“What about before them?”
He finished chewing before he answered, “Not like what you have with Hazel. I’ve lived a handful of lives, and within those lives, I’ve had different groups of friends. My longest friendship is with Rhys. I’ve known him since before my first deployment, and we met Hunt and Kieran when I was back on leave the first time.”
She studied him, peeling back all his layers. When he’d suggested installing the bug himself, she was shocked. Until she remembered he was a retired Green Beret. Being a shadow, getting in and out, and placing a bug was likely something he’d considered easy in his military life.
A soft laugh drew her from her thoughts. Archer’s brows lifted. “Why are you looking at me like a puzzle you can’t quite figure out?”
She laughed as well, shrugging. “I guess I’m wondering who you truly are.”
He wiped his mouth with his napkin. “Who I am?”
“Yeah.”
His look turned measured. “I’ve been a pretty open book, don’t you think?”
“Sort of,” she said, the confusing thought suddenly becoming clear. “But as you said, you’ve lived a lot of lives. Your life with your mom. Your life with the military. Your life with Rhys and the guys. Are you happy with this life you have now?”
“Very happy.”
She looked for any hint of a lie on his face and didn’t find any. “You’re content, then, with running security for Phoenix, simply heading up teams that handle all the action?”
“Extremely content. I enjoy my job, and I know at the end of it, I might not die.”
She pushed the mashed potatoes around on her plate and smiled. “Okay, I guess that’s a plus. But don’t you miss all the excitement, the adventure?”
He shook his head. “I don’t look to the past, only to the future.”
“And this life, the one you’re living, makes you happy?”
His silence was his reply. She thought he wasn’t going to answer, but then he surprised her. He lifted his intense stare to her. “Right now, at this very moment, I am the happiest I’ve been, maybe ever.”
She couldn’t look away from him, not when his soul was bared. She instinctively replied. “Me too.”
Their gazes held for a long moment, her insides quivering, the intensity rich on the air.
Until her cell phone beeped, breaking the stare. She started and jerked her focus to the screen revealing a text from Penny: Got the blueprints. Review them with boy toy. Elise read the text aloud.
“Let me have a look.” He wiped his hands, then accepted the phone, and Elise could barely take her eyes off him.
She’d seen Archer be irritating, sensual, and sweet, but this side, the lethal soldier, nearly made her bones melt as he took his time studying where he was going, forming a plan. “All right. Simple enough.” He returned her phone and focused back on his dinner.
The rest of the meal was eaten in comfortable silence. They quickly cleaned up, and he discussed his plan for getting in and out fast. “I’ve got something for you,” she said, taking an ear communicator out of her purse and offering it to him. “You’re not going in there alone.”
“I wouldn’t have expected otherwise.” He grinned.
She found herself moving closer, pulled by the warmth he offered and the strength he possessed. “I would tell this to anyone else I’m working with, so I’ll say it to you: Don’t be an idiot. We’re not superheroes. No one gets hurt under my watch. Ever. We investigate, not fight. Any presence of danger, you get out. Got it?”
His grin widened. “Yes, ma’am.”
“What’s that smile about?” she asked, wiggling into him.
He dipped his chin, bringing his mouth within an inch of hers. “I was just thinking there was a time I got really irritated when you got bossy.”
She lifted her brows at him. “And now?”
He had her by the waist and yanked her against him. Tight. Until all she could feel were the hard lines of his body. “I’m growing rather fond of you telling me what to do.” He sealed his mouth over hers, devouring her laughter. He kissed her roughly, passionately with his tongue dancing with hers until she had this deep, foreign need not let him go and to keep him safe.
When he broke the kiss, breathless, she reopened her eyes. “Promise me you’ll be safe.”
He gave her another kiss. A soft one. One that felt different than any other kiss before it. “I promise.”
The town house lay dark and quiet as Archer, dressed in black cargo pants and a black long-sleeve T-shirt and beanie hat, made his way to the back door through the garden. It’d been a long time since he ran a mission, but he’d run many just like this. His instincts sharpened, everything become alert, and his surroundings becoming clear.
“I’ve disabled the security system,” Penny said through his ear communicator. “You’ve got ten minutes tops to get in and out before they figure out the system is down.”
Archer didn’t respond; Penny already knew he wouldn’t. The sound of a voice carried even when someone thought it didn’t. Getting the okay to enter, he used his thin screwdriver to unlock the deadbolt and then the lock on the door handle. The bugs were in his pocket, and once he was inside, he kept his focus on getting them in place and getting out. He went to the most challenging spot first. From what he knew of people, most conversations happened in three places, no matter who you were or where you lived. The bedroom, living room, and the kitchen. From the blueprints Penny had given him earlier, he knew the master bedroom was on the third floor.
Once he entered the house, he quickly noted the silence, the darkness. The town house had three levels, with an unfinished basement below. Following the image in his mind, he headed up the stairs, keeping his small flashlight turned off until he reached the master bedroom. He hurried to the nightstand and used the light to guide his way to attach the bug to the backside of the stand, low to the ground, where no one would find it.
“First bug is activated,” Penny said through the ear communicator.
Clicking off the thin flashlight, he moved swiftly back downstairs and installed the next bug in the living room, beneath the television stand.
“Second bug up,” Penny acknowledged.
Right as Archer went to move toward the kitchen, he spotted movement in front of the living room window.
He ducked behind the main wall separating the hallway from the living room, holding his breath as Elise said, “Shit. Isaac is on the porch. He’s coming inside.”
“Alarm reactivated,” Penny said.
The fear in Elise’s voice rattled Archer for a moment. Not only was he not used to his team being scared, but he also wasn’t used to Elise being scared of anything. It touched on an unknown place in his heart. But this, he did know how to handle. He blended into the shadows, staying perfectly still.
The front door opened and shut, and the hall light flicked on. Isaac hit the button to rearm the alarm. His shoes clicked against the floor as he strode by and headed up the stairs quickly, indicating he didn’t plan to stay long. Neither did Archer.
When all was clear and Archer heard Isaac walk into the bedroom upstairs, he silently hurried down the hallway to the kitchen. There, he attached the bug to the bottom of the fridge, working in pure darkness.