The Elegant Corpse

"Roger, I have a hard time agreeing with this." Jay panted heavily.As Roger listened to his hiss from his breathing mask, he added: "We promise to keep our identities secret."

"The homicide investigation overrides all commitments," Roger said.

Another gasp. "Maybe legally," Jay said.

Hell, Roger thought, this was forcing him to get a search warrant.He didn't want to do it.He didn't want to break the rules of the circle.He didn't want to face the exposure that would surely follow.He certainly didn't want to face a barrage of reactions from the entire community against him personally.

"There must be a compromise." He coaxed in different ways.

He heard Jay snap the mask on, and breathed behind it for a full minute, and then the man's voice rang again on the other end of the phone, saying only two words: "No."

***

"Your thread is broken?" Marianne asked.

"Not yet." Roger thought while crossing his hands in front of him.There were five folders spread out in front of him, each of which was a sealed file, and every young man recorded in it was determined to be a "suicide".He was almost certain that he had seen these names before.Roger hopes to test his instincts with Jay, but he is also almost certain that when he first met these five people, they already had some connection with the early "Avatar Club" group.

"I want to talk to someone who knows these young people," he said.

"We are already sure that we can report the material to the police?" Marianne expressed doubts.In fact, they should have done so if they had even a small amount of evidence.But if the evidence isn't enough, they shouldn't be contacting anyone yet.

Roger leaned back in his chair, tapping the shift key on his keyboard in frustration.

The lights on the landlines on his and Marianne's desks came on, and the latter picked it up first, as usual.When she got up to get the evidence bag and coat, Roger knew from the other's expression that this must be another murder.But this made him relieved to a certain extent, and he could temporarily divert his attention when he was busy with other things.Roger followed Marian out of the police station.

***

"I'm a Batman, someone's ancestral grave is overturned!" Marian whispered.

Although a bit of frankness and personalized expression can indeed alleviate the horror and absurdity inherent in their job, Roger feels that Marian sometimes takes "the dead are the best" too seriously.

A warehouse keeper at the Long Beach Pier dock opened a storage room that had been half-empty this morning and found an uncovered box inside of which lay a new, gutted, and posed body There is also a ritual mummy.

The unsolved case they had in hand had gone in the direction he and Marianne feared most: a serial murder case with unknown victims.

The smell of varnish and mothballs is sickening.Roger felt that this smell was basically equated with death.Roger put a handkerchief to his nose and mouth, and then slowly lowered it as he watched a coroner uncover the linen held together by streaks of varnish.

Roger's surprise was tempered by a sense of predictable anticipation as the victim's face was revealed.

"This is Adam Marchant," he told the medical examiner. "I visited him two days ago on a cold case."

***

Marchant's wife, Judy, didn't report her missing until that morning.

"Mr. Marchant is very, very busy in the city. He, he doesn't like to be disturbed." She explained in a low voice to Marianne with difficulty.

"When was the last time you saw him?"

Slowly, they got the information they wanted from Judy: the last time she saw her husband was the night of Roger's visit.Apparently, Adam Marchant would often be away from home for two or three days to "run errands in town," and his wife had become accustomed to his occasional walk-away activities at that time.

Although she looked frightened, she was much better than the last time Roger had seen her.The men in the room who heard the news were extremely emotional.A man was sitting on the sofa with his back hunched, covering his face with one hand, trying to speak clearly to the plainclothes police officer sitting next to him.

Next to Roger stood two men, trying to control their emotions, but one of them couldn't help it, his eyes were red and his face was scrunched. "Father Marchant saved the parish," a man said to Roger, who came to inquire. "Before he came, we were almost swallowed by the gang of humanists who had gone away."

"Have you known him for a long time?"

It's been a long time.This person is Anthony Clark, one of the patriarchs of the church. "I've known Adam Marchant since my wife and I were married."

"Do you know what Mr. Marchant is doing in town?"

Under Roger's gaze, Anthony's eyes were obviously evasive. "Adam has a lot of extended work to do."

"Expansion?"

"Yes." Anthony Clark was a big man, with a belly that held his shirt tight, but his arms were muscular.He lifted his chin, his nostrils parted slightly; Roger was sure that Clark was the kind of guy who used to scare people with a temper tantrum in order to dominate the conversation. "Sorry, Inspector..."

He squeezed his body toward Roger, as if that would push him aside.

Roger was not interested in this kind of pushing and shoving contest, but he didn't give in. "Sir, where were you on Wednesday night?"

"At home with my wife. Here she is." He introduced Mrs. Clark.She seemed as docile and timid as Mrs. Marchant.She gave an alibi for her husband.Roger recorded it carefully, completely ignoring the growing anger in Anthony Clark's eyes.

"Judy still asked us to babysit her children, Inspector, it's time for my wife to go home."

"Thank you, no further questions, sir," said Roger, finally letting the couple go. "Can I find you with this call?"

Clark didn't answer, he pushed his wife away in a hurry.

Roger turned to look for Marianne, and found her standing outside, typing quickly on her BlackBerry. "The Wives and Mothers Club," said Marianne.Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes were angry. "Can't ask a word. I bet these men have whips and chains hidden in the basement."

Roger snapped his mouth shut because he found he couldn't help explaining the difference between admonishment and abuse to his partner. "Does anyone know why Marchant is coming into town so often?"

"No. So, don't you think that's ridiculous?"

Roger agrees.

"I've gone to check the call log on the phone. I hope these idiots don't block everything under the guise of 'religious confidentiality' first." Marianne seemed a little out of breath, Roger thought.He suspected that it was because she had contacted those church elders before.

Judy Marchant showed up at the door with agents from the FBI, and the unsolved case finally began to gain traction.As soon as the agents saw Roger and Marianne, they led Judy to the lawn where they were standing.

Clark Miller, the FBI agent, looked like a football winger trying to tuck himself into a suit and tie.His cheeks were flushed, and his cold blue eyes were set like two tiny marbles in puffy lids.His hand was lightly on Judy Marchant's arm, but she followed him like a timid rag doll, looking around bewilderedly as if she hadn't been out much.

"I called an ambulance," Miller told Marianne. "We're going to need a full-time officer from the Special Victims Unit."

Several church elders came out of the house at once, and they seemed to be quite concerned about how to deal with the pastor's widow.

"I think the situation here may be special." Roger said.

Judy Marchant looked completely bewildered.Based on the state of the housewife's bruises and the fact that Miller felt there was sufficient evidence of retaliatory abuse, he ordered a search of the entire house.Roger protested weakly at last, but stopped immediately. Anyway, with such a big fanfare, it was impossible to collect more clues.Under the watchful eyes of everyone in the parish, people from the crime scene investigation department poured into the small room to start their work.The mood seemed to boil over into a kind of righteous outrage, and Roger estimated that in a few hours at most, the LAPD and FBI would be prohibited from pulling any records here.

"Remind me about calling the phone records." Roger reminded Marianne, who had already typed this message quickly beside her.

"I told, Detective M, Miller," Judy Marchant told Marianne inexplicably, "Mr. Marchant wasn't, wasn't angry that night. We didn't, didn't fight, fight .He often goes in, into the city, into the city. He talks to that young man, and he comes back after talking, and he talks, talks, talks to me..."

"Boy?" Marianne asked.

Judy Marchant was sensitive to slight shifts in tone and expression, and Marianne's hardly stern tone made her flinch even more. "Yes." She said barely audibly.

Agent Miller called in a portraitist to try to recreate the man's appearance; during this time Marianne took several glances at Roger.Neither of them named Sean, but it was obviously no coincidence that he was a "tall, white guy with red hair in his 30s".

"I'm harboring a fugitive," Marianne said as they drove away.

"is it?"

"I should have told Miller."

"Indeed."

"Then why don't I say it?"

Roger glanced at Marianne, who was twirling a lock of her hair and looking out the window dreamily. "I also want to know."

***

"You're working horrible hours," Sean said.

They listened to him before they walked through the front door.Marianne looked at him and then back at Roger.

"I'm dead tired," she said, and walked straight upstairs through the living room, throwing bags, coats, and shoes along the way.When she took off her shirt to expose her shoulders, she disappeared behind the door of the bedroom on the second floor.

"Lock the door when you go," she yelled, and slammed the door shut.

Roger turned his gaze back to Sean. "I thought you were asleep by now."

Sean tapped with one hand while biting the index finger of the other. "It's hard to relax right after I get off work." He was wearing an old knee-length flannel dressing gown, baggy and unbuttoned, and Roger could see plaid briefs and a bottoming T-shirt underneath.Sean's hair was curly, as if he had been tossing and turning on the pillow for a long time before coming downstairs.

"So you've been working tonight?" Roger took off his coat and hung it in Marianne's closet.

"Yeah. Exactly."

"And last night you were at a BDSM party," Roger said, walking into the living room, "and the night before?"

"What are you doing? I have a lot of work, brother! Or I'm trying to pick up the work."

"It's touching, isn't it? You can still find time in your busy schedule to drive a few hours to Adam Marchant's house in Moorpark and spend the night with him."

Sean stopped knocking.He put down his biting fingers. "This is my personal freedom."

"Sean, what did you do there?"

Sean's chest rose and fell. "I want to meet him. Why are you jealous?"

"Adam Marchant is dead," said Roger.Sean's terrified ducking, face twitching and head tensing as he looked up was anything but fake.One thing is for sure, this man can hardly pretend.

"Fuck me." He cursed softly.

"You've got to take a note," Roger said. "Can someone do an alibi for you that night? After six o'clock in the morning?"

"Yeah. Well, Bob can. I messed around with Marchant for a while, but then I left, Roger. Bob can prove it for me, I was helping him carry the slats that he brought in until late at night. box."

Roger sat down in the chair opposite Sean.This man has something on his mind.Everything was written on his face, making it easy to see.He tightened his eyebrows, bit his knuckles, and kept shaking his knees.Roger's gaze unconsciously fell on his disheveled body again.The upper half of Sean's thighs had obviously not been exposed to the sun much, so the skin there was as white and smooth as pure cream, and a layer of curly golden-red body hair thinly covered the bulging thigh muscles.

Roger forced his thoughts back to the matter at hand. "What do you mean you 'worked with him'?"

"I asked him about Gary." Sean blinked constantly, as if trying to avoid the thoughts in his head.

"What did he say?"

"Didn't say anything. You know, the guy was one of those 'straight at work bisexual' scumbags. I've seen a lot of that in bars. He pitched the same old hellfire, 'God hates Gay' or something. He went home after that and I drove off."

Not only these.There are also things that Sean has been thinking about and can't sleep. "anything else?"

"What do you mean? What 'and'?" Sean raised his voice, seeming to grow more anxious - if "more" at all.

Roger stared at him. "Withholding information in a homicide investigation is an offense of obstruction."

"Then you want to arrest me now?"

Roger exhaled exaggeratedly. "Sean, you shouldn't be getting involved. This behavior is... stupid. Very dangerous."

"Hey. If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't even know this guy existed," Sean said.

Roger hasn't slept for 48 hours.He was almost certain that the serial killer was after him, his whole body clamoring to overwhelm the young man right there at his partner's house so he could tell the truth.

"That's not the answer I wanted," he snapped.

Sean rubbed his face, and Roger noticed the dark circles under his eyes and the puffy eyelids. "I don't know what kind of answer you want," he said.

"What else did you talk to Marchant about?"

"My God. Nothing."

Roger suddenly reached out, grabbed Sean's arm and pulled him to his thigh; the powerful arm pressed the other's lower back to push him down, and spread his arms and legs to the sides.

"Wrong again," he said.

"What the hell are you doing?" Sean asked.

Hands up and down.

Roger's palm landed neatly and deftly on Sean's panty-covered buttocks.

Sean giggled. "Well, you know it's just going to turn me on a lot."

Another two claps.It's just heavier.

Sean twitched twice, but made no sound.

Snapped!Snapped!Snapped!

"Ouch." Sean stretched his hand behind his back, but was hit when the last slap fell.He sucked his injured finger, obviously pretending to be pitiful, but not seeking comfort.He had to admit: "I followed you, okay. I saw that bastard's church. I was curious. He called me a second chair. I called him a coward. He said my brother is a mentally abused Crazy. Well, let me get up!"

Roger heard a hint of self-deprecation in the last sentence.But he put one hand on Sean and said firmly: "You can't follow me anymore. You can't get involved in the investigation anymore. It's dangerous and stupid. If I push me, I will lock you up and prevent you from getting close to these things." .”

Sean was having trouble breathing and Roger let him get up.He grabbed Sean by the shoulder and shook it hard. "have you understood?"

Sean's restless and angry face was written all over the bad things that kept him awake all night.His eyes blinked constantly, avoiding the harsh light.Suddenly, Roger pulled him into his arms and hugged him tightly, stroked his hair with one hand, and opened his mouth to kiss Sean's ear.

Sean whimpered and threw his arms around him.

The fear and anxiety that had been entrenched in Roger's heart these days were like a snake charmer's rope, circling round and round in his mind, and then he lifted Sean's face and kissed it.

Sean eagerly deepened the kiss - he thrust his tongue into Roger's mouth and pressed his body eagerly against him, trying to stand on tiptoe to match Roger's height.

Roger stopped. "Don't be here," he gasped.God, they're still standing in Marianne's sitting room!

They shoved and tugged up the stairs, down the hall, and into Sean's bedroom.Roger closed the door carefully, terrified of what he was doing, Roger allowed the fear to creep into his consciousness for the first time, but then Sean's arms were drawn around him, his whole body pressed against the His back, the voice is hoarse.

"How do I take this holster off, Roger?"

Roger turned around and tore off Sean's flannel nightgown like paper.His own tie and shirt were also thrown on the floor.Sean stared at his face, his hand still on Roger's belt buckle, as if he needed it to stabilize himself.

Holsters and guns were scattered on the desk.He kicked off his shoes as he pushed Sean onto the bed.After that, Roger covered his rosy lips again, and moved his palm over Sean, like a sculptor feeling his stone.

Sean's feet were trampling on the bed cover, and his body was pressed against Roger tightly. His fingers stroked the back of Roger's head, and the rough calluses made Roger's back tremble.

"God, you're as big as a cow." Sean said in a hoarse voice, pressing his mouth against Roger's lips.Roger sucked on Sean's sweet neck, causing the man below to whimper and writhe, and his hands landed on his shoulders before sliding down his arms.

Roger fumbled around the edge of Sean's panties and yanked them off, trapping them between his knees.His hands searched for Sean's scrotum and penis, feeling the heat and shape, and when Roger's fingers finally covered them, the man beneath him couldn't help moaning.

"Roger, God. Roger, let me touch you."

Sean's hands went into Roger's panties and pulled out his cock.Roger's lower body was swollen and painful, he hadn't felt this way for a long time, he had to lift Sean's crotch to hold it firmly, and then kept rubbing against his stomach, feeling the gap between the two bodies gradually A sense of wetness.

Sean's hand ran over Roger's cock, his gnarled fingers darting back and forth across the tip, eager to feel it.He raised his hand to his mouth to taste, his deep eyes fixed on Roger all the time.

Roger let out a low growl from the depths of his chest. He pulled Sean's fingers aside, and forcefully stuck his tongue into the other's mouth, demanding.Then he raised Sean's crotch again so that their cocks squeezed together and rubbed against each other, Roger pumping and twisting, pushing back for more but not too greedy.

Sean looked away, gasping and coughing.He freed a hand to grab Roger's chin.His lower body was swollen, and his hands were covered with pre-cum when he was grabbed by Roger.Roger was panting like a wild beast, and he was relentlessly dancing on Sean's smooth, white belly until the orgasm poured down from the spine. He held Sean tightly, letting the aftertaste of the orgasm spread slowly.

"Whoa," Sean murmured, only the moonlight dancing on the bed.

Roger growled.

This thing is hopelessly stupid.

Sean's hairy head was pressed against his neck, and Roger's hands instinctively wrapped around it. "Wo wants to scream right away..." Sean said, and after a while, he was snoring quietly into Roger's neck.

Roger pulled a blanket around the two of them, staring at the ceiling until Sean's snoring dragged him into an uneasy sleep.

***

As a man who spent most of his time among men, Roger had never had the opportunity to really admire a woman.And when he started to get to know them, he realized that he could treat them as simple human beings and like them from the bottom of his heart.He sees this as one of the great perks of being gay.

When a man has done something stupid, a smart and kind woman will always treat him with a peaceful attitude; and if a man finds out that his colleague is having sex with others downstairs, he will treat him with a kind of congratulate him in a vulgar way, or be selectively blind to the truth in a terribly awkward gesture.

Marianne wriggled into the kitchen calmly in a blue silk nightgown and pink piggy slippers.She glanced at Sean, gave Roger a "blessing" smile, and said, "Thank you so much for not making too much noise last night, babes. I'm so tired." Then she started fiddling with the coffee machine.

"Sean, Roger and I have coffee. How about you?"