The Kitten Club
Who: Brett and Garret
Where: The Kitten Club
When: Evening
Brett had spent most of the day sleeping, dead tired after being up for most of the night. Not that he'd been able to fall asleep the moment he'd gotten home - he'd spent several hours tossing and turning and cursing the bitch's name and the day she came into his life and then himself for being insane enough to do what he did. Sleep had come eventually though, fitfully, until it had been time to get up. Get up, grab a coffee, and head out to work, lack of sleep making his usual foul temper even worse. That wouldn't matter though, given his role.
His job for that night was one of his intermittently reoccurring ones: security of sorts at the Kitten Club. Watch the stage door, watch the backstage entrance, be glowering and big and make sure that nobody bothered the girls. It was an easy role and one he actually didn't mind - not that he'd ever admit to that. Nor would he ever use the word 'enjoy' in relation to it. Brett determinedly took no joy at all from his life, one may even say he made a point of it. But there he was, suited and booted - though unshaven - moving around between the backstage area, and the occasional trip around the floor, checking for any of the usual troublemakers. Occasionally he'd stop and talk to one of the customers, or one of the girls, if he was wanted, or needed.
Garret was tired, restless
Garret was tired, restless and in need of a drink. Maybe two. It wouldn't hurt to have some entertainment he could pay attention to instead of scanning for any signs of guns, theft or trouble. The Festival had been trying. There were maybe a quarter of the people attending than had six years ago. Couples seemed to outnumber families. The place was also full of cops. In uniform or out. Luckily the biggest problem was the occasional pickpocket or drunk. That and the rather amusing antics of a twelve year old girl running around asking people if they wanted their palms read, then smearing lipstick across their hands if they said yes.
He sat at a table close to the stage and took note of the hired muscle doing much what Garret had done this afternoon. He also saw the waitress, with her low cut outfit displaying her goods. He motioned for her and ordered a rum and coke. "And what time do you get off, darlin?" He gave her a smile.
"Bout one, sugar. Then my big, beefy boyfriend picks me up." She spoke with the casual tone of one used to staving off customer's advances.
"Damn, I'm always late to the party." Garret pulled a crumpled pack of cigarettes from his trench coat. "Great. Could you send the smoke girl over? I was almost out anyway."
.
Brett had just emerged from back stage, closing the door behind him with a click when he caught sight of a familiar blonde head. Familiar, even though it had been a couple of years at least since he'd seen it. Garret. Brett paused for a moment, his eyes on his former friend, but he had few choices - he either carried on out, where he had to pass in full view and close by the guy. Or he turned tail and fled backstage again. Well, fuck that - Brett was no fucking coward and it wasn't his problem. Why should he give a damn anyhow - for all he knew this former 'friend' had been one of the people who had screwed him over. He couldn't and wouldn't trust anyone anymore. Setting his jaw, Brett strode out across the floor, his somewhat imposing frame combined with his confident stride making him even less ignorable than before, almost daring the cop to say something to him.
Jere itched for a cigarette.
Jere itched for a cigarette. He wasn't a heavy smoker, but it did help him relax. He usually had three a day, and one during drinks was habit. Habit was enough to make him a little more edgy. Edgy for a cop meant extra observant.He'd been talking to the waitress when Trent had come in, but he spotted the son of a bitch now. By his position in the room he'd come from the door leading to the back stage. So, the double crossing fuck was reduced to backdoor duty. Jere didn't acknowledge the fact that there was a fissure of relief somewhere deep down. Bouncers in a high traffic joint weren't usually doing the family wetwork. They were too recognizable to any patron, so it wasn't often that they were trigger men. Trent still set his gut to churning acid, however.
Jere also was aware of Trent spotting him. The other man stiffened a bit. They'd been more than partners, at least Jere had thought. They were supposed to have been best friends. He found out too late that the weasel was slowly driving the knife deeper and deeper into his 'friend's' back every day. He had to hand it to Trent, not many got one over on him. Especially up close and personal. Maybe that was what put the blinders on.
Trent walked close by, half glaring, like it was Jere who'd screwed everything over. Like he'd been the one to betray the badge.
"Well if it isn't the alter-boy. How's it goin, Brett? How's the new job treatin' you?" The cigarette girl, all sequins and fringe, chose that time to come over with her tray of smokes and candy. Garett held out a bill, "Make me Lucky." He was talking to the buxom girl whose tray of goods accentuated her tray of goods, but he was looking at Brett.
He was handed a pack of 'Lucky Strikes' and he gave her a generous quarter tip. Her presence was only a temporary damper on any hostilities.
.
So, he'd chosen to say something. And the nickname too - had been the running joke for years, but now it sounded like an insult to Brett's ears. Or maybe more of a mockery. Maybe it was, maybe the guy was just taunting him, dangling the fact that he knew in front of Brett's face. Maybe he'd been involved - Brett had no way of telling and he wasn't going to give anyone the benefit of the doubt.
He stopped and turned to Garret, thunder in his blue eyes. "What do you want, Jere?" he asked, sticking to names. Brett had a long standing habit of using nicknames with people he knew, and generally if he used someone's actual name, it was to make a point, even if he didn't take it as far as using the guy's actual given name.
Jere took the time to tamp
Jere took the time to tamp down his box of smokes, the rhythmic tap, tap, tap, the background for his answer. "Same thing any guy wants. Money, a good drink and a beautiful woman. But for tonight I'll take the drink,some entertainment, and maybe a bit of company on the side."
He finally opened the box and popped a stick into his mouth before lighting it behind a cupped hand, taking that first, lovely inhale and feeling the smoke wind its way through his lungs, followed by that tiny rush. Brett was short tempered tonight, and that was usually Jere's forte. Jere exhaled a long stream of smoke.
"Can't a man ask about an old friend? Haven't seen you in years. Been wondering what you got up to." And God only knew what his ex-partner HAD been up to. Brett was always on the straight and narrow. The alter-boy he was nicknamed after. Jere actually admired the guy for staying completely upright in a world that bended. Brett would rag on Jere for shaking down the occasional unaffiliated drug dealer or thief. It wasn't moral and all that. He'd made Jere doubt himself. And Garret Dixon had always considered himself mostly a good guy. Not a great one, but really caring about the average citizen, trying to protect them and do his best by 'em. Then the slime ball goes and sells out. All that self doubt, the secret admiration, for a man who pissed on the badge.
.
Brett snorted as he was called an 'old friend'. Sure, it had been true, once. Now? Well, bridges got burned, didn't they. He'd never even asked if the guy believed what they said about him. Never even stopped to ask what exactly was said. He knew that there was word, or had been, that he'd been the one to murder his own captain, Hardy. He knew there wasn't evidence enough to arrest him for it - but lack of evidence didn't mean shit when condemning a guy in anything but a court of law. Murder, theft, and then everything else he actually had done since that time. Things he was honestly and truly guilty of. It all weighed against him and he knew that this man, this good man in front of him, would never understand that. Oh, sure, Dixon had had his flaws from time to time, but he was a good man, in Brett's opinion. Or he'd thought of him that way. And he either still was, or he was one of the ones that threw Brett down here to this hell, and he was here to rub it in his face. Brett didn't know which one, and he didn't care - he was screwed either way and this man was no friend, he couldn't be.
Brett grabbed hold of the internal anger and pain of that thought and bundled it up, rolling and stretching it out into a blanket, a shield which he kept wrapped around himself, protecting him against the world he lived in now. "Like I'm gonna fucking tell a cop," Brett said, as if he'd never been one himself, keeping that anger up, that defence against the betrayal of himself, of everyone he'd known, of everything he'd once stood for. Except that man was long gone, this was all that was left. This and that single thread, but he was probably fooling himself there. After all, that thread had left him to his fate.
Jere raised his eyebrows.
Jere raised his eyebrows. "Well I've never been a priest. That celibacy thing would never hold. Though the wine is free." So it was just another badge to Brett. One more cop thrown into the pool he'd considered himself above. Garett noticed the younger man's choices certainly hadn't made him any happier. If he had a bigger chip on that shoulder it would squash him.
Damnit, there was still a small part of Garret that cared. It angered him that it was there. It had no right to be there. The betrayal cut to the bone and the knife had twisted. It sliced out that respect and left bitterness and pain in its wake. But that little sliver was there. Maybe it remained because Jere still couldn't figure out WHY Brett had done what he did. Brett always had reasons as well as morals. Working for the mob made no sense in the makeup of the guy. Or the man he'd been, anyway. What had made him do it? Motive was the basis of everything a cop worked from. It didn't add up. Maybe some day he'd figure it out.
"You're lookin' healthy, anyway." Must be all the Italian food, the bitter though followed without words.
.
Brett had lost the bandage that Eris had put on his hand that morning - the damn wound had stopped bleeding and he didn't like to draw attention to any injuries. A sign of weakness was the start of another slippery slope, and people took advantage. "You'd look like shit in a dress anyhow," Brett told him, giving just a little, but not much at all, the wall very much still in place. "And I'm sure you'd have no problems getting free wine - just flash your badge and make your threats. You know how the game's played," he added with an edge of venom. Like he could talk these days. He was way beyond that level, maybe once hearing that from him would have affected the other guy. Now it would probably just sound like hypocrisy.
"Never went for freebies
"Never went for freebies from shop keepers, Brett. If you're gonna try to make a hit you gotta know where to place it." Garett hoped Brett hadn't made any Hits, with the capitol H flashing. But if he had offed the Captain... damn. Brett wasn't his case, so he shouldn't try to solve it. He was too close. However; Trent knew Jere didn't ask for favors from the Joe on the street, he even payed for his coffee. It was only the criminals who had to clutch their purse strings.
Another pull from his smoke. Two hits usually relaxed him. Something about the company kept him on edge. "So bouncing's your gig now. Less glamor, more babes." Jere smirked. "Nicer view than your average stakeout."
.
"Shops aren't the only place to get wine, Jere," Brett retorted, pointedly, aware that there was a glass or two being supped around the room as they spoke. And the Kitten Club was hardly lily white when it came to ownership. Still, he hoped the guy had more sense than to try getting freebies off something in this deep - even if the connections were all just rumour and speculation. But that was how it went in this town - the police could never get enough to pin shit on anyone. Not and make it stick. That had been why Brett had gone where he'd gone in the first place, and why so few people had been brought in on the reality - to keep it small, to keep it clean, to wiggle round the corruption and get evidence that couldn't be ignored. But someone had known about it, someone had set it up, set him up.
He pushed the thoughts from his mind and focused on the blonde man. "Pays the bills," he allowed. This wasn't what he did full time, but if Jere wanted to believe that it was, then let him. There were worse things he could beleive, after all. "Don't get much time for enjoying the view though," he added.
"You do get off the clock
"You do get off the clock some time. You have to appreciate a gorgeous woman, even if ya can't stop and stare." Work or no work, a nice chassis deserved a moment of attention, however fleeting. Even if it was just window shopping. Did mob henchmen get off the clock? Likely about as much as a cop.
"I don't want to keep you from the job." Like hell I don't, Garret mused to himself, I wanna take you off it one way or the other, and I'm not sure which way I prefer, which annoys me. "No need to get you called to the floor." The waitress arrived with Garret's run and coke at that moment. Jere put his half smoked cig in the ashtray and tossed a bill on her tray. "Make sure you give Brett a drink on me when he get's off. Keep the rest."
.
Brett glanced down at the note, then back at Garret. "I don't drink," he told the other guy. It wasn't the entire truth, he did from time to time - but when he did, he hit the bottle pretty hard. Which was why he generally didn't these days. He'd used to though, and he knew Garret knew that. They'd often gone for a couple of beers after work, helped each other home more than once. But that had been in the days when Brett's live hadn't made him want to drown himself into an alcohol-fuelled stupor. That had been in the days where he actually liked his life and who he was.