No personal effects. No photographs. Not even a pad and a pen.
“Where is it, Luchas,” he murmured. “You must have left something for him. You didn’t do that without explaining yourself.”
Blay went over to the bed, which was made up precisely, with hospital corners Fritz would approve of and a set of pillows that were so centered at the headboard, you’d think a protractor and ruler had been used to put them in place.
“Where did you get the black robe?” Blay murmured. “And why did you wear it—”
He stopped.
Now his hand shook.
As he reached out to the rolling table, he didn’t pick up the white, business-sized envelope that had been placed in the corner of the tray. He just brushed his finger over the two words written in thin blue ink: “Brother Mine.”
Blay swiped his face with his palm. Then he looked around again.
When he refocused on the tray, he saw why Qhuinn would have missed the missive, especially if he’d been in a panic as he’d looked for his brother: The tray was white, the business envelope was white, and just like the pillows, the letter had been lined up precisely in one corner. It was nearly invisible.
“You okay?”
He pivoted to the voice. Manny Manello was leaning into the room, the doctor’s face full of grim expectation. Like he’d seen this specific kind of tragedy before and knew what a head job it did on people.
“Can you—” Blay cleared his throat. “You can make sure no one comes in here, right?”
“Sure, but what is—”
“The note.” Blay pointed to the envelope. “It’s for Qhuinn. I don’t want anyone touching it or anything else in here.”
Manny nodded. “Nobody gets in here but him.”
“Thank you.”
“What can I do?”
Blay looked around again. Then he went over to the bathroom. Pushing the door open, a light came on automatically. There was nothing significant on the counter.
No, that wasn’t true. There was a toothbrush in a holder that would never be used again, a half-filled tube of Colgate that would never be finished, and a bar of soap that would remain forever dry. Towels, which had been folded with care, were stacked on some shelves over the toilet and there were others hanging on rods—and they would all remain untouched by the suite’s previous occupant. The shower, which was just a curtain and a lip, the threshold for entry no more than two inches high, would no longer be turned on by Luchas’s hand, its stool never sat upon by him again, the shampoo and soap forever at the level they had been left.
Taking a deep breath, Blay caught the faded scents of cleanliness and habit.
Death was so strange. When it claimed its prey, there was a hard stop to the heart, the lungs, the body itself. But the artifacts of a person had a kind of kinetic motion that kept them going forward, at least for a little while. Clothes, shoes, medicines, bath products, subscriptions to things… all of that detritus of life was like loose objects in a car that had hit a brick wall, still banging around the interior.
Until they were dealt with, given away, put to use by someone else, thrown out, canceled.
Life should be more permanent than a tube of toothpaste with three inches left in its belly, he thought.
Blay rubbed the ache in the center of his chest. Then again, that was what the heart was for. The dead were immortal in the souls of those they left behind, and the payment for that permanence was pain.
As his phone went off with a text, he turned back to Manny. “Just make sure no one gets in here, okay? Please.”
Manny placed his right hand over his sternum. “You have my word.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Qhuinn was sitting by the side of the tub when he heard the bedroom door open and close. The footfalls that came across the Persian carpet were soft, and there was a hesitation before Blay leaned inside the marble expanse.
The sight of that red hair and those blue eyes, of the clothes that Qhuinn had watched the male put on earlier in the night, of his mate’s expression of wary sadness, made a wave of emotion crest. But he fought the feelings back, stopping the weakness by recalling that when the dressing had occurred, when he had enjoyed the sight of his mate’s naked body in the walk-in closet… everything had been different.
The world had been totally altered.