The bells chimed with a thud of the door.
Seth’s hands pulling back faster then a snapped elastic band on a tension test.
“I didn’t mean to interupt.”
That voice caused an involuntry shudder to course through me like a defibrillator on max settings.
The electricity now coursing through my system with over three thousand volts of, “what the fuck is he doing here.”
“What are you doing here?” Haha.
Jinx with a side of well played Seth.
Seth’s question having been the only one said out loud aimed at Zare who’d just walked through the door panting like an over stuffed bear whose just pigged out on a fields worth of ass plugging grass to hibernate for the winter months.
“I came as soon as I could after seeing Rexy fall over down town. I was worried something might of happened to her so I came straight here.”
So that part was real.
I’d thought seeing Zare was a part of my nightmares come true.
“Well as you can see she’s fine now. No need to worry. If you’ll excuse us I was just about to close up early and take Rexy home. She’s had a big day.”
Ignoring Seth.
Zare’s eyes zeroed in on me.
“Are you sure you’re alright?”
Nodding with all the energy of an overworked pentioner just months away from retirement whose still doing the job of twenty two years I answered with a what I hoped was my best, “This ain’t nothing.” Voice.
“Yes I’m algood now I’m with Seth.”
The subtle boundries drawn into my words hit the nail on the head as a flash of that look appeared for a brief two seconds until it once again borrowed it’s way beneath dark eyes of something I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
Was it jealousy I kept seeing?
Interjecting my recourse to over analise every interaction I encountered, Zare made himself scarce.
“Very well then I leave you to it. I hope you feel better soon Rexy.”
Leaving with an imagined click as my mental door slammed his arse on the way out I turned towards mister concern himself.
“He was there?”
“I guess so. At first I thought I’d imagined it. Looking back now I do remember someone speaking to me after I fell.”
PI gears spining like clockwork inside a well oiled machine.
Seth locked the door turning the sign from open to closed with slow calculated movements that made me think he wasn’t in the here and now but lost somewhere between coincedence and sheer dumb luck.
Facing me his eyes glassed over while the screws tightened with the overflowing toolkit in an arsenal of deductive skills and intuitive instincts he asked.
“How many times have you run into him outside of work?”
I could see what his foresighted conclusion was getting at by the change from worrying about me to worrying about Zare’s apparant pop up notifications of, “here I am.”
“You can’t be thinking what I think you are.”
“It makes sense Rexy. The night last week now this. It all happened after he arrived.”
“This. Today. Was because of you not him.”
He visibly flinched at that one.
Backpedding like a fortune five hundred CEO the moment a employee tries to cash in on one of thier promises I quickly added.
“What I mean to say is.
He lives around that area.
So it makes sense that we would run into each other.” When he still looked sceptical I doubled up with a, “He was running errands Seth.
I saw the grocery bags myself.”
When Seth still didn’t answer I put his fears to rest with the one thing I knew he’d listen to.
“Don’t let your judgment be clouded by your feelings for me.” The instant my words were out I regretted them.
3-3 with a side of “At least not until you have proof.”
Since I couldn’t take the words back I could at least make him see reason.
Still in a state of melancholy he agreed.
“You’re right. I shouldn’t get ahead of myself until I know for sure.”
Meeting my gaze the pain in his eyes at what I’d said almost made my heart explode with guilt.
I had opened up pandoras box only to snap it back shut before it even had a chance to let hope out.
I had brought to life the one thing that was an unwritten rule between us to never to be voiced out loud.
Why did I do that?
“We fight, we fix, we move on.”
My first smile since this whole ordeal started.
In one sentence Seth had set things straight.
Those few words having the effect of yeeting the perverbial elephant in the room to timbuktu along with it’s uncomfortable twin in a snake skin leather jacket.
“We fight, we fix, we move on.”
With a smirk that set his eyes alight once more, effectively removing the dispair that I was afraid would dwell between us forever he grabbed his jacket.
“Come on. I think we’ve done enough for the day.”
Giggleing like a school girl out of girls gone wild I nodded.
“Agreed.”
“What, no snappy come backs about how walking you home is cramping your style?”
“You caught me on a good day.”
“Or maybe your warming up to the routine.”
“Not a chance bucko. Come hell or high water I’ll gain my freedom back.”
His laugh followed us out the door.
~
In the weeks that followed there was no more runins with mister tall dark and contradictary.
Everything going back to normal like I hadn’t had the worse panic attack of my life that I hoped no one would ever see again, let alone Seth.
The missing persons case was back on the board and my date night chellenge put on the back burner for the time being.
Don’t get me wrong I hadn’t given up on my chance to work along side Seth as his mentee.
For now though I felt I needed to desensitize myself before reentering the one stop shop with all your torture needs.
Seth’s suspicions about our leather wrap burito male eqivilant of a snack filled taco were put at ease.
His case proving to be even more complicated then the missing person.
“I just don’t get it. It doesn’t add up.”
Much to my delight daily briefings had started where Seth would run through each case he was working.
With my Sherlock homes hat in place deligently taking notes across from agent Gideon criminal minds extraordinaire.
“What doesn’t?”
“With all the carnage of the crime scene. The police couldn’t find one piece of evidence. Not one.”
“Maybe the killers a cleaner?”
No pun intended.
“It was in a park. What cleaner would kill someone in a park where it’s literally imposible to clean.”
“Good point.”
Closing the file he switched to the missing person.
“Two seemingly unrelated cases and yet I’m stumped on both.”
“Have you tried not thinking about it.”
His leveled me with his best, “do you want to do it.” Stare.
“I’m just saying sometimes when you think too hard about something the answers seem further away. Try looking at it like it only just happened.”
“Like a new call in?”
“Exactly. Let’s say you were back in your detectives offices and bam in comes the call. Girl missing. What would you do?”
“I’d go to the location where she disappeared.”
“Well hop to.”
“We can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because its been three months the place has already been cleaned and reassigned to someone else.”
“Ah but it’s a new case isn’t it. It’s only just happened.”
Excited about finally going on a field trip I was already out the door by the time Seth had grabbed his things.
“You sure about this? It’s in the upper suburbs.”
“It’s not like I haven’t been there before.”
“True but the last time you were there,”
He let his words trail off leaving me to fill in the blanks.
“I killed a man. It’s ok Seth you can say it.”
“I just want to make sure the same thing doesn’t happen.”
“What me killing a man or hypervetaling like a bucking mule?”
“Can you not be serious to two seconds and talk to me like you aren’t a sarcastic ball of sass.”
My laugh drifting into the wind was so loud the people across the street stared at us like we were teenage mutant ninja turtles straight out of the sewer.
Hissing at them with my best splinter inpersonation as they padded down the road like Shredder’s foot soldiers after yet again being beaten to a bloodly pulp.
“Was that necessary?”
“It really was and yes Seth I can handle an outing to midas’s kingdom where everything turns to gold.”
“The question is can they handle you.”
Mumbled under his breath while his back was turned to lock the door.
“Heard that.”
“You were meant to.”
My tongue poked out so fast I swear I could see the frog shifters clapping behind him in a standing ovation of, “if only you were one of us.”
“Brat.”
Beaming from ear to ear I lead us to the only transportation that would get us to uppers in one piece.
Barely.
Besides flying in shifter form that is.
The train station.