Only One Draw Ch. 03

"No, I don't recognize her. She must be new on the street." Homicide Vice detective Hardesty turned to his partner, Glen Whitehall, and said, "Do you recognize her?"

"Thought you said it's a T-girl," Glen said. "Why would I know her if you don't?"

It was a reasonable question. Hardesty--that he went by just the one name identified him as a hard-as-nails cop--was the one of the two who specialized in male prostitution in Washington, D.C., which included T-girls in the various stages of transition. Glen went with the ladies of the night. It had been a good work split. It also revealed each man's own fetish for the vice he was charged with managing in the district. That Hardesty had a thing for young male prostitutes and Glen for women streetwalkers didn't prevent either from doing a fine job controlling prostitution in the city. What it did was accord the prostitutes some respect and physical protection and thus made them more cooperative with the police then they otherwise would be.

Both men, in their own ways, were sex on a stick and had little trouble maintaining the attention of the city's prostitutes. Hardesty, in his mid-forties, thanks to his active cop's life, great genes, and regular work in a gym, had a solid, hard bodybuilder's physique. The man was toned, exuding an aura of danger, but also of authority and self-confidence. He was sexy, but clearly in a fully masculine, mature way. He was scarred up, revealing that he was an alley-fighter thug and looked the part. Submissive men gravitated to him, going hard just looking at him. He was hung like a god. His age showed in the gray struggling with the black of his buzz cut and in the close-cropped mustache and beard. And he'd had a hard life, as evidenced in rugged features, a nose beaten slightly off kilter, and a few puckered bullet entrance marks on his torso. But he was one sexy dude. In contrast, the younger Glen Whitehall was a strapping, young, athletic all-American-looking blond, who differed from Hardesty's "been through the ringer" forty-year-old scruffy--but sexy--thuggish look.

"She's a T-girl all right, all the way," Hardesty said, crouching over the bloodied body huddled at the base of the brick back wall of the abandoned gas station on 19th Street that had been discovered a half hour earlier, after 11:00 p.m., by a junkie who had come back here to shoot up in private and had reported the body and then disappeared in the night. "She's been done with a knife. Several strikes. Looks like it was in anger."

He called back to one of the patrolmen who was setting up the yellow tape, "Can one of you pull one of the plastic sheets from the trunk of my car and bring it here. Let's give her the dignity of covering her up until the medical examiner arrives." Hardesty had to replenish the supply of plastic sheets he kept in his Hummer for this purpose all too often.

Two policemen showed up in short order--one with the sheet and another with a purse. "We found this in the street over there, Detective," the young cop said. "Looks like it matches the vic's dress." He couldn't bring himself to use a pronoun for the victim here. Most of the beat cops couldn't decide how T-girls should be referred to in polite company, not to mention treated. They left that to Hardesty and the others of the Vice Squad. Homicide Vice was a subset of the Vice Squad. When there was no homicide going, Hardesty and his team worked general Vice.

There quite clearly was a homicide case going here, though.

Hardesty took the purse and opened it. He already was wearing surgical gloves, as was Glen. Only Hardesty had turned the body, though, to determine what they were working with here.

"There's a D.C. driver's license here for a Nick Ames," Hardesty said. He took it out of the purse and uncovered the victim's face to compare against the photo. "Yes, close enough," he said. "I guess she hadn't been transformed long enough to get a new license. And what do we have here? Her working name is Nicola, apparently. Here are business cards for the Transformation escort agency. Yep, that figures." He covered Nicola's face again and stood up.

"Any chance this is connected to the Liam Hathaway murder last week?" Glen answered. "Different MO, but a T-girl. There aren't all that many of them on the street here in D.C.--at least not yet." The detectives had accepted that the T-girl population in the nation's capital was likely to grow. Washington, D.C., was a party time venue that liked its kinks.

"We'll certainly have to compare the notes when we get back to the department," Hardesty said.

A third beat cop walked up, a cellphone pressed to his ear. "Detective Hardesty," the cop called out. "There's another body, a floater, over in the Tidal Basin. Your captain, Crane, is asking that you and your partner go over there to see what's what. You two are the closest department detectives to the river out here tonight."

"Tell him we're on our way," Hardesty said, signaling Glen to follow the Hummer in the squad car he was driving.

"It looks like there are fresh tire tracks right there in the mud from this morning's rain," Hardesty said to one of the cops he directed to stay with the body awaiting the medical examiner. "Make sure nobody messes them up before the lab guys... people.... get here. Could be connected." He'd caught himself on saying "lab guys." These days they were just as likely to be women. More and more that world was changing in the D.C. police force. One of the cops who had been here with the body of Nicola--Hardesty would be determined to use the victim's name now that he knew what the T-girl would prefer--had been a woman. And only that cop, of the three who had been here, had been willing to go near Nicola.

"Let's hope it's not another T-girl over at the Tidal Basin," Glen said as they moved toward their vehicles.

But of course it was.

* * * *

Dex quickly regained consciousness in the backseat of his taxi in the Sylvan Theater parking lot and came up sputtering, "Bitch stole my knife. Gonna get her and cut her good for that." But in reaching down to the floor to get leverage to sit up on the backseat, his hand touched the closed flickblade and he grabbed it up. He could see Natalie, barefoot, with heels in hand, struggling away from him toward the Potomac River. She wasn't moving all that fast because of her long, clinging skirt.

"Knowed I shoulda brought the gun tonight," he said, disgusted with himself.

What was helping Natalie now is that she'd slammed the back door of the cab shut and Dex had had it set on external lock. He had to go over the front seat back and into the driver's position to go after her, by which time she'd gathered her skirt up around her waist and was moving at a faster clip across the grass of the lawn around the Washington Monument and toward Independence Avenue at the Tidal Basin. Rather than follow her on foot, Dex decided to run her down with the car on Independence. He fired the taxi up and took off.

He was conflicted. He wanted to punish her like he had the other T-girl who had struggled against him behind the gas station on 19th Street. At the same time, he had in his mind that this one had wanted him fucking her and had gone with it. When he caught her he'd give her what she wanted again before knifing her. But as he drove, he became a little less crazy. Offing one of these crazy trans bitches in a night was more than enough. Maybe when he caught this one he'd just remind her that whole men were the boss.

His shift was ending. Jasmine would expect him home and in bed with her. And Jasmine's bitch of a mother no doubt would be watching the clock and be making up all sorts of shit to torture Jasmine with on what Dex was doing rather than coming home. He laughed at that. The old snake couldn't, in her wildest, imagination guess what Dex got up to sometimes when his libido was up--or what his fetish was: tracking down T-girls and showing them what a real man could do.

He was realizing that going after the T-Girl in the taxi rather than on foot in this parkland around the monuments was a mistake. There was too much off road here. Just when he was deciding to pull the cab over and continue on foot, he saw her, loping down the center of Independence Avenue, headed for the Tidal Basin.

He revved up the engine and pointed the nose of the cab at the ridiculous figure looming ever closer in his headlights. He almost laughed at the vision of the pantyless T-girl with black silk bunched up around her waist and her heels dangling from her wrists by the straps jogging down the center of the street. Guess she likes the shoes so much she can't bring herself to ditch them, he thought. Then in watching and aiming for her, he laughed. She may have gone through what she paid for to be a total transition, but she ran like a man.

* * * *

The floater in the inner Tidal Basin, judged to be a woman, floating face down, because a black satin evening dress and long, blond strands of hair billowed out from the body, had been out of reach from those at the shore and no one saw the need to go into the water themselves. She clearly was dead and the divers would be here momentarily. They just had to keep an eye on the body so that it didn't float away from them. There were three squad cars parked half on the road and half on the grass on Independence Avenue where it separated the outer from the inner Tidal Basin. They had closed that section of the road. Their lights were going, but not their sirens. The initial show was over. The five cops milling around, putting out yellow tape, were just waiting for someone of greater police authority to arrive in the area.

That someone was Hardesty, backed up by his partner, Glen Whitehall. The two drove up at the same time a two-person team of divers, one woman and one man, arrived. The divers went into the water immediately and had the body out of the water and on its back on the grass as Hardesty and Whitehall walked up.

"Recognize this one?" Whitehall asked. "I don't."

"Yeah, I'm afraid so," Hardesty said. "She went by the name of Destiny."

"Another T-girl?"

"I'm afraid so. She's from the same stable as the one we just left--Nick Adams going by the name of Nicola. And the same agency--as in the case we already had. Liam Hathaway."

"So, maybe a serial?" Whitehall said. "Maybe someone from the stable--someone in competition with them?"

"I doubt it's a competition thing. For some reason T-girls like this are in high demand in D.C. There seems to be a lot more demand than supply. They don't have to fight each other for johns. But, yes, maybe, to the serial killer suggestion. And, if so, it's escalating." He went down on his haunches beside the body, closed his eyes, and said a little prayer for Destiny. Hardesty wasn't a religious man and he had no idea whether or not Destiny had been, but he thought it only polite to cover all of bases. He'd also gone a couple of rounds with Destiny and she'd been a sweet lay. This was getting personal with him.

With his eyes closed he didn't catch sight of Natalie, dressed in long black satin, similarly to Destiny, the skirt now being let down, materialize in the headlights of the squad cars. She was hobbling, her shoes dangling from a wrist, and looked nearly played out, as if she'd been running for her life--which she, in fact, had been doing.

Dex, coming up from behind her on Independence Avenue as it approached the Tidal Basin, had seen the lights on top of the squad cars before Natalie had. She had known there was a vehicle behind her, with her caught in its headlight beams, and she was aware that it might be the crazy cabbie out to run her down, but she had been unable turn to look because it would have run her down if she slowed. Instead, she had veered to the side of the road, gauging the distance between where he was and the line of Japanese cherry trees that would give her protection from the car bumper.

Suddenly, though, she no longer was in the light of the cab's headlights and, having reached the side of the road, she did look around, to see that the cab--and it was the Capitol Cab Company taxi she'd been in--was turning around on the street and heading in the other direction. It was only then that she saw the lights on top of the squad cars and moved toward them, more slowly now, suddenly realizing that she was near exhaustion.

But she also was safe, at least for now.

She saw two men on their haunches beside something on the ground beside the Tidal Basin as she stumbled up, both confused and euphoric that there were cops out on the road--her saviors, at least in this instance, although she usually was trying to avoid them rather than using them as safe haven. She recognized one of the men, a real hunk she'd salivated over and had been good with the girls. Hardesty. It was OK if Hardesty was here. He'd make sure she wasn't hassled or disrespected. And if she could get him alone, she likely would be well fucked too, if what the other girls had told her about him was true. The younger blond one was a hunk too. But then she realized what they were kneeling beside, and, as she got closer, she recognized who it was. Regardless of how beat she was, she started to run.

"Oh, no. Destiny, baby. Tell me it's not Destiny!"

But it was Destiny. David Danforth, a la Destiny had met her chosen namesake.

"You know this woman?" Hardesty said, standing and turning to the approaching Natalie. Then, upon seeing her and that she was in distress--and recognizing her although they hadn't met yet--he said, "Are you all right? You look like you've been attacked."

"I have been attacked, sugar, but Destiny first. What happened to her? And I know who you are. You're that hunky Vice cop shacking up with Toby Drake. You're that guy all the rent-boys and T-girls want to go under. But Destiny..."

"It appears she's drowned. We can't tell any more until the ME gets here and has a look at her. It might be suicide."

"Destiny wouldn't do herself in, and certainly not by flinging herself in the water. Destiny hated the water." Natalie indignantly went on the defensive. They'd like it to be suicide. They'd like anything involving a T-girl to be wrapped up quickly and neatly and covered up.

"Well find out what it is," Hardesty said. "But you look done in yourself. Were you and she together tonight?"

"No. Well, yes, we were supposed to be together. There was an exhibition. Mostly the drawings of Griffin Gould over at the Artechouse gallery. She was supposed to be there with Gould and I was with someone else, but she didn't show. I kept calling her and calling her but she didn't pick up."

"An art exhibit? And she was supposed to be the date of the artist?"

"Yes, like I said. She had a sitting with him earlier this afternoon. I talked to her on the phone before that. Couldn't get her later, though."

"Get that name down, Glen," Hardesty said. "Griffin Gould, artist. He may have been the last one to see Destiny alive." Then he turned back to Natalie. "Do you know a T-girl named Nicola?"

"Yes, not well. She's new, but we're with the same agency."

"And maybe Liam Hathaway?"

"Yes. She's not transformed yet, but she dresses lady and is with the agency too. Some of the agency's clients want them only part way--they just want them to look like a women until they unpeel them. But she might have left town. Liam, I mean. I haven't seen her in a while and the agency is pretty mad about her just cutting them off."

"She hasn't just cut them off," Hardesty said. "Anything you can tell me that these girls have in common other than the trans angle? You said Destiny was modeling for Gould today. Were the others models?"

"Yes. Gould is doing a series on T-girls. Drawings. Destiny and Nicola--and Liam too have done modeling for him. I have too. But, wait, you said 'were.' You not saying--"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. Liam hasn't just cut the agency off, and we just came from... a scene, where Nicola--"

"Nicola what?"

"I'm sorry," Hardesty said, and Natalie picked up on what he wasn't saying immediately.

"Oh, no, not Nicola too," Natalie wailed and collapsed on the ground. Hardesty crouched down and consoled her. Natalie perked up a bit at being in the embrace of the hunk that all of the girls were salivating over. He didn't just police the girls and guys, he handled them--and manhandled them like most of them liked when they knew it wasn't going to get out of hand. Most street prostitutes weren't all that aroused by vanilla sex anymore. What revved their engines was something kinky or fetish or forceful. Sex with a cop was kink--especially a cop that was from Vice and had kinky fetishes himself. This Hardesty was reputed to be a pro with the bindings and the whip--even the fist. The book on this hunk was that he did it all and left his sex partner melted and begging for repeats.

"But what's your story tonight?" Hardesty asked. "What has you running around the park without your shoes if you aren't part of what's happened to Destiny here?" There was still the possibility that she was involved in this, he was thinking.

"Yeah, I might be. A cabbie picked me up at the exhibition at the Artechouse over on D Street not more than an hour ago, and he didn't take me where I told him to go. He pulled up in the park over by the Washington Monument, and he assaulted me in the backseat of the cab. I think he was going to off me. Maybe--"

"Maybe it's connected, and he's our guy. Yes, that's possible. Did he... is there a possibility of getting DNA."

"Did he fuck me? Yes, indeed, he did. He used a rubber, but I've got some of him right here," he said, holding her hands up and splaying her fingers out to show her long, sharp finger nails. "I fought the black bastard. I got some of him under my nails. He better not have broken any of them."

"Then let's get you to the hospital for some lab work and we'll have a doctor check you out," Hardesty said.

"You'll do that yourself? You won't send me off with one of these other cops?"

"Yes, I'll take you myself, if that's what you want."

"And you'll stick around and take me home--where I wanted the cabbie to take me--over by Dupont Circle."

"Yes, if you want."

"It's what I want, sweetie." Hot diggety-dog, she was thinking.

* * * *

At the moment, Dex, the taxi driver, was having more panicked thoughts. As soon as he saw the three revolving lights on the squad cars on Independence Avenue, he'd had the thought that the bitch had managed to call in the calvary and that she was leading him into an ambush. That told him he had had more than enough for the night and was in over his head. He'd gotten his cab turned and was headed to the northeast to his row house near the old RFK sports stadium that was set for demolition in 2022. He no longer was worried about the reception he'd get from Jasmine and her mother for being home late from his shift. Now he was more concerned that he'd dropped evidence from his escapades of the night that would lead those three cop cars with the revolving lights on their roofs back to him.

It had been quite a night for him, though, and all started by that blond rent-boy with the older guy who he'd taken from D Street to Farragut Square. Seeing them kissing in the back of his cab is what had set it all off. He was the cutest of the three that night, and, boy, he'd like to get that honey alone in his cab. Dex wondered if he was an all-the-way T-girl like the other two he'd had tonight. He'd sure like to find out. Maybe he'd spend more time cruising that area of Dupont Circle where a lot of them were hanging out. He'd sure like to get a piece of that blond honey. He'd fuck him until he squealed and then he'd put him down.

* * * *

"Do you remember anything more about this cab driver who assaulted you? Did he say anything to indicate he'd done this before?" They were sitting in the idling Hummer H3 outside of the 21st Street Northwest apartment house Natalie had said was where she lived. Hardesty wondered if that really could be. She'd given college student at the nearby George Washington University as her occupation when they'd taken her statement at Hardesty's office at the police department. She had, though, given a 21st Street address. This apartment house near Dupont Circle looked decidedly upscale for a college student. Natalie had said she didn't have a roommate. Business must be better for T-girls than other hookers, he thought.