The Mystery of Nevermore (27 page)

“No!” Duncan cried, and I could hear him running toward me.

I dodged the closest people as I made for the door.

Don’t stop
, I told myself.
Just run.
Get him away from Max. Away from Beth. Away from everyone.

I had just opened the shop door, barely stepped into the freezing night, when a hand grabbed mine. I startled but didn’t break free.

I knew that hand.

“
Run
,” Calvin said sternly. He took off into the dark, hand tight around mine, never letting go.

I slipped and skidded on the frozen sidewalk, but Calvin’s footing never wavered. He held on, keeping me on my feet as we ran down the block and crossed the street. The air froze my lungs as we ran, the wind burning my face with its freezing temperature.

But we kept running.

Calvin’s coat billowed open around him, like dark wings that would lift us off the ground and bring us to safety. The wind tore down the street, and Calvin’s scarf was tugged free from his neck.

Everything happened so quickly, it seemed to actually slow down. The minute details I remember seem almost silly now. The strange glow of freshly falling snow in the streetlamps. The echoing pound of our steps, as if the city were completely empty, save for the two of us. The strides Calvin took, too powerful for me to keep up, and he had to yank me forward.

A gun fired behind us, and Calvin skidded to a stop. He spun around, pulling me to stand behind him as if he were a shield, while reaching into his coat to pull his pistol free. Calvin raised his gun, not even managing to take aim at the figure standing in the middle of the street between the blocks before another crack echoed into the frozen night.

And then Calvin fell.

He crashed backward onto the pavement, gun sliding free from his hand. He was staring up at the clouded sky as if in surprise. And then pain.

He took a breath that sounded so scary.

Duncan was laughing. Screeching and bellowing as if he’d finally lost his fucking mind.

I dropped to my knees beside Calvin and reached over his chest. His right side was wet and warm, and he made another pained sound at my touch.

“Oh God,” I whispered when my hands came up covered in blood. I was shaking so badly, I could barely control my limbs. “Cal? Oh God, oh God.” I yanked my jacket off and pressed it down against the bullet wound.

Stop the bleeding. Put as much pressure on it as you could.

“That’s what you deserve, you son of a bitch, disgusting
pig
!” Duncan was screaming. “
Sebastian
! Don’t touch Sebastian! Don’t touch
Tamerlane
! It’s mine, mine, mine!” He waved his gun at us.

I looked down at Calvin. “Please,” I whispered. I needed to call for help. He wasn’t going to make it. I reached down and gripped his hand tight.

“Sebastian!” Duncan shouted.

I looked up.

“Get away from him!”

“Duncan, put the fucking gun down!” I cried. “You shot him—aren’t you happy now? Put it down!”

“Get away from him!” he shouted again. “Bring
Tamerlane
!”

I glanced at my coat, which was soaking up Calvin’s blood, before digging inside to remove the pamphlet. It was covered in blood. Priceless to worthless. “Is this what you fucking want?” I raised it up and tore it in two.

“
No
!” Duncan screamed. “No, no, no! Sebastian!
What have you done
!”

He was going to kill us both.

When Duncan raised his gun again, I dropped the book and grabbed Calvin’s fallen pistol. I’d never touched a gun before, and the weight was cold and deadly. All I knew was aim and pull the trigger.

So I did.

The kickback was strong, and I dropped the pistol out of fright. The crack was so loud, like thunder had struck my brain. While my ears hummed and buzzed, I watched Duncan drop to the ground.

I had no idea where I’d struck him. Didn’t even realize I would be able to hit him. But what if he were okay? He still had his gun.

I stumbled to my feet, tripping over myself as my legs refused to function. I moved closer to Duncan and looked at him warily. He had blood running from his mouth, but his lips were still moving, saying something I didn’t care to hear.

I picked up his gun and ran back to Calvin.

“Cal! Cal! Don’t you fucking die, do you hear me?” I begged when I got back on my knees beside him. “Cal?” I shook him hard. “
Calvin
!”

I reached into his coat, took out his cell, and called 911. I told the dispatcher a policeman had been shot and gave the cross streets.

The wait for the ambulance was the longest five minutes of my life.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to end.

MY KNOWLEDGE
that Duncan Andrews was the killer was based on nothing but circumstantial evidence at best. It was my gut that told me, like when he mentioned loving Poe when we first met. His adoration of literature, and the roses he’d brought me at the diner, which were identical to the ones left in my shop. Especially the comment about my eyes, which I learned was from Poe’s poem, “A Valentine.” Nothing but circumstantial evidence.

Thank God I was right.

Not that it fucking mattered.

I needed to see Calvin, but no one would let me. When the ambulance came to pick him up, I wasn’t allowed to go with him. When I went to the hospital myself, I was turned away. I wasn’t a cop. I wasn’t family.

So scram.

My heart was fucking breaking. I was the reason for it all. If I’d just called Calvin instead of going to Beth’s with a half-formed, dumbass plan, none of this would have happened. Was he even alive? No one would tell me anything. I just needed to be assured he was okay. Even if he never wanted to see me again, I’d be okay with that. As long as he was
alive
.

“Sebastian?”

I had been prowling the hospital waiting room like an insane person but stopped at the sound of my name. I looked over, pushing up my glasses. “Quinn.” My heart dropped to my gut.

She motioned with a curt wave of her hand for me to follow away from the strangers in the room and down a quiet hallway.

I rushed after her. I had been awake for nearly two days straight and was fueled on nothing but coffee, adrenaline, and absolute fear. By the time Calvin had been rushed to the hospital and into surgery, visiting hours were long over and I had been told to leave. No one could make me rest, not Pop, Max—Jesus, even Beth came to my apartment to see I was tended to. I returned to the hospital that morning and stubbornly sat in the lobby, hoping,
praying
a nurse or passing cop would feel bad for me and let me in to see Calvin.

“Quinn,” I said, and my own voice sounded very strange and far away.

She stopped and looked up at me, holding out her hand and taking a breath. “Why are you here?”

“You
know
why. I only want to know if he’s… no one will tell me anything.”

Quinn pulled her coat off. She looked dapper in a suit and tie. Goddamn, I was so tired. She looked back up while holding the jacket against her chest with both arms crossed. “Calvin’s okay.”

I let out a shuddering breath and had to grab the banister on the wall.

“You know, the boys all call him Mr. Invincible,” she pointed out with a small smile.

I closed my eyes, took off my sunglasses, and quickly rubbed them dry on my sleeve. “He’s really okay?”

“Yes. They took him out of the ICU already.”

I put my glasses back on and looked at her. “Thank you,” I whispered.

Quinn seemed to hesitate for a minute, looking back over her shoulder once or twice. “Look. I know that Calvin’s family is here now. They were notified last night.”

I thought of the photograph in Calvin’s box under the bed.

“But I can go speak to Calvin and get you permission to see him.”

I wanted that. More than anything. To see him alive and breathing and to apologize until I was hoarse, but it didn’t seem right. I couldn’t make him feel obligated to see me.

And that photo. Calvin’s expression in that picture nagged at me. An unhappy man. A man with secrets. I knew in that moment that his own family didn’t know he was gay.

What a nightmare.

“No,” I said, having to clear my voice. “It’s okay.”

“You sure?” Quinn asked in surprise.

I nodded and took a step back. “He needs to rest.” I paused. “Can I ask you a question? About the case?”

Quinn shrugged a shoulder and nodded. “Sure.”

“Duncan—”

“He’s alive. You didn’t kill him,” she interjected.

“Oh.”

Okay. Good. I guess.

“How did Calvin know where to find me?”

“They found one print at your apartment. It got rushed through the system and came back matching Duncan Andrews. He was convicted of assault against his great uncle a year or so back. The late Edward Andrews, I should say.”

“The estate,” I replied.

She nodded. “He had no will, left Duncan nothing. Calvin mentioned he talked to you on the phone and that you were having lunch with that guy. When the prints came back and we realized it was the same Duncan, he tried calling to warn you to stay away, but you never answered.”

“I went to the library and left my phone on vibrate. Sometimes I don’t… notice it.”

“Yeah, well, he called the Emporium, your dad, and then he tried Good Books. Ms. Harrison said you were there for an event. Calvin went off fucking half-cocked without me.”

I remembered, when I had caught sight of Beth the night before, she had been hanging up the phone. Talking to Calvin moments before unveiling
Tamerlane
, and the entire event went to hell, courtesy of me.

“How’d he get into my shop and apartment?”

“Stole your keys and made copies, it looks like,” Quinn replied.

“Will I be arrested?” I asked next, sort of surprised by my question. “I had to shoot him—Duncan.” I had already gone through this with the responding officers, but if I couldn’t get confirmation from Calvin himself, his partner’s word was just as comforting.

“No.
Hell no
. Duncan Andrews brutally killed two people and assaulted you and his own uncle. He shot a detective. He’s definitely unstable and will probably plead insanity, but no, Sebastian. You aren’t going to jail,” Quinn answered.

There was that, at least.

I DIDN’T
hear from Calvin the rest of the week.

So I guess whatever could have happened between us was over.

I know I had said I’d be okay with that so long as he was alive and well, but in all honesty, I wasn’t okay. I had never felt like this. Never felt so fucking helpless and broken and devastated. I’d only known Calvin for two weeks, but it felt as if everything in life had led up to us meeting. We were supposed to meet. I was supposed to love him.

I tried to placate the bitterness inside me with the knowledge that our relationship would have surely soured like mine had with Neil. If you’ve dated one closeted cop, you’ve dated them all. But that only made me have to lock myself in the bathroom of the Emporium for a bit so I could sob my fucking eyes out. I couldn’t win.

And so the days went until Christmas. It was snowing as I was getting ready to go to my dad’s place. He had offered to come to me, but I needed to get out. Needed to walk and breathe in that cold, festive air, and once and for all come to terms with what the universe had laid out for me. I wouldn’t start the new year with such blackness in my life.

There was a quick knock at my door, and I cursed at the thought that Pop felt he needed to come over and make sure I got to his apartment okay. “Coming,” I called, leaving the bathroom and drying my hands on my pants. “Pop,” I grumbled as I tugged open the door.

Calvin looked up.

My breath caught, and my stomach felt full of butterflies. “Cal,” I whispered.

“Am I interrupting?” he asked.

“N-No, no. I just—” I looked him over. Standing, breathing, arm in a sling with his jacket resting over his shoulder. “You’re really here.”

He held up a few folded pieces of paper. “I needed to return your letters.”

“Letters?”

He handed them over. “Smart. About Duncan. You figured all of that out without any of the information I had available.”

I felt my face heat up when I opened the notes I had all but forgotten about. My evidence against Duncan, should I have been hurt. My good-bye letters to Pop and to Calvin. “I didn’t—I’m sorry I left these. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Seb,” he said. “Can I tell you something?”

I swallowed painfully and nodded. His expression was raw and naked, so exposed from the usual guarded appearance Calvin wore.

“I know you couldn’t be with Neil because he denied his relationship with you. Look… baby… I’m no better.”

I gritted my teeth hard but nodded. How much of a hypocrite would I be to deny Neil but go through the same issue with Calvin? This was for the best.

“So I told my family.”

I immediately looked up. “What?”

Calvin looked a little sad. “They came to see me while I was in the hospital. I’ve never told any of them that I’m… gay.”

“Is everything okay?” I asked, but I knew it wasn’t.

Calvin forced a smile onto his face. “I know it’s not much, but if it’s a step in the right direction for you—”

I dropped the papers to the floor and grabbed him in a hug.

“Ouch!
Fuck
, baby!”

“I’m so sorry!” I exclaimed, pulling back.

Calvin winced and put a hand on my shoulder, managing another smile. “I love you, Sebastian.”

You know that whole
cry because you’re so happy
thing? I was
so close
to that. I smiled and wiped under my glasses. “Yeah, well, you’re not so bad yourself,” I said, grinning.

“Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas, Cal.”

“Can I come in? Or are we going to stay in the hallway for this?”

I scoffed and laughed. “Want to come have breakfast with my dad and me?”