Page 39 of Artifacts

“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 sayingrelationships, 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’sdangerous, 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’sit? Itoldyou, 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 differently. And that would work two-fold—if Darrell saw that Aldric had changed and grown, maybe it would show Darrell thathecould, 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?”

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