Page 28 of Be Still My Unbeating Heart

Outside, they sat under a parasol at one of the two tables facing the street. Whitby scoffed down her vanilla ice cream in two bites, then draped herself over a chair in full sun. Bastian and De Luca chose spots facing the street, angled toward Micio Micio. From where they sat, they should have no trouble seeing Emilio leave the cat café.

Bastian licked his gelato, savoring the taste. It was perfect. Creamy and delicious. Not too much banana, not too much caramel, and just sweet enough without making his teeth sing. He smiled as he ran his tongue over the frozen cream.

Thiswas what he had pictured for his holiday. Whitby purring in the sun, Bastian availing himself of the local delicacies, and thefact that they were in the company of an attractive man—no matter how infuriatingly stoic—was just the icing on the Italiantorta.

Bastian paused midlick and frowned. Somebody was humming the opening refrain from one of his favorite songs—“Smalltown Boy.” He blinked at De Luca in amazement when he realized the humming was coming from him.

“You know Bronski Beat?” Bastian asked.

De Luca stopped humming. He glowered, looked embarrassed.

“Bad habit,” he said.

Bastian couldn’t hide his astonishment. “I didn’t think anybody remembered Bronski Beat.”

De Luca licked his ice cream. “I have them on CD.”

“Well now, aren’t you full of surprises? And CD, too. How retro of you.”

“Physical media is the best way to listen to music.”

Bastian raised his face to the sun, suddenly wistful. “I saw them play London in the eighties. Bronski Beat, I mean. They were phenomenal.”

“In the eighties? But that—” De Luca broke off. “Oh, right.”

“He’s older than he looks,” Whitby said, lying on her back, front paws drawn up to her chin. “But younger than you might think.”

De Luca squinted at her but said nothing.

“The plus side of eternal life,” Bastian said. “I’ve seen agaggleof important historical moments. Blondie and the Pointer Sisters at the Hammersmith Odeon, Spandau Ballet at Heaven Nightclub…Bronski were always my favorite, though, and nothing surpasses ‘Smalltown Boy.’ ”

Now De Luca looked at him. There was a glimmer in his eyes. He seemed…impressed?

“I guess we’re all smalltown boys at heart,” he said, his tone a shade less grumpy than usual.

Bastian sensed a tiny chink in his armor. He couldn’t help being intrigued.

“Did you ever want to leave?” Bastian asked.

“Where?”

“Vernazza, dear. It’s what the song is all about. Escaping.” Bastian shook out his hair. “When I was young, I couldn’t wait to escape my town. Move to the city. See the world.”

“You remember those things? From when you were…”

A smile played on Bastian’s lips at De Luca’s hesitance. “It’s not a bad word, Inspector. Yes, I remember things from when I was alive, although some of it is hazy.”

He considered the inspector, unsure if he was genuinely interested, then decided to continue regardless.

“I hated the town I grew up in. There were so many small minds, I doubt they had a single original thought between them. I stuck out like a cockatiel among crows, being one of the only obvious queer kids. If you were different in that town, you were despised on sight, ridiculed and shunned, as if you had any control over who you were. As if it were achoiceto be different. As if beingqueermade you amonster.”

He bit out the word, his jaw clenching with a familiar twinge of anger. He saw Whitby looking at him with one eye and shook off the anger, shrugging.

“When I turned eighteen, I escaped to the city, and things were better there. I could be myself a little more. A few years later, I was invited to a rave at Stonehenge. It was quite something to behold, all those laser lights dancing over those big old hunks of rock. I danced for hours, feeling the history of the place like it was filling me up. Then I met a beautiful man in a denim jacket, and we kissed, and suddenly his kisses hurt, and the next thing I knew, I was dying. When I woke up the following night with the moon rising above the sarsen circle, I was changed.”

De Luca had gone very still. He looked at Bastian.

“You were turned at Stonehenge?”