I grit my teeth and clench my hand into a fist. “What people?”
“Narcos,” he hisses, the word coming out with a perfect Spanish accent. It’s a reminder that my baby brother is fuckingbilingual, and he used that to get involved with drug lords rather than finding some kind of legitimate work, andJesus Christ.“I was sick of constantlyliving off your goddamned tit, and did something about it. While you were off rubbing elbows at Isla’s fancy-ass engagement party, I was getting myself a damn job that paid me almost as much asyoursdoes.”
I recall my own words to him over the phone prior to that weekend and could slam my own head against the stainless steel table. This is my fucking fault, too. My shitty choice of words apparently lit a fire under Archer’s ass to provide for himself, and he’s so disconnected from reality that selling drugs seemed like a good option.
I don’t know what my face looks like right now, but it seems to trigger Archer to launch into a tangent.
“I was paying my fucking rent with my own fucking money, Colin.” His light brown brows are high on his forehead. “I paid my utilities. I hired a fuckinghouse cleaner. You didn’t even notice that I wasn’t using the money you put in my account, and you didn’t even notice that I stopped asking for cash after that weekend. And then you were like, I’m gonna give you all this money if you can stay clean, and I was gonna fucking do that because evenIknow it was a better option than slingin’ blow. I was gonna go pick up my last haul and tell them I wanted out after that, but they didn’t like that too much.Nosotros hacemos lo que diga el jefe, y listo.You do what you’re fucking told with these people. They’re the shot-callers, not me.” He slams back against his chair. “So, yeah, I was already drowning before I even realized I was in the water. But I only got in the water because I was trying to take care of my own shit.” He lowers his face to stare at his hands again. “I’m just a fuck-up, Colin. You’ve always been right about that. So just deal with it.”
My mind is firing off synapses as I attempt to logically parse through everything he just said and everything I remember about the past few months. As if there’s a way for me to right all of this by simply making sense of it. But there’s no sense to be made. We’re both fucked up, and we always have been. My fucked-up-ness only contributed to his, and his fucked-up-ness contributed to mine, and so on and so forth from here to fucking eternity.
I release both my jaw and my fist, and then slump in my chair. “I mean… I have no room to talk about someone else being a fuck-up, so maybe just forget all the times I said that.”
“Ha.” He gives a sardonic snort. “Yeah, yeah. Hot shot sales guy Colin with his fancy fuckin’ BMW is a real fuck-up, lemme tell you.”
“You can have a BMW and be plenty fucked up, letmetellyou.”
Archer rolls his eyes at me. “Oh really.”
“Yep.” With this shitty turn-of-events, there’s no point in keeping the big secret from him anymore. “I’m sure you noticed that Elle’s knocked up, right?”
His expression softens. The sight of it is a reminder of how good she was to him, and how much I wish all of her goodness could be a permanent facet of my life. “Yeah.”
“Well guess who’s responsible forthat.”
His soft expression morphs into a blank look for all of two seconds before his jaw falls open and his eyes stretch wide. “You fucked my recovery coach?” He blinks rapidly. “Holyshit, Colin.”
“She wasn’t your recovery coach when it happened,” I clarify, borderline deadpan because my give-a-fucks have all but dissolved over the course of this meeting. “She used to work for me, and I took her with me to assist with nailing down a deal with Ernesto, and we hooked up that weekend. Then she insisted that I fire her, which I needed to anyway after that, and then it was just a bizarre coincidence that she happened to get a job at Allied after all that.” I shrug. “And I was enough of a piece of shit to her when she worked for me that she doesn’t want me involved in her lifeorthat baby’s life. So I’m so much of a fuck-up that I’m going to have a daughter who doesn’t know anything about me beyond the fact that I’m her sperm donor.” I point at him. “You’re going to have a niece that doesn’t know you either.” I wave my hand at the room. “I think that’s even more fucked up than any of this.”
Archer gives a low whistle and shakes his head. “That is pretty fucked up.” He pauses before hitching one shoulder. “I dunno, Elle’s pretty fuckin’ cool and level-headed. Maybe she’ll come around at some point.” He jerks his chin at me. “You like her?”
I glance at his face before dropping my gaze, but say nothing. Which doesn’t matter because I know he can read me like a book.
“Oh.” He drums his lap. “Youmore thanlike her, huh?” He sighs loudly. “That sucks.”
“Yeah.” I straighten up in my chair and adjust the knot of my tie. “But oh well. Sometimes life sucks.” I nod sideways at the glass. “Russell seems pretty competent. And the progress you made before this will probably help. Maybe you won’t getjustprobation, but I bet it won’t be as bad as it sounds.” I exhale loudly. “When all this is behind us, maybe you and me get out of the city for a while. The city’s full of bad memories anyway.”
“Yeah,” Archer echoes.
We sit in silence for a minute or two before an officer comes in the room, and Archer stands. He’s perfectly compliant as the officer cuffs him, but the sight of it makes me sick to my stomach because it’s evidence of how badly I’ve failed him.
“Hey, Colin,” Archer says as the officer leads him toward the door.
I stand up from the chair and push it back next to the table. “Yeah.”
“I’ll keep my fingers crossed that she comes around.” He offers a wide grin and a glint in his eyes. “I think you’d make a really good dad. You always took good care of me.”
Except that Ididn’t.
So maybe itisbetter that Elle keeps her distance.
Regardless, I return his smile. “Thanks, Archer. Behave yourself in there, and I’ll see you soon.”
After they slip out of the room, I glance at my phone and remind myself that I still haven’t returned Elle’s call; that I really wanted to, but was too caught up with Archer’s ordeal to do it yet. But now I’m thinking, maybe I shouldn’t. She invited me to hang out with her at her apartment—yes,to make me feel better, but I’ve been waiting for an invitation like that formonths.
But now, I don’t know if that’s such a good idea.
Maybe me being involved with this baby isn’t such a good idea. Because the only other person who’s ever been under my care is currently being led back to a cell where he’ll wait to go before a judge and likely end up in prison.
