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“Good.” He slips the phone into his back pocket, robbing me of that access to the outside world, and leans across instead to cup my face. “I’m missing out on a psycho wife case too. But if I had to be anywhere else, I’m happy it’s here with you.”
I study his perfect, green stare. His stubbled jaw, and straight white smile.
I didn’t come to Copeland to meet a man and marry him in the span of a single heartbeat.
But hell, it’s what I did anyway. And even when he sends me crazy with frustration, I wouldn’t change anything about who we are. I wouldn’t change our story.
“I love you.” I often wait for Archer to initiate our kisses. I wait for him to show me his desire. But I lean forward now and swallow down his exhale of contentment. “Let’s do this honeymoon thing.”
“Yes, fucking, ma’am.” He slips his tongue past my lips and draws a heavy groan from the depths of my stomach until I melt into him. “Anything to make you happy, babe.” Pulling back, he studies my eyes. “Want another glass of bubbly? We’ll be at our destination soon.”
ARCHER
The problem with telling half-truths and full omissions is that eventually, I either have to get better at lying… or own up to my shit.
Unfortunately for me, I’m not ready for the latter. So as the car pulls up to the privately owned marina in Biscayne Bay, and I spy the superyacht moored at the end of the slip, I make sure we move fast. Unsnapping seat belts and grabbing our bags. I shove the car door open before Smith has time to come and do it for us, and instead of risking Mayet’s incoming freakout, I clasp her hand and force her to slide out my side of the car.
I twine our fingers together and slam a kiss to her lips the moment her feet touch the ground. I have to be smooth. Fast. Convincing. Because if I allow her too much time to think, she’s going to ask questions.
And those questions don’t have easy answers.
I don’t feel like having a fight with my wife so soon into our coveted honeymoon.
“A boat?” She kisses me back. She wraps her arms around my hips and presses her chest to mine because she can’t help herself any more than I can. But her lips move one way, whileher eyes go another. She contorts her face, which, in theory, is an impossible thing to do. “We’re going on a boat?”
“Yes.” Tongue. Mouth.Seduce her into submission, dammit! “But you’ll like it, I promise.”
“It’s a really big boat.” She turns her face, breaking our kiss with an un-sexy slurp, before she tilts her head and studies the two-hundred-and-fifty-seven-foot monstrosity just waiting for us to board. “That’s, like…” She stops and swallows. “You bought us tickets for a cruise?”
“Well…”
“You actuallychoseto take us on a cruise? Like, with all those other old couples who play bingo and watch the Elvis impersonation show?” Startling herself, she swings her gaze back my way. “Will there be an Elvis impersonation show?”
“No.” And I have about thirty seconds to get her on board before she hits the brakes and saysnope. “There are no impersonators on this boat. Come on.” I carry her bag of meds in one hand and wrap the other over her shoulder to pin her close to my side. “Smith will bring our bags aboard. And since you brought it up, there’s no bingo on this boat, either.”
She almost seems… disappointed. “No bingo?”
“I mean, unless you want there to be. I bet I can scrounge up some dabbers and print some pages off for you.” I lead her from the car and onto the pier that goes on for about three hundred feet. This portion of the bay is not for swimming unless you don’t mind a fifty-foot drop-off as soon as your feet are wet.
“So what do all the old people do?” She studies our surroundings, her head on a swivel as she takes everything in. “No bingo, and no musical shows. I thought these cruises were specifically to cater to the older crowd who want to dance and gamble.”
“You can do both, if you want.” Chuckling, I pass staff who will work for the length of our honeymoon. Cooks. Cleaners.Servers. Bartenders. Men and women in black dart in the shadows, mostly unseen by the woman attempting to see everything. But I notice them. I notice the way they watch me, wondering if I’m like I’m my father, who just so happened to be quick with punishment and merciless when he felt the desire to be unkind.
I left my family in New York more than a decade ago. Choosing a life outside of everything I knew to spite the man who would have had me killed before my eighteenth birthday if I continued to defy him.
He wanted soldiers. Instead, he created an army of free thinkers. He fathered five sons who all stood firm in their belief that he was a piece of shit.
Cato, Micah, and Felix stayed behind. They didn’t have a lot of choice.
But Tim and I bolted. Which means those who watch me now do so in hesitant faith, having been told I’m not like the man who came before me.
They have no way to confirm. They merely hope. And in exchange, I hope they won’t slip poison into my dinner the way Mrs. Savese did to off her husband…probably.
“Are we late?” Minka wraps her arm across my back and anchors her hand on my opposite hip. “It’s not as big as I expected it would be.”
“The boat?”
“Yeah.” She studies each level with interest, her eyes flittering from floor to floor. “Like, thosebigcruises with the water slides and ballrooms and stuff. This isn’t like that.”
