Fan Male Ch. 03

Ian Marcus was crossing the Potomac from the District side back into Virginia. He felt like he'd been flipping back and forth over the river for hours. But he was getting somewhere at last. It was time to set up for Sandman's visit.

He drove into the Virginia suburbs down Lee Highway and into Falls Church, an old Virginia town going back to the time of George Washington that had been swallowed up by the suburbs of the nation's capital in the 1950s. He had a small house there at his disposal that couldn't be traced to him--a house he'd heard about from a guy in a bar in Baltimore that wasn't occupied at the moment because some old queer guy was down in Florida for some time taking care of a sick mother down there. The guy in the bar had said the old queer guy was a recluse and everyone else in the neighborhood stayed away from him. Marcus had found that the house was set in an overgrown yard, wasn't in line of sight from the neighboring houses, and he could park the truck behind the house, all of which was good as gold for what he wanted. And the basement of the house was easily set up for his purposes. He'd had no trouble getting into the house to use it--just one pane of glass in that basement door smashed in.

As he pulled the truck behind the house and turned the ignition off, he grabbed his cellphone and the piece of notepaper where he'd written Todd's name--just his first name; he didn't know the guy's last name--and the phone number of the escort agency. He called the agency to put in an assignment contract with a small, pretty, platinum blond by the name of Todd, who had been recommended to him. He had trouble not laughing about the recommendation part. He'd ask that they meet at Freddie's Beach Bar in Crystal City. He'd already seen the little honey there, so he knew the whore did business there.

* * * *

"In the end we were the only ones who would hire him for the evening work. He did very well by us. In contrast to what some of the other clubs and houses had to say about him, he didn't ruffle the goods here and he was quite effective as a bouncer. He was all muscle and mean looks. He didn't seem all that bright, but it doesn't require a genius to do the job. In some ways it's best not to hire a deep thinker to be a bouncer."

"Did he taste the goods?" Hardesty asked. "Knock any of them around, did he?"

"Not when he was here," came back in answer. Hardesty mulled that one, wondering if he should ask about rumors of behavior on another job, but he decided not to ask. The club manager had alluded to problems elsewhere and Hardesty thought he'd expand on that on his own without being prompted to. This would be the best way to get the information.

Hardesty was sitting in the office of Del himself in the Deloitte House on East Baltimore street in Baltimore, west of the larger inner city Patterson Park, which had been a major pickup venue for gay boys back in Hardesty's younger days when he had just started as a policeman, beginning his career here in Baltimore. As far as he knew, Patterson Park was still a hookup venue. Deloitte House was just one of several gay clubs and brothels near the park on East Baltimore. It was the only one that was blacks only on offer, though, and its madam, a handsome, trim black guy in his late twenties--the third generation of Dels to own and manage the house--was about to give Hardesty the reason why Ian Marcus had done well at this brothel while he'd had trouble at other clubs and male brothels on the street. With luck he'd be able to give Hardesty a reason why the man had moved on to Washington, D.C. It was quite clear, though, that Ian Marcus was the man for the case in the District.

Hardesty had called the vice squad in Baltimore on the basis of Angelique saying the man who had assaulted her said he was from there. The guys in the Baltimore unit allowed as how they had had a case similar to that and even had the Ian Marcus name to attach to it, but nothing had happened in the previous three weeks and, in talking around, they'd heard the guy had moved on, so they'd put the file on a back burner.

"If you have him there in Washington, you can keep him," the Baltimore detective had said.

"You don't sound surprised that he may be in Washington now."

"I'm not," the Baltimore detective answered. "According to the computer file I have here, Ian Marcus isn't his only name. He was adopted. His original name was Danny Smith, and we found he kept and used credit cards in both names. The Smith card, according to this file, is currently being used in the D.C. area. We don't have enough on him to make a move. But there's enough smoke there to keep track of where he is."

"What were you looking at him for?" Hardesty had asked. He hadn't mentioned the MO of the perp in Washington, but he was thinking "Bingo" when the detective said there had been problems with a certain type of gay male prostitute on East Baltimore street. Small, blond, and feminine looking.

"Could be the same guy," Hardesty had said, not interested in sharing all that much with the Baltimore detective if Baltimore vice was happy with giving up any claim to jurisdiction.

"The problem for us--other than getting the brass's interest in anything involving hassling male prostitutes in this town--was that everything was minor or not carried through--more that it was building and we were afraid the guy was going to go all the way with someone."

"Who would I talk to on East Baltimore Street to get more background on this? I'm familiar with The Block, by the way. I started off on the Baltimore force." Hardesty didn't get into what his more significant connection to The Block was--which was as a player himself--and the reason why he was nudged by the Baltimore brass, the detective mentioned, to take his career elsewhere. Hardesty had used Patterson Park as a pickup venue himself--and he'd gained quite a reputation for how he used the young men he picked up there--not that they avoided him, once used.

The detective mentioned several clubs and brothels that this Marcus had worked at as an evening bouncer and/or there had been trouble reported with him.

"Do you mind if I come to Baltimore and talk to some of these folks?"

"Not at all. As I said, if you have a case to work on this guy there in D.C., be our guests working it. The brass here aren't anxious to have this sort of case on our books at all."

So, Hardesty had come to Baltimore and moved from clubs to brothels on East Baltimore Street, being stonewalled until he'd gotten to Deloitte's House. Once he'd told those he first saw that he was from the Washington, D.C., vice squad and, with permission from the Baltimore police, was interested in talking about Ian Marcus, everyone had clammed up. He'd felt he had to be straight up with them, especially since he hadn't been the Baltimore force's favorite cop when he'd worked here. Only a few of them claimed to know Ian Marcus and fewer of them admitted he'd worked in their business. Even those who admitted that, though, weren't willing to discuss what had gone bad--why Marcus no longer worked for them.

At the front door of Deloitte's House, when the house manager himself, Del, was summoned to the door, it had looked like Hardesty would be stiffed here too, but someone Hardesty recognized, a prostitute named Arch who Hardesty had known--and had relations with when they were both younger--had appeared over Del's shoulder. He'd seen Hardesty, flashed him a smile, and whispered something in Del's ear. After that the house manager was all "Welcome, come in, and come on back to my office. We'll see what we can do for you."

Hardesty knew Del had a different idea why he was there than Hardesty did, but Hardesty used the misunderstanding to get to the guy's office and then just launched into his real reason for being there.

"I wonder why Marcus bombed out everywhere else on The Block but was OK here," Hardesty asked near the end of the discussion in Del's office.

"That's easy," Del said. "We're all black here. Marcus's fetish was little blond guys. He couldn't keep his hands off them, and he wanted to do kinky sex with them. They ran from him--not because he wasn't a hunk in his own way, but he seemed too crazy and because of the stuff he wanted to do. He wanted to try new, complicated and physically dangerous stuff he wasn't experienced in. He got hooked on some Internet story site where some writer was writing all sorts of kinky sex stories. Marcus wanted to replicate the stories. Here, I think I can bring up the site on this computer."

Del turned to a laptop on his desk and keyed in a Web site and then a screen within the Web site. "Here. Here's the site and I found a story by the writer. His name is Sandman." He turned the screen around to where Hardesty could see it and gave Hardesty a little knowing smile.

"A story Web site, you say?" Hardesty said, looking at the screen and noting the Web site name, but not looking closely at the story. "I Wonder why he left here for D.C."

"That's not a headscratcher either. This Sandman wrote a lot about small, blond, pretty guys in his stories, which mated up with the fetish Marcus already had, and he got it in his mind that Sandman was small, blond, and pretty and would be delighted to play with him. Marcus seemed to realize he didn't have the experience to safely try what he wanted to do. Sandman wrote like he knew how to do it. A lot of the stories were set in D.C., and Sandman had let slip that was where he was--so, off Marcus went. At least that's what we've decided here."

"Thanks, that clears a lot up," Hardesty said. "That leaves why you were so willing to talk with me when everyone else slammed their doors to me."

"Baby, it's because I wanted to have you here with me to look at," Del said, with a laugh. He reached over and put a hand on Hardesty's thigh. "My boy Arch, who is lurking on the other side of that door, waiting for us to move on to some fun, told me you were a player--and a player as we like it. Arch says you've been naughty with him before in special ways. Here, look at this story I brought up on the screen. See what Sandman is writing about here." He gestured for Hardesty to take a closer look at what was written there.

He turned me on my back again, and I spread and bent my legs and lifted my pelvis to him, willingly, offering myself as a sacrifice, a sacrifice he accepted. He fisted me. Now I could take it after the reaming of his cock over the previous hour. I would give him anything, and he wanted--and took--it all. I panted and groaned as he penetrated me with a greased hand up to his wrist, taking his time.

"We have all the time in the world," he murmured to assure me that I was completely in his control.

"Be good to me, Master," I begged.

"You wish me to stop? You wish me to withdraw?"

"No. Have me as you like."

Del smiled. "I've scratched your itch. You can scratch ours now. Let us give you a tour of our place."

The tour ended in the fully equipped basement room, where Hardesty was encouraged to relive old times with Arch, who Hardesty found strapped to an X-frame. Afterward Hardesty drove back to Washington in his Hummer humming. At the Maryland rest stop on I-95 between Baltimore and Washington he stopped and made a phone call.

"Larry. Add a name to that search you're doing for me, please. Danny--or Daniel--Smith, of Baltimore." That was the name on the credit card Marcus was using in Washington, D.C.

* * * *

The German artist, Helmut Stern, was not what Kit Helms had been expecting, and Kit could have kicked himself for not having checked his profile entries on the Internet. He'd assumed from the German's reputation and the number of works Kit had seen photographs of and references to that the man would be ancient. He wasn't. He couldn't be more than in his late thirties, and he was robust as hell. He was very Germanic--tall, big boned, with one of his biggest bones, Kit hoped, hanging between his thighs, blond, ruddy complexioned, and boisterous. He also was touchy feeling, touching Kit and walking close to him while Kit was giving him the behind-the-scenes walking tour of the National Gallery of Art. Obviously, someone had told him that Kit took cock.

In a dimly lit storage room housing the German Renaissance art period, Stern came in close behind Kit, put his arms around the young man, and whispered, "You smell bezaubernd--lovely. Ich will dich ficken."

"What?" Kit asked in surprise and shock. He knew what ficken meant in German.

"I want to fuck you. I'm horny. I was horny when Hopkins and I talked about who would behandlen--handle me--who I would handle--on this tour. He told me you take cock and that you're an easy lay. You take cock, Ja? I was even more horny when I saw you. I am a männliche--how do you say? Virile?--man. I must have it regularly. My art come from the lust--the same as you say it, Ja?--for young men like you. You take a big cock, I hope."

Kit groaned. William Hopkins had been telling tales. Willian Hopkins, the curator who had given him the internship job here--who had hired him at least in part because Kit had let the man pick him up in a Georgetown bar and fuck him. He couldn't deny he took cock, no. He couldn't say he hadn't been an easy lay for Hopkins. And he'd been thinking of this robust German artist in those terms during the tour.

"And Hopkins says you are lüstern--wanton, lustful--too. He says he's seen you take three men in a night."

That was true too. That damned New Year's party.

"You take my cock, Ja?"

"Ja," Kit answered, with a sigh, but trembling from the prospect. The man was a hunk and Kit had been told to make him happy and to keep him happy. "Not here, though. There must be someplace--"

"You take a big cock, Ja?"

"Ja, OK."

"I am booked at the Alexander Hotel. Hopkins tells me there is no trouble--"

Kit laughed. Everything was the Alexander Hotel these days. That was where gay guys with money did it.

Stern fucked Kit in an upholstered chair in the man's hotel room at the Alexander. Kit's butt was scooted down to the front edge of the chair. his legs were draped over the arms, and the German had methodically opened his hole with his tongue and lubricated fingers. The man hadn't been able to wait to get them into bed. He had bunched up the fingers and gone in to the knuckles, with Kit opening to him and panting at the prospect of a cruel fuck, crying out in his mind only, Yes, yes. Fist me! Make me feel it. Make me scream! Kit had been fisted before; he'd never had as intense a fuck as this.

But the man didn't fist him. That didn't mean he didn't take Kit completely.

Stern crouched over him, his thumbs on Kit's throat, forcing Kit's head to arch over the top of the back of the chair. As big as the man was, his cock didn't match in proportions--that had been a somewhat empty boast and a disappointment for Kit, who had mentally prepared for it--but he was large and thick enough to get the job done. What he lacked in size, he made up for in stamina. Kit dug his fingernails into the man's shoulder blades and went with the ride. The ride wasn't wild, though, it was just rhythmic, the sheathed cock moving in and out in unvaried speed and rhythm, seemingly taking forever for the man to work up to an ejaculation, with Kit panting and moaning in low tones and the German crying out "Ja, Ja! Nimm es! Nimm es!--Take it! Take it!" as if he was taking Kit with wild abandon and a really, really big one, which he wasn't.

The most arousing part came after the first fuck, when Stern came in his condom, pulled away and said, "Bleiben Sie dort, so. Das muss ich festhalten--Stay there like that. I must capture that," and went off to retrieve a sketch pad and sticks of charcoal. As Kit remained stretched out and all askew in the chair, legs over the arms, in a pose exhausted more by the time the fuck took than the vigor with which he'd been screwed, a naked Stern--looking hunky enough to keep Kit interested--quickly sketched Kit in the postcoital nude. It was then that Kit remembered Hopkins had shown him a closely held portfolio of similar sketches Stern had made. What was lost on Kit at the time was that Hopkins had probably been signaling what was expected of him on this tour. A little late for that. But Hopkins had been right that Kit would be an easy lay for the man.

After the sketch was done, they fucked again, Kit on his back on the bed, holding his legs raised and spread, as the German hovered over him, fists pressed into the mattress on either side of Kit's biceps and thrusting and thrusting and thrusting--slow, methodical, a never-changing rhythm and pattern, building up to his ejaculation, marking it only by a sharp intake of breath and a long exit slide.

Afterward, when Kit was driving back to his apartment, he tried to figure out what had been wrong--unmoving--with the fucks. They had been fine. But just fine. His cock hadn't been as advertised but that wasn't all that was a little "off." They'd been very Germanic, though. Organized, methodical, getting the job done--the trains running on time--but little excitement.

Stern obviously had been pleased with them, and he'd made two sketches, giving Kit one and thus making the afternoon quite profitable if only after the German died and his art had appreciated significantly. And, at one time the screwings would have been enough for Kit. But since he'd been fucked more cruelly, more passionately, with more pain, demand, and abandon, by a few men, he realized that that was what he needed to reach the heights of pleasure and satisfaction--at least a bit of pain helping him to break through to the ecstasy and passion. He wanted to be punished a bit in the process.

Pain, ecstasy, passion. Even fucked with a fist if that helped get it "there."

* * * *

Hardesty wasn't back at his desk at D.C. vice any longer than to call out, "Where the fuck's Whitehall gone at?" when the unit research clerk, Larry, was standing in front of him with paper in his hands.

"You seen Whitehall?" Hardesty asked.

"I know where he is. He's at a house up on MacArthur Boulevard getting in on a homicide call. You'll want to be up there yourself."

"Why would I want to get in on a homicide?" Hardesty asked. "I've got a lovely vice case of my own." He laughed. Hardesty was in a good mood.

"The victim is one of the names you gave me on a list to check out this morning."

"Fuck you say. Which one?" Hardesty was all business again. That list was names from Toby's recent contacts. Hardesty didn't fuck around when it came to Toby.

"Jason Jarvis."

"Fuck." Hardesty stood up from his desk, ready to be on the move again. He looked at his copy of the list. Toby had serviced that guy just the day before. "OK, give me the address of this place on MacArthur."

As he did so, Larry said. "The name you just gave me has come up on the screen too."

"Danny Smith? The one I called in while driving back from Baltimore?"

"Daniel Smith, yes. Confirmed because of the credit card number you gave me. That escort agency called in just before you arrived back. The name and card number tried to book a session with Toby."

"What the fuck? They didn't make a booking, did they?"

"No, sir. But, like they say you asked them to do, they strung him along until they'd gotten a name and credit card number."

"Thanks, Larry, you did great. Call the agency back and thank them for me. Say I own them one. Keep working that list. We'll party when this is all over. You and me."

Larry nearly melted on the spot. He lived for attention like this from Hardesty. He also was delighted to be the one to give praise to the escort agency. He'd die to be listed with them and there always was the chance that contact like this could lead to getting on their list. As he was returning to his desk at the entrance of the unit, Hardesty took out his cellphone and called Toby. "Toby, this is Hardesty. Get yourself over to Paul's and stay there until I come home. Don't answer your phone for anyone but me."