38. Chapter 38
Chapter 38
Delilah
“ Y ou did not ,” I gasp, unsuccessfully hiding my delight.
“I swear on my reconstructed tooth,” Marcus says, tapping his cheek. “He would get positively grouchy when I misnamed one of his babies.”
“I never referred to the fish as babies, not once,” Cedric says, throwing daggers out of his eyes at his brother.
“You didn’t have to! You guarded those things as if they were made of solid gold.”
“He’s exaggerating, as per usual,” Cedric says to me.
It’s hard not to smile as this young man who looks nothing and everything like Cedric shares stories about their childhood; even harder, still, when Cedric pretends to be more annoyed than I suspect he really is, his thumb stroking my knee beneath the table.
“So, where are you staying, Marcus?”
A look passes between him and Cedric before he replies, “I’m sure they can spare a room for me at the hotel. Ced mentioned it’s not exactly overpopulated.”
“It’s not,” Cedric confirms somberly. One look at him, and I can tell his mind is both here and elsewhere. “Marcus is tired. Aren’t you, brother?”
Marcus makes a face that would contradict that, but another look from Cedric, and he raises his hands in surrender. “Sure. Knackered,” he says as he gets up, straightening his beige corduroy pants in a gesture that reminds me a lot of Cedric, though I doubt he’d ever wear the fabric himself. There is something so stylish and sophisticated about Marcus, yet the very way he moves speaks of someone who is easy-going and has a smile permanently etched on his face. For some reason, he’s not what I expected when Cedric talked about him; but it’s clear as day how much affection they hold for each other.
“It was a pleasure meeting the girl who has thawed Cedric’s cold, cold heart,” he says, taking my hand and mimicking a kiss to its back.
Cedric clears his throat, gently prying Marcus away from me. “You go straight to the hotel, alright? No funny business.”
He says it lightly, but something tells me he’s truly worried Marcus might incur into some kind of trouble on the ten-minute walk to the hotel .
“Shouldn’t we accompany him? I mean, he just got here and–”
“That’s a splendid–”
“He’ll manage,” Cedric interrupts both of us, shooting a pointed look at his sibling.
“Well, let me walk you to the door, at least,” I say. Marcus bows lightly, throwing Cedric a wink.
Marcus and I walk to the door, and when I open it and gesture for him to follow me outside, he gives me a curious look.
“I know it’s probably not my place, but–did something happen?”
“You might have to define something,” Marcus says, hands in his pockets.
“I mean, is Cedric in… danger? Did you come to warn him or–”
“Nothing of the sort,” he interrupts with a casual smile. “Don’t worry. Cedric will be fine.”
I look at him for a beat longer, unsure whether he’s being evasive on purpose, but I don’t question it again. Maybe he really did simply miss his brother, and Cedric might have mentioned he’s been enjoying his time here. There doesn’t have to be some obscure reason for Marcus’s visit. I smile back, nodding.
“Alright, then, I guess I’ll see you around.”
“Unless my brother hoards you like a dragon with its eggs,” Marcus smirks.
I blush lightly as I wave Marcus goodbye, watching him walk away as he whistles to himself, his laced-up shoes kicking up the occasional tiny rock. Belatedly, I remember I could have invited him over for my birthday, and make a mental note to tell Cedric to ask him .
I get back inside to find Cedric curled on the sink, his broad back to me as he scrubs vigorously.
I place one hand on his back, leaning in to get a look at him.
“Are you okay?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” he asks, eyes trained on the rim of a glass that looks cleaner than humanly possible.
“You’re going to consume that,” I chuckle, gently taking it from his hands. He sighs, setting the soapy sponge down.
“I wasn’t expecting to see him,” he admits after a few more beats of silence.
“You say it like your brother being here is a bad thing.”
“It’s not bad, just–like I said. Unexpected.” He smiles feebly, though it looks more like a grimace. “I have a few work calls to make.”
“I’ll walk Blaine in the meantime, then,” I say as I lean against the counter, Blaine’s excited whimper catching my attention. “Do you want to go out, boy?”
He barks and breaks into a hoppy run toward his leash.
“How about I do that?” Cedric asks.
“What about the calls?”
“I’ll make them while I walk,” he says, one hand enveloping my forearm, his fingers brushing the skin soothingly. I want to tell him that it’s not me who needs to be comforted right now, but I soak the small gesture of affection in without a word.
“The fresh air will do me good,” he adds.
“If you’re sure,” I say, getting Blaine ready to go out. His tongue is lolling out of his mouth as he taps his paws excitedly against the floor. “Oh, make sure to hold tight if you happen to stumble upon a frog.”
“A frog? ”
“Yeah, those little devils love jumping around here, and Blaine loves chasing them in turn,” I say with a shake of the head.
“Noted,” he says, taking hold of Blaine’s mint green leash. “Let’s go, boy.”
Blaine looks up at me questioningly, but when I tell him he’s alright to follow Cedric, he doesn’t hesitate, rushing outside so that Cedric nearly trips on the doormat.
“Bloody hell,” he mutters, and the warmth that fills me as I watch my puppy and this man together could power a thousand suns.
Cedric
“If I were more like my father, I’d probably find a way to murder you and make it look like an accident,” I tell Myers as I grip my phone with one hand and Blaine’s leash with the other.
“How is it my fault your brother is a conniving–”
“ Precisely because of that,” I interrupt. “Not only did you sleep with him–”
“How do you–”
“But you also thought, ‘ How about I let him meet with some unvetted supplier Cedric knows nothing about! Better yet, how about I do not pay any attention to him at all!’ Allowing him to get on a bloody plane–”
“He enthralled me!”
“Do you know what would happen if Joe found out we’re both here? ”
“He won’t. I’ll come up with something, but what’s important is that you need to get out of there as soon as possible,” he hisses.
I exhale through my nose, willing this swirling rage not to get the best of me. This is not how it was supposed to go. None of it.
“There are still things I need to work on,” I tell him.
Like explaining everything to Delilah. Telling her if it were up to me, I’d throw everything to sham and stay with her forever.
“Well, better get to it quickly, boss! For both our sakes.”
“Do not call me–” But he’s already closed the call.
As I pocket my phone with a grunt, something green and slimy flashes in my vision. Before I can call out something that even remotely resembles a command to Blaine, he starts running like a demon, nearly dislocating my arm socket in the process.
“It’s gone, there’s no point,” I tell him when we stop.
Blaine looks up at me dubiously–I swear if he could talk he’d say, ‘ Let me be the judge of that’. With a sigh, I let him take me in the amphibious’s direction. Blaine sniffs loudly on the pressed earth path, following the little bugger’s trajectory, until his snout reaches the edge of a seemingly endless grass patch that edges the forest. I suppose I hadn’t been paying much attention to where we were going.
“There are probably hundreds of ticks in there,” I tell the dog, who is eyeing the grass intently, ears perked.
He then yaps excitedly, puffy tail starting to wag.
“What are you so happy about?” He doesn’t look up at me, only pulls for me to take him into the grass. “If you had the faintest idea of how dense your fur is, you’d realize you’d do better and lis– ”
The sound I hear next can be described as nothing but a growl. I lower myself to look at Blaine, but he turns to me, panting excitedly, and I know it couldn’t have come from him. I get up and squint, trying to place the origin of the rumble, but the trees beyond the expanse of tall grass are thick, anything beyond the occasional fluttering bird wings and the sky above indiscernible.
“We should go,” I say to Blaine, pulling lightly on the leash, though he isn’t budging. “Are you going to make me carry you?” I ask, my patience thinning as something worrisome churns in my gut. “Blaine, let’s get back to–”
Another growl comes, this time unmistakably closer. I freeze, willing Blaine to do the same, but he doesn’t seem scared in the slightest. I hold my breath as my eyes dart around us, and a second later, the grass shifts with movement.
I look down slowly, and my gaze lands on a pair of huge, ocher eyes.