Cal got lofty. “Do you really think I would ever leave him alone with you?”
“Well,” Benny jumped in while searching for a place to park, his tone almost thoughtful, “he did try to kill you, Cal. Specifically, he tried to have a demon or Ray kill you. So if you wanted to avoid him, I’d understand and I bet Ray would too.”
Ray took several long moments to even out his breathing while Cal tried unsuccessfully to shush his friend. “What,” Ray said softly but distinctly, “the fuck?” He pointed to Cal. “Explain, Snapdragon.”
Cal’s eyes went wide. His lips parted. “Oh, Ray. Oh, that’s not fair.”
Ray tossed the ice pack onto the seat next to him. “Why is it a problem when I say the flower names?”
Cal shook his head slowly and didn’t seem to be aware he did it. “All this time, have you known what the flower namesmeant, and I never thought to ask?” He was so quiet, he might have been asking himself. “I thought you were just being… teasing. Or facetious.” He swallowed. “Speciesist. It’s why I responded in kind, why I called you stuff likeFido. I thought you wanted that. Instead, you were being secretly sweet or something, but you just let me…. You never once said ‘Stop making dog jokes, Parker!’ In your gruff voice. God, we have issues.” He wheeled around to cross his arms, leaving Ray to stare at his shoulder and one pointed ear.
“Anyway,” Cal continued after a moment, not looking at Ray. “I won’t do it again. I grew up disliking Bones for the things he called Spock—yes, Benny, I know they were friends or, to some people, lovers, but Spock was half-human and I am half-human. He had pointy ears and so do I, and I never liked all the ‘green-blooded’ stuff. Yet there I went, doing it to Ray.”
“I probably didn’t mind,” Ray offered hesitantly. He’d heard worse in high school gym class.
Benny scoffed. “I doubt it. That shit takes a toll whether you acknowledge it or not, especially when it’s constant, andespeciallywhen it’s from someone who matters to you.”
Cal huffed and then aggressively wiped his face. “Snapdragon. He not only uses them, he uses them like a fairy would use the actual flower. I…”
Ray wished he had a handkerchief or at least a tissue. “I keep making you cry.”
“This timeImade me cry,” Cal snuffled into his forearm, then popped Benny’s glove compartment to expose a pile of paper napkins from fast food restaurants. “But it’s been a stressful twenty-four hours.”
Ray had never seen a fairy cry until yesterday and he was already too familiar with the sight. “Ross.” It was a pathetic subject change, but Cal sniffled and dabbed at his face before shooting a look at Benny. “Tell me about him.”
Benny made a small, exasperated noise, poked Cal in the knee, then said, “That mess. Well, you should know you and Cal were not together yet. There was a series of gross and weird murders, and it turned out this officer, Ross, who was a jerk anyway, thought that murders of people you didn’t like would impress you.”
That seemed to be the extremely short version.
Ray could feel himself frowning. “Why would he need to impress me?”
“Honestly, Raymond,” Cal mumbled into his napkin.
Ray only narrowed his eyes. “Because I’m were,” he guessed out loud, “he thoughtmurderwould impress me? Is that it?”
“Not to give Ross any credit because fuck that guy,” Cal mumbled at a higher volume, “and he definitely knew nothing about you or actual weres, but his desire to impress you was more aboutyouthan a werewolf kink.”
“Anyway.” Benny was firm enough to silence Cal before continuing his summary of the events. “Ross trapped a demon to do it—that was added to the other charges. The demon is still in therapy about it, poor guy. You nearly died fighting the demon to protect Cal, because it turns out that resisting making Cal your, um, man.” Benny stopped there as if reevaluating his word choice and Cal shuddered dramatically. Benny wrinkled his nose in agreement. He tried again. “That resisting making Cal your matelot,” Cal made a thoughtful sound so Benny went with that word, “had weakened you, and you took some major damage in the fighting, and you weren’t healing fast enough to repair that damage.” He gave Ray a condemning look in the mirror before driving took his attention again. He shrugged. “Then you fainted.”
“Resisting?” Ray echoed the word ringing in his ears. He looked at Cal, who didn’t turn around but seemed to know Ray was studying him.
“Later, Ray,” he promised, softly.
Ray reached for the ice pack and put it to his forehead before shutting his eyes.
“Ah! Gotcha!” Benny whispered triumphantly, and parked in a good spot.
Ray looked out the window at a small patch of grass and a few trees, one of the city’s unofficial parks. Too small for events, but something nearby residents had claimed for their own. At this hour on a weekday, it wasn’t crowded. A few parents or sitters with very small children. An older human woman reading a book on grass although the grass was probably a dog restroom, and a youngish human man, white, maybe in his twenties and dressed casually, sitting at the metal picnic table between a hot dog cart and a tamales cart. The human man wasn’t doing anything but nervously flipping his phone around and around in his hands.
“That’s who you’re meeting?” Ray asked, trying to ignore the unpleasant, cold feeling in his stomach.
“Okay, but like,pretendyou’re not paying attention,” Cal agreed and chided Ray at the same time before getting out of the car. “Andtryto be inconspicuous.”
Ray frowned and waited until they were both gone before he pushed Cal’s seat down to help him painfully extricate himself from the backseat. He got rid of the ice pack, and then, even though it made his head throb, he bent down to touch his toes and stretch his back.
He stayed on the far side of the car, although he towered over it once he straightened and not even the breeze or the children’s chatter could keep him from hearing the conversation between Cal, Benny, and the young human. He kept his eyes down at least, for appearances, not that it mattered.
“Who is that?” the human at the table remarked almost the very second Ray stood up. Ray considered his suit and tie, out of place in a park, and wondered irritably if he should have worn something more informal.
