Common Powers

by Lynn Lorenz

  “You arrestin’ me?” He stared at Brian through one good blue eye, the other starting to swell shut.

  “Not yet. This is for your safety and mine. I need to go in and find out what happened and I can’t have you out here alone.” He did not need this guy wandering off, only to wind up in a ditch or hit by a car. He got both his hands under Mott’s arms and lifted. Mott came off the ground and kept his feet under him, but protected his ribs with both hands.

  “I can tell you what happened. I got the shit kicked out of me.” He flung an arm toward the bar. “Motherfucker.” In Brian’s estimation the guy wasn’t drunk, or at least not over the legal limit, but a breathalyzer would give him the results later. Right now, he needed to find out what had happened.

  Brian walked him to the patrol car, leaned him against the side and opened the back door. “Go on and get in. I’ll be back in a few.” He guided Mott’s head down, helped him drag his legs in, then shut the door.

  Time to find out the what, why and how. He already knew when and where.

  He stepped into the bar, pausing to let his eyes adjust to the dim lighting. He scanned the place. Not a big crowd, but at least a dozen men and women. Brian located one of the bartenders he knew and strode over to the bar.

  “What happened, Mel?” Brian took out his pen and pad and rested them on the bar. Mel had a phone in his hand, but when he turned and saw Brian, he hung up.

  “Shit. Why’d you catch this? Guess it’s for the best, under the circumstances.” Mel shook his head, then let out a breath. “Okay, look, Phillip comes in here every couple of nights or so. Has a beer or two.” He leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Sometimes, he picks up a guy. They go into the bathroom and come out after ten, fifteen minutes. Thinks I don’t know what they’re doing.” He shrugged. “I don’t care. Live and let live.”

  “He’s hooking? I didn’t think you’d let that go on here, Mel.”

  “Nah. No money, just sex. Like I said, I don’t care. Consenting adults.”

  “So, what happened?”

  “So, tonight, he picked the wrong guy. I couldn’t get to him in time to warn him.”

  “Who threw the first punch?” Brian took off his Stetson, wiped his forehead with his arm, and settled it back on. It might be in the forties outside, but with his department jacket on, in the bar it was a shade warm.

  “Guy in the black hat. Jamie Crowder. I haven’t seen him in here for ages.”

  “I guess he’s not gay?”

  Mel snorted. “Guess not. When I looked over, Jamie was standing there and shouting, ‘Get away from me, you queer piece of shit.’ He hit Phillip smack in the eye, knocked him off his bar stool and started kicking him on the ground. That’s when I grabbed Paul”—he nodded toward the other bartender at the end of the bar—“and we pulled him off Phillip. We tossed him out, mostly to keep him from getting hurt worse. How’d you get here so fast?”

  “You didn’t call us earlier?” Brian covered his early arrival.

  “Nope. Someone else must have done it. Glad they did, though. You find Phillip?”

  “Yeah, got him in the cruiser, out of the cold.”

  Brian wrote the facts down as Mel told the familiar tale. Gay guy misses the cues, comes on to the wrong guy and wham. Beat down.

  “I got it. Thanks for stepping in.”

  “You might want to get Phillip to a doc. Steel-toe boots can do a lot of damage.” He shook his head.

  “Will do. Listen, any physical damage to the bar?”

  “No, luckily. Phillip can’t afford to pay damages, and frankly, if I was going to go after anyone, it’d be that jerk Jamie. If you ask me, Jamie’s in the closet, but no one is asking me and I don’t care if he is or not. I just don’t want him beating up my steady customers.”

  Mel frowned and Brian got the feeling he liked Phillip way more than Jamie, and probably for good reason. Brian understood Mel didn’t care who a man or woman loved, mostly because he thought it wasn’t his business and anything that came between his bar and customers wasn’t in his interest.

  “I’m going to have a chat with Mr. Crowder. Thanks.” Brian moved toward the table where three men in their early to mid-twenties sat huddled over their beers. As he approached, one of the men cocked his cowboy hat up on his head, leaned back in his seat, rocking the front legs off the ground, and tried to look tough.

  Good luck with that.

  “Mr. Crowder? Officer Brian Russell, Spring Lake PD.” He didn’t extend his hand but kept his gaze locked on his suspect.

  “That’s me.” Crowder glanced at the other guys and grinned.

  “Gentlemen, if you’ll give us a few moments alone?” Brian jerked his head in the direction of away. They slid out of their seats and eased to the other side of the bar, near the jukebox.

  “Mr. Crowder, I understand you were involved in a fight tonight with Mr. Mott.”

  “I was. Fucking fag offered to give me a blow job!” Crowder’s gaze danced away from Brian’s.

  “You couldn’t just say no? You had to punch him and kick him?” Brian spread his legs a little more and crossed his arms over his chest, flexing his biceps just a bit. Crowder might think on beating Mott, who was half Brian’s size, but he’d never dare try that shit with Brian.

  “Well…” Crowder let the chair drop back to the ground. “Now, I ain’t saying I did nothing.”

  “I have witnesses that say you did. And I have a victim that might need medical treatment. So, what I say is…” Brian rolled his eyes up for a second, then narrowed them down to Crowder. “Please stand up, put your hands behind your back. You’re under arrest.”

  “Fuck.” Crowder tensed and, for a moment, Brian saw something wild flicker in Crowder’s eyes—flight or fight or give up. Brian didn’t feel up to a scuffle, but he would if he had to.

  “Don’t be stupid, Crowder. I’ve got witnesses and your name.” Brian lowered his voice and Crowder sort of just drooped, even as he rose out of his chair and complied.

  Brian ricked on the cuffs as he read Crowder his Miranda rights. Then he leaned in close to Crowder’s ear. “And by the way, just so you know, I’m one of those ‘fucking fags’.”

  Crowder’s ‘what the fuck?’ expression almost started Brian laughing, but he kept control. “Come on, let’s go.” He spun Crowder around with his hand on the cuffs and got him facing the door then, with a push, started him moving.

  He needed to get Crowder to lock-up, but he also had Mott to deal with.

  “Thanks, Mel!” He got a wave from the bartender as he opened the door and pushed his perp through it.

  Brian reached up to his shoulder and pressed his radio button. “Going to need a car to transport to lock-up. One in custody. I have a victim with injury to deal with.”

  He got the okay from dispatch then walked Crowder over to his cruiser. Time to pat him down and get him into the back seat of the transport as soon as it arrived.

  He glanced into the back seat of his car. Phillip Mott sat there, head back against the seat, eyes closed. Or maybe it was the swollen shut eye he was seeing. No ambulance, huh?

  “You arrestin’ him too?” Crowder sneered.

  “Nope. He’s the victim.” Brian shook his head.

  “He wanted to give me a blow job! Isn’t that illegal?”

  “Did you ask him how much? Did you give him money?”

  Crowder sputtered. “Fuck no!”

  “Then it’s not illegal. But beating someone up, assault, that’s illegal.”

  He found little on Crowder. A pack of smokes, his wallet, a condom. Typical pocket contents. No drugs. No weapons.

  “Sit down on the ground, cross your legs and lean against my tire.”

  Crowder grumbled, but obeyed.

  Brian reached into the car and got out the breathalyzer. “Here. Blow hard.” He held it to Crowder’s mouth. The man took it and blew. Just under the limit.

  “It’s your lucky day, Crowder. No DUI today.” Part of Brian wished he�
��d been over the limit, just to add some more onto the arrest. Guys like Crowder, willing to hurt someone over his own insecurities, needed to learn a lesson.

  Guys like Phillip Mott, they needed people like Brian to help keep them safe, maybe find a little justice. It was what he’d signed up as a cop for and why he’d been a PI back in Houston. Getting justice for the little guy.

  Phillip Mott was one of the little guys. He’d seen them before at bars. Hell, at one time in his life, he’d been one of them. Barely nineteen. Just realizing he liked dick, but not knowing what to do about it, other than hit bars and look for fast, easy hook-ups. But he’d grown up in Houston.

  In a small Texas town like Spring Lake, playing that game was taking your life in your hands. Brian wanted to be part of the fix for that problem. He wished life were different, but knowing how hard it had been for his own partner Rush Weston to come out of the closet here, well, he didn’t expect things to change too fast.

  Still, with two ‘out’ gay couples, he and Rush, a rancher, and Jack, the chief of police and his partner Edward, who ran a day spa, now living in Spring Lake, the times were changing, just not as fast as he’d like.

  Not fast enough for the Phillip Motts of this world.

  Flashing lights appeared and in a minute a cruiser slowed, turned in and parked next to his car.

  Officer Gale Blount got out, they swapped info and Blount took possession of his suspect. Brian would still have to write up the report, but at least he could avoid the time it took to do the booking and get on to seeing to Phillip Mott.

  The patrol car drove off and Brian turned to his current problem waiting for him in the back seat of his cruiser.

  He opened the door and leaned over. “Hey, you okay?”

  Mott rolled his head to look at Brian out of his good eye. “Yeah. Can I just go home? Am I under arrest?”

  “No, you’re the victim in this. And I’ll take you home. But you really should see a doctor. I’ll need a statement from you, but that can wait until tomorrow.” Brian sighed and shut the car door. He walked around to the driver’s side and got in. “You can come back for your car tomorrow too.”

  “Don’t have a car.”

  “How’d you get here?”

  “Walked. Sometimes I catch a ride.” He shrugged. “It’s not that far.”

  “Okay. Give me your address.”

  “You know Smith’s, the tire store and garage? I live behind it.” He slumped back against the seat.

  Brian pulled out and headed down the main street toward the garage. He remembered picking up Edward there when he’d first arrived in Spring Lake. That had not been a good experience for Edward, due to some homophobic mechanics who’d hassled him.

  “You work there too?” Brian frowned into the rearview mirror.

  “Yeah. Work the front counter. Live in a trailer behind the shop.”

  No way this is the guy who harassed Edward, is it? He drove for a little while longer before his curiosity got the better of him.

  “How long?”

  “Just under a year. It’s not what I want to do with my life, but it pays the bills.”

  Brian tried to remember the description of the guy… Hadn’t Edward mentioned his name? It started with a J, didn’t it? John? James? Jimmy?

  “You got a mechanic there named Jimmy?”

  Mott rolled his eyes and pursed his lips like he’d sucked on a lemon. “That son of a bitch? Yeah. He’s a real piece of work.”

  Brian relaxed. Mott’s dislike of Jimmy couldn’t be plainer.

  “Must be hard working with someone like him, day in and day out. He knows you’re gay?”

  “Fuck no! If he did I’d be out of there before I could spit and in worse shape than now, for damn sure.” Mott stared out of the window for a time, then met Brian’s gaze in the mirror. “Are you going to out me? Write it up in your report? I can’t afford to lose my job and my place.”

  “Well…I suppose I could keep the nature of your scuffle vague, but if Crowder gives a statement, it’ll have to go down in the report. So, it’s really out of my hands.” Brian shrugged. “Wish I could do more.”

  “Right.” Mott sighed. “Well, Merry Fucking Christmas to me.” He closed his eyes and turned his head away to stare out of the window.

  Brian reached the garage and turned the corner. “Back here?”

  “Yeah. See? That’s my trailer. For now.” A ramshackle trailer, the kind towed behind a pickup back in the 1960s, stood parked in the farthest part of the rear parking lot, next to the back fence. Dents and peeling paint marred the aluminum siding. A soft light glowed from one of the two small windows. “Home sweet home.” Mott snorted.

  God, he sounded so defeated. And Christmas was just a few days away. Brian could only imagine what it would be like for Mott. Did he have friends or family? He almost asked, but it really wasn’t his business.

  He got out of the car, came around and opened Mott’s door. “I’m sorry, man. Wish I could do more.”

  Mott eased out of the back seat with a few groans, then stood as straight as he could. “You’ve done enough, Officer.”

  “Brian Russell. Here, take my card. If you need anything, just call. I’m serious.” Brian held out one of his business cards with the station’s phone number. “Call me tomorrow to set up a time for the statement. Just ask for me.”

  Mott took it and slipped it into his back pocket. “Night, Brian.” And with that he limped off to the trailer as he got out his keys. He stepped onto a small wooden deck made from a shipping pallet and unlocked the door. Then, without a look back, he opened it and slipped inside.

  Brian got back in his cruiser, reversed and headed to the station, thinking of how to write it up. Wouldn’t matter much if Crowder talked about Mott asking to give him a blow job. Then, all bets were off.

  * * * *

  Phillip hung on to the top of his tiny refrigerator as he pulled open the freezer door. After taking out a bag of frozen peas that he kept there for times like this, he stumbled to his bunk and fell onto it.

  He winced as he placed the bag over the side of his swollen face. Fuck. How the hell was he going to explain this tomorrow? Maybe the swelling would go down enough. He could tell everyone his bad knee had acted up and he fell, hit his face on the table. That would work.

  Man, he’d fucked up tonight. He looked around the trailer. It wasn’t much, but right now, it was all he had. Some clothes, a used laptop, a pair of boots, a pair of work shoes, a lightweight winter jacket. Everything else belonged to the trailer.

  How long before the story got around and Joe Smith, Flynn, or, worse, Jimmy heard about how it happened? What would Estaban think of him getting his ass kicked?

  How the hell would he get by if he lost his job?

  Well, he’d fucked up when he’d come on to the guy at the bar. Or at least, when his gaydar had gone on the fritz. He should have waited longer, tried to get a better feel on the mixed signals the guy had been giving, not rushed. But he’d wanted to let off some tension.

  He could have pushed the guy, but he’d promised himself to never do that again. Influencing someone who didn’t want to have sex was the same as rape. He’d understood that for years, ever since he’d first acted on his desire to be with men.

  Ever since he’d realized his power could be used to hurt people.

  That what his mother had made him do was not only illegal but immoral.

  Had he been a different man, say, a man like Jimmy? Phillip shuddered at the thought of the pain Jimmy could inflict using influence on people to get his way or whatever he wanted. Over the years, he’d thought of his power as a curse, he’d wished it gone, but he’d never wished it on anyone else.

  The frozen peas were thawing out. He should put them back in the freezer for thirty minutes, but damn, it just felt so good. He sat up, groaning and holding his side. He touched his tender ribs, testing to see if they were broken or just bruised.

  Just bruised. He lifted his shirt and
placed the bag against his side, shivering at the touch of the cold. Ten minutes later, he rose, holding on to the bag, and limped to the fridge, opened the freezer and tossed the bag in. He searched for something else to use.

  He should’ve bought another bag of peas so he could swap off. Well, hindsight is twenty-twenty.

  Right now, the sight in his left eye wasn’t getting much better. He got the plastic ice tray down and twisted it to pop out the cubes, letting them fall onto one of his dish towels. Then he refilled the tray and stuck it back in the ice-shrouded freezer. After wrapping the ice up, he took the makeshift pack back to the bed and put it on the shelf.

  Then he went to the miniscule bathroom and looked in the mirror.

  “Holy fuck,” he muttered. No wonder the cop had wanted to take him to the ER.

  His face was messed up, bad. A dark bruise on his cheek and an epic black eye covered one side of his face. He fumbled with the bottle of painkillers, shaking out three, then, thinking about it, adding one more. He turned on the water, cupped his hands under the meager, spitting flow, then swallowed the pills.

  Phillip stripped down to his briefs, then crawled into bed, put the ice pack on his face and closed his eyes.

  The scene in the bar replayed in his head, like a bad movie. A horror movie. The guy climbing off his bar stool. Turning, in slow motion, his face scrunched up and distorted, lips pulled back, teeth showing in a snarl, like an animal. The pain hitting him, flying backward, impacting the floor. Stunned. Trying to catch his breath.

  Then the kicking started. Curling into a ball.

  Phillip shivered. He wrapped his arms around his chest, letting the ice pack slip away as he turned on his side. His ribs ached, as if remembering being pummeled. Shivers turned into the shakes, as if he was an addict going through withdrawal.

  He howled like a wounded animal into his pillow.

  What the hell is happening? Phillip put his hands over his head, holding his temples as if they might explode. He sucked in air, gulping it down, trying to fill his lungs, because, shit, he could barely breathe.