“No, I think you liked the idea of me. Oliver in theory was mysterious and brooding. Oliver in actuality was far messier and needier than you imagined, but he expected very little of you in return.”
Releasing a tired sigh, Oliver stared at the man’s familiar burnished hair and sharp, green eyes. It didn’t matter. He didn’t think even Ansley knew why he behaved the way he did, and it didn’t change what happened then or how Oliver felt now. If Ansley was going to continue acting this way, there was only one course of action: move on without him, as he had done years ago. Taking a step toward the door, Oliver hesitated. He and Ansley weren’t lovers, or even friends, but Oliver cared for him in his own misguided way. A part of him still wished Ansley would change, if only for himself.
“If you want to be part of the case, Ansley, you know where to find us. If not, I hope you have a safe trip back to Washington. I’m sure your partner will be happy to have you back.”
As Oliver slipped into the hall, he thought he heard Ansley say something under his breath, but whatever it was, was lost beneath the slam of the apartment door.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Vulnerable
Oliver stared at thesorted piles of evidence that had been taken from the Institute for the Betterment of the Soul with equal parts awe and horror. Somehow, he had expected it to shrink when he straightened it, but it appeared that the Brooklyn Pack had collected everything that wasn’t nailed down. Some boxes were filled with financial records that Oliver would leave for Ansley or whomever replaced him. Others were medical records that would be far more useful for Oliver’s purposes. The ones marked,Remains,had already been brought down to the lab, but removing them hadn’t made a dent in the pile waiting for him and Felipe in the archives. Oliver had never considered bringing on a helper before, especially since he couldn’t or wouldn’t want to reanimate a corpse in front of them, but staring at the mountain of boxes, he considered it might not be the worst idea.
Locking the door to room fifty-six, Oliver let out a deflating sigh and headed for the archive’s exit. His arms and back ached, and his shirt clung unpleasantly to his skin from hauling boxes in the airless space. He had hoped Ansley would show up after their argument the day before, but while Oliver thought he spotted him in the stacks, Ansley never came to help. At least, the head inspector had given Felipe permission to bring six people onto the case to help them go through everything and to reach out to the Federal Branch if Ansley didn’t cooperate by the end of the week. The thought of explaining everything they knew so far about the case to an audience of investigators was too exhausting to even think about, but Felipe would handle them until Oliver processed all the physical evidence and remains that had been collected. That would buy him a few days of solitude at least.
And Felipe... Heading down the back steps, Oliver tried not to dwell on it. The constant hunger was probably an unfortunate side effect of being a self-healer trying to maintain a not quite living body. The way magic interacted with living beings hadn’t been heavily studied, but Oliver suspected he was constantly leeching off Felipe’s healing magic as his hands no longer grew chapped and shaving knicks healed in minutes. Seeing in the dark on the other hand... Oliver had never heard of someone spontaneously developing that ability, but no one knew how necromancy affected a body or what physiological processes were altered postmortem. Perhaps, it was normal. As much as he wanted to dive into the library and the special collections to find the answer, the case had to come first or he would get everything muddled. For now, though, Felipe was fine. A little stranger but fine.
Pushing open the laboratory door, Oliver found Felipe staring up at the clock above the door, drumming his fingers on the bench in a steady tattoo. The moment he turned toward the sound of the door, the tension in his features was replaced by something far warmer. Oliver’s cheeks heated. He didn’t understand why Felipe seemed to enjoy seeing him disheveled and sweaty, but he liked knowing Felipe found him attractive no matter how terrible he looked.
Meeting him halfway, Felipe kissed him. “I didn’t expect you to be gone so long. If I had known, I would have helped you before I visited the office.”
“It’s fine; I needed the exercise. Everything should be ready for your recruits to sift through. How did it go with them?”
“Fine, I have one or two who seem a little overeager, but that isn’t the worst thing.”
When Felipe didn’t say more, despite the tension in his features, Oliver asked, “Is everything all right?”
“Yeah, I’m just nervous about talking to Teresa.Ifshe shows up.”
“I’m sure she will. She replied to you yesterday, didn’t she? I don’t recall her response being terse or sarcastic.”
“It wasn’t.” Sighing, Felipe leaned back against the bench and pushed the stool beside him back and forth with his foot. “I want to make this right between us. I never meant to hurt her with any of this, but...”
“But things can never go back to normal,” Oliver replied.
“Unfortunately. I just hope she understands.”
