Past Tense

Chapter 7


“Brian, Detective Coltrane is on line one,” Cynthia informed her boss.

“Thanks.” Brian pushed the button for line one on the phone and said, “Detective?”

“Mr. Kinney, my men have been able to get the information about who rented the post box in Philadelphia.”

“And that would be?” Brian asked when Coltrane didn’t immediately tell him.

“Someone named Brian Kinney.”

“B…Brian Kinney?”

“That’s right, does that name ring any bells?”

“I did not rent that mailbox.”

“I didn’t think you had,” Coltrane said. “Obviously, this case is a little more than simple identity theft. Whoever rented that mailbox used your name and would have to have the papers to go with it.”

“Papers?” Brian asked.

“Yes, like a driver’s license or some other ID. This guy would have to establish all that first, before any of this began.”

“So, this is … calculated?” Brian asked pensively. Who could have concocted this whole plan?

“Very calculated,” Coltrane agreed. “Oh, and the address listed for the rental of the box is fake. It’s an apartment building in Philadelphia, but no one named Brian Kinney lives there. The person who rented the box paid in cash for a year, so there’s no way to trace that.”

“Well, that’s just peachy,” Brian griped.

“This guy probably has several ID’s, including yours,” Coltrane informed Brian.

“Shit.”

“I thought I’d let you know that we are working on your case, but it’s looking more and more like a dead end.”

“Great,” Brian said before they cut the connection.



*****



“Brian,” Cynthia said as she walked into his office carrying a sheaf of papers. “I just received the signed copies of the contract with Hammond Foods. They were just faxed over.”

“Chase Hammond is nothing if not prompt,” Brian replied as he quickly scanned the pages Cynthia handed him.

“Will we be seeing any more of Mr. Hammond in person?” Cynthia asked hopefully.

Brian studied her face. He was about to make some flip answer, but he changed his mind and answered her seriously. “I doubt it. At least not in the foreseeable future. Maybe when the ad campaign is all done.”

“Did something happen between you two?”

“You could say that.”

“Care to share?”

“You know I don’t share,” Brian said, immediately regretting how harsh his words sounded.

“Of course,” Cynthia said turning to leave.

“Cynthia…”

“Yes,” she asked not even turning around to face him.

“When I know more about it, I’ll fill you in.”

Cynthia nodded and then left the office.



*****



Brian finished the design he was working on for the Hammond Foods account. He shot it off to the art department on the computer. He leaned back in his chair and stared up at the ceiling. After thinking for a few minutes, he turned back to the computer.

He called up his personal email account, and went to his saved drafts. He opened the file and studied the list in front of him. The list had taken him a good chunk of the previous day to compile. However, it wasn’t as long as he had expected it to be. That was probably because he didn’t know the names of half of the people who should be on the list. He proceeded to study the short list of his enemies that he had compiled for Sam Spade.

Jim Stockwell, Craig Taylor, Kip Thomas, Melanie Marcus. Brian snorted as he read that last name and decided to delete it. Melanie might hate his guts and want to castrate him, but she wasn’t really his enemy. There were others like Marvin Telson who probably detested him as well, but was Telson really an enemy? Then there was the list of people he had bettered in business – like Gardner Vance and the guy from the Pool Boy Beverage account. There was the man who Brian had helped to thwart in his attempts to extract money from the Liberty Ride, while he was pretending to make money for the GLC. The guy had got a lot more money than he deserved, before he took off into the night. Brian couldn’t remember his name. Was it realistic to think of him as an enemy?

And what to do with the thousands of men he had fucked and kicked out of his bed. He had never wanted to know any of their names. Now maybe it was important that he did. Brian shook his head as he stared at the computer screen.

Deciding there was little he could do, he kept the first three names of his possible enemies. Then he wrote a brief explanation of the other potential enemies and how he had few names to supply. He hoped Spade would understand.

With a deep sigh he pressed send and leaned back in his chair.



*****



About an hour later Brian’s phone buzzed with Cynthia telling him that Samuel Spade was on line one. Brian chuckled to himself. Apparently Cynthia wasn’t familiar with the Sam Spade reference either.

“Mr. Spade,” Brian said into the phone.

“Call me Sam.”

“Sam, what can I do for you?”

“I got your list of enemies. Three?” the man asked, clearly confused by Brian’s email.

“You expected more?” Brian chuckled.

“You led me to believe there would be many.”

“I know, and I tried to explain why the list was so short in the note I sent with the abbreviated list.”

“You don’t know the names of your potential enemies?” Sam asked clearly not understanding how that could be possible.

“That’s correct. Until recently there were a lot of men through the doors of my newly mortgaged loft.”

Sam couldn’t help but chuckle at the reference to the mortgage that Brian was now dealing with. “I got the impression that there were … many men.”

“I was, and still may be, known as the Stud of Liberty Avenue. I did have many men over the years. I never wanted to know their names and I never had them back again.”

“You used them.”

“Let’s say we used each other, but … some of them expected and wanted more.”

“Which you were never prepared to give.”

“Correct.”

“So, any of these men could hold a grudge against you.”

“Yes.”

“Okay, then let’s deal with the three men you have named as your enemies. Jim Stockwell was the police chief who ran for mayor in the last election.”

“That’s right.”

“Why is he at the top of your enemy list?”

“I ran his campaign for mayor … for a while,” Brian said.

“Did you two have a falling out?”

“I learned to detest what the man stood for. He wanted to make Pittsburgh family friendly, if you remember. And his way of doing that was to drive all us fags underground or into jail.”

“I see.”

“What do you see, Mr. Spade?” Brian asked. He wondered if Spade had maybe supported Stockwell’s campaign for a family friendly town.

“I see that such a campaign would go against everything you are.”

“Is that right?” Brian said surprised at Spade’s answer to his question.

“I’m not a bigot, Mr. Kinney. I don’t like to see any group picked on.”

Brian relaxed visibly. He felt the knot in his shoulders release. “I didn’t mean to jump all over you, Sam,” Brian replied, deliberately using Spade’s first name. He wondered why he had gotten so uptight. “Call me Brian. The memory of my dealings with Jim Stockwell is still pretty raw. He cost me a lot in my life … and yet he helped me find what was most important.”

“That’s an interesting realization, Brian.”

“Yeah, I guess it is,” Brian chuckled. “Even I can be introspective … sometimes.”

“I have no doubt that you examine your life very carefully,” Sam replied.

Brian frowned. This private dick seemed to have figured out much more than Brian had first thought. “Anyway, Stockwell has a lot to hate me for. I engineered his defeat,” Brian said with a touch of pride in his voice.

“And you don’t regret it one bit, do you?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Therefore, he should be at the top of your enemy list. Okay, I’ll check him out, but it’s rather unlikely that the former police chief would resort to crime for his revenge.”

“You never know.”

“Hm,” Spade said. “What about Craig Taylor? Is he the father of your partner?”

“Yes, he is.” Brian proceeded to tell Sam about their rather volatile encounters.

“He certainly has motive to steal your identity,” Sam said when Brian finished. “However, he doesn’t seem like the kind of man who would do something like this. Run you over, yes. Steal your identity, I’m not so sure.”

“Yeah,” Brian agreed. He didn’t want to think that Craig Taylor had done this.

“And the last name, Kip Thomas. Who is he?” Sam asked.

Brian told him the whole sordid little story of their brief encounter and Kip’s attempts at blackmail.

“He sounds like a sleazy little bastard. Maybe he could come up with this idea.”

“He disappeared right after he dropped the lawsuit. I don’t know what happened to him after that.”

“Why did he drop the suit?”

“Beats me. I was just happy he did.”

“I’ll find out what’s happened to him since he disappeared from Pittsburgh. That may tell us something.”

“Okay.”

“If you remember any other names, shoot me another email with them.”

“I will, but don’t count on receiving any more. And Sam … when you get this identity theft thing worked out, I have another job for you.”

“Oh? What would that be?”

Brian explained about Chase Hammond and the revelation that he had made. “I want to know if we’re related.”

“I’ll check it out. Most of it will be public record.”

“I thought there was privacy about birth parents in cases of adoption.”

“That used to be the case, but we know the birth parents. Their names were on the birth certificate Hammond showed you. It doesn’t seem likely that it went through a government agency either. I’ll see what I can find out.”

“Thanks,” Brian said simply before he cut the connection.

Brian set the phone back in its cradle. He leaned back in his chair and thought about the conversation he had just had with Sam Spade. The man surprised him. He hadn’t seemed at all judgmental about Brian’s lifestyle. The fact that Brian had had hundreds, probably thousands, of men traipsing through his life, and his loft, hadn’t fazed Spade at all. He had been very matter of fact about the whole thing.

Brian had to wonder if the three names he had given the man were worth the bit of cyberspace he had written them on. Stockwell was a fucking cop. He had retired since his run for mayor, and had totally dropped out of public life. Brian imagined he would have a decent pension, and would not get involved in something like this identity theft scheme. However, it would certainly be payback for what Brian had done to him. And who better than a cop to know how to go about creating an identity theft scam?

As for Craig Taylor, no one doubted how much the man loathed Brian Kinney. Craig thought Brian had molested his innocent son, had turned Justin into a perverted homo. Brian drew in a breath. Maybe there was a grain of truth in that idea. Who knew what Justin would have done that fateful night on Liberty Avenue, if he hadn’t met Brian? Justin could have been gang raped or mugged or killed even. Or he might have given up and gone home to the life he was used to … at least for a while. It had been the touch of naïveté that Brian had seen in the young man that had attracted Brian so much. That, and Justin’s determination and sense of adventure. Brian knew he had loved that aspect of the lad. Justin Taylor was game for anything.

But would Craig Taylor have gone to the lengths that this identity thief had. Brian had ruined Craig’s family life. That would be a bitter pill for any man to swallow, but would he resort to theft to get back at Brian? Craig had rammed Brian’s Jeep with his car. Brian could see Craig Taylor hiring someone to beat the shit out of him, but identity theft seemed out of character somehow. Craig might be able to hire someone to do it for him, but it wasn’t like Craig needed the stolen money. It would, however, cause Brian all kinds of problems and possibly ruin his finances. That would appeal to Craig Taylor.

And that brought Brian to Kip Thomas. Kip was enough of a liar and schemer to be behind this whole mess. He wanted to get ahead, and he certainly wanted money. Could he have concocted this scheme? Brian wondered if the man had that much know how. He could have had help. Brian had always wondered why he dropped his sexual harassment suit and disappeared. Could he have plotted this after all the time that had passed?

Brian wasn’t sure any of the three men would have done this. They all hated him, but hate was one thing. This involved so much more. No answers were forthcoming, so with a sigh Brian got back to work.



*****



“Oh yeah! Right there. Fuck!” Brian gasped as Justin rammed his cock so far into him that he was sure he could taste it in the back of his throat.

“Close,” Justin managed to get out. He gave a final thrust and they both exploded, making lights flash in front of their closed eyes.

Brian felt Justin’s weight on top of him, and then the welcome burden rolled away. Brian turned onto his back and felt the burn in his now empty hole. He turned to look at Justin who was lying beside him. His eyes were closed and his chest heaved from his recent exertions. His skin was sheathed in a thin film of sweat. He looked so beautiful in the diffused glow of the lights from the street below the loft.

“Wow!” Justin said as he opened his eyes. “That was … fucking fantastic!”

“Four stars,” Brian said with a little chuckle.

“Just four?”

“Greedy.”

“They use five stars if a hotel is really, really, really good,” Justin stated with a grin.

“Are you a hotel?”

Justin chuckled. “Maybe not.”

“But you do deserve a … six,” Brian said as he leaned over and kissed Justin’s full lips.

The radiant smile that greeted him when he released those lips shone into the very core of Brian’s being. Justin’s sunshine smile had revolutionized his life.

“How was work?”

“Maxim Graphics is okay,” Justin said carefully.

“Has the honeymoon period worn off already?”

“They don’t actually let me do much, at least not much creatively.”

“It will take time … until they get to know what you can do.”

Justin nodded. He knew Brian was right, but it hurt having to do touch ups of other people’s designs, when he should be making those designs himself. “How was your day?”

“They found out who rented the mailbox in Philadelphia.”

“Oh? Who?”

“Brian Kinney.”

“B…Brian Kinney?”

“Yeah,” Brian said wiping his hand over his face. “Whoever stole my identity has papers that make him officially Brian Kinney.”

“But how can that be?”

“My question exactly.”

“Can’t they track him down? He must have an address.”

“There’s an address listed, but no one named Brian Kinney actually lives there. It’s an apartment building.”

“This is really weird,” Justin said. “Have they got any ideas?”

“Coltrane told me it looked like a dead end,” Brian said with a grimace. “But Spade, the PI, is checking out my enemies.”

“Enemies?”

“Yeah, that’s what I was working on yesterday.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize that was what you were doing at your computer all day. Was it a long list? You spent a lot of the day on it.”

“I ended up with just three names, after I took Melanie off.”

Justin laughed. “You included her?”

“I told you I took her off.”

“She would be so pissed if she knew.”

“I think she’d take it as a compliment,” Brian said with a smirk.

“Who else was on your list?”

“Jim Stockwell.”

“Well, yeah, he hates both our guts, but I’m happy we were able to foil his plans,” Justin said proudly.

“Yeah, me too.”

“Who else?”

“Um, don’t take this the wrong way – your father.”

“Fuck! You don’t think he’d…”

“I don’t think it’s him, but he certainly hates me.”

“Well, I’m glad you don’t think he’d be behind this…”

“More likely he’d hire someone to string me up by my balls.”

“Ball.”

“Thanks for reminding me.”

Justin chuckled. “But a lovely ball it is.”

“Thanks.”

“Who’s the third enemy?” Justin asked after a moment.

“Kip Thomas.”

“Oh?” Justin said as he felt a twinge of guilt for never having told Brian what he did all those years ago, what he did to save Brian’s career.

Brian looked at Justin in the dim light. “You remember Kip?” he asked waiting to gauge Justin’s reaction. Something wasn’t quite right.

“I…um…I have something to tell you.”