Murder in Pastel (10 page)

“It was a mistake to come back here.” His breath was warm on the back of my neck. I shivered and he slipped his arms around me. I stood very still though I’m sure he could feel the betraying thud of my heart against my breast bone.

I understood my reaction to Brett. It was about sex, pure and simple. Or maybe not so pure, but definitely simple. My reaction to Adam was so much more complicated. I wanted him, yes—badly. But this yearning was more than physical. I couldn’t define it and I knew there wasn’t a hope in hell of satisfying it. And yet, after a moment, I relaxed and leaned against him. We stood there for what felt like a long time.

“Why was it a mistake?” I asked finally. I was thinking that in a moment he would let me go and I would feel colder than I had ever felt in my life.

But under the circumstances I guess it was a silly question. Adam didn’t bother answering, resting his cheek against my head.

“For so long I thought of you as a kid.” He turned his face to my hair, breathing in. “Jesus, you still even have that little boy scent.”

“I think it’s the…uh…baby shampoo.” My voice sounded odd.

So did Adam’s laugh as he turned me to face him. His hands were gentle, almost tentative as he drew me against him. I could feel his body taut and powerful down the length of my own. And I could feel the erection straining his jeans. I pressed closer, hoping he couldn’t tell I was shaking. It’s a little frightening when a dream comes true. For an instant we stood there, eye to eye, cock to cock. His breathing was even but fast, like he was holding himself in check.

“Adam,” I whispered and fastened my arms around his neck. We kissed. Not gently, not tentatively, but hard and hungry. As though we had both been waiting for this from the day he returned.

“Oh, God, Kyle,” he muttered into my mouth. I made a soft inarticulate sound of encouragement. His kiss deepened and I opened to it.

Instead he withdrew, kissing the corner of my mouth and then the sensitive hollow beneath my ear. I turned my mouth, seeking his. He kissed my eyebrow, and then—tenderly—my lips.

My heart pounded heavily in my chest, but it wasn’t with happiness or excitement; it was anxiety. There was no joy in that kiss: it felt like good-bye. I opened my eyes.

“This isn’t fair to you,” he said unsteadily.

A car door slammed.

We pulled apart like boxers at the sound of a bell. There was a crunch of feet on shale, and then the front door opened and Joel and the doctor came in.

I’ve known Dr. Hicks all my life. I guess his was the first face I ever saw, if a newborn can see. He hasn’t changed much over the years: iron-gray hair, iron-gray eyes which now met mine in stern disapproval. Hicks is small and spry for his age, which I always took to be advanced until it occurred to me recently that at the beginning of our acquaintance he must have been a young man.

I read Hick’s disapprobation as the result of my having skipped my last check-up. However, when Adam and the doctor had disappeared into the bedroom, Joel hissed at me, “I give it two thumbs-up, dear boy, but if you’re planning on a return engagement, keep in mind that this room is like a stage when the blinds are drawn. Steeple Hill is watching.”

I viewed the room ablaze with candles and lanterns, and recognized the truth of that. Anyone happening to look out his window would have been treated to a cliché straight out of the
Late Show
.

About an hour of sick-making sounds later, I was on the sofa starting to doze when Adam and Dr. Hicks came out of the bedroom.

“Call me if there’s any change,” Dr. Hicks was saying.

“Yes. Thanks for coming out this time of night,” Adam replied.

Dr. Hicks paused to glower at me. “You should be home in bed, young man.”

“I’m just going,” I said.

“And I want you to call this week to set up another appointment.”

“Uh, sure. Yes.”

Joel made the naughty-naughty sign before following the man of medicine into the night. I wasn’t sure which “naughty-naughty” he was referring to.

Adam and I stood on opposite sides of the room. Adam said, “Go home, Kyle. You look dead.”

“I’m going. If you’re sure you’re all right?”

Adam nodded. “Terrific. Brett told the doctor he thought he had been poisoned.”

“What?”

“Hicks took some—samples to get them analyzed.”

“Food poisoning? Is that what Brett meant?”

“Brett told Hicks he thought someone was trying to kill him. He didn’t mean Jen’s guacamole.”

“Why would he say that?”

“Presumably because he believes it.” Adam pinched the bridge of his nose. “Who the hell knows why Brett does anything? I gave up trying to figure him out a long time ago.”

Which wasn’t to say that he had stopped loving him.

* * * * *

The rain had passed and the moon shone. I stood out on my front porch, too restless to sleep, though I was beat. The lights were off in the cottage across the meadow. I could still feel Adam’s arms around me and the taste of his mouth on mine. On impulse I decided to walk out to the old church and watch the sunrise.

When I was younger I used to walk out to Steeple Hill often. I think it started as a kind of proof to myself that I wasn’t actually in the graveyard if I could walk to it. Too, I guess the silence and peace appealed to me. My imagination was stirred by the graves with their ornate headstones and flowery epitaphs. Lest I appear some fey creature of the woodland, I didn’t wander that way much anymore, but I still could trace the path in the dark.

The church stood lightless and silent, windows boarded, the doors padlocked. The bell in the steeple hung motionless, its tongue stilled for many years.

I’m not sure how long I had been sitting on the steps watching the marble angel frozen in its dance when I heard a rustling sound behind me.

Warning prickled down my spine. I half turned and something slammed down on my shoulder. I was in motion so it was a glancing blow, but it hurt unbelievably and it scared the shit out of me.

I think I yelled, “What are you
doing
?” Which should have been obvious already. I scuttled over the broken stones in the walk, dodging a kick aimed at my midsection.

It happened so fast. It didn’t occur to me to fight back. I’d never been in a fight. I wouldn’t have known where to begin. My focus was on escaping in one piece, and for that I was well equipped, being limber, relatively fast, and familiar with the churchyard.

I dived, rolled across the wet leaves and grass, and scrambled to my feet as my assailant slammed the board into a stone urn, showering bits of cement flowers over my face and hair.

“Don’t like it rough,
honey
? Don’t want to play anymore?”

It was too dark to see more than a bulky outline. His voice was hoarse, rasping, unfamiliar.

“Fucking faggot!”

I scrambled up and bolted for the break in the fence. He was right behind me. I wriggled through, tearing my sweatshirt, managed to get to my feet and raced for the shelter of the woods.

Once inside the muffled darkness I slowed. Stopped. Listened.

He was coming up fast.

Slipping off the path, I moved carefully, cautiously, while nerves clamored to break and run. Quietly, quietly… Creeping through the tangle of vines and underbrush, the humid smell of earth and mold assailed my nostrils.

Something moved nearby. I froze. Leaves crackled. I sank down on my haunches behind a tree trunk. My heart was clamoring like an eight-bell fire alarm.
Steady, steady
, I warned my faulty pump.

Silence.

I was afraid to breathe. He was not gone. He was listening for me, as I was listening for him.

I thought of my father vanishing in these same woods ten years ago.

The crack of a tree branch beside me was like a gunshot. I jumped up, thrusting through the mass of thorns and brush. My face and hands stung as I plowed on.

There was crashing in the undergrowth behind me.

And then, at last, I was out from under the canopy of trees and into the wide-open space of the meadow. The white flowers glimmered like fallen stars. My lungs burned as my feet pounded the dirt.

Like an arrow I flew down the path straight onto my porch and through my front door, which I slammed and locked—for the first time in four years—behind me.

I staggered over to the window. Nothing moved along the woodline. The moon shone down colorlessly, the high grass rippled in the breeze. I stared and stared, shaking with exertion and adrenaline, still trying to catch my breath. Nothing moved in the night.

It was unbelievable. I stumbled around checking the side door, the windows; locking, bolting, securing myself against siege. I even threw open closets, to reassure myself. After checking the back bedroom, my old room, I turned out the light. The ceiling glowed fuzzily. I regarded it in surprise.

Far, far away in a distant galaxy…

I hadn’t given this a thought in years; when I came home from the hospital my father had stuck tiny glow-in-the-dark stars, moons and meteors all across my bedroom ceiling. When the lights were off, I had my own private galaxy.

Gazing upwards now, this memory comforted me.

I circled back to the front room. There was still no sign of pursuit. Across the meadow, Adam’s cottage was dark and silent. I picked up the phone, listened to the dial tone. I hesitated.

Fag bashing in Steeple Hill?

Ridiculous. Had I heard correctly?
Fucking faggot?
No one could have known I would be at the old church tonight. I hadn’t known myself. So someone had followed me.

Or had waited for someone else.

* * * * *

The next morning dawned hot and clear; the sky was achingly blue, the water glittered with what my father used to call “sun dazzle.” Sail boats dotted the waves in perfect composition like one of Frank Benson’s painted summer idylls.

Walking over to Adam’s, I found Brett holding court on the terrace. True, Vince was the only courtier, but he seemed sufficient. They had been deep in conversation but shut up at my approach. Neither looked particularly thrilled to see me.

“How are you feeling today?” I asked Brett. His face looked pinched and jaundiced. There were circles like bruises under his eyes. Still, he looked hunky in a white gauze caftan that didn’t cover his spread knees.

“Okay.” Was it my imagination or was there hostility in the eyes meeting mine?

“Someone tried to kill Brett last night,” Vince announced.

“You’re kidding,” I said. “Someone tried to kill me too.”

I couldn’t have asked for a better reaction. They both gawked. Brett finally sputtered, “
You?
Why would anyone want to kill
you
?” Like murder was reserved for the select few.

“Maybe they thought I was someone else.”

Brett’s eyes narrowed. Vince was asking all the normal questions: when, where, how, why? Brett said nothing, but by the time I finished relating my adventure he had a peculiar look on his face.

“You have no idea who attacked you?” he asked.

“No. Do you?”

“Me?”

Vince said slyly, following his own line of thought, “But what exactly were you doing in the churchyard at two o’clock in the morning? Hmmm?” He exchanged a knowing glance with Brett who merely looked pissed.

“That’s right,” I said, “my social life is so dead I meet my dates in the graveyard.”

“Kinky,” laughed Vince.

“Shut your goddamn mouth,” Brett bit out.

Vince looked wounded.

“You’re obviously feeling better,” I remarked. “See you later.” I turned to leave.

Brett sniped, “Are you going without seeing Adam?”

So that was it. I stared at Vince who avoided my eyes.

“I didn’t come to see Adam.”

“I really should be getting back,” Vince said hastily, rising from the iron chair. “Tell Adam to bring my painting over when he gets home.”

Brett and I ignored him. Brett patted the chair next to himself invitingly. I stood where I was.

“Don’t frown, Kylie, you’ll make wrinkles.”

“Do you mind not calling me ‘Kylie’?”

“Do you prefer ‘scout’?”

“I prefer ‘Kyle,’ which is my name.”

His lips formed a sneer, but he let it pass. “Don’t stand over me, Kyle. You’re blocking my sun.”

My sun. That about summed it up. I sat down in a chair across from him and said, “Brett, do you really think someone is trying to kill you, or are you doing this for attention?”

“I don’t need to get my stomach pumped for attention, okay? I get all the attention I need.”

“How much did you have to drink last night?”

“Alcohol poisoning?” he hooted. “You’ve never seen me seriously drunk.”

I had a feeling I wouldn’t want to. “I guess the real wonder is nobody’s tried to kill you before.”

He chuckled. “I’m hurt. I thought we were buds. It’s what Adam wants, you know. He worries about me.” He studied my face to see how I responded to that.

I had no response to that. Brett continued to eye me and then said thoughtfully, “You’ve got scratches on your hands and face. Your lover plays rough. I guess that lets Adam out.” He got to his feet. The sunlight shone through the gauzy nightshirt. He stretched hugely and his dick bowed to the audience. Me. “Let’s fuck.”

I sighed and rose. Brett grabbed my arm as I started to walk away. “Don’t get snotty, Kyle. You’re my only friend. You’re the only person here I trust.”

The survival instincts of a lemming.

“Don’t you trust Adam?”

His expression went blank. “Sure. But that’s different.”

Something was glittering on the stair. I picked up Brett’s anklet. He snatched it out of my hand. “Shit! The clasp must be broken.”

I remembered he had been wearing it the night before. Irene’s gaze had fixed on it as though she had never seen a man wearing jewelry. Maybe she never had.

Brett chuckled, and dangled the anklet in front of me. “401K.”

“Huh?”

“Get it? Instead of 14 karat—never mind. It’s my retirement fund.”

“What are you retiring from?”