The Jake Bennett Adventures Vol. Two, The Fall And Rise Of Jake Bennett

By Bayla Dornon

Blood Will Out: Back in LA after their disaster-vacation in Palm Springs, rookie cop Jake Bennett and his waitress girlfriend Debbie Cantrell try to pick up the pieces of their lives and their relationship. But Jake's job as a cop and his family life soon derail things even further. Now some powerful people have taken an interest in Jake Bennett, with serious consequences. Now suddenly he's swimming with the sharks-- and there's no exit from the tank.

Presumed Dead: Exiled, humiliated and almost flat broke, Jake Bennett arrives in the city of San Francisco feeling as low as a man can get. Slowly he claws his way up from the gutter, and fights to build a new life for himself. But his past always returns to haunt him, and sinister figures threaten to derail his new life. Can Jake Bennett battle back from the crushing disaster he experienced in Los Angeles, become a private investigator, and finally find his missing father, too?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bayla Dornon
• Release date: Mar 13, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005335458

Bayla Dornon

Bayla Dornon’s first book is “Gay Testaments, Old & New” an edited compilation of texts from both famous and obscure literature that paint a vivid and exciting portrait of men loving men.In 2020 and 2021, Dornon published the four-book RESTORATION series, the story of twenty-year old Chris Brenner, a gay man fleeing from his ultra-religious parents and their efforts to 'torture him straight' through religious conversion therapy. Escaping to the Center in San Francisco, Chris meets and befriends fellow initiates George and Mary — and falls head over heels in love with Tom Griffin, a charismatic Priest at the San Francisco Center for Restoration. The four novels follow these young adults as they struggle for independence and restoration from indoctrination and abuses of religious and patriarchal families and society.In 2022, Dornon has released the new series of “Jake Bennett Adventures”, the stories of sexy bisexual rookie LA cop Jake Bennett, trying desperately to make his way in the asphalt jungle of Los Angeles.Married to one man since late 1988, Bayla Dornon is an author, critic, playwright, former teacher, silly pagan, photographer, cat-lover and videographer. A third generation Californian, Dornon and his husband recently escaped the absurd desert of San Diego and now live happily ever after in Seattle.

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THE JAKE BENNETT ADVENTURES

VOLUME TWO

THE FALL AND RISE OF JAKE BENNETT

by Bayla Dornon

©2022 Béla Dornon. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 9781005335458

All images ©2022, Béla Dornon.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Previously published as serial stories ‘Blood Will Out -- A Jake Bennett Adventure’, ‘Presumed Dead -- A Jake Bennett Adventure’, on Amazon Kindle Vella.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information contact [e-mail]

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For information contact [e-mail]

Contents

Foreword

Blood Will Out

Presumed Dead

Acknowledgements

About The Author

FOREWORD

Welcome to tape Volume Two!

Finishing with the final novel in the Restoration series by the end of spring 2021, I embarked on my first full-time writing of a Jake Bennett adventure.

I say full time, but that’s certainly not true. We were still in COVID shutdown, of course, and because of that, my husband Phil and I had decided it was time to stop stalling and finally move away from San Diego! So I started writing ‘Blood Will Out’ on the fourth of July, and also started packing the house and getting rid of eighteen years’ worth of stuff. I finished the first draft on September 18, a few days after the moving van loaded all our worldly possessions and moved them to Seattle. Along the way, I wrote ‘Presumed Dead’.

In form, the two stories in this volume are very different. ‘Blood Will Out’ is a straight, linear, sequential timeline, unhampered (for the most part) by digressions or flashbacks. It is a simple crime story, combined with a story about family. Or to be completely specific, Jake’s family, several of which make their first appearance in this story. As Tom explains, the theme is an honest man crushed by a dishonest system.

The structure of ‘Presumed Dead’ is far more complex, beginning at the end of the timeline and proceeding for the first part through interminable flashbacks. The story moves back and forth through 2014 and 2015. The first part also details Jake’s final descent into alcoholism, and reveals several of the reasons for his growing dependence.

The second part is a love song to two very different red heads.

The third part is again a crime drama, with a big film noir climax.

When I was putting together these volumes, I needed a title. The first one, LAPD Rookie, was easy. Volume Two presented a problem, since they pivot right in the middle of the volume from his life as a cop in LA to his new life in San Francisco. I decided on the title ‘The Fall And Rise Of Jake Bennett’ because, one, it’s a funny inversion of what you’d expect, and two, it clearly describes the over-all arc of this volume.

Thank you for reading!

Béla Dornon

Seattle, March 2022

The Jake Bennett Adventures

Volume Two

THE FALL AND RISE OF JAKE BENNETT

BLOOD WILL OUT

A Jake Bennett Adventure

By ‘Leo Adler’

PRELUDE

The hooded, cloaked figure held the squirming bundle in the crook of one arm, while the other arm disappeared into the black recess of some pocket. Jake Bennett grunted in pain, his vision shot to hell by the drug he’d unknowingly ingested. He struggled in slow motion against ropes that felt like tree roots, sharp, cold and unyielding. The gag in his mouth tasted like a gasoline-soaked rag.

Will you tell me now? asked the figure, heavy shadows from harsh overhead light completely concealing the face. The voice was mysterious and elusive, a low woman’s voice or a high man’s voice, Jake still couldn’t guess which.

He frantically worked at the filthy oily gag in his mouth, desperately pushing it with his tongue, trying to shout a warning, or some kind of defiance: but all that came out was more grunting. Horror and a deep grief filled his eyes to overflowing. The tears were beginning to make his nose run. Between the gag and the stuffed-up nose, he soon wouldn’t be able to breathe at all.

Nothing to say? mocked the maddening voice.

The shrouded figure pulled the hand out of its pocket quickly, and a curved pair of sharp blades glinted horribly in the dancing light from the undulating bare bulb overhead. A shake, a jostle, and the wrappings of the squirming bundle fell apart to reveal the baby, naked and perfect, arms and legs uncoordinated, waving helplessly, the mouth gurgling, searching for goodness. Instead, the glinting small pruning shears slowly rose to meet the fingers, to encircle one of them.

Last chance.

The silky voice chuckled wickedly as Jake’s whole body spasmed wildly back and forth before helplessly collapsing onto his side, his knees, feet and hands bound together behind him.

The baby and Jake screamed at exactly the same moment.

Jake! Wake up! called Debbie quietly, urgently but gently shaking the six foot tall cop, his face bathed in his own tears, his body spasming in alternating contractions and convulsions.

Jake Bennett, rookie cop, sat straight up in bed and flung off the covers, and was halfway to the door before he fell to his knees, naked, shaking uncontrollably.

It was just a dream, sweetheart, Debbie repeated over and over as she shepherded the sobbing man back to her bed.

This was the third time in two nights that Jake had dreamed—no, had a violent, hideously real nightmare— about the kidnapped Petroff baby, the subject of the biggest manhunt in the LAPD’s history.

The news had broken Saturday night, just a few hours after Jake and Debbie returned from their disastrous excursion to Palm Springs. Every cop in LA, plus the entire Sheriff’s department, was mobilized by Sunday morning and set on the hunt. The public, unfortunately, was also extremely excited due to a torrent of social media stories about the purloined infant. The fact that the baby just happened to belong to an insanely rich developer and his vividly-bleached second trophy wife hadn’t helped matters one bit.

Every organ of Los Angeles’ monstrously bloated, overfed press was gleefully filled with lurid speculations about who done it: that handsome Rams quarterback, a former lover of the trophy wife, had stolen her baby to get even; an evil international plywood cartel was punishing the developer who had stopped playing ball; a Kardashian had been spotted accessorizing the purloined baby on Rodeo Drive; a designer gene therapist had discovered latent lethal alleles in the developer and was conducting forbidden DNA experiments on the tot; the hot new DA, Leonard ‘Lennie’ Linwood, had it in for the developer and was preventing the new police chief, Jeff Markham, from committing sufficient manhours to the hunt in order to punish him and his trophy wife.

And so on, and so on.

BACK TO WORK

Dreading a second day on the baby hunt detail, Jake Bennett kissed Debbie goodbye as she dropped him off in front of the precinct. A pair of cops she knew from the diner saw Jake and Debbie together and whistled at them. Debbie waved; Jake ignored them and hurried inside, making his way through the precinct complex to the locker room where he quickly changed. His lanyard and uniform were among the few important possessions he hadn’t lost the week before, when he was captured and robbed while vacationing in Palm Springs.

Jake stripped off his white T-shirt and saw fresh blood on the back. His wounds had started bleeding again. The young man automatically reached his hand behind him, but couldn’t quite reach the bloody spot between his shoulder blades. Some sadistic bastard had chloroformed Jake in his own bed, blindfolded him and tied him to a chair, and tortured him for information. When beating had produced no results, the sick fuck had used a sharp needle and some heavy thread to make a series of stitches in Jake’s back, which hurt like hell; then he had slowly ripped them out, one by one, when Jake couldn’t provide the information he wanted.

Jake shook his head. Shucking his pants, Jake glanced at the purple-black bruise on his right thigh. He had been punched in the same spot over and over again. The deep and ugly mark, along with a limp, were more mementos from the interrogation. The bruises on his face were fading to a dull yellow.

Jake grabbed a fresh T-shirt and hauled it on, hoping the blood wouldn’t soak through onto his uniform. Officer Jake Bennett dressed rapidly in his black police uniform: tunic and trousers, belt, taser, gun, radio. His good sunglasses, thankfully, were buttoned in the breast of the tunic, where he’d left them. Everything else, his keys, wallet, and phone, along with all of his photos and music, was gone forever. And to top off the horrible experience, his old Elantra had died a hideous and noisy death, just as he pulled into the driveway of his apartment building Saturday afternoon. Sunday morning while he and Debbie had slept it had been towed away to the impound lot.

Like Steve: gone forever.

Jake angrily finished dressing as he pushed away the thought of his dead boyfriend. Debbie was the only one in the world who knew what had happened, but he couldn’t talk to her about Steve. Debbie Cantrell, whom Jake and several other cops thought of as Jake’s girlfriend, had taken him to her place, let him use her car, let him eat at her apartment, and hinted several times that if Jake wanted to share his feelings with her, he could do that too.

But that wasn’t Jake.

Three naked and wet cops exited the showers and dried off in the locker aisle next to Jake’s. One other cop, the short little muscle fire hydrant Danny Maher, his ivory skin tatted from neck to ankles, remained in the steaming shower, idly singing a pop tune in his light Irish tenor. The word ‘paparazzi’ drifted above the sounds of the shower. Jake could hear the other cops snapping towels, laughing, talking trash about the baby kidnapper and what they would do to him or her when they caught them. Lockers banged and clanged, and their loud voices distracted Jake’s unhappy thoughts as he finished getting ready. He hurried into the squad room, filled with other uniforms, to get his assignment for the week.

Bennett! You’re with Jackson today. Take the Mall. The lieutenant turned away before Jake could even think to ask who Jackson was. The rookie looked anxiously around the crowd of cops, all of whom he quickly identified as his eyes glanced over them.

NEW PARTNER

There. A new guy, in the back; also looking uneasily around. Jake Bennett waved and headed toward him.

You Jackson?

The good-looking, light-skinned Black man nodded. Jake offered his hand.

Jake Bennett. Come on, I’ll drive.

By the time they reached the Mall, Jake had begun to fill out a preliminary bio on his latest partner. Dewayne Jackson was twenty-four, a recent transfer from Goleta. He’d grown up next to a rich neighborhood of Santa Barbara, the son of a working-poor single Black mom. In answer to Jake’s casual questioning, Jackson asked a few of his own about Jake.

Orphan, replied Jake. I have seven cousins. Raised by my aunt and uncle in a hick town called Poplar Bend. Couldn’t wait to leave. As soon as I was twenty-one and had a hundred dollars, I took off.

The black and white patrol car rolled slowly through the crowded noisy Mall underground like a killer whale cruising invulnerably through the myriad other lesser species of the ocean parking garage. Jake parked the squad car in one of the spaces reserved for cops and turned to Jackson as he killed the engine.

You work the even numbered floors, I’ll take the odd. Let’s meet at the food court in one hour and compare notes.

Dewayne Jackson nodded. As the pair of rookies climbed out of the patrol car, a rhythmic thumping noise, combined with angry, irrational ranting, attracted Jake’s attention. Jake glanced over at Jackson, who stood irresolute, his eyes turned to his brand-new partner. Jake waved at him to go on, and Jackson turned and headed for the escalator.

Officer Bennett cautiously approached a giant black SUV, next to which a deranged man was standing, just drawing back his foot for another kick at the front left tire. He was wearing some serious boots, and one of those bag-like knitted hats that covered all of his hair and most of his face.

The damn brakes! The damn brakes! The damn brakes! raged the wild and slender figure endlessly.

Hey— knock it off, ordered Jake in his best no-nonsense voice. Is this your vehicle?

An angry Latinx face turned to Jake for an instant, then the young man’s expression totally altered to one of shocked surprise. The tire kicker assumed a combat crouch, a feral dog ready to run or spring in any direction. Jake reached one hand for his taser, the other held palm outward in front of him.

Quiet down now, he commanded.

The damn brakes! screamed the maniac one last time, then whirled and darted quickly away. The damn brakes! echoed one last time as the hyperactive man exited the parking garage, headed for points unknown.

Jake watched him go, shaking his head. Then he took out his little notebook and made a note in it of the time, place and license plate of the abused vehicle.

‘Startled young Latinx male 10-50, screaming/kicking SUV’s tire in lot.’

For the next hour, Jake dutifully snaked through the endless shops, up the escalators, in and out of the elevators, and peered into each and every bathroom. In one of the bathrooms he discovered two boys, judging from the worn and shabby athletic shoes visible under the stall doors. As Jake silently stepped through the restroom, he quickly realized that the lads were trading blowjobs through a gloryhole in the wall of a stall.

LAPD, he announced in a maliciously big, booming voice. We’re conducting routine searches in connection with the Petroff baby abduction.

There was a crack like thunder as a toilet seat lid dropped, followed by the unmistakable sounds of panicking adolescents. One of the boys sounded like he was having a heart attack, while the other made more noise trying to pull himself together than a dozen mops falling over on a tile floor. Jake just smiled and snickered quietly to himself as he swaggered back out of the john. As the bathroom door started to swing closed behind him, he heard the first boy repeating Oh my god! over and over. Jake giggled and made his way to the food court.

A BREAK IN THE CASE

Anything? Jake asked his new partner.

Nada, answered Dewayne as they stood together a while later, staring through the greasy greenish glass at an endless stream of preprocessed goodies making their way through the hellish deep fat fryers.

Let’s switch and work back down, Jake said.

Dewayne nodded.

By the way, sniggered Jake. There’s a gloryhole on the third-floor men’s room; you might want to knock before you go into that one.

Jackson scoffed and made a disapproving face.

Did you cite them? Dewayne asked.

Naw, they were just kids, Jake explained expansively with a dismissive wave.

Immorality, pronounced Officer Jackson.

The two cops resumed their work, and Jake called in the negative results while Jackson made notes. With another ten hours left in their shift, the two cops were ordered to break for lunch and patrol the other side of the Mall, which had the largest concentration of infant supplies in the area.

It was a generally accepted theory of the case that the baby had been grabbed spontaneously, in an unplanned kidnapping. The event location was not on the mother’s regular agenda, nor was that particular Saturday afternoon trip to the coffee shop a part of her normal routine in any way. Therefore, the theory went, the snatcher would most likely immediately need supplies. Every single grunt-level cop on the force was detailed to prowl the endless industrial infant supply outlets. Higher level operatives were delicately investigating known contacts to the infant trafficking markets, though everyone hoped this was not a professional job.

The freshly-elected District Attorney had seized on the Petroff baby kidnapping case like a pit-bull on a pork chop. Extremely telegenic Lennie Linwood, six foot two of tanned silver fox, had been all over the TV and other visual press, urging people to come forward with any and all tips and info about the missing baby. His bright, earnest green eyes shone in his handsome face as he explained that the baby suffered from a heart-breaking genetic disorder, and needed regular doses of a special medication in order to survive. Linwood’s clips, begging the public for help, played endlessly on every screen in town, usually spliced together with the standard baby videos playing over his strong masculine baritone repeating the phone number and website of the LAPD tip lines.

Privately, Jake Bennett questioned the wisdom of this media strategy, which seemed a tremendous gamble: if the baby was found unharmed, Linwood would naturally be hailed as a hero. But if not… then the DA’s face would be forever connected to the tragedy.

If Linwood had asked his opinion, Jake might have told him how he thought it a bad idea to go all-out in the media for this baby. Linwood, of course, had scant idea who Jake Bennett, an otherwise undistinguished first-year recruit, was, beyond the fact that Jake had lost his first partner in a gun-battle with the Sherriff.

Fortunately, Sergeant Harris, Jake’s slain first partner, had managed to teach his protégé one thing, at least: When It Comes To Dealing With People In Power, Keep Your Trap Shut. Jake Bennett had heeded that advice in spades after Harris died, never revealing the juicy secret he and Captain Miller shared about DA Linwood to anyone.

Two hours later, a mid-twenties Latinx woman loading a shopping basket full of diapers, formula and other infant paraphernalia suddenly attracted Jake’s full attention. He loitered carefully by the cheese counter, watching as the woman slowly made her way down the baby aisle of the supermarket.

This particular Mall had two supermarkets, one near the east side, and the other buried near the north entrance to the parking garage. He studied the woman: stylish clothes, well groomed, not using her cell phone. There were also no children whatsoever with her. Jake snapped a pic on his crappy new phone, and struggled for a moment to text it to the number his partner Jackson had given him. He thumbed his radio.

Jackson, I just texted you a picture. Follow her when she leaves the east supermarket. I’ll pick you up.

Copy that.

Jake quickly made his way to the squad car, and followed Jackson’s radio directions to the parking level where the woman was loading her car. As she drove to the exit, Jackson emerged and got in.

The two cops trailed her silently home and waited as she took her purchases into the house. She opened the door fearfully shortly after Dewayne knocked, and immediately invited them in. In the second bedroom of the six-pack apartment was a crib with two sleeping Latinx infants and a sixteen-year-old cousin babysitting them. Jake apologized smoothly, thanking her for her cooperation. The Latinx mother, whose name was Lydia, urged the two cops most strongly to ‘find that poor lady’s baby’.

Jake and Dewayne walked to the car.

Not exactly poor, though, is she? commented Dewayne Jackson as he climbed in.

Unfortunate, I’d say. Jake drove back to the Mall, parking in the same spot reserved for cops.

The two men resumed their work, meeting periodically, speaking less regularly. A pair of women with furtive glances and hushed voices speeded up as they walked past Jake, tripping his police instincts. After waiting a full five minutes for them to come out of the ladies’ room, Jake knocked, announced himself, and entered, just as the manual required.

The big bathroom was completely empty. After a quick search, Jake found a service door to the inner hall system, which was supposed to remain locked at all times. Jake excitedly radioed Dewayne, who came running.

The lieutenant himself responded to Jake’s radio call, arriving six minutes later to personally oversee the forensics collection of prints and other evidence, including a poopy diaper found stashed in one of the tampon bins in a stall at the end.

Jake and Dewayne were roundly congratulated even as they were dismissed. On the drive back to LAPD headquarters, Jake felt his shoulders relax for the first time in days.

Think they’ll find the baby now? asked Dewayne.

I do, yes, smiled Jake. I’ve got a feeling.

So what are you doing to celebrate? asked Dewayne in a friendly tone.

I guess go over to my girlfriend’s place, Jake answered. She works at the Bite This diner.

Not Debbie? asked Dewayne in surprise.

Yeah, Debbie Cantrell, Jake smiled some more.

Man, she is hot, Dewayne enthused.

Jake’s smile a faded a little. When did you meet her? he asked.

Last week. I was in there with Danny Maher, she waited on us. Really nice looking lady.

Jake realized again what a small world it was here in LA. Millions and millions of people, but you kept running into people who all knew each other, it seemed.

What kind of phone is that you got, anyway? Dewayne asked suddenly.

I just got it yesterday, Jake apologized. Why, is the picture no good?

It’s like half an inch big, Dewayne complained.

Jake apologized and promised to fix it.

He and Debbie had bought the cheapo phone yesterday, Sunday. She’d advanced him the money, until he could get a new ATM card and some cash. Jake Bennett didn’t have a credit card: not because he didn’t want one, but because he had no credit at all. His car was officially a loner from his uncle, and he lived paycheck to paycheck in his lousy six-pack apartment. His current bank balance, he estimated, was just barely three digits. He felt sure he could afford the seventy-five dollar phone, but he had no idea how he was going to replace the dead car. If only he’d spent that money from the film shoot on his car, as he’d planned to. But Steve had insisted that they go to the huge gay party in the desert instead.

Consumed with remorse over Steve’s death and the miserable week leading up to it, Jake skipped the shower and changed into his street clothes.

Hey, say hi to Debbie for me, OK? urged Dewayne as they emerged from the locker room after changing.

His head deep in his own problems, Jake nodded vigorously and waved as they separated, he walking to where Debbie waited across the street, Dewayne Jackson to his car in the parking garage. Debbie dropped Jake at his place before heading to the diner.

A TRIP TO THE BANK

Tuesday morning dawned fair and bright in the so-called city of angels, and Debbie called Jake on his new phone at seven.

Did you see? she squealed excitedly when he answered. They made an arrest! The Petroff baby is safe!

General rejoicing greeted the good news. Debbie and Jake arranged that, if he didn’t have to go in, as he suspected, she’d pick him up at nine thirty and they’d go to the bank. Ten minutes after she called, Jake texted to confirm that he had the day off.

After he hung up, Jake flicked on the boob tube. Every live channel featured close-up shots of DA Linwood. Nine out of ten clips showed the DA holding the dazed Petroff baby in the crook of his arm while her highly blonde mother petted Linwood. The tenth clip showed Linwood shaking hands manfully with the baby’s father, their faces stern and tense, full of manfully repressed feelings.

Two and a half hours later, shaved, showered and deodorized, Officer Bennett climbed into Debbie’s Toyota and kissed her good morning. As she drove them to the bank, they compared notes on the arrest. The internet was, of course, full of the good news, with Linwood’s handsomely wolfish grinning face everywhere.

At the bank, Jake was coldly informed that he would need at least one form of ID to withdraw money or a new ATM card. He started to explain that his only form of ID had been stolen, then remembered his police lanyard. He had brought it home, since it was still attached to his tunic, which would have to be dry-cleaned, to get the blood off the back of the tunic. Debbie dashed out to her car to get it, and they left twenty minutes later with a hundred and three dollars in cash, all that was left of Jake’s balance.

Debbie dropped him off at his place before heading to work at the diner. As she kissed him goodbye, she gave him a very secretive smile and told Jake she had a surprise, but it wasn’t ready just yet.

At his awful apartment, Jake called the DMV, hating the need to make an appointment to get a replacement license, as well as the fact that he would have to pay for it. The recording cheerfully informed him that he could make the appointment and submit his documents easily online. Once again, Jake cursed his lack of a viable connection to the world wide web. He decided to wait on the DMV until after his next payday, which was still a week away.

Laboriously, on foot, groceries were procured, consisting of milk, cereal, and coffee. The market was only three blocks away, but it seemed like a mile as he trudged back to his horrible apartment. Jake had always hated the Elantra, which was older than he was, but now he hated being without it even more. Officer Jake Bennett was rapidly discovering what millions before him had already learned: that Los Angeles, like most of the west coast, was no fun without a car.

He couldn’t take his uniform to the dry cleaners.

He couldn’t go to the gym.

There was a bus that would get him near work, but it would take almost two hours.

Back at his apartment, Jake watched the news periodically to see how the Petroff case was unfolding. Linwood was by turns solemn, gleeful, and stern as he hailed the heroic efforts of the LAPD and promised that swift and terrible justice would be done on the kidnappers. There would be a press conference very soon, he revealed, in answer to a shouted question. Flashing his brilliant smile, Linwood waved at the cameras. Jake felt revolted by the show-biz taint of it all.

At three-thirty, Debbie called, her voice filled with poorly concealed excitement. She asked if Jake could put on some long pants and walk over to the Bite This diner, which was only eight blocks away. Jake’s tender California feet were already complaining, but he dutifully agreed to make the trek, and fifteen minutes later he headed north toward Santa Monica Boulevard, wondering all the way: why the long pants?

THE MOTORCYCLE

As Jake walked up to the Bite This diner, he saw Debbie wave and gesture through the front window to meet him in the parking lot in back. Jake walked around the building just as Debbie burst