Page 15 of Missing Pieces (Brantley Walker: Off the Books #12)

Violet rolled her eyes, still smiling. “Whatever.” She looked at Archer. “Once you say yes, what happens?”

“The yes is pretty much a box to check. They’ve already started a background check. I figure once that checks out, they’ll push to get my answer.”

Violet looked at Simon, her tone serious. “Should we be worried?”

Simon smiled. “We should always be worried about him.”

She continued as though Archer wasn’t there. “That’s what I thought. Maybe I can pass Reese a buck or two under the table to make any skeletons in his closet disappear.”

Archer chuckled. “Honey, I can assure you, there are no skeletons in my closet. Not since I came out of it when I was twenty-two.”

“And that was how many years ago?” Violet asked, clearly fishing. “One or ten, I forget.”

“Somewhere right in the middle.”

“He’s on the last leg of his twenties,” Simon said with a smirk.

“Twenty-nine? Really? You’re just a young buck, aren’t ya,” Violet drawled, giggling as the waitress approached to take their order.

“Hey, girl,” Archer greeted the waitress with a smile.

As was the case far more often than should be, the waitress giggled and blushed. Archer pretended not to notice, just as he always did.

He gestured for Violet to go first.

“Strawberry banana pancakes and orange juice.”

When Simon peered over at him, Archer smiled. “Age before beauty, my friend.”

He knew Simon was mentally flipping him off as he ordered up his egg whites and toast.

“And you, hun?”

“I’ll take four eggs, scrambled. Six pieces of bacon, two sausage links, and some tomato juice if you’ve got it.”

“Goin’ light today, huh?” Violet teased.

“Don’t wanna be too full when we meet up with Brantley and Reese later.”

Archer glanced at the door when he heard the bells chime.

He was hoping to see Spencer Elliott strolling in, but as had been the case since he arrived, he wasn’t that lucky.

He’d texted the man late last night, asking if he’d meet him for breakfast, but got no response.

Nor did he have one when he woke up this morning.

“Y’all are meetin’ up with them?” Violet asked Simon.

“If they’ve got time, we were gonna meet at the apartment,” Simon told her. “I wanted to walk them through the information we have. Reese mentioned wantin’ to talk to Holt. Since they didn’t connect yesterday, I figured two birds, one stone.”

“You’re not goin’ to talk to the mob boss today, are you?”

Archer watched the interaction between the two, keeping his smile on the inside. He had to admit, he’d never expected his friend to fall in love. Simon wasn’t the sort to skirt relationships or anything, but he’d never seemed interested enough in one woman to settle down.

Until he met Violet.

If Archer were a betting man, he’d put every penny he had in the bank on them getting married sometime next year. Violet had been sporting the ring for a few days now, but they’d yet to decide on a date.

“We’re not goin’ to talk to Max,” Simon told her. “I promise, when we do, you’ll be the first to know.”

“Technically, you’ll probably be the third or fourth to know,” Archer corrected.

“He can’t go by himself,” Violet said, staring at Archer.

“I’ll make sure he doesn’t.”

The bells chimed again, drawing his attention toward the door.

“Are you expectin’ someone?”

Archer’s gaze cut back to Simon quickly. “No.”

Violet sighed. “If you’re lookin’ for Spencer, he said he’s got some early showings today.”

Good to know. Didn’t explain why the man was avoiding him, though.

An hour later, after they’d polished off the food on their plates, Archer parked his Harley in a spot on Main Street in downtown Coyote Ridge.

Simon and Violet were already there, talking softly in front of Shelf Help, the bookstore Violet owned, smiling like a couple of lovesick teenagers.

Archer took his time removing his helmet, securing it. By the time he climbed off his motorcycle, he thought for sure they’d be done making googly eyes at one another, but he was wrong.

He made his way to the sidewalk, doing his best not to look at them or invade their private moment.

When they still weren’t finished, he stood back, pretending he found the sidewalk fascinating while he waited for Simon and Violet to say their goodbyes.

Seriously, that was how Simon had phrased it.

As though the man wouldn’t be lingering around the bookstore for most of the day anyway.

He could stop in at any point and see the woman, so Archer saw no reason for lengthy goodbyes.

Clearly he was the only one.

“If you’re not busy at lunch, I could grab somethin’. Bring it by,” Simon told Violet as they inched closer to the door.

Yeah, okay. As fun as this was, he had no interest in watching the two of them make out. Archer shook his head and gestured toward the second floor. “While you two do the kissy-kissy thing, I’m headin’ upstairs.”

Neither of them looked his way.

Amused at how far gone Simon was, Archer headed down Main Street, past the barber shop, toward the narrow alley between the two buildings. He turned left, eyeing the metal staircase that would take him up to the second floor at the rear of the building.

He wasn’t in a rush to get to the apartment.

Mostly because he hadn’t bothered to grab the key from Simon, which meant he couldn’t get in.

Despite Simon’s promise to stop in at the hardware store to get another made, the man had yet to do so.

He knew it had to do with the fact he was in love and distracted by all the hearts and flowers that were swimming around in his brain, and not because the task was difficult.

After all, the hardware store was right next door to the bookstore.

Easy, right? Then again, the guy was in love, and since Archer never had been, perhaps—

He stopped on the step that was second to the top.

Frowning, he looked toward the opposite end of the building, expecting to see someone on the exterior walkway, although he had no idea who he would see.

There were four doors, but only two had people coming and going.

The first was the office that Spencer rented for his real estate business.

Since, according to Violet, he was currently taking care of early showings, he wouldn’t be there.

The second was a storage room that Violet used for her bookstore.

The third was the converted apartment that Holt rented from Violet, and the fourth was also storage, from what he’d heard.

So, unless Paige was at door number three—which she wasn’t because she was back in Dallas taking care of some things—then that meant someone was at the real estate office.

Was it Spencer? Or someone who worked for him? Were they supposed to be there?

Only one way to find out.

Archer continued up and walked a few feet to the door with the placard that read REAL ESTATE OFFICE.

He got the feeling they didn’t have many clients meet them there.

He thought back to a few days ago when Simon and Violet wanted to see a house they were interested in.

Spencer met them at the house. Made sense that they wouldn’t need to office out of anything fancy.

Reaching up, he was about to knock when the door opened a fraction of an inch. An eyeball appeared as though scoping the area.

“Spencer?”

“Oh, shit.”

Before the door could slam closed, Archer put his hand up to stop it.

“Shit, shit, shit,” Spencer muttered, stepping back and spinning around.

“What the fuck, man?” Archer followed him inside, closing the door behind him.

He looked around, ensuring no one else was there, and was pleased to find they were alone. He took another minute to take it all in, to get to know Spencer just a little bit more by his surroundings.

When it became clear Spencer wasn’t going to say anything, Archer turned to face him.

“So, did you lie to Violet? Or did Violet lie to me?” he prompted, wanting to know why Violet would tell him Spencer had clients to meet early this morning.

“I lied to her,” Spencer grumbled, not meeting his eyes.

“Hey, look,” Archer told him, holding up his hands and backing up. “If you’re not interested, just say the word. I’ll leave you alone. No questions asked.”

Spencer looked up, frowned.

“I’m not an idiot,” Archer continued. “I know when to back off.”

“It’s not that I’m not interested,” Spencer said, his tone somewhat weak. “It’s just…”

“No questions asked, remember?” Archer repeated as he turned to leave. “You don’t need to come up with an excuse.”

“Archer, wait,” Spencer snapped as he turned the knob on the door.

Releasing it, Archer turned back, stared at the man, and felt that same warm buzz in his veins that he’d felt the first time he saw Spencer in Violet’s bookstore.

The guy looked professional but not starchy with his blue jeans and polo shirt, which featured the name of his real estate company.

He wore his dark brown hair neatly combed, tapered on the sides and back.

His light brown eyes were lined with thick lashes and held a hint of worry in them.

When Spencer didn’t launch into anything, Archer leaned back against the door and waited.

He’d been told more than once that he was intimidating. He figured it mostly had to do with his size. Then again, having been a gangly teenager at one point, he’d been called worse than that.

Spencer took a deep breath and exhaled on a rush. “Look. I really don’t want you to think you’re obligated to … I don’t know … date me.”

Archer’s eyebrows lifted. “Obligated?” That was a first.

“Yeah. You know.” Spencer huffed and waved a hand. “Because I told you what I told you.”

“That your brother’s ex-wife raped you?” he asked, addressing it head-on because that was how Spencer had done it when they first talked about it the night Archer interjected when Jennifer Elliott, Slade’s ex-wife, was giving Spencer a hard time at Moonshiners.

You don’t like her much, do you?

Not even a little.

Ex-girlfriend?

My brother’s ex-wife.

Oh.

Oh, what?