///~///~

Chapter 10 - You Just Needed To Relax.

Brian still didn’t look like he was buying Justin’s logic, but he couldn’t argue the point either. Instead he just sat there, his arms crossed stubbornly over his chest, saying nothing. Justin thought it best not to belabor the matter so he just moved on, leaving the topic of Michael hanging there unresolved.

Justin looked back over Brian’s list, noting that they’d eliminated almost all of the names. But there was one anomaly; Justin didn’t see any names on that list that looked like family. And, based on his extensive knowledge of television crime dramas, Justin was sure that they’d need to examine those folks as well, if only to exclude those names. 

“Brian? Shouldn’t you have listed your family members here as well?” 

“Why?”

“Well, because we have to look at ALL possible suspects, right?” Justin answered.

“I have nothing at all to do with my birth family,” Brian replied succinctly, exuding an even more closed off air than before, which Justin thought should have been impossible. 

“Nothing?” Justin questioned, a little shocked by Brian’s summary dismissal of his family like that. “But . . .”

“There are no butts involved, kid. My family doesn’t approve of that kind of stuff,” Brian responded, trying to lighten the mood with an inappropriate pun, perhaps - Justin didn’t know, but found the reaction even more perplexing. When Justin simply sat there, staring at Brian with a stunned confusion, however, Brian eventually relented. “My father died about two months ago from lung cancer, which was exactly the painful and disgusting death the abusive bastard deserved, in my opinion. My mother is a frigid bitch who thinks I’m going to hell because I refuse to go to her hate-baiting, pedophile-infested church. Which leaves only my sister, who’s a whiny, uncultured, homophobic, trashy breeder with two bratty kids that she’s already taught to hate me because Uncle Brian is gay. Why the fuck would I have anything to do with any of them?”

‘Okay, wow . . .’ Justin thought, rendered speechless by the stream of vitriol Brian had just let fly. ‘That’s more words together than I’ve ever heard Brian say about anything. And all of them angry as hell. So, then . . . Why don’t I feel any anger coming from him at all? You’d think rage like that would be fairly deafening, right? But there’s . . . Still nothing but that blankness? What’s up with that?’

Then Justin looked up again and noted that Brian wasn’t really as good at suppressing his emotions as he might have thought. While the man wasn’t emoting anything that the empath could pick up with his sixth sense, Brian was clearly displaying several classic symptoms of the kind of rage his words portrayed. There was the tight smile that didn’t even come close to reaching the narrowed eyes. There was the clenched jaw, evidenced by muscles working so hard that you could see the ropy tendons flashing under the skin over his mandibles. There was also the hands curled into fists, the knuckles going white. Clearly, there was emotion there, it was just silent emotion, an intriguing phenomenon that Justin had never experienced before.

“Isn’t that all the more reason to suspect them for something like this, Brian?” Justin pressed. “I mean, if they feel about you the way you say, then wouldn’t they be exactly the kind of people who’d do something like taking your son to hurt you?”

“Maybe, if they knew I had a son, but I haven’t shared that particular fact with either Joanie or Claire, and don’t plan to even if I were speaking to them.”

Justin didn’t have a response to that. He might not be getting along well with his own parents at the moment, but he couldn’t imagine not telling them when he had a kid of his own. Judging by the tension in Brian’s stance, though, Justin didn’t doubt that Brian was telling the truth about how much he and his family disliked each other. Still, there was this tiny nagging itchiness in the back of Justin’s mind that wouldn’t let him just dismiss Brian’s family from their investigations. He didn’t have time to analyze it just then, but there was something worrying him about Brian’s out-of-hand exoneration. That much mutual animosity deserved more attention, didn’t it? Didn’t it?

It seemed, however, that Brian had already moved on. “So much for your brilliant plan to find the kidnapper by making fucking lists, huh?” Brian complained, pushing his desk chair back, away from the computer, and sounding defeated. “Got any other ideas, Kreskin? Should I call a few neighbors in so we can hold a seance or something?”

Justin looked at the short list of possible culprits they’d amassed and threw up his hands, almost as skeptical as Brian by that point. “That’s about as good a suggestion as any I’ve had so far, so why the hell not?” Brian snorted a half-amused huff ending in a sigh. “I’m sorry I’m not being more help, Brian. I didn’t come over here just to waste your time like this. I thought . . .” Justin tried to reach out with his mind again, feeling around to see if he could pick up that connection to the kidnapper once more, but there was still nothing. “It’s just so strange that I can’t feel anything. I mean, nothing at all. Not the guy who took Gus. Not anyone else, either. It’s all just . . . gone. It’s the weirdest thing . . .”

Brian looked at him oddly for about a half a second, making Justin feel like he was a bug being examined for possible dissection. “You said before that you thought you were trying too hard - that you just needed to relax, right?”

“Yeah . . . Maybe,” Justin admitted, although he wasn’t sure that was precisely what the problem was. 

“Okay. Then, let’s relax you,” Brian stated with determination. 

Brian got to his feet and reached out a hand towards Justin. The youth only hesitated a moment before he accepted, letting Brian haul him out of his chair. All business, Brian led the younger man across the breadth of the loft and up the stairs to the bedroom. Then with perfect detachment, he started to loosen Justin’s school tie and unbutton the crisply starched white shirt. Justin's heart raced as he began to anticipate what would come next but Brian seemed not to notice. Once the shirt was unbuttoned, Brian simply pushed the jacket and shirt off, over Justin’s shoulders, as one, and proceeded to address himself to the trousers in a similarly systematic fashion. And as soon as Justin’s pants joined his shirt and jacket on the floor of Brian’s bedroom, the older man put his large hand in the center of the boy’s chest and gave a shove, pushing the slender youngling backwards so that he landed with a bounce in the center of the gigantic king-sized mattress.

The whole time all this was happening, Justin was in complete shock. When he’d come to find Brian that morning his only intention had been to help the worried father find his son. Justin had long since given up hope that The Stud of Liberty Avenue would relent on his one-fuck-only rule or give him a second go. So this new development was totally unexpected. Not that Justin was complaining, mind you. Hell no! He was more than happy to let the man he’d been fantasizing about for months take control of ‘relaxing’ him. Even though he wasn’t feeling particularly relaxed at the moment. Nope. Far from it. In fact, as Brian stripped off his own clothing and started to climb up the bed to reach the nubile and naked youth waiting for him, Justin privately admitted he’d never felt so un-relaxed in his young life.

Meanwhile, Brian nibbled his way up Justin’s body, starting at his toes and proceeding up, past a well formed calf, nipping at a sensitive inner thigh, licking across the thin skin covering a hip bone, and then veering towards the center and the deep well of a needy belly button. Justin only realized that those whimpers and the panting noises were coming from his own mouth when Brian laughed at the yelp of surprise that occurred when his tongue dipped deeply into Justin’s navel and then sucked back all the moisture deposited therein. Which shouldn’t be all that erotic, right? It just shouldn’t be. But, still, Justin was so turned on that his dick felt like it was on fire, and Brian hadn’t even touched that part of him yet. The things this man could do to him . . .

Justin didn’t have long to dwell on his amazement over Brian’s belly button technique, though. Before the boy had recovered from his wonder at that element, Brian was already moving on to the next big thing in his sexual repertoire. Two big hands began to inch up, over his torso, the heat from Brian’s touch sparking sense memories of their earlier encounters. And before Justin had completely registered what was happening, he felt those big hands pinching at his nipples, rolling the hard little nubs between soft finger pads, creating electrical zaps of sensation that seemed to connect directly to Justin’s already rock-hard dick. 

“Shit! This . . . This isn’t . . . Isn't relaxing . . . Relaxing me, Brian,” Justin gasped out, between pants, as Brian’s touch created a series of electrical jolts that rocked through his body.

“Patience, my padawan, it will. Trust me,” Brian purred, the vibrations from his voice against Justin’s skin adding to the exciting sensations that were flooding the boy’s nether regions. 

Those reassuring words were immediately proven wrong, however, when Brian’s next move was to direct his mouth about two inches southward to where Justin’s cock was twitching against his abdomen, asking for its share of attention. The boy wasn’t sure what caused the gasp that ensued - whether it was the moment of frisson when Brian’s slightly stubbled chin rubbed against the sensitive tip of his dick, or the welcome wet warmth of the tongue that followed - but the contrast of sensations was literally breathtaking. By the time Brian had taken Justin all the way into his mouth, the young man felt like he was literally going to explode. So much for all that relaxing Brian was supposed to be imparting, huh?

Justin’s hands automatically drifted down, feathering through the silky, baby-fine, chestnut strands and involuntarily clamping on so as to have some handhold. Brian merely grumbled a warning, which Justin instinctively understood meant he shouldn’t presume to tug too hard. But the rumbling noises almost instantly translated into delicious vibrations that tickled along his dick and Justin soon forgot all restraint. Luckily for Brian’s hair, the attention to Justin’s nether regions got the desired response pretty quickly; in less than five minutes, Justin felt his balls beginning to contract and that tell-tale tingle flared into a full-fledged conflagration that erupted from his core, setting his whole body on fire. 

“Brian . . . Brian . . . BRIAN!” Justin chanted, unable to think of any other words as his orgasm short-circuited his brain. 

Of course the Master of Relaxation, the one and only Mr. Brian Kinney, was completely unruffled by these proceedings. Giving Justin’s now-spent cock one last, slurping kiss, he raised his head and made a show out of licking a few stray drops of cum off his gorgeously swollen lips. Justin managed a weak smile in lieu of thanks and pulled his fingers free from Brian’s hair. Brian, now free, slithered further up the much-less-tense body spread out beneath him.

“Better?” he asked, wearing a knowing smirk.

“So much better,” Justin replied, with a quiet giggle.

“Ah . . . if you’re still able to speak, then I clearly haven’t done my job yet,” Brian surmised, cutting off any retort with the highly effective move of swooping in for a long, deep, wet kiss. 

“Mmmmm,” was the only reply Justin could come up with by the time his lips were released.

“That’s better. But I think we should go for the full-body, so-relaxed you pass out, ultra-deep-tissue treatment, don’t you?” Brian concluded with a sexy smile as he raised up enough to free Justin’s legs, scooping one arm under each thigh so as to lift both calves up onto his shoulders. 

All of a sudden, Justin’s brain began to register the anticipation of what Brian was still promising, and he found himself not quite as relaxed as before. 

“Yes. Yes, please. Oh, please . . .”

“Such a polite little boy . . . Now, how can I refuse such a civilized request?” Brian purred, his fingers already lubed up and prodding at the boy’s most-intimate entrance.

Justin gasped again as the cold fingers invaded, but the discomfort only lasted until Brian located the boy’s sweet spot and, after that, he only registered pure, unadulterated pleasure for the next however-many-minutes it took for his lover to prepare him. Before he had time to get fully un-relaxed again, Justin felt the blunt tip of Brian’s condom-clad dick pressing slowly inside and then it was just more of the same bliss that he remembered from their one night together so many months before. The wonderful sense of fullness. The delicious friction. The swelling heat. And the sure aim that caused Brian’s dick to pound into the one spot that caused Justin’s entire being to light up like a fucking laser show. It was exquisite torture and unbelievable euphoria at the same time. But the one thing it wasn’t was relaxing; Justin had never felt so alive before. 

And then the only thing that might possibly make the experience even better happened; Brian’s emotional mask slipped.

All of a sudden, Justin wasn’t alone in his pleasure any longer. He could now feel every titillating pang of Brian’s rising stimulation as well. That rush of pleasure from his lover was like taking up the normal elation of sex to near-rapture levels of pleasure. Talk about fucking feedback loops! Brian’s pleasure fed Justin’s, which in turn was returned to Brian and on and on and on. And before Justin knew what was happening, there was a white-hot burst of such ecstasy that he actually saw flashes of swirling color behind his closed eyelids, just like on Independence day when the light from the fireworks would echo on his retinas even after the show was over. 

By the time the post-fuck lassitude finally swamped his senses, Justin had to admit, in his fading moment of awareness, that yes, Brian really had relaxed him better than he’d ever been relaxed before. 

And then Justin passed out completely. 

So much for searching for the kidnapper . . .

///~///~

The child was so bundled up that the only way you could tell there was a baby inside was when the blanket twitched or when the little whines of distress got loud enough to reach outside ears. 

The blanket itself wasn’t exactly clean. Nor was the umbrella stroller the child was strapped into. Even in the dim light, you could see that the once-white plastic handles were yellowed and cracked with a jagged edge showing where a large piece of the grip had broken off altogether. The fabric of the stroller’s seat was soiled and dirty, with a large splotch of what appeared to be red ink staining the upper right corner, right behind where the baby's head rested. 

As the baby’s whimpers increased in volume, the scene gradually widened, allowing the viewer to see more of the environs surrounding the stroller. A few meters away, there was a rack filled with merrily lit candles, their twinkling light cutting through the relative darkness nearby. Beyond the candles, you could glimpse the beginning of several rows of church pews, stretching out into the vagueness of distance. The rest of the background, though, was obscured by the crepuscular murkiness of the dream.  

The bundle of blankets eventually got fed up with being left unattended and let out a wail of protest. The baby’s cries echoed around the space incongruously; judging by these echoes, the space the stroller was in must have been huge. Almost immediately, another sound joined the caterwauling - a tap, tap, tap of shoes on bare stone floors - coming closer. 

“Shhhh! Damn it! Do you want to wake everyone in the fucking neighborhood?” The voice admonishing the baby was no more than a sibilant hiss without inflection or identifiable timbre. “Shit. You’re gonna get us caught, you stupid little parasite!”

Two hands reached down and unbuckled the straps on the stroller, lifting the bundle up and shaking the contents into a startled, momentary silence.

///~///~

“Fuck!” 

Justin was startled out of his dream and brought abruptly back to full consciousness by the loud cursing in his ear. 

“Wha . . . ?”

Rough hands grabbed Justin by the shoulders, the fingers digging into his flesh deeply enough to cause pain. “What the fuck was that? Was that Gus? Where is he? Tell me!”

“What? I don't . . . I don’t know . . .” Justin tried to pluck words out of his confused brain but it wasn’t going well. 

“I saw Gus!” Brian was screaming, hovering over Justin’s supine form, his large hands pinning the youth’s smaller body to the mattress. “He was there, right in front of me! And I saw YOU there too, standing over him, looking down at him. Then you grabbed him and started shaking him, damn it! Don’t you know, you can’t fucking shake a baby!” 

Justin struggled to free himself from Brian’s frantic grip as the older man began shaking him in an eerie recreation of the way the baby had been treated. 

“Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck . . .” Brian’s protests and curses slowly died out and he eventually released his captive, sitting back on his haunches, both hands coming up to cover his mouth which was opened wide in an expression of horror. 

As his awareness came back online, Justin realized what had happened and, overcoming his amazement, he rushed to take control of the situation. He sat up, taking Brian’s larger body into his embrace, and whispered calming nothings into the distraught father’s ears. Justin could feel the way the otherwise sturdy body was trembling and heard the syncopated breaths as the man came close to hyperventilating. Justin rubbed consoling circles on Brian’s bare back, leaving small kisses on whatever piece of skin his lips could reach. It took several minutes, but eventually they both calmed down, and Brian began to breathe easier. 

“What the fuck was that?” the angry father asked when he finally had himself back under control.

“I don’t know . . . Somehow . . . Somehow I saw the same thing you did and that’s NEVER happened before.” Brian’s scoff of disbelief interrupted his conjecture. “It's true, Brian. I’m not lying to you. I think . . . I think, somehow, you shared one of my visions. I just don’t know how, exactly . . .”

“I SAW you!” Brian insisted, edging on the frantic again. “I saw you! You had Gus and you were shaking him!”

“It wasn’t me, Brian. I’m right here with you. It WASN’T me!”

“But I saw . . .”

“You saw my vision, Brian. I saw it too. Only, you . . .” Justin quickly thought through what he’d seen and tried to reconcile what Brian was saying. “I think you saw the scene through me but since I’m seeing through the kidnapper’s eyes, you saw me in his place . . . Or something like that . . . Because you KNOW I’m right here with you and it CAN’T be me. Right, Brian?” Brian just stared at him with haunted-looking eyes. “Right, Brian? I’m right here with you. You see me here, right? It can’t be me that you saw with Gus. Right?”

“I . . . I saw . . .” Brian reached out and let his fingers trail down Justin’s cheek, as if to reassure himself that the boy sitting in front of him was real. “But I saw you and Gus . . .”

“Yeah . . . Guess your relaxation techniques worked better than we’d hoped.” Justin squirmed until his legs were freed from where they’d been trapped under Brian’s body. “You believe me now, right?”

Brian threaded his hands through his hair and nodded mutely.

“Okay . . . Well, this is good. We can use this.” Justin sat cross-legged on the bed in front of Brian and tried to work though what he’d seen in his dream/vision. 

“He’s hurting Gus,” Brian moaned, still unable to get beyond what he’d seen.

“You can’t focus on that, Brian,” Justin insisted, trying to pull the older man’s hands free so he could hold them. “We have to concentrate on the other clues in that vision. It’s the only way we’ll find your son. We have to use this to figure it all out.”

“But, Gus . . .”

“I know you’re worried about him, Brian. I am too. Which is why we need to find him as soon as possible.” Justin reached up and, one hand on each side of Brian’s face, forced the other man to look directly at him. “Listen to me, Brian. Are you listening?”

Brian took a deep breath and nodded.

“Okay. I’m not sure how the fuck this shit works - I can’t understand how you managed to see into one of my visions - but that’s good, because now you’re seeing what I’m seeing too which should make things easier. Tell me what you saw and we’ll compare notes. Maybe it’ll lead us to whoever has your son.”

Justin watched as Brian visibly pulled himself together. The panic on the other man’s face morphed into determination. The fear turned into a barely suppressed rage, evidenced by the way Brian’s eyes lit up and his jaw settled. Justin could almost hear the way Brian was gritting his teeth. But it was all good because it meant they could move on.

“It was a church,” Brian summarized.

“Yeah. That’s what I saw too; the votive candles and the pews . . . But it was pretty dark and I couldn’t see much else.”

Brian paused, lost in thought for thirty seconds or so, before he finally spoke again. “The candles . . . There was a picture - a painting - behind the candles. I think . . . I think I recognize that picture.”

Justin scoured his memory. He’d been so focused on the stroller and the child within, that he hadn’t really paid much attention to the surroundings. But when he went back into the vision, he realized he had noticed the painting Brian was referencing. It was a stylized, expressionistic version of a Madonna. Very well done, actually. And definitely something that would stand out if you’d ever seen it before in real life.

Justin watched as Brian screwed his face up, almost comically, as if trying to locate that picture in his memory bank. And at the moment it came to him, Brian’s entire countenance lit up. If Justin hadn’t been so worried about finding Gus, he would’ve been amused by the instant change in Brian‘s demeanor.

“That’s it! Yes! I remember that painting from the time Deb made me go with her to church last year; she ordered us all to go with her to the special mass she had said for Vic when he was super sick and we didn’t think he’d make it. I had nothing else to look at for, like, twenty minutes, so I just stared at that damn picture.” Suddenly animated, Brian crawled off the bed and started grabbing for his clothing which had been left, strewn across the floor. “It’s Deb’s fucking church! The kidnapper and Gus are in Deb’s god-damn fucking church!”

Justin scrambled to follow Brian’s example, searching for his own clothing and dressing as fast as he could, hoping all the while that this was the break-through they’d been waiting for.

///~///~