See chapter One for disclaimers and story info.

Chapter Six.

"Yeah, I understand." Vic sighed heavily. "Thanks for telling me this, Danny."

"I-I... Just don't make me regret telling you."

"I won't. Trust me."

Vic tried to rub away the pounding in his head as he disconnected, but something told him that the headache was there to stay. At least until he had figured out a good way to deal with everything that had happened. And since there was no good way to deal with it...

Releasing another heavy sigh he flicked on his cell phone again and dialed a new number. Waiting for Corrine to pick up he went through his conversation with Danny in his mind. It had turned out he had been right earlier. She had been lying about what had happened between her and Dutch. Although considering the situation he couldn't find it in himself to be upset about it.

In fact, he felt bad for her, knowing that she felt more than a little responsible for what was happening to Dutch. But, as he'd made sure to tell her, it wasn't her fault. The only option to confronting Dutch had been to ignore what he'd told her and she couldn't have done that. Not as a friend. And certainly not as a cop.

No, she had done the right thing. He was sure of that. Although, he thought while giving his temples another one-handed rub, she hadn't necessarily picked the right time or place for it.

"Hello?"

"Hi, baby."

"Vic?"

"I'd sure hope so," he answered, a small smile playing on his lips. "I'd be very unhappy if other men phoned my wife, calling her 'baby'. How are the kids doing?"

"Well... Matthew was having a bit of a problem with his homework."

The background noise told Vic that his wife had been watching the TV. He felt a pang of guilt for disturbing her, knowing quite well that Corrine only got a few moments of free time every day. But he really needed to hear her voice, he told himself. And it was only for a few moments.

"His sister helped him out though," Corrine continued on the other end of the phone. "She's being a real angel."

His wife's familiar voice was soothing and he felt a bit calmer with the knowledge that Corrine and the children were fine. They were protected, out of harm's way. Nobody was going to hurt them like Dutch had been hurt. Nothing bad was ever going to happen to them. He'd make sure of that.

"Tell her that her daddy is proud of her."

"I will." There were a few moments of silence before Corrine continued, concern obvious in her voice. "Is something wrong, Vic?"

"Nah... I just needed to hear your voice."

"A though case?"

Corrine's voice was even softer now and Vic felt a pang of gratitude. He was usually rather good at not taking his work back home with him but occasionally a case would leave him with the feeling that what he was doing -- what he was trying so damn hard to do -- was all for nothing. Those were the times he called home just to make sure that there was something good left in his world.

"Yeah. But it's going to be okay."

"Do you want to talk about it?" The TV-noise in the background stopped abruptly. "I could put on a movie for the kids. They're pretty much done with their homework anyway."

"Just hearing your voice is good enough. But, thanks."

"Okay. Remember I love you, okay? And the kids love you too."

In the background he could faintly hear Cassy's voice, stating that she loved him very much and could he please buy ice-cream on his way home. Vic smiled a bit, making a mental note to do just that.

"Love you too, baby. And the kids. Give Cassy a big hug from me."

"See you tonight then."

"Yeah, bye."

As she hung up Vic realized that, although his headache had lessened slightly during the conversation with Corrine, he should probably still take an aspirin or two as a preventive measure. After all, he thought with a dark frown, as hard as it was to believe he still had the worst part of the day ahead of him.

Heading over to Dutch's bathroom Vic wondered what his next step should be. Fuck, he cursed silently. Why did I have to get involved in this? He knew himself well enough to know that he wouldn't be able to just wash his hands of the situation. Corrine always told him he was a control freak and part of him knew she was right. Ever since he'd been a child he had wanted to fix things that was broken, make them go back to the way they should be.

Only with cases like Dutch's you couldn't fix things. You couldn't go back some twenty year back in time and make things right. It was too late for that. All you could try for was damage control.

He stared at himself in the mirror, seeing but not really taking notice of the scowl on his face. Turning on the water faucet with one hand he pulled open the medicine cabinet with the other. Rummaging through the shelves he found a handful of prescription bottles as well as some over-the-counter painkillers.

As he reached out for for the Tylenol Extra Strength Geltabs -- smirking a little at the thought of Dutch refusing to take usual tablets -- he spotted the name of one of the prescription bottles. Ambian. He recognized the name as that of a sleeping pill, not very strong but you still needed to a doctor's prescription for them. A stray thought -- 'Maybe I should pocket those until I've talked to Dutch?' -- suddenly made him fully realize the seriousness of the situation.

"Jesus Christ," he muttered. "What the hell am I supposed to do?"

Damage control, his mind reminded him. Damage control. That's all you can do.

But how? He obviously needed to talk to Dutch. Not that he felt that he needed to confirm his suspicions, but more as a way to see what Dutch wanted to do. You mean to find out if you need to take away his gun before you leave for the night, a cynical voice added from the back of his head.

Vic rubbed his hand over his face with a sigh.

God, he couldn't believe that this was happening. He couldn't believe that Dutch -- of all people! -- had been hurt that way as a kid. The man had worked as a cop for years; how come nobody had ever picked up on it? Surely there had to have been signs?

A memory of Dutch's pale face and erratic breathing as Vic had talked to him after they'd seen that cherrypopper movie with Sally suddenly flashed through Vic's mind. The hard look in Dutch's eyes and the determined set on his face as he approved of doing things Vic's way when the man who'd raped that little girl was caught.

So, of course there had been signs. Only, just like him, everybody had chose not to see or take notice of them. Male victims of sexual assaults were too rare to be easily acknowledged. Vic knew that, had been told as much by some tiny woman with too much make-up at a mandatory police work-shop.

He suddenly found himself wishing that he'd been listening more carefully instead of spending the day half-asleep in the back of the room. In fact he'd trade half of his private porn-collection for one of those pink pamphlets on how to approach adult survivors of child abuse that had been passed out to the attending officers.

He'd folded his into a paper airplane, he remembered with a flash of remorse. Sent it flying into the trash can. Then left for beers with his buddies.

Yep, you're an asshole. But we already knew that. His subconscious told him without any sympathy. The questions is, now what? It's not like you can head over to the library and-

Closing the medicine cabinet with a loud bang Vic hurried out into the living room and Dutch's large bookshelf. As he'd noticed earlier all the books were first categorized after subject and then alphabetized. At the time he'd first saw it he'd lost the battle to keep from laughing, lost in the realization of just how desperately Dutch really needed a life. Now -- as he found a shelf dedicated to survivors of childhood abuse -- he took back every snort of laughter.

Grabbing a book that looked reasonably easy to read he threw it onto the couch, then went back to the bathroom for the Tylenols he'd forgotten. If he was going to read a book then he was definitely going to need them.

And then he was going to have to call Claudette and explain to her why she couldn't come to see Dutch after her shift ended. Maybe he could make Danny talk to her? Come up with some bullshit story about how she wanted to go see him herself to tell him that things were okay between the two of them or something. Or maybe not. Claudette was too damn good at spotting lies.

But he really needed to talk to Dutch alone first. Explain to him that things weren't as bad as the poor man undoubtedly thought they were. The look in Dutch's eyes earlier that day was still haunting Vic and he didn't want the man to do -- or say -- something he would end up regretting later.

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