by Jill Shalvis
Distant.
And she hated that most of all.
This time when she tried to tug the knife from his long fingers, he let her. Rising, she stared down at him. “We done here?”
He rose to his feet too. And just looked at her.
“Well?” she asked.
“We’re never done,” he said.
No kidding. But since she had no witty retort for him, she turned on her heel and headed for the doors. She pushed out into the blissfully cool night and strode across the courtyard, which was lit with strings of tiny, beautiful white lights threaded across the shops and small trees that lined the way. San Francisco in February could be just about anything: icy, wet, powder dry, even warm . . . Tonight the sky was a blanket of black velvet, scattered with diamonds. The air was cold and crisp, and it showed in the white puffy clouds she exhaled, hoping for some inner calm.
It didn’t come.
She strode to the fountain in the center of the courtyard and stopped to take a minute. And actually, she probably needed more than one.
In her life she’d very carefully and purposely gone after the things she’d missed out on in her childhood and she’d gone after those things hard. She was carefully put together, tough to the core, and, she liked to think, loyal to a fault. And the fact was, she felt incredibly loyal to Archer. After all, he’d gotten her out of a bad situation and she was grateful to him for that. He’d changed the course of her life. But she could admit to herself that deep down she was also a little pissy that he’d never seemed to want more from her. Not that this was a surprise, not when she’d cost him so much. Such as his first career.
And his family . . .
The water in the fountain fell in soft streams into the copper base, which was lined with coins. The thing had been standing here for fifty years longer than the 1928 building around it, dating back to the days when there’d actually been cows in Cow Hollow. The myth went that if you made a wish with a true heart, true love would find you.
God forbid, Elle thought with a shudder.
But it’d worked enough times over the past century that people believed the legend. And in fact, two of her good friends had found love thanks to this very fountain.
As far as Elle was concerned, only a damn fool would make a wish for love. Love brought nothing but complicated problems and she could do without more complications or problems, thank you very much.
“Aren’t you going to toss some money in and wish for true love to find you?” came a raspy voice. “That’s what everyone else does.”
It was Old Man Eddie, who lived in the alley. By choice, mind you. Several of the building regulars, including herself, had tried to help him more than once, but Eddie said he lived an alternative lifestyle and he wanted to be left alone to do it.
He flashed a smile that went with his shock of white Christopher Lloyd-circa-Back-to-the-Future hair, board shorts, rain boots, and a Cal Berkeley sweatshirt that said Don’t Panic, It’s Organic over an image of a weed leaf. Since he’d actually gone to Cal Berkeley in the seventies after previously frying his brain at Woodstock, she flashed a smile back. “I’m most definitely not going to wish for true love,” she said. A warm deserted island, maybe. World peace, definitely.
But never love.
“Pru found Finn by wishing,” he reminded her. “And Willa found Keane.”
“And I’m happy for them,” she said. “But I’m not wishing.”
“Bummer, dudette, because I was thinking if you were planning on throwing any money away, you might find a better use for it instead.”
“Let me guess,” she said. “You’d be happy to take it off my hands?”
“Couldn’t have said it better myself.”
“For the record, I never throw money away,” she said, but she slid her hand into the hidden pocket of her wrap, pulling out her emergency twenty, which hadn’t fallen out in the bar. Of course not. It’d had to have been the knife. She gave a mental grimace and handed Eddie the cash.
“Thanks, darlin’.” He slipped the twenty away before kissing her on each cheek. “I’ve got today’s newspaper, can I repay you by giving you your horoscope?”
“Don’t bother. I’m sure mine says ‘please just don’t kill anyone today.’”
He laughed softly. “And it’s no secret who you’d kill either. He’s smart as hell, our boy. Intuitive too and a gifted investigator. He takes care of his own. He’d take a bullet for you—we both know that. But one thing he’s not good at is admitting his feelings.”
“Who?”
He gave her a don’t-be-stupid look.
“Archer?” she asked.
“Well who else do you let drive you crazy?” he asked.
Good point.
He patted her on the arm. “Just remember, there’s not a lot of softness in his life, or room for weakness—of which you’re definitely one. He has absolutely no idea what to do with you, and as an action guy, that’s confusing to him. So maybe think about taking it easy on him. Even just a little bit.”
She sighed and then opened her mouth to say that she and Archer never went easy on each other but the old man had vanished back down his alley, leaving her alone in the night.
The theme song of her life.
She went to pull out her phone to call an Uber and then remembered she’d handed her cell to Spence to hold for her during the distraction. Spence, who was in all likelihood still sitting at the bar. “Dammit.” She headed back across the courtyard and let herself into the pub again.
Spence was indeed at the far right side of the bar, at the area Finn always held open for their gang. But that wasn’t what caught and held her attention. Nope, that honor went to the other side where Archer sat talking to some beautiful woman who was clearly coming on to him, leaning in, a perfectly manicured hand on his biceps. She was smiling with lots of white, straight teeth, her hair carefully tousled in a way that said it was possible she’d just gotten out of bed and wasn’t all that opposed to going back.
Rolling her eyes, Elle headed toward Spence. Pru was with him, as were Willa and Haley. Willa ran South Bark, a one-stop pet shop across the courtyard from the pub. Haley worked at the second-floor optometrist’s office and was currently single, but she and one of Finn’s waitresses had been flirting for several weeks now and everyone had fingers crossed that it’d turn into something good.
Spence slid Elle’s phone across the bar top toward her and then, when he caught the look on her face, passed his glass over as well.
“Jameson?” she asked.
“Only the best for you,” he said, watching with quiet amusement as she tossed it back and then coughed. “Easy, tiger.”
Turning her back on the sight of Archer and the woman, the both of them flirting freely now, she nodded a thanks to Finn, who brought her another drink.
“She came on to him if it helps any,” Willa said, always the peacemaker of the group. Willa had the heart of a saint.
Elle did not. “I couldn’t care less.”
“Uh-huh,” Spence said.
Why were all men assholes? “You know what?” she asked, setting her glass down. “I’m out.”
“Aw, come on.” Spence grabbed her hand. “Stay. I’ll even let you try to kick my ass in darts.”
She pointed at him. “I own you in darts. But no. Not tonight.”
“It’s only ten o’clock.”
“I have to get up early for class and work.”
“Adulting means you get to do whatever you want,” Spence said.
He only said that because he’d sold his start-up two years back for an undisclosed sum, a.k.a. big bucks, and he no longer had to be on the hamster wheel. Instead he bought shit to amuse himself—like this building—and did whatever suited him, which lately had been walking dogs for Willa’s shop. Elle knew he only did so because women were suckers for a man walking their pet. “No, adulting is like”—she searched for the right words—“looking both ways before you cross the street and then
getting hit by an airplane.”
He laughed and she started to walk off, but at the last minute she couldn’t help herself. She once again glanced at the other end of the bar where Archer and the woman sat laughing, and she knew she wasn’t smart enough to “go easy” on him or leave well enough alone.
“Elle,” Willa said from behind her. “Honey, maybe whatever you’re planning isn’t a great idea.”
No kidding. “I’m not planning anything,” she said. “I’m being . . . spontaneous.”
“But you’re never spontaneous,” Pru said. “You make a Pinterest board before you change your lip gloss color.”
Dammit. True story. “Hey, that was a secret board that I let you on because you wanted to compare colors. And I know what I’m doing here.”
“But do you really though?” Spence asked.
Ignoring them, Elle headed toward Archer, unsure of exactly what was bothering her so much about the way he was letting that woman come on to him. Okay, that was a lie. She knew exactly what was bothering her and it was the fact that he never flirted with her. Absurd. Ridiculous. Asinine . . .
And yet did she stop? No, she did not. She kept heading right for them, leaning in between them to pat Archer on the shoulder. “Hey, nice to see you out and about,” she said, all friendly-like. “Your full body rash must be all cleared up then . . . ?” She trailed off, letting her gaze run over him from head to toe, lingering quite by accident on his crotch because as it turned out, Trudy was right. He did indeed have an impressive-looking package.
Archer gave a slow shake of his head, a small almost smile playing about his lips. “Nice to see you, Candy,” he said calmly, the jackass.
She sent him an eat-shit-and-die look, and in return he smiled a full two hundred watts.
Damn him. She wished she’d said cock rot instead of rash. Rash wasn’t bad enough. With her fuse fully lit now, she turned on her heel and stormed out into the night. Ignoring the chill, she got an Uber and headed home, which was one side of a postage-stamp-sized duplex in Russian Hill.
She loved her place almost more than she loved her shoes, even if she couldn’t turn around in it without bumping her elbows on the walls. It was cozy, quaint, warm . . . everything her life had never been before.
She made herself some hot tea and sat at her tiny kitchen table in her tiny kitchen and stayed up late into the night doing homework for her two accounting classes.
And absolutely not thinking about one irritating, infuriating, smug, arrogant Archer Hunt.
Chapter 4
#OffTheDeepEnd
Archer lived in an old converted warehouse in the Marina. He had a gym on the ground floor and in the early mornings he always hit that first, beating the crap out of a punching bag. He did this to keep his body in lean, mean, fighting shape. He also did it to clear his mind.
But his mind wasn’t having it today.
Elle had kept his knife. She literally carried a piece of him around with her wherever she went and he had no idea what to make of that. Especially in the day since she’d done her best to ignore him. And when she wasn’t ignoring him, she was treating him like a bug on her windshield.
He got it. She deserved far better than he could ever come up with. And plus no way would he ever risk her being with him because she felt she owed him. So he’d put up walls, trying to be disciplined when it came to her. For her sake.
But she’d kept his knife . . .
Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out an agate worry stone. The very one she’d given him in return for the knife in that run-down park the night when everything had gone to shit for the both of them. Pounding the punching bag until his muscles quivered pleasantly, he reminded himself that Elle had changed.
They’d both changed.
And neither was interested in going back. Convinced of that, he showered and headed to work.
The morning’s light was just hitting the courtyard of the Pacific Pier Building as he walked through. The cobblestones beneath his feet glinted from the middle of the night’s light mist. Heading past the fountain, he took the stairs to his second-floor office but instead of turning right at the top, he went left.
And ended up in front of the door that read Elle Wheaton, General Manager.
Spence came out of her office and went brows up at the sight of him.
And the weirdest thing happened. Archer’s gut tightened and a seed of some unnamed emotion barreled through him.
He’d been the one who’d talked Spence into hiring Elle for the job. But then something unexpected had happened—over the past year she and Spence had become unexpectedly tight.
While she’d kept her distance from Archer.
He had no business giving a single shit about it but he did. It was a hell of a thing to realize he was actually jealous. It pissed him off that he felt that way, but it was fact. He was pretty sure if anything was going to happen between Elle and Spence that it would’ve already happened, but ridiculously he still felt bitten by the green monster.
“What’s up?” Spence asked.
“Nothing.”
Spence looked him over for a long beat and then smiled. “She’s eating you up and spitting you out.”
“Bullshit,” Archer said, and then he paused. “But if she was, why is that amusing?”
Spence clapped him on the shoulder. “Going to be fun to watch, that’s all.”
“What’s going to be fun to watch?”
“You on your ass.” And with that enigmatic statement, Spence walked off, hands in his pockets, still looking vastly amused, the fucker.
Archer shook it off and reached for Elle’s office door. It was locked, but given that Spence had just come out, she was obviously in there. She was always in this early. She was one of the hardest working people he knew. He wasn’t sure what her endgame was but he suspected world domination, and to get there she took online college classes from six to eight a.m. several mornings a week. She came here to do them because her Internet at home was unreliable.
She’d be furious to hear just how much he knew about her, not that he ever intended to tell her. After all, he valued his life. “Elle,” he said with a knock on the door.
Nothing.
She was being cautious after last night’s stunt at the bar. Smart woman. But it didn’t matter. As head of the building’s security, he had keys to everything, although he didn’t pull them out now because he wasn’t stupid.
Elle was on the other side of that door. He could hear her breathing and chances were she’d shoot him on sight if he let himself in. After the “body rash” thing, he was feeling the same desire in return, except his weapon of choice would be his hands. He’d put them around her pretty throat and squeeze.
This wasn’t a new urge, but he could resist.
Just as he’d resisted his other more troubling urge—to haul her into him and kiss them both stupid. Or at least more stupid than he was in this very moment.
That wasn’t a new feeling either but he had no intention of following it through. On either.
“What do you want?” she asked through the door.
“Should I give you the long or the short list?”
Nothing but a loaded silence.
“You,” he said. “You’re my problem.”
“You’re mad about last night.”
“You mean when you implied to everyone in the pub that I had a sexually transmitted disease?”
There was a gasp behind him. He turned and found Trudy standing there with her ever present cleaning cart. Her gaze dropped to his crotch and he barely resisted the urge to cup himself.
“The clinic on Post is really good,” the woman actually whispered to him. “And, um . . . discreet.”