Declination

by Gregory Ashe

  “What? Why? It’s not your fault.”

  “It is. I asked him for help a couple of times. He knows things. But he’s—”

  From the kitchen came the crash and clatter of dishes.

  “It’s ok,” Shaw said. “It’s going to be ok.”

  “You don’t know Ronnie,” North said, his mouth twisting into a grimace.

  Shaw vaguely remembered dishes neatly piled on the side of the sink; now, they had spilled into the sink itself, a heap of plates and glasses, some of them obviously broken. Ronnie had climbed onto the counter, which seemed the best explanation for how he had managed to knock the dishes into the sink, and was currently opening cabinets and closing them with sounds of disgust.

  “I don’t have any liquor,” Shaw said. “I think North has a few beers in the fridge.”

  “Like your father,” Ronnie said with a smile. “Well, I think a beer will have to do. It’s not Bud Lite, is it, North?”

  “No, it’s a rye IPA. 4 Hands, I think. Listen, Uncle Ronnie, whatever this is about, I’ll take care of it. I’ll do what you want. I just think we’d better take care of Shaw and then I can talk to you later, all right?”

  Ronnie sat on the counter, legs swinging like an overgrown child, and grinned. “That’s really sweet. I like it. I like it, North. Really. But I’m here to talk business, and you’re just going to have to be patient. The way I was patient when you didn’t return any of my calls.” He flashed a smile that showed small, capped teeth. “How about the 4 Hands?”

  North was frozen, so after a moment Shaw slipped out from under his arm and fetched the beer. He popped the cap. “Glass?”

  “Bottle’s fine,” Ronnie said, accepting the beer with a smile. He took a drink. “Well, that’s all right.” Another sip. “Good golly, that’s really all right.”

  North still hadn’t moved; Shaw pressed up against him, his arm going around North’s waist again, but this time, North didn’t seem to notice. He didn’t wrap his own arm around Shaw’s shoulders. He didn’t really seem to be breathing. They just stood there like that, Ronnie kicking his legs like a kid, pulling at the beer, tiger eyes glinting.

  “I think you boys know a friend of mine. His name is Patrick Monaghan.”

  North didn’t say anything. Ronnie’s legs kicked steadily like a kid hanging from monkey bars. The longer it went on, the more Shaw felt that there was something grotesque about this small man, about his childlike mannerisms, about the way his lips puffed up around the neck of the beer and his throat bulged like a frog’s. Something about the eyes, mostly. And something about the fear turning North into a tin-man.

  Then, all of a sudden, North relaxed, and when he spoke, his voice had its familiar low, amused smolder. “Goes by Truck now. Non-binary. Preferred pronoun is ze.”

  Ronnie tilted his head, considering this, but his feet never slowed. “I need to talk to ze.”

  “Hir,” Shaw said.

  “Why?” North said.

  “Because that’s the preferred—”

  Now North did move, his mouth quirking into a smile. “No, babe. I’m asking Ronnie. Why do you need to talk to hir?”

  Ronnie furrowed his brow; it made him look like a goblin, his whole face scrunched with concentration. “Nothing to worry about, North. I just need to talk to him—”

  “Hir,” Shaw said.

  Tipping the bottle in acknowledgment, Ronnie said, “I need to talk to hir. That’s all.”

  “You need to talk to Truck?” North said. “That’s it? Talk?”

  With a laugh, Ronnie said, “That’s all? North, you make it sound like I might, oh, I don’t know, take Truck out behind a tire shop and work him over until I get what I want.”

  “Or he might go swimming in an empty pool,” North said, voice still amused, like they were just pulling each other’s legs. “Or he might fall off the Grand overpass. Or he might trip and sit down on a piece of rebar. One guy did that, didn’t he, Uncle Ronnie? It went straight up his asshole and out his throat. Do you remember that? Or he might do something really stupid like put his hand under a lawnmower.”

  With another laugh, Ronnie tipped the bottle at North. “People do all sorts of stupid things, don’t they?”

  “Ze’s not going to do anything stupid?”

  “Well, I can’t promise that, can I? But let’s just assume, for the sake of conversation, that ze’s going to go on and do the bare minimum of stupidity.” Ronnie took a last pull and tossed the empty bottle into the sink. “After all, ze was already stupid enough to steal from someone important.”

  “All right,” North said. “We’ll look into it.”

  “That’s great news.”

  “How do you know about Precinct Blue?” Shaw said.

  North didn’t quite groan this time, but the sound was working its way through his throat, a vibration that Shaw could feel in North’s chest. North squeezed Shaw’s arm and shook his head.

  “What do you know about Jadon Reck? What do you know about him getting shot, and what do you know about Taylor and Waggener and whoever else might be trying to cover things up? What do you know about the Slasher?”

  “Ronnie, he’s just asking. Don’t answer him. Shaw, why don’t you go upstairs?”

  Shaw ignored North’s fingers biting into his arm; he met Ronnie’s look and held it.

  “Your father is Wilson Aldrich, is that right? CEO and owner of Aldrich Acquisitions?”

  “Shaw,” North said, his fingertip bleached white where he clutched Shaw’s arm. “Go on upstairs now. Get the first aid kit out. I’ll come up in a minute.”

  “That’s right,” Shaw said. “Part owner, anyway. It’s publicly traded now.”

  “I believe Aldrich Acquisitions has an interest in a biotech startup. Some WashU and Chouteau grad students started it, and they’re doing wonderful things with transgenics.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t talk to my dad about business. I want to know what you can tell me about the Slasher.”

  “I can tell you quite a bit about the man who attacked you in that alley,” Ronnie said. For the first time since he sat on the counter, his legs slowed, his heels coming to rest against the cabinets. He turned his head, and Shaw thought of tigers coiling, crouching, the sun glinting on cold, bright eyes. “Maybe we should have a conversation.”

  “No,” North said. “You told me what you wanted. I said yes. I’ll find Truck. That’s the end of it.”

  “Don’t interrupt, North,” Ronnie snapped, and his small face was wizened and goblinish again. “I’m having a conversation with Shaw.”

  “Get out, Ronnie. Right now. Get the fuck out.”

  Shaw was shocked at the small man’s transformation. Hate—or possibly contempt—continued to twist his features until he barely resembled the neighbor who grilled up some dogs while his dog ran after a frisbee. “Watch your mouth, North. I’ve told you before that I don’t like it when you have a smart mouth. Do you want me to remind you?”

  Color leaked out of North’s face. He didn’t answer Ronnie; he just set his lips in a grim line.

  Then, with a small laugh, Ronnie was Ronnie again, and he kicked his feet once and slid off the counter. “Well, I probably should be going. Interesting conversation, though. I wouldn’t mind talking to you about it more, Shaw. I think there’s plenty we could talk about. And North, just so we’re clear: what we’ve talked about tonight, with Patrick, that takes care of those little favors you called me for. But it doesn’t clean the slate. Understand?”

  North looked gray. Even those ice-rim eyes were gray. He nodded.

  “Goodnight, boys,” Ronnie said, shaking their hands once more. “I’ll see myself out. So happy for you, by the way. Congratulations. Best wishes. All that. Have a wonderful night.”

  Ronnie left, and when the sound of the door clicking shut came from the other room, North staggered out of the kitchen. A moment later, Shaw heard the deadbolt turn. He heard a single,
raw breath escape North, and then heavy footsteps came back to the kitchen.

  “What was that?” Shaw asked.

  “A bad decision,” North said, stepping back into the room. “Actually, a lot of them.”

  “What he said about Truck—”

  Some of the color had come back to North’s face, and he shook his head firmly now. “Not a chance. I just said that so he’d leave.”

  “What? Why not?”

  North walked over to him, his arms looping loosely around Shaw’s neck, his forehead falling to rest against Shaw’s. “Because Ronnie’s a psychopath and whatever he wants with Truck, it’s going to be bad. Really bad.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning Ronnie wants something else; he just doesn’t want to tell us what.”

  “But if Ronnie can tell us something about Jadon—”

  “No, Shaw.”

  “But if he can tell us something about the Slasher—”

  North caught his jaw, the touch light but solid. “No.” He wagged Shaw’s jaw side to side. “I’ll deal with Ronnie, ok?”

  The words came out without Shaw knowing where they came from—without knowing how to stop them. “The way you dealt with Troy at Precinct Blue tonight?”

  An ugly purple flush slashed across North’s cheeks. He pulled back.

  “That was a joke,” Shaw said.

  North shook his head.

  “North, I was just—I was kidding.”

  “I should go.”

  “North.”

  “We left the dog in the car. I need to make sure he’s ok.”

  “And you’re coming back, right?”

  North’s hand dropped from Shaw’s chin, and he rolled his shoulders and stepped back.

  “I thought maybe you could—” Shaw grabbed at North’s arm, and North twisted away slightly, just enough that Shaw missed. “I thought maybe you’d—” He gestured at his face, where the cuts and bruises still throbbed.

  North’s eyes were an arctic wasteland, but he nodded. “I let it happen, didn’t I?”

  “Come on, I just—I said something stupid and shitty. I’m sorry.”

  “I’ll get the dog; you go up and get the first aid kit.”

  He left before Shaw could say anything else.

  Shaw’s mind went a million places. It went back in time before he could be such an idiot. It went after North, turning him around in the hallway, covering him with kisses. It went out to the street and breathed the humid heat of the end of summer. Part of him went after Ronnie. Because knowing about the Slasher, knowing what Jadon found that made him a threat to Taylor and Waggener, that was more important than anything else. More important than a coked-out thief like Truck. At least, that’s what that voice at the back of Shaw’s head said.

  But after another moment’s consideration, Shaw opened the fridge and hooked two 4 Hands by the neck and carried them upstairs. His bedroom was in its usual state, which meant it was perfectly organized in a system that North seemed to find baffling. In the bathroom, Shaw set the beers on the counter and lowered the toilet seat. By the time he retrieved the first aid kit from the hall, North’s steps echoed up the stairwell. Then the sound of scurrying claws filled the upstairs. The puppy skittered into view, slipping along the wood floor as he tried to turn, and yelping pathetically as he slid on his stomach. He met Shaw’s gaze with huge, soft eyes.

  Suddenly Shaw thought about the knife and the bar and Troy and the way North’s arms had been twisted behind his back, the look of pain and helplessness so unfamiliar on North’s familiar features. His eyes stung with tears because it could have gone differently. North could have been dead, bleeding out on Precinct Blue’s floor from a nasty cut with a broken bottle. Shaw had been there before. He had been in a dark alley with Carl bleeding out on the pavement. He had been helpless with the Slasher’s hand around his throat, choking the life from him, enjoying it.

  He blinked the tears away and took three deep breaths. Never again.

  “Sit down,” North said as he stepped into the bathroom. The puppy came after him, yapping once and then snuffling at Shaw’s feet. “Actually, take off your shirt and then sit down.”

  Undoing the buttons, Shaw wriggled out of his shirt; the cold air raised goosebumps on his skin, and more goosebumps followed when North ran fingers down his chest.

  “We’re not going to get very far if you do that,” Shaw whispered.

  A shadow smile traced North’s mouth, but just a shadow.

  North worked in silence, cleaning the cuts on Shaw’s face, bandaging the ones that could take a bandage, probing bruises until Shaw grunted and pushed his hand away.

  “Official diagnosis,” North said, his eyes limpid like glacial ice. “You’re still pretty.”

  Shaw found it hard to look into those eyes for long. It was like snow glare, too much light reflecting and magnifying until it made Shaw feel small and shabby. Blind, too. Most of all it made him feel blind.

  A wet tongue found the top of Shaw’s foot, and he yelped in surprise and then laughed. The puppy skittered away, shocked by the sudden noise.

  “You sound like you’re ok too.”

  “Maybe,” Shaw said.

  “Maybe?”

  He found North’s hand and brought it to his chest, let gravity drag it against the resistance of his skin until North’s fingers tented low on Shaw’s belly. “I think I need a full examination.”

  No shadow smile this time. Only the painful, blue-white clarity of North’s eyes. “That’s not a good idea. Last time—”

  “Last time was last time.”

  North breathed deeply through his nose. Shaw could see it in his face. He was trying so hard to be a good man. A decent man. But tonight, Shaw didn’t want a decent man. Shaw wanted how easy it had been that first time. He wanted all the easiness he had felt with Matty, but he wanted it with North, now and for the rest of his life. And he didn’t know why it seemed so far away.

  Dr. Farr had said—

  But Shaw shut down that line of thought. Dr. Farr was wrong. North was wrong. There was nothing wrong between Shaw and North, nothing at all. This was a Shaw problem. And Shaw would figure it out. By himself.

  North started to shake his head.

  Never again, Shaw thought, dizzy with the smell of North’s skin, with the memory of the alley, in the breathless dark where he went sometimes.

  Pushing up to his feet, Shaw grabbed North’s shirt and pulled, dragging it up over North’s head and then letting it fall against his back so that his arms were still through the sleeves and the taut line of fabric pinioned North’s limbs. Holding him. Trapping him.

  Shaw traced a finger through the thick mat of blond fur.

  “Shaw.”

  “Uh uh.” He let his fingernail skate over dense muscle, drawing a shiver through the bigger man’s body, hearing the sudden, uneven intake of breath.

  “Shaw.”

  “Be quiet.” His nail found North’s nipple, circling it as it stiffened. North took another of those unsteady gulps. Shaw dragged his nail up, along North’s shoulder, across the ultra-sensitive skin on North’s back.

  This time, the shiver was a shudder, and North moaned.

  “Yeah,” Shaw said. “More of that. I want to hear a lot more of that.”

  North flexed suddenly, as though he had forgotten the shirt, struggling to move. Shaw kissed him, clawing North’s back, hard enough that when he broke the kiss, North was hissing, his eyes blank and wide like the tundra.

  “I don’t—” North was struggling to speak. Struggling, even, to breathe. “Shaw, I don’t want—”

  “What don’t you want? Tell me.” Shaw’s mouth moved lower, taking in North’s nipple, teasing with his teeth.

  North’s voice was high and tight. “Hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  Leaning back, Shaw plucked at the shirt binding North’s arm and chuckled. “Does it look like you can hurt me
tonight?”

  Then, placing his hands on North’s waist, he marched the man backward toward the bed.

  Chapter 11

  NORTH LAY AWAKE, his heart beating faster than he liked, sweat crusting his skin. His mind kept launching off into something like dreams—wild, fractured images—and then he would come back to the ache between his legs. Not pain. That would be silly because North hadn’t been hurt; Shaw hadn’t hurt him. That would be ridiculous. And then he’d shoot out into the stratosphere of those wild dreams, exhilarating, arousing, frightening, until the ache drew him back again.

  Squirming on top of the matted bedding, North tried to find a position that was comfortable, but his skin felt abraded, and the six-hundred-thread-count sheets rubbed like sandpaper. His shoulder touched Shaw’s, and he flinched away, colors like sunspots dancing in his vision. It had started out all right. It had been hot, actually, the way Shaw had fucked him. There had been something fun about it—knowing that it was a game, which was what made it fun. If it hadn’t been a game, it might have been upsetting. North thought about that, trying to swallow, but his throat was too dry. Yes, if it hadn’t been a game, with his arms pinioned by the t-shirt and with Shaw tossing him onto the bed, it might have been terrifying. North’s eyes fluttered, chasing those sunspots in the dark. But that was silly.

  He took deep breaths. He could smell their sex in the air. The thing about it, though, he thought. The thing was that it didn’t seem silly. Not right then. Not in the dark, when sleep was a mile out of reach and he could only leap into those wild, fractured moments that had taken the place of dreams. It didn’t seem silly at all. He kept thinking about Shaw’s face, about the intensity of those hazel eyes, the broken-back smile. The way Shaw had moved, the way his eyes had captured North like a photograph without ever seeming to see him.

  Maybe, North thought, maybe the problem wasn’t with Shaw. Maybe the problem was with North.

  I just wish it could be easy again. The way it was with—

  Matty. That was what Shaw hadn’t said. Whatever North had with Shaw, it was always going to be second to Matty. Matty was dead, but he was always going to be there, like a scrim between the two men. Maybe the problem wasn’t trust. Maybe the problem was that North had been too slow to act on his feelings for Shaw. Maybe North was always going to be too late.