Page 7 of A Box of Wishes
Alastair’s smile had wilted edges. “You don’t have to stuff my face every time I walk through the door.”
“I don’t have to, no. And I promise to stop the moment you no longer need it.” He poured himself a cup of tea and reached for a slice of lemon drizzle cake.
Alastair had been part of many of Ryan’s firsts. It had been Alastair who’d stood beside him when he’d come out to his family. Alastair, who’d accompanied him to his first night out at a gay bar. Alastair, who’d been with him on his road trip across Ireland. He’d been with Ryan in Connemara when Ryan had found the Box of Wishes. And he’d turned out his own pockets to help Ryan buy the thing.
Ryan was more than happy to return the many favours, starting with looking after Alastair when he hadn’t slept for a day or more and his aura had less colour than a rainy day. “Where have you come from?”
“Singapore.”
Ryan raised a brow at the one-word answer and tried to work out what time it would be in Singapore. Late. Or very early. He poured tea and set the cup in front of Alastair. “Tell me later,” he said. “When your brain’s in the same time zone as your coat.”
Alastair picked up his cup and took a sip. The tension flowed from his shoulders as he sighed. “Don’t fuss. It’s tired I am and no mistake.”
The wavering green of Alastair’s aura called him a liar. “That’s not all that ails you.”
That drew a chuckle, but no confession. “You see far too much, kiddo. But I’m not blind, either. Why’s there police tape around your place?”
Questions
Across town, at his desk at the police station, Ben doodled on his blotter. He’d spent the afternoon working through updates on the drugs traffic in the area and had read everything they had on file about Ryan and the Top o’ the Morning coffeehouse.
Neither set of information amounted to very much.
In the westernmost corner of the county, drugs offences made up a tiny percentage of local reported crime, and the main trafficking routes ran well east of the county boundaries. The closest Ben had come to a drugs case since he’d moved to Rothcote was by assisting the neighbouring force in an arrest.
The information about Ryan’s coffeehouse was just as scanty. A Crimestoppers report, a comment made to an officer during a community outreach session, a complaint about customer parking, and the resulting follow-up reports. None of their checks had found drugs or a connection to a dealer.
“Yeah, well.” Ben shut down his computer and tidied the files away. “I can’t picture Ryan as a drug dealer, either. And I’m supposed to have a knack for assessing people’s characters with a look or two.”
A knack that failed when you met Keith and fell for the cheating sod.
“Oh, shut up!” Ben muttered, aware he’d given the negative thoughts far too much room in his head. Besides, what had happened with Keith was irrelevant. Ryan might have caught his eye, but Ben wouldn’t let the attraction interfere with his job. He needed facts, and the morning spent in the coffeehouse had yielded a bunch of them.
Ryan O’Shaughnessy got a kick out of looking after people. He greeted his regulars by name, joked with customers he didn’t know, and reached for their chosen pastries before they’d even placed their order. He’d refused to talk about the break-in until after he’d fed Ben a delicious breakfast. And he’d cared for the crime scene team while they worked, supplying sandwiches and muffins alongside tea and coffee.
The coffeehouse felt more like a home than business premises. And for the first time in months, Ben had been as content with another person as he usually only was with his cat.
He’d wanted to return to Ryan’s coffeehouse, he just hadn’t expected to do so while working. Tarbert assigning this case to him made sense, though. Seeing Ben at odd times would neither surprise nor alarm Ryan, while it gave Ben a chance to verify the reports about Ryan handing out small packages to his customers without being obvious about it.
Ben stopped for groceries on the way to the coffeehouse, stocking up on frozen pizza, steak and ale pies, battered haddock, and chunky chips. He bought cat food and treats for Morris and even remembered to buy milk. Christmas music and gaudy decorations were everywhere he turned, and as he parked beside the Christmas tree in the courtyard, he wondered about the single red bauble in a sea of white tinsel, baubles, icicles, and stars. Its placement was neither an accident, nor was it random. Did that mean it was a signal?
It was, for now, an unanswerable question.
The coffeehouse smell drew Ben out of his car. And his day grew brighter when Ryan O’Shaughnessy looked up at the jangling of the bell over the door and smiled.
“Thank you!” Ryan whispered to nobody in particular when Ben Hobart stepped into his domain for the second time that day. He’d hoped to see the sexy cop with the sad eyes again, but he hadn’t expected that Fate would be quite so prompt to grant his wish.
Ben turned to close the door, and Ryan’s gaze caught on the beautiful V made by wide shoulders and narrow hips. Before the detective had reached the bar, he’d cut a slice of banoffee pie and placed it on a plate beside a turkey and cranberry relish-stuffed panini.
“What’s your poison of choice at this time of the afternoon? Still tea? Or coffee?”
“Tea,” Ben said, an apology in his tone. “Sounds silly, perhaps, in this age of coffeehouses, but I don’t like coffee all that much. And I’m a bit of a tea nerd.”
“I’ll not argue with that.” Ryan allowed more of his Irish accent into his voice. “There’s little that a good cup of tea can’t fix. That’s what my ma says.”
“Reckon, she’s right, too.”
Ryan’s hands hesitated over the edges of the tray. Sludgy grey surrounded Ben, but Ryan felt none of the physical symptoms that would make him reach into the cubbyhole under the bar for a slip of coloured paper. No difficulty catching his breath, no burning tightness in his chest, no pain in his gut forcing him to double over. Just a sad-eyed detective in an aura of grey. “Find yourself a seat. I’ll bring your tea right over.”
