Elle shifts to stand just behind me as I unlock the door. “Good,” she says in a small voice. “You?”
“Just fine,” I say, and then I can’t help huffing. “At least until Archer decided to go AWOL again.”
“Has he done this before?”
“Yep.” I push the door open and step inside first, just in case there’s some seedy fuck crashed out on the couch—which has happened before, andfuck me. “I probably should’ve put in that file that he has a recent history of being a flight risk.”
Elle follows me inside, but stays behind me. “Where does he go?”
“I have no idea.”
I skim the studio apartment, squinting at the fact that it isbizarrelyclean. It’s never clean like this. Normally, it’s not much different than a typical sixteen-year-old’s bedroom. The hide-a-bed sofa is folded up tidily with the cushions neatly in place and pillows set at each arm. The small oak coffee table is cleared. I march to the side with the kitchenette and see that the sink is empty and wiped clean like nobody’s ever used it. The inside of the refrigerator has a pitcher of water and an unopened bottle of Gatorade, but it’s as clean as everything else. I cross the room to the bathroom, and eventhatisspotless. Like a fuckingmaidhas been in this place.
Moving back to the center of the space, I turn a slow circle, eyeing all of it like the furniture is about to grow arms and legs to pounce on Elle and me.
“What in the actualfuckis going on here?” I demand, mostly of the room, and Elle speaks on its behalf.
“What do you mean?”
I peer at her. “You’ve been over here before, haven’t you? Like, that’s part of what you do, right?”
She nods, eyes darting back and forth between mine.
I wave an arm at the room. “Has it ever looked like this?”
She casts a bewildered gaze across the space. “Looked like what?”
I throw my hands up and let them drop at my sides. “Clean.”
She tilts her head. “Yes. It’s always clean like this.”
I squint at her, incredulous. “Archer can’t cleananythingto save his life. I don’t even think he knowshow.”
“Well, maybe he—”
“No,” I clip, turning to look around the room again, and I’m getting that sixth sense. The one I get when I know something isfuckedand I just don’t know what it is yet. “This is not anArcherthing to do. He doesn’t clean. Someone is cleaning this place, and it’s not him, and I don’t have any fuckingcluewhat that means.”
“Colin—”
“Something iswrong, and I don’t know what it is yet, but I know that it’sbad.” My pulse is thumping loudly in my ears, and on some level I can tell I’m breathing quickly enough that I’m starting to hyperventilate, and I knew I was going to end up with literalanxietyat some point in my life, and I guesshere we fucking are.
“Colin, if it’s just that his apartment—”
“No, Elle, you don’t understand.This isn’t normal.Something is wrong. I don’t know what it is, and I don’t know where he isagain, and I swear to God, you guys were my last fucking resort with him, and—”
“Shhhh…”Her chin is suddenly on my shoulder, lips right next to my ear. Her torso is pressed flush against my back, arms wrapped around my chest, and I can feel the bump pressing against the small of my back. She gently pats my sternum and gives it a firm rub. “Breathe.”
I can’tbreathe, but it suddenly has nothing to do with the sixth sense of something being totally fucked and me not knowing what it is yet. It has everything to do with the bump against my back. Elle and I are suddenly the human version of a Venn diagram, our individual circles intersecting at a center that is a perfect combination of the two of us, albeit one that’s still safely hidden inside her.
“Breathe, Colin.”
Her chin is still on my shoulder, lips still right next to my ear, and I can’t help turning my head toward her. Her mouth isright there, but I won’t do that. Iwon’t.
But then…shedoes.
It starts with only a single, small kiss before she angles her mouth over mine, and then it unravels. Elle is suddenly in front of me, in my arms, her fingers combing and gripping my hair, the evidence of a life we created together pressing against my abs, andmy God.
A life we created.
