Ink & Snow (Clair de la Lune #1)

5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

T here were of course still three dead kittens in my yard, and if the circumstances had been really dark, their mom’s body was somewhere under the snow too.

I’d have loved to ignore frozen baby cats behind my pile of firewood, but I’d probably not have been able to sleep knowing they were there, so I’d decided to take advantage of the sheriff after he’d unpacked the vet stuff and had asked him to take care of Cherry’s siblings, which he’d done, offering no more than a grunt.

Once he and the dead kittens were gone, I put Cherry in a moving box, making sure she was snug under her new blanket.

“You stay there. I have work to do,” I said in barely a whisper.

For the fact that I hadn’t really done anything, I felt pretty exhausted, so I made myself a nice double espresso and took it downstairs with me, along with my laptop, leaving Cherry’s box by the radiator in the living room.

I knew I’d be able to move the car around the building and use an extension cord to charge it back there, but the snow made that impossible for now. But I did need to charge the car, and to get that done, I needed to open the door because the power cord needed to go into my shop. And if I opened the door for charging my car, I might as well open the shop for business.

With my inadequate jacket, I went outside and brought the charging cord back in with me. The good thing was the snow covered it for the most part and it wasn’t in anyone’s way that I could see. I plugged it in near the show window where I should probably decorate some to fit in. And to show potential customers I knew how to take petunias and roses and jasmine and make something beautiful out of it.

Once the car was charging, I took a look around. There were so many things to do here, but I picked something that should be easy enough to accomplish. The sheriff had said people would want wreaths.

I headed to the cool room, the temperature there nowhere near as biting as the outside. Fran hadn’t shortchanged me. On one of the shelves, glossy mistletoe branches piled high, waiting to be shaped and bound with ribbons.

The shop was stocked well, and I picked out a few wreath bases, straw and twig, and began making rounds of living green to brighten the darker season, something that people could hang on their doors or inside their rooms.

The pancake rule totally applied to wreaths too, and the first one was shit. After that, muscle memory or something set in, and they turned out nicely, the leaves folding over one another to cover the straw body I was winding them around. I added red, green, or gold bows to some, left others bare, and after about two hours of work, I had some stock I’d be happy to sell.

The pancake wreath I’d take upstairs and put on my mantle. I wasn’t the type to celebrate, not really, but I was… I sighed, running a thumb over a mistletoe leaf. I was glad to be here. To be away from my old life. To have started fresh. I could put up a damn wreath to celebrate that.

The pile of wreaths in front of me filled me with an odd, satisfied joy. Yes, in part doing this, buying this place, had been following an impulse. But in other ways, I knew I wanted this or something like this. To break out of the life as it had grown around me. I wanted to make my own, and this felt like Aunt Hedwig had set me up for it from the start.

“Maybe I am having a midlife crisis,” I said, shook my head, and grabbed the wreaths to take them out to my show room.

There were plenty of hooks above the front windows, and standing on my ladder, I adjusted them for a festive display. Outside, it was still snowing or snowing again. All that fucking snow. I could imagine being stuck here all winter, and I wasn’t sure whether that would be a horror story or a romantic one.

When I hung my final wreath, something truly uplifting approached through the drifts. I saw the pink pom pom early from my vantage point. I was still wrangling the wreaths when Amory came into my shop.

“Good morning,” he said, bright smile stretching on his face.

“Hi. How’s the hand?”

He lifted the appendage in question. “Ah. It hurts, but Dr. Ben gave me some Ibuprofen when he changed my bandages this morning.”

“Did he? How nice of him.” I scrambled down and put the wreaths on the display table.

Amory looked up at the ones I’d hung. “These’re nice. For this Sunday?”

“Yeah. The sheriff mentioned it.”

Amory nodded. “Right. Did Dwayne check in on you again?”

“No. I wanted to make a fire this morning, found a kitten outside. I wanted to just drop her off at the vet, but it turned into this whole elaborate production.”

Amory’s eyes widened. “You got a baby kitten?”

“No. I found a baby kitten and am holding on to her for the time being until the vet finds someone who can take her off my hands.”

“Aww! And of course the one day I don’t stop by the café, this happens. Where is she? What’s her name? Can I see her?”

I smiled. “Since you’re asking and not breaking and entering this time. She’s called Cherry, which is short for Cherry Pie because everyone loves that, and I put her in a moving box upstairs.”

Amory looked shocked. “You put her in a box? You put a baby kitten in a box? Like Schrodinger’s cat?”

He was already halfway to the stairs, so I followed. “No. Schrodinger’s cat is a thought experiment to explain one aspect of the nature of quanta. It isn’t and never was an actual cat.”

Amory snorted as I followed him upstairs. “And you are lecturing me?”

“Yes, because you’re accusing me of saving a cat only to then put her in a box with poison. I would never.”

He walked into the apartment, looking around. I pointed at the box, and as if on cue, Cherry meowed. Amory cooed in response and tiptoed over to the box by the radiator under the windows overlooking the yard behind the building.

Inside, a black ball of fur was moving around and staring up at us with eyes still mostly blue but with hues of marigold showing through. She meowed again.

“Is she hungry? Do we need to feed her? Oh my god, she is so cute.”

Amory reached out to touch the cat with his bandaged hand, and I caught it by the wrist.

“Careful. I don’t know that she has no diseases, though Duncan said he didn’t think so. I don’t want your cut to get infected.”

Amory smiled at me fondly. “For your information, Ben just gave me a tetanus booster, and doing what I do, I’m pretty caught up on all my vaccinations. And, uh, PrEP. I’m also on that. You sometimes accidentally hit yourself in the finger and, well, I figured I might as well, you know.”

It was difficult not to at least leer a little at him. He still had his jacket on, and all I could think about was getting that off him for some reason. Had to be neediness of the carnal type. Or rabies, courtesy of Cherry.

“Are you giving me the green light to ask you if you’re down to fuck, Amory?”

He turned crimson, the shade clashing with his damn pom pom. “No, I didn’t say that.” He pointed. “Plus, the baby is hungry.”

“The vet fed her. She’s not due for another feeding yet.”

“You sure?”

His warm breath tickled my cheek. I drifted closer, he didn’t pull back. I wanted to move a lot closer still but didn’t want to risk scaring him off entirely.

“I’m very sure.”

“Then she wants to cuddle.”

Cherry meowed again, and Amory reached for her once more, breaking my gentle hold with ease. I let him take the little furball out of her temporary home and onto his lap.

“She pees on you, I’m not taking the blame.” Vet Duncan had been really delighted about her ability to do that, not something I thought Amory would agree with.

The kitten wiggled before she realized she was getting petted, which had her settle down and soak up the attention.

“Oh, she won’t do that. She’s so cute.”

I huffed, shook my head. “You’re cute, neighbor. I never got around to making breakfast,” I said, deciding to ignore the fact I’d had bagels earlier. “I haven’t been shopping yet, so nothing stellar, but I have somewhat stale bread. Want to stay for some French toast?”

“You really meant that about the cooking?” Amory asked shyly.

“Mmm-hmm.”

“I could eat. But I really only have an hour, tops. I need to reschedule the appointment I had for today, move some of the bookings for piercings up.”

I stopped on my way to the kitchen. “Shit. Your hand.”

Amory shrugged, moving from the floor to the couch. “No biggie. In fact, with this weather, people won’t be all that mad they don’t have to make the drive. I mean, Silken Chains is open, of course, but the people from there don’t mind if I rebook them either.”

I started moving items from boxes to the kitchen, finding the things I’d need. My cast iron skillet, the bread, some fancy jam I’d put on top in lieu of berries.

“What’s Silk and Chains?”

Amory huffed out an amused little noise. “No, Silken Chains . Like, chains made out of silk. It’s the mayor’s club.”

“The mayor also owns a nightclub? I guess power floats to the top everywhere.”

Amory chuckled. “It’s a sex club actually. Elias keeps inviting me. He says I can just come to hang out at the bar with him, grab a drink.”

I tried to remember if someone had mentioned Elias before, and if so, who he was. Maybe someone from the hiking store? I needed to start taking notes of all the people in this weird little town.

And I needed to absolutely keep my eyes on Amory. Between getting Doctor Ben to jam a needle in his behind for a tetanus booster and getting invited out to drinks at a sex club, I wasn’t so sure he really was as much of a wallflower as I’d been taking him for. Assuming I wasn’t worried over some straight guys simply wanting to hang out, Amory had admirers.

Didn’t I just want to fuck him, no strings, only yesterday? a small voice in my head asked.

I frowned as I whisked my batter together.

Maybe. But things changed.

My inner voice liked both sarcasm and cruelty. Right, because rushing into a new relationship after ending an old one spells such a glorious outcome.

“You make that look simple,” Amory said from the door. He leaned against the frame, watching me, Cherry trying to eat his index finger.

“It’s simple. Whipped cream would make it fancy, but I ran out.”

“Right. I can’t cook like that. I can make instant noodles in a chili peanut sauce though. That’s my go-to.”

I chuckled. “Instant noodles, huh.”

“I also have an emergency stash of instant coffee at my shop.”

“You joke.”

“Nope.” He popped the P and grinned at me.

“Such a renegade. What are you piercing today?”

“I’m not sure I should tell you that. Client confidentiality, you know. Are you pro or con piercings?”

I stopped whisking and stared real hard at him. “Why are you asking?”

He blushed, the reaction an answer all itself. “No reason. Just. Some people are really prejudiced. I’m not implying that you are. My mom sort of was. Is, I guess. She kept telling me I’d never find a nice woman looking like a criminal, and that she’d really been trying to find one from church to set me up with. At least that’s what she said when I came back and she saw me with my shirt off after I took a shower. I got most of my ink in Korea. Before that, she would just warn me about the yakuza.”

“But you went to Korea.”

He shrugged. “I’m aware.”

“And if you don’t mind the follow-up, are you not out or bi?”

“Neither. My mother isn’t one hundred percent convinced it isn’t a phase or a lifestyle choice. I never brought anyone home.”

“I’m sorry,” I told him, which he accepted with a shrug. I had several more follow-ups, but I didn’t want to be too nosy. And ideally, we’d talk more very soon.

I fiddled with the gas burners, then began dipping the first slice into the batter. When I lowered it into the pan, the smell of warmed cinnamon and caramel filled my nose and made my mouth water.

Amory had come closer. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

He bobbed his head. “Do you have a family other than your aunt? Do they know you like guys? Oh, do you have a tattoo?”

“Let’s see. My aunt passed, but she knew. I came out pretty early, and she just sat me down and told me she had prepared this whole talk about being responsible when I got together with a girl and about how to locate the clitoris.”

Amory’s jaw dropped. “You’re kidding.”

“No, not even a little. Aunt Hedwig was all for equal opportunities, in life and in orgasm. Anyway, she told me she’d prepared all that, even had this diagram of the female anatomy ready which she’d titled—and I kid you not—‘Oh! Marks the spot.’ She complained it was all useless, and she’d have to start fresh in her research now. The next year, she took me to my first Pride Parade.”

Amory’s eyebrows had climbed up his forehead. “Wow. I think I would have liked to meet her.”

I bit my bottom lip. A few months before Hedwig had died, I’d come to visit her. She’d known in that way people near the end do. Once the strong person who had raised me, she looked so small in her bed then. And yet her eyes had been just as clear, as full of heart and humor.

You haven’t found your man yet, and I might not be here when you do, she’d told me, and she had shushed my protests. When you find him—and you will—you tell him this from me: you tell him I’ll watch over him too from wherever I get to go next. You tell him he is family to me. Which means, he fucks up, I get to haunt him like I would my own, and I will. Then you give him a kiss from me and hold him tight.

My eyes misted with the memory, but I pushed it down, pushed it away. I said, “Hedwig was one of a kind. My mother had no interest in raising me, so Hedwig did it. As far as I know, my mom is still around. I never knew my father. I don’t have a tattoo and am not currently in the market for one.”

“That’s…a lot,” Amory said. He didn’t sound like he was pitying me, and he didn’t awkwardly force the conversation to continue.

Instead I could see the gears turning in his head, possibly looking at me in a new light. I wanted to say it didn’t bother me at all, knowing I was unwanted, but it did. Children at school had teased me about it, and the fact that I was so visibly of color yet had no connection to my non-white heritage, whatever that was, hadn’t helped. Despite every good thing Hedwig had done for me, being abandoned would always haunt me, same as every occasional visit from my mother where she would tell me whatever she thought wasn’t right with me.

But Amory didn’t say anything else. He just stood there, holding the kitten, who was slowly falling asleep again and watching me flip the French toast.

I went to get plates from one of the moving boxes and arranged the first slice when Amory started shifting from one foot to the other excitedly. “I know! I’m taking you to the carolers on Christmas Eve, and then after to the potluck at the café. That way you don’t have to be alone on Christmas Eve.”

I turned to look at him, lifting an eyebrow. “Wow. You’re really rolling out the welcome mat. I might still be a serial murderer who is looking to lock you up in my basement.”

“Your daddy is strange, little Cherry,” Amory said to the kitten.

“I’m not keeping her.”

“Shh. You’ll scare her.”

I sighed. “All right. I’ll bite. You want to drag me before the carolers. That sounds very doom and gloom. And what’s potluck at the café?”

I flipped the second piece of French toast. Amory paced up and down my kitchen excitedly. Maybe he didn’t get to do as much walking as he needed at the tattoo parlor.

“Why would you think the carolers are doom and gloom? And I’m not taking you before them. I’m taking you to see and listen to them. They’re really good. The potluck is basically a cookout in the Village Green on Christmas Eve, only it’s then moved to the Moonlight Café so everyone can get out of the cold. It’s become sort of a tradition for people to bring stuff except for those who go home and do their own thing.” He made a face. “Or go to church. The mayor provides the booze each year.”

“Nice re-election campaign.”

“You are a very cynical man, Soyer Bennet. Will you come to see the carolers with me all the same?”

He looked actually shy. Well, not really shy, just inexperienced. Innocent. My cock firmed up. It was something about those eyes with their golden circlet and those rosy lips and…

Yeah, I was lost here. Lost to lust and desire. Except of course I really wouldn’t be the kind of douchebag who’d pressure someone on the ace spectrum into fucking.

And so I told him, “It would be my pleasure, Amory.”