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“Not for the next seven days.” Grinning, he reaches across and takes the phone from my fingers.
“Hey!” I try to steal it back. “Archer!”
“Cause of death, Doctor Emeri?”
“Uh…” I hear her. Even without the phone pressed to my ear. “Detective Malone?”
“I’m on the other side of the country. So no, it wasn’t me. COD?”
“Poison?” she says it like a question. When I know damn well she’s smarter than that. “I’m leaning toward poison. Which, we all know, is often the weapon of choice for women.”
“So you think we have two murderous wives in a row?” He slaps my hand away when I try to reach out for my phone. “What are the chances of that?”
“Considering the full moon?” Aubs exhales a heady breath. “I’d say it’s right up there in the realm of possibility. Tell Chief Mayet I’ll chase the lab results down as soon as I can. And that I’ll pay particular attention to carboxyhemoglobin formation. Does she want me to call her with the results?”
“Ye—”
“No.” Archer presses his palm to my forehead and pushes me back. “She does not want you to call her with the results. In fact, this was her one and only phone call. Once I hang up in,” he pulls the device from his ear, reads the time, then brings it back again, “thirty seconds, her five minutes are up, and she’s done until we get off the plane in Copeland again next Monday. Unless you, Fletch, Moo, or someone else we love is bleeding and in dire straits, then we don’t want to be disturbed.”
“Archer!”
“She made a deal,” he says to Aubs. “She promised she could set work aside and not be obsessive about it. So as her loving husband, it’s my duty to help her reach those personal goals.”
“It’s not okay that you’re coming between us,” Aubree grumbles. “Best friends before boyfriends.”
“I’m her husband,” he drawls. “And technically, I knew her before you did. So you don’t get to claim the friendship card.”
“Ovaries before brovaries.”
“Aubree—”
“Chicks before dicks! Breasticles before testicles.”
“Aubree Emeri!”
“Sluts before nuts.”
Finally, he breaks, laughing and shaking his head from side-to-side. “I’ve already got her on the other side of the country, Emeri. She’s with me. I have possession, and we both know that’s all that matters in civil cases. Now shush, do your work, and let Mayet rest for the first time in her damn life. I promise to return her, good as new, in fourteen to twenty-one days.”
“Seven days!” I snatch the phone, surprising him with my speed, and slam the device to my ear until my hearing turns tinny. “Ouch.” Scowling, I rub my ear and shoot my elbow forward when Archer tries to steal from me a second time. “Seven days, Aubree. I’ll be home this time next week. Your vic was poisoned. Probably cyanide but run the diagnostics to makesure. Then have Detective Fletcher search the house; chances are, you’ll find your weapon right there in the kitchen.”
“Blink three times if you need to be rescued from this honeymoon,” Aubree mock-whispers. “Blink four times if you’re in immediate, life-threatening danger.”
“I’m blinking,” I tell her, though my voice is bland. Flat. “Though you can’t see that. So your plan to save me from this dude is flawed.”
“This dude,” Archer grumbles. Then he reaches out. “Say goodbye, ladies. The first step in addiction is admitting you have a problem.”
“Goodbye!” Aubree calls out. Like I’m going to war in nineteen-thirty-nine and won’t be home for a while. If ever. “Have a fabulous time! Rest. And eat. Have lots and lots of sex, so your birth control is screaming at you to chill the eff out.”
“Alright.” I relinquish the phone back to Archer and glance out the window. “I’m done.”
“Don’t actually get pregnant,” she continues, shouting. “I’m not ready for that yet. But practice it. Practice, like you know I wanna bang a Malone, but won’t ever get the chance.”
“Goodbye, Doctor Emeri.”
“Goodbye, Doctor Emeri,” Archer repeats. Then he pulls the phone from his ear and kills the call. “She’s desperate for Tim, and too stubborn to do anything about it.”
“I’m sad I’m missing out on a cliché poisoning case.” Dragging my focus from the streets of some Floridian metro area, I come around to study my husband’s handsome grin. “But I’m not sad to be here with you.”
