracking them down, on account of the fact that I haven't got a clue who they were.

[rolls off the tongue easily, and maybe a little smugly - convincing to anyone but himself as his chest tightens thinking about the memory of soft kisses against his ear and a warm body curled in his arms. hawk takes a good swig of his own drink, still more measured than embry's because at least one of them needs their wits about them tonight, christ, and it doesn't look like it's going to be the younger man.

especially not when he practically tenses up as hawk enters his space, just shy of impropriety, and notices that despite the mood lighting, there's a pointed flush against pale skin that looks good enough that hawk might like to lave the flat of his tongue hot against it before opening his mouth and biting hard. something tells him this is absolutely not his first rodeo, nor is it hawk that's the one making him outright nervous or jittery or whatever the hell this is - so maybe it's someone he's expecting? a bad experience he's trying to conquer? or is it who or what he'd been chasing away that night they first met?

far be it for him to kick a man while he's down - at least, not this one - so instead he just watches the plume of smoke out from his lips, wondering what those other vices might have been and who else on the base got to see them, and glances around the room again as if he's actually making a stab at surveying it for them.]

For me?

[a pause, to let him think he's gotten away scot free.]

Or you?

[he leans in again, gaze deliberate as it falls down the narrow bridge of his nose onto the delicate profile before him.]

Because there's only one person here you can trust right now, and I doubt you're ready for that conversation.