The Mercenary and the Mortician (The Silent Hollow #1)

44. Ryan Fairview

T he rest of the service went relatively smoothly despite Cal’s interruption. As guests started to leave, I excused myself and went to hunt him down.

We needed to talk about some things, and the sooner we had this conversation, the better.

Leaving Luthor to deal with clean up, I wandered through the house searching for my mercenary. I found Iris and Naomi in the kitchen making cookies, and I couldn’t help but smile at the wholesome sight.

“Hey, is Cal in here?” I asked, and they shook their heads.

“He was here earlier, but he went out back. He said he needed to talk to that girl out there.”

My heart stopped.

“What girl?” I snapped, and Naomi’s eyebrows rose in surprise at my tone.

“I don’t know. There was this angry teenager moping in the garden. He went to see if she was okay.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I muttered, pinching the bridge of my nose in exasperation before heading out the back to run interference.

Why couldn’t he just stop meddling in shit that wasn’t any of his business?

I stepped out onto the sunny porch and saw Cal sitting on one of the wrought iron benches in the middle of the garden with the angry teenager from earlier. Their backs were to me, so they didn’t immediately notice me as I approached.

I was about to lay into Cal but paused when I heard what he was saying.

“It’s okay to be sad, you know. Even if you did hate him.”

“I’m not sad. Fuck him.”

Cal shrugged, nodding. “I felt that way for a long time after my mom died. She was a huge bitch too. I fucking hated her.”

His callous words made me cringe, but then Anna-Marie turned to face him, and I was surprised to see a small smile on her lips.

“But you don’t feel that way anymore?” she asked, and Cal shrugged again.

“No, I still hate her, so I felt really confused when I started to also feel sad whenever I thought about her.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever be sad that he’s dead,” Anna-Marie said, scuffing her Mary Janes on the ground.

“I think I’m more sad for me , if that makes sense,” Cal said softly. “I think the little version of me deserved a mom who took care of him; instead, I got saddled with the psycho lady who birthed me. It feels shit. But it’s okay, you know, to mourn that. To mourn the father that you never had instead of the one you lost. It doesn’t let him off the hook.”

She was staring at him again, and even from where I was standing, I could tell her eyes were filled with tears.

“He really was a fucking asshole,” she whispered. Cal gave her a sad smile and leaned a little closer to her.

“Good thing he’s fucking dead now. You win.” He winked at her, and she burst out into a fit of giggles.

“Anna-Marie!” I jumped out of my skin as Mrs. Hemmingsworth came around the side of the house. “There you are! I thought I told you to wait in the car.” She hurried forward and grabbed her daughter by the arm, pulling her away from Cal. Cal and Mrs. Hemmingsworth glared at each other, but thankfully, neither of them said a word.

Anna-Marie rolled her eyes but allowed her mother to drag her away.

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever.” She glanced over her shoulder at Cal and waved. “Thanks for hanging out with me, dude. See you around.” She waved at him, and Cal gave her a two-finger salute.

“Anytime, Kiddo,” he muttered, and I felt all the anger I had been harboring toward him melt away.

For a second, it was my father sitting on that bench, saying goodbye to the child he had just quietly comforted.

It was the part of the job that my father had always excelled at. George Fairview loved what he did because he really felt like he was making a difference in people’s lives. He helped people move on from some of their darkest days, and he was always a safe space for those who needed extra grief counseling.

What Cal had just done reminded me of that so much that my entire body erupted in gooseflesh.

Sure, my father definitely would have had that chat without using the f-word, but… maybe that was why Cal had been able to break through that child’s angry exterior. He spoke to her in a language she understood. He had treated her like an equal and made her feel like her feelings were valid.

Instead of shaming her for being angry and speaking ill of the dead, he had given her room to process those feelings and opened the door for her to move onto the next stage of grief when and if she was ever ready.

I was blown the fuck away.

“What’s that look for, ginger snap?” Cal asked, and I jumped again, realizing I had been staring at him.

A warm, tender feeling crept through my chest as I watched him watch me. He was surrounded by flowers, and the bright afternoon sunlight was casting caramel highlights on his dark hair. He really was fucking beautiful, even if he stressed me out more than anyone I had ever fucking met.

“That was… that was really nice. What you just did for that girl,” I said, coming forward to sit next to him on the bench.

He shrugged. “It was nothing. I’ve been there, you know? I’m sure it’s tough when someone you love dies, but when you hate that person, it’s tough too. Just in a different way.”

I nodded, though I couldn’t pretend to understand. The only person in my life that had died was my father, and I loved him more than anything.

“You’re mad at me again,” Cal said suddenly, and I glanced over at him to find him watching me with an oddly vulnerable look on his face.

I sighed. “I’m not. Not anymore, at least.”

“What you said before about me not texting you… I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you expected me to.” He fiddled with the strings on his hoodie. “No one usually expects me to check-in. Even Naomi is used to me being gone for a few days at a time.”

A jolt rocked through me. A few days?

Cal was watching me carefully, and a gentle smile tilted on his lips at my expression.

“You need to tell me what you’re thinking, baby. What’s making that gorgeous face twist up like that?” he asked, his voice soft but lilting with gentle amusement.

I crossed my arms over my chest and stubbornly looked away from him.

“If you’re slinking off into the night to murder people, Callum, I expect to hear from you more frequently than a few days. How am I supposed to know if something bad happened to you?” Without my permission, my eyes darted to the spot on his neck where the blood had been. He must have washed it off because it was gone now, but I couldn’t forget the shot of fear that had ripped through me when I thought he had been injured.

“Worried about me, ginger snap?” He hummed, reaching over to gently turn my face toward him.

The skin on my face ignited beneath his fingers, and my breath caught in my chest. Fuck, every time he touched me, my whole body seemed to light up in response. I wanted so badly to lean into him, but… we were outside in the middle of the day. Anyone could see us.

Maybe just a quick kiss?

My gaze darted nervously around the garden, checking to see if anyone was around. It was just us.

A quick kiss wouldn’t hurt—just to make up for not kissing him goodbye last night…

I was about to lean into him when he suddenly dropped his hand and scooched farther away on the bench.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

I frowned. “Why are you sorry?”

He shrugged, and this time, he was the one that wouldn’t meet my gaze. “I promised I wouldn’t push you to come out, and here I am, fondling you in public.”

He chuckled, but it sounded sad, and it made my heart hurt.

I slid my hand across the bench and wrapped my fingers around his, squeezing them tight.

He glanced at me in surprise, his eyebrows shooting up into his hairline.

“I’ll admit, this is all a lot for me, and I don’t know how ready I am to start screaming from the rooftops that I’m… you know.”

God, I was pathetic… Why couldn’t I say it out loud?

“You know…” I tried again. “ Gay. ”

Cal didn’t interrupt me; he was just staring at me, somehow sitting so still I wondered if he was even breathing.

“But inside earlier, and even just now… That’s not why I’m pushing you away, Callum.”

He frowned. “Then why?”

I sighed. “This is my business. Yes, I live here, but during operating hours, I need to behave with a certain level of decorum. People don’t need to see their mortician engaging in PDA, no matter what gender their partner identifies as. There’s also a certain expectation for how you should be dressed if you’re walking into a service.”

I gestured to his outfit, and he looked down at his sweater as if realizing for the first time that it might be inappropriate.

“If you’re going to come around here while I’m working and insert yourself into services, you need to dress accordingly.”

“What, like… a suit?” he asked, wrinkling his nose as if the idea made his skin crawl.

I nodded. “Yes. Even Theo puts on a suit when she’s helping out, and trust me, I think she’s more allergic to formal wear than you are.”

He tongued his lip ring as if he were mulling what I said over.

“Okay. I can do that,” he said carefully, and I smiled.

“Besides…” I blushed. “I bet you would look really good in a suit.”

Cal’s entire face lit up at that. Threading his fingers through mine, he tugged me closer to him, his eyes darting around the garden to see if we were still alone.

He pressed his lips against my ear, and I shuddered in ecstasy as his hot breath tickled that sensitive spot he always seemed to find so effortlessly.

“Keep saying things like that, ginger snap, and I might have to steal you away.”

My cock twitched in my pants, and I swallowed.

I wanted that.

With him sitting here next to me after I had been so worried about him all day, I suddenly wanted to be alone with him.

I was tired of fighting the urge to kiss him and touch him… I just wanted to sink my fingers into his hair and show him that I wasn’t ashamed of him, no matter how skittish I had been acting.

“I don’t have any more services today…” I said quietly, my entire face flushing with embarrassment at how forward I was being.

Cal pulled back, his eyebrows raising in surprise. My whole body quivered in response to the nefarious smile that curved across his plush mouth.

“Take me somewhere, baby,” he whispered, dropping a soft kiss on my neck right by my jawbone.

Forcing myself to push past all the anxiety and self-consciousness that seemed to always want to eat me alive, I stood up and tugged his hand.

“Let’s go to my room for a bit.” I smiled at him shyly, and he beamed up at me, his brown eyes shining in the sunlight.

“I thought you would never ask.”