Chapter 37
CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN
Mercer
I couldn’t sleep. The club would still be open for a few more hours, which meant I should be awake. Keeping an eye on things. Keeping everyone safe.
Instead, I sat. On my couch. In the dim glow of a lamp that didn’t used to exist in this house, surrounded by furniture and blankets and pieces of a life I’d barely envisioned.
I stared at it all and thought about doors that had opened and then slammed shut.
About kind people who’d stepped into my world only to be replaced by cruel strangers.
Luxe, for example.
Luxe wasn’t a person at all, but a persona. A hard, glittering mask that hid my pretty girl’s real face. And it punched straight through me to realize I would’ve taken the facade over what I’d gotten instead. Because at least the mask had looked at me. Spoken to me. Let me close.
Then he’d rejected me. I’d been turned away. Refused. Replaced.
Darby was his own guard now, same as he’d been his whole life before he met me. He hid his tender heart behind the stone wall of Luxe, and I was now on the wrong side of it.
The dismissal reminded me too much of my exit from the service. One minute I had purpose, direction, and a role that made sense. The next minute, I was dismissed, and the world moved on without me.
Just like Darby had tonight.
The television had been on, then off, then on again.
Now it was dark. The blur of my reflection stared back from the black screen: a lonely man on his sofa, wearing a tank top and gym shorts, rubbing the stump of his leg and wondering when his life was going to start.
Or worrying it had ended in the desert, that I’d left my future there along with my other missing piece.
My phone hummed in my pocket, startling me. I fished it out.
I didn’t hope for Darby this time, but the name on the notification was still a surprise.
It was a text from Rachel.
I can bring Molly by your house next week. Are you available?
For a second, I locked up, doing nothing but blinking and breathing as I stared at the screen. When the shock wore off, I huffed out something like a laugh.
Available?
I was painfully, devastatingly available. I had nothing but availability these days.
But for the moment, I was grateful for that.
My hands shook as I typed back.
Yes. Any day. I’ll be here.
I supplied my address then set the phone on the coffee table. As I leaned back, nerves crackled through me like static.
Maybe I should check her room again.
Make sure it was clean.
Make sure the nightlight worked.
Make sure…
I pushed up from the couch, already halfway down the hall in my mind, when a knock at the front door stopped me cold.
Not a polite tap either.
A resounding, deliberate knock.
The kind that meant whoever was on the other side didn’t just hope I was home—they knew I was.
I wasn’t in the habit of taking house calls.
Not before Darby, anyway. And considering my recent visit from Antonella Rossetti and her heavenly goons, I had more than enough cause for alarm.
The angels had proven they didn’t need my permission to enter, but I didn’t know what else to think, so before I went to the door, I went for my pistol.
The Glock was stored in a small table in the hall, tucked inside the same worn case I’d used overseas. I hurried to retrieve it, palming the grip and sliding one finger over the trigger.
The knock sounded again, louder than before.
“I’m coming,” I muttered, checking the magazine before thumbing the safety off.
With the gun held low at my side, I returned to the entryway. My free hand grazed the deadbolt when I paused, remembered the peephole, and leaned in to look.
Squinting through the little glass circle, I expected to see a halo or a wing or something equally ominous.
Instead, I saw a crowd.
Six people crushed shoulder to shoulder on my tiny porch, their eyes trained on my door and glowing in an array of colors. For a second, my brain refused to make sense of it. Then I blinked, pressed my eye to the peephole, and blinked again.
I recognized every single one of them, including their petite leader who stood front and center in Missus White’s maid uniform. He had one hand planted on his hip, and his tail swished with agitation that had the others ducking and dodging its barbed tip.
My stomach dropped into my feet.
“I’m here!” I called through the door, my voice a yelp like I’d been caught doing something I shouldn’t. “One sec!”
I spun, hurried back to the hall table, and stashed the pistol in the drawer and out of sight. Safety on. Dashing back to the entry, I yanked the deadbolt, twisted the lock, and flung the door open.
I stood, stock still and barefoot, heart somewhere in my throat, facing Darby.
And he faced me right back, holding his ground on my new welcome mat with the five other dancers crammed around him. The porch light warmed his bronze skin and made his hair and ruffled apron seem luminescent.
He didn’t enter, didn’t speak.
He just looked at me with white lashes fanning around his vivid orange eyes and his glossed lips puckered in the slightest pout.
In the pause, I wondered who I was seeing—Luxe, with all the armor and attitude, or Darby, the man who’d shut me out tonight. Both felt possible. Both hurt.
Before I even answered that question, I came up with more. Namely, why was he, or any of the dolls, at my house? Why would he come to me after what I’d done? After what he’d said?
His gaze cut toward the interior I currently blocked, and his brows knit together before he announced, “We need somewhere to sleep.”
Despite my mounting confusion, I practically leaped aside to clear the path.
Darby surged forward and dragged the rest in after him. They moved more slowly than I’d ever seen, stumbling toward the nearest pieces of furniture and toppling onto them in heaps. Darby remained on his feet, overseeing, while I pushed the door to a gentle close.
After everyone else was settled, he started bustling about, collecting throw blankets and pillows and passing them out.
Not a word was spoken as he retrieved the TV remote and flipped through the channel guide until deciding on something. Then he handed the control to Oz, who had posted up in the corner of the couch with Zephyr draped over him.
The twins packed in alongside them, making for a tight squeeze on the three-seater sofa, while Elliot claimed the armchair, sprawling across it sideways with a blanket covering his head.
When Darby finally turned and headed into the kitchen, I followed.
He kicked off his heels and grabbed a stepstool I didn’t recall buying, then climbed up to start rummaging through my cabinets.
His voice was almost lost in the wood and shelves as he muttered, “We also need something to eat.”
I was no more prepared for this than I had been for impromptu s’mores, so the things he scavenged made for an odd menagerie. And that was before we even addressed the sheer volume of food needed to feed six hungry demons.
Cereal and milk were set out alongside a bag of potato chips and the last of the lunchmeat and bread. He kept going, emptying the pantry, fridge, and a portion of the freezer too. I wasn’t sure how he intended to carry all of it until he grabbed the first handful of items and shoved them at me.
I extended my arms automatically and let him stack the food in a teetering tower. He might have meant for me to carry it all into the living room, but I waited while he pivoted to the silverware drawer and started parceling out forks and spoons.
“Uh.” I cleared my throat and peered over the pile in my arms. “Did something happen?”
Grabbing a stack of plates, he dumped the flatware onto it with a clatter. “It was the angels. In the walk-in. With a trash-bagged cadaver.”
My eyes bulged. “Do what?”
Darby let out a long, weary breath and finally met my eyes. “I swore the dolls off the Clue jokes,” he said. “But someone had to say it.”
“A cadaver?” I repeated.
This must have been how Frank and Earl felt trying to understand my life lately—two steps behind and losing ground fast.
Darby and I stared at each other, once more at odds, but his frosty exterior from the VIP suite had thawed. Now he didn’t look angry or resentful, just sad.
“You didn’t know about it?” he asked, hesitant, like he was bracing for me to lie.
I shook my head. “Antonella said property damage, and she implied…” I hitched up the groceries before the bag of chips could slide free. “That Mister Beckett was good for it. Not to mention insurance, and… you.”
Darby crossed his arms, still guarded, still tense. “What about me?”
“I wanted to protect you, Darby, but I had to choose.” He’d been right about that much. “So, I chose to get you and the dolls out of the building. And I knew you might not forgive me for it.”
He dropped his gaze, dragging one stockinged foot over the other while his tail swished against his calves. “You were right to take care of Molly,” he said at length. “She needs you.” Then he looked up again. “But why didn’t you tell me? Or any of us?”
I wanted to reach for him, but I was too encumbered with the food that was bleeding cold against my chest and soaking my shirt with condensation. “Was there anything you could’ve done if I had?”
Darby seemed to consider while the living room TV filled the silence between us, then he shrugged.
Turning toward the dishes and silverware stacked on the counter, he straightened and restraightened them, giving me cause to wonder if they were even needed, considering most of what he’d scavenged were finger foods.
They were a distraction, though, until he worked his way around to muttering, “I don’t like being lied to, Mercer.”
My answering nod made my armload of foodstuffs sway.
“Especially not by you.”
Still nodding. Still trying not to drop anything.
Darby nudged the stack of forks one more millimeter to the left. “And I don’t like being mad at you,” he said. “So I think I’m done with that, if that’s okay.”
A wave of relief rolled through me, and my head bobbed vigorously. “Yeah. It’s okay.”
Only then did he glance up. His eyes went wide in an earnest, almost hopeful way, and his body relaxed like he’d finally let go of a breath he’d been holding. I had no doubt who was facing me now. This was all Darby.
“Can we talk some more?” he asked, tail curling in the space behind his legs. “Somewhere private? After we get everyone settled.”
My mouth twitched in a smile. Always thinking about his boys.
“Sure,” I replied.
We worked in quiet tandem after that. Shockingly quiet considering the chaos the Dollhouse dancers usually manufactured. The house was almost serene as Darby and I carried the food and dishes into the living area.
The television murmured something indistinct while flashing light and bright colors across the cozy scene.
On the couch, Zephyr’s ruby-red hair sprayed out of its half-pony, tickling Oz’s cheek, but the bigger man didn’t bother to brush it away.
The twins were folded together beside them.
Colt’s hat tipped low over his face while his arms locked around Callum.
None of them stirred while Darby and I arranged everything on the coffee table.
Elliot sagged in the armchair, fully shrouded by his blanket, and judging by the steady rise and fall of his chest, asleep.
Darby fixed a plate and set it on the floor beside him, then stepped back and surveyed the room.
The TV droned on. Someone snored softly. No one ate.
I watched Darby watch them, and before I could overthink it, I grabbed his hand.
He startled, just a tiny jerk, before his fingers curled around mine.
He’d asked for somewhere private, but I couldn’t bring myself to suggest the bedroom. It felt presumptuous. That was the kind of intimacy you earned, not escorted someone into.
Instead, I tugged him toward the door leading to the garage. When we reached it, I opened it and led him through into the warm, dim space.
The latch clicked, and we were alone.