Hutch has a secret–and he wants to admit his inner passion to Starsky. But Starsky likes Star Wars and Hutch has watched every episode of Star Trek twice.
Keeping the secret wasn’t the issue. Hutch had hidden this part of his life since the mid-sixties. It was second nature to him by now. What was more difficult was keeping Starsky off the scent. He was like a birddog: Did you go out with whatshername? Have a good time? Put your whatchamacallit into her…
Hutch wasn’t that facile at lying. That was a fact—it truly rattled his inner morality. Going undercover was a completely different matter. That was acting: inhabiting a separate persona in pursuit of a goal, to obtain justice.
Constructing an alternate reality simply to conceal the truth from Starsky was flat out dishonest.
Nevertheless, he used obfuscation and half-truths to avoid evenings spent drinking beer and playing pool with his best friend for his secret vice.
A Star Trek convention.
Starfleetcon ran yearly in the Bay City Grand Hotel, and what a wonderland it was! Past the lobby entrance, large banners identified the diverse species and races from Star Trek. Klingons, Romulans, and Earth humanoids congregated, chatting like old friends. Businessmen guests of the hotel stopped in stunned surprise, staring at the strange life forms in their midst. Further along, the dealer room sold all manner of Star Trek paraphernalia from Starfleet uniforms to tribbles and miniature starships of every style.
Hutch walked in quietly, not in costume nor planning ever to perform a song in Saturday’s filk show. He simply came for the joy, slipping into his fantasy world as a member of the Star Trek universe. This was the future he wanted to envision—one of peaceful exploration, diversity, and love for fellow man.
After checking in at the con registration desk, Hutch collected his badge, program of activities, and a button that said Starfleet Academy. Clutching his prepaid banquet ticket, he tagged behind a bunch of con goers over to the conference area of the hotel.
There was a buffet set up for dinner, a line of servers wearing aprons in Star Trek colors dishing out exotically named foods.
Joining the queue, Hutch grabbed a plate, perusing the selection. Starsky would have wanted a taste of everything, from sliced tribble in cream sauce to grilled Andorian yak with capers, even if he wouldn’t recognize the Star Trek themed names.
The server, who had wide brown eyes and a long brown braid, held up her serving spoon. “What can I get you?” she purred as if imparting a dash of allure with the menu.
“Sliced Tribble in cream sauce.” Hutch grinned with delight since it was clearly chicken. The grilled yak was obviously beef. A salad with brightly colored lettuces and slices of star fruit looked delicious, and to wash it all down, there was Saurian brandy. It was burgundy red, not blue, however. Clearly not the real thing.
“Come back for seconds!” She winked with a come-hither smile.
Not what he’d come for, Hutch thought. This was his place away from being a cop, dating, all his mundane life. This was special and private. So why did he feel like he’d abandoned his best friend to go out on the town alone?
Grabbing a chair against the wall, he took a quick sip of the so-called brandy. As suspected, it tasted like sangria.
“Haven’t seen you in forever, Kenny!” A tall woman with straight black hair, decked out in pointed Vulcan ears and a micro mini blue science uniform, said enthusiastically.
“Serene.” Hutch put down his fork to hold up his hand in the classic Vulcan greeting. “Live long and prosper.” Which was truly his internal mantra when police work was hellish, and always gave him a moment of calm. “Great to see you.”
He’d known Sara Garver for six years. Once every summer they spent two and a half days with other Star Trek enthusiasts, discussing their favorite TV series, dissecting the episodes and focusing in on character narrative. She always dressed the part of a Vulcan lieutenant in the science department but couldn’t quite carry off the logical, unemotional trait of the alien race if her life depended on it. She was effusive, joyful, and sweet.
At one time, Hutch might have asked her out, but he’d been married himself when they first met, although he and Van were on the outs. Through the years, Sara had caught the eye of another ST fan, MacDouglas “Mac” MacDhoughall, who wore his gold captain’s uniform with a flare even William Shatner couldn’t pull off.
“What’s been going on since last year?” Hutch asked, forking up more Tribble. Sara knew that he didn’t attend the monthly meetings due to his work schedule.
“You know, of course, that Paramount will be filming a movie—to be released in ’79, with the original cast?” Sara gushed. “Mac already has a guaranteed walk-on part.”
“That’s terrific,” Hutch said, hearing Starsky’s favorite word come out of his mouth. He was surprised how much he missed him, but Starsky had never shown much interest in Trek. His fannish delight encompassed a wide swath from Godzilla to cheesy horror films, and finally Star Wars. Starsky had dragged Hutch to see the film a year ago and had been piloting an imaginary Millennium Falcon ever since. It was like he and Starsky were in opposing camps but Starsky didn’t know Hutch’s tent existed.
Which was the way it had to stay forever. He refused to allow anyone, particularly his best friend, to pull him away from his secret indulgence.
“I heard that they’d enlisted some of the Star Trek fan groups to be extras,” Hutch said, giving the Vulcan salute to others he recognized coming in to join the banquet.
“Wasn’t this a fantastic meal? Much better than the Enterprise shaped pizzas we had last year,” Serene said. “The hotel now has a caterer on retainer for events.”
“A good way to deal with extra tribbles.” Hutch laughed, finishing his meal. He eschewed the chocolate cake on the dessert table, although he was tempted.
“There you are!” Mac MacDhoughall came over, grabbing Serene’s hand. Although two inches shorter than his statuesque wife, he wore a mantle of calm importance with ease. “Deb and Jackie are here. Hi, Kenny, good to have you back.”
“Nice to be back,” Hutch responded happily.
“Have to go mingle. Enjoy yourself in the dealer room,” Serene said, a dimple blossoming on her right cheek. “As Mac’s wife, I get privileges.”
Mac had assumed the role of running the con a few years earlier. Hutch knew there had been some dissent in the ranks of the Starfleet Club but since he didn’t attend the meetings, he didn’t know the specifics.
“Thanks.” He gravitated to the large room filled with merchandise. Not just officially sanctioned items like Star Trek novels and action figures but mugs and shirts printed by fans. Also available were zines: stories written by fans for fans. Hutch had read a couple stories but generally steered clear of owning anything that would mark him as a Trekker at home, so he’d never bought a souvenir.
He admired the vast array of art in the art show. Paintings, drawings, crafts, and jewelry, all created by talented fans. He stared longingly at a beautifully painted portrait of Spock contemplating his chess set. The likeness was stunning, the colors jewel-like, gleaming in the overhead light. To the right and left were well made illustrations—one of the team beaming onto a planet with glitter utilized liberally to show the dematerialization of the transporter and a sweet watercolor of Kirk kissing Uhura. Hutch looked back at the Spock masterpiece, more tempted to buy the artwork than he’d ever been before.
“Please don’t touch that,” a woman said nervously from several feet away.
“I can touch whatever I damn well please,” a man retorted angrily. “Do you know who I am?”
Hutch turned away from the art exhibit. The belligerent man was Brad Wexler, as he’d suspected. Wexler was a well-known figure in the local ST scene, generally decked out in a Romulan uniform. He was loud, foul-mouthed, argumentative, and in complete opposition to the inclusive values set forth by Trek, a prejudiced bully. He seemed to love to pick on the shyer female members of the group.
Holding a phaser weapon in his hand, he pointed it at the older woman behind the table of collectables. Her Starfleet badge identified her as Martha Rogers.
“That’s a real prop, from the series…” Martha pleaded in a distinct British accent.
“Knew it looked authentic!” Wexler sneered. “In fact—” He flipped it over as if inspecting the workmanship.
“Brad,” Hutch said quietly. “It’s one of a kind.”
“Yeah, it was mine until I was forced to sell it because of bankruptcy.” He glanced around at the crowd of congoers who had gathered.
Most members who attended had heard his claim that he’d been a regular on Trek twelve years earlier. The main opinion was that he wasn’t any good. Hutch had seen his name listed as one of the red shirted crewmen on the end credits and had attempted to catch a glimpse of him. Wexler rarely seemed to be facing the camera and had probably been one of the replaceable crew who died on missions to alien planets.
“Rodenberry blackballed me! Never gave me another role!” Wexler shouted, pretending to fire the weapon. “Pew, pew.”
Martha went white with rage and fear. Clearly, she was not adept at confrontation.
Hutch was about to step in as a cop, and not just a fan, when another voice was heard from. The people who’d begun to gather around stepped back to give MacDhoughall space.
“Wexler,” Mac said with authority. “We need you for the 8:00 panel.”
“Duty calls,” Wexler said loftily. “Kenny, you’ll want to sit in on this one. We’re discussing The Apple.” He chuckled nastily, tossing the phaser into Martha’s outstretched hands.
She clasped it to her bosom as if she’d been reunited with a lost child.
Hutch gave her a hopefully supportive smile. “I’ll look at your great selection a little later,” he promised.
“Bless,” she said, placing the prop phaser into the place of honor amongst the other fan made phasers and communicators. Her hands shook slightly as she toyed with an earpiece like Uhura wore. “Thank you, Kenny. He’s such a brute. I’m not clever with…”
“You stood up for yourself,” he soothed. He’d never let on to anyone here that he was a cop and had never used his position to check up on any of the members. However, more than once he would have liked to learn exactly what made Wexler tick. “Are you attending the panel?”
“Oh, no, I prefer to read and sit with my friends.” She smiled benignly, holding up the novel Spock, Messiah!.
Hutch trailed in the wake of Wexler and Mac, gritting his teeth. He hadn’t planned on attending any panel Wexler moderated, but particularly that one. His own cousin, Daniel Sorensen, had played one of the native “Feeders of Vaal” on the planet Gamma Trianguli VI. Although obscured by a ridiculous pompadour and outlandish make-up, his familial resemblance to Hutch had always been a source of embarrassment.
Wexler started off in a bombastic extolment of his tiny part as one of three red shirts killed shortly after they arrive on the planet, showing a short clip of the episode as the crew was beaming down.
Hutch squirmed, perching on a seat at the back of the hall. It wasn’t merely the humiliation of having a relative in the episode. Hutch had enjoyed plenty of other guest star appearances Daniel had made on other series. The main problem was that Hutch really didn’t like the heavy handed moralistic diatribe of The Apple. There were plenty of other episodes he preferred over this one. As he stood to sneak out the door, Wexler played another short clip featuring Daniel looking like an oversized Oompa Lompa from the Willie Wonka movie.
“Hey, Kenny!” Wexler jeered, stopping the frame to show the Gamma Trianguli native in mid-stride. “Care to fill us in on your part in the show?”
Hutch froze, stage fright locking his limbs, fingers clutching the door handle.
Serene stood, from the middle of the rows of seats. “C’mon, Brad, it’s been proven more than once that Kenny wasn’t in the episode. What I’d like to explore are the parallels between this world and the classic Greek drama Lysistrata.”
A cluster of female voices drowned out Wexler’s pouty complaints.
“I’d agree, except Lysistrata is about the withholding of sex by the women of the town, not…” another woman began.
Hutch inhaled finally, mentally thanking Serene for her save. He slid gratefully out of the door and into the smaller room across the hall, coming into a viewing of the creepy episode Miri only slightly late. Watching with fellow enthusiasts was always the highlight of the evening, since at home he had no one to talk about the plot with. The ensuing discussion afterward held him until nearly nine pm.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t stay to join in a panel on race relationships in the 23rd century, not and get enough sleep to be awake for a jog in the morning before his day shift. Hutch took a few minutes to revisit what he’d already begun to think of as his Spock painting and regretfully headed out to the parking structure. Stowing the con program and his con badge in the glove compartment, he pointed the car toward the freeway on-ramp, pretending he was the navigator on the Starship Enterprise.
“Engage, Mr. Sulu. Open hailing frequencies, Lieutenant Uhura,” he said out loud, humming the iconic theme music. He would definitely be back on Saturday evening to watch the costume competition, filk singing, and hopefully, a less confrontational panel.
~~**~~
“So…?” Starsky bounced slightly when Hutch slid into the passenger seat. “How was…?” He paused as if waiting for the latest gossip on whichever one of their countless flight attendant or secretary girlfriends Hutch had romanced the night before.
About to take a bite of the toast with boysenberry jam he’d brought along for the ride, Hutch had to think frantically. What cover story had he given the day before? “S-she couldn’t make it after all,” Hutch said, taking a huge bite to cover his nervousness. Why was he lying to Starsky, in the first place?
Shouldn’t he come clean after all this time? Starsky jumped into his favorite things with both feet, basking in the glow of whatever pleased him. Hutch tended to pick up hobbies and abandon them after only a short time. His music and Star Trek were the only two things he’d hung on to since the late sixties.
“What?” Starsky flicked a glance at him at the stop light. “You shoulda called. Marla has a twin sister, Darla. We could have set you up.”
Except Hutch really didn’t want to be ‘set up’. He felt like a different person at Starfleetcon. Not the cop, but Kenny, the kind of geeky guy who liked singing folk songs and digging in the dirt, repotting spider plants. “You took both of them out?”
“Nah.” Starsky grinned cheekily. “Just me and Marla. Played mini golf at that place…” He stopped speaking, blinking rapidly, as if caught in a memory he’d rather not have right then.
Hutch knew exactly what he was remembering. For reasons he’d never quite fathomed, Starsky liked hitting golf balls into pink palaces and oversized clocks more than actual eighteen hole golf on a pristine green course. His favorite place, where he often went, had been one of the last places he’d taken Terry Roberts. Shortly after, she’d died from a gunshot wound to the head by an angry man with a revenge motive against Starsky.
Hutch had golfed several times there with his buddy, and Starsky generally could get through a game without looking like he’d lost his female best friend, but apparently this wasn’t one of those times.
“Hey.” Hutch put a hand on Starsky’s arm. “She’s probably up there watching you miss the fourth hole, across the little bridge, and laughing like she always did.”
“Yeah.” Starsky nodded with a rueful shrug. “Marla’s a hoot but she’s…”
“Not Terry,” Hutch finished for him.
Starsky somehow scored the parking place in front of Metro yet again and sauntered up to the front door with his usual flair. Hutch chuckled, feeling like the world had once again settled into place.
~~**~~
“Starsky, Hutchinson!” Dobey’s bellow greeted them as Hutch swung the squad room doors open.
Starsky planted both hands on his hips, in playful imitation of Dobey’s stance. “G’morning to you, too, Cap’n.”
“Where have you two been?” Dobey asked brusquely. “It’s—”
“Five minutes after seven, Cap,” Hutch answered, pouring a cup of coffee. He took a sip and passed it over to Starsky. “We were in the building on the dot of seven but Bigalow had a question about a requisition we’d put in earlier this week.”
Starsky snickered, blowing on the hot coffee before taking a drink. Hutch liked his brew hotter than Starsky did, although Hutch never put in enough sugar for Starsky’s taste. Still, they tended to share the same mug more than half the time.
“There’s been a murder at the Bay City Grand, you two will be the lead—” Dobey broke off as Hutch suddenly dropped into a desk chair.
“You okay?” Starsky asked, handing the cup back to his partner. Hutch didn’t usually pass out before they even got to a murder scene. In fact, he’d only gotten sick at the sight of a corpse on his first case, with his detective training partner, Luke Huntley. Starsky hadn’t been there but it was still the talk of legend. Hutch had vomited directly onto the dead drug dealer.
“This coffee’s hot,” Hutch complained after taking another sip. “Wha—who’s the victim, Captain?”
Hutch was grumbly and his color had improved with the drink, but Starsky wasn’t entirely convinced the hot coffee had affected him like that.
“A Bradley James Wexler was found in the back of one of the conference halls, under several tablecloths that had been folded after a banquet.” Dobey gestured out the door. “The M.E. is Ginny Simpson. She’s already left for the crime scene.”
“C’mon,” Starsky urged his partner, prepared to have a private discussion in the car. At this time of day, with so-called rush hour traffic beginning to dwindle down, it would still take them a minimum half an hour to make it out to the BC Grand.
Galvanized, Hutch stood and rushed out the double doors as if he couldn’t wait to get there. Confused and somewhat nonplussed, Starsky followed, mentally formulating what he wanted to ask.
Despite what he’d prepared, Starsky never got a chance to grill him for answers because Hutch began talking before they’d pulled out of the parking spot.
“Starsk, I didn’t go out with anyone last night,” Hutch started, donning sunglasses against the early morning glare of sun in the smoggy sky.
“Y’already told me that,” Starsky lobbied back at him.
“Because I had a…” Hutch stared out the passenger side window as if the sight of two hookers flaunting their wares this early in the morning was something new. “A destination. I went to the Bay City Grand.”
“You spent the night at the hotel?” Starsky asked, puzzled. “But you were at your—” He hit the brake slightly harder than necessary at the light just before the onramp, realization hitting. “You had an assignation?”
“Assignation?” Hutch repeated, swinging around to finally look at him. “When did you turn into a Victorian biddy? Who says that in this day and age?”
“My mom,” Starsky said, driving onto the freeway. As usual, there was a sea of cars although most were moving about ten miles per hour slower than the posted speed limit. “Sounds better than a one night stand.”
“WenttoaStarTrekconvention,” Hutch said rapidly.
“You went—” Starsky spaced the words much more slowly but they still made little sense. “To a Star Trek Convention? You?”
“Yes, me.” Hutch sounded oddly happy. He smiled slightly with an embarrassed shrug. “I like Star Trek, been going to Starfleetcon since the first one in 1972.”
“But I knew you then.” Starsky saw the sign for their destination up ahead and signaled to change lanes. “How did I not know this?”
Hutch looked down at his hands as if he had no answer for that. “I kept it private. Guess you could say I was in the closet.”
Starsky guffawed, reaching over to pat his arm. “Or the transporter room, more like.”
“How would you know?”
“I’ve seen Kirk and Spock,” Starsky replied, changing lanes toward the offramp in a half mile. “All those tribbles.”
“I thought you were a Star Wars fan,” Hutch countered.
“That movie was great, wasn’t it?” Starsky grinned happily, steering onto the main street. The hotel was two blocks up, and already there was a large contingency of police vehicles and press trucks parked out front. “It’s the—fantasy of it, Hutch. Someplace we’re never gonna actually see. Plus, Han Solo was cool.”
“But that was basically a Saturday afternoon shoot ‘em up,” Hutch said emphatically. “Star Trek is deep in ways that you aren’t even aware of on the first viewing, on subjects not usually covered in TV shows, like racism and xenophobia.”
“Xeno?” Starsky glanced his way, wishing they didn’t have to end the conversion so soon just as it was getting interesting. “Put on your cop face, Trekkie boy, we have a murder to solve.”
A blue uniformed rookie waved the Torino to a stop, coming over as Starsky opened the window. “Sir, the building is off-limits right now…”
“We’re the detectives.” Starsky held up his badge. “We have first priority.”
“Oh!” The kid blushed scarlet, waving them through to the curved driveway in front of the main rotunda of the hotel.
Starsky parked in the only available space left, behind the ME’s van.
“Before we get out,” Hutch said, his jaw tightening. “I hadn’t planned to ever tell you about Starfleetcon, but now—” He pointed to a sign on one side of the main doors. Starfleetcon was at the top, spelled out in small removable letters. Below was listed the different rooms for panels and viewings. “They know me here. As Kenny, a fellow fan, not Hutch, the cop.”
“They’re gonna know now,” Starsky said, slightly exasperated at Hutch’s hesitancy. What did he have to hide? Wasn’t like this was something illegal or anything. “But when this is over, we’re talking more about this, Hutch. I wanna know everything.” He climbed out of the car, wishing he’d been with Hutch the night before instead of insipid Marla who couldn’t get the blue golf ball through the windmill or the giant clock in twenty swings. And he’d counted.
He and Hutch were ushered into the hotel by another uniform, and led past the front desk, the elevators, and a small indoor waterfall that spilled into a tiny lake surrounded by restaurant tables. Gathered in the restaurant were about a dozen people, watching them intently. Starsky might not have guessed they were with the convention except for the abundance of Star Trek t-shirts and small badges with the inverted triangular logo of the Starship Enterprise.
“Kenny!” A tall woman with straight black hair to her shoulders and perfectly aligned bangs jumped up, running over. “So glad you came this morning, it’s been awful! Brad was–”
“Serene.” Hutch put a gentle arm around her shoulder. “I heard about Brad. And I—”
“They think Mac is involved,” she wailed, tears in her eyes. “The police…”
“That would be us,” Starsky interrupted. “Dave Starsky and this is my partner, Ken Hutchinson.”
“You’re a cop?” Serene gazed at him in shock, wiping her cheeks. “But—”
“Detectives?” another uniformed cop called them, beckoning from double doors that led to a conference room.
“Serene, we’ll need to question everyone involved with the convention,” Hutch said quietly. “Right now, I need to examine the crime scene.”
“You never told me,” she said, sounding both annoyed and confused. “We’re all being questioned by a cop in the back office.” She crossed her arms over, looking exhausted. “Which is why we’re here. Mac was the first to be called in.”
“I’ll get back to you,” Hutch promised. “Keep you updated. I gotta go now.”
“Who is she and what’s her full name?” Starsky asked, sotto voce.
“Serene—uh, I believe her real name is Sara Garver,” Hutch supplied, tapping his forehead. “Maiden name Garver, married to the con leader, MacDouglas “Mac” MacDhoughall. That’s literally all I know about them,” he added, following Starsky into the large room.
“Gonna be difficult keeping your feelings out of this one?” Starsky commented, stopping to survey the scene. The all-purpose room could be used for classes, meals, a ball or even a church gathering depending on the arrangement of furniture and opening or closing of a folding partition down the middle. Hotel staff had clearly been in the midst of changing it from a banquet to a meeting before the work had stalled at the discovery of the body. On one end of the room was a small podium with a portable lectern and three rows of chairs facing the stage. On the other were half folded tables, chairs piled in rickety stacks, and a table with unlit butane burners for keeping buffet dishes warm. To the left, near the open door leading to the kitchen, Ginny Simpson, the medical examiner, was bent over a body partially covered with tablecloths.
“Thing is,” Hutch said, glancing around the room, as well, “we didn’t exchange personal details. This was our safe space, Star Trek all the time. I’ve known many of these folk for six years, but I don’t attend the monthly gatherings. Some, like Brad, I know his name, and that he used to be an extra on the series, and others, only as Nellie-Uhura or Bob the Navigator Guy.”
Starsky gave Hutch’s chambray-shirted belly a single pat, walking over to Ginny. “What’d we have here, Miss Ginny?”
“Brad Wexler. White male, roughly early thirties, thirty-three according to his driver’s license, killed with a single shot directly to his heart.” Ginny pointed to a small caliber gunshot wound in his chest, slightly to the left of center. “The bullet did massive internal damage from what I can ascertain without opening him up, and he died very quickly. The assailant then covered him with the tablecloths and left.”
Hutch heaved a sigh, walking around the body. “He was attending this Star Trek convention,” he said without inflection, waving a hand at Wexler’s Starfleetcon badge, plus the heather gray and brown shirt with a blue sash over one shoulder. “Not likely a suicide, I’m guessing. No gunpowder residue.”
“You’ve been doing your homework.” Ginny nodded, rising from where she’d been crouched on the floor.
Starsky bent over to peer at Wexler before one of Ginny’s techs came over to load the body onto a gurney. The man must have died so quickly, there was barely a drop of blood visible around the tiny wound. “Someone who knew precisely where to shoot and from close quarters,” he said.
“Excellent aim,” Ginny said dryly. “Had to be only a few feet from the victim.”
“You think he knew his killer?” Hutch speculated.
“Gotta be.” Starsky said, well aware that Hutch must be thinking of his friends in the group. This Mac and his wife, Serene. Or any of the others. He needed to know much more about this convention. “What exactly was going on here last night and where were most of these…” he glanced over at his partner, “fans?”
Hutch nodded as if reading Starsky’s unasked question. “Thanks, Ginny.” He looked around the crowded room. “There was a banquet here last night.”
Again, Starsky heard the subtext of the bland statement. Hutch must have eaten here. Laughed with Serene and Mac, maybe, or shared some Star Trek trivia with any one of the other attendees. He had an odd pang of jealousy that he hadn’t been invited. It wasn’t as if he and Hutch had never discussed sci-fi series or anything—he could go on and on about Star Wars or the new Superman movie that he’d seen trailers for at the movie theater, but Hutch didn’t tend to dig into the trivia and exciting battles like Starsky did.
They’d even watched Star Trek together. Starsky remembered sitting in Hutch’s hospital room the year before, watching an episode where Spock’s brain had been stolen from his head. Starsky had enjoyed the goofy nature of the plot, not to mention the sexy female aliens, but Hutch had derided the entire episode.
Now he realized it was probably a combination of Hutch being in pain from his broken femur and the lunatic story line. Hutch liked the cerebral stuff that allowed him to ponder deep meaning and the underlying questions of life. Exactly what he’d said earlier in the car.
“Let’s take a look around and then talk to MacDhoughall and Garver,” Starsky proposed, cocking his head in hopes that Hutch would join him. They walked over to where the lectern had been erected. Standard protocol was to keep employees and staff away from a crime scene when there was a murder in a public building. Two lab guys were still fingerprinting around the murder site, but once Ginny and her team left with the corpse, Starsky and Hutch were relatively alone.
“You ate dinner here last night?” Starsky asked lightly, crossing his arms, and leaning against the white wall.
“Yes,” Hutch said, elongating the sibilant S sound. “Chicken, salad and punch, all with Star Trek inspired names.”
“Annnnd—” Following his example, Starsky exaggerated his opening word, “you spoke to the victim.”
“Several times,” Hutch admitted ruefully. “As well as Serene, Mac—uh…” He frowned, “Martha in the dealer’s room, and said hi to a dozen others. Starsk, it’s like a party. We were here to hang out with others who share the same…” He sighed, as if he’d lost something special. “Passion.”
Starsky sincerely wished he’d come along too, if only to see Hutch in this very different element, having fun. “Take me through the night, and walk me around the convention area.”
Hutch turned, as if reorienting himself to last evening. “I came through the lobby, just like we did and into the corridor outside this room. Serene was the first one to say hello. She was dressed as a Vulcan, as she often is.” He gestured at the remains of the banquet dishes. “Ate and went into the dealer room.”
“Which is?” Starsky followed Hutch out the door and across the hallway into a wonderland. It made him yearn to attend Starfleetcon all the more. What fantastic stuff! Action figures, Star Trek costumes, props, and more. None of the dealers had been allowed back into the room, so some of the treasures were covered with blankets or quilts to keep the dust off, but Starsky wanted to explore everything and buy a few of the novels. “This is terrific!”
“Wexler came in and was harassing this nice woman named Martha.” He paused, pointing to a corner booth. “She sells props, and apparently had one that Wexler sold off when he went into bankruptcy.”
“Motive?” Starsky asked, still salivating over the plethora of merchandise. He longed to pick up one of those authentic looking communicators and hail Scotty.
“Starsk, I doubt that sweet old lady knew how to use a gun, much less owns a .22.” Hutch raised his hands in resignation. “But literally everyone who came in contact with Brad Wexler had some beef with him. He was a nasty piece of shit.”
“Oh, ho!” Starsky crowed, centering on his partner. For some reason, he was overcome with the idea of kissing that defeat off Hutch’s face and had to savagely repress that. “What’d he have against good ol’ Kenny Hutchinson?”
“Nothing that gave me a reason to plug him in the chest.” Hutch snorted inelegantly, “We need to talk to Mac and Serene and then dig into Wexler’s history.”
Starsky gave the smorgasbord of Star Trek paraphernalia one last look. “Could we…” He stopped, suddenly aware that he might not be welcomed here because he was a cop, and that the convention only happened once a year for three days. “Come here together next year?”
Hutch stared at him, a vibrancy lighting him from the inside. But he seemed startled, as if caught in a secret fantasy.
~~**~~
“You want to go?” Hutch asked, feeling like he’d been hit with a blast from one of the show’s iconic phasers. His chest was all hot, his heart suddenly beating faster than usual.
“This looks like a lot of fun.” Starsky nodded enthusiastically,
“But you’re a Star Wars fan.”
“And Star Trek, and…” Starsky raised a finger the way Hutch did when he was making a point. “Just saw a commercial for a new series coming out on ABC in the fall season with Lorne Greene. Y’know, from Bonanza. Set in the future with spaceships and robots.”
He did know. He’d seen the commercial, too. And his interest had been piqued. “Battlestar something,” he said, pretending he had not memorized the premiere date and time.
They rounded the corner back to the indoor lake where many of the congoers had congregated. Some of them were looking at him with undisguised betrayal and suspicion, as if he’d wronged them all these years by not confessing that he was a cop. “Are Mac and Ser—uh, Sara still around?”
“Kenny!” Martha piped up, giving him a smile. “Are you going to solve this murder?” The excitement in her voice proved she was not only a Star Trek lover but quite probably a murder mystery fan, as well.
“I hope we can uncover evidence to…” he prevaricated.
“We’ll find the murderer,” Starsky said, with a sly grin for the older woman. “You wouldn’t happen to have any inside information, would you, doll?”
Martha pinked up prettily at the old fashioned complement. “No, but I do have his fingerprints.”
Starsky glanced over at Hutch, eyebrows raised. “Do you?”
“He touched one of her phasers,” Hutch explained. “But so did you, Martha.”
“You can take my prints anytime, and compare them,” she suggested eagerly.
“Not a bad idea, actually,” Starsky agreed, beckoning over one of the uniformed cops. “Kwong, could you get this lovely lady’s fingerprints and then escort her into the dealer room so she can point out which prop our victim touched? Bag it for evidence.”
“You’re not going to do it yourself?” Martha sighed.
Starsky gave her a regretful smile. “Your phaser’s safe with me.”
“We have to talk to–” Hutch waved Mac and Sara over, glad to escape Martha’s enthusiasm. “Them.” He put out a friendly hand to MacDhoughall. “Is there someplace we could talk about Wexler?”
Serene slid her eyes toward her husband and he gave a sharp nod.
“In the main panel room,” Mac said quietly. Then he raised his voice to address the crowd. “Starfleet members, the police have cordoned off the main hall where we had the banquet last night but we’ve been released to go on with the con starting about noon.”
Several people cheered, and chatter buzzed around the group. “What about the filk show tonight, Mac?” a barrel chested man with a bushy mustache called out.
“The hotel has generously allowed us a different ballroom because whatever had been booked there was cancelled,” Mac replied. “Give me a couple hours and we’ll watch Trouble With Tribbles, with sandwiches from a local deli at noon.”
“That’s a terrific episode,” Starsky said wistfully.
Hutch felt like his whole world view had been spun off its axis. What else was he going to learn about Starsky today?
After they’d all walked into the small conference room, Serene took a determined stand in front of Hutch. “Kenny…Officer Hutchinson…”
“It’s okay, I know this is awkward,” he said, feeling like a heel, even though he knew he had no reason to. This had just blown up his safe little haven. And yet, admitting the truth to Starsky had opened up a completely unexpected way to connect with his best friend. “You can call me Kenny, or Hutch. And this is my partner, Sergeant Dave Starsky.”
Starsky smiled fondly at him, turning a chair around to straddle it backwards. About five feet away, Mac glowered, arms folded over his gold Starfleet captain’s t-shirt.
“We had absolutely nothing to do with Brad’s death, you have to know that!” Serene blurted out. “After the panel he modded, Mac and I…”
“We spent some alone time, just the two of us,” Mac said stiffly.
“Anyone who can verify that?” Starsky asked.
“The room service guy,” Serene said. “Brought up champagne and ice cream at about—”
“Ten o’clock,” Mac added. “We’re…” He glanced at his wife with a clear question on his face.
“We’re trying to have a baby,” she finished his sentence. “Last night was the right time of the month. We tipped the waiter named Jesse, who brought up our order.”
“Congratulations!” Hutch said sincerely. “I hope you get a new little Starfleet member by next year.”
Mac let out a frustrated sigh. “Do they have a time of death for Brad? Any leads?”
“We can’t divulge any specific information at this time.” Hutch hid behind the police department line. “You sound knowledgeable about that sort of thing.”
“We’re lawyers,” Serene said. “MacDhoughall and Garver, attorneys at law. Although, we mostly do corporate law.”
“No crime dramas in the courtroom?” Starsky asked lightly.
Surprised at how carefully Starsky was handling this questioning, Hutch realized Starsky was trying to follow his lead, since these were his friends.
“Mergers between companies, tax fraud, that kind of thing,” Mac said. “But Star Trek is my passion. Wexler has been a pain in my ass for the last six years, acting like he was special because he was in four episodes.”
“Only four?” Hutch asked in surprise. He’d never paid attention to which ones, other than The Apple, because of Wexler’s continual teasing.
“He made it seem like he was a regular, didn’t he?” Serene finally sat down in a folding chair. “But he was really an extra with a line in one single episode. We tolerated him because he pays his membership to the convention every year, which we need to pay the hotel bills.”
“You said he filed for bankruptcy?” Starsky prompted.
“He contacted us, what was it—four years ago because he was having money solvency issues, and needed a lawyer,” Serene said, flipping her hair behind one ear.
It was the one of the few times Hutch had ever seen her without pointed Vulcan ear caps in place.
“We didn’t feel it was a good idea to mix our professional career with our fan life,” Mac said. “We recommended a fellow attorney who specializes in bankruptcies and didn’t think much more about it.”
“Except that he brings up the subject at every single con since,” Hutch said. “Did he attend the monthly meetings?”
“Some.” Mac nodded. “He campaigned to be top dog, but I was voted in as club president over him. I’d have to look at my log books at home to give you specifics on dates he attended.”
“He has several children and frequently seems too busy. He never dresses up in uniform for our yearly Christmas visit to local hospitals and charity events,” Serene added. “Truth is, I would rather not talk to him.”
“When was the last time you spoke to him Friday night?” Starsky asked.
“After the panel on The Apple, about nine thirty.” Mac glanced over at his wife. “Sara had already ducked out to our room. I said good-night to about half a dozen people, including Wexler, and went up in the elevator.”
“Was there any reason for him to be in the banquet room after the meal was finished?” Hutch asked, thinking back. He’d gone into the Miri viewing, and participated enthusiastically in the lively discussion on the merits of the episode, with lots of comments on the spectacular acting of the teenaged girl playing Miri. “I left at nine,” he said quietly. It was generally against police department policy to work on a case when a member of the investigation team was involved in the case. Should he recuse himself? Or simply not tell Dobey about his inner knowledge of the fan convention? “I didn’t see Wexler at all. In fact, the dealer room was nearly empty and very few con members were in the lobby when I walked out.”
“A lot of people gather in the con suite with their favorite beverages…” Serene smiled, miming drinking. “To read popular fics out loud.”
“What’re fics?” Starsky asked.
“Stories people write about the characters,” Hutch said.
Starsky grinned as if he’d discovered a new taco joint. “There are stories about Kirk, McCoy, and the Enterprise crew?” He practically danced sitting down. “Now I know I wanna come back here and look around.”
“You’re very welcome, Sergeant,” Serene said sweetly. “I can tell you are a fellow fan.”
“And then some,” Hutch muttered. “Mac, Wexler’s driver’s license was on his body, so we have his home address, plus the Medical examiner showed me his employee card for a medical clinic, but do you happen to know his profession?”
“You didn’t know?” Serene giggled. “He was a doctor. Apparently used his earnings from Star Trek to go to medical school.”
“At least that’s what he says,” Mac added.
“On an extra’s salary?” Starsky scoffed. “Hutch and me were in a movie—”
“Starsk,” Hutch warned, his cheeks burning. “It hasn’t been released.” And his single line had been cut. He wasn’t sure how much of the few scenes he and Starsky had been in remained.
“And there ain’t no way he coulda paid for medical school on what an extra makes now,” Starsky said, eyebrows raised. “I asked some of the others on the set. Must’ve been even less when Star Trek was on the air.”
“I’d never thought of that,” Mac confessed. “He probably worked on other TV series, too.”
“Possibly,” Hutch said. “Anything else you could tell us?’
“I don’t think so.” Serene shrugged, her pretty face solemn. “I’d love to call his wife, give her my regards, but I don’t even know her name. This is so…sad. I didn’t like him, but I don’t wish him dead.”
“Just proves how little we know people that we see all the time.” Mac frowned, reaching out to take his wife’s hand. She smiled winsomely at him.
“If you think of anything, no matter how small, give us a call,” Starsky said, sketching a wave as he and Hutch walked out.
Lost in thought, Hutch slowed to a stop in the middle of the hallway and Starsky plowed directly into him. “Why’d you bump into me?” Hutch asked, irritated for no reason because he’d wanted to touch Starsky during the entire conversation—but not by Starsky practically bowling him over. “I was thinking of–”
“What?” Starsky cocked his head.
Hutch could have kissed him then and there, except they were in public, at a Star Trek convention. Guys didn’t do that to their best friends. “What Mac said: how little we know about people we see all the time.”
“You spoke to these people, what, once a year?” Starsky spread his arms to encompass the entirety of the convention. “Not surprising you don’t talk about regular life, you’re here for the—” He put both hands on his hips, standing like an actor about to emote. “The five-year mission to explore new worlds… and all those gals in barely any clothes.”
Hutch rolled his eyes at the bad imitation of William Shatner’s overly dramatic delivery, impressed at Starsky’s obvious knowledge of the series. “No, dummy,” he laughed. “I meant you. That we’ve even watched the show together and I never knew you were such a fan.”
“We’ve watched it once together. So, turning this around,” Starsky poked Hutch in the chest. “How come you never told me you did this every year?”
Hutch felt his cheeks burn, and turned to head out to the lobby. “It was my private thing. Van used to say, ‘what’s that trash you’re watching’?” so I could hardly tell her I really liked Star Trek and had watched the episodes more than once.” He headed for the front desk. It had just occurred to him that they should check out Wexler’s room. “After she—”
“Left you,” Starsky finished. “You needed something that made you happy.”
“I know, huh? Probably should have worked on my music, or studied another language.” Hutch ducked his head, seeing a group dressed in Starfleet uniforms hurry past.
“Hutch.” Starsky came around in front of him, grabbing the sides of his chin to center Hutch’s gaze on him. “Why’d you do that? Act like everything’s got to be so serious or it doesn’t count? You deserve to have some fun.”
His heart hammering so hard against his rib cage, Hutch wondered if he was having some kind of panic attack as he stared into his partner’s blue eyes. So very beautiful and a completely different shade than his own blue eyes. He had to inhale to extract himself from the daydream of kissing Starsky there in the lobby of the Bay City Grand. “We—we need to concentrate on the murder,” he squeaked in a higher than usual register.
Starsky stepped back, with a slight nod. “What’s our next move, Doctor Watson?”
“Why am I Watson?”
“Cause I said so.”
Starsky sauntered over to the registration desk, doing exactly what Hutch had planned to but never mentioned.
“Which room was Brad Wexler staying in?” Starsky asked, holding up his detective badge for identification.
“Let me check.” The young man behind the counter consulted a large book, flipping one page over and then back again. “This is the guy they discovered in the…?”
Hutch nodded. “The victim. He was with the Starfleet convention.”
“But he’s not registered here, not with the block of rooms we set aside for that group, or anywhere in the hotel,” the desk clerk answered.
“Damn,” Starsky said softly. “Guess we have to go to his house. Mac didn’t say where he worked.”
“Thank you.” Hutch nodded to the desk clerk, walking toward the double doors. He had a stab of sadness that he hadn’t gotten a chance to show Starsky the painting of Spock. “Ginny showed me his ID for a medical clinic.”
~~**~~
Checking his notepad for the Wexler home address, Starsky drove the Torino onto the freeway. Their destination was about as far from the hotel as was possible and still be inside the Bay City limits.
“Not exactly where you’d expect a doctor to live,” Hutch said, peering at the drab apartment complex. It obviously hadn’t been painted in decades and the plantings around the entrance were brown from years of drought. “Guess he really did go into bankruptcy.”
“What kinda doctor was he?” Starsky asked dubiously, getting out of the car. He had a bad feeling about this. “Something shady?”
“Uh—” Hutch patted down his pockets, finally locating his notepad. “According to the ID found in his wallet, he worked at a practice on Crenshaw.”
“Which is thirty minutes from here, and also not the best area in town.” Starsky walked through the open gate, senses on the alert. A couple of dogs nosed around a pile of garbage near a swimming pool, devoid of water, and a gaggle of children were playing a loud game of cops and robbers on the far side of the courtyard. “What does 1215 Avenue de las Pulgas mean in English?’
“Avenue of the fleas.” Hutch chuckled. “We don’t have an apartment number.” He pointed at the bank of mailboxes. “Twenty units—most with Spanish or Vietnamese names.” Running his finger across the second row, Hutch tapped the box numbered twelve. “Wexler.”
Apartment twelve was up a staircase, with an open walkway that looked down on the dry pool. Starsky knocked, swallowing hard. There was no reason to be so rattled, and yet he was. Did Wexler have had a family or a roommate?
“Who is it?” a female voice called through the closed door.
“Police. We need to speak with you,” Hutch answered.
The door opened a crack to reveal a brown eye. “What? This isn’t about the rent, is it, ‘cause…”
“We have information about Brad Wexler,” Starsky began carefully. Never easy to inform family and friends that their loved one had died.
“That jerk? Get arrested again?”
Not what he’d expected her to say. Starsky exchanged a stunned glance with Hutch. Neither of them had unholstered their guns for a visit to possible grieving family members. The woman seemed so irate, he wondered if he should have.
“Are you Mrs. Wexler? We’re very sorry to tell you that your husband has been murdered,” Hutch said softly in that compassionate voice of his.
She opened the door wider, her mouth in a grim line. “Now I’ll never get any child support from that bum.”
“Could we take this inside, more private?” Starsky asked, aware of curious eyes watching them from several other open doors and windows.
“No,” she said defiantly. “Say your piece and get outta my face.”
“What’s your full name?” Hutch asked politely.
“Carla Mayhew, like the actor.” Carla was short with long brown hair pulled back in a braid that reached her waist. She crossed her arms over pendulous breasts, sticking out her chin like she’d hit one of them if they came any closer.
The look on Hutch’s face proved he didn’t know what she was talking about.
Starsky might have laughed another time. “Peter Mayhew who plays Chewbacca,” he said. “Mrs. Wexler—”
“Ain’t used that bum’s name in a year. Now that he’s dead, why’d I want to be reminded of him?” she responded.
“Ms. Mayhew,” Hutch said genially. “When was the last time you saw Brad Wexler?”
“He came by a couple of days ago, had some candy for the kids, Brad Jr. and Brenda, but zilch for me.” Carla shrugged, tugging her tight house dress down around her lumpy figure. “I threw him out and ate some of the candy. Brad cried, Brenda’s only two, she don’t care.”
She’d never asked where he was found or how he died, Starsky thought. “Would he have normally been at the—”
“Bay City Medical Clinic on Crenshaw,” Hutch supplied without being asked.
“This morning?” Starsky went on, grateful for his partner’s backup. Mayhew’s attitude had thrown him since he’d expected a grieving widow.
“Not unless he caught something from that bitch,” she said vindictively.
“He doesn’t work there?” Hutch asked.
“At a medical clinic?” Carla snorted. “He ain’t got a job that I know of.”
“We were under the impression he was a doctor,” Starsky said after a beat to internalize the picture she was painting. Not only was Wexler apparently a jerk, according to Hutch and all those at the con, but he was a deadbeat, too.
“That’s his twin.”
“Twin?” Hutch repeated, with a dumbstruck expression.
“Bradleigh—spelled like some dumb ass English girl’s name. My ex was Bradley, like a man signs his name,” she explained, leaning against the doorframe as if all this talking was exhausting.
“You mean there are two Wexlers?” Starsky asked. “Could you write down those names?”
Hutch handed her over his notebook and she spelled out the two different versions of Wexler’s name.
Starsky sorted through her comments in case they missed a clue. “You mentioned he might be with some other woman?”
Rolling her eyes, Carla turned at the sound of a cranky toddler’s voice. A miniature version of her mother wandered to the door, dragging a threadbare teddy behind her. “Brenda, give me two freakin’ minutes. Brad’s got himself some nose in the air bitch with money. An’ before you ask, don’t know where they live. Brad useta have a place on 104th, but he got kicked out.”
“Thank you, Ms. Mayhew,” Hutch said with a quick glance at Starsky. “We’re sorry for your loss, and the police department may have more questions or information at a later date. You can contact us any time.”
Starsky had turned to go, Hutch shoulder to shoulder with him when she called them back.
“Hey,” Carla said diffidently, holding Brenda up against her shoulder. “Just cause, like, Brad Jr’ll want to know. Where was he? I mean, where’d he die?”
“At a Star Trek convention,” Hutch said.
“Fuck. He used to take me.” Carla blinked rapidly as if finally saddened by the news. “I was real cute decked out like Yeoman Rand.”
~~**~~
“Did she completely freak you out?” Starsky asked, steering the Torino to a freeway onramp.
“All I can say—not what I expected,” Hutch confessed, wiping sweat off his forehead. Mid-July and the temperature was rising.
“And there’s no way she ever looked cute as that blonde with the basket on her head,” Starsky bitched.
“Grace Lee Whitney was a beautiful woman,” Hutch said, admiring Starsky’s profile. She had nothing on his partner. Starsky’s eyelashes alone could—Where the hell was all this coming from? Suddenly, all he could think about was Starsky. Sure, he’d fantasized on rare occasions, to get himself through the night, but since Friday, all he wanted was to be with Starsky—and do things they’d never done before. Not just hang out at a Star Trek convention.
“You remember her name, but not Chewbacca’s?” Starsky teased, speeding to go around a slower truck.
“Priorities, Starsk.” Hutch waggled his eyebrows. He rubbed his chest, trying to stay with the case and slot everything they’d learned about Wexler into a cohesive whole. “We should pull a jacket on Wexler when we get to headquarters, see his priors. She said he’d been arrested.”
“And find out who this nose in the air…lady is,” Starsky added. “Where to, Sulu? Hey, that rhymes.”
“Almost.” Hutch flashed a smile, but he was thrilled that Starsky was diving so deeply into Star Trek. “The clinic on Crenshaw. After that, we’ll check Wexler’s background, talk to any other family members—”
“Such as a twin brother.” Starsky spared a glance at him when they were off the freeway and on the boulevard again. “You ever hear Wexler talk about a brother?”
“Not like I ever initiated conversation with the man, even in a panel discussion. I tried to avoid him most of the time.” Hutch looked out the window at the rundown neighborhood. “Having a twin is something most people brag about.”
The medical clinic was just as Hutch expected, the sort of place where transients, street people, and those without a steady income got their medical care. He was in awe of the selfless doctors and nurses who worked in such places, dealing with drug addiction, violence, and diseases most people didn’t worry about, such as TB. Hutch could not conceive of the Wexler he knew actually working here.
The nurse at the front desk was a stunning redhead who could have graced the pages of Vogue even in her white nurse uniform and perky little white cap. Her name tag said P.G. Woods, RN.
“Can I help you?” PG asked.
Starsky flashed his badge, standing directly beside Hutch so that their arms touched from shoulder to elbow.
She gave a resigned sigh. “Who did what this time?”
“Does a Dr. Bradley Wexler work here?” Starsky asked.
Hutch surveyed the waiting room. Several men, their underfed bodies bundled in sweatshirts despite the heat, waited in the chairs. Two pregnant girls sat together talking softly, and an older man with a cast on his right arm read a magazine. Hutch recognized the cover of Time from several years earlier.
“Sure, but he didn’t show today,” PG said with a good-natured ‘what can you do’ expression. “We’re short-staffed, and Dr. Wexler was supposed to be in by eight.” She held up a hand to forestall questions. “Murray, you can go see Dr. Nguyen now!” PG called.
The old man nodded, tucking the magazine into his jacket pocket before walking slowly into the hallway to the right of the front desk.
“We’re sorry to inform you that Dr. Wexler was found dead this morning,” Starsky said in a somber voice.
PG gasped, her green eyes wide. “Good Lord, how’d it happen?”
That was the reaction Hutch had expected from Carla. He couldn’t see PG with brutish Wexler, but odder relationships had happened.
“We can’t give out details,“ Starsky answered. “Have you worked with him long?”
An Asian doctor greeted Murray in the hallway and walked him into an exam room.
“He was here when I started.” PG wrinkled her nose, tapping her pen on a clipboard with a list of patient names. “About a year.”
“What do you think of him?” Starsky continued, leaning on the front desk.
“I don’t want to…speak ill of the dead,” PG said, biting her lower lip. “But he wasn’t my favorite. That would be Dr. Johanssen. Dr. Wexler wasn’t a friendly person. Gruff, you know, condescending a lot of time.”
“How about as a doctor?” Hutch put in. He couldn’t picture the crass, egotistical man as someone in the healing profession.
She focused on the waiting room as if silently counting the remaining patients, touching her nursing cap. It had slipped sideways toward her left ear. “There had been no complaints,” she said diplomatically.
“May we see his office?” Hutch asked. “We need to know more about him. We’ve spoken to his wife, but she hadn’t seen him in some time.”
“Clara?” PG waved at a man coming in, motioning him to a seat. “I should call her!”
“No, Carla,” Hutch corrected.
“His wife’s name is Clara,” PG repeated, her brow furrowed. “She must be devastated.”
“Does she live on Avenue de las Pulgas in South Bay City?” Starsky asked with a quick glance at Hutch.
“Of course not,” PG said, steadying her nurse cap with her left hand to reinsert a bobby pin to the base with the right. “It’s 939 Laurel Dell Canyon.”
Curiouser and curiouser. Hutch cleared his throat, throwing Starsky a return glance. “That’s not far from your place,” he commented. “We spoke to a Carla Mayhew Wexler.”
PG opened her mouth in surprise, shaking her head. “That’s not his wife.”
“This may sound strange,” Starsky spoke up, obviously perplexed. “How do you spell Wexler’s first name?”
“It’s unusual.” PG grinned, looking past them at the group in the waiting room again. “He and I once commiserated on our out-of-the-ordinary names. I’m Persephone Grace. He is Brad with L-I-E-G-H after that. Go into doctor’s office on the right down the hall, his medical license is on the wall.” She marked something off on the clipboard. “Miss Gonzalez?” PG called to one of the pregnant girls. “You can get your blood test now.”
Sure enough, when Starsky and Hutch crowded into an office the size of a supply closet, there were three medical licenses framed and displayed on the wall. One for Tran Nguyen, one for Mabel Johanssen, and the last for Bradleigh Wexler.
“I was weirded out after we talked to Carla, but I feel like we’ve stepped into that episode where every member of the Enterprise crew had a double.” Starsky examined the single desk that all three doctors must share when writing on charts. “He is a twin or he isn’t. He’s either got two wives, or each twin has a wife. But which is which?”
“Mirror, Mirror,” Hutch supplied the episode title. Very unsettled himself, he examined a few photos tacked to a bulletin board. He recognized the Vietnamese doctor in a group shot with Wexler and a curvy black woman. Another had Wexler dressed in a well-made suit, one arm around a beautiful woman with long brown hair styled in an elegant French braid. “That’s definitely the Wexler I’ve met, there, with the brunette.”
“Who could be Carla, but she’s not,” Starsky poked a finger at the picture. “She’s…”
“Better dressed, weighs far less…” Hutch exhaled. “The Brad Wexler I knew would never have done charitable work at a free clinic, that’s for sure. In fact, I’m having a hard time seeing him as a doctor at all.”
“Hey!” Starsky called, bending over a small cart with a coffee maker and what appeared to be very old donuts.
“Don’t eat those!” Hutch admonished.
“Wasn’t going to.” Starsky wrinkled his nose. “However, bet that’s Wexler’s mug.”
Three mugs hug on hooks beside the coffee maker. One said, ‘World’s Best Doctor’, the second had Snoopy atop his doghouse, and the third was plastic with pictures of the Enterprise, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy on the side.
“Doesn’t look like he rinses it out between cups of coffee,” Hutch said grimacing.
~~**~~
It was decidedly odd to drive into his own neighborhood to get to Brad and Clara Wexler’s house. They lived about five minutes from Starsky’s place. Number 939 Laurel Dell Canyon was a pleasant little bungalow built on stilts, as many of the houses in the canyons were, and definitely a step up from the apartment on Avenue De Las Pulgas. It wasn’t fancy or large, but knowing how much his own rental was worth, Starsky recognized that the place was beyond the price range of a man who worked in a free clinic and claimed to have declared bankruptcy.
“Maybe the missus has money?” he suggested, glancing at the other houses on the street. Much like his own, it was steep with lots of trees and vegetation around.
“I can’t even fathom…” Hutch stood beside the Torino, his hands in the classic ‘what the hell is going on’ gesture. He marched up to the small porch, knocking on the front door.
Starsky had to look down so that he wasn’t zoning in on how the sunlight was glinting in Hutch’s blond locks, making them shine.
“Hello?” A woman opened the door with pleasant but cautious expression. “Are you lost, it’s so easy to—”
That was definitely the woman in the photograph at the clinic. Wexler had a type: short and curvy with long brown hair. The two women could almost be sisters; even their names were similar. But while Carla looked like she needed child support and a new wardrobe, Clara was wearing high-end clothes and had red polish on stylish long nails.
“Police,” Hutch said, holding up his badge. “Are you Mrs. Wexler?”
She nodded, glancing past his shoulder at Starsky behind him. “What’s this about?”
Starsky let Hutch take this one as he had with Clara Mayhew, and Starsky had been the lead with Nurse PG. They divided the work to keep an eye on the other’s back. Or backside, literally, because Hutch had a very nice one. Starsky rubbed his eyes, feeling out of sorts again—why did he keep thinking about Hutch like that? He’d told himself more than once that Hutch wouldn’t appreciate Starsky’s infatuation. He wouldn’t condemn the interest, just politely steer Starsky in the direction of some comely flight attendant or secretary. Not a meter maid, though.
“We’re sorry to inform you that Brad Wexler has died.”
Clara crumpled, almost collapsing against the open door. Hutch grabbed her arm to prevent her from dropping onto the porch. “Starsk!” he called frantically.
Starsky supported her other side, and together they got her inside the house and onto a flowered loveseat in a cozy living room. A little girl, possibly about three years old, was watching Saturday morning cartoons.
Starsky had to look at her twice just to make sure it wasn’t Brenda from Avenue De Las Pulgas.
“Mrs. Wexler?” Hutch said gently, patting her hand. “Can we get you something? Water, coffee?”
Clara was sobbing as if she’d lost all hope. Hutch looked completely out of his depth.
“Dat her soda,” the child piped up, pointing to a tall glass filled with ice cubes.
Unless Starsky’s nose completely deceived him, it was rum and coke at barely eleven in the morning. “I’ll get her some water,” he said, dashing toward the room beyond, which turned out to be the kitchen. It was spotless, not a crumb on the counter, not a bruise on the fruit on the basket on the table. There was a bottle of rum beside the sink and a bowl with a puddle of milk at the bottom. The little girl’s breakfast bowl?
By the time he returned, the child was sitting in her mom’s lap and Hutch had escaped to the upholstered chair beside the TV.
Clara was sipping her cocktail, but accepted the water with a sweet thank you. “Bria, drink what the nice policeman brought,” she said, her voice wavery from crying. She wiped her eyes with an elegant, manicured finger. “How did Brad die?”
“That’s for the medical examiner to determine,” Hutch said delicately. “He was found at the Bay City Grand Hotel—”
“Oh, his convention.” Clara sniffed with a nod. “He was so loved there.”
Bria watched them solemnly over the rim of her glass, drinking the water.
“What kind of convention?” Starsky put in since Hutch seemed unable to comment.
“Star Trek.” Clara gave a watery grin, hugging her daughter against her shoulder. “Not my thing, but every couple months he attended his club and then went to the convention in July. He started the group, you understand. They all clustered around him because he’d been pivotal on the series.”
“Really?” Hutch sounded strangled, but cleared his throat. “Have you watched his performances?”
“Like I said.” She heaved a sigh, drumming her fingernails against the glass of rum and coke. It made a musical sound, especially accompanied by an inane song on the cartoon series. “Not my thing. But our marriage worked because we were free to follow our own paths. I own three manicure shops—Tip-top Nails. That, and Bria, of course, keep me very busy.”
“Does Mr. Wexler have other family?’ Starsky asked, pretending innocence. With Clara at her nail salons, maybe that was how he’d had another wife and kids? The little girls were not that far apart in age.
“Like a twin?” Hutch slid his eyes over to Starsky, silently expressing his utter amazement at yet another strange twist in the case.
“No, he’s not a twin.” She blinked tears, indicating several framed photographs on the wall. The usual, a glossy wedding picture, Bria as an infant, a larger version of the picture that had been pinned on the bulletin board of the three doctors, and one of Clara with an identical twin. ”I am, though.” There was an odd bitterness in her voice.
“Auntie Carly,” Bria said, jumping off her mother’s lap to point to the photo.
How many woman were there with extremely similar names and faces? Carly and Clara were as alike as two peas in a pod. Same build, same hairstyles, and same friendly smiles. Carla Mayhew looked a great deal like them, but she wasn’t their triplet.
“And—I know these may seem like probing questions, but where did he work and how do you spell his name?” Hutch asked.
“He works at Bay City General. He’s a brain surgeon.”
Starsky had to clamp a hand on Hutch’s thigh to keep both of them from expressing their utter disbelief. He and Hutch had been patients far too many times at BC Gen, yet they’d never seen—or heard of—Dr. Wexler. Of course, neither of them had ever needed a brain surgeon.
Hutch stiffened, his voice a trifle higher than usual. “A neurologist?”
“Yes. And it’s Bradley, the normal way one would spell it.”
“Mama.” Bria wiggled, knees clamped together, almost spilling what was left of her water. “I gotta…”
“Then go.” Clara grabbed the glass, waving a hand toward the hall. Once the little girl was out of earshot, her mother rolled her eyes. “I swear, don’t have children until you are good and ready. She wears me out. I really need to lie down and…” Her lower lip trembled and she swigged the rest of the rum and coke in a single swallow. “What will I do without Brad? We can’t…”
“I am so sorry for your loss, Mrs. Wexler,” Hutch said with sympathy. “Could we call anyone for you? To help you with Bria?”
“Your sister, maybe?” Starsky suggested, watching her closely.
Wiping a tear dripping from her eyelashes, Clara’s whole face went from grief stricken to spite and back to utter sadness in under a second. “No, not Carly. She’s likely to be at work right now.”
“What does she do?” Starsky asked, fascinated. Brad wasn’t the only one with a convoluted family history.
“Owns a catering company.” Clara led them to the door, her long braid swinging like a pendulum across her back. “Starpower Catering. They do big conventions and events for the movie industry. Keeps her very busy.” She exaggerated the very sarcastically. “So we don’t see each other often, since I have my nail salons.”
“Thank you for your time.” Hutch shook her hand. “We’ll call you if we have any more questions.”
Starsky could tell there was something going on with him, Hutch looked more unsettled than he had earlier.
“I can’t go into the salon until Bria’s sitter comes…” Clara sighed, sounding teary again. “What’ll I tell them?” She pressed a hand against her mouth. “Can you tell me, who identified him? At the con?”
“Uh, I don’t actually know,” Hutch blurted out. “But we—I mean, the members of Starfleetcon all knew him.”
“Yes, he was so beloved.” Clara nodded, giving a little wave as they walked to the Torino.
~~**~~
“I swear, it’s like there are multiple Brad Wexlers,” Hutch exploded once Starsky had driven away from the Wexler home. “And I have a feeling I’ve met Carly whatever her last name is.” He could see her in his memory—although the encounter had been less than a minute or two. She’d been the server at the con banquet, he was sure of it. “Before we stop at Metro, we should speak to this Carly.”
“Address?”
Hutch was way ahead of Starsky. He snatched the mic for the police band radio. “Dispatch? This is Zebra three.”
“Zebra three,” Beulah answered their hail. “What do you need?”
Starsky leaned toward the mic while he was stopped at a red light. “Address for Starpower Catering.”
“Also, could you have Minnie in records pull a jacket on a Bradley Wexler,” Hutch added, warmed when Starsky’s arm brushed against his. “Spelled either Brad with L-E-Y at the end, or L-E-I-G-H.”
“Which is it?” Beulah asked, sounding peeved. “Leigh is a girl’s name. My sister’s name, to be specific.”
“We aren’t sure.” Starsky revved the engine as he went left.
“Starpower is on 520 Andover,” Beulah said. “Owner’s name is Carly Millhouse.”
“Thanks.” Hutch clicked off the speaker button.
“Spill.” Starsky glanced sideways at him.
“The moment I met Clara Wexler, I thought I’d seen her before,” Hutch explained. “Because I’d seen Carly Millhouse, at the convention, serving at the banquet.”
“The plot thickens,” Starsky said. “Think she has any catering samples on display? I’m starving.”
“You’re always hungry.” Hutch shook his head, surprised at how content he was. He’d been sure that Starsky learning about his secret vice would cause teasing and ruin his joy. Instead, not only had Starsky embraced it wholeheartedly, but somehow, this entire investigation was filling him with happiness. “I didn’t see Wexler in the banquet room, so it’s possible that he didn’t eat dinner…”
“But did he know his sister-in-law was there?” Starsky continued the thread. “Clara knew he was there, Carla would have gone if he’d asked her.” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “What’d you eat?”
“What?” Hutch had been watching Starsky driving so intently that he hadn’t paid attention to the question. Not good at all!
“You said you had chicken for dinner?” Starsky repeated. “I need food, even if it’s just talking about food.”
“Sliced Tribble.” Hutch chuckled. “Tasted like chicken.”
“Man!” Starsky licked his lips. “Think she has any leftovers?”
Starpower Catering was in a narrow building in an upscale shopping district. A large plate glass window displayed several photos of the rich and famous standing with Carly Millhouse behind various plates of food.
“Wow.” Starsky almost had his nose pressed to the glass. “Isn’t that Zephyr, the singer, at her wedding?”
“That cake must be five feet tall.” Hutch grimaced. Ever since his own ceremony, where Vanessa and her mother had gone over-the-top to the nth degree, he couldn’t stand ostentatious weddings. “You read too much of that People magazine, mushbrain.”
There was a dark skinned girl with a huge Afro at the front desk speaking on the telephone. “Thank you, ma’am. You come in on Friday, and Ms. Millhouse will help you plan the whole meal.” She hung up the pink phone, looking up at Starsky and Hutch cheerfully.
Hutch flipped his badge.
“Detectives Starsky and Hutchinson,” Starsky said. “Is Carly Millhouse here?”
“Sure.” She frowned nervously, glancing between the two of them. “She’s in the back packing for hors d’oeuvres for a movie premiere—”
“Don’t get up,” Hutch said politely, unsurprised when Starsky twisted the knob on the door behind the desk. “We’ll introduce ourselves.”
Starsky stiff-armed the door, barging unannounced into an industrial style kitchen with the receptionist on their heels. Three people stopped their busy bagging and packing, one small man giving out a high-pitched shriek at the intrusion.
“Police!” Hutch said as Starsky moved to the left to keep the entire roomful of people between the two of them. He recognized Carly Millhouse immediately, because, of course, she looked exactly like Clara Wexler. She glared at him angrily. “We’d like to speak to Carly Millhouse.”
The Asian man pointed at her, his eyes wide and terrified. The other woman, older, with a gray beehive hairdo, was frozen in place.
“What is the meaning of this?” Carly demanded.
“Ms. Millhouse, I told them you were bu—” the receptionist cried.
“Kimlashea, go answer the phone,” Carly said imperiously.
“Ms. Millhouse?” Starsky said with a slight drawl as if assessing the worth of her character and finding fault.
Made Hutch think about kissing him and maybe climbing into bed with him. He needed to keep his focus on the situation, not fantasies about Starsky naked. He shoved that into a deep closet in the depths of his brain and tried to lock the door.
“We’d like to talk to you about Dr. Brad Wexler,” Hutch said calmly. “Do you have somewhere private?”
“Wang, Edna, finish the boxes,” Carly directed. “I will deal with this. Shouldn’t take long.” She stared hard at Hutch as if silently threatening him and pointed at a door in the corner of the kitchen, marked with a brass name plate. “My office.”
Starsky took a step back to let them pass, gazing at the hors d’oeuvres and tiny cakes on the counter.
All three squeezed into the little room which had no visitor chairs. There was a filing cabinet, a small, tiled table with a phone, and a chair with a green rubber seat. Carly had used patio furniture for her office. “I didn’t do it.”
“Do what?” Hutch asked without inflection. This was new—so she knew he was dead? Added even more weight to the theory that she had offed her brother-in-law.
“Whatever some asshole of a customer has accused me of.” Carly spread her hands as if including any one of her clients.
“We came to inform you that your brother-in-law, Brad Wexler, died last night,” Hutch finished.
She didn’t move, eyes narrowing with speculation. “Why tell me?”
“Weren’t you working at the Starfleet Convention yesterday evening?” Starsky said aggressively.
“Bunch of weirdos,” she said dismissively, flipping her long ponytail over one shoulder. “Giving idiotic names to every one of my signature dishes. But the BC Grand has me on retainer, so it’s paying gig.”
“You consider your brother-in-law a weirdo?” Hutch asked, raising an eyebrow. She was her own worst enemy, trash talking those who hired her for her catering. Her food had been delicious, no question there.
“Brad?” She smiled, rolling her eyes. “He’s definitely eccentric, but a brilliant mind, despite that. A wonderful man.”
“We spoke to several of his colleagues and people at the convention.” Starsky crossed his arms, rocking forward slightly. “That’s not what they said.”
“He’s complex. I can’t believe he’s dead.”
Hutch didn’t believe her at all. There was almost no emotion, either anger like Carla, or distress like Clara. She was too calm, too controlled.
“His heart is so gentle.” Carly shook her head with slight exasperation. “Giving away most of his money earned at the hospital and working for nothing at that damned clinic.”
“Didn’t he file for bankruptcy?” Starsky put in.
“If he did, Clara didn’t tell me.” She hitched up one shoulder. “Listen, I really need to get back to this job. Those petit fours don’t box themselves.”
So she knew about both of his jobs, and the convention, too. Hutch mused. Apparently, Carly knew Wexler better than either of his wives. “You and your sister –his wife? Don’t get along?” Hutch continued, watching her for signs of guilt. She clasped her hands together but there was no nervous twitching or darting eyes. Starsky was the one shifting from one foot to the other, clearly uncomfortable in the tiny room.
“She married him to have a baby, and we had words.” Another eye roll. “I’d already been dating him before. He really loves me.” She puffed out her chest. “Clara made her bed, she can just lie in it. He planned to divorce her once…”
“Then why’d you kill him?” Starsky asked conversationally, poking at a small display of miniature plastic fruit on top of the filing cabinet.
“What?” She was on her feet, going feral in an instant, eyes blazing. “Is that what you think? I should…”
“Call the police?” Hutch didn’t take his eyes off her. She seemed as unpredictable as liquid nitroglycerin. If she rushed him or Starsky, he would not hesitate to use force. “We’re here. Do you have some information on Bradley Wexler’s death?”
Her eyes abruptly awash with tears, Carly quivered, boxed in between the two of them. “I’m pregnant!” she wailed.
“And Clara was the one who wanted children?” Starsky took a step back, giving her more space. “Is Brad a twin?”
The non-sequitur confused her. “What?” Carly angrily wiped her wet cheeks, glancing wildly at a filing cabinet drawer inches away.
She started to reach for the handle but Hutch knocked her hand to the side, pulling open the drawer himself. There was a small gun on top of a pile of Starpower Catering brochures. Unless Hutch missed his guess entirely, they’d found the murder weapon.
“He refused to divorce my sister!” Carly seethed, digging her sharp, well-manicured nails into Hutch’s right arm. “Told me to get rid of my baby!” She raked a long scratch across his forearm.
Shoving the phone table to the floor, Starsky hooked an elbow around hers and knocked her away from Hutch. “Lady!” he growled, “You are under arrest…”
The wounds seeping blood, Hutch let Starsky take the lead, drawn to his partner like never before. His arm stung, but Starsky’s emotional response was breathtaking. It teetered on the edge of too much, balanced by a soul searching look at Hutch as Starsky snapped the cuff on Carly’s wrist.
“I own this place!” she screamed, attempting to buck away, but the room was narrow and Starsky had her crowded into the wall. “You cannot do this…”
In that one second when their eyes locked, Hutch felt Starsky’s love to his deepest depths. Knew Starsky felt exactly the same way he did. There was no doubt at all.
“You have the right to remain silent,” Starsky began, locking the other cuff on the squirming woman.
He was speaking so rapidly, Hutch was sure that Carly wouldn’t understand a word, if she was listening at all. Grabbing a hanky from his jacket pocket, he wrapped it around his bloody arm, nudging Starsky with his left elbow. He felt Starsky stop and inhale with a full body shudder.
“Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law,” Hutch recited, finishing the Miranda rights required by law during an arrest
“Ms. Millhouse?” Kimlashea called nervously, knocking on the closed door. “What’s going on?”
Carly straightened, her volatile moods shifting yet again. “You can’t parade me in front of my employees like a common criminal!”
“Lady, you killed a man. Common ain’t even in your vocabulary.” Starsky raised his eyebrows, glancing to Hutch. “You need…?” His fingers flexed as if wanting to bandage or at least provide some kind of comfort.
Hutch could read every movement of his body. “I’m fine. Nothing that a little Bactine won’t fix.” He marched Carly the four steps to the door, waiting as Starsky opened it.
All three employees were grouped in a huddle. Each one gasped seeing Carly in handcuffs, and Hutch despaired of getting out of the catering business in less than an hour. He and Starsky hadn’t even called for back-up.
“I phoned the local constabulary!” Edna, the older woman with the physics defying hairdo, brandished a rolling pen. “There are laws about breaking in and assaulting…”
“Good,” Starsky nodded with a shit-eating grin. “Saves me the trouble.”
“I hear a siren already,” Hutch said. “Miss Millhouse, may I escort you to your ride?” He almost laughed as they passed by the table laden with dozens of petit fours.
Starsky was always quick. He’d grabbed a couple cakes with a single sweep of his hand.
~~**~~
Amazingly, the aftermath of the arrest was quick and without further mishap. Starsky hated that the wicked witch of catering had left a mark on Hutch, but her little pink cake was delicious beyond words. He debated saving the second one for Hutch, or eating it quickly and pretending it had never been in his pocket. Would Hutch smell it on him?
He was surprised that the clock hands were only at three-fifteen after Carly was carted to booking and the three confused employees locked the doors of the building. A brief questioning proved that none of them had known anything about Brad Wexler or that Carly might be carrying his child.
Adding a mental note to have social services determine if Carly really was pregnant to his to-do list, Starsky rubbed his belly and pulled the tiny cake out of his jacket. It was perfectly square, iced in a pretty blue color, and topped with a miniature white petaled flower. Almost too beautiful to eat.
“I saw you take that,” Hutch said, his lips curled up like the Cheshire Cat’s, leaning against the car parked in front of Starpower.
“For you,” Starsky said smoothly, holding it out on his flat palm. “Cause you got hurt.”
“You eat it.” Hutch’s eyes caressed him, as if looking at Starsky was the ultimate joy in his life. “I didn’t get shot—or bashed on the head. I’ll live.”
This felt different and wonderful. While not exactly strange, because he and Hutch had always been at their best together, it was new. Something powerful had changed.
“Uh—” Starsky stuffed the cake into his mouth to give himself a beat, and munched it down far too fast to savor the sweetness. Except the expression on Hutch’s face held all the sweetness in the universe. “We solved this case in less than a shift!”
“So we did.” Hutch slid into the car, donning his sunglasses. “You have plans tonight?”
Jangling the keys, Starsky made a show of starting the engine. So many possibilities presented themselves, and then there was this Starfleetcon, too. “I might.”
“We have to write up preliminary arrest reports, and find out if Minnie pulled a sheet on Wexler.” Hutch waggled that long forefinger of his.
Which brought up a completely nonsensical thought into Starsky’s over-stuffed brain. But he seldom let even the most bonkers idea go by without bringing it out into the sun for examination. “Hutch, you remember that movie with the Flying Nun a year or two ago?”
“You mean Sally Field?” Hutch asked and, as he spoke, he leaned back in the car seat, clearly disturbed. “Sybil? The woman with sixteen personalities.”
“What if—just let this sink in for a moment.” Holding the steering wheel firmly, Starsky made a circle with his free hand to encompass the whole illogical but intriguing theory. “What if Wexler was a multiple personality like her.”
Hutch exhaled noisily, rubbing the base of his throat. “We’ll never know, will we? He’s in the morgue.”
“But…” Starsky coaxed more out of him.
“I don’t know much about that psychiatric field of study,” Hutch continued as if approaching a possibly live grenade, “but—”
“It provides an explanation of some of the weirder inconsistencies.” Braking the Torino, Starsky kept his eye on a big rig truck making one of those awkward, articulated turns from the middle lane. “That he seems to have paperwork with more than one name on them. Two wives…”
“Hate to say this,” Hutch put in ruefully, “two wives that we know of.”
“There’s that. Plus Carly. Two jobs, people who knew him giving wildly different accounts of his behavior.”
“God, I’d rather not go any farther down that particular rabbit hole.” Hutch sighed.
His foot softly on the accelerator, Starsky passed a Volkswagen Bug once the big rig had negotiated the turn into the Von’s parking lot. “But you gotta admit. It’s got merit.”
Snickering, Hutch held up both hands like a believer testifying at a revival meeting.
The rest of the drive was the comfortable silence between two tired friends. Starsky tucked the big red car into his usual parking space in front of Metro. “What time does this convention start up again?” he asked, going for casual.
Hutch swiveled toward him, hope blossoming on his face. “Well, it’s all day. But tonight is the costume contest, filk singing, and more panels.”
“Like what?” Starsky made no move to get out of the car even though there were mounds of chores to get the case in shape to charge Carly with murder.
“Panels are lots of fun. The moderator has a specific subject like…” Hutch began enthusiastically, “The duality of the episode Mirror, Mirror or the emerging role of women in a futuristic society. Those were two I attended last year.”
“And last night?” Starsky asked. Coming around the Torino, he pretended to accidentally bump Hutch as he was climbing out of the car.
Hutch chuckled, his eyes shining when he removed his sunglasses. “Unfortunately, Wexler was giving the panel.”
“So you didn’t attend?” Starsky took the front steps at a gallop and had to hold up at the top until Hutch was there.
“I-I did,” Hutch stammered, suddenly red-faced.
“But you left,” Starsky guessed shrewdly. “Cause Wexler made some crass remark and you were offended for the sake of the group.”
“Exactly!” Hutch punched the air with his finger. “He goes on and on about being a member of the cast, although he was basically a glorified extra.”
The overly emphatic response only proved that there was another more embarrassing reason, and Starsky was determined to scope it out. Later. “So what’s this filk singing?”
“Really talented song writers either alter actual song lyrics to incorporate Star Trek, or write their own songs.” Hutch mimed playing a guitar as they walked into the squad room. “Lots of fun.”
The joy reflected on his face made Starsky want to go to the con simply to see Hutch in a space that gave him such pure happiness. Although cautiously admitting to himself that he was in love with his male partner, and had been for a long, long time, Starsky was not blind to Hutch’s moodiness and occasional biting criticisms. That just proved he was human, despite his Nordic God good looks.
“Starsky, Hutchinson!” Dobey intercepted them the moment they claimed chairs at their communal desk. “Good work arresting a suspect so quickly!”
If the rest of the detective squad hadn’t been aware of their success before, they were now. Starsky took a mocking bow, seeing Hutch give a similar expression of amusement. Babcock, Simmons and a few others, including two civilians apparently there to give statements, all looked up with interest.
“Captain,” Hutch said smoothly, with all the proper decorum and correct posture that Starsky could never have achieved if he tried. “Starsky and I pursued the evidence and talked to Wexler’s family and friends, identifying Carly Millhouse. She basically confessed to us.”
“That’s impressive.” Dobey shook Hutch’s hand first, and grabbed Starsky’s in a firm, if slightly damp, grasp. “I’ll apprise Chief Ryan.”
“Cap,” Starsky interjected. “We found what we think is the murder weapon, and we’re gonna dig into the paperwork pronto, but Hutch and me got somewhere to get to by six.” He side-eyed Hutch, nudging him in the ribs. “Right, partner?”
Hutch went abruptly from debonair and polished to gosh-shucks, his eyes so wide there was white all the way around the summer blue irises. “Yes, we’ll have a preliminary report on your desk by the time we leave, but we don’t want to incur any overtime.”
“Exactly what I like to hear.” Dobey smiled proudly as if he’d helped with the investigation personally. “Oh, and Miss Kaplan left a file for you.” He waved an expansive hand, going through the door into his private office.
“Bingo!” Starsky grabbed the manila folder, flipping through the paperwork. “This is for a Brad L. Wexler, not sure if the L is for L-E-I-G-H or L-E-Y, who apparently had several run-ins with cops for A&B, drunken disorderly, and public disturbances,” Starsky read before passing the folder to Hutch.
“I can believe all of that from the Wexler I knew.” Hutch looked at the arrest picture with a nod. “That’s him, all right.” He ran his finger down the list. “Man, not a single conviction.”
“Only actually charged in two cases, but doesn’t look like he went to trial or did any jail time.” Starsky grimaced. “Interesting detail, but since he’s dead, not much help in the long run.”
“I hate to say it, but a third persona with such a similar name could give more credence to your hypothesis, Mr. Spock.”
“Now you believe me, Captain Kirk?” Starsky laughed out loud.
“Or he likes to play with aliases,” Hutch said in William Shatner’s jerky, overly dramatic pronunciation.
Starsky wadded up an old, unread memo and tossed it at Hutch.
Ducking with a grin, Hutch inserted an arrest form into his typewriter.
Starsky began the tedious but necessary list of witnesses, family, and friends they had talked to, and slotted them into a new folder with the notes he’d taken after each encounter. He’d write up more detailed transcriptions of the interviews on Monday, but for now, he was eager to go to Starfleetcon. With Hutch.
And, he wondered, would anything else develop? Could they broach the subject he was fixated on, and about 99% certain Hutch was, too?
Maybe they’d kiss?
~~**~~
The Bay City Grand was a blaze of light—and there was a new addition in the lobby: model replicas of the Enterprise, a Klingon ship, and a Romulan vessel on a large, wheeled cart parked near the indoor lake.
“Mac!” Hutch greeted him, holding out both hands to show that he was not armed. “What do you have here? These are incredible.”
MacDhoughall rubbed the back of his neck, clearly uncertain of how to greet Hutch and Starsky. “Back for more interviews?” he asked neutrally. “We heard from a journalist who was talking to con members that someone was arrested.”
“We can’t give you specifics,” Starsky said, “but as far as we are concerned, there is a suspect in custody and we’re just ordinary Star Trek fans.”
“There isn’t anything ordinary about Star Trek fans.” Serene walked up with a warm smile, flashing the Vulcan hand sign. “Kenny’s a member. Can I escort you to the registration table? Your name was Dave Star-key? Like Ringo Starr?”
“Star-sky,” he corrected, nodding. “I’d follow you all the way back to the planet Vulcan, pretty lady.”
“Watch it, Starsk, her husband is right beside you.” Hutch laughed, happier than he could remember being in a long time, and that counted the previous night when he’d been in this exact spot.
“Walk this way, and I’ll take down all your particulars,” Serene beckoned with a merry expression. “The husband knows I’d never stray.”
“I’m still keeping my eye on him,” Mac joked, smiling.
“I got my eye on someone else, too,” Starsky assured, flicking a look at Hutch as he went across the lobby to a small table crewed by a man and woman dressed in Starfleet uniforms.
Hutch’s heart ramped up to warp drive in nanoseconds. He coughed, very aware that Starsky had thrown down the gauntlet. There was love in the air, so what did he do about it? He’d never done more than glance at a good-looking male body. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He’d been entranced by Jack Mitchell’s bare tanned chest when they were both life guards in eleventh grade. But he’d always kept that part of himself well hidden, and had successfully dated, and married, women. Until Starsky. His magnetism had attracted Hutch from their first meeting.
He was in a public place, though, and had to pretend he didn’t want to chase after Starsky like a hound. “Uh—” Hutch focused his shredding attention to the here and now. “Did one of the Starfleet members make these?”
Mac chuckled as if reading the undercurrent between Hutch and Starsky quite accurately. He puffed out his chest proudly. “No, as a matter of fact, Gene Roddenberry gifted them to the group.”
“These are real? I mean used on the series?” About to touch one of the narcelles on the Enterprise, Hutch pulled his hand back in awe.
“Look real to me.” Starsky returned wearing an official Starfleetcon badge clipped to his shirt. “What’s next?”
“They’re serving pizza in the room beside the dealer’s room,” Mac said as two con members came over to wheel the cart away. “It’s smaller but the main banquet hall is still—”
“A crime scene,” Hutch finished. “Thanks. Starsk, did you get a program?” He fished his own badge out of his jacket pocket but figured he’d probably left his con schedule in his car, at home.
“Mac!” Serene called, trotting after the retreating cart. “We have a presentation in ten minutes!”
“Gotta go, guys.” Mac sketched a wave. “Glad we’re back in con mode and not—” He took a remorseful moment. “Wexler was a pain in my ass for years but I don’t wish him murdered. We’re going to have a brief memorial for him on Sunday morning.”
“Good idea,” Hutch agreed. “He must have had a couple of friends in the group.”
“Like you said,” Starsky commented, unfolding the program. “There’s a costume contest, the filk singing, as well as a panel on the difference between Romulans and Klingons, plus–” He frowned.
Charmed by Starsky’s enthusiasm, Hutch leaned in close to see what he was looking at. He could smell Starsky’s unique aroma, hints of leather jacket, gun oil, and peppermint gum. “What is this thing called K slash S?” he read the notation Starsky was pointing to.
“That panel is at eleven pm,” Starsky said, leading the way to the free meal. A short line of con-goers stretched out the door. “Why so late?”
Hutch hadn’t actually read any of the Kirk/Spock stories that had coined the term slash. He really wasn’t into fanfiction much at all but he had heard the word before. “It’s—uh…”
“When Spock and Kirk get together, like in the episode Amok Time,” the girl in front of them, wearing a short blue uniform like Nurse Chapel and shiny black, over-the-knee boots with fishnet stockings, spoke up excitedly. “You should read the zine Interphase 2. It’s really hard to come by, here on the West coast, but the story World Well Lost was…” she sighed, clearly overcome. “Sublime. I’m Namita, I’m writing a K/S story now.”
“You mean—” Starsky thrust his thumb into his balled fist in a crude approximation of sex.
“Yep.” Namita scrutinized the two of them. “You guys could go as Kirk and Spock—if he had a gold uniform and you had a blue one. And act out the climactic scene on Vulcan.”
Climactic. Hutch felt his face blush and inwardly cursed his fair skin.
“Who wants cheese, sausage or vegetarian?” a server called from the table laden with pizzas. “Make three lines and you can always come back for seconds. There’s plenty.”
“I’m for veggie,” Namita said. “See you around!”
The crowd reshuffled into three queues.
Starsky craned his head around a big-bellied man in a “Trekker not Trekkie” shirt. “You knew about this slash?” he asked casually, a hand on Hutch’s lower back.
“Y-yes,” Hutch agreed. “It’s…” He put out his hands in a universal inclusion gesture, feeling suddenly nervous and unprepared but never wanting Starsky’s hand to ever, ever move away. “Common knowledge.”
“And here I thought Serene said there wasn’t anything common about Star Trek,” Starsky said, so close his breath tickled the hair at the base of Hutch’s neck.
“Ordinary,” Hutch corrected breathlessly. “She said…” He gave up the mini-argument for a lost cause, tilting his head enough to look Starsky in the eye. “You think…”
“This could be our first date?” Starsky whispered.
Hutch bobbed his head without speaking, his Adam’s apple suddenly too big for his throat. The server handed him a plate with sausage pizza. Hutch stepped aside so Starsky could get his own.
“We’ve eaten together lots of times,” Hutch said gruffly.
“At a con?” Starsky’s eyes twinkled. He scooped up two sodas from a large bin and led the way to a table. “Talkin’ about K/S?”
There were three other people already there. Two guys wearing shirts that said Starfleetcon in gold, red, and blue letters were munching pizza. A lone woman dressed in office attire as if she’d just gotten off work, with pointed Vulcan ears peeking out from under her gray hair, smiled at them.
“Dave.” Starsky waved, sitting down.
“Ken—uh–Kenny,” Hutch introduced himself, not at all sure how he’d become a Kenny in this place when he’d never used that name before.
“Did I hear you mention K/S?” the woman asked. “I’m Ruby. Have you read Spock Enslaved?”
“Haven’t read anything yet, I’m a virgin in these woods,” Starsky answered, winking and biting into his pizza. He leaned into Ruby with rapt interest.
So focused on Starsky, Hutch barely noticed what he was eating. There was no jealousy because he knew his partner too well. Starsky was an avid reader, fascinated by almost every subject. Hutch had always recognized that he was an unabashed Starsky watcher, long before he admitted to himself that he was in love. Starsky radiated passionate enthusiasm for life, something Hutch often found himself hard pressed to emulate. He was more apt to be disappointed or dispirited by the darker sides of life, opening himself to depression. But here at Starfleetcon, all was sunny.
“When you’re finished, I’ll show you the zine table in the dealer room,” Ruby said.
“I wanna go to the filk show.” Starsky mopped his face with a napkin.
“Don’t worry, there’s time.” One of the two guys hefted his guitar from below the table. “I’m up first.”
“Good to know,” Hutch said, drinking down his cola. His inner musician adored the clever play on words utilized by filk writers and singers, but his stage fright got the better of him. He wanted to relax and have fun, not pre-show jitters. Better to sit in the audience and hum along.
The dealer room was in full swing when they entered. Hutch waved at Martha as he passed her table, keeping his eyes fixed on Starsky and Ruby.
Heaped on a table in the far wall were piles of zines: stories bound with plastic coils or simply large staples. Most had gorgeously illustrated covers featuring Spock and Kirk. Ruby rummaged through several stacks before selecting one with a drawing of Spock on the cover. He was bare chested, clad in a long cloth tied around his waist. The most arresting part of the drawing were the manacles and chains around his wrists linking him to a pole on the right.
“You’re in luck,” Ruby crowed. “This is a rare find.”
“What else would you recommend?” Starsky asked, bright eyed, making little grabby motions with his fingers.
Ten minutes later, Starsky had five zines, and Hutch had made the rounds of the entire room. He admired miniature figures depicting specific scenes from various episodes, earrings with the Star Trek logo or tiny starships, mugs with photos of the crew and a hand-sewn quilt with amazingly intricate stitching illustrating a battle between the Enterprise and a Klingon Bird of Prey. Not to mention Martha’s inventory of phasers, tricorders, and other paraphernalia.
Stepping out of his own comfort zone, he did something he’d never done before. Bought a piece of art. Where he was going to display it was another matter, but when Hutch picked up the painting of Spock musing over his next move in tri-dimensional chess, he was content in a very elemental way.
“Hey!” Starsky greeted him, perusing the painting Hutch held. “That’s terrific. Who painted that?”
“Far out. That was done by a fan in England,” a teenaged girl knitting a long multi-colored scarf said from her perch on a stool. “Friend of Mac’s, I think.”
“First thing I have ever bought here,” Hutch admitted, his cheeks warm. Must be the crowd of people in the relatively small room.
“You never bought…” Starsky waved his hand at the array of merchandise. “Anything? I could get something from every dealer. C’mon.” Shifting his load of zines under his right arm, Starsky herded Hutch through the press of fans to the table opposite Martha’s. “Two shirts, one for each of us,” he said to the beefy guy with his face painted black on the right side and white on the left.
“Command, Science or Engineering?” the faux Commander Bele asked, waving his hand at the red, blue, and yellow shirts folded neatly in front of him.
Hutch wanted to slip back into obscurity, with his Spock art, not stand up in front of the group—some people he’d known for several years—and declare his alliance for all to see. Martha Rogers had put aside her novel to watch with fond amusement.
“Command for Kirk here,” Starsky declared, stashing his zines on the tabletop to pull out the necessary cash for the purchase. “And science for me.”
He almost laughed, remembering Starsky calling him Captain Kirk in the squad room. “Starsk…”
“You’re wearing this.” Starsky leveled his finger at him, in obvious imitation of Hutch’s signature move. “If I am.”
“Only here,” Hutch conceded, suddenly over the moon. Which was a logical place for a Starfleet captain.
“Did I say you had to wear it to Metro?” Starsky laughed.
“Good job, Dave! Kenny needs to blend in with the bridge crew.” Serene gave the Vulcan hand greeting, waving it to the people in the room. “Came in to announce that the filk show starts in ten minutes, everyone. And the dealer room will be closing up because I know a couple of you are talent in the show.”
“C’mon, let’s go change,” Starsky urged. “I wanna hear all about the Good Ship Enterprise.” He hummed the Shirley Temple song, bobbing his head in time.
“Did you just think that one up?” Hutch asked, impressed. That would make a great parody now that he thought of it.
“Nah.” Starsky pushed him into the public restroom with alacrity. “Heard the singers practicing at one of the dealer tables. They were selling novelizations.”
Ducking into a stall, Hutch pulled off the shirt he’d worn all day and skimmed into the form-fitting yellow-gold uniform. It was softer and far more comfortable than he’d expected, made from an almost velvety cotton. He could hear Starsky clamoring around in the adjourning stall, and let himself daydream, imagining Starsky in the science officer blue.
It would be perfect with his blue eyes.
Stepping out, Hutch collided with the emerging Starsky. The bright hue of the Starfleet uniform was a match for Starsky’s eyes. For once in his life, Hutch didn’t overthink. Tipping forward, he kissed Starsky.
Starsky inhaled, his arms going around Hutch in a tight hug. It was like being pulled into Starsky’s soul through his mouth.
Hutch was soaring, his entire being changing from a single, lovelorn man to one in relationship with his male partner.
And that was exactly where he wanted to be—forever.
“To boldly go where no man has gone before…” Starsky murmured against his mouth, “takes on a whole new meaning now, huh?”
“I—” Hutch stared dazedly into his lover’s face. “To explore new…”
“Telling you, I ain’t strange,” Starsky said merrily, kissing him quickly on the lips. “But maybe we can continue this tonight—”
“And tomorrow?” Hutch whispered, very aware of voices right outside the restroom door. Others would be arriving in seconds. “You’re okay with this…?” The significance of what they’d just done, how their future had changed, was beginning to sink in.
“I was hoping that would happen before midnight, Cinderella,” Starsky hissed, gathering up his zines, Hutch’s painting, and both their mundane shirts.
Four guys pushed into the small area near the sinks while Hutch washed his hands. They all wore red vests with “Beam Me Down” printed on the back and carried a variety of instruments.
“See you in the show!” Starsky waved.
“How is it that you’ve been here an hour and you’re already practically on a first name basis with half the members?” Hutch marveled.
Grinning, Starsky nudged him with his elbow. “If you got it, flaunt it,” he boasted. “What are the odds this hotel has a vacant room?”
Hutch had never thrown a boner so quickly. He gave a hoarse laugh, grabbing his other shirt to hold in front of him when they walked through the corridor. “It’s a small con, and a big hotel. I’d take that bet.”
“I’ll save you a chair in the theater, James T.” Starsky leaned in close as if whispering a secret in his ear, and licked the lobe, just once.
A thrill went down Hutch’s spine and he shivered, so close against Starsky, he could hear his heart.
“If you go get us a room,” Starsky proposed.
“I’m beaming right up,” Hutch said, absolutely giddy. “The show’s probably two hours, tops.”
“I was kinda interested in that panel at eleven pm,” Starsky said, stepping aside to let two women carrying plastic cups with straws walk past them. “But I’m thinking we could have a private—”
“Con, all our own,” Hutch agreed. “Captain’s log, stardate zero seven, fifteen, nineteen thousand seventy eight, this will be a date to remember.”
~~**~~
With snatches of the songs they’d just heard playing in his head, Starsky stood, waiting for a gap in the throng of fans surging from the theater to head out himself. “Which floor are we on?” he asked over his shoulder, eagerly anticipating what was about to occur.
He and Hutch, together as a couple. It would fulfill every erotic dream he’d had while masturbating for the last few years. If the far too brief kiss they’d exchanged in the bathroom was anything to go by, he and Hutch were going to be in wonderland.
“Room 417,” Hutch said, his hand on Starsky’s shoulder. “Elevators are on the right across the…”
Starsky slid into a space in the flow of fans and made a break for the door, his cock swelling at the thought.
“Hey, Kenny?” a lanky guy with long, straight hair hanging past his shoulders stood flat against the wall of the hallway, one hand out to get Hutch’s attention.
“Dan Lu, right?” Hutch shook the outstretched hand. “Loved that song about McCoy. Both funny and true.”
“I’m a Doctor, Jim…” Starsky laughed, wiggling his hips.
“Thanks,” Dan ducked his head shyly, although he’d been boisterous and loud onstage. “Listen, I—” He bit a cuticle nervously.
Hutch beckoned him along the hallway to a small alcove where they weren’t constantly buffeted by strolling con members. “Yes?”
Standing slightly away, Starsky watched his partner’s empathetic listening skills encourage Lu to open up. It made him love Hutch all the more. Lu’s interruption had only exacerbated Starsky’s burgeoning erection, but he knew he’d have to wait his turn for Hutch’s undivided attention.
“I saw you this morning—you two were investigating…” Lu’s eyes went left at the door crisscrossed with crime scene tape.
“Wexler’s murder. We’re cops,” Hutch said quietly. “Did you know him?”
“Well.” Lu twisted his fingers together, fidgeting. “Not really, I guess. It’s weird. I—” He took a deep breath. “Last winter, I had a bad headache and went to the hospital. I was supposed to see a Dr. Wexler, and I was all—wow, he’s got the same name as that jerk at Starfleetcon. I mean, how many Brad Wexlers can there be?”
Starsky nodded. Exactly. How many were there? His lips quirked upward when Hutch glanced his way, eyebrows raised.
“And?” Hutch waited patiently.
“He was out, so I saw a different doctor, Dr. Dorn, an’ eventually got fixed.” Lu shrugged. “But another time, I saw Wexler at a coffee shop near the hospital. He was having hot chocolate and schmoozing with this waitress. Nice as you please.”
“He seemed like a different person?” Starsky joined the conversation since apparently Lu needed to chat.
“Totally—like a doppelganger, right?” Lu nodded. “He was there a couple times over the last six months, and I even talked to him. Friendly, y’know?” He nibbled the edge of his finger thoughtfully. “He didn’t know me at all, and I’m like the only Chinese guy who goes to the con. Everybody always wants me for Sulu in photos.”
“You don’t know anything specific about this Dr. Wexler?” Hutch asked, sounding wary. He cast a glance at Starsky, obviously wanting a way out.
“I think our Brad—” Lu waved a hand to include the entirety of the con members. “Was a twin. You should talk to his brother. They’re identical.” He emphasized the last word dramatically.
“Identical twins,” Hutch echoed, widening his eyes, looking at Starsky over Lu’s shoulder. “Did you ever find out for sure?”
Lu went back to twisting his fingers, as if, having imparted his important news, he had nothing more to impart. “Dr. Wexler hangs out at the Hot Cuppa near the hospital,” he said finally.
“Thanks a lot, Dan.” Hutch patted his shoulder with a sweet smile. “We really appreciate when concerned people provide us with new information. Starsky and I have a lot of work to do to uncover exactly what made Brad Wexler who he was.”
“G-great. See you tomorrow?” Lu stammered.
“You better believe it!” Starsky laughed. “It’s my first con, I want to do everything. For now, Hutch and me have—”
“Somewhere to be,” Hutch finished.
Which was the bare truth. Starsky grabbed a fold of the super soft yellow-gold shirt to propel Hutch toward the elevator. They ducked into an empty car, chuckling. Hutch twisted around to push the correct button and managed to kiss Starsky in the process.
“Talent,” Starsky whispered, hearing the elevator ping as they rose to the third floor.
“That was for rescuing me. I didn’t want to get pulled deeper into the widening spiral of Wexler,” Hutch whispered as the doors opened to reveal three barely-out-of-their-teens girls dressed in sexy outfits. The most identifiable one wore an overly teased green wig, a silver bra and mini skirt set, and a metal collar around her neck.
“Going up or down?” she asked.
Still touching Hutch from shoulder to thigh, Starsky grinned. “You look great. We’re going up but…”
“No thanks!” She waggled her fingers at him as Hutch hit to button to slide the doors shut, her friends giggling.
“What’d you do that for?” Starsky dug his knuckle into Hutch’s groin to see him writhe.
“We’ve got plans and I’m not including some thrall from Triskelion,” Hutch said fiercely, kissing him quickly. “I have waited long enough.”
Starsky wasn’t sure if his knees buckled from emotion or the movement of the elevator ascending. Nearly dropping his armful of zines, he grabbed Hutch’s arm to steady himself and curled into his chest. First time he’d ever had a romantic partner who was taller and physically larger than himself. “You’ve waited…” he repeated breathlessly. Was it suddenly far hotter in the elevator?
Luckily, there was no one waiting on the fourth floor, and room 417 was directly across the hall. Hutch pulled the room key from his pocket, letting them inside immediately.
The zines and old shirts were piled on a gold and green cushioned chair. Hutch set the portrait of Spock reverently on the bureau beside the TV. Two beds beckoned.
“We don’t have any luggage,” Starsky said, unbuckling his belt. He was horny as hell, although he’d seen Hutch naked any number of times from the showers in the Metro or the locker room to Frankie’s Gym.
“The desk can send up toothbrushes,” Hutch said, sounding distracted. “And everything for a shower is in the bathroom.”
With his jeans shoved down around his knees, Starsky looked up to see Hutch watching him undress like a starving man in front of a sumptuous banquet.
“And you don’t need a clean pair of underwear,” Hutch said in a rush.
“Haven’t had time t’do the laundry.” Starsky toed out of his sneakers and shimmied the jeans off, his filled cock rising against his belly. “How’s your arm?”
“Scabs. It’ll heal.” Hutch hadn’t removed his clothes and was staring at Starsky with rapt interest.
“You need a hand with that zipper?”
“No.” Hutch took a deep breath, grabbing Starsky around the waist to reel him in, even closer than they had been in the elevator.
Starsky was surprised he had to tilt his head back ever so slightly to kiss Hutch on the lips, and for what seemed a long while, that was all he wanted to do. He ran his fingers up and down the yellow-gold shirt in a soothing rhythm. Hutch’s heart pounded against Starsky’s chest as if he’d merged with his soon-to-be lover. The velvety texture of Hutch’s shirt brushed Starsky’s hairy chest in an alluring manner, but he wanted bare skin against his body.
Pushing his hands under the edge of Hutch’s shirt, Starsky explored his partner’s back without breaking the seal of their extended kiss.
Hutch gasped, arching away with a loud smacking sound as their lips parted. “Your hands are cold!”
“Cold hands, warm heart,” Starsky boasted. “Take it off, take it off.”
“You’re the one who wanted me to put it on,” Hutch snarked with a teasing glint in his eye.
“Changed my mind.” Starsky snickered, watching as Hutch pushed it over his head, revealing his pale, hairless chest. Coming from a hairy family, Starsky had always been fascinated by Hutch’s smooth skin. He flexed his fingers, pressing one hand gently onto Hutch’s abdomen.
Tossing the shirt to the unoccupied bed, Hutch captured Starsky’s wrist in one large hand, pushing it down toward his groin, still covered by his slacks. “No one’s ever made me this hard, so easily.” He smiled dreamily. “I think you’re just about to fulfill every fantasy I ever had about going to a con.”
“Meeting a cute guy and makin’ out with him on the first date?” Starsky pawed Hutch’s rock-hard erection, his own throbbing in anticipation. He worked Hutch’s zipper, sliding his pants down those magnificent thighs, and steadied Hutch so he could step out.
“This was my secret place,” Hutch confessed, hitching a breath when Starsky pushed his thumbs past the elastic on Hutch’s boxers. “But at the same time, I kept picturing you with me.”
Starsky brushed his palm over the crown of Hutch’s cock, mesmerized by the size and shape of it. His was by no means small, but Hutch’s penis, like the rest of him, was large, solid, and thick. It filled Starsky’s palm when he closed his fingers around the girth. “And here I am,” he whispered, feeling it pulse against his hand. As if he were holding Hutch’s heart. It seemed impossible, and yet true. The culmination of all he’d ever wanted without having acknowledged the validity until now.
What should he do next? Rub and stroke it the way he did his own on lonely nights? He’d pretend he was with Megan or Sarah, when really the face in his mind’s eye had flaxen locks and summer blue eyes. It was decidedly weird to hold a penis backwards, as it were, facing the blunt end instead of having it attached to himself.
Still trying to figure out how to perfectly satisfy Hutch, Starsky looked up at him. Hutch was gazing at him with such adoration, such love, Starsky wanted to cherish this moment forever.
“Thralls of Triskelion,” he said instead, sweating and a little lightheaded. “Were there… guys doin’ that, too?”
“Could have been.” Hutch shuffled around, with Starsky still holding onto his prize, so he could sit on the edge of the bed. “For Uhura? Or Chapel?”
Which meant Starsky had to bend down.
“Maybe Chekov?” he added, presented with a solution to his dilemma. On his knees, between Hutch’s thighs, he was in a perfect position to mouth the cock inches away. He’d never given a blow job, but how hard could it be? Aside from the obvious pun, that Hutch was really, really hard.
“Like a steel rod,” he murmured, sticking out his tongue to lick the length as if Hutch were a giant Rocket pop and Starsky was thirsty on a hot summer night. Such as tonight, under some alien moon, on a distant planet.
The effect was akin to setting off a bottle rocket. Still seated, Hutch went tippytoed, raising his thighs with a shout. “Oh, yeah, keep going…” He grabbed Starsky’s shoulders, holding him in place.
Starsky gave into his wanton pleasures, amazed at how much he wanted to do this. To please Hutch, to give him as much joy as it was possible to give. He closed his eyes, sucking in as much of the thick shaft as he could manage without choking. If there was a heaven, this was it.
He could have savored the occasion for a long while, but the climax came too quickly. Hutch orgasmed, spurting viscous fluid into Starsky’s mouth.
He coughed, releasing the cock to lean against Hutch’s bent knees. He felt incredibly loved, amazingly proud of what he had done for the first time.
Hutch was panting like he’d finished the obstacle course at the academy in record time. He gathered Starsky in, threading his fingers through Starsky’s tangled curls and peppering him with kisses.
When Starsky turned his face up to catch one on his lips, Hutch wiped a dribble of ejaculate off his chin. “Would you let me do that to you?” he asked sweetly.
“You don’t have to—” For once in his life, Starsky was unable to find the right words to express how perfect this was. How he didn’t want what they had to change, even though it surely had now.
They were a couple. Not just partners, something infinitely more. With the promise of a better future. Which was exactly what Star Trek was supposed to represent.
“I want to.” Hutch pulled him up, enveloping him in a hug.
It was the second time Starsky was acutely aware that he was the smaller of them. Not by much, really. A couple of inches. He liked the sensation of Hutch surrounding him, grounding him, holding on tight.
“Scootch up on the bed,” Hutch encouraged. “Spread your legs. I can’t kneel on the floor.”
Starsky grinned, crawling backward toward the pillows, beckoning Hutch with a crooked finger. “Take care of that back,” he said. “I like it.”
On all fours, Hutch grinned mischievously at him. A big, rambunctious lion cub, ready to pounce on his prey.
Starsky lounged back on the pillows, raising his arms to welcome Hutch.
“Put more under your butt,” Hutch suggested, swooping down for a few kisses.
Otherwise occupied, it took Starsky a few minutes to rearrange the pillows in the optimum position under his ass. Hutch looked him over with such a wonderful smile, arousal mixed with adoration and love. He stroked both hands over Starsky’s belly, avoiding the erect cock awaiting its pleasure.
“Hutch…” Starsky couldn’t help the little whine that slipped out. He was more than ready. He was primed to explode.
“Making you wait just a little longer.” Hutch investigated the smooth skin under Starsky’s cock, flicking a finger across his anus.
Gulping lungfuls of air, Starsky bent his knees, pulling them toward his chest to give Hutch ample space. Felt like his skin was dancing, jittery shocks stimulating not just his perineum but all across his lower body as Hutch explored.
When Hutch lapped a wide swath across Starsky’s scrotum with his tongue, Starsky howled in triumph. Then Hutch went down on him, and Starsky’s world narrowed to his warm, wet cock.
Paradise.
He came hard, as if every molecule in his body climaxed. The most amazing orgasm he’d ever had, and all because of Hutch.
Curling on his side, Starsky peered lazily at the blond beauty who slipped up beside him. This was what real love felt like. Bliss.
“Want the covers over you?” Hutch asked gently, draping his long leg and left arm over Starsky’s body.
“Just you,” Starsky said blearily, barely able to keep his eyes open.
He wasn’t sure how long they both slept, but it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes. He could hear someone laughing in the hallway, shouting “pew pew” as if pretending to shoot a phaser at some evil alien.
“What’s on for Sunday?” Starsky asked, getting up for a wet washrag to clean them both off.
“More of this?” Hutch grinned wolfishly. He brushed a kiss on Starsky’s shoulder as he was being wiped down.
“Put that down in your Captain’s log.” Starsky winked at him, climbing back into the bed. This was so exciting and comfortable, at the same time. Usually, with a new lover, there was a period of getting to know each other, learning their favorite foods or what they liked to do. With Hutch, there was none of that.
Except one thing. “So how’d you start coming here? In what, ’72? You and Van were still married, and we were working together…”
Hutch huffed a breath as if coming up with a plausible answer. He shuffled closer to Starsky in the bed, all but leaning on him, pulling the covers around the two of them. “Van and I’d had one of our epic battles, so I left the apartment for a late-night coffee shop. I wasn’t going to burden you with what was going on—”
“I knew,” Starsky said softly, hugging him.
“It was embarrassing.” Hutch sighed. “How fucked up my married life was. Felt like I was living out her father’s initial assessment of me. So I wanted to—”
“Hide?”
He nodded with a slight lift of his shoulders. “I ordered coffee, knowing it would keep me up all night so I could drive to the precinct in the morning, and saw Serene, uh–Sara putting up flyers.”
“For the con.”
“Nobody I knew in Duluth had been a Star Trek fan, so even after we moved to California, I kept that private.” Hutch slipped his arms around Starsky. “It seemed so perfect—I could book a hotel room in a month, be away from Van for a whole weekend to reevaluate my circumstances, plus maybe have some fun.”
“Didja date Sara?” Starsky nuzzled Hutch’s ear.
“Thought about it. Thought about Van…” Hutch turned his head to look into Starsky’s eyes. “Thought about you, to be honest. But no, I never actually went out with her, as long as sitting beside her at a panel doesn’t count.”
“Your secret’s safe with me,” Starsky wiggled his foot to feel the long, muscled calf pressed against his. He really liked being in bed with his partner. “’Cept, you shouldn’t have kept it a secret all these years.”
“Starfleetcon or that I love you?” There was such sweetness and joy in his voice.
Starsky gazed at him for a long moment before kissing him. “Both. I woulda come with you, and maybe—”
“We could have done this sooner?”
Starsky raised his hand in the Vulcan salute. “Live long and prosper, babe.”
FIN
Ninety-nine knights of the air
Ride super high-tech jet fighters
Everyone’s a Super Hero
Everyone’s a Captain Kirk
With orders to identify
To clarify and classify
—99 Red Balloons by Nena
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