Chapter 38
38
Elliot Crane
I love you.
Seth Mays
I love you.
You’re like five feet away from me, you know.
I looked up and found him grinning at me. We were surrounded by boxes of Christmas and winter-themed decorations. I was sitting on the couch, trying to stay out of the way as Lulu, Noah, and Elliot festooned the whole house—with Noah and Lulu doing most of the festooning, and Elliot explaining what things were or providing the nails, putty, or other necessary tools with which the festooning was accomplished.
The three of them were having a great time.
Not that I wasn’t—I’m just not that excited about decorating. Especially when we were going to take it all down in a week or two, because Christmas was literally the following day.
I’d dug the last two ducks out of the chest freezer Elliot kept in the garage yesterday with this in mind, and was slow-roasting them with apples, onions, potatoes, and herbs. I’d made Elliot prepare bread dough this morning, as well, so that I could bake rolls to go with the duck. There was also squash cut and seasoned, ready to go into the oven, and roasted brussels sprouts with hazelnuts and dried cranberries.
Dessert would be poached pears with pomegranate seeds and ice cream—regular for everyone else and cashew milk for me.
So I was intermittently prepping dinner while the other three gleefully decorated the house, traditional Christmas music playing through Elliot’s bluetooth speakers. Lulu and Elliot definitely knew all the words to most of them—especially Lulu. Noah and I had some of them—“Jingle Bells,” “White Christmas,” the songs that played over speakers in stores and on TV shows. But the other two knew the traditional carols, too.
They were currently belting out Latin verses of something that sounded familiar, although I wasn’t sure of its title.
“Were you raised Catholic or something?” I asked Elliot when he came near the couch. He hadn’t struck me as being at all religious, and it felt weird to think about an Indigenous family being Catholic—although I suppose there was no reason that that would be any weirder than anyone else being Catholic.
“No, but the Harts are. So Ma always has Christmas music going in the house after Thanksgiving.” He cocked his head to one side, studying me, several ornaments hanging from one hand that were, in theory, going on a pine tree that Noah and Lulu had gone out to purchase this morning while I had been in the kitchen soaking the ducks in water while Elliot made pancakes.
Noah had also brought back a wreath for the front door and a sprig of mistletoe that they’d hung from the little overhead light on the front porch. To say nothing of the lights that they’d begged Elliot to hang and he’d promised to do before lunch.
The song changed from the Latin thing to “Silver Bells,” and Noah joined in the chorus just as the kitchen timer went off, and I pushed myself up to go check on the duck.
My phone went off, and I looked down with a curse, seeing Colfax’s name on the screen.
“It’s Christmas Eve,” I complained by way of answering.
“And some stupid asshole always likes to put actual candles in a tree every year,” came the response. “We’ve got a body, so I need a CSI.”
I sighed. “Merry Christmas to us.”
The other three were all giving me you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me disappointed faces, despite the bouncing notes of “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” playing in the background.
“Look,” I said, holding up my hands. “I get tomorrow off, guaranteed, so that means I have to take this one.”
Noah sighed dramatically. “But we came all the way out here…”
“And I’m the rookie,” I pointed out.
“Will you make it back for dinner?” Elliot asked.
“No idea,” I answered honestly.
“Be careful.”
I kissed him. “I will be.”
Everyone was unbelievably grumpy, although I wasn’t in the least surprised. Nobody wants to work on Christmas Eve, and nobody really wants to work a death scene on Christmas Eve. We were at an old farmhouse that was now in a rural neighborhood in Fairbanks, just south of Tigerton.
Well, an old former-farmhouse. Part of the framing still stood, but most of the rest had been reduced to blackened beams and ashes.
I pulled the van in behind the car I recognized as belonging to McKinley, then got out, wincing as my booted feet hit the ground. I hadn’t bothered to change, so I was still wearing jeans and the ridiculous Christmas sweater Noah had brought and insisted I put on.
“Nice sweater, Mays,” McKinley remarked as I shucked off my parka to pull on a bunny suit.
“You, too,” I told him, noting the fluffy snowman peeking out of the half-unzipped front of his parka.
“My mother won’t take no for an answer,” he replied dryly.
“My brother won’t, either.”
McKinley barked a laugh. “Family, am I right?”
“We love them anyway.”
“We do,” he agreed. “So how about we work this fast and efficient and get the hell back to them before Christmas dinner?”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” I agreed fervently.
Nobody, least of all me, was at all happy when I smelled the gasoline over by where the Christmas tree had been—the charred metal stand still sitting amid the ashes and steam.
“You have got to be shitting me,” was McKinley’s reaction, making me feel almost like I was working back with Hart again, although I had the sneaking suspicion that Hart’s version would have been even more colorful than the banal ‘shitting’ McKinley had used. But I’d almost gotten used to Smith’s extremely clean language, so the mild profanity made me weirdly happy.
Sometimes, we take what very little we can get.
Colfax tromped over, still wearing most of their fire gear, although the jacket was open and they’d left their helmet somewhere else.
“Merry Christmas?” I offered.
“Like hell,” came the big orc’s response. “You’re telling me this is arson?”
I nodded. “Sniff for yourself.”
Colfax drew in a long, deep breath. “Well, fuck.”
I didn’t disagree.
Somehow, I actually made it back to the house before dinner—barely, and smelling of smoke, ash, and death. The victim had been loaded up and sent to the ME’s office, and I’d done my best to get samples that contained gasoline as evidence of arson, under Colfax’s supervision, of course. Borde had naturally not made an appearance at all, and McKinley had released everyone else, swearing under his breath that he’d have Borde fired if it was the last thing he did this year. I wished him luck with that, although I wasn’t sure who we’d end up with if he succeeded.
Back at the house, I showered as quickly as I could, then threw on a dark green sweater and a different pair of jeans, since my Christmas-themed sweater was no longer acceptable to wear to dinner, sweaty and filthy as it now was. I threw it—and my dirty jeans—in the wash and hoped for the best.
While I’d been at work, Elliot, Noah, and Lulu had finished decorating the house, and other than the plywood over the patio door, it could have passed for a Hallmark Christmas movie house, all pine and sparkling lights and beads and glass.
After dinner, Elliot found a bunch of pillows and blankets and piled them up on the floor in front of the couch, then basically made himself a nest, pulling me down to join him and leaving the couch for Noah and Lulu so that we could watch Christmas movies all night.
We hadn’t had dessert yet because we’d all stuffed ourselves on duck and squash and brussels sprouts and bread and a cold bean salad. I was pretty sure we’d get to the pears and ice cream at the end of the first of the Christmas Story movies, which were Noah’s favorites.
I put the them back into the oven to rewarm while everybody else took a bathroom break, so that when the movie finished, the pears were warm, the bourbon caramel sauce steaming, and I served up bowls with ice cream that caused everyone to make satisfied noises.
By halfway through A Christmas Story Christmas , all three of them were asleep, so I paused it and went into the kitchen to make a french toast casserole that I could put in overnight for a tasty breakfast Christmas morning.
Extremely early.
Because Elliot was following through on his promise to drag us down to Madison with the Harts. Noah was genuinely excited. Lulu was nervous.
I was…
I didn’t know what I was.
Nervous, yes, because I was about to spend an entire day with a family that wasn’t mine, and that was stressful. I didn’t know them, didn’t know what they would make of me—although I hadn’t heard any nightmare stories about the fact that Hart was gay and Taavi was a shifter—and didn’t know what to expect.
I felt like it was also a test—of my commitment to Elliot, of how much I loved him, how much I was willing to put up with for him, and of what the people he considered family thought of me. That I had to pass the test in order to be worthy of him.
But I was also happy that he wanted me there.
I mixed egg and almond milk, added cinnamon and a little honey, then set it aside so that I could assemble the rest. I took slices of crusty french bread, cranberries, apples, and pecans and put them in a baking dish—a thick slice of bread, then some apples and cranberries, a few nuts, then another slice of bread, and so on.
I smelled Elliot before I felt his hand on my waist. “What’re you making?” he asked, snuggling up against my spine.
“Breakfast,” I replied. “For when we all drag our asses up at five a.m. to go over to the Harts’.” We had to be there by six-thirty, and Noah insisted that we had to open Christmas presents in the morning. Not tonight, not tomorrow after we got back, but first thing in the morning in our pajamas.
“It’s cute that your brother is this into Christmas,” he said softly. “I didn’t think anybody except Judy Hart was that into Christmas.”
I snorted. “You’re telling me she’s as bad as Noah?”
“More than half the shit currently hanging in this house came from Ma.” He laughed. “My family liked the idea of Christmas, although we weren’t Christian.” He shrugged. “But the idea—gifts, love, light, celebrating the return to longer days—that’s all something my people celebrate, too, with stories and fires and food. Christmas really isn’t all that different.”
“Just with more Jesus. And Santa.”
He laughed. “I always liked Krampus better.”
I couldn’t disagree. “He’s growing on me,” I confessed. “I like the whole kidnap-the-wicked-and-hit-them-with-sticks part.”
“You and Val.” There was affection in that comment, even if he did seem to find it amusing.
I finished with the bread and fruit, then picked up the milk-and-egg mixture and poured it over the top, making sure to coat all the bread and distribute the liquid evenly. “Well, we both like you , so clearly we have issues.”
That got me another laugh. “You definitely do,” he replied, still teasing. “But I’m not going to complain, since that means I can do this.”
This was Elliot sticking his good hand into my jeans.
“Elliot!” I hissed, trying to sound scandalized even though I was laughing and my body was reacting much more positively to the grip he had on me.
“Mmm?” He nuzzled against my back.
“My brother is in the next room and could wake up and come in here any second,” I pointed out.
“Good thing your back is to the doorway, then.”
I stifled the groan that wanted to slip out as he stroked me. “ Elliot ,” I repeated.
His hand stilled. “What?”
“Later.”
He made a grumbling noise, but let go of me and pulled his hand out, settling it on my clothed hip, instead. “Fine.” I felt him kiss my spine through my clothes. “But I will hold you to that.”