The Problem Client

by K P Maxwell

  They get everything loaded rather quickly between all of the muscular, athletic men, and it’s not actually a lot, all told. It looks especially small in the back of the cargo van. All of Damien’s past life, packed up into a few boxes. He feels nostalgic all of a sudden, but Ty grabs him around the waist again, pulling him close.

  “You ready?” he asks, pressing a soft kiss to Damien’s temple, and Damien nods. He is.

  “See you tomorrow,” he announces to the other guys, waving goodbye, and Liam almost looks like he wants to hug Damien again but refrains from doing so. Damien’s grateful. He doesn’t think he can handle any more sentimentality today.

  “See you later, man,” Kaz says, raising a hand.

  “Yeah, take it easy, bro,” Jake chimes in.

  Damien hops into the passenger seat of the van. He keeps trying to tell himself that he’s going to be back tomorrow, that this isn’t really goodbye at all, but it feels momentous in a way that his previous life decisions haven’t. There’s something about the café that feels more like home than anywhere else he’s ever lived before. He tries not to think too hard about that.

  Ty is in an incredibly good mood the entire way there, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel of the van as he drives. Sometimes Ty seems like a complete contradiction. He’s entirely comfortable in this setting, when Damien knows quite well that he could have easily paid for someone else to do this for them. Damien slides his eyes over to look at the other man as he drives. It’s hard to imagine Ty as some sort of ruthless businessman or alpha wolf when he’s like this.

  “What?” Ty asks, sensing his mood finally and glancing over at him.

  Damien shrugs, lips quirking up into a smile and looking back at the road again. “Just thinking you could have hired someone to drive the truck.”

  If Damien’s not mistaken, Ty’s face reddens a bit at that. Ty shrugs a shoulder.

  “Thought it would be nice,” Ty mumbles, and Damien laughs. It is sort of sweet, he thinks. They’re crossing a bridge now, into downtown Portland, and Damien puts an elbow against the spot where the window meets the car door and leans his cheek against his hand as he looks out across the river.

  “It is nice,” Damien admits, and he doesn’t look back at Ty to see what kind of face Ty’s making at that.

  Ty parks in the loading zone next to the cargo elevator when they finally get to his building. He puts the hazard lights on and hops out of the van. Damien climbs out to help. The cargo elevator is much more convenient to load up with all of the boxes, and they are able to pile everything in there all at once and take it all the way up to Ty’s floor. They leave the elevator doors locked open as they make several trips to get it all moved down the hall over to the condo.

  Once they get the last few boxes into the doorway, when Ty finally closes the door, he stalks over to Damien and grabs Damien around the waist, lifting him up bodily. Damien squeaks, because it’s completely unnecessary. Also, he’s pretty sure Ty’s still parked, probably illegally, in the loading zone.

  “Don’t you need to move the van?” he asks, wrapping his legs around Ty’s waist, and Ty shrugs.

  “Nah, someone will take care of it,” he says mysteriously, adjusting his grip on Damien so all of Damien’s weight is resting on his arms. “I need to carry you over the threshold.”

  Damien starts laughing when Ty starts carrying him into the bedroom. He’s so much taller than Ty that this sort of arrangement feels awkward, but Ty holds him up easily as if he’s not bothered by the size difference. Damien presses a kiss against Ty’s lips, the corner of his mouth, his cheek, attempting to distract him from his mission.

  “I’m not some sort of bride,” Damien says, but it’s too late to protest. Ty throws him down onto the large king-sized bed. Damien thinks of his bright blue comforter with cats all over it. It’s packed away in one of the boxes, and he stifles a laugh at the thought. Kaz had it packed up without comment, and Ty’s never seen it. Damien wants to try to keep it that way for as long as possible. He knows it’s childish, but it’s always made him happy.

  “I like the idea of you being here, like this,” Ty says, half growling as he crawls over Damien onto the bed. They are both still fully clothed and a little sweaty from moving even Damien’s small amount of belongings. Ty seems to like it though, nuzzling at Damien’s neck.

  “Mmm?” Damien asks, “You’ve got me all to yourself now,” he says. Ty grins at him, the feral, half wild smile that always attracted Damien from the beginning. Wolf, he thinks, with a shiver of pleasure. He’s still never seen what Ty looks like in wolf form though, he realizes, and the thought gives him pause.

  “What are you thinking about?” Ty asks, noticing the change in his mood, and Damien laughs a little at being caught woolgathering.

  “Just that I’ve never seen you shift before,” he says honestly. “Kaz is in cat form half of the time at the café.”

  Ty looks a little uncomfortable at the statement, and sits back. “Ah,” he says. “I don’t shift very often anymore.”

  “Why not?” Damien asks, and Ty frowns, looking down at his hands.

  “Why would I?” Ty shrugs. “There’s no point to it, usually. Not here in the city.”

  Damien considers that. “Don’t you get restless though?” he asks, and Ty looks up at him.

  “Maybe,” he admits. “Why?”

  “Kaz was really upset when he first moved into the café and felt like he couldn’t shift around any of us,” Damien says, and Ty nods.

  “I guess it can be like that sometimes,” Ty says. He moves off of Damien so they are sitting next to each other.

  “It feels like I always have this energy running underneath my skin,” Ty explains, and Damien runs his fingers down Ty’s arm, as if he might feel it there.

  “I’d like to see it sometime,” Damien admits.

  Ty grins at him. “Yeah?” he asks.

  Damien nods but doesn’t say anything further, not wanting to press. He wonders if Ty’s shift is like Kaz’s. He’s never seen anyone but Kaz shift before.

  Ty looks at him for a moment, and then shrugs. He stands up off of the bed and starts to take his clothes off. He laughs at Damien’s expression.

  “The house cat probably doesn’t have to do this part, but I’ll get tangled if I don’t,” Ty explains. “It’s just easier if I’m not wearing clothes.”

  Damien’s not going to complain, honestly. He watches the other man undress appreciatively.

  “You ready?” Ty asks, and Damien nods. Ty seems worried, but Damien’s not sure how it could be much different from Kaz’s shift. Ty gives him one last look and then he’s gone.

  There’s a gorgeous, dark grey wolf in his place. The wolf tilts his head at Damien, and the eyes look at Damien curiously. He’s big. Larger than a German Shepherd, Damien thinks, and fluffier besides. Damien pats the spot next to himself on the bed.

  “Can you come up here?” he asks, and the wolf inclines his head. He hops up onto the bed in a graceful movement, and Damien can feel the weight of the beast. Of Ty. He’s somehow lighter than Ty when Ty is in human form, and it’s hard for Damien to wrap his mind around. Magic.

  Before he moved to Portland, he had no idea that magic existed. There are always the rumors. Legends. Hints of mysterious things happening. But Damien had never personally interacted with magic before meeting Melanie.

  “Can I touch you?” Damien asks, and Ty bumps his head against Damien’s shoulder. Damien laughs, taking that as a yes.

  “I wish you could speak,” Damien says, “But I guess that wouldn’t make sense.”

  Ty, in wolf form, seems happy though, and Damien runs his hands through the thick fur. He has an amused moment to wonder if Ty sheds in this form and thinks maybe having him get up on the bed wasn’t a good idea at all. He strokes the wolf’s fur idly, enjoying the warmth, and Ty curls up next to him, his eyes starting to droop closed.

  Damien huffs a small laugh. “You were more tired than you
were letting on, huh?” he asks, and Ty lifts his head up, tilting it again at Damien curiously. Damien smiles down at the wolf. “Go to sleep,” Damien says. “We can unpack later.”

  Ty lays his head in Damien’s lap, eyes closing, and Damien continues to stroke his fur gently. He leans back against the headboard of the bed, sighing with contentment.

  Before he knew about magic, he had no idea what he was missing out on, he thinks.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Monday is tough. Damien leaves to go to the café right as Ty is waking up for the morning. He presses a kiss against the other man’s morning stubble and leaves Ty a cup of hot coffee on the counter. Ty’s office is downtown, not too far from where the condo is, apparently. On Sunday, after they woke up from their nap, they talked a little bit about work and logistics, and Ty said he’d take Damien to his office to show him around sometime. The space is mostly for business meetings, and he also ends up traveling to various locations around the city depending on shipment locations.

  Damien has to navigate Portland’s public transit system during one of the busiest times of day, and he can’t help but feel like he’s running late by the time he makes it to the café. He’ll never be able to make in as early as he used to, coming all the way across town and having to take a transfer, so he’s just going to have to get used to the feeling, he thinks, regretfully.

  The café is already open by the time he gets there, and Liam waves happily to him from the counter as he works on an order for a customer. Damien tries to smile in return and heads back to Melanie’s office.

  She glances up at him expectantly when he comes in, and he realizes he didn’t bring her coffee or a croissant this morning. She must understand his realization because she immediately waves a hand at him. “It’s fine, Damien. I can get my own coffee,” she says, but there’s still something about the break in tradition that feels wrong to him. Off-kilter.

  The whole day feels like that, and the evening isn’t much better. It starts raining in the afternoon and doesn’t stop by the time Damien needs to leave for the day. He regrets not bringing an umbrella. He borrows one from Melanie and leaves the café right at 5, making his apologies to Liam that he can’t help close up. Liam reassures him that it’s fine, that Kaz or Jake will help.

  The return trip back to Ty’s condo is somehow even more awful than the morning commute, with some combination of the weather and the sheer number of people all trying to travel at the same time. By the time Damien gets back, he’s grumpy, and he kicks his wet shoes off in the doorway, hanging the wet umbrella on a coat rack. Ty isn’t even home yet, and the empty condo feels strange without him there. Some of Damien’s unpacked boxes are still sitting in a corner of the living room, and there are a few others that they stashed away in the guestroom closet.

  Damien sighs and heads back to the bedroom to change out of his wet clothes. He’s hungry already, too, and as he’s slipping on a new shirt and some comfortable sweatpants, he realizes with sudden clarity that he mostly relied on Sebastian to provide all of his meals for him when he lived at the café. Or Kaz, lately, too. Yesterday, he and Ty just ordered takeout. In fact, when Damien is here with Ty, they almost always order takeout, although sometimes Ty makes him breakfast.

  He pads back into the kitchen and opens the fridge. It’s just as empty as he thought it was. There’s some milk and a carton of eggs. A few condiments in the side of the door. The cabinets are nearly empty, too, except a half-empty bag of rice. Damien knows Ty doesn’t spend much time here, but it’s different being confronted with the reality in this specific context.

  He ends up ordering Thai from a place nearby, and by the time it shows up, Ty does, too, walking through the door not long after as Damien’s removing cartons from plastic delivery bags and getting out real plates and silverware. Ty looks so happy to see Damien when he gets back from work, though, that Damien can’t help but smile back at him, feeling a little bit better about the whole thing.

  Of course the first day will be rough, he thinks. They just need to get into a rhythm.

  Ty wraps his arms around Damien’s waist from behind, and Damien melts into the other man. Ty kisses his neck, and after a moment lets Damien go back to portioning out some of his pad see ew into a bowl.

  They end up eating on the couch with Ty typing away on his laptop in between bites, still working even late into the night and Damien watching a TV show with headphones in on his own laptop. Damien rests his head against Ty as Ty works, eventually falling asleep there, waking up only briefly when Ty carries him to the bedroom.

  The rest of the week and the weeks that follow really don’t go much better. After a full week of using public transit to get to the cafe, Damien has half a mind to ask Melanie if she could just whip up one of those magic doors for him, but he doesn’t want to presume anything. And anyways, he hasn’t had the chance to see her as much with the limited amount of time he spends at the café. For the first week, he tries to leave right at five, and the second week, he tries leaving even earlier to beat traffic. It doesn’t seem to make much of a difference as far as the commute is concerned, and Ty is never home when he gets there, anyways.

  By the third week, he gives up entirely and starts staying at the café late, helping to close up at the end of the day. Liam’s a little concerned at first.

  “Everything okay with Ty?” he asks as they are cleaning up the café for the evening, and Damien nods reassuringly. He’s flipping some of the chairs up onto the tables so they can easily sweep underneath them.

  “It’s just the commute,” Damien explains as he grabs the broom. “And Ty usually works late, anyways.”

  Liam frowns a little at the response, but doesn’t ask anything further.

  The first day or two that he stays late, he feels guilty, but he realizes that the traffic is much better at this time of day. The busses are less crowded already, whereas before sometimes they were so crowded that they would pass him by and he’d have to wait for the next one. Even though he’s leaving later now, somehow by the magic of public transit, he still manages to get back to Ty’s condo not too much later than he was when he was leaving around five.

  Ty is still never home when he gets there, however. It’s almost as if Ty was making an effort to come home earlier all of those other days, and now he’s simply gotten back into his old schedule.

  Ty is way busier than Damien could have ever imagined. Damien realizes that Ty must be moving heaven and earth to get Saturday nights and Sundays free to spend time with Damien, because those are nearly quite literally the only times that Damien sees the other man. Ty has a business to run, and he runs it. He must have paranormal stamina to manage to do all of the things he does. He reminds Damien a lot of Melanie in his single-minded pursuit of getting things done. Most nights, Damien doesn’t see Ty until very late, so late that sometimes Damien crawls into bed before Ty’s even home, especially on days when he wants to go into the café, since the café opens early.

  But, Damien’s determined to make this work. He’s glad to have any amount of free time with Ty, and it’s still nice to wake up in the mornings next to the other man, even if he has to slip out of bed to get ready for his commute to the café. He’s also glad to no longer have to worry about finding an apartment, although part of him has started wondering about getting a new job. If he found something closer to Ty’s, it would make things easier, but he’s also reluctant to fully leave the café. The situation he has there isn’t something that he could easily find elsewhere.

  Somehow, though, he still feels like he’s in this weird in-between state where things aren’t quite working, and that something has to give, but he tries not to think about that very hard. Instead, every Monday, he starts looking forward to when they spend time together on Saturday and Sunday like they did before. On those days, it’s almost like nothing’s changed, but not quite. Sometimes now, Ty will have his laptop out on Sundays, when before he would spend the whole day in bed with Damien. Sometimes
he’ll even go out for quick meetings, especially on shifter business, which can pop up at all hours of the day.

  They get into a rhythm, but unfortunately that rhythm means they rarely see each other, except on those Saturdays and Sundays, which are like a small window of happiness in the rest of the week. Damien can’t help but thinking that this might somehow be worse than when he lived at the café, but he tries to push the thought aside.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  After a few more weeks of living with Ty, Damien no longer worries too much about the time that he gets back from the café on weeknights. He’s started staying for the staff dinners on some nights even, enjoying the feeling of hanging out with all of the guys at the café again. He didn’t realize how much they had all become friends to him, even Sebastian, who he never would have called a friend a year ago.

  One night, he manages to stay so late that Ty’s already back and apparently in a bad mood when Damien gets home. As soon as Damien opens the door, Ty’s head snaps up, glaring at Damien from his place on the couch.

  “Cat,” he says, voice low with a growl, and Damien pauses in the doorway. He has half a mind to smell himself, but he knows he wouldn’t be able to tell anyways.

  “You can smell Kaz?” Damien says, stepping further into the condo, closing the door behind him. Ty nods, setting his laptop aside and pressing his fingers to his forehead.

  “Half the time, you come back here, smelling like that cat, and it drives me crazy,” Ty says. “It drives the wolf crazy.” He stands up, stalking closer to Damien. “Smells like the cat was rubbing himself all over you.” Ty’s giving him a dark look that makes all of the blood drain from Damien’s face.

  “You’re – what are you implying?” Damien asks, barely able to control the tone of his voice. He can feel himself shaking from anger. He’s had a long day, too, and maybe he did spend part of it sitting next to Kaz in the lounge, but when Kaz is in his feline form, Damien treats him like any other cat. If they had any cat in the café, he’d be spending time with it as well.