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CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

THE brEAKUP

J oe followed the scent of Percy’s very particular tobacco blend. He didn’t know London well, but when he’d run about two blocks, he came upon the Savoy and hedged his bets. There were three bars in the hotel, but it was in a quiet corner of the American Bar that Joe found Percy starting the last of the three cocktails he’d already ordered. “Three more of those, please,” Joe instructed the barman, then he took a seat by Percy.

Percy glanced at him, downed the cocktail, and lifted a hand for another.

“Drunk is good,” said Joe. “But it’s not going to solve anything.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. If I stay drunk forever, then I won’t have any more problems.”

“Percy—”

“Don’t try to make it okay. That was it. That was my final straw. I’m done. You and me…” Percy’s eyes flitted away to the dark recesses of the bar. “We’re done.”

Joe’s heart skipped a beat when he heard the words, but his voice was strong when he replied, “Do you remember what happened last time you tried that? I didn’t listen then either.”

“And look where that got us.”

“It got us engaged.”

Four more drinks were set down on the table, three empty glasses taken away. Percy took up the next to avoid speaking.

Joe said, “I had the best time with you in Sicily. And in Bruges. The best time in my whole life.”

Percy countered with a maudlin, “I almost lost you yesterday. I thought I got away with it. I thought we could have that happy ending. And I let myself feel hopeful. I thought we might solve this mess. Together. But you know, there’s always going to be that one last thing. That sting in the tail. It’s this life. It’s just the way it goes.”

Joe pressed his knee against Percy’s beneath the table. “What happened to eternity? Burning down the gates of Heaven?”

“That’s when you were dead and I didn’t have anything to lose. But now you’re back?—”

“So you’ll throw me away before you lose me again?”

“Something like that.”

Joe let a few empty beats fall between them before he asked, “And Cleo? Are you going to throw her away too?”

Percy’s eyes closed slowly, and remained that way when he said, “It’s not like that.”

“Of course it’s not.” Joe pulled at Percy’s hand until he drew his gaze back. “I know you and I know you’re going after her next. I love that about you. I love that you could walk away right now, with me, which I know is what you want. And I love that you won’t.”

“Joe, it doesn’t matter what you or I love. That’s the rule of evil. It will always destroy what we have. It will come back again and again and chip away at this. If it’s not Molly, then it will be some bishop with a basement full of soul eaters. If it’s not that, it will be a group of fucking Nazis with a nice painting. There will always be something. There’s no escaping it.”

“It’s because you seek it out,” Joe said softly. “If we’d already moved to our nice pub, you wouldn’t have a clue those things were going on out there.”

“The pub would inevitably be haunted. You know that as well as I do.”

“Probably.” Joe chuckled. He sipped the blood-red drink, which was, as always, wonderful. Percy’s taste, everything about him, always wonderful, in its bittersweet way. Joe ventured to point out what Percy must already have known. “Molly will be ready for us this time. You know she’s powerful. Maybe even more powerful than her familiar, and it almost killed us both so easily. We’ve seen her raise the dead—god knows what else she can do. And I’m willing to bet, the thought’s already crossed your mind that if you kill her body, Cleo’s trapped in that skull forever.”

That idea, until then unspoken, had occurred to Percy, over and over, but only as background noise. He’d been too busy to let himself worry about it. “I’ll figure it out.”

“No. There’s no way I’ll let you do this on your own. I know I’m not a hitman. Or much of an art thief. Or a trafficker of fine arts and artefacts. But what I am is a man who’s in love with you. And it’s time for you to take your foot off the pedal, just for a little while. Let me help.”

A sceptical smile cut into Percy’s cheek, bereft of humour, and he shook his head.

“I know.” Joe lifted Percy’s fingers and kissed his open palm. He placed his hand on his chest and held it there. “It’s control. It’s what you need. I understand that now. But I need you to slow down and listen to me.” Taking Percy’s hand to the table, he reached inside his coat, and produced Moxie, setting her down by Percy’s fingers.

The act elicited Percy’s sharp, “Get that thing the fuck away from me.”

Joe grasped the hand he withdrew. “This cat is the key to everything. It understands Molly. It can help us fix this. It will help us fix this.”

Percy stood to leave, but Joe was up faster, locking an arm around his waist. “If you try to go without me, I’ll come anyway. I know I let you down?—”

“You didn’t let me down.” But even with that comment, thrown out so blithely, Percy remained avoidant, his chin pulled up and away, the distance palpable.

“Would you stop saying that? Even now you’re trying to protect me, and I need you to stop. You’ve done enough.”

“It was a good and noble thing?—”

“It wasn’t good and noble that got us out of that,” Joe cried in exasperation. “It was your passion, and your violence, and your anger. It was your steadfastness.” He wrapped his fingers around the opening in Percy’s shirt, feeling the strong beat of his heart beneath the palm of his hand. “Percy, when you said those things, when you talked about tearing eternity apart, when you almost slashed my throat and yours, that’s when I realised. You’re never going to change.” Percy withdrew a little further into himself, eyes to the carpet, words lost at his lips, and Joe put a hand to his cheek and moved closer, chest against chest. “And I have never felt so safe in my entire life.”

Finally, Percy’s eyes met Joe’s, their lips an inch apart. “I thought, hoped, I was right when I agreed to marry you. I’ve been in love with you since our first week together. But when you put that knife to my throat, that’s when I knew. You’re the one true thing. We’re forever, because you’re forever. You make me feel so safe, and I won’t give that up. I won’t ever give you up, so stop talking like that. If that trust you had in me is broken, then let me prove myself. Please. I’m not going back to the emptiness I felt before I had you. Before you filled me up with your brutal, beautiful way of loving. With every ridiculous and perfect thing that you are.” His chest heaved out a frustrated groan. “I love you. I love you to the end of existence and back, and I’m never leaving you. Not for all the world.” Joe’s two hands on Percy’s cheeks pulled him in, and had Percy wanted to resist the soft lips that caressed his, it wouldn’t have been possible.

It was over. They both knew it. But Percy tried a last ditch, “It’s not safe.”

“Fuck, Percy, nothing’s been safe since the day I met you. You live in a constant storm. You are a storm. There’s no escaping that because it’s who you are. But I need you to understand, I want to be in that storm with you. You’re all I want. You’re all I’ve ever wanted. We’re going to fix this. We’ll get Cleo back in her body, Molly reunited with her familiar, and then we’re going to get your kitten back to you, too.”

“Percy!” the barman called across the almost empty room. “No cats in the bar!”

“I’ve had a long day, Ben,” Percy shouted back. “Can’t you see I’m breaking up with my fiancé?”

“No, he’s not!” Joe called out.

Ben watched the two a moment, then rolled his eyes and said, “Drinks are on the house.”

“Two more Devil’s Cocktails,” Percy responded.

On a double take, Joe asked, “Are they really called that?”

“I didn’t name them. But they are very good.”

“They are.”

He let Joe take his hand and settle him back into his seat. Moxie had long since stretched out on her belly, and for a while, had been shuffling towards Percy. He ripped his hand away from the paw that reached for him. “Don’t you ever touch me.”

It was Joe who leaned over and scratched her behind the ear. “Don’t forget, your kitten’s in here too.”

Percy watched Moxie twist her head up to enjoy Joe’s pats, eyes half closed with the sensation, that constant purr he’d already grown to love rattling out of the tiny body. “I wonder what that must be like for her.”

“Not bad, I think,” said Joe. “She’s warm and well fed.” He snuck a glance up at Percy. “She’s loved. I don’t know what it’s doing to her brain to be melded with a being like that, but the familiar isn’t intrinsically evil. It’s just an asshole.”

“Mew,” Moxie protested.

“You are,” said Joe, rubbing her chin.

Percy still refused to touch the little beast, but Joe could see he wanted to. He picked her up and put her on Percy’s shoulder, where she nuzzled against his neck. Percy tilted his head away, but as Joe expected, he let her stay there, albeit with the disgusted look of a man who’d just had a bird shit on his shoulder.

Joe hid a grin behind his drink. “So did you say we’re off to Paris next?”

“Joe—”

“Shh! I’m going. And you’ll see. I’m going to be a proper criminal, proper ghost hunter, proper witch, um, de-body-erer, and no fuck ups. Watch me. Because, Percy, I’d travel all the way to France for you.”

Percy levelled a powerful glare at him. “You’re going to be like that?”

“I’d walk over to that bar and back for you,” Joe quipped.

Percy rolled his beautiful eyes. “Why did I bother to save you?”

Joe leaned close by Percy’s ear and said, “I’d burn through every cigarette in that case, drink every drink in this hotel, then take you upstairs and fuck you senseless.”

Finally, a full grin broke across Percy’s face, and he was Percy again, just as much as Joe was Joe again. And they two were as hopelessly in love as they both knew they would always be.

Moxie chose that moment to stick her purring nose in Percy’s ear, and he reached up and stroked her back. “Fine. You can come to Paris. But no fucking around. And I won’t go easy on you.”

“I won’t go easy on you.”

“Stop flirting. I’m trying to be morose.”

“I won’t let you be morose. You’ll see. Once we get through this next episode, there’s a happy ending waiting for us. I promise.”

“I hate to break it to you, Handsome. I don’t think you and I are cut out for the happy ever after lifestyle.”

Joe, with an arm around Percy’s neck, his lips smacking against his cheek, said, “If I’m with you, no matter what happens, that’s my happy ending.”

“You should probably aim higher.”

“It’s not possible to aim higher. You’re it. Will you marry me?”

Percy, by this time as pink and happy as a schoolboy deep in his first crush, replied, “It’s nice to be asked.”

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Joe wrapped his second arm around his fiancé and kissed him long and loving. “Come on. Let’s forget the rest and go back to the hotel.”

“Ben,” Percy called out. “Get us a room upstairs, would you? And mind this cat for me.”

Ben, ever the professional, was on the phone with barely a blink.

“It’s a ten-minute cab ride,” Joe protested. “To your penthouse. That costs a fortune.”

Percy pulled Joe around the table, walking him backwards, kissing him over the words, “I can’t wait that long.” He dumped a grumpy but compliant Moxie on the bar, danced Joe past reception, and within minutes they were alone, just Percy and Joe, with all the cares and worries of their world shut outside that room, outside that bed, kept decadently at bay, until the hour came when they would have to open their door again, and let the horror back in.