Archer only looks me up and down with long strokes of his eyes. A lingering stare. A heated pause when he stops on my hands. On the glass I’m stealing.
Finally, he lifts one brow and looks to Aubree. “Where are you going?”
“Somewhere else. And since you refuse to talk to Minka, it’s apparent you neither care about, nor need to be apprised of, our whereabouts.”
His face grows pained, and his jaw clenches with unspoken thoughts. “Aubs…”
I step to the side and paste on a fake smile. “I don’t need you to speak for me,” I tell Aubree, then I meet Archer’s glare and drop my smile. “And I don’t need to beg for your attention. I promise you, Malone, I won’t plead for your time.”
And yet, my heart screamsYes I will! I’ll beg. I’ll do anything it takes.
But it’s not possible. Which is exactly the reason I resisted falling for him in the first damn place.
“Detectives.” I incline my chin when Fletch steps inside the bar, then moving around them, I place my hand on the second detective’s arm as I pass, since I’m not actually mad at him. “Charlie.”
“Delicious.” His eyes glisten with the weight of the tension Archer and I have placed on our group since I told Archer my truths almost a week ago and hoped he’d keep them safe.
That’s what a relationship is, right? Honesty. Trust. Bravery.
He demanded those things of me, and when I delivered, he turned on me and threw it all in my face.
“How’s it going?” Fletch asks. “You good?”
“I’m good. Thanks for breakfast, by the way. It was exactly what I needed.”
He smiles, though the expression doesn’t quite make it all the way to his eyes. “You’re welcome. I like to take care of the people I care about. Even when shit is complicated and weird and everyone is cranky.”
“Heh.” I glance back to Archer and almost shrink under his furious glare.
But that’s not who I am, and it’s not the woman I want to be in the future. So I remain standing tall and own my truths.
I’m a killer. I’m a seeker of justice. And he… is a homicide detective.
“Archer.” Nodding in farewell, I drop my gaze and move around him with enough space that we won’t touch as I pass.
Reaching the door and shoving it open to reveal an icy wind hurling along the street, I huddle into the coat I didn’t bother taking off, and turn right toward my apartment.
I don’t look back to make sure Aubree is following; if she changes her mind, that’s her decision to make. If she’d prefer to go back in and hang with her other friends while Tim macks on another woman, I won’t hold a grudge. But I hear her footsteps on the sidewalk anyway.
Surprisingly, I exhale a breath of relief when I realize I won’t be going home alone.
I push through the glass door of my apartment building and spare a mere glance for Steve, my elderly landlord whose office is, by all appearances, at his front door, as he watches tenants come and go.
“Ladies—”
“I’m ordering food in a minute.” I start up the stairs without slowing. “Let the delivery guy through, okay? I’m starving.”
“Uh… okay.” He looks to Aubree. “She okay?”
“She’s working through some stuff.”
I don’t stop to listen to them talk about me. It wouldn’t do me any good. Instead, I push on to the second floor. Then the third.
Approaching the fourth, I take out my keys and select the right one, then I shove it into the lock the moment it’s within reach and push through the door to my apartment.
I leave it open, since Aubree is only seconds behind me, and move into my kitchen to snag the bottle of tequila I’ve stored atop my fridge—right beside the apparatus I need to administer medication for my blood disorder.
Two different types of medication: one for hemophilia, and the other to numb my brain when my heart aches more than I can possibly handle for a second longer.