The Witness Wore a Puppy Tail, chapter 14 (Patreon)

Before going to bed, Ken had forgotten to draw the living room curtains, so a spear of light on his face woke him around 10 am. He stretched and sat up, the lethargy vanishing when he thought about Robert. If the little shit had taken off, Ken was going to hunt him down and sit on him. He hurried up the stairs, but he slowed near the top when he heard Robert snoring. Clearly he hadn’t run off.

Trudging back down the stairs, Ken wondered if he had just screwed up. If the captain knew what he’d done, kittens would be birthed. Many kittens. But if Ken hid it, Jenkins would skip the interspecies birthing process and move right to human sacrifice. This is why Ken had liked the military—the rules were clear.

And he hated the military because those clear rules sucked, and having a house fall on his head didn’t even rate an apology. Ken grabbed the phone and dialed the captain’s desk. He was juggling his phone and a pitcher of water for the coffee machine when someone other than the captain answered.

“Captain Jenkins’s phone, may I help you,” the man asked.

“This is Detective Hoffman. Is the captain in?”

The long pause told Ken everything he needed to know. Once again, he was ground zero for the gossip mill. He’d really thought Jimenez’s girlfriend showing up at the station after she’d found out he was married would put the kybosh on that, but not so much. “He worked late and isn’t scheduled until noon. I thought you were on comp time this morning. I heard you worked late.” The pregnant pause begged Ken to share some juicy details.

“Can you transfer me over to Detective Hoyt?”

“Yeah.” The guy on the other end sounded disappointed. Ken was fairly sure it was Becker, but it might be Schultz. 

The phone rang again. “Detective Hoyt.”

“Detective Hoyt, this is Ken Hoffman.” Ken paused to give her time to react. Her lack of any worried him a little. “Captain Jenkins said you were joining me on the bashing cases.”

“Yeah. I’m reading the file now. You’ve filed a lot of paper.”

“And?” Ken wanted to start off on the right foot since he hadn’t worked with her in the past, but that didn’t sound like an auspicious beginning.

“And nothing, Detective. Truth be told, I agree with most of your conclusions. We have escalating violence, one victim who may still die, and now it appears that our suspects have graduated to intimidating or trying to kill a witness. You were on scene last night—which do you think it was?”

Ken’s gut churned, but he only had one answer. “They didn’t order him to shut up or stay away from the area.”

“So, it wasn’t intimidation,” she concluded.

“You should have a statement in there from Henry Moore. He said they were psyching themselves up outside the apartment. Moore looked at how young the suspects were and compared them to little boys trying to work up their nerve, but look at the damage these guys have already done.”

“They don’t need to work up to it,” she said. “So, what? Are we looking at a control and power motive or thrill killings?”

Ken rubbed his face. He hadn’t wanted to get into this discussion before coffee. “I’m guessing thrill killings. The early victims were all chosen for convenience and there’s very little evidence of dominating language. I’m also concerned they’re growing more organized. They’re figuring out what they like, and that’s leading them to increasing levels of violence. That’s why I wanted to bring the FBI in.”

“I can see your point. I can,” Hoyt said in a sympathetic tone. “But you pushed that too early.” She lowered her voice. “People above the captain have said no to a consult, and we’re not going to change their minds until we show them that we’ve done our work and we’ve ticked off our boxes. You have to play this smart.”

Wincing at the idea that he had screwed up, Ken dropped into a kitchen chair. “I want to find these bastards, and I don’t want to get stuck playing politics while someone dies.”

“Hey, I’m with you. I just don’t want to burn any bridges I might need to catch the next assholes who cross my desk. Play the politics, Hoffman. We put in a solid week. We visit these clubs, talk to people--”

“Wait for someone else to get hospitalized with a brain injury,” Ken added. His words came out far sharper than he intended, but he was right. She was suggesting that they wait until they had evidence that these suspects were budding serial killers. That would require a body. 

She sighed. “Hopefully not. Look, some witnesses react better to a less confrontational approach. Maybe I could take a run at Millan.”

“Millan?” Ken thought about Hoyt and Millan. Carol Hoyt was a slight woman with gray hair and a soft smile for everyone. Of course half the time she used that smile to cozy up to suspects and regale them with compliments and sympathy. More than one suspect had confessed out of a mistaken belief that Hoyt would help them. He’d actually studied some of her interrogation tapes because she was that good. However, Robert would eat her alive and spit the bones back out.

“Millan, yes. Robert Millan. Pseudo-rent boy with a penchant for anti-police protests. I’m told he’s rather memorable. Ring any bells?”

“Yeah, I know who he is.” Ken was starting to dislike Hoyt. “However, he does not do well with less confrontational. Hell, he feeds on conflict.”

“Which might be a good reason for me to try again from a different direction. Do you know where he is?”

Ken looked up at the oblong water stain on his ceiling from an old roof leak. The landlord had replaced the roof but hadn’t fixed the ceiling. Right now Millan was sleeping just to the right of that spot. “I couldn’t get him to go anywhere reasonable.”

Hoyt hesitated before saying, “Define reasonable.”

“He asked for a ride to a homeless shelter. When I refused, he wanted to go up to Loyola and sleep on a dorm room floor.”

“Oh, tell me you didn’t.”

“I didn’t,” Ken said. “I brought him home and put him in my bed.”

A long silence followed. A terrifyingly long silence. She cleared her throat, and Ken thought she was going to speak, but even more silence filled the air. Eventually she said, “I’m sorry. Did you say he’s at your house?”

“It was better than letting him sleep on the streets. I had to threaten to follow him around until I could arrest him for loitering to avoid that disaster. And face it, his father would have filed complaints against every member of the department, living and dead, if I had let Millan sleep on the streets.”

“Okay, you do have a point with his father,” she said warily. “Not a great point, but…” She sighed. “Do you have a self-destructive streak I need to worry about?”

Last night had seemed so reasonable, but with a few more hours sleep under his belt, Ken knew that a defense lawyer would twist this into something ugly. "At least I'm ready if the suspects show up," Ken said. “I told him that sleeping on a dorm room floor was putting lives in danger, and I stand by that.”

“I agree on the last part, but there are options between throwing him to the wolves and taking him home. Did you call his father?”

“I get the feeling they aren’t close.”

Hoyt sighed. “Are you being serious? This is starting to feel like a practical joke.”

"I won't leave him unprotected so they can come back and finish the job."

“I didn’t say you should. I respect that you’re willing to stick you neck out for a victim, but you’re...” she didn’t finish her thought, but Ken could pretty much guess all the adjectives that fit.

“I refuse to apologize for protecting a witness.”

“Of course you won’t. Look, I’ll talk to the captain,” she said with a world of weariness in her voice. “But I fully plan to throw Millan under the bus. I’m going to tell Jenkins that you’ve lost perspective and Millan is entirely too good at wrapping people around his little finger.”

"He didn’t want to come here at all. I threatened to follow him around all night and arrest him the minute his ass touched concrete," Ken admitted. 

“It couldn’t happen to a nicer guy,” she said. “And on that note, I’m going to hang up before I find out anything else I don’t want to know. So, if this is an elaborate practical joke and you’re just fucking with me, now is the time to say something.” 

Ken let the silence answer for him.

“God help me,” Hoyt said before she disconnected. Ken couldn’t worry too much about what she might say to the captain because he had a witness upstairs to deal with. And the coffee was done. Ken found the world made much more sense after a few cups of coffee.  He poured himself a mug and headed up the stairs for the second time. As he reached the top, he spotted Robert sitting on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands.

He looked up and said in a self-pitying voice, “Every bone in my body hurts."

The EMT's had cleared Robert, so Ken suspected it probably had more to do with stress than injuries.

"Come on, let's make sure you haven't broken anything new since last night," he said as he offered Robert his hand.

For a second, Robert just eyed Ken’s hand as though it might explode. Then he gave a dramatic sigh and put his hand in Ken’s. Ken pulled him to his feet.

"You're just looking for an excuse to feel me up," Robert complained.

"You should check out the mirror before you say that. The pattern of the wrinkles in my pillowcase are etched in your face." The marks were so deep that they looked like special effects makeup. Clearly Robert had hit the pillow and never stirred once—not even to roll over in his sleep. Robert scrubbed his hand over his cheek. Then he groaned in pain.

"Where does it hurt?" Sometimes adrenaline hid injuries until the next morning.

"Where doesn't it?" Robert shuffled toward the bathroom.

"Can you be more specific?"

"Fine, my shoulder hurts, happy?" Robert asked. He stopped in the bathroom door and rolled his right shoulder.

"God, you wake up cranky, Millan." Ken rested his left hand on Robert's shoulder while he used his fingertips to explore the muscle. A knot coiled just under the skin, and Ken teased the edges of it, pressing into the flesh. Robert groaned.

"Fuck, yeah," Robert said as he let his head fall forward. Ken pressed harder, kneading the reluctant muscles as Robert twitched and moaned. Shit. Ken used massage as his warm up act for sex more often than not, and the sounds Robert was making were sending all the wrong signals to his body.

Ken focused on the bend of Robert's neck and the sleep-warmed scent of his skin, all while warning bells sounded alarms in the back of his head. Robert leaned closer, exposing more collarbone, and Ken’s body warmed in anticipation.

"Damn, you're good. I could get you a job if you ever want to do some moonlighting," Robert said, and the spell broke. "Between your Dom voice and those hands, you'd make a killing." Ken backed off, blinking as he turned toward the stairs to hide his erection.

"Man, I wouldn't mind a little more," Robert complained.

"Catch a shower. You stink." Ken headed downstairs. The bathroom door closed when Ken was halfway down, but Ken continued until he stood at the bottom, wondered what the hell he was doing. At the very least, he wondered about his idiotic cock. He should make breakfast.

Ken closed his eyes and cursed when he realized he’d left his coffee somewhere upstairs, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to risk running into Robert again. Not right now. Abandoning his mug, Ken headed into the kitchen, looking for eggs and a fast way to cool off. Opening the refrigerator and letting the cool air swirl around him seemed the fastest. Fuck, what the hell was wrong with him? Ken took deep breaths of cold, stale air that smelled faintly of molded bread.  Leaning forward, Ken rested his forehead against the open edge of the refrigerator and let the cold burn him.  Ken wasn’t sure how long he stood there, but his cock was finally in full retreat before he gathered the makings for scrambled eggs.

While he waited for the pan to heat, Ken turned on the television and poured another cup of coffee. Ken managed to get together scrambled eggs and toast by the time the shower stopped. He focused on the mundane: hot pans and eggshells and the toast crumbs scattered across the counter. It kept his brain from wandering back to the smell of Robert and the line of his neck.

The morning newscast had a woman in a pink suit cheerfully describing the deaths of three people in a car accident as Robert wandered into the kitchen. He had one towel wrapped around his waist and was using a second towel decorated with tiny Christmas to dry off.

"That smells good," Robert said, and Ken put a plate on the table, ignoring the sudden memory of Robert in that leather harness, clutching a blanket around himself while he berated the officers at Mr. Espinoza's house. When Ken had walked in on that, he had made a few judgments about the man who had gestured wildly, making the silver ring on his wrist restraint jingle. Yeah, and most of his judgments had been dead wrong.

Ken grabbed his own plate and fork before sitting at the table next to Robert who was already eating ravenously.

"I know I acted like a complete asshole last night, and I really appreciate you not actually throwing me in jail, even if the threats were a little over the top," Robert said before shoveling more eggs in.

"You're welcome." Ken ignored the rest as he watched the news.

"A student from Loyola was attacked last night," the woman said, and suddenly Millan's apartment appeared on the screen, the CSU van still there as the first pink rays of morning crept over the hard edges of the buildings.

"Robert Millan, son of civil rights lawyer Sebastian Millan, was attacked by three men last night. Police won't comment, but three men matching the general descriptions of the West Bashers broke into the apartment and attacked Mr. Millan, who was treated at the scene and taken into protective custody as a material witness."

The picture changed to a new man, a man entirely too familiar to Ken. "The latest victim, Raul Mendoza, died less than an hour ago at Washington Hospital after clinging to life for three days." The picture returned to the reporter, who smiled as she turned to a new camera. "Moving to economic news—"

Ken clicked the television off and looked at Robert. He had turned ashen white, and Ken could imagine how he felt. Last night, Robert hadn't just fought off teens who were trying to teach him a lesson. He'd faced three murderers. With his bare hands, he had fought for his life and won. Ken waited for the explosion.

"I'm--" Robert stopped, his words failing. Ken could see the confusion, and he just waited for the reaction.

"I need to get out of here." Robert stood, shoving his chair back with enough force to make it tip over and rattle to the ground. Robert stared at it a second as though trying to figure out why it had fallen.

"Robert, we need to talk about this."

"They put my face on TV. They said I was a witness. Fuck. Those idiots know I work at Loyola."

"They knew all that before. Robert, think through this with me," Ken said calmly, even though he knew Robert's ability to think clearly had probably ended about the time the shock set in.

Robert didn't even answer. He bolted for the stairs, shedding towels as he hurried upstairs. Ken planted himself between Millan and escape. Sure enough Millan came down the stairs seconds later, pulling his shirt on as he navigated the dangerous treads.

"Move," Robert warned darkly.

"Not going to happen, Junior." Ken braced himself. Robert was spinning out of control, and Ken wasn't letting his witness walk the streets alone, panicked and disoriented. Robert would have to get through him first.

"Buddy you do not want to piss me off right now. So, move." Robert's voice trembled with rage.

"Robert, if you want to be pissed, go right ahead, but you are not walking ou--" Ken didn't finish before Robert flung himself forward, and Ken caught a fist in the gut. The kid could hit.

Chapter 15: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-15-19009742 

Chapter 16: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-16-19049610 

Chapter 17: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-17-19064720 

Chapter 18: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-18-19083274 

Chapter 19: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-19-19142224 

Chapter 20: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-20-19153311 

Chapter 21, 22, 23: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-21-21192263 

Chapter 24: https://www.patreon.com/posts/witness-wore-24-21260957