Chapter Fifteen
EDWARD WASthe sort of man who looked hard as nails even unconscious in a hospital bed. An IV was down in the crook of his arm, and electrodes were glued neatly to his chest to make the assorted machinery whine and beep.
He had a room to himself, and the doctor had actually come in to speak with Joe.
Cal wasn’t sure if that was because Bailey Holding employees had goodhealth care, or that Edward’s condition was serious. He scratched his side. All he usually got when he was busted up was a gurney, a tired nurse with dissolvable thread, and a glass of orange once the stitches were done.
“I need to change,” Joe said from the chair by the bed. He’d spent the night there, conflicted and mostly silent. He rubbed his hands over his face. “Call my father, let himknow what’s happened.”
Cal pushed himself off the wall. “I’ll drive you back,” he said. “The hospital will call if anything changes.”
“They wanted to know if he had any relatives,” Joe said. “I didn’t know. The things you don’t know about people. I’ve known him my whole life but… he knows who my real mother is, and I don’t know if he has a brother or a niece. I don’t know whether to be pissedoff at him or guilty.”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know. And yet.”
After a moment Joe sighed and stiffly pushed himself upright. He put a hand on Edward’s shoulder with awkward, obvious affection, and then walked past Cal and out into the hall.
“Thanks, for staying,” he said as he paused in the doorway and put his hand on Cal’s arm. “I know he’s not your favorite person, but he’d appreciateit.”
“I didn’t do it for him.”
“ThenIappreciate it,” Joe said. He briefly tightened his hand.
“Didn’t say it was you either,” Cal said with a shrug. He winced inside as he said it, but his skin itched to get it over with and screw up the moment.
Joe smiled and then winced as the expression creased the road rash on his jaw and cheekbone. It was raw and freshly cleaned, the yellow swab ofiodine stained onto Joe’s skin, but the nurse had decided not to bandage it.
“I have to speak to the police later,” he said. “A detective is going to call at the hotel. Not sure if I should call my father before or after.”
“After,” Cal said. That reminded him of the missed call from Van that he still had to return. It would have to wait. He fell into step beside Joe as they left the room andwalked down the hall. “Otherwise you’ll have to call him again. Trust me, your family always wants to know what the police said to you.”
Joe dredged a cool smile from somewhere. “You’re the expert, I guess.”
That comment would usually have made Cal smirk and crack wise, reassured in a weird way that he was right about how people saw him. It wasn’t as though he could complain about it either—hebrought it up.
“Not exactly something to be proud of,” he said instead. The words felt rough in his throat, and he felt the back of his neck scald with embarrassment at being soft. Or… vulnerable. Cal cleared his throat and crooked the corner of his mouth in a smirk. “Maybe I should have stuck with stamp collecting when I was a kid, had another string to my bow.”
Joe bumped his arm against Cal’s.“I like you fine the way you are,” he said. “I don’t think stamps would have made a difference.”
“Probably not,” Cal admitted as he hooked his arm around Joe’s waist. He leaned in to rub a rough, stubbled kiss up Joe’s jaw so he could he confess into his ear. “Especially since when I say collected, I mean cut them off the letters old lags sent to my granddad from Spain… or Strangeways.”
He stillhad them somewhere. Maybe. After Grandad died, most of his stuff went to El, boxed up and packed in the white van he rented. El offered Cal whatever he wanted from the house, but what would Cal have done with it back then? When he had money, it pissed through his fingers, and when there was no money, he didn’t have a pot to piss in.
The vague idea of going to get them floated through Cal’s head.Although he didn’t have any idea what he’d do with them—frame them to cover the weird dent in his rented one-bedroom apartment? Before he could pick the idea to shreds, Joe snorted and pushed Cal away from him.
“If I ever need to send an emergency letter, I’ll call you,” Joe said. “For now, I need to talk to the nurses and make sure they have my contact details. Meet me outside with the car infifteen minutes and we can go back to the hotel?”
Joe turned away without waiting for an answer. It wasn’t a problem. The car was parked in the high-rise as the parking fees stacked up in twenty-minute increments. It was a bit high-handed—apleasewouldn’t have taken long—but under the circumstances, Cal could let it go. It was thewethat made him hesitate, even if not for the reasons it wouldhave two weeks before.
“Once I drop you off,” Cal said, “I’ll need to take a couple of hours personal time.”
That made Joe turn to look at him. As easy as it was to read him sometimes, at others, Joe was still opaque behind that handsome, reserved face when he felt he needed to be. Joe was disappointed, maybe, or curious. Whichever it was, he didn’t dwell on it.
“I suppose I’m lucky that mysecret admirer hasn’t scared you off entirely,” he said. “Fine. I doubt I’ll be going out anywhere this morning. If anything changes with Edward before that, I can get an Uber. That is, assuming you will be back?”
“Nowhere else to be.” Or that he’d rather be, but even that made Cal squirm with discomfort.
