A Door
Into A New World
By
Tinnean
Episode
5: Sometimes the Dragon Wins
"Remember,
no matter how right you are, no matter how hard you work, sometimes the dragon
wins." -message pinned to the chaplain's door
I
stalked across the tarmac. To the casual observer, I was just a traveler
completing a tedious journey, tired and perhaps a trifle out of sorts.
Ben
Petersen knew differently. A member of the New Mexico State police, and lately
my lover, he was the cause of the irritation I was experiencing.
And the
anguish.
The most
emotionally confident male I had ever met, he was still a mass of
contradictions. He persistently questioned my friendship with Pat Medford, an
entomologist I had dated in Washington.
Whatever
relationship I might have developed with Pat, it fizzled long before I was
assigned the New Mexico case, although her father had once hoped that we would
marry. Pat had slept with me a couple of times, strictly out of compassion, and
it left me with a nasty taste in my mouth. When she finally told me she valued
our friendship too much to jeopardize it by continuing to see me on a romantic
basis, it was a relief to both of us, and I vowed to never again be anyone's
pity fuck.
That was
before I lost control of my life. I had gotten drunk at a Bureau function and
woke up in bed with... Well, let's just say it was someone extremely
influential with a penchant for virgin ass. And for taking it the roughest way
possible.
Sometime
after that I found myself, one of the best agents to come out of the FBI,
banished to the wilds of New Mexico as liaison in the series of missing persons
cases that had suddenly been plaguing a small town near Los Alamos. Ben was the
officer I was assigned to liaise with.
After
what had happened in D.C., I suspected that I must be a slut, to have allowed
what was done to me. Now I was positive of that. Within twenty-four hours of
meeting Ben Petersen, I had fallen into bed with him, reacting in amazement as
he sucked me off.
Amazed
that I was jerking him off as he did that, making him come all over my chest!
The last
thing I wanted him to know was that I had been questioning my feelings for the
scientist even as Pat was ending our affair. The result was that we quarreled.
Not a knock down, drag out, clear-the-air argument, but the kind of slicing at
one another that cuts to the bone and leaves gaping wounds.
Finally,
I retreated into silence, refusing to speak to him at all. We boarded the plane
that was to take us to the City of Angels and I stared stonily out the window,
promising myself that I was done with him.
It would
be better that way.
And then
his wicked fingers wormed their way under the blanket I had draped over myself.
He undid my trousers and began to fondle me through my shorts. I was struggling
to keep silent under his sensual assault when he swore and ordered me to close
my pants.
I was
confused. And hurt.
And then
he dragged me back into the small lavatory at the rear of the plane, locked us
in and sucked me to a climax that just about fried my brains.
How
could I stay angry with him after that?
Actually,
it was remarkably easy: the man had a talent for shooting himself in the foot!
The
stewardess was rapping briskly on the panel. "Sir, we have a line out
here!"
Ben
poked his head around the door, then yanked it back in, muffling a snort of
laughter. "Come on, big guy! And try to look sick!"
"Hmm?"
That was the best I could come up with. I was floating on a cloud of sheer
sexual satisfaction, a silly smile on my face, certain I could reach out my
hand and heaven would be within my grasp.
My lover
opened the door and sauntered past what looked like the entire passenger list.
"He gets airsick!" he had the gall to tell them. "I have to hold
his head!"
I didn't
need to look sick; I knew I was green. There went my job, my reputation, my
whole fucking life! And Ben had done this to me! I ducked my head and slunk
down the aisle. "Sorry." I could barely force the words out of my
throat. "Excuse me!"
The
groan I uttered as I threw myself back into my seat was not an act: I was
mortified.
The
stewardess gave us an odd look as she hurried back to the forward cabin and I sank
down as deep into my cushion as I could go.
Ben had
the nerve to laugh. I snarled at him and went back to staring out the window.
When we
landed I was out of my seat and down the aisle before Ben could unfasten his
seatbelt. Unfortunately, I had to wait for him by the car the LAPD had sent to
meet us.
"Afternoon,
sirs," the young uniformed officer said as he snapped to attention.
"I'm your transport. I'll take you right down to the railroad yard, if
that's all right with you?"
I nodded
and reached to open the back door, but Ben was there before me. The angle of
his body prevented the cop from seeing his hand run over the curve of my ass
and squeeze a cheek.
"Do
you think that will make it all better?" I demanded coldly, still not
willing to forgive him.
"I'm
working on it, Bobby!"
Huffily,
I got into the vehicle, determined to ignore him. And then he took my hand and
wound his fingers in mine, and I knew that no matter what he did, no matter how
this ended, I was his. I would always be his.
The young
officer was apparently awestruck to be in the company of an FBI agent and a
representative of the New Mexico State police. He only answered our attempts at
conversation with a "Yes sir" or "No sir," and nervous
glances in the rearview mirror. In sync with each other, Ben and I decided to
address our questions to the insurance investigator who was looking into the
massive theft of sugar.
The
vehicle came to a halt outside the train yard which was surrounded by an
ancient, rusted chain link fence. Ben followed me as I got out and walked to
the boxcar that was reminiscent of Gramps Johnson's store and the trailer that
had been discovered in the desert. The side was a gaping ruin, as if ripped out
violently by a powerful force. The investigator was shaking his head as he
examined the devastation, a clipboard in his hands.
He
looked up at us as we approached him and introduced ourselves. "FBI, huh?
New Mexico, huh? Now why is that?" He frowned when he saw no answer would
be forthcoming.
"Well,
it has to be an inside job! There's no other way that much sugar could have
been trucked off site! The night watchman *has* to have been in on it!"
Ben
squatted down and sifted something through his fingers, then tossed it away.
"Where's the night watchman now?"
"He's
in jail! He claims he saw nothing! That's impossible! It's just a matter of
time before we get him to confess!"
I caught
Ben's eye and frowned, uncomfortable with the venom in the investigator's
voice. What could the old man have done that would have caused the dapperly
dressed insurance man to harbor such ill-will?
Ben
jerked his head toward the police car and I nodded. We started toward it, Ben
calling a brief thanks over his shoulder. "Take us to the precinct where
the night watchman is being held," I told our driver.
We sat
in brooding silence, lost in our own thoughts. I was startled when Ben began to
speak softly. "I'm sorry about Pat. It's none of my business if you want
to keep seeing her. I know I don't have the background that she does. It just...hurt
that with everything we have going for us, you can't see a future with
me!"
My head
snapped around and my jaw dropped open. I stared at him in numb shock. "Is
that what you think this was all about? Her pedigree?" I whispered.
"Isn't
it? I'm just a sergeant. I barely made it through high school. She's a
well-known scientist. She's beautiful, and she's got a father who has more
influence than J. Edgar Hoover!"
"Well,
he never used any of that influence on *my* behalf! But there is one other
thing in her favor," I couldn't resist taunting him.
"Oh
yeah?" He was thoroughly disgruntled. "What could that be?"
"Her
legs are prettier than yours!" Before he could respond to that outrageous
statement, I continued. "Ben, this isn't the time or the place. Can we
finish this conversation tonight? In our hotel room?"
His eyes
lit up at the thought of us spending the night together. "Oh, that's an
aye-firmative, big guy! That's a *big* aye-firmative!"
****
The
night watchman was brought into an interrogation room. Not only was he nervous,
but he was scared. He didn't have many years to go before retirement, and to
spend that time in jail, or without a job to fall back on frightened the piss
out of him.
I
offered him a Chesterfield and lit it for him, then lit one for myself. Tobacco
got on my tongue despite the force I had used to tamp it down. As I removed the
flakes I found Ben watching my mouth, and I became hard and breathless. He raised his eyes to mine, and then dropped
them to my lips again, and I almost groaned.
The old
man was hurrying to his own defense. "I didn't hear nothing, I swear it! I
didn't see nothing! It's sugar, for Chrissake! Is sugar a hot commodity? Is
there a black market for sugar?" He took a deep drag of his cigarette, his
fingers shaking. "I swear..." His voice broke and his shoulders began
to shake.
Awkwardly,
Ben patted him on the back. "It's all right, Pop. We'll square this with
the railroad."
The old
man looked up at him, tears running down his face, gratitude welling in his
tired eyes. "You won’t let them put me in jail? You won't let them fire
me?"
I
couldn't face him. "We'll see to it, Pop. Take it easy for now."
We left
him finishing his cigarette. "Don't let him go!" I ordered the
precinct captain.
His look
soured. "I didn't think we had enough evidence to hold him!"
"Captain,"
I said, "your government wants this man kept in custody until further
notice. If anyone speaks to him, you will be held personally responsible!
You'll be notified when he can be released!"
We were
about to leave when uncontrolled sobbing drew my attention. The captain
followed my line of vision and sighed. "This has been an insane weekend!
Mrs. Lodge's husband crashed his car in a residential neighborhood."
“Anyone
hurt?”
“Just
the tree he hit.”
"Was
he drunk?" Ben asked idly, clearly wanting to be away from the
uncomfortable storm of emotion.
"No,
he was dead! His arm had been torn off at the shoulder and he bled to
death!"
"Oh
my God!" I felt sick.
"Oh,
that's not the least of it." The captain was not happy with having to take
orders from a government man, and clearly relished having information that we
might need. "Their two boys are missing!"
"Shit!"
Ben and I locked glances, and both of us went back to talk to the distraught
woman.
Between
sobs, she poured out the story. Thom, her husband, was in the habit of taking
their boys out early on Sunday mornings because that was the only time he had
available to spend with them. "He would take them for pony rides, or boat
rides in MacArthur Park. Last week he arranged for them to go to the zoo before
it opened so the boys could see them feed the animals. They always came home so
dirty! I'd spend the rest of the day washing their clothes. I kept telling Thom
to take them places were they wouldn't get so dirty!"
And she
collapsed in her chair, sobbing as if her world had ended.
I caught
the eyes of Ryan and Sutton, the police officers who had found Thomas Lodge.
They were standing by the door, at a loss to help the weeping woman.
Thankfully, they followed me out of the room, while Ben did his best to console
Mrs. Lodge. In the other room I spotted a map on the wall. "Where can a
man take his kids for pony rides, or boat rides in this vicinity?" I asked
the older of the two cops.
Ryan
pointed out MacArthur Park, and some local areas that offered slot car racing,
hills where kites could be flown, things geared toward children. They were all
too far from the spot where Thom Lodge crashed his car and died.
Ben
joined us, rubbing his eyes. "She wants a glass of water." One of the
police officers left to get her one. "Do you have anything else that you
wrote up between six and noon?"
Sutton
pulled out his pad and read off his arrests. "Just three ‘drunk and
disorderlies’. Sorry."
Ben
looked at me. "Maybe they spotted something?"
"We
can look into it!"
Two of
the men arrested that morning had been put in the drunk tank to sleep it off.
They scrounged cigarettes off me and conducted a conversation that held meaning
only to the two of them. If they had seen anything out of the ordinary, they
were too befuddled to realize it.
"This
is a waste of time!" I spat, losing what little patience I had left.
Between the giant ants in the desert, and Ben in my bed, I had not been getting
much sleep, and now it was catching up with me.
"Take
it easy, big guy," Ben murmured, rubbing my shoulder. I was tempted to shrug away from him, I was
tempted to lean into his touch. "We'll figure this out. Where's the third
drunk?" he asked Sutton.
The
officer shook his head. "Jensen. He's over at the VA hospital. He's got
the DTs. We send him there every few months to dry out."
I looked
for the young uniform who had driven us to the precinct. "Can you take us
to the VA hospital?"
****
General
James himself escorted us to the ward where Jensen was a frequent visitor. The
grizzled veteran watched the General with a gimlet eye. "I won't enlist,
and you can't make me!" he stated belligerently.
The
General wasn’t easily ruffled. "No, Jensen, I won't try to make you
re-up."
The
confused old man's face took on a crafty look. "Make me a sergeant and
gimme the booze, and I'll re-enlist!" he wheedled.
"Did
you see anything unusual this morning, Mr. Jensen?" I asked, trying to
regain control of the conversation.
"Nope!"
he said, but he cast an uneasy glance out of the window by his bed.
"They're gone now."
"Who's
gone?"
He
seemed to be off on another tangent. "They looked like they was too big to
fit into them little airplanes!"
"What
was too big, Jensen?" Ben persisted.
But
Jensen was watching the General now, saying in a sing-song voice, "Make me
a sergeant and charge the booze! Make me a sergeant and charge the booze! Make
me a ..."
Ben lost
his temper and grabbed the old man's shoulder. "What was too big,
Jensen?" He gave him a shake.
Suddenly
sober as a judge, the old drunk responded with a lucid answer. "The ants!
I usually see 'em at night! Over there, by those big holes!"
He lost
whatever touch he had with reality and went back to singing. “Make me a
sergeant, gimme the booze!”
"Stop
that! Please!" begged the occupant in the next bed. "My nerves!"
Ignoring
the patients in the ward, we all turned to look out the window. A dry
watercourse ran as far as the eye could see in either direction.
"The
riverbed! Oh Jesus, that's where they are!"
****
By the
time every one in New Mexico had been notified, it was too dark to do anything
but scut work.
We had
gone out to the riverbed while it was still daylight and searched the area that
could be seen from Jensen's hospital window. Near the opening of one of the
storm drains, we found a small, battered model airplane, the kind kids build
and fly; the kind Jerry and Mike Lodge, the missing boys, owned.
The army
was mobilized, the city was put under martial law and an eight o'clock curfew
went into effect. There were over seven hundred miles of storm drain under the
city, and the ants could be anywhere in there.
General
James took one look at the two of us and bit back a curse. "When was the
last time you two got any sleep?"
My eyes
crossed trying to concentrate on a likely answer. The drinks I had had at
dinner were suddenly hitting my system. Ben grinned and shrugged.
"Well,
apparently it's been too long! Get some rest!" the General ordered.
"We'll have to wait until Dr. Medford and General O'Brien fly in from New
Mexico, anyway. Tomorrow is going to be a long day!"
I needed
to get off my feet; I had never felt this tired in my life: not when I was in
Europe during the War, not afterwards in Washington! It wasn't just physical,
but emotional as well. I was almost staggering with exhaustion by the time we
got to our hotel room, and Ben had to prop me up while he fished for the
keyhole.
Once we
were inside, he made sure the door was locked and then stripped off his clothes.
I sat on the edge of the bed, stupid with fatigue and alcohol. "Come on,
Bobby, help me here! You'll feel better once you've had a shower!" He
manhandled me this way and that until he got me out of my suit. His shoulder
was just the right height to fit under my arm and he supported me into the
bathroom. Getting the shower turned on became a major production, but when it
was done he got me under the pounding spray.
I braced
my arms against the wall of the shower and let the warmth of the water ease the
kinks out of my neck and back. "Ahh, that feels good!" I moaned and
spread my legs a little. "You gonna fuck me, Ben?"
He
froze, a bar of soap in his hands as he prepared to build a lather to wash us.
"Do you want me to?" he asked cautiously.
I turned
around and leaned back against the wall, smiling at him sadly. "’t's only
fair, doncha think?" My words came out a little slurred from the
culmination of the last hours: weariness, alcohol, depression. “You’ve been
fucking me all along. I figure, one last time...?”
"You
want to explain that to me, big guy?"
"Well,"
I said slowly, as I twisted a strand of his chest hair around my finger.
"no. I don’t think I do. Not now. Just wanna fuck now. Doncha wanna fuck
me?"
"I
thought you were mad at me."
"I
was. An’ I’ll be mad at you again tomorrow. Tonight I just want you to put your
big dick into my ass. Okay?"
"So,
you're going to be mad at me again tomorrow, anyway?"
I nodded
somberly.
"Then
I guess I might as well give you something to be really angry about!"
Before I
could question his meaning, his mouth slammed against mine, knocking my head
back against the wall. I could taste blood as he split my lip, and then nothing
mattered except his hands on my body and his cock rubbing demandingly on mine.
"Ever
do it in a shower, Bobby?" he asked gutturally. He shoved me around and
angled my hips sharply back toward him.
I had to
shake my head, I couldn't speak. I ached with excitement as I felt soapy hands
stroking the crevice of my buttocks, finding my puckered opening and entering
with two fingers to stretch me.
I was
breathing heavily through my mouth, quivering with anticipation. And then the
hard tip of Ben's cock nudged at me for entry. He toyed with me, taking his
time, pushing in an inch and then pausing until I begged for more.
And he
made me beg. By the time he was all the way in and I could feel his thighs
against my ass I was almost frantic with unslaked passion.
He would
bring me to the edge and then stop until I moaned and pleaded with him to finish
me. Again and again he hit the spot that almost had me sobbing with need.
"Please,
Ben! Please!"
He
grunted in my ear. His mouth fastened on my neck and he sucked on it strongly.
Finally he seized my cock in both hands and jerked me off, almost painfully,
until I began to spill myself between his fingers. “Mine! You’re mine!”
At the
same time I could feel the heat of Ben's semen pouring into me. We had been in
the shower so long that the water had become cold. The chill of it pouring over
me contrasted so sharply with the hot come inside me that I shuddered in
mindless pleasure.
With a
groan, Ben eased himself out of me and rinsed us both off. He twisted the
faucets and grabbed a towel, wrapping it around me while he took another one
and dried himself with vigorous swipes.
"You
know something, big guy? I wasn't kidding when I told you I loved you. That's
why I was so hurt when you said you wouldn't want to marry me."
I
followed him into the bedroom and looked at the twin beds. Ben already had the covers
of his bed stripped down. He got under the sheet and turned on his side,
leaving me standing alone.
"I
didn't say I wouldn't marry you," I told him, a thread of pain in my
voice. He didn't say anything, but I could see he was listening to me. Don't
fuck this up now, Graham! I said to myself. But I knew, even as I took a deep
breath and jumped, that it was futile. There could be no future for us. "I
said I couldn't."
He
turned over to look at me, his eyes bitter. "What do you feel for me,
Bobby?"
Why did
he keep pushing me? I had given him everything that I dared. "It doesn't
matter what I feel. I'm FBI, Ben. I can't have any kind of relationship with
you! And oh, Christ, I'd cut off my right arm if I could!"
He
ignored my outburst. "Say it, College boy!"
All I
could do was look at him with my heart in my eyes.
"Say
it!"
I felt
as if my heart was being ripped out and devoured by wild animals. I sat down on
my bed and shook my head. "It doesn't matter.” I felt defeated, deflated.
“When this is over, I'm going back to Washington. That you say you love
me won't mean anything.
"And
the fact that I love you..."
My words
hung in the air. I got under the covers and turned out the light.