Page 72 of Beautiful Thing

As I hide behind the half-open door, he speaks without looking up from his puzzle. “You wouldn’t make a very good secret agent, you know that?” A faint grin curls the corners of his lips.

My face flushes with embarrassment over getting caught spying on him again. I take a backward step and the floorboards scream under my heels, confirming that it’s too late to run away now. I might as well go with it.

I make my best attempt at a sassy smile as I saunter into the small room. “Sheesh! Way to dash a girl’s career aspirations. I guess I’ll have to stick to sleuthing as a hobby."

“Good idea.” Archer chuckles, his eyes finding mine as he takes off his glasses and sets them on the table beside him.

Goosebumps wash down my back as his dark irises grab hold of mine. I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s the charming crackle of the fireplace. Or the intimate silence of the house. Or just the ceaseless memory of what happened between us the last time we were alone in the same room at this time of night.

I pull my gaze from his, letting my eyes travel around the room. “So,thisis where you run off to every night?” I softly close the door behind me. Somehow, it feels like sealing my fate.

Archer throws a distracted look around the room before his full attention is back on me. “This is it,” he says simply.

I try to ignore the nervous sensation blooming in my belly as I look around the small home library.

The vibe is cozy and rustic. Warm but in a masculine way, if that makes sense. There’s one wall packed from corner-to-corner with old books. A big picture window overlooks the woods out back, where snowflakes fall lazily from the sky. There’s an overstuffed sofa shoved up against one wall. I notice the half-finished jigsaw puzzle that used to be in the living room. It’s now sitting on a hand-carved antique table in the corner. The old-fashioned light fixtures and the roaring fireplace only add to the quaint atmosphere.

My eyes return to Archer. He’s still looking at me from his recliner, curiosity in his expression. That intense stare draws my awareness back to the fact that I just barged into his private space in the middle of the night with zero explanation.

“Couldn’t sleep…” I mumble. I tuck a lock of hair behind my ear, just to give my fidgety hands something to do. I wait for him to tell me to get lost.

Instead, he just nods faintly. When I say nothing further, he drops his eyes back to his puzzle book.

“Did you eat?” I ask quietly. “I left you a plate in the fridge.”

“Yeah. Thank you for dinner, Belle. It was delicious.” He nods gratefully.

After another silence, he slides his hot lumberjack-professor glasses back on and returns to his crossword.

Well, at least he’s not kicking me out. So I take that as an invitation to explore the room some more. I start with the pictures on the wall first.

An image of a younger Archer, dressed in his military uniform, embracing his mom as he returns home from a deployment. A picture of Stella, perched happily on Archer’s shoulders as she eats an ice cream cone in the middle of the farmer’s market. A shot with all the Brighton brothers, struggling to keep up on the basketball court as Archer dunks the ball into the net. The little family photo gallery makes me smile.

In the corner of the room, a door slowly swings open on its own, startling the heck out of me. Peeking inside, I realize that it’s a gorgeous rustic bathroom with a deep bathtub, a walk-in shower and a huge wooden vanity. I almost sigh out loud, thinking of how relaxing a soak in that tub might be.

I move on to a bookshelf tour. I let my fingertips trail along the spines of the books, enjoying this tiny peek into the more private side of Archer. Some of the books on the shelves surprise me. Sprinkled between the classic detective fiction novels and the military sci-fi adventures and the non-fiction history tomes, I recognize more than a few well-loved romance books.

Archer Brighton reads romance books.

I was right. I always knew this hard-shelled man was soft and cuddly at the core.

I peek over my shoulder and steal a tiny glimpse of him, wondering about all the other parts of him I’ve yet to discover. Longing makes my chest ache. I want each and every one of his secrets. I want him to share every little piece of his story with me.

His firsts. His favorites. His triumphs. His regrets.

When his head starts to lift from his puzzle book, I snap my neck away. I absently pluck a novel from its place on the bookshelf. I begin to peruse the pages ofSense and Sensibilitywithout really seeing the words.

Shit. The tension is so thick right now, I can practically feel it crawling across my skin. But I’m realizing that I like being near him, even when words aren’t being exchanged. My relationship with Razor was all about screaming matches and shouting fits. I grew so used to the chaos that I never understood what ‘companionable silence’ meant. But I think this is it.

The quiet is…nice. Even in Archer’s silence, there’s nowhere I’d rather be, and I find myself realizing just how starved I am for connection.

After a long moment, I dare to glance back in Archer’s direction. This time, I find him already staring at me. Well, at my ass, to be precise.

He’s checking me out.

Blatantly. Hungrily.

The shock of it makes the book slip from my fingers. It hits the carpet with a muffled thud. I hurriedly scoop it up, slipping it back on the shelf.

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