Advent Calendar - Day 8 - Fiction from Christine Danse

 

Yes, it's Monday. I know. I KNOW. But I have something for you that might ease the pain a little.

We have a coda--well, not exactly a coda. More like an AU take on When Adrien Met Jake. ☺️ This is from a reader-writer-friend Christine Danse! 

Christmas Shadows

 

Cops before the breakfast rolls were out. Before I’d started the coffeemaker, even. As if Mondays weren’t bad enough.

I let them into the café. Two plainclothes detectives.

“If you’re looking for drip coffee, the machine will take time to warm up. Espresso drinks only right now.”

I threw the words over my shoulder as I walked toward the counter, which I wanted to put between me and them as quickly as possible. A solid surface to brace myself against as they delivered whatever bad news they had for me. It had to be bad news, if it was coming before I’d even turned the brewer on.

“We’re not here for coffee, Mr. English.”

“No? Donuts are down the street.”

An aborted throaty noise. Not a laugh. It came from the taller cop.

It was an asinine thing for me to have said. My mouth had moved on its own. Nerves.

“We’re here about your employee. Robert Hersey.”

My heart, already pounding, gave a sickening thud. I pressed my hand against the cool glass of the countertop and sat on the padded stool behind it. Usually, I didn’t care about the lack of back support. Right now, I could have used it. I could have used any support.

“What about Robert?” I asked.

The shorter, older of the two cops watched me with intent black eyes. Next to him, the big blond detective was taking a long look around the café, gaze raking over the tinsel garland and hand-painted wooden ornaments—tiny books, magnifying glasses, and fedoras—like he’d never seen Christmas decorations before. Or as if he was a Christmas decoration judge who had never been more unimpressed.

“He’s deceased.”

At these words from Detective Chan, the big cop—Riordan—swung his gaze to me. Tawny eyes studied my reaction. I realized I’d been fooled. He hadn’t been writing mental citations over the Santa bootprint decals on the wall. He’d been observing me.

“I…what?”

Riordan said, “He was found stabbed to death last night.”

My heart gave another sickening thump, a reindeer falling onto its side and giving a kick. I reached for the drawer beneath the sales counter, aware of both sets of eyes watching me. I panicked a moment when I couldn’t find what I was looking for, then exhaled as my fingers closed around the cool plastic container of Toprol. I downed one of the tablets, turned to the mini-fridge beneath the espresso machine, and pulled out the first cup that came to hand.

I was expecting my leftover ginger tea, so I grimaced at the bite of peppermint mocha. A wrong order I’d shoved in there yesterday evening. Hell. With my surprise came a burst of dismay. I wasn’t supposed to drink caffeine at the best of times, and it was the last thing I needed now.

A café owner and small-batch coffee roaster who couldn’t drink coffee. That just about summed up my life.

I only took one gulp, enough to swallow the pill. When I was done compounding my heart problems, I pushed the cup to the back of the fridge and nudged the door shut with my foot.

“Are you all right, Mr. English?” Detective Chan asked, but when I looked up, it was Detective Riordan’s whiskey gaze I met.

“What—” My voice was hoarse. I cleared my throat. “What happened?”

They told me. They told me Robert had been stabbed 14 times outside his apartment, and then they asked me a series of questions. When had I last seen him? What kind of employee was he? As a mystery author, I’d dreamed of having the opportunity to witness L.A.’s Finest do their thing—but not like this. This was surreal. Nauseating.

“Mr. English?”

I realized I’d missed a question. “What?”

Chan repeated, “Were you and Mr. Hersey involved?”

“Involved?”

“Were you having sex?” Detective Riordan enunciated.

My face warmed, my mouth went dry. “No.”

A rainbow ornament hung just over the cash register. Riordan reached up to flick it with one big finger, sending it spinning.

“But you are a homosexual.”

I felt a flare of anger. Stared Detective Riordan in the eye. “Yeah. What of it?”

 

I was standing outside when Riordan arrived. Blue and red flashing lights had transformed the nighttime parking lot into a crime scene. Police voices rose and fell, occasionally drowned by the crackle of radios.

A door slammed. A figure that was becoming too familiar strode toward me, briefly silhouetted by blinding headlights.

“What’s going on?” Riordan asked. He stepped out of the direct path of the high beams. His face resolved into something recognizable, but it was still difficult to read him. The light threw his features into hard relief.

“Someone put a dead cat in my walk-in fridge.”

“You want to tell me what happened from the beginning?”

“Not particularly.”

He scoffed. “From the top.”

I tucked my hands under my folded arms. I told him the whole sordid tale, from Angus, the new barista, going into the walk-in for whipped cream and coming out white-faced to the arrival of Riordan’s brother law enforcement and the Public Health Department. Animal Control had come for the party, too.

Riordan asked all the questions that had already been asked, plus a few more.

He interrupted himself to say, “Are you cold or something?”

I was, in fact. There were no Santa Ana winds to warm things up tonight, and the temperature had dropped in the last couple of hours. My chills were also at least partially due to nerves, but I wasn’t about to admit that to Detective Rimmed in Ice.

“I left my jacket inside,” I said. Once the police had taken pictures and removed the remains, I could have gone back inside for it, but I hadn’t been able to bring myself. Not with the image of the dead cat fresh—or, not so fresh, as it were—in my mind.

It was difficult to tell in the harsh half-light, but it seemed like Riordan narrowed his eyes at me. No doubt: yet another way in which the fruity café owner didn’t pass inspection.

“Detective Riordan.”

One of the younger cops pulled him away. While they stood aside, speaking in low tones, I looked at the building’s facade. The painted Christmas scene in the window—an elf in a fedora and scarf—appeared lurid in the light of the police vehicles, red and blue clashing with red and green. It hit me that it was two nights till Christmas Eve. Two nights before Christmas Eve, and I didn’t know if I’d be open again before then. Even if I were, I’d have to buy all new stock. No way I’d be keeping what was in the fridge, even if the DPH didn’t have anything to say about it. Which they would.

I was only vaguely aware of the cop going back inside. Riordan had turned to someone else. I’d been forgotten. Despite all the bright lights and surrounding activity, I was getting colder. But I hadn’t been officially dismissed, and I was loath to go inside, even to my apartment upstairs.

I was still staring at the shopfront, thinking about how I’d handle the orders for Christmas baked goods—it was easier than dwelling on the growing certainty that I was being stalked—when someone said, “Mr. English?”

It was the young cop who’d been talking to Riordan a few minutes before. She held up a black drape of fabric. “Your jacket?”

“I— Yeah. It is. Thanks.”

Her mouth pressed into not quite a smile. I pulled the jacket on. As I did, I happened to turn my head. Across the lot, Riordan looked up, and our gazes caught. Held.

 

 

After the chaos at Bruce’s house, the café was stunningly quiet. I held the door open

for Riordan—Jake—embarrassingly grateful he’d come in with me. We hadn’t said much since his “This won’t be an easy thing.” We were both wrecked. The adrenaline had drained from my system, and the sun had just risen on Boxing Day, chill and wan.

Riordan—Jake—stood in the center of the café, looking around like he’d never seen it before. Never seen any café before. In fact, why had he come in? It’d seemed like the right thing when we were getting out of the Bronco, but now…

He looked like he didn’t know, himself. I was too tired to think, but I knew there was no way he’d be staying. He’d have Internal Affairs. Meetings. Paperwork to file. His day would just be starting.

He finally looked my way, and his mouth made a rueful twist. Like his thoughts were following the same track.

I found myself smiling back.

“Let me make you a cup of coffee,” I said.

“Espresso only?” he asked, wryly.

“Yeah. That’s the good stuff, anyway.”

He came to watch as I tamped the puck and steamed the milk. For the first time, I perceived he hadn’t only ever been observing me because I was a homicide suspect. His intense regard warmed me from my cheeks to my toes. I found I didn’t dislike it.

I didn’t dislike it at all.

A while later, as we sat watching the world wake, me with my eggnog and Jake with his latte, he murmured, “Yeah. That’s the good stuff.”