Page 25 of Sinful Deception

“Sure. Come on.” I unsnap my belt and turn to the door, but Frank is too fast, pulling it open and holding an umbrella up to cover my head from the snow floating down. My arms sting from the cold, so I cross them over my chest and rub them to create friction. But of course, Archer slides out quickly and comes around to drop a hoodie over my head. Not my jacket, which would be too stiff and uncomfortable and cold for now. But a hoodie I know belongs to him. Somehow, between the hospital and here, he’s acquired a thick sweater that wraps me up and warms me all over. “Thank you.” I look up into his emerald eyes, the glittering jewels he walks around with daily, but where love and adoration usually sit, worry takes over. So I step onto my toes and press a kiss to his jaw. “I love you.”

“I could talk to Mia.” He rubs my arms to bring me more warmth. “You’re already not talking about that other stuff from Thanksgiving. There’s no need to add more to your pile right now.”

“I want to.” I turn and wrap my arm around his, so we can walk side by side. “For Fletch. And Mia. I want to.”

“And you’ll tell me if this is all too heavy for you, right? Later, when it’s just me and you, you’ll tell me if you’re struggling?”

We step up onto the sidewalk and stop beside Fletch. Then, all three of us simply stare at the door. The one that will lead to a lobby-like area, and after that, stairs. Just a few flights, and we’ll be with Mia.

And after that… nothing will ever be the same again.

“Mayet?”

“Yeah.” Hesitantly, I start toward the door. Because if I don’t, I’m not sure either of the others would make a move. “I promise. And even if I don’t with my words, you’ll know with my body language.” I yank the door open with a grunt, combatting the wind that whips along the street and smiling a soft smile of thanks for Fletch when he grabs the handle. Then we start in and move up the stairs. “You always know how I’m feeling, Archer. Even when I’m not telling you about it.”

“I don’t want to have to rely on a gut feeling,” he growls. “Not when you need me.”

“Maybe we should wait until tomorrow,” Fletch wavers. Tension grows thick as we make our way up the stairs. “It’s almost bedtime, and she still needs dinner and a bath. So if I tell her now, she probably won’t sleep. And if she doesn’t sleep, she’ll struggle in school tomorrow.”

I glance across to Archer in silence. Fletch is spiraling. And Mia probably isn’t going to school tomorrow, no matter how well she sleeps tonight.

“But not telling her feels wrong,” he rambles. “I can’t go in there and not expect her tofeeleverything that’s happening. To not tell her, when she’ll know something is up, is lying.”

Archer’s phone rings in his back pocket, but when he reaches back and frees the device, only to see Felix’s name on the screen, I don’t need to read his mind to know why he declines the call.

Way too much to unpack, and not enough stairs or privacy to unpack it.

So he jumps to the text screen and simply types:I’ll call you later.

“Maybe the school will have a counselor on staff,” Fletch continues. “We could let the school tell her. They’re theprofessionals, and we owe it to her to be told by someone who knows what the hell they’re doing.”

Archer’s phone buzzes again, but this time, with a text response:Call me before I come looking for you. Give Fletch my best, if you think it appropriate.He probably won’t want to hear from me, considering our history, but I’m thinking of him tonight. Even if she was a hoe who never deserved them.

“That’s enough of that,” Archer mumbles, locking the screen and slipping the phone back into his pocket. “He’s not great at keeping inside thoughts, inside.”

I scoff and lower my gaze to the stairs. “I know.”

“But to send her to school without telling her, and having them do it, seems cruel. She would never forgive me. But maybe we could both go to the school. We could do it together.”

“What should we do?” I whisper to Archer. “He’s not ready.”

“Give him two more flights to work it out.” He peers back to make sure Fletch is still following. Still with us and moving. “This is what he does sometimes.”

“I wish I knew a counselor personally. We could bring them here tonight. Best of both worlds, and my baby would have a fighting chance at healing from this.”

“Whatever you decide,” I tell him. “You’ll always make the right choice for her.”

“I don’t know any counselors, though. But I know a doctor who deals with death, so that’s kind of similar. Not the same,” he amends. “But similar. And it’s better than nothing. And you know how to talk about these things without losing your shit.” He searches my eyes when we turn at the next landing. The last one before his front door. “Your ability to be cold and factual and unemotional is a gift, Mayet. Sometimes it pisses me off because I want to see youfeel. But in times like this, Mia hearing this news from someone who can deliver it without breaking down,but that same someone loves her, that’s a best of both worlds, right?”

“Yes. I think so.”

“So I guess that’s what we do. We can?—”

“Daddy!” The apartment door flings open, and Mia bounds through kind of how the Kool-Aid man does in the cartoons. She’s all smiles and rosy cheeks. Wild hair after a big day at school, and messy clothes with paint splotches on them.

But man, she’s happy.

“Cato picked me up from school, Daddy!” She waves back through the door till Cato steps to the threshold, not nearly as cheerful as his mini-best friend. “Miss Penny was there, too! But Cato said he could take me, and she tried to call you to make sure, but you didn’t answer. So then she called Uncle Archer, and Felix said he could take me.”

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