Page 58 of Housesitter

Shepherd narrowed his eyes. “Uh-huh,” he said and waited a second. When that got them nowhere, he sighed. “OK, I’ll say it then. I’m guessing there’s just one small problem?”

The legs of Kel’s chair hit the tiles with a thump as he leaned forward. He rested his arms on the table.

“One way to put it,” he said.

Easy scratched the side of his jaw with the bottle and grimaced before he admitted. “It seems,” he said, drawing the admission out sourly, “that in the intervening years, Albert found my contract, which was in the bedroom, and, uh, relocated it.”

“You can’t find it,” Shepherd said.

Easy and Kel looked at each other, two sets of nearly black eyes visibly conspiring about the tack to take. In the end, Kel shrugged, and Easy admitted, “I can’t find it.”

Chapter Fourteen

Hell House Client Brief: Feed the books at 8am. There should be enough blood in the fridge.

Kel tore open the mattress with more aggression than was necessary. He dropped the scissors and ripped the holes wider with his hands. Stuffing and springs and the smell of something long dead escaped as he worked.

“Do you think he'd fucked it?” Shepherd asked from behind him

“People hide things in mattresses,” Kel said. “Money. Tapes. You'd be surprised.”

Shepherd snorted. He came around the bed and picked up the crumpled sheet off the floor. Dust dropped over his feet as he shook it out and then flicked it over the bed.

“Not sure there’s much point to that,” Kel said.

“You could have a guest.”

Kel doubted it, but he helped anyhow. They made the bed in silence, spreading the heavy, brocade quilt over the sheet and plumping the pillows.

By the time they finished tucking in the sheet with the precise, economical practicality he brought to all the weird stuff he did, it looked like nothing had ever happened. Just like how, now he was back, it was like he’d never left.

“Do you really trust him?” Shepherd asked, brushing a scrap of stuffing off the bed with one hand.

Kel didn’t know why he hesitated. He’d expected the question. It was the one he’d have asked.

“He's my grandad,” he said. It sounded weak even to him. “Ruby always said he'd never have left us if Albert hadn't forced his hand.”

“She trusted him?”

Kel started to answer, but didn’t. Because Ruby had never said that. She'd said his grandad was smart, that he'd gotten a raw deal, that Kel was like him. But trust? The fact that Kel was supposed to be like him threw that into doubt for a start.

Kel rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “I don't…I don't remember her ever actually going that far,” he admitted. “But what other choice do I have?”

Shepherd raised his eyebrows. "What happened to the guy who took twenty minutes to decide damnation was a good return on his investment?"

Kel looked at Shepherd. The truth didn’t hurt—not the way anything Jesus-related did—but it didn’t sit well in his stomach either. He still stuck with it.

“He nearly killed Ruby,” Kel said quietly. Because even when telling the truth, he had to distance himself from the vulnerability of it. “He drove you away.”

Shepherd rolled his eyes. “Don’t blame me,” he said as he walked around the end of the bed. He reached for Kel’s hand. “I was looking for an excuse. I always am.”

Kel took the offered hand and twisted their fingers together. Shepherd’s hand was cold.

Or maybe Kel’s was hot. He’d noticed the last few days that his internal temperature had been turned up a few notches. Not just physically either. His temper was set to ‘spark’ as well. The ‘smoke’ liked it. That shift towards something hotter, hungrier, made it feel more at home.

Since Kel was already doing everything he could about that, he ignored it for now as he rubbed his thumb over Shepherd’s knuckles.

“And Ruby?” Kel asked. “She's a terrible old bag, but she's still my grandmother. She raised me. She loves me. In her way, but she loves me. I nearly killed her trying to make her tell me her secrets.”