25. Tallus

Diem wouldn’t take his gaze off me. However, there were also times he couldn’t make eye contact, but he refused to leave me alone for more than five minutes. Even when my mother showed up, he hovered, constantly peeking in the room as he paced the hallway. The man might be physically incapable of initiating touch, but he’d somehow wrapped me in a figurative blanket and wouldn’t let go.

When the hospital discharged me at five that evening, he stood close to be sure I was steady as we walked to the Jeep. I was completely fine by that point, but there was no convincing him otherwise. He drove straight to his office. When I aimed for my vehicle, intent on heading home—although unsure how I would drive with compromised vision—he growled in warning.

I cocked a brow—which hurt my face—and Diem took me by the arm and directed me toward the office. No questions asked. No arguing. I wasn’t going anywhere. I didn’t think it was the time to mention that he was getting handsy and demanding again.

We took the elevator—apparently, I couldn’t walk up a few flights of stairs—and he deposited me on the couch in his apartment while he made us dinner. His cupboards were as bare as mine, but he located canned soup and a sleeve of crackers. Like earlier, I felt his gaze on me, watching me eat every bite, seemingly studying my bruises, unless I glanced up, then he looked away.

“I’m fine. Stop worrying.”

He didn’t stop.

I’d never seen Diem so unhinged. He clearly blamed himself for what had happened, and there was no convincing him otherwise.

After dinner, he turned on the TV and flipped through the channels, settling on a police drama I would have ordinarily enjoyed. But my vision was so compromised by my broken glasses it was hard to watch. When I closed my eyes, Diem jolted upright and asked if I was nauseous, or dizzy, or faint, or if I needed to go back to the hospital.

“I’m fine.”

When I set my glasses on the coffee table, he asked if my headache was returning.

“D, relax. I’m okay. Truly. Can you take me home? I’m tired and don’t think I can drive with my glasses shattered. It’s been a long day, and I want to go to bed.”

“No.”

I chuckled and opened my eyes, peering sidelong at where he hovered on the edge of the couch. His oversized frame and facial expression were lost in a blur, but I could imagine the look he was giving me.

“It’s getting late. You’ve babysat me all day. The doctor gave me a clean bill of health. Please take me home.”

He didn’t respond, cracking his knuckles and wringing his hands. It was obvious he had something to say and was chewing on the words, unable to spit them out.

“Talk to me, Diem?”

“Stay.”

“What?”

“Stay… Here.”

I studied him, squinting, trying to erase the blur. He wasn’t looking at me. Did he want me to spend the night? It seemed unfathomable. Not Diem. Did I really want to question his decision after the day I’d had?

No.

“Do you have something I can sleep in?”

He grunted and got up, vanishing behind the partition separating his bedroom area from the main living space. A moment later, he returned with a soft and faded T-shirt.

I pressed it to my nose and inhaled laundry detergent and a hint of Diem.

“It’s clean. I don’t work out in that one.”

“Toothbrush?”

“Under the counter in the bathroom.”

I put my glasses back on and stared at where he hovered. Loomed.

He looked away.

“Are you sure you want me here?”

A grunt.

“Is it because you’re worried I’m not okay?”

No answer.

“Is it because you want to fuck? I’ll be honest. I’m not sure I’m up for that.”

No response, but his neck took on a hint of color.

Chuckling, I heaved myself off the couch. “I love our chats.”

I used the tiny bathroom. It was fitted with a toilet and sink but nothing more. The vanity was made of painted wood, dull and peeling, hinges creaking. I found a toothbrush and paste. While brushing, I stared at my mangled face in the mirror. I looked like hell. My boss might send me home if I showed up at work like this. Clay Davenport was a particular man. But I’d burned through too many sick days as it was and couldn’t afford to miss more. If I lost too many hours, I’d never be able to pay my rent or car insurance. As it stood, I was considering going in the following day to make up time, even though it was Saturday.

I spat foamy toothpaste into the sink and rinsed, then I got closer to the mirror to examine the line of stitches across my forehead. They were ugly. I hoped the doctor was right about his skills. I didn’t want a nasty scar, especially where everyone would notice. I wasn’t strong and powerful like Diem. They suited him. They gave him character—although I wasn’t sure he agreed.

Back in Diem’s living area, I found him planted on the love seat, half-heartedly watching TV.

“Do you want me to sleep on the couch?” I asked, hoping he would say no because it was too small to stretch out.

“No. You can…” He motioned to the bedroom area.

“Okay. I’d stay up, but I’m beat, so I’m going to lie down.”

He grunted, refusing eye contact.

Giving up, I went to find his bed; a double mattress and box spring sitting directly on the floor, no frame. I crawled in and was immediately surrounded by Diem’s scent. Pulling the covers around me, I got cozy and listened to the soft hum of the TV in the other room, wondering if Diem planned to join me later or not.

Something told me not.

And I was right.

It didn’t take long to fall into a deep sleep.

The faint click of a door closing disturbed my slumber at some point in the night. I awoke with a start, disoriented and not placing where I was. At first, I thought I’d picked up a guy at the club and had gone back to his place, but then the previous day came back in a flash. I was at Diem’s. I’d almost died of carbon monoxide poisoning. My heart knocked heavily against my ribs as I sucked in a few clean breaths of air. Had I been dreaming? What had woken me?

The bed beside me was empty and cold. The drone of the TV played on from the other room.

Diem had turned off the lights in the apartment, a courtesy, I was sure. A gentle yellow glow from his snake enclosure danced across the ceiling and helped to highlight the furniture.

“Oh god,” I mumbled into a pillow. “I’m sleeping in the same room as a killer snake.” But I was too tired to truly panic and lay still instead, listening for Diem, wondering if he was sitting out there alone or if he’d fallen asleep.

Ten or fifteen minutes passed. I was nearly back to sleep when the same clicking noise that had woken me sounded from the other room. It hadn’t been a dream. It was the office door. That time, the noise was followed by the quiet tread of someone walking toward the couch. I listened as Diem settled, and then there was no sound but the TV.

I waited, taxing my ears. I’d set my phone beside the bed earlier. Reaching for it, I checked the time. It was three thirty in the morning.

Sitting up, I lowered my bare feet to the cold floor and fumbled for my broken glasses. Diem’s T-shirt hung to midthigh as I wandered around the partition, foggy from sleep.

He was on the couch, elbows planted on his knees, fingers tightly clasped behind his head, which hung limply between his shoulders. He wasn’t watching TV. He looked like he was suffering from whatever was going on inside his head.

I approached, shuffling my feet so I wouldn’t startle him. He didn’t look up, but I sensed he knew I was there. A faint waft of cigarette smoke billowed off his clothes and hung in the air. I didn’t know if it was the cheating husband case, what happened at the university, my exposure to poisonous gas, or the fact I was sleeping in his bed and he didn’t know how to bring himself to join me that had set him off, but he was clearly troubled. Suffering.

The rubber ball I’d given him sat a few feet away on the coffee table. Three empty bottles of water occupied the space beside it. No beer. No empty tumbler. A stress ball and water.

He’d tried.

I sat beside him, close enough to lean my head on the broad side of his shoulder. “Hey, Guns.” My voice croaked with sleep. “Should have let me go home, huh?”

No response.

“Do you want your bed back? I can sleep on the couch.”

“No.”

“Do you want to join me?”

No response.

“It’s okay if you do. I’d like that. I won’t push myself on you. I promise.”

Nothing.

“Are you protecting me against the killer snake in the corner? If so, I appreciate it.”

The noise I’d come to associate with an almost laugh left Diem’s throat, and I chuckled.

I didn’t ask any more questions but leaned against him for another twenty minutes until my eyelids grew heavy before softly kissing his shoulder blade and heading back to bed.

He didn’t join me, and in the morning, I found him passed out on the love seat in a sitting position with his neck craned to the side. I dressed, collected my things, and donned my broken glasses. I couldn’t see properly to drive, which was why I hadn’t taken myself home the previous night, so I arranged an Uber, cringing at the expense.

Even though it was Saturday, I needed to go to work. I’d missed three days that week and feared my attendance might be frowned upon. The records department was closed on the weekends, but it didn’t mean I couldn’t catch up on work. Hopefully, showing initiative would help me look more favorable in my boss’s eyes. I couldn’t afford to be out of a job.

I’d get my car later.

On my way out, I left Diem a note, telling him to call me when he woke up, knowing he probably wouldn’t.

***

I arrived at the headquarters building by nine. Thankfully, it was a quiet morning. Most employees had weekends off, so only a core group of detectives, those working on important cases, graced the premises on Saturdays or Sundays.

It gave me time to think. I hadn’t been in any state of mind the previous day to contemplate what had happened in Natalia’s office. The sheer risk to my life and how I might have died had I not managed to connect a call to Diem was mind-boggling. He could easily have sat in the parking lot for another hour before realizing something was wrong. I’d have been dead by then.

Spending the night in his bed—without him—was a whole other can of worms to process.

I continued the monotonous task of inputting data into the computer system for the first few hours, then I grew bored and read the digital version of the Toronto Star newspaper—I’d paid for a stupid subscription after all—seeking information about the incident at the university. I found a tiny write-up on the third page that indicated the police had a potential suspect in custody. No name was provided, but I knew from Doyle it was Roan Guterson’s father.

What I couldn’t sort out was why the man had attacked Shore’s wife. Did Natalia have more knowledge of his crime than she was letting on? Did she know David had been involved in a hit-and-run in 2010 and was covering for him?

The screen in front of me shifted out of focus while I thought. We suspected Beth, Olivia, and Noah had known about the hit-and-run. We suspected it was the reason why Beth and Noah were now dead. Logic suggested David was responsible for Beth’s death. It made sense. He had been with her the previous evening. Evidence suggested David Shore might have posed a threat to Noah and that terror had eventually led Noah to commit suicide.

If Natalia knew as well, it stood to reason that David might have wanted to eliminate her before she told anyone. But David was locked up yesterday, and besides, wasn’t it too late to take revenge and cover his bases? The police knew he was responsible for Roan’s death. They had enough evidence for a conviction.

“Except the second blood sample found on the rag didn’t match,” I said out loud to no one in particular.

The door to the records office opened, and I clicked away from the newspaper article to a work-related tab before glancing up. I was about to announce the office was closed to whoever was strolling in until I realized it was my cousin and his supposed bestie, Quaid Valor. Both were dressed casually like they’d been out and about and not at their desks.

Costa flinched when he saw my face, then chuckled. “Shit. Az wasn’t kidding.”

Quaid elbowed him in the gut before offering a sympathetic smile. “Morning, Tallus.”

“Hey,” I said with little enthusiasm. The last thing I needed was to deal with my cousin. “What are you two doing here on a Saturday?”

“I could ask you the same thing. We heard you were in the building.”

“From whom?”

“Az,” Quaid said. “He and Torin are working upstairs.”

“Oh. But why are you here?”

“We were in the neighborhood for lunch, and I wanted to be sure you were okay.” Costa scanned me head to toe. “We heard what happened at the university.”

I feigned interest in the computer. “Yeah. I zigged when I should have zagged. Learned a lesson. I’m fine.”

The two approached the counter, Costa openly examining my injuries. They were worse today. Two decent black eyes, a semi-swollen nose, and an ugly line of stitches running the length of my forehead with crusty blood on the edges I couldn’t wash off because it stung too much when I tried. I wouldn’t win any beauty contests, that was for sure.

“Az said you and Krause gave them an interesting pointer on the case. They were up half the night trying to tie it together,” Quaid said. “They’re still at it. Barely convinced them to stop to eat.”

I glanced at the MPU detective. For an older guy, he was attractive, especially when he dressed down. I’d thought so since the day I met him, but he was married to the homicide detective who had questioned Diem and me the previous day, and I wasn’t as fond of Doyle. Probably because he was pestering us about our case.

“I’m glad they found it useful,” I mumbled, unsure what else to say.

“They aren’t including you in their report,” Quaid added. “Or Krause. It’s why they’re trying to find evidence to move the case forward on their own. They don’t want to draw you two into this mess. It could mean trouble with the department, and they know it.”

“They’re trying to protect you, Tal,” Costa added.

And now I felt like an ass for hating on Doyle. “Really?”

Quaid nodded. “So if you two find any more useful information, don’t be afraid to call them.”

“Did he send you down here?”

“No.” Quaid nudged Costa. “This one wanted to be sure you weren’t concussed, and he needed backup.”

“I didn’t need backup.”

I sized up my cousin. His humor over my injuries had sobered, and I saw the concern in his dark eyes. “I’m fine. Truly. No lasting effects from the carbon monoxide. My tango with the desk, however, proved fatal. My glasses have been laid to rest. The funeral is this afternoon. No flowers. Please. I’m strictly taking donations for a new pair.”

Costa smirked. “May they rest in peace.”

“Pieces.”

He laughed. “I’m glad you’re okay. That was kind of freaky.”

“It was. I just hope I don’t lose my job. If my boss sees me like this, I might be in shit. It’s why I came in today. Showing initiative and all that bullshit.”

“Fuck him,” Costa said. “Tell him you got into a fender bender and smacked your face on the steering wheel. He won’t look into it. Trust me. I know Davenport. He’s a lazy ass. He can’t fire you for being involved in an accident.”

I chuckled. “Thanks. Good advice.” It didn’t explain my two days off for a migraine, though.

“And Az and Torin will keep your name out of it,” Quaid added.

“I appreciate it.”

I was waiting for a lecture about my decision to get involved with Diem, but it never came.

The pair didn’t hang out for long, and when they left, I clicked back to the newspaper tab on the computer. Ten minutes into browsing the entertainment section, a thought hit me, and I jolted upright.

“Whoa, hold on…” I shut down the newspaper tab and opened the social media searches I’d done on Beth, Olivia, and Noah the other day, scrolling frantically to find the one picture I remembered seeing.

It took an age to locate, but when I did, I stared at it for a long time, slotting a new idea into the puzzle to see if it worked.

“Holy shit.”

I snagged my phone and called Diem. It was after eleven, but he answered with a groggy grunt. The man was likely still asleep since he’d been up half the night.

“Hey, it’s me. Do you have a contact at the hospital?”

Another grunt—this one of affirmation—was followed by a yawn.

“Good. Call them. I need them to look into something for me.”

Then, I explained my theory.