Dating Rules And Pretty Fools - 20. Like Snuffed Out Candles

Chapter Twenty – Like Snuffed Out Candles

No sign of Jackie’s blabbing to others about double identities and whatnot, at least not on the guy’s phone. Hudson worked quickly, one hand on the wheel, the other on the extra burner he had with him in case of an emergency. As soon as the gruff voice at the other end answered, he didn’t waste a moment.

“I’ll need Room B,” he spat.

“How soon?”

“I’ll be there in fifteen.”

“Okay.”

“The captain shouldn’t--”

“Yeah, I know. I wasn’t a moron, last time I checked.”

Hudson held the curses climbing up his throat in check. Gavin was an asshole, but he was right. Also, he was a dependable asshole for all the times they needed to circumvent the usual procedures to get things done.

Gavin didn’t even offer him the courtesy of a perfunctory ‘bye’. Knowing the gruff officer, he was already on the job, doing what was needed. Hudson wasn’t particularly fond of going off-script, but if there was one guy who could help him save the case – no, not the case, just his undercover op – Gavin Stetson would be that guy.

Jackie groaned, drawing his attention. Well, there was no way of telling how long he’d be out of it, and Hudson hadn’t meant to hurt him too much. The way he saw it, the youngster was his lifeline, and, even if Jackie didn’t know it, that went the other way, too.

He stopped the car behind the station, using the back entrance to get inside. Carefully, he extracted Jackie from his seat and dragged him along as Gavin opened the door for him. Room B was the closest for the kind of thing he had in mind, and also out of the way enough not to draw too much attention from other people working at that hour.

“Damn it, West,” Gavin said and moved the toothpick he liked so much to chew on from one corner of his mouth to the other. “Can you at least bring them in while still conscious?”

Hudson threw his unconventional friend and colleague a look that conveyed most of what he was thinking. Gavin looked fairly unimpressed. He helped Hudson move Jackie quickly, and soon they had the guy inside the interrogation room, his wrists secured to the table with handcuffs. Gavin took it upon himself to pat Jackie’s cheek and shake him until the other came to.

“What the hell?” Jackie murmured and, as he tried to straighten himself up, realized he was restrained. He did what anyone under the same circumstances would, he struggled to get free, his eyes bulging out of their sockets, his mouth open wide while his brain forgot how to curse.

“Looks like we’ve got a lively one,” Gavin said cheerfully. And then, turning toward Hudson, “What did this one do?”

Hudson set his jaw hard. No point in admitting his mistake; Gavin would never let him forget it. “I need to show Jackie here a few pictures.”

Gavin stood and crossed his arms. “So?”

Hudson gave his friend a good hard stare. Gavin took the hint and moved away, shrugging. He waited until his friend was out of the room to give Jackie his undivided attention again. His eyes fell on his unexpected hostage’s hands, the way they still squirmed although there was no possible way for him to get out of there.

“If this is your idea of fun, Vegas, I don’t like it,” Jackie said morosely. He shook his head, trying to clear it of booze and misunderstandings.

Hudson didn’t have time for that. He slapped the table with both palms, right in front of his prisoner, startling him. “Look here, asshole,” he said in a low menacing growl, “who did you talk to about me?”

“What the fuck do you mean? No one,” Jackie said defensively. “I saw you leaving with Otis, kissing him in the street. And I thought you were my friend. Where the fuck are we? Are people into this kind of thing now? Interrogation rooms? I don’t like what you did with the place.”

Jackie sounded fearful, but there was clearly a part of him, sly and ready to help him wiggle his way out of it. Hudson had no intention of letting him escape. “I’m not playing.”

“What? What do you mean? Shit, is this real?” Jackie made another attempt to free himself, while his nostrils flared. The alcohol haze was lifting and fear was taking over. “Then, I need my fucking phone call! And a lawyer!” His voice rose, while his eyes darted around, looking for something to hang his hope on.

Gavin walked in, with a folder in his hands. He took turns staring at Hudson and Jackie but held his tongue for once. He put the folder down on the table and stepped back.

“Why are there two of you here? Are you going to play good cop, bad cop with me now? I’m not telling you nothing.”

“We haven’t asked you anything yet,” Gavin said, the irony in his voice evident.

Hudson opened the folder and looked inside. He took one picture and placed it in front of Jackie.

“Do you know this guy?”

Jackie set his jaw hard, and Hudson expected resistance. But the green eyes full of fear moved to the table and took a look at the displayed picture. Jackie looked up and then down again. “Yeah, I know this guy. We call him Bang-Bang.”

“Okay.” He looked over his shoulder at Gavin, who quirked an eyebrow and offered him nothing more. “Why Bang-Bang?”

Jackie raised his shoulders and let them fall. “Because he likes getting gangbanged.”

“One of the models, then?” Hudson continued.

“Yeah,” Jackie replied as if his interrogator was hard in the head and couldn’t see the obvious.

“Is he still with your club then?” Hudson asked, slowly showing his teeth.

Jackie threw him an unpleasant look in return. “No, and you probably know that. Since you’re obviously a cop.”

“He doesn’t miss much this one, does he?” Gavin said with a snort.

“Neither of you is the good cop, right?” Jackie shot in a quarrelsome manner just to show that he wasn’t as scared as he looked. He wasn’t good at it.

“Tell me,” Hudson continued patiently, “where is Bang-Bang now?”

“How should I know? He graduated, took his money and dashed. Doesn’t even bother to call, the scumbag,” Jackie commented.

Hudson searched the young face for any signs of lying. But all that met his eyes suggested that his mark was scared and wanted to get out of there. He chose another photo from the folder, careful not to bring out too much at the start.

“What about this one?”

Jackie leaned over the table. “That’s Stud,” he said. “Come on, Vegas,” he tried to play it cool, “all these guys are legal. Don’t tell me you think they’re underage or something.” Clearly, he was searching for a reason why Hudson was keeping him there, asking him about these guys. “Like Stud here. He has a dick as thick as a baby’s arm.”

Hudson closed his eyes for a moment as he focused his mind on not dwelling on how Stud looked in the other pictures stashed inside the folder in his hand.

“Don’t tell me, he graduated, too,” he said through his teeth.

Jackie, seemingly more and more in control of his own emotions, shrugged. “Yeah, this is a business where new faces are in high demand. But you wouldn’t know that, since you’re a cop,” he spat again, narrowing his eyes.

“Damn, you broke the kid’s heart,” Gavin commented.

That was his colleague’s due. He got to watch and be a part of it. And run his damn mouth all he wanted. Hudson ignored him and picked another photo from the several inside.

“Do you know him, too?”

Jackie didn’t make a fuss and looked at the face in the picture for a bit longer than at the others. They were all ID-like photos, magnified for the sake of creating a profile for all the victims identified so far.

“The hair’s wrong,” Jackie said quietly, “but I always thought that kind of platinum-blond could only come from a bottle. But I can bet my ass this one’s Sweetheart.” He looked at the picture, his eyebrows furrowed.

Hudson hovered closely. “What about him? What happened to him?”

“Graduated,” Jackie replied, but this time, there was a flair of stubbornness in the way he said it.

“What was your relationship with him?”

Jackie shook his head and tried to touch one of his ears, only the handcuffs preventing him from doing so. He was searching for a lie, and Hudson had just gotten the tell.

“No relationship,” Jackie said promptly.

“Really? You keep telling me how much you score with the models,” Hudson taunted him, hoping for more.

“So? It’s all wham, bam, thank you ma’am,” Jackie replied, increasingly irritated. “What’s to say about all that?”

“Have you heard from any of them since their graduation?” Hudson asked.

“No. But it’s their fucking business. The boss gave them good money, and now, they’re all too good for the rest of us,” Jackie expressed his frustration. “If they did something shady, that’s not the boss’s fault, Vegas.”

“Vegas,” Gavin echoed and snorted.

“Yeah, like that’s not even your real name,” Jackie continued, all riled up. “Fucking cop.”

Hudson opened the folder again, debating on how to proceed. He knew how, of course he knew, but that didn’t mean that it would give him any pleasure. Quite the opposite.

“Give me the key,” he told Gavin without looking at him.

He used it to free Jackie’s hands, watching his temporary hostage rub his wrists.

“What the hell, man?” Jackie murmured. “All this to ask me about some dudes from a lifetime ago? By the way, you know I’m going to tell the boss everything. Man, he’s not going to like it.”

He made a move to get up, interpreting this small mercy as being let go. But Hudson had something different in mind. He began to take picture after picture out of the folder and throw them on the table.

“They graduated? That’s what you’re saying?”

Jackie was still holding one wrist with the other hand. He stopped and looked at the pictures, bending over as if he couldn’t understand what he was seeing.

“What the hell, man, are these… shopped or something? The fuck you’re making me look at this shit? It’s like--” He stopped abruptly and looked closer at one.

Hudson didn’t move a muscle. He just watched, waiting. Jackie touched the bottom edge of one picture with his fingers and a tremor began shaking his whole hand.

“These are fake,” he said, but it was clear that his confidence was crumbling.

Hudson knew, without looking, which of those horrible pictures had held Jackie’s interest. He reached into the folder and selected another. He placed it next to the other at which Jackie was looking. “In case you were wondering where the rest of him is,” he said quietly.

Jackie moved violently away, his face pale, sweat gluing his hair to his forehead.

“Sink, over there,” Gavin said sternly. “Fucking operation shock and awe,” he commented as Jackie threw himself at the sink and began retching.

Hudson moved to his side and held his forehead. Jackie’s skin was dead cold, and his entire body was shaking. Then, he said something he never said lightly. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”

“Aww,” Gavin the asshole intervened, “are you two going to get a room already?”

“We just did, so leave us the room, please,” Hudson shot at his colleague. “Also, how about you make yourself useful and print out those forms?”

“Okay, boss,” Gavin said mockingly but walked out nonetheless.

Jackie was barely keeping himself upright, so Hudson took it upon himself to steady him.

“Is it true?” Jackie asked in a raspy breath. “Is he… dead? All of them, dead?”

Hudson filled a cup with water from the sink and handed it to Jackie. “Rinse,” he said.

Under the circumstances, orders like that were the easiest to follow. Jackie obeyed like a young child. And then, he filled the cup again himself and drank, the sound of his gulping the only thing breaking the silence of the bleak interrogation room.

***

The stew wasn’t half-bad, Otis decided, although he would have preferred to call it half-good instead. But how good was half-good? By the rules of mathematics, somewhere in the middle, and he liked to think that his stew was better than that. The correct way to describe it, he thought, after some deliberation, was above decent.

Would Hudson be all right with above decent stew? The deplorable state of the small refrigerator his neighbor had in his apartment should be enough of an argument that his tastes wouldn’t be particularly refined. However, Otis didn’t want to jump to conclusions and then see Hudson unhappy with his stew.

With measured moves, he picked up each piece of cutlery there was and examined it with a critical eye. Now that he had a boyfriend, and not just a temporary one, he definitely needed to invest in some proper spoons and forks.

He looked out the window. It was getting late, and Hudson had said that he would be home in time for dinner. Otis consulted the clock on his phone dutifully. His boyfriend must have gotten caught up in something. According to the internet, phoning to check on your partner too often, too soon, too annoyingly, was a sign of clinginess and frowned upon by boyfriends all over the world.

That meant that he would just have to wait. In the meantime, he had to busy himself with something, so he returned to his phone. Having a boyfriend came with a wide range of responsibilities, one of them being getting to know the other’s hobbies. How difficult was it to learn how to fire a gun?

***

Hudson gathered up all the pictures from the table and stashed them back in their folder. Their job was done. More difficulties would follow, but he believed himself to be a good enough judge of character. The captain would never approve of this kind of unconventional approach, but he did close an eye or two when needed, for the sake of results. Nonetheless, Hudson preferred that the man who trusted him so much didn’t learn about his going off-script in this particular case. Gavin was trustworthy.

And that left him with just one wild card to handle. He didn’t say a word as Jackie moved back to the table and sat on the chair of his own accord. Leaning over and covering his eyes, the young man was rocking his body to comfort himself, as little as that was possible.

“Who did this?” he asked in a raspy voice. “I hope you guys are chasing the fucker who did this. That you caught him already.”

“We haven’t yet,” Hudson said. “And it’s not a single person doing this.”

Jackie looked up. There were lines etched into his face that hadn’t been there before. “What do you mean? Isn’t some sicko, some serial killer or something, doing this?” His eyes trailed to the folder in Hudson’s hand and then moved away. His face was turning green again.

“No, it’s worse than that.”

“What could be worse than that?” Jackie whispered and huddled in on himself. A pained moan escaped his throat, and he rested his forehead against the cold table.

Hudson got up and locked the door. Gavin would get the message and wait until the door got unlocked again.

“How long have you known Watkins, Jackie?”

“The boss? I told you. Since I came into the city. You don’t think… the boss has nothing to do with this,” Jackie said with conviction.

Hudson didn’t offer a reply, knowing very well that his silence was as good as an answer.

“No, you really can’t believe that,” Jackie continued his protests. “What? Do you have like a beef with him or something?”

“When the same MO is noticed in a string of homicides,” Hudson recited, “the first thing on the order of business is to identify similarities between the victims.”

Jackie watched him with the eyes of a wounded animal. “They all worked for the boss. That’s your similarity?” he spat. “It could be just any lunatic.”

Hudson sighed and ran one hand over his face. This job was ninety-nine percent suffering; the rest, if you got lucky, was the satisfaction of putting bad people behind bars. But the rest was dealing with the scumbags of the earth, and the hate, the pain, and the misery they brought on others.

“How do you explain that their disappearance are linked to what you call their graduation?”

Jackie’s eyes grew wide. “You don’t think I had anything to do with this?!” His body began shaking again, his eyes wandering frantically over his surroundings. “Not him, why did it have to be him?” he mumbled and hid his face.

“What was he to you, Jackie?” Hudson asked, as gently as he could.

A shake of the head was the immediate reply. Negation rising from hurt so extensively that it couldn’t be processed.

“Did you sleep with him?” Hudson continued.

“It was more than that,” Jackie lashed out and then, with a pained groan, he grabbed tufts of his hair and pulled, twisting furiously.

“Then you should help me bring down the ones who did this to him,” Hudson said. “They didn’t graduate. You can’t continue to tell the same lie to yourself. And your boss, Watkins, I bet he knows very well. He knows what happened to them. Even more, he’s the reason why this happened to them.” The gentleness had gradually faded from his voice, making room for harshness, and he smacked his hand on the closed folder to get the other’s attention.

“But the boss--” Jackie said and swallowed thickly, “no, it’s not… it can’t be. But even I was there, and then, the boss didn’t let me work with that guy, and yeah, I mean, there were some others who asked for weird stuff, too--”

He was babbling, and there were many things Hudson wanted to extract from that mind, but not as addled by grief as it was now.

“How well do you know Watkins, Jackie?” he insisted again.

Jackie stopped rocking his body. His eyes kept darting to one side, but then they returned to the folder under Hudson’s hand. “There must have been others, like those weirdos,” he whispered.

“Like the one who liked you cold, right?”

Jackie nodded.

“And how did they meet these boys? Who introduced these so-called clients to Elliot, Fergie, and Henry?” He used the victims’ real names, aware of their impact. They were walking a thin line here. And he couldn’t hold Jackie forever. Continuing his undercover op depended on how things stood once they were ready to call this meeting over.

Jackie pursed his lips and squeezed his eyes shut, but there were tears running down his cheeks now, and he couldn’t hold them back. “Henry,” he said, “that’s Sweetheart. He was always so nice. Damn, he was so nice to everyone. Never hurt a fly in his life, that one, I’m sure. Why, why would they do that to him?”

Hudson leaned over the table. “These are people who cannot be called human beings. Help me catch them, Jackie.”

“Like how? I mean, what the hell do I even know? If I’d continued to work for clients, they would’ve gotten me, too. I would’ve been in one of those pictures now.” Jackie started heaving.

Hudson caught his shoulder and squeezed hard to pull him back from the dark place threatening to engulf him. “But you are here,” he said firmly. “And because you’re here, you can make a difference. You can help me get them, put them behind bars--”

“Like hell, I want to kill them!” Jackie reacted, pushing his arm away. “I’m going to get a fucking gun, and I’m going to blow his head off! Not Henry,” he began weeping again, “why Henry?”

“Watkins is not alone in this,” Hudson said.

Jackie raised his eyes to stare at him and wiped them with the back of his hand. “If you know so much, how come they’re still free? They shouldn’t be fucking breathing!”

“You’re right, Jackie. But we need evidence. And we need to know who else is in on it. Do you know of anyone with a metallic voice? Someone who talks like he has a robot stuck in his throat?”

Jackie shook his head. “No, I have no clue about anyone like that. Is that the scumbag who killed my Henry?”

Hudson didn’t want to talk more about what he knew without having Jackie’s signature on the right papers.

“I want your help. And I know you want to help me. So how about we strike a deal, you and me?”

“How? I’ll do it,” Jackie said, closing his fists.

Hudson walked over to the door and unlocked it. Gavin walked in ten seconds later, with the print-out in his hands.

Jackie stared at them for a while, still twisting tufts of his hair from time to time. “I’m becoming a snitch?” he asked bitterly.

Hudson exchanged a glance with Gavin. It was all down to what Jackie was going to say next.

“Can I get a pen?” Jackie asked, stretching out one hand.

***

Waiting was difficult, and one of the most difficult things when you had a boyfriend who was late for dinner, Otis decided. He looked at his phone and pondered over whether certain circumstances were considered appropriate for placing a call to inquire about how long he would have to wait until Hudson got home.

What if he forgot? Otis felt the familiar squeeze in his chest, as the memories threatened to overtake him. His mom had used to forget about him for long hours every day. She was too busy drinking herself into a stupor, grandma had said. Otis had learned the meaning of that expression later, when he started to learn how to talk properly. Stupor was a good word to describe what happened to her during those times. While growing up, Otis had learned ways to unlock the door to the room where she pushed him to be left alone so that, yes, she could drink herself into a stupor.

A paper clip had become his closest friend. For hours, he scraped the insides of the lock with the deformed little thing, listening carefully to every sound. It had taken him many months to figure it out, but in the end, he had become an expert. By instinct, he hadn’t told his grandma that he knew how to pick a lock. It sounded like something only scoundrels would know, and he didn’t want his grandma to think that about him.

With the faithful paper clip hidden in his pocket, he quietly walked around the house. His mom, luckily for him, was a noisy sleeper and if she woke up, she usually knocked over various things in her path, a chair, a cup from the counter, to alert him that she was no longer deep in her slumber. As soon as he heard her, he rushed back to the room and closed the door. He counted on her not realizing that the door was unlocked, due to her state of confusion caused by the alcohol.

And then, the confusing part would begin. She would drop to her knees and hug him.

I’m a good mom, right, Otis?

He’d never known what to say back. She was simply mom, not good, not bad.

Dwelling on the past was good in small amounts, as grandma said. Otis shook his head and turned his attention to his phone. If there had been a reason for his delay, Hudson would have called. Maybe he couldn’t call. Maybe he was caught up in something… but what? A late night photoshoot with sexy men?

Otis surprised himself with the way he pursed his lips until they hurt. Was what he felt right now… jealousy? But taking pictures of handsome men wearing nothing but collars and other things was Hudson’s job. Otis would be a very unpleasant boyfriend if he got jealous over his partner’s occupation.

Still, the images that came to his mind did nothing for his nerves. He got up from the bed and walked to the door. Maybe Hudson was right at the door, and he was working himself into a jealous fit over nothing.

There was no one at the door, nor walking down the hallway. Disappointed, Otis closed the door and returned to the bedroom. Then, he asked the internet how long he was supposed to wait until calling a tardy boyfriend.

***

Hudson checked his phone and frowned. Damn. Things had gone out of his mind completely. And he couldn’t take that call in front of Jackie and Gavin, for a number of reasons. How crazy had he been to get involved with his cute neighbor while undercover? Crazy didn’t cover it. And now he was faced with an incredible dilemma. Anyone would tell him to back away and do everything necessary to get Otis out of his life and himself removed from the other’s life.

But was that really an option? Jackie knew Otis. No, even more, Jackie knew that he was the boyfriend Otis had talked about. There was no coming back from that. To protect him, he couldn’t just call it quits and hope for the best. This whole undercover op was a mess by any standard. The problem was, as always, the human element.

He needed to send a quick text.

“Hey, playing Pokémon can wait,” Gavin warned him.

Displeased and unable to hide it, Hudson put the phone away. Otis would chew him out for sure, but this was one of those situations that made it impossible to act the boyfriend part. The life of a cop. He was wrong to involve Otis in it, and now as it had been for some time, it looked like it was too late.

He followed Gavin and Jackie, whom they were both flanking, down to the other room to finalize all the details. Jackie was walking with his shoulders hunched, like a man heading to his execution. Maybe only now it was starting to dawn on him the kind of dangerous situation he was getting himself into, by turning into a snitch for the police. Watkins must have protected his protégé for reasons only he knew until now, but Hudson doubted that this kind of betrayal – if discovered – would be brushed over. Yeah, after all, Jackie was right to walk like that, as if he was climbing onto the gallows.

Tonight, after all the ups and downs he had suffered, he had gotten himself an informant. He was yet to find out if he still had a boyfriend after missing dinner and being an asshole by not even calling. Worse even, he had just let the other’s phone calls go unanswered. Would Otis understand?

***

Hudson wasn’t picking up. What did that mean? Otis plopped down on the bed and puffed out his cheeks. Usually, he was too busy getting into evening learning of various words and other things, but that held no appeal right now. And learning about guns had proven quite boring.

How little he knew about relationships. Did everyone go through these strange sensations? He didn’t even know if he had reason to worry. What if Hudson had gotten hit by a car? Then, Otis would have to search for him at all the hospitals in the city, like he had seen in movies. But the city was quite large, and there were several prominent hospitals, as well as numerous clinics.

No, he wasn’t supposed to think about bad things. The nice lady who had helped him with speech therapy so patiently had guided him away from dark thoughts.

Life is not all about pain and suffering, Otis…

Even as he had listened to her soothing words, he still felt the taste of ashes in the back of his throat.

But what was the alternative? Otis considered. A problem needed to be looked at from all angles. The first thought that had crossed his mind was that Hudson was surrounded by sexy models and enjoying their attention. In some movies, the jilted wife often discovered that her husband of twelve years or more was having an affair with his secretary.

But Hudson didn’t have a secretary, which was a good thing. Also, suspecting his boyfriend of cheating was a nasty thing to think.

There could be a large number of other reasons why Hudson was so late. Three hours late. The stew was cold. Otis needed to go to sleep, because even one night of bad sleep could wreak havoc on one’s health. Still, as he changed into his night clothes and lay in bed, he doubted that sleep would come quickly tonight.

He turned on one side and focused on the lessons he had learned a long time ago from the therapist and his grandma. One had to think happy thoughts to push away the darkness. Beautiful thoughts were like an incantation that could dispel curses, which were the bad thoughts.

His mind continued to churn. Hudson was at the supermarket, debating what kind of milk to buy. They didn’t have his favorite brand, and it was so late that the personnel had left and locked him in. Otis found himself laughing at the ludicrous scenario playing in his head.

He couldn’t stop worrying, it seemed. He turned on his back and put his hands behind his head. If happy thoughts were important to chase away stupidity, maybe he would just think… He munched on his lower lip. He knew. He’d think of all the nice things Hudson had told him lately.

His phone buzzed, making him jump to pick it up.

I hope you’re already sleeping, but anyway, good night, Otis. Feel free to strangle me tomorrow. I bet that stew was a blast.

TBC