Frost and Raine

Chapter 1The Cupid came into Don’s coffee shop on February fifteenth, under a doorway-swirl of pink hearts and red roses. He had a slim leather briefcase in one hand, and glared at the biggest bouquet on the closest table as if it’d personally offended him. “No.” “What’ve you got against defenseless flowers?” Don had already begun making his coffee. Black, strong, plain: easy enough, and familiar after eight weeks of mid-morning caffeine-themed encounters. Covertly, he watched those elegant fingers, that annoyed scowl. Raine Amari had pale green-gold eyes and pale red hair, an unusual tumble of curling gold-washed cinnamon Don’d never seen on anyone else; Raine dressed like the embodiment of the universe’s—or at least Seattle’s—most flawless crisply-suited high-powered lawyer, which he in fact was. He’d arrived from Los Angeles eight weeks ago, a specific time and place which Don knew because the name had been recognizable. Mentioned in a few tabloids, a few of those gossip sites Don’s ex-boyfriend had liked to devour. High-profile celebrity divorce settlements, billion-dollar agreements, a smile that’d been caught in paparazzi snapshots: the beautiful Cupid who paradoxically made a living from separations. Raine was famous, in the way that lawyers sometimes were famous; occasionally people at Uncommon Grounds glanced up from conversations or laptops when he came in. One enterprising reporter’d suggested that Raine had been the reason for at least one of those divorces, with no greater substantiation than Raine’s good looks and Cupid heritage. This was almost certainly untrue, but nevertheless: Raine had departed Los Angeles and arrived here. Incontrovertibly so. Frequently with caffeine in hand. And he was exactly Don’s type, graceful and dazzlingly competent and more brilliant than anyone Don’d ever met, the sort of person who might’ve been made to feature in every fantasy ever daydreamed by anyone; he was also not at all Don’s type, because— “It’s February fifteenth. Valentine’s Day is over. And your little ice displays in the window are just showing off.” Don ignored the critique of his windows—Raine knew perfectly well that no Cupid had room to comment on a Frost’s ice-patterns, thank you—and reminded himself that he liked being a patient and happy sort of person, dammit, and also Raine tipped his baristas well when Don himself wasn’t working. “Isn’t it sort of your holiday? And how’s your day been?” “You mean the commemoration of commercialization and insincere affection?” Raine c****d an eyebrow at him, somehow making dry cynicism devastatingly attractive. “And my day has so far involved your overhead mobile made of lopsided hearts and the assemblage of complicated arguments regarding custody rights to a Chihuahua. Don’t you dare draw anything on the top of that.” “I couldn’t if I wanted to. You never order anything with foam.” Don handed over the coffee. He also tried not to feel large and clumsy and underdressed in jeans and apron and blue plaid flannel shirt and the two-week growth of fuzzy brown beard he’d been contemplating keeping. He hadn’t deliberately meant to aim for the hipster grunge outfit; he liked being cozy and comfortable. Raine would probably look at his feet and judge his much-loved Converse with a single devastating eyebrow. It was, Don considered, entirely possible that Raine, in those irritatingly flattering fashion-model outfits, did not even know what sneakers were. He added, “I was thinking four-leaf clovers. For St Patrick’s Day. The windows.” “At least it wouldn’t be hearts.” Raine took a sip, closed his pretty eyes in appreciation, let out a little sound of satisfaction. This sound was unfair. Someone so brittle and pointy shouldn’t have moments of steam-kissed happiness, sighs of pleasure, glimpses of delight. Don swallowed. Hard. “Thank you,” Raine said, scrupulous about this as ever—the polished lawyer façade had snapped back into place—and turned to go. Don said, “Chihuahua?” “We’re working out visitation schedules. I don’t entirely understand why anyone needs to visit a tiny animal that looks and sounds like a demented miniature alien crossed with a hyperactive fire alarm, but then again I don’t understand a lot about people, so I’ve given up trying.” Raine might have been answering out of politeness, or might’ve simply wanted to be annoyed about small dogs to a willing audience. His fingers were long and slender around the coffee, artwork over a disposable cup. “But you do understand people,” Don said. He couldn’t avoid saying the words. They just popped out. Raine glared at him over morning caffeine. “Don’t say it’s because I’m a Cupid. Personifications are as fallible as anyone else, I know you know, and assuming I know anything more than anyone else about desire is an old-fashioned—” “No,” Don said. “Not that. I mean you’re working it out. For your clients. Because it matters to them, even if it doesn’t to you.” “It doesn’t,” Raine said, and turned and went out the side door: heading for the stairs and the upper floor of the corporate building, all glass and smoky steel and February mist. Don, left with coffee and a college-student employee and tables that needed cleaning and several preoccupied customers, exhaled. Leaned elbows on the counter for a second. Tried not to think of all the ways that could’ve gone better. He hadn’t met a Cupid before. They weren’t the rarest of the Personifications, and he was a little surprised he hadn’t, now that he thought about it. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but it hadn’t been Raine Amari, divorce lawyer and despiser of Valentine’s decorations. Most Personifications tended to like their own abilities, to be proud of gifts that could coax forth sunshine or winter or harvest bounty. Most ordinary humans tended to like those gifts as well, especially because the officious but well-meaning Registry in theory kept everyone accounted for, aware of who and what might be in the area, and also because over the centuries most of the power had grown diluted enough that nobody was a threat. Don himself certainly wasn’t, given his level of magic, and anyway he enjoyed running a small coffee shop with steady corporate clientele, and cheerful employees, and oversized mugs that could briefly warm up his usually cold fingertips. He might’ve found a different career. Something about weather, or winter entertainment, or ice-skating rinks. He was, he supposed, very mildly unconventional; but then his family had always told him to be happy, and he liked making customers happy too, seeing them smile. He had regulars who came in daily, including most of Raine’s law firm—or at least an intern picking up orders, if they were busy—and he had new customers all the time, human and magical; he greeted them all with a smile, and they smiled back. If Don himself was mildly unconventional, Raine Amari was the more dramatic side of the word. A Cupid who lived on sarcasm and black coffee. A Cupid working as a lawyer. As a divorce lawyer. A good one. Practically blasphemous, given his heritage and the amount of power that hovered in the air when he was nearby. Don had felt the shiver of magic the first day Raine had walked in—Personifications generally knew each other, a little tingle of recognition, an invisible nod—and had been prepared to smile and maybe to feel a ripple of desire, because rumor said that was often a side effect. He definitely had felt desire. He still did. It fought with mild exasperation, every single day. And Raine kept on coming by, a daily routine now. And Don handed over coffee and asked how Raine’s day was going because for some reason he always wanted to know what the answer would be, whether it landed sharp or wry or full of inventive descriptions about tiny yapping dogs. Whatever Raine answered, it would be interesting: different, unpredictable, a surprise. Leaning on the counter, he considered his window art. Valentine’s Day was over, after all. And he had a reputation as a Frost, if not a terrifically gifted one, to uphold. He went over and pressed fingertips to windowpanes. He let the cold ripple out: clean and crisp and familiar as a kitten, wreathing around chilled shapes. He was not the best artist; he was only a minor talent, one among any number of Frosts, omnipresent and dutifully recorded by the local Registry. Anyone could, in theory, look up the basic facts of his family and his location and his abilities; most people didn’t bother. Frost was easy, simple, taken for granted. Donald Robert Frost, coffee shop owner and classic science fiction fan, would be especially uninteresting. Kit, the very human college-student employee and Don’s current favorite barista, appeared at his side, balancing darkly steaming mugs in both hands. “Want me to order more mint syrup, if you’re going to start doing green things? For St Patrick’s Day.” “No,” Don said. “I mean yes. Sure. Why not.” The windows bloomed: fields of clover, three leaves and four, happy and lucky and hopefully enticing customers. Most of their clientele came from the downtown corporate population, not just Raine’s law firm; two other regulars came in just then from the real estate office across the street and waved. Kit delivered the mugs and got busy with the almond milk. Don regarded the window thoughtfully, and added a tiny puppy, an extremely high-pitched and excitable one, gamboling among clover. It was the least he could do. * * * * “It looks like a beagle, not a Chihuahua,” Raine said, two days later. This comment came without any opening hello; Don handed over coffee—black, plain, strong—and answered, “I wasn’t aiming for any particular breed.” “So it was a coincidence.” Raine took the coffee. He was wearing grey and green today, a suit that’d likely cost more than Don’s yearly rent and made his astonishing eyes glow like bewitched sage and sugar. Both the Tooth Fairies—one male, one female, commiserating over the trials of the job across maple cream sugary concoctions—sharing the table in the corner had looked up when he’d entered. Raine had that effect. On humans and on supernatural beings. On everyone. “I like dogs. How’s the settlement going?” “New case. Cheating husband. And cheating wife. Entertainingly enough, with the same person.” “Ooh. Bet that’s not fun.” “In fact it rather is. I’m learning interesting tips for unusual s*x acts. One involving a pool table. The whole set, in fact. Balls included.” “If you’re trying to shock me,” Don said, leaning on the counter, “it’s not working.” Kit, partway through today’s shift, stopped to listen; Don shooed him away with a towel. Outside, rain bounced in to clamor off the ground and dive wildly down from eaves. The world became noisy and close, coffee-hot and intimate. “Don’t tell me you know how to do that with a pool cue,” Raine said. “Imagine your customers finding out. Horror and scandal in the local coffee shop. Story at eleven.” “What makes you think I don’t get kinky with my espresso machine after hours?” Kit, approaching the pick-up counter with a latte, turned around and gave them an exaggeratedly horrified stare, complete with theatrical hand-to-heart. His normally frizzy brown hair was green around the edges as of last week; Don had wondered whether this was some sort of attempt at holiday solidarity, and hadn’t asked. Raine took a sip of coffee. “You? Please. The closest you’d get would be extra cinnamon on a pumpkin spice monstrosity. You’re too solid for that.” “You’ve never even tried my pumpkin spice monstrosity. Solid?” “And I don’t need to. You’ve missed a corner in the left window. The top one. No decoration.” “I hadn’t gotten to it yet. What did you mean, solid?” “It’s a state of being,” Raine said. “Not liquid. Not gas. Here and present and thoroughly dependable. Why coffee, anyway?” “I like coffee. And I like making people happy. And I wasn’t good enough to make a living out of the art. Why lawyering?” “Why not,” Raine said, and took another sip of coffee; Don waited until it became apparent that this was all the answer he’d get, and then asked, “What were they doing with the pool cue?” “Nothing solid and dependable ears need to hear,” Raine said, and more customers clamored in, a spilling flood of winter coats and colorful scarves and requests for caramel drizzle and coconut milk and blueberry scones. By the time Don managed to get everyone served, Raine had gone. * * * * Late at night, closing up—Kit was off studying or getting laid or whatever college students did to cope with stress; Don did not mind closing but was starting to wonder about recruiting more help, because Kit plus the second barista Annabelle, who mainly worked weekends, were not going to be enough to keep up—he thought about that adjective more. Solid? Reliable? Was that what Raine thought? That was not a usual description of the Frosts. Glittery, wintry, artistic: he’d heard those. Among the oldest of the Personifications; he knew that. Generally not dramatic or scandalous, and he’d grant Raine that one: a family lineage that stretched back and sideways and out across the world, given existence by millennia of belief, blooming flowers and ferns into icy life for that world to appreciate. But the family heritage lay in the evanescence of winter art, gleaming and dissolving, a reminder of the cold and the ephemeral. Don had always liked warmth. He’d always liked radiance, heat, color: the impressions of life, quick and vibrant and beckoning. He liked the rich dark flavors of coffee, nutty and smoky and sweet and roasted, all those permutations. He liked the milky swirl of cream, the delicate traceries of a rose when he drew it in cappuccino foam, the smile in a customer’s eyes when taking a sip. He liked the heat of a mug cupped in chilly hands: vivid, real, grounded. He liked fire-bright and cinnamon-sharp and complicated green-gold eyes, and the way Raine always managed to be kind to Kit even if not to Don himself. He wondered why Raine had even commented on the window he’d not gotten to. Raine did not like decorations, celebrations, silly ridiculous fluff. Going out, he skimmed fingers over glass. A tiny storm cloud burst into being, trickling ice-etched drops down the window, from the corner.