Page 76 of A Box of Wishes
“Did something happen to make you change your mind?”
The thread of worry in DI Tarbert’s voice soothed Ryan’s agitation. “Yes, but it had nothing to do with your investigation. I won’t touch the box until you’re here. You can open it yourself.”
“We’ll be around after three,” Tarbert said a moment later. “Thank you.”
Ben parked the car in the courtyard and turned off the engine. Despite it being close to four, and therefore well past Ryan’s advertised closing time, the large window of the Top o’ the Morning coffeehouse was still lit, and he could see Ryan pacing inside. He seemed lost in his head, too, not taking any note of anyone.
“You said nothing had happened,” Ben said. “That doesn’t look like nothing.”
“Agreed. Let’s see what’s changed his mind.”
Ryan stopped his pacing as they entered, and Ben struggled to stay professional when all he wanted was to wrap Ryan in a hug.
“Are you okay?” he asked instead. “Paula said you’ve been feeling ill all morning.”
“Alastair was in need of a wish.”
Ben thought of Ryan’s cousin as he’d first seen him, dead to the world on a Northampton street. “What’s the matter with him?”
“He ballsed up a relationship. Remember you telling me about the holidays always causing trouble? I now believe it, too.” He locked the front door and drew the blinds. “Thanks for coming. I’ve decided I’ve been an arse over that box, and I want—”
“Wait!” Tarbert held up a hand. “I want your assurance that this is truly your decision. I wouldn’t want to think that I’ve desecrated a shrine.”
Ryan looked startled. “Please. It’s not as if someone’s forced me or anything like that.”
“Then what changed your mind?”
“My cousin Alastair. He needed the kind of help I usually go to the box for. Only, the box was nowhere near, and it’s well past the time I tend to make it available. But I couldn’t deny what I felt, so… I made him write a wish and it was heard.” He flushed a little, trying to explain the unexplainable. “I didn’t always have the box, you see. Finding it… saved me. And then I made myself forget that it was a prop, a means to keep my gift manageable. There’s really no reason we can’t open it.”
“If you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.” He pulled a key from his pocket and held it out. “It’s the way I left it when I packed it away on Boxing Day.”
“Which is where?”
“In my safe.”
Ryan led the way to his office, tidy and organised now, the desk bare except for a large mug filled with pencils and rulers. Morris’s bed sat in a corner, waiting beside clean, empty dishes, and Ben’s heart clenched at the sight.
His tabby wasn’t happy home alone after getting used to company in Ryan’s coffeehouse, and Ryan was still waiting for Morris to come back. Ben wanted to pull Ryan aside and apologise. He had to remind himself that he was here to work, not fix his mistakes.
Ryan removed the wooden crate with a wine merchant’s brand on the side from the safe and set it on the desk. “All yours.”
Ben had been with Ryan when he’d lowered the box into the crate. He’d watched him fill the gaps with holly, rowan, and witch hazel twigs. “It looks exactly as it did on Boxing Day,” he told his boss. Then he turned to Ryan. “May I?”
Ryan nodded, and Ben reached into the crate and lifted out the Box of Wishes. Tarbert moved the crate aside, and Ben settled the box on the empty desk. The metal-bound slot gleamed in the overhead light, and the clover leaf-shaped padlock held the latch closed.
There was no reason for Tarbert to hesitate. They had Ryan’s permission. And yet, the inspector stood, looking down at the box and turning the key over and over in his fingers.
“Nothing horrible will happen if you open the box,” Ryan assured him.
“Then why were you so vehemently opposed to it before?”
“As I said… I’d tried to forget that it is a prop. Having a gift like mine isn’t exactly easy, inspector. I used the box as a shield to hide behind while I figured things out. And I feared that breaking the rules I’d made for myself would… I don’t know… take me back to how things used to be.”
“And that has changed?”
“I don’tneedthe box to help. I’ve never needed the box. But I needed to grow up enough to remember that. And not be afraid of it.”
