Snitches Ch. 03: The Next Day

"It's pretty obvious that he was killed during sex, Raul. It's a rough trade."

"No, I think it's bigger than that. Not that he hasn't been killed during sex—but I think it was someone wanting to find Jason. Someone who didn't want something being told. But Jason did tell. He told Lyle and Drew and me."

"Drew?"

"Yeah. One of my roommates is Drew. Drew Dunston."

"Shit," Hardesty exclaimed. "OK, you'd better tell me. What does this Jason know and who's trying to silence him? And where the fuck is he?"

"That's just it. Jason's gone. He was so scared that he took off for home yesterday."

"Where's home for Jason and why was he scared?"

"Pennsylvania. Allentown. Jason's from there. He said he had a sugar daddy to go back to. Some guy who owned a store. The guy who initiated and took care of Jason before he moved here."

"What was he scared of?"

"One of Jason's regulars—a kinky guy, Jason said, keeps coming up on TV. A senator or someone. He's up for some important office. Vice president or something."

"Etheridge? Halburton Etheridge?" Hardesty asked.

"Yeah, that was the name."

"Christ almighty," Hardesty exclaimed.

"Yeah. Jason sometimes comes home with welts on him. Some guy—this Etheridge, apparently—likes to whip and fuck him. Jason always said the john paid him real well and that he kinda got off on it himself. Anyway, last night—he was in the same hotel you took me too . . ."

"The Downtowner?"

"Yes. Two of this senator's goons took Jason there, with Jason thinking they were taking him to the senator, and they fucked him up and he said they were going to kill him to keep him quiet about the senator now that there was a big job at stake. But he got one of them down and got away. Came right here, packed, and left. He told the rest of us what happened while he was packing, though."

Hardesty knew about the body of a private cop that had been found in one of the rooms of the Downtowner.

"Shit, Raul, we've got to get you out of here. Somewhere safe."

"And Drew too. I don't know where Drew is, but he heard the same thing Lyle and I did."

"Drew's safe now, Raul. Ain't nobody who's going to hurt him now. It's you we need to worry about. Give me a minute with the guys here and I'll take you somewhere. We'll keep you safe."

* * * *

"Shit, this is some place," Raul said when they entered the apartment. "Whose place is this?"

"This is my apartment," Hardesty said. "You can spend the night here. We'll figure out what to do with you tomorrow."

"Spend the night here? With you?"

"If you want. If it will give you comfort." Hardesty was keyed up and in need of it enough that he knew that fucking Raul again would comfort him.

"I want. Hey look, you can see all the important shit in Washington from here. The Washington Monument too." He gave a little laugh, the first time Raul had been anything but close to tears since Hardesty had returned to police headquarters and found him, shaking and scared, waiting for him there.

"Yeah, it's quite a view," he said, pulling off his jacket and undoing the harness for his gun holster.

"You know I can't look at the Washington Monument without thinking of—" Raul started to say.

"A hard dick," Hardesty finished for him. "Yeah, me neither."

"Your hard dick," Raul said. "I can't forget you fucking me yesterday. Fucking me good, with a huge dick." He had turned from the window and come back to where Hardesty was standing. "Fucking me rough. I didn't know I wanted it that rough. And when I was sucking it . . ."

"Is that what you want, Raul? Will that help you calm down? Do you want to suck it again. Being fucked by it again?"

"Yeah, that's what I want," Raul said, sinking to his knees in front of Hardesty. "What do you want?"

"That's what I want too, Raul. But as I told you before, I'm not going to pay for it."

"Hell, I found that having it taken from me gave me a hard on that paying johns don't," Raul answered. He was rubbing Hardesty's crotch, feeling his hard on under the material of the trousers. Both of them knew there was no stopping this train now.

"That's another reason you should just go home, Raul. Having that sort of need is going to get you killed."

"Are you gonna fuck me or not?" Raul responded in a petulant voice.

"Yeah, I'm going to fuck you." Hardesty unzipped his trousers, and Raul did the rest—pulling the cock out, which of course was erect, opening his mouth to it, sucking it.

Later it occurred to Hardesty what he was mimicking while he fucked Raul, and he almost laughed. The only difference was that Raul was bound—because he said he wanted to be—at the wrists by his belt and at the ankles by Hardesty's belt. Otherwise it was the same position on the sofa that Hardesty had watched the Oriental client fucking Toby the previous night. Raul's knees were pushed into where the sofa cushion met the sofa back and he was bent over the back of the sofa, his bound arms dangling toward the carpet behind the sofa, his legs bound together, and Hardesty, feet up on the sofa cushion, crouched over Raul's back, mounted on him and fucking him from a high position while grasping the hair on the back of the young Hispanic's head and arching his head back.

"Jesus you're rough," Raul cried out.

"You want it this way. You want to feel it."

"Shit yes, I want it this way."

Pounding, pounding, pounding the young Hispanic, just as they both wanted to avoid thinking about the power of the man out there who was searching for Raul and Jason—the two survivors left—and to assuage their own carnal lust.

Afterward, Raul wanted Hardesty to take him into Hardesty's bedroom and continue fucking him, but Hardesty said, "No, not until later. Time to settle in. You'll find what you need in the refrigerator and then you can shower and sit and contemplate the similarities between the Washington Monument and my dick if you want to. I have someplace to go before the government closes down and then I have to make better arrangements for you for the next few days than here."

He made it up to Capitol Hill just before the congressional offices were closing for the evening. He got a surprise from the receptionist in Senator Etheridge's office.

"Someone from the police has already been here this afternoon," she said. "I told him the senator went back to his home state to meet with constituents earlier today. Didn't the other policeman tell you that?"

"The other policeman? What did he look like?"

"Tall, blond, handsome, but with a smart mouth," she said.

Phil. So that's where he went. Drew had told him the story. He was following up on it on his own.

"What state is the senator from? Where has he gone?"

"He represents Pennsylvania. He left for Allentown this morning, I think."

Allentown? The same place the guy he wants to smother went? "Shit," Hardesty said, as he whirled around and left the office.

"Another smart mouth," the receptionist said to no one in particular as she returned to closing up the office for the day. "But sexy as hell. As sexy as the other one, but in a different way."

Hardesty put in a call to Crane at Vice while he drove back across the river to Crystal City.

"Sure, you can go up to Allentown if you want tonight—to be there tomorrow," Crane said. "I'll make connections. You'll have to leave it to the police there, and, being as how it's a U.S. senator, they'll probably have to get some ducks in line politically. You can fill them in when you get there. So you think Phil has gone over to the dark side?"

"I think he's been mostly there for some time, Captain. I'm sorry to say that both of the strangled rent-boys look like his work. I wouldn't be surprised if he's trying to eliminate the competition in being able to blackmail the senator."

"Shit. I'll have to take this upstairs, but they'll want this rolled up and tamped down ASAP. You're green lighted to see what you can do. So, when are you starting out?" Crane asked.

"Later this evening. I have to put this witness to bed first."

Crane didn't ask what putting a witness to bed meant. In fact, knowing Hardesty as he did, he decided not to ask. It first meant Hardesty knocking on the door of the man down the hall in the Crystal City apartment who put Hardesty up when Toby needed the entire use of the apartment—in exchange for sexual favors.

"Hardesty," Paul said when he opened the door. A big grin went across his face. He was in his mid fifties, but he'd kept in shape and was a handsome man. He also could be a very lonely man. He'd been a real player in his day—a male model—and still did some catalog work when they needed an older man, so he had a reason to keep in shape. He didn't get his itch scratched much these days, though. "You need a place to stay tonight?"

"I need a favor," Paul. "And I have an itch. Haven't been here in a while."

Paul had a plow belt he liked to use—a thick, black leather strap with hand holds at both ends, a doggie sex strap. Hardesty fucked him with the strap supporting Paul's stomach, and Paul suspended in air out beyond the foot of his bed. The tops of his feet were on the bed, Hardesty was standing between his legs, and Paul's torso was arched back, his hands locked behind Hardesty's neck. Paul worked out a lot. He liked the athletic, testing fuck positions. He particularly liked sex with Hardesty, because the vice cop was strong enough to support Paul's body suspended with the belt—and Hardesty didn't cut him any slack because of his ate.

Paul was doing the splits on his dresser, his hands pressed on the dresser top in front of him, and his buttocks suspended beyond the front of the dresser with Hardesty gripping his waist and plowing his ass when Paul asked him what the favor was.

"As I remember, you like to go both ways. Is that right?" Hardesty asked.

"Yes, but you don't, so I don't usually—"

"I've got a real honey of a rent-boy you can use for a few days if you'll put him up and keep him a secret. I've got to go out of town for a few days, and he needs to be hidden. But he can be used hard in exchange for room and board."

Hardesty made some calls before returning to his apartment. He found Raul, naked on his bed, and asleep. A few snaps on the young man's back and buttocks with Hardesty's belt brought him awake, after which Hardesty used the belt to bind Raul's wrists behind his back, mounted his ass, and rode him hard while slapping his butt. Raul loved the attention.

After feeding him dinner, Hardesty fucked Raul again, this time reclining on the ottoman in the living room and having Raul crouched between his spread legs, facing away from him, backed into his cock, while Hardesty grabbed the young man's wrists and pulled them back toward his shoulders. Raul fucked himself on Hardesty's cock in this position.

When Hardesty delivered him to Paul's apartment, He was met with a smiling Paul, who already was ready, naked, and fisting the handles of the plow belt he'd introduce Raul to for the next two days.