My stomach felt a little fluttery as I went to sign him in to the office—a mix of excitement to see him and hunger.
Ronda, our front desk admin, was chatting amiably with Elliot, who was wearing jeans, a black turtleneck, and an olive-green cardigan, heavily cabled with wide wood buttons under his open coat. His earrings were heavy silver teardrops that swung slightly as he moved. He held a grocery-size paper bag with the Farm Inn logo stamped on it in red ink. My stomach rumbled at the smells wafting out of the bag, and I grinned behind the mask I’d pulled on to walk out to the front.
Elliot’s expression was a little wary, and I wasn’t sure why.
“Hey, Ronda,” I said to her, and her eyes crinkled a little as she smiled at me. “Can I sign Elliot in?”
“He’s going back?” she asked, confused.
I frowned. “I thought we could have spouses and significant others come back?” I said. It was one of the things I thought Lacy had said during my rather rushed orientation after they’d hired me.
Ronda’s eyes went wide, and I immediately understood what had happened.
Shit.
She’d seen an Indigenous man with a food bag and assumed he was just here to deliver an order. And I’d just outed both of us. I figured it would take a day, tops, before the whole of the Sheriff’s Office knew I was gay and dating an Indigenous shifter—because Elliot wasn’t wearing a mask, and it was pretty clear that people probably knew who he was, given the media circus that had to have accompanied his dad’s death last year.
I glanced over at Elliot out of the corner of my eye to see whether or not he looked angry with me for having said something, but I couldn’t read his expression.
“Oh! Um. Yes, yes, of course,” was what Ronda said once she managed to stop gaping (I’d seen her jaw move as she closed her mouth, despite the mask). She looked over at Elliot, then, pulled some papers out of one of the drawers. “We just need you to fill these out, please, sir.”
Elliot frowned. “What are they?”
Ronda’s eyes turned up at the corners as she smiled at him, although there was strain there, too. He made her nervous. “Well, we need to make sure that we can trace anyone who comes in. It’s just your name, birth date, and contact information.”
Elliot’s expression was flat. “In case anything goes missing.”
Ronda’s face flushed. “It’s standard procedure for secure areas,” she said, flustered.
Elliot grunted, but set the bag down on the counter and picked up the pen on its little chain and started to fill out the paperwork. I decided that now probably wasn’t the time to mention that Ronda would be using this to run a full background check on him. All of us had been run, too, of course. You had to be in order to work in any capacity for the Sheriff’s Office, from lab tech to officer to front desk admin to janitorial staff.
It probably wouldn’t really make much of a difference, anyway, since I was pretty sure they would have done a comprehensive dive into his background last year—statistically, family members were always the most likely suspects in cases of homicide or suspected foul play. Once they’d decided that Gregory Crane hadn’t killed himself, Elliot would have been the first place they looked. And if he physically couldn’t have done it, they would have checked his finances, contacts, everything.
While Elliot wrote, Ronda handed me the form I had to sign saying that I would be responsible for supervising him while he was here, making sure he didn’t do anything or go anywhere that would be problematic. Mine was a lot shorter—my name and my Sheriff’s Office ID number, along with my signature. Not that I was worried Elliot would do anything to get either of us in trouble.
I waited for Elliot to finish his paperwork—punctuated by a few sighs and a very emphatic signature at the end—and Ronda hit the button to let him through the mag-locked half-gate. It wasn’t really that much of a deterrent, since you could jump over it fairly easily, but I didn’t think that was really the point.
Elliot picked up the bag containing our dinner and came through.
“Hey,” I said, feeling oddly shy. My stomach growled loudly, expressing its greeting, as well.
“Hungry?” Elliot asked, the corner of his lips twitching.
My neck felt hot. “I did not successfully remember to eat today,” I admitted.
“Seth—”
“I know, I know.”
“And yet, you don’tdo,” he remarked in a tone that was at least trying to be lighthearted.
“I know.” I held open the door to what passed as my office, shared with Lacy and Roger, of course, and Elliot walked inside, looking around.
“This is…” I knew he was looking for something positive to say.
I pulled off my mask and set it on the table near the door. “Nineteen-seventies chic,” I said.
Elliot snorted. “Nineteen-seventies shabby chic,” he offered.
