Charlie ignored him. “We just need to keep putting you in his path. Like, he can’t resist those big doe eyes and your gorgeous face forever. Not to mention your ass.”
“Shh,” Robby said, pushing his finger against her lips. “Don’t mention it.”
Wyatt snickered. “I think you got him wasted. We should go.”
Was he wasted? Probably. His head buzzed and his tongue felt like a spongy sour grape and his limbs were heavy in a not unpleasant way. He’d hoped Charlie and Wyatt would take his mind off of Calder, but instead his whole night was just one big Calder-fest. Calder. Calder. Calder. Robby couldn’t even get a total manwhore to fuck him. He was pathetic.
“No,” Charlie cried. “We need to plot a plan or plan a plot. What am I saying?”
“Beats me, Dr. Seuss,” Wyatt muttered.
“We need to plan a plot to get Robby inside Calder’s world, so he can get inside Robby’s ass,” she said before erupting into a fit of giggles.
Wyatt stood. “Okay, that’s enough for tonight. I’m getting really tired of being the sober friend.”
Charlie sputtered, spraying Robby with saliva. “That’s not my fault. Lincoln log said you lost your drinking priv-privadges when you were doing stupid stuff, like cutting yourself. I don’t have any rules, and I like it that way. But this isn’t ‘bout us. This is ‘bout Robby. Oh, and Calder. We need to get them together. Ooh. Ooh. Project. Let’s make up a stalker. Robby can hire Calder, and then he’ll fall in love with him. We can teach Robby how to seduce him. Yeah. Let’s do that!”
Robby stared at Charlie in horror. “No. No way.”
“It’s perfect,” she cried. “You can be all like, ‘Oh, Calder. I’m so scared. Come sleep in my bed and keep me company.’”
Wyatt got to his feet. “Yeah, okay. That’s enough out of you. I called us an Uber. They’ll be downstairs in five. Let’s go.”
Robby watched them leave before lying back down on the couch. He attempted to put his wine glass back on the table but missed. The glass didn’t break but it spilled. He rolled onto his stomach to watch the wine spread across the hardwood floors. He should probably clean it up, but he was just too tired.
* * *
It was a strange sound that woke him, like somebody popping the seal on a vacuum. He forced his eyes open, even though his lids felt weighted. He frowned into the darkness. It wasn’t dark when he’d fallen asleep. He heaved himself upright, stomach sloshing and head pounding. He needed water. Water and a thousand aspirin. He had to stop drinking. It never ended well for him. He only prayed he didn’t wake up with another tattoo. Drunk him loved tattoos…and honesty. Never a good combination.
A high-pitched whimper came from far away, sending a shock of adrenaline through him, his heart racing as he fought to place the sound. “Cas?” he whispered, not sure why he was afraid to call out in his own home. The sound came again along with scratching on glass.
Robby sucked in a breath as he realized the sounds were coming from outside the sliding glass door. The one that went to the balcony. A balcony with only thin bars protecting Casanova from plummeting to the ground below. He lurched to his feet before stopping short. How would Cas get out onto the balcony? There was no way. He’d been sleeping in his bed the whole time Wyatt and Charlie had visited and had curled up at Robby’s feet on the sofa as soon as they’d left. Not even drunk him would have put Cas out on the balcony. Would he?
Robby snatched the only thing in his immediate vicinity, the short, sharp, triangular cheese knife from the remnants of the charcuterie board. He held it before him as he crept towards the balcony. Had that been the sound he’d heard? Was there somebody lurking in the shadows, waiting for him to rescue Cas? He considered calling the police but couldn’t risk Cas wiggling between the bars and falling.
Was he just being paranoid? Had somebody broken in? It seemed hard to believe. This was a secure building. Well, more secure than most. But it wasn’t a new building and he hadn’t locked the door when Wyatt and Charlie left.
He forced himself to creep through the darkness, feeling like he had found himself in a Scooby-Doo episode. He breathed a sigh when he reached the door without incident and Cas bolted back inside, giving him a look of betrayal with his one good eye.
He bent down to try to pick him up, but the dog cowered away, pulling his lip back in an uncharacteristic snarl.
“What’s wrong with you, baby? How’d you get out there?”
He sensed another presence behind him a split-second before something solid swung into his periphery, missing his skull by a millimeter and crashing to the floor. It was a heavy stone sculpture shaped like a goddess. His heartbeat pounded in his ears as his brain tried to make sense of what was happening. He staggered forward, still hunched over, rearing up as he turned to face his attacker. The man grunted, lunging at Robby once more. He swung wide with his knife just as the man grabbed him. There was a slick sucking sound, and then something warm and sticky poured over Robby’s hand.
The man stumbled back, his hands holding the side of his neck. Robby followed without thought, unsure what had happened. He flung the cheese knife away from him, watching as the man fell to the floor, a puddle forming beneath him, looking like black ink in the shadows of the room. Why was there so much blood? It was such a small knife. He stood for far too long just staring as the stain crept towards him. When it almost touched his sock, he finally jerked into motion. He flipped on the light and ran to the man. He was large, like a wrestler or a linebacker, but it was the slit in the side of his throat that had Robby’s eyes going wide as a fountain of thick red blood poured from the wound. He put his hands over it, but the man’s skin looked wrong, waxy and gray in the soft lights.
“Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, God. Please don’t die in my apartment. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
After a few seconds, the blood stopped pumping, instead oozing out slowly. The man gazed upward, his mouth slack as a strange rattle escaped from the back of his throat. Robby scooted away, snatching Casanova and his phone, before retreating to the only spot he could find in his small apartment not stained crimson. A sob caught in his throat as his fingers slipped each time he tried to unlock his phone with his blood-slicked hands. “Fuck. Come on,” he whimpered.
Finally, his phone relented, and he stabbed at the contacts, calling the only name that came to mind. The name he’d focused on for the last three nights.
“‘ello,” Calder mumbled, his eyes still closed.
“Calder… It’s me, Robby.” Calder’s eyes flew open at the tear-soaked voice on the other end of the phone. “I-Oh, God. I think I killed someone.”
Calder jerked to his feet. “Where are you?”
