Darrell was tired too—exhausted, even, but his mind kept poking him back to wakefulness every time he dropped off. The case, the second attempt on Aldric, the identity of the thugs—none of that was going through his mind. Instead, how he’d felt when Aldric had played with his ass obsessed him and the thought of Aldric fucking him consumed him. Aldric had barely penetrated him, but Darrell ached to feel him deep inside. Although…he feared he already did, and deeper than any other penetration could ever be.
* * * *
“Darrell?”
Aldric’s half-whisper had Darrell wide awake. “What time is it?” he demanded.
“Early. Well, ish. I can take you to your apartment. I have to take the van back.” Aldric held out a cup. “Only decaffeinated. I try not to have caffeine in the house.”
“You make it sound like a loaded gun.” Darrell scanned the nightstand for his. He felt exposed, caught out. Had Aldric watched him sleep? His phone buzzed and a glance at it showed him Mateo’s face. He had to change those settings.
“Not answering?”
“It’s what voice mail’s for.” Darrell swung his legs to the floor. Aldric stood there, and Darrell sighed. He needed coffee for this, but… “I was hooking up with him until recently. I broke it off the same day I met you, actually.”
“Oh. How did he take it?” Aldric’s soft face was creased in concern.
“He never replied to the text. He’s been calling.”
“Jesus!” Aldric cried.
“I’ve ignored every call. You can see if you like.” Darrell gestured at his phone.
“I’m not concerned about that! I’m mad at you treating someone like that.” Aldric glared. “Look, there’s no time for this now. I’ve already showered, so go ahead.”
The journey to Darrell’s residence was silent, Darrell not initiating conversation because he wanted Aldric to focus on the road, and Aldric seemingly agreeing.
“Is that how you end all your relationships?” Aldric asked the second he pulled up at the gate Darrell directed him to and cut the engine.
“I don’t have—” He stopped himself saying relationships, although it was true. “Look, is all this because you saw me try to talk to him the other day? It wasn’t him I was interested in as much as the guy he was with. Wait. That sounds bad. I mean interested professionally. That was Nick Buckman, Buck’s son from his first marriage. There was bad blood between father and son, and Buck kicked him out, so my thinking is Nick’s back in town to see what he can get now his father’s dead.” He wished he’d been in a position to answer Mateo’s calls, but… “I didn’t say anything at the time because I didn’t want to worry you. He’s not exactly a choir boy.”
Aldric’s expression was a precursor to his angry words. “How many more times do I have to tell you not to treat me like an idiot, or a snowflake?” he demanded.
“I’m not explaining well.” Darrell rubbed his forehead. “Let me get out. I need fresh air and coffee.”
A calculating look crossed Aldric’s face when they were both outside the vehicle and Darrell glanced along the sidewalk and inside the gate to his complex. “We’re right near the coffee stop you use, near your apartment and your parking spot, right? So let’s go in and get one. We’ve got time.”
Darrell fell silent. There was so much he wasn’t ready for. Everything happening between him and Aldric was moving at lightning speed. Before he could form an answer, Aldric had opened his car door again. “Where are you going?” Darrell demanded.
“What’s the point in staying around when you don’t listen to me?” Aldric asked. “I’ve told you more than once I’m not some naïve little flower you have to protect from life. I am capable of standing on my own two feet.”
“Is this about the case? It’s dangerous, Aldric!” Darrell tried to hold back his exasperation. He wanted Aldric to be kept safe, for fuck’s sake!
“And remember when I told you that I’m not some behind-closed-doors fuck-buddy? Well, I meant it.” Aldric glared at him. “You had a chance and blew it, so that’s that.”
Darrell’s phone rang, and Aldric tilted his chin at it. “I’m not like him—I won’t be calling you.”
“What?” Darrell didn’t believe it. “That’s it? I told you, Aldric! I explained about my family, my job—”
“My family’s crap too, but I don’t use them as an excuse for being a coward, afraid to try, scared of getting hurt when I want a relationship. I’m living my own life, the best I can.”
And with that, Aldric was gone, leaving Darrell staring after him as he drove away.
Chapter Seventeen
For the first time, the jingle of bells on the door handle of the antiques shop as he opened it for the start of a new day didn’t fire Aldric with excitement and energy. His mind buzzed like a hive of bees, his emotions swarming in a mass, and he took deep breaths, hoping to calm down. All that did was cause him to inhale the lemongrass and lavender scents that always hung around the place.
Elliot had explained that those herbs and flowers had once been used to keep stored items fresh, and that now makers of air freshener used them in their products, providing a connection to the past. Aldric had thought it charming, but today he found the store musty—stifling, even, when he needed to think clearly. Anger had him clenching his hands into fists, crumpling the paper bag he’d put the puzzle box into that morning. The dumb decoy box.
The events of yesterday raced through his head. He hadn’t processed them at the time and realized now he hadn’t dealt with the assault on him in the alley either. He should hate this store. He’d felt so full of hope, and even tiny sparks of happiness, when he’d gotten the job here, yet it had resulted in danger and threats and even attacks on him. Maybe there was a curse, but if there was, he doubted it was on the store or even the items from the estate sale. It’s on me.
“Wish I’d never walked in here that morning,” he muttered to the china cabinet, which was filled with plates, dolls and even thimbles of the same material, the grouping a result of the way Elliot liked to arrange the wares by theme or families. “Then I’d—” Never have met Darrell.
Aldric had been trying not to think about him but, bam, he’d popped up again, and not just because Aldric’s body was still purring, wanting to curl up like a cat before a fireplace and bask in the memory of the incredible sex they’d had last night. He didn’t know how sex could leave him both sated and sparking with energy, but it had.
Why didn’t Darrell see they’d be good together? Well, he couldn’t even see that Aldric was capable and independent, not some weakling in need of protection. Darrell seemed to despise that. He thought Aldric had messed up the sting operation. Did I? Aldric didn’t know. What he did know—well, okay, felt—was that if he were more Darrell’s type, or what he was seeking in a partner, Darrell would have found it easier to try to be in a real relationship with him. Would have been able to treat him differently from the string of guys he picked up in bars or at the gym or wherever to slake his lust, then play some sort of cat-and-mouse game with, like that Mateo guy.
You’re not being fair. Or even rational, his brain told him. “Help me out, then,” Aldric ordered it. He gave it time and space while he went about his usual first-on-the-premises routine of making sure that the tea kettle and water jug out on the table in the store were filled and that the miniscule break-room-slash-kitchen that Elliot called a pantry was clean and tidy. He couldn’t be angry about having been hired at the store. That was an overreaction. The job had given him many things, like friends and confidence, health insurance and a good, steady income. He needed to work through his anger and fit it into the right place—or purge it altogether.
By the time he’d finished, crumpling up yesterday’s newspaper left on the counter into the recycling, squashing it down on top of the box from Elliot’s dinner last night, all he’d been able to come up with was that if he could demonstrate he wasn’t naïve and in need of help and protection, Darrell would see him d
ifferently. And that would work two-fold—if Darrell saw that Aldric had changed and grown, maybe it would show Darrell that he could, too. Aldric wandered back into the shop, a vision of a possible future with Darrell, him and Darrell as a couple, tantalizing him. It hung like a ripe fruit, but one on a branch too high to reach easily. “So what do you do when fruit’s too high up the tree to pick?”
“Use a ladder?”
Aldric jumped and knocked the paper bag containing the puzzle box from the counter where he’d left it. Elliot just managed to catch it before it hit the floor. “I didn’t hear you come in,” he gasped, clutching his chest.
“That was evident.” Elliot set the bag down and regarded Aldric. “Oh, I can be very stealthy when I need to be. I saw you deep in thought and didn’t wish to interrupt.” He gave a faint smile. “Genius at work?”
Aldric made a scoffing noise. “I wish. But what did you say—use a ladder? What if there isn’t one?” Because he couldn’t see one.
“Then I’d suggest making one.” Elliot straightened up the small section of leaflets and flyers for other local businesses that he kept in a corner of the counter. “You’re being very elliptic today, Aldric. Did anything else happen yesterday while I was out?”
“Oh, how did your meeting go? I forgot to ask,” Aldric exclaimed, hoping to get Elliot off the topic.
“It went well. It has the potential to be a profitable and rewarding contact. The gentleman is an interior decorator, always needing to ‘source’, as he put it, pieces for clients, both commercial and private. He’s currently working on a loft conversion apartment Downtown and looking out for Depression glassware, the mass-produced semi-transparent pale-green glass items of the nineteen-thirties. I’m just about to see what pieces I have in stock or in storage or if I have news of any coming up at auctions or sales.”
Elliot seemed to have the counter cleaned and arranged to his satisfaction and now turned back to Aldric to continue. “I’m aware you’re changing the subject, Aldric, and I would never wish to intrude, of course.”
“Of course,” Aldric echoed, wondering, not for the first time, about Elliot’s courtly, old-fashioned manners and way of speaking. It felt even more like something out of an old black-and-white movie than usual today.
“But if you explain, maybe I can help? I can see you’re perturbed and I would like to help ease that.”
“I… Yes.” Relief rushed into Aldric like the tide into a rockpool. “Something did happen yesterday, well, has been happening, and I think I do need help.”
“I see.” Elliot’s demeanor sharpened, his tawny-brown eyes brightening behind their wire-framed glasses. “I wonder if this is a case of three heads being better than two? If so, Jonas should be along any minute now…”
The bells at the door tinkled right on cue as the third Intrinsic Value employee entered and stopped in his tracks. He probably wasn’t expecting to see his boss and co-worker waiting for him, about to pounce. He looked from one to another.
“No, nothing’s wrong,” Elliot assured him. “At least, I think not. Aldric is about to explain something and where he needs help on it.”
“I’m in.” Jonas’ reply came instantly.
Elliot clapped Jonas on the shoulder as he walked past him to lock the door and flip the sign to closed. “But first, please tell us how the interview went at the university. Or is it a college? I can never keep up with these changes in academia.” Elliot made himself seem older than he was.
“Oh yes!” Aldric exclaimed. He felt ashamed for being so wrapped up in his own stuff that he hadn’t asked how things had gone for Jonas.
“Oh, I think it went well.” Jonas’ modest half-smile came and went. “I feel good about my chances.”
“They’d be lucky to have you on their faculty, and you deserve much more than filling in as a replacement for someone halfway through the semester,” Elliot told him warmly.
“Well, we can’t always get what we want, no matter how much we want it or how much we have to bring to it.” Jonas suddenly sounded bleak. “But we can try.”
He was a natural teacher, patient and clear, and Aldric had wondered why he wasn’t working in the field his qualifications were in. His theory was that Jonas had been burned out, had needed a break from teens or young adults and was trying to make a living from his side-line. “You miss it,” he deduced. “Is the university at the Hill where you just interviewed like the sort of place you worked at before?”
“Aldric!” Elliot scolded. “Quit stalling!”
Elliot had the occasional lapse from his old-fashioned ways and into more modern speech, Aldric had noticed. He nodded and launched into the story, trying hard to leave nothing out. Elliot exclaimed when Aldric described how the two men had tried to snatch him.
“Attempted abduction? In broad daylight?” he gasped. “Sorry, I interrupted, Aldric. Go on.”
Some details Aldric had to blur, of course, but he felt both men understood what was between him and Darrell. What had been, he corrected himself. He also felt neither man would judge him or recoil from him.
“Hmm.” Jonas took off his tortoise-shell-framed glasses and rubbed them with a tissue. “Whatever’s happening, and something is, it’s connected to the Buckman estate purchases, correct?” Aldric nodded, and Jonas continued, “Let’s narrow it down. It isn’t all the contents of Buck Buckman’s study that Elliot bought. As amusing as they are, the finger traps he used on guests and the ‘priceless sculpture’ he showed off to them that collapsed when they were near it, causing consternation and shock, aren’t part of it.”
He chuckled. “Though I must say, I would have liked to see the ‘first folio Shakespeare’ whose pages fluttered out and crumbled when the cover was opened! I wonder how often he used that trick on the unwary, and how they reacted! But our concern is only the puzzle boxes, that are in and of themselves, cheap toys with no precious value.” He pointed at the one on the counter. “Like that one, for instance. Common wood and a common item. We can narrow our focus to a finer point yet—to the one box said to be his favorite.”
“So let’s get to work.” Elliot undid his cuffs and rolled up his sleeves. “Luckily I still have all the items here and didn’t take them to the safety deposit.”
Fetched from the safe and spread out along the countertop of an antiques store, the wooden boxes looked cheaper and flimsier than ever.
“This hexagonal one?” Elliot checked. Aldric nodded. “Jonas, take note.”
“Thank you both for this,” Aldric said, appreciating the support more than he could explain. “You have no reason to help, and any other boss I’ve ever had would have fired me for bringing all this trouble to his door.”
Elliot shook his head. “None of this is your fault, Aldric, any more than it is mine for purchasing the items in the first place. If anything, more blame attaches to me for not getting rid of them. But even though neither of us started this, we’ll end it, yes?”
“All for one and one for all?” Jonas added, perplexing Aldric. “The Three Musketeers, Aldric.”
The reference to a chocolate bar confused Aldric even more, but he fetched stools, and he, Elliot and Jonas took four boxes each. Elliot took a gilt sandglass from a shelf and turned it over.
“We’ll work on a box until the sand runs out, then switch,” he declared.
Aldric cheated a little by starting with the rectangular one he’d opened before. It had taken him a while when he’d played around with it last week, but now it was simple to slide the lid back—and not be frustrated when it didn’t move all the way—then forward as far as it would go, then back to the closed position. The next move was to the left, and, when he moved the lid to the right after that, it glided completely off. The box was empty.
“Uggh!” Elliot drummed his fingers in frustration on the counter either side of the box he was working on. “I heard a click, but then I did something and heard another click, and nothing’s moving!”
“That’s the difficulty,
locking it again without knowing how you half-opened it,” Aldric replied.
They managed to open two more as the morning went on, but neither of them was the box in question. That was easily the most ornate and Elliot studied it from several angles and different distances, much the same as Aldric had the works of art in the museum.
“I think it must have something to do with the inlay squares,” Elliot said at last. “They’re applique, not just different marquetry wood mosaic.”
He began pushing at the middle strips, perhaps hoping to push them out as he had the square box he’d solved, but nothing happened. Jonas tried twisting the top one way while twisting the box another, in the same manner in which he’d opened a round box and found a netsuke miniature sculpture inside, but that did nothing in this case.
“This is infuriating, and I don’t see us getting anywhere,” Elliot said at last.
“My cousin Selena would just smash it,” Aldric admitted.
“No.” Jonas put out a hand, as if Aldric were about to do just that. “Oh, not because of any curse, but from what I’ve been reading, some bigger ones like this were used to carry secret documents or messages and had thief traps in case anyone tried to smash them open.”
“Like what?”
“Dye that destroyed the paper inside,” Jonas told Elliot. “I’m convinced this box contains something.”
“Thief trap…” Aldric closed his eyes to think. “That’s what we need. To draw anyone who wants the box to it, but under our terms, not theirs.” He opened his eyes again. “What if we displayed the boxes somewhere, but just for a short space of time? Luring whoever’s after them to attempt to steal them, or this one, and we catch him red-handed?”
Catch Nick Buckman. Aldric had been thinking over what Darrell had said about the guy, whose own father had kicked him out, being back in town to see what he could get his hands on now his father was gone. Darrell’s face, when he’d hinted that Nick wasn’t exactly a model citizen… He thought the man was behind it—Aldric was convinced. Aldric did too.
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