A Friend in the Dark

by C. S. Poe

  Rufus ate some more pancakes. “That next bullet might hit its mark. I don’t make it a habit of walking headfirst into danger.”

  Sam’s smile snapped out, and he worked on the food for a while. When he spoke again, his voice had flattened back into its former tone. “Then you could at least tell me what you think might be going on. Where you’ve looked for his phone. Anything that might help.” Then, throwing down the knife and fork, Sam pushed away the plate. “You might not care about Jake enough to risk your life, but I do, and I want to find who did this to him.”

  Rufus stopped chewing the mound of dough in his mouth and stared at Sam. “I do too care.”

  Sam raised an eyebrow. “Nobody taught you not to talk with your mouth full?” Then, that smirk ghosting across his lips, “Except in certain cases, of course.”

  Rufus swallowed. “Wow.”

  “I might have somewhere to start, but I want to know the rest of it. Where else have you looked for his phone? If you had to make a list, right now, of who might have killed him, who are your top five? What don’t I know that I need to know?”

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?” Rufus asked with a sort of disbelieving laugh. “Jake was a cop—a good one. Any criminal in this city would want him out of the way. Anyone he’s put on Rikers who’s got connections on the outside could have done this.” But Rufus held up one hand and began to tick locations off on each finger, starting with his pinky. “I checked his apartment. I checked his car. I checked his secret apartment.” He said that and gave Sam the finger. “I checked trash cans, a nearby park—short of going through his desk at the precinct, I’ve checked everywhere for his stupid phone.”

  Sam mouthed, Secret apartment, shook his head, and ate a few more bites of potatoes. Then, without seeming to realize it, pushed the mostly intact stack of pancakes toward Rufus. “I don’t know,” Sam said. “If they wanted to scare you off, they might have tossed the phone. Maybe they still have it. We could talk to the girlfriend, see if she’s connected to his Find My Phone app or whatever they have. Or… or we try something else, to start.”

  Rufus inched his fork toward Sam’s pancakes as he spoke, stabbed one, and quickly slid it on to his own plate. “Do you know Natalie? I’ve never met her. I’m not supposed to know about her. But I’m a curious little shit, so said Jake on more than one occasion.” He doused the pancake in more syrup and took a huge bite.

  Whatever Sam thought about that little revelation, Rufus couldn’t tell. Sam watched him again, hands tucked under his arms, the pose now familiar. “No,” Sam finally said. “Jake told me about her. Just that she existed, basically. Jake was complicated about that kind of stuff.”

  Rufus made a sound. “Complicated,” he agreed.

  “Do you want to cruise the Ramble with me?”

  “I’m still on Natalie. She might freak out, you know.”

  “Oh, she’ll definitely be freaked out. But I’d rather have her freak out and give us some answers than us stumble around just so we can leave her illusion of Jake intact.” Leaning against the bench, both arms now stretched along the back of the seat, Sam said, “You didn’t answer my question about going cruising together.”

  Rufus’s fingertips tingled. He put his fork and knife down and rubbed his hands on his thighs until the friction against his jeans deadened the sensation. He realized he’d been staring at Sam’s broad chest while doing so and quickly averted his gaze to… Sam’s biceps that went on for days. Rufus shook himself, looked at Sam’s face, and nearly drowned in the other man’s deep brown eyes. Dammit. “Uh, I don’t… at the Ramble… no.”

  “You don’t put out for pancakes,” Sam said like a kid doing sums. “You don’t go cruising.” Then, one plus one equals two, he said, “Oh God. You’re a virgin.”

  “What? No, I’m not. Fuck you.”

  Sam nodded slowly. “Of course not. My mistake.”

  “I’m not. And you know, acting this thirsty to fuck a bona fide redhead is excessive. Just ask nicely.”

  Nodding again, Sam said, “Ask nicely. I’ll remember that.” Then, reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a wad of bills and counted out cash. “Will that cover the check?”

  Rufus looked down at his mostly eaten meal.

  Jake hadn’t ever asked Rufus how he was doing on money—Jake had simply done things for him. Little things. Like calling in delivery whenever Rufus broke into his apartment because he was lonely and couldn’t stand another night in his shithole studio without someone to talk to. Sometimes Jake would slip a fresh MetroCard in alongside Rufus’s CI pay, because Jake knew he jumped the turnstiles and he was trying to deter the petty thief in Rufus. And occasionally Jake would ask Rufus to go buy them both a coffee at a bodega, but he’d give Rufus too much money and Rufus never came back with change and Jake never questioned it.

  Sam hadn’t offered to buy Rufus a meal. He’d merely done it—in his own aggressive and brutish way, of course—but it’d meant something to Rufus. It meant something when another man could see his fault lines cracking, growing wider, shaking his foundation, and instead of pointing it out for everyone and God to see, they… nudged a plate of pancakes in front of him because Rufus hadn’t eaten much in the last few days and it was probably starting to show.

  So the least he could do in return was bring Sam to Natalie Miller’s apartment. It’d put Sam on the path toward discovering answers, and then he could talk to the cops about whatever he found. They’d believe Sam. He was ex-Army. Jake’s friend. He’d see that justice was served. And whoever thought Rufus was a threat would be handled and everything would… go on.

  Rufus downed his remaining coffee, collected his jacket, hat, sunglasses, and said with a quick nod, “That’s enough.” He got out of the booth, put the articles on, and instead of making a show about how he was now, in fact, putting out for Sam, he asked, “Get all those singles from stripping?”

  Sam raised an eyebrow as he slid out of the booth. “Ask nicely, and maybe I’ll show you.” And then he was past Rufus and heading for the door, calling over his shoulder, “Let’s go blow another heteronormative world to fuck.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  While they’d been in the diner, it had been easy for Sam to keep his shit together. Noise—the soap playing on the television mounted in the corner, metal spatula scraping the grill, patrons talking, a balding man laughing on his phone—but a level that Sam could handle, nothing too loud or too abrupt. And smells, too, but for the most part, they’d been good smells: the pancakes, the grease, the coffee, the hint of Rufus’s Dial soap that snuck through everything else. In the diner, while Sam could clamp his hands under his arms and pretend everything was fine, he’d been able to work Rufus pretty well, get most of what he wanted without giving away too much.

  As soon as they were back on the streets, though, Manhattan invaded. The thrum of a jackhammer; two women shouting at each other from open windows on the fourth floor of a brick building; a screech of brakes as a car swerved to avoid a courier, and the courier swearing as he swerved in turn to avoid a mommy gang pushing strollers. The heat, the stink, the dirt. Sam took deep breaths and jerked his chin at Rufus to take the lead.

  It only got worse. Rufus led him down a flight of stairs to a subway station. The rattle of an approaching train filtered through the hub of voices, and Rufus sprinted forward, jumped the turnstile, and glanced back at Sam with something smug all over his face. When Sam hesitated, Rufus shrugged and jogged down another flight of stairs.

  Swearing, Sam copied the movement, blushing at the dirty look an older man gave him. Someone shouted after Sam, and he pitched down the stairs, hitting the landing below at a jog. He caught sight of Rufus boarding a car, and Sam sprinted after him, turning sideways to squeeze between the closing doors.

  Then they were crammed together. Sardines in a can. Maybe fish in a barrel. The stink of unwashed bodies, of sweat, of spoiled food. And no empty space, no air. Rufus’s body was pressed up against Sam’s, Sam’s sweat-cov
ered back plastered to the door. This close, Sam could feel the wiry muscle running through the redhead, could smell Dial soap and, now, his hair, the wool of his beanie—what a ridiculous piece of fuckery in July—something else, too, something he thought of as just Rufus.

  Rufus’s thigh was between Sam’s legs.

  Rufus kept shifting.

  There wasn’t enough air in the car. There wasn’t enough space.

  Sam must have made some kind of noise, because Rufus glanced at him. “How you doing? Downtown train at the start of rush hour and all.”

  “Fine,” Sam growled.

  The redheaded asshole just kept shifting his weight, his thigh bumping into Sam every damn time.

  Sam tried to lean away. He tried to pull back. He tried not to think about the fact that Rufus was actually kind of funny, actually kind of cute, surprisingly sensitive under the veneer, if his reactions were any gauge, and maybe even smart and tough, although some of that remained to be decided. Sam tried really, really hard not to think about freckles, how far they might go down the redhead. Tried not to think about all the jokes that had seemed safe and contained inside the controlled environment of the diner.

  Rufus twisted around, his mouth almost at Sam’s ear, and said, “We need to get off.”

  Sam might have groaned. He hoped that the shriek of brakes engaging drowned out the noise, but judging by the way those green eyes widened in amusement, he didn’t think so.

  Then the doors opened and they spilled out of the car, Rufus catching Sam’s shirt—the inside-out tee almost translucent where the white had soaked up sweat—to steady him. A few more minutes, and they were out of the hellhole, emerging into a city that seemed, in comparison, clean and cool and open. Sam hated the city, but he thought he might fucking die if he had go in the subway again.

  Rufus led them onto a smaller street. Brownstones ran along both sides, many of them choked by ivy. The trees here were tall, green, shady. After ten steps, Sam wiped his face, dried his hands on his jeans, and felt a little more centered. When Rufus looked at him, though, he just shook his head. He didn’t want to talk about it; he definitely didn’t want to give the redhead any more of an edge.

  “Are we close?” Sam asked.

  “We have to walk to Fourteenth and catch the L into Brooklyn. It’s a hell of a trek.”

  Sam stopped walking. “More trains?”

  Rufus paused midstep, looked over his shoulder again, and gave a ridiculous grin. “No. I’m kidding. We’re almost there. Near the end of this block.”

  “Oh,” Sam said, hearing the lameness of the response. And then, even worse, but he couldn’t seem to stop it: “Good.” And he didn’t know why he liked that Rufus held that ridiculous grin for another moment before going on.

  Rufus stopped at one of the brownstones, distinguishable from the others only by the blue trim on the windows and a flowerbox that had been neglected for a long time.

  “She owns this thing?” Sam said. “Christ, is she an heiress or something?”

  Rufus removed his sunglasses, hung them from the collar of his T-shirt, and hummed in response. “She owns some startup company. A millennial whose success hinged on mommy and daddy’s bank account.”

  “A millennial,” Sam repeated. “Fucking perfect. And you think she’ll be home? What are the odds she’s going to smile at her boyfriend’s old fuck buddy, hand over her phone, and tell us to have fun and be safe?”

  Rufus glanced up at Sam. “Aren’t you all sunshine and puppies.”

  “How good are you at—” Sam tried to find the right word, the one that would get Rufus’s hackles up and, hopefully, put his ego on the line. “—snooping?”

  “I was eating fucking chips when you fumbled your way into Jake’s place. How good do you think I am?” Rufus asked, not breaking his eye contact.

  “Slightly below average,” Sam said with a shrug. “You left crumbs everywhere.”

  “Are you baiting me?”

  “You’re cute when you get all suspicious and paranoid. All right. Let’s try this. I’ll talk to her. You find a way to get out of the conversation and look around.” Sam pursed his lips. “Unless that’s too difficult for you.”

  Rufus squared his shoulders, jutted his chin out, and did a very good job at looking well and truly offended. “Natalie carries a purple Michael Kors bag. And I bet—” He paused, patted various pockets, then produced a pack of gum. “I bet this that her phone is in the purse. And if this wasn’t for Jake, I’d knee you in the nuts for suggesting I’m below average. I’m a fucking great snoop.”

  “Spearmint.” Sam made a face. “And I didn’t suggest you were below average. I said you were. I guess we’re about to find out if I’m right.”

  Without waiting for an answer, he took the steps up to the brownstone’s door and rang the bell. It buzzed deep inside the house, and thirty seconds passed before footsteps moved toward the door. It swung open, and a petite woman with brown hair in a pixie cut and very expensive shoes answered the door.

  Natalie Miller made eye contact with Sam’s chest, then tilted her head to look at his face. “Um—yes?”

  “Sam Auden, ma’am. United States Army Intelligence.” He produced his military ID, which he’d smuggled out after everything went bad at Benning, the expiration date still six months away. “This is Mr. Hiscock. May we have a few minutes of your time?”

  “Army Intelligence?” Natalie repeated, looking toward the ID, but Sam was already tucking it away. She glanced at Rufus next, who stood a step behind Sam, studied his appearance with a skeptical eyebrow raise, then asked, “What’s this in regards to?”

  “You were acquainted with Mr. Jacob Brower?”

  Her face screwed up into something painful, her eyes bright with wet. “Y-yes,” she managed with breath that sounded as if it’d been knocked from her chest.

  “If we could just have a few minutes of your time.”

  Natalie cautiously stepped aside and gestured for them each to enter. She led them into a combination kitchen and living space at the back of the brownstone, obviously a gut-and-update job, lots of expensive-looking appliances and furniture, white subway tile mixed with jute floor coverings, and columns of July sunlight pouring in through the windows. After she motioned to a sofa, Sam and Rufus sat, but Natalie remained standing, wringing her hands once and then adjusting a tiny ceramic bluebird on the console table.

  Sam nudged Rufus’s knee with his own, waiting for Natalie to make her opening offer, coffee, tea—unless she fell apart first.

  “Ms. Miller?” Rufus said, meeting her eyes as she jerked her head up. “May I use your restroom?”

  “Oh. Yes, of course. It’s the first door down the hall,” she said, pointing to the right.

  Rufus stood and walked out of the room without making a sound.

  Natalie glanced at Sam once the bathroom door had shut. “Would you like something to drink? I don’t have coffee. It’s not good for you. But some herbal tea, maybe? Or water?”

  “Water would be fine,” Sam said. Some of what was going to happen next was strategy. And some was intuition. And some was totally predictable. But a big part was conditioning: get her saying yes, answering the little questions, so it all seemed natural. When Natalie came back with a water in a cardboard box like that milk they used to sell in the school cafeteria, Sam struggled not to roll his eyes. The damn thing probably cost more than the lunch he’d just bought Rufus.

  “What was the nature of your relationship with Mr. Brower?” Sam asked, pulling out his phone and pretending to type, as though taking notes.

  “Our relationship?” Natalie took a seat in an overstuffed chair directly across from the couch and crossed her legs at the ankles. “I suppose you’re asking everyone close to him…. Jake and I are—were dating. A little over a year.”

  Over her shoulder, Sam spotted Rufus slipping out of the bathroom and heading away from the conversation. Sam focused on giving Natalie a smile, just business, you know how it is.
It wasn’t as easy as he’d thought. A little over a year. Images flicked through his head, a carousel of all the precious fucking moments Jake had spent with her: holding hands at the Alice statue in Central Park, gelato in Midtown, kissing at a rooftop bar while the city glowed like flecks of mica on a black beach. Sam could hear himself, hear how casual he’d tried to make it sound to Rufus: We fucked around. Then, vividly, punching the breath from his lungs, Natalie on her back and Jake driving into her.

  “That’s right,” Sam heard himself say. “Could you describe your relationship? How were things between you and Jake?”

  “Good,” she said in a rush. “I mean, you know, it was mostly good. Relationships can be tricky.”

  Rufus appeared in the hallway again. He held a phone up high and waved it a little, then made a crossing motion with his hands to suggest something was wrong.

  That he couldn’t get beyond the passcode, Sam suspected.

  “Jake worked a lot,” Natalie was saying. “He was a detective with the NYPD.”

  Sam knew that Rufus’s semaphores were important. He knew that what Natalie had said was important; she had practically held the door open for him to ask about Jake’s work. But what he heard in his head—what he saw, like that sign flashing Dear Evan Hansen when he’d left Port Authority building—was good. Things had been good. Good, good, good. And then, he had a hundred questions: did he ever roll over and kiss your shoulder after? Did he ever want to lace your fingers together while you made love? Did he hide things around the apartment, knowing you’d find them—movie tickets, a coupon for fifty percent off a burger, a four by six of the two of you on the Chattahoochee, just sun and skin and water?