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I step around my desk and place my hand under his good arm. Lifting, I grunt when he doesn’t move quite as quickly as I expect.
But he giggles. Then he claps his hand around mine and groans as he noisily climbs to his feet.
“You smell like a flamingo.” He sets his good hand on my hip and his nose against the soft flesh behind my ear. “I mean, I’ve never smelled a flamingo before. But you smell fruity and yummy and kinda how I expect a flamingo would smell.”
“You got him stoned.” Cackling, Fletch lopes to Archer’s other side and holds him up when my legs begin to shake. “What the hell did you give him, Mayet? Cocaine?”
“I gave him pain relief!”
Crossing my office and switching my white coat for a thin, brown, poor replacement, I snatch my bag and go to work setting my cell and keys in the main compartment. Finally, I turn back to Archer and Fletch… and sigh.
Because Archer is trying to hug his best friend, which is all fun and games right now, but once the meds wear off, it’ll hurt so much more.
“Can you help me get him to my apartment?” I open the door and wait as Aubree dashes through. She picks up her phone and dials Doctor Flynn’s desk, while skipping across my office, Mia pays no attention at all to the two men stumbling over the tile. “Please, Fletch? He needs a bed, and I can’t carry him all the way on my own.”
Mock-huffing, Fletcher rolls his eyes and starts forward. “The things I do for love. And just so we’re clear; he’s vulnerable right now. We can dump him in the bay and have your marriage overturned within minutes.”
“We could.” I extend my hand for Mia to take, then I hold the door wide and wait for the guys to pass. “Doesn’t mean I’ll marry you, though.”
“Oh, burn!” Fletch sends his eyes skyward, while Aubree finishes her call and jogs across the room to hit the elevator call button. “You’re mean.”
“It’s like I adopted a pet fish.” I follow the men to the elevator and, when the doors open, step in after them and hit the button for the lobby level. “I didn’t want the fish. I had no particular affection for the fish. I didn’t even have the things needed to take care of a fish.” I turn back and pin Archer with a filthy glare. “Now, it’s my job to keep the damn fish alive.” I wave a hand toward his shoulder. “It’s proving really difficult!”
“I love you.” Slurring his words, Archer grins and gives in to the way his eyelids flutter closed. “I do. I love you so much, Mayet. Even if you’ve killed—”
Panicked, I tear my hand from Mia’s and slap it over Archer’s mouth instead.
“Heh.” A nervous giggle rolls through my chest and along my throat.
Detective Fletcher’s brows lift in question, and Aubree’s eyes widen with surprise.
“It’s, uh…” I clear my throat. “Bad manners to discuss the late mayor with a child present.”
“But we’re in the neutral cube of telling the truth,” he gurgles against my palm. “S’okay.”
“Nope. It’s not.” I smile for Fletch and hope to remain a free woman a little longer. “It’s a terribly traumatic subject I no longer wish to revisit.”
When the doors open at my back, and Archer’s teeth gently nip at my palm, I sigh and turn to get off the lift. “Stop talking, Malone. Not a single word.”
“‘Kay.”
ARCHER
Darkness swallows the entire room, leaving me blind and wondering for just a moment where the fuck I am. A thin strip of light attempts to outline the window, and another shadow on the opposite side of the room says that’s the way to the exit.
Those clues help me realize after a moment that I’m inside Minka’s apartment.
We’re married, yet we still each have an apartment.
Drawing a deep breath, I attempt to sit up and get my head on straight, but the movement makes me hiss, and the pain in my shoulder sets every nerve ending in my body alight.
“Fuck.” My voice comes out thick and hoarse. Sleepy and dry.
But I don’t stop what I’m doing. I don’t stay in this bed, because no one else is in it with me—andthat, when it’s the middle of the damn night, is unacceptable.
Pushing up to stand, and gritting my teeth when the soles of my feet tingle and my knees knock together, I take another deep breath and shake it off. The weakness. The dizziness. The fact I don’t fucking remember how I got here or who stripped me to my boxers.
Dropping my head, I creep across the bedroom and stop by the door, then holding my breath, I work hard to listen past the sound of my pulse thudding in my ear, and try to hear Minka.
