Chapter 30
30
Elliot Crane
How late are you working today?
Seth Mays
Looks like the usual.
Why?
Just wondering if I you were going to miss dinner.
I hope not.
:)
I tried not to take it personally that he’d clearly forgotten my birthday. For one thing, we’d only been actually dating-dating for less than a month, and for another, I’d mentioned my birthday once during a conversation back in Richmond about the fact that Hart’s parents—despite being incredibly nice, generous, and caring people—had named him Valentine at least in part because he’d been born on February fourteenth. I really couldn’t reasonably expect Elliot to remember that mine was St. Nicholas Day.
Which was actually apparently a thing that people celebrated in Wisconsin. I’d been seeing little signs in the stores—hardware, grocery, and some of the shops on Main Street—about putting candy canes or roasted nuts or oranges (or coal) in kids’ shoes. And some of the quirkier places, as well as the public library, of which I was rapidly becoming a fan, since they had both ebooks I could get on my phone and access to a surprising amount of research materials for a tiny public library, had signs about Krampus, a demonic goat-like creature that stole naughty children and accompanied Jolly Old St. Nick on his rounds.
Part of me was secretly getting excited about the holiday season—I loved the idea of Christmas, the lights, decorations, music, cookies, all of it. Probably because I’d had the kind of upbringing where Christmas was very much a religious—and only a religious—occasion, and Noah and I weren’t allowed to even mention Santa.
As soon as we were on our own, Noah and I had taken every opportunity to do all the Christmas things we could—to find the neighborhoods with Christmas lights, splurge at the grocery store on candy canes and hot cocoa, and to watch whatever Christmas specials came on TV. The stuff we could do cheaply.
When we’d gotten older, and had steadier jobs, we’d bought decorations, a small fake tree, and gotten each other gifts that we’d done our best to stretch into piles of presents—like if one of us bought gloves or socks for the other, we’d wrap them separately just to have more presents to put under our tree, like in the movies.
This year, I would be here, since I definitely hadn’t managed to save up enough for a plane ticket back yet, although I was already starting to feel weird about the fact that I’d missed Thanksgiving with Noah and would now miss Christmas, too. Noah’d sent me pictures at Hands and Paws in Richmond, and I’d sent him pictures back from Green Bay, but I’d missed him.
I had the feeling Christmas was going to be worse—not only was I not going to spend it with Noah, but we were going to spend it with the shadow of death threats hanging over our heads. Just the thing to bring holiday cheer. I was glad I had Elliot—but I also wanted my brother. My family, small and sad as it might have been.
I talked to Noah about once a week, and texted him more often, although I was sometimes surprised when I went three or four days without hearing from him or vice versa. But usually one of us sent something to the other. A photo of one of Noah’s new paintings. Cinnamon rolls Elliot had made one morning. A plate of food at a fancy restaurant in DC that Lulu had taken Noah to. The last roasted duck I’d made with potatoes, pearl onions, carrots, parsnip, butternut squash, and apples.
He’d texted me about twenty-two times so far today—only eleven more to go—with different emojis, messages, and photos of the present Lulu had left with his cream cheese bagel and the cupcakes someone had brought to work to celebrate. Quincy had also texted me, a series of emojis and the words HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!! followed by the image of a dancing badger. It was the wrong sub-species—European, not American—but I appreciated the thought.
Ronda had brought cookies to work with little candles on them in frosting, which was about the sweetest thing anybody had ever done for me for my birthday. Obviously Noah and I always celebrated, but that was expected—we were twins. But the fact that Ronda, who had only known me for a handful of months, not only figured out my birthday (probably by looking in my personnel file), but gone out of her way to bring dairy-free cookies for me brought a small lump to my throat. The idea that someone who barely knew me would do that was incredibly sweet.
Elliot hadn’t said a word about it.
Not this morning when he’d sleepily shuffled into the kitchen to kiss me before I left, and not in the message he’d sent me around four-thirty. Or at any point in between those two things.
It was making me surly, despite the fact that I repeatedly told myself that I shouldn’t be mad that he didn’t know what day my birthday was.
It wasn’t just the fact that he didn’t know my birthday. I was mad about several things, but that was one that could have easily been remedied by Elliot remembering what I’d said back in March.
Months before he’d decided to think of me as anything other than a few-night stand.
I sighed.
I needed to stop self-sabotaging. At least in terms of the still-very-new relationship I was otherwise pretty happy in. So he didn’t remember my birthday—so what? We were also dealing with people leaving death threats on his doorstep in the form of skinned animals. His dad had died almost exactly a year ago, murdered in the house he still lived in—the house where he’d grown up.
Part of me thought he was incredibly strong for refusing to give up the home where he’d grown up—a home where he’d had a loving family. Friends. Good memories. I imagined, anyway.
At the same time, I didn’t know if I could have stayed in a house where someone I loved had been killed. Was it even healthy to stay there? Honestly, I didn’t know. Maybe it was actually healthier to acknowledge the death and loss, to live with it, than to pretend it had never happened.
“Happy birthday!”
I almost jumped out of my skin. At least I managed not to shriek, even if I did actually jump.
Roger laughed. “Sorry, man. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
I gave him a sheepish smile. “Sorry. I was kind of in my own head there.”
Roger grinned back. “Well, sorry about that—but happy birthday!”
“Thanks,” I said, feeling a little blush creeping up my neck.
“Don’t have too much fun,” he told me, still smiling. “Still a workday tomorrow.”
I waved him off, then finished up a few last pieces of paperwork that would go into the file that Lacy was taking over. I’d convinced her to at least let me complete the tests and reports on the dog and badger, arguing that I’d started those and should at least be able to finish them.
It felt funny, putting that stack of papers in her little in-box bin, knowing it wasn’t over and that anything new relevant to the case wouldn’t come across my lab table. The only other time I hadn’t finished a case was the one that had landed me in the hospital—and out of a job. I didn’t like the trajectory that suggested for me not finishing cases. And yes, I knew that’s not how things worked, but that superstitious part of me that had made it through all of my scientific training still didn’t like it.
I forced myself to walk away, outside, and get into my car to head back to Elliot’s house. Part of me wanted to go back to my apartment—which I’d been back to over the weekend to do laundry and make sure nothing in the fridge was going horribly off—so that I could wallow in self-pity over Elliot not knowing my birthday in peace. Especially because I probably wasn’t going to get any more gracious about it than I currently was—and that wasn’t much.
But I couldn’t leave Elliot alone, not until this case was resolved. And his text had asked about dinner, which meant that he was at least making food—and that would be better than anything I’d be able to justify getting for myself, birthday or not.
I had the opportunity while driving over to work myself into a good sulk, which I knew meant I was likely to be not just grumpy, but downright rude about the fact that he hadn’t so much as mumbled a happy birthday this morning.
He’d at least left the porch light on for me, so I could see as I made my way from the driveway past the winterized roses and up to the front door. I opened it, and the smell of Thai food hit me almost immediately—spices, coconut, curry, and peanut—and I inhaled deeply. I hadn’t known there even was a Thai restaurant anywhere in Shawano. I’d thought I knew every possible restaurant in this small town.
In spite of my sour mood, I was smiling as I kicked off my shoes and set my satchel in its customary place near the door. I love Thai food, and it had been ages since I’d had any, much less the good stuff, which this smelled like it was. Even if Elliot had forgotten my birthday, he had still gotten me Thai food, and that was probably enough that I was likely to forgive him a lot sooner. Not that I really needed to forgive him, exactly. I knew I wasn’t being completely reasonable, but that didn’t change how I felt.
And then I padded into the kitchen and stopped.
Elliot was there, grinning at me. On the kitchen island were three boxes—each one wrapped in bright paper with bows on them. There was also a vase with a bunch of bright flowers that he definitely didn’t get out of the garden, which was dead and dormant for the winter season.
My surprise must have been evident on my face, because his lopsided grin got wider. “You thought I forgot, didn’t you?”
I nodded mutely.
He walked around the island, putting both hands on my waist, grinning up at me. “I will never forget you,” he told me, the intensity in his voice surprising. His mouth quirked. “You told me it was Saint Nicholas Day,” he said softly. “Back when we first met.”
I nodded, still unable to figure out what to say, especially because now it was even more obvious—to me, anyway—that being at all upset that he’d forgotten was beyond stupid since I didn’t know when his birthday was.
“November fourth,” he said, reaching out to rest one palm on my bearded cheek.
“What?”
“Mine,” he replied. “Because I realized this afternoon that I never did tell you.”
“Oh.” I felt my neck flush. “I missed it,” I said, possibly stupidly, since I knew exactly when he’d showed up on my doorstep with flowers to make me breakfast, twelve days after his birthday. And that had been twenty days ago.
Twenty days really wasn’t very long in relationship terms at all, especially when it felt like we’d been together for months.
“Missing my birthday is not a problem,” Elliot replied. “I deserve it, anyway, for being a self-centered asshole.”
I frowned, and he put a finger on the lips I opened to object.
“Not talking about me,” he said, the crooked smile returning to his lips. “It’s your birthday. I got Thai food, since I seem to remember that’s your favorite.”
I nodded enthusiastically. “Where’s the Thai place in Shawano?” I asked. If it was good, I wanted more.
Elliot barked out a laugh. “Green Bay,” he told me.
I stared at him. “You drove to Green Bay to get me Thai food?”
He shrugged. “You’re worth it,” he told me, and I felt the flush creeping higher. It made him laugh. “You’re adorable when you get flustered, you know that?” That did not help.
“I am not,” I grumbled, but that earned me another laugh, followed by a kiss.
“Dinner or presents first?” he asked me.
“Dinner please,” I answered meekly, both because I was a little embarrassed at the fact that he’d gotten me anything, much less three things, and also because I was hungry and hadn’t had decent (aka, not microwave or boiling-water prepackaged) Thai food since I’d left Richmond.
He grinned again, then led me over to the dining table, where he’d set out the food in serving bowls and on platters, and had put fresh beeswax candles in the center.
“El—”
He kissed my cheek again, then pulled out a chair for me. “Happy birthday, Seth.”
I’d stuffed myself to a ridiculous point on Thai food—Elliot had gotten more than enough for the two of us to have leftovers for a few days, not that I was complaining—before he convinced me to open the presents, one of which was actually from Judy and Marsh Hart. That one was a really nice ceramic casserole dish with a leaf pattern on the outside that Elliot admired with a hint of envy, although I pointed out that he could use it any time he wanted.
“If I come to your apartment,” he commented, leaning on the kitchen island from where he was perched on one of the stools. I was sitting next to him.
I shrugged, keeping my eyes on the dish. I still wasn’t entirely certain that I was ready to officially move in with him, and I didn’t want to restart the argument now.
“Okay, this one,” he said, sliding me one of the other two boxes—the bigger one.
I couldn’t help the smile on my face when I opened it. “So this means you’re going to make me do more yard work?” I asked him, teasing.
He grinned back at me. “Yard, furniture, whatever. They’re steel-toed, steel-shanked, lined, all the good stuff.”
The high-ankle work boots were a warm brown, and I could see the quilting of the inner lining that looked thick and plush, but not like it would overheat my feet. They were nice, and they would keep me from wrecking my new hiking boots by wearing them for yard and construction work.
“Thanks, El,” I said, leaning forward to give him a kiss.
“You’re welcome,” he replied, beaming. Then he grabbed the other, smaller, box and handed it to me. “This one is from both me and Henry.”
I had no idea what they might give me—the only thing that sprang to mind was something to do with foxglove, but I really didn’t think that Elliot would make a joke out of that, or that Henry would either, for that matter. I pulled off the paper, then opened the lid and sucked in a breath.
Inside was a round, royal blue cabochon-style stone, set in silver shaped like a running wolf, its back arched around the curve of the stone, the other side showing the edge of the moon, its surface pitted to mimic the lunar craters.
The stone was set on a length of black leather, and I realized it was a bolo tie.
“El, this is gorgeous ,” I breathed.
“Henry makes them, although the design was me.” He smiled shyly.
“It’s really amazing.” I lifted it gently out of the box, running my thumb over the blue stone.
“It’s sodalite,” he told me.
“It’s beautiful.” I smiled at him, still a little awed. “This might be the nicest thing anybody’s ever given me.” The boots might have been more expensive, technically speaking, depending on how much the silver had cost. Now if you factored in the cost of creative labor—what Henry had actually done to make it and the skill of Elliot’s design—I was sure it cost far more than anybody would have ever paid for it, particularly in a society that devalued art and craftsmanship.
Elliot looked startled. “Seriously?”
I nodded with a shrug. “I’ve never had much,” I said softly. It was something of an understatement. My parents had believed in deprivation and asceticism. We weren’t given things that weren’t absolutely necessary. And then Noah and I had been homeless, shuffled through foster homes until we fell back on the charity of Hands and Paws. And once we’d gotten degrees and jobs, we’d at least been independent, but never rich. I’d personally never had the money for anything more luxurious than a meal at a restaurant or high-end ingredients from a specialty store. One nice suit for weddings or funerals.
Everything else was an essential—maybe nicer than the absolute base model of phone or computer, but nothing that was so cutting edge anyone in the middle class would be envious.
Until now, I’d owned two ties: one had been purchased on sale because I had to wear one to a funeral for a cop killed in the line of duty, and the other, with a bright, multicolored paisley pattern, had been bought for weddings.
I knew Elliot wasn’t rich, but he was comfortable. He owned his house outright—although I knew he would have traded that for his dad’s life in a heartbeat. He owned a business that made him enough money that he could not only pay his bills, but have some extra spending money, as well. Enough to buy me shoes. Good shoes. To feed me. To help me get my feet under me.
I wanted that. I didn’t envy him what he had—I didn’t wish it were mine instead of his—but I wanted for once in my life not to be worried about how I was going to afford the things I needed. Or to not feel obligated to someone else for the fact that I had them. It was the story of every relationship I’d ever had. Including this one, since I already owed him for putting me up for several weeks and for buying me a really nice pair of hiking boots. And now tonight.
“Seth.” Elliot’s voice held a warning tone.
I blinked. “Um. Sorry. What?”
He sighed. “Stop thinking that you have to somehow repay me. It’s your birthday . People get presents on their birthdays.”
“It’s not the presents,” I said, although that was only half true. I wasn’t worried about paying him back for them, but it was what had made me think about everything else I owed him.
“Then what?”
I shrugged. “Everything else.”
He let out a dissatisfied noise. “You don’t owe me anything.”
“You fed me?—”
“You bought some of those groceries and did a lot of the cooking.”
“You housed me?—”
“And you helped me with a lot of projects that I couldn’t have done myself.”
“You bought me hiking boots?—”
“To replace the ones I barfed all over!”
I gave him a look that I hoped conveyed that I wasn’t buying his excuses.
“Seth,” he said seriously. “You don’t owe me anything. Not now, not ever. I want to do things for you because I like you. I’m not doing it for anything.”
“I know, but?—”
“But nothing,” he retorted. “Do you expect me to give you anything for everything you’ve done for me?”
I blinked, startled. “But I haven’t done anything,” I objected.
He raised both eyebrows. “You’re here,” he said simply. “To keep me safe. To help me deal with Dad’s death. You think those aren’t worth anything?”
“I mean, no, of course not.”
“Well, then,” he said matter-of-factly, as though that settled everything. “We’re even.”
I gave in. “Fine.”
He leaned toward me. “So you don’t have to kiss me, if you don’t want to.”
“And if I do want to?”
“Then,” he said, getting even closer. “You definitely should.”
I took him up on his invitation, sliding fingers around the back of his neck to pull him the few remaining inches until I could claim his mouth with mine, run my tongue along the seam of his lips, and feel him melt into me, his mouth spiced like curry.
I pulled him off the stool so that he stood between my knees, the height of the seat putting me taller than I usually was so that he had to tilt his head back to keep kissing me. I held his face at the jaw, my fingers brushing over the scars on his neck, his hands sliding up my forearms. He gripped my arms, then stepped away, pulling me with him.
I let myself be tugged from the stool and out of the kitchen, but I didn’t let him away from the kiss, not that he was trying to escape. But kissing makes for difficult walking, especially backwards, and we were forced apart, laughing, when he stumbled into the wall.
“Come on.” He took my hand and pulled me into the bedroom, where he’d already turned back the covers. There was a bouquet of roses on the nightstand on the far side of the room.
“Jesus, Elliot,” I breathed.
“I’d have set up candles everywhere, but I thought if you were hungry, I might accidentally burn the house down.” His tone was light.
“Burning the house down bad,” I told him, pushing him down to sit on the exposed sheets.
“Yes,” he agreed as I straddled his legs. “But sex good.”
I laughed, unable to help myself as his hands slid up the back of my thighs to knead my ass. “Is it?” I asked, teasing.
“Yes, very good,” he replied, mock seriously. “But clothes, right now, are bad.”
“Are they?”
His hands pushed at the bottom of my sweater. “Bad,” he repeated, and I obligingly tugged it off over my head, following it with the thin turtleneck I’d had on underneath.
Elliot let out a low growl, his hands roaming the skin of my chest and stomach. I grimaced a little as one hand crossed the layer of belly fat I’d put back on since moving out here.
His response to that was to squeeze the extra at my sides. “Your body is perfect,” he told me, his tone now actually serious. “I’m glad you put the weight back on.”
I raised an eyebrow. “This coming from Mr. Two-percent-body-fat.”
“Genetics,” he replied lightly. “I like your body just the way it is.”
I couldn’t help rolling my eyes, knowing my neck was flushing pink. “You have to say that.”
“Nope, I do not,” he disagreed, his fingers making their way back around to my stomach, then down to work open the button on my corduroy pants. “I could just not say anything. But I don’t like that you think you’re not sexy as fuck.”
I snorted—I couldn’t help it.
He flipped me, air rushing out of me in a gasp as my back hit the mattress, Elliot kneeling between my knees, his hands pressing down on my shoulders. “Sexy,” he repeated, grinding his hips into mine to demonstrate just how much certain parts of his anatomy were interested in my body, “as fuck.”
I stopped arguing with him, too breathless and turned on. Even if I didn’t understand why he thought I was sexy, there was no question he was hard, his erection straining behind his jeans. At least until he undid his own fly, shoving both jeans and tight black underwear down to the floor, followed quickly by the dark grey long-sleeve UW t-shirt.
He made equally quick work of my pants and socks, although he left my trunks on, the dark green knit fabric stretched tightly over my rapidly hardening cock. He climbed onto the bed, his shoulders pushing my legs wide, and bent to nuzzle between my legs, drawing a gasp from me as he drew in a long breath.
“Fuck, I love your smell,” he breathed. “I have always loved your smell.” He nuzzled me again. “Tell me I can taste you,” he rasped.
“God, yes,” I panted.
I barely registered that he’d removed my underwear, much less what he did with them, through the haze of want, and lost all capacity to think about it as his mouth closed around the head of my cock. The vibration of his low, rumbling growl did indescribable things to my nerve endings, sending a shudder of pleasure through me.
I got lost in the heat of his mouth, the suction and occasional scrape of his teeth, my head thrown back and hands clenched in the blankets. “El,” I managed.
He hummed around me in response.
“You’d better fuck me or I’m going to come,” I panted.
He pulled away, then kissed and nipped his way up my stomach, pausing to nibble, then suck on one nipple, then up the side of my throat until he seared my mouth with his and I could feel the heat of his arousal pressing against my highly sensitive balls. “Not yet,” he murmured into my mouth. “I want to feel you when you do.”
I moaned. “Then you’d better hurry the fuck up,” I told him, grinding up against his taut belly.
That earned me another growl, but I heard him open the bottle of lube, then felt the rough pressure of fingers—two of them—and gasped.
“Too much?” he asked, his voice tight.
“N-no.” Words were hard. Two fingers stretched me to the edge of discomfort, but not farther than I was willing to go. Not even close.
“Fuck, baby, you’re so tight,” he breathed against my ear, nuzzling against my neck. He pushed me, stretching faster than he usually did, and the urgency in his touch stole my breath and made my heart race. I pushed my hips against his hand, and he moaned. “Tell me you’re ready.”
“God, yes.”
More lube, and he slicked himself, sheathed in latex, his skin flushed and shining with a faint sheen of sweat. He put one of my legs on his broad shoulder, hand running up and down my thigh before he breached me, just the very tip, pressing gently, slowly— agonizingly slowly.
“El—fuck.”
“Too—”
“Too fucking slow,” I complained, trying to rock my hips into him, and he groaned, pressing deeper in.
“Baby, you feel so fucking good ,” he breathed as his hips finally met mine.
I made a noise that I hoped expressed just how incredible he felt inside me.
And then he started to move, slow at first, then harder and faster, one hand on the outside of the leg on his shoulder, the other behind my bent knee. I felt every inch of him, every slide of latex-encased length against muscle, every near-withdrawal and push as deep as he could get, heard every rapid breath, the soft grunting sounds of desire he made in the back of his throat, the slap of sweaty skin, and the hammering of my own pulse.
“El—” I gasped out. I was struggling to hold back the wave that threatened to overwhelm me.
He let out a long, deep moan, driving hard enough to lift my hips off the mattress. I made a strangled noise as I lost control, my orgasm ripping through me so hard I could feel it in my toes. Elliot’s hips slammed into mine once more as the aftershocks rippled through me, and he gave a sharp cry before I felt him shudder with a low, strangled moan.
He panted, his head hanging down for a moment before he turned to press a kiss to my leg, then another. Then he half-rolled off me, landing beside me on his back, chest heaving.
Then he shifted, turning on his side to press a kiss to my upper arm, his fingers lacing with mine. “Okay?” he asked, still breathless.
I grunted, squeezing his hand.
“Yes or no, please.” His voice was soft, a little concerned.
“Fantastic,” I replied, the word a little slurred.
He kissed my shoulder again, then nuzzled the skin. “Thank you.”
I turned my head to look at him. “For?”
“Answering. That. Everything.” He smiled at me, kissed my shoulder again, then untangled our fingers to go and get a washcloth to help me clean up.
Lying with my cheek on Elliot’s chest, his right arm around me, his fingers toying with my hair, I traced over the feathers of the long-legged bird in flight at the top of his bicep. “Will you tell me about them?” I asked. Elliot’s hazel eyes watched the path of my fingers.
“It’s a Sandhill crane,” he said softly. “Because, well, Crane.”
“For your family?” I asked.
“Mmhmm.” He was silent for a moment, still watching me run my fingers over his tattoos. “It’s my mother’s family name,” he said. “Dad took her name when they got married because they wanted to be part of Mom’s nation. Dad was never that active in the Ho Chunk, and being Mamaceqtaw was important to Mom.” He shrugged, the motion shifting the muscles under his painted skin.
My fingers made their way into the branches of a triple-trunked birch tree, not unlike those in his back yard.
“That’s for Mom,” he murmured. “She loved those trees—she used to sit under them, reading or weaving or just sitting. So that one’s for her.” The leaves on the tree were golden in hue, the rest un-inked in color, just black lines on his copper skin. Around it, wound among the roots and spreading up in viney tendrils, were roses—the lavender-and-gold blooms I’d been drawn to the first time I walked up to his house.
“And these?” I asked him, my finger following the curve of a thorned tendril.
“Dad,” came the soft answer. “The Distant Drums were always his favorites.” These were newer than the tree, the lines sharper, the colors more vibrant. I heard Elliot swallow. “I just finished it at the end of July.” Right before I’d driven halfway across the country to follow my heart to his. My fingers chased the roses up to where they bloomed on either side of the crane, then back down to where they knotted into the tree’s roots.
The roots stretched down his arm, twisting and turning as they crossed his elbow, providing a frame for a crescent moon- and-star on the inside of his upper forearm. “And this one?” I asked, touching the purple edge of the star.
“Val.”
“He gets a tattoo?” I felt a little jealous, although that was ridiculous.
“He’s my brother,” Elliot replied, his tone matter-of-fact.
I nodded, accepting this. Hart had been a part of his life since they were kids. I wondered if someday I would get a tattoo on Elliot’s skin. I hoped so. Not that I would ever ask.
“So,” he said, interrupting my thoughts. “Cake?”
I pushed myself up on my elbow. “You got me a cake, too?”
He snorted. “Of course not. I made you one.” He grinned. “Carrot cake with vegan cream cheese frosting.”
“Oh, my God, I love you.” I froze, realizing what had just come out of my mouth.
But instead of freaking out, Elliot just laughed, then pulled me into a kiss. “I love you, too,” he said against my lips. “Just in case that wasn’t obvious.”
I grabbed his face and kissed him more thoroughly this time, until he pushed one hand against my chest. “Seth,” he panted slightly, laughter in his voice.
“What?”
“I didn’t bake this cake so that it could sit on my counter.”
“Okay, okay,” I agreed. “I’ll eat your damn cake.”
“You’d better,” he told me. “The looks I got in the grocery store for buying vegan cream cheese…”