Chapter 11
HARLOW
I was being followed. I knew by the way the back of my neck tingled. Goosebumps broke out on my arms.
At the next set of lights, I crossed to the other side of the street, using the reflection from car windows to look behind me. For a moment, I thought it might be Cass.
Then I saw him.
He wasn't really trying to be subtle. Of course not, that wasn't his style. It still begged the question, why the hell was he following me? That was definitely what was going on here. Someone like him didn't just happen to be walking the same way I was.
I stopped suddenly outside a shoe store and admired the display in the window. A girl could never have too many boots. And theirs were particularly nice. Did the red ones come in my size? They'd go perfectly with my black skirts.
I glanced over my shoulder to see him walk past, the momentum of the crowd carrying him forward. To his credit, he didn't look back at me.
Reluctantly, I stepped away from the window and followed him. All the way to the end of the block before he turned onto a side street.
Keeping my distance, I took the same turn, almost running straight into him.
"Why are you following me?" His dark brown hair was cut short except a small section on the top. That was almost long enough to curl. Eyes almost the same color as his hair demanded answers, but without fear or anger. Instead, there was a need to know. To understand.
"You were following me," I pointed out. "I should be asking you that question."
"I wanted to know where you were going," he said, as if somehow that explained everything.
"Why does Archer Hardwick want to know where I was going?" I cocked my head at him. "Why do you give a shit?"
"Curiosity," he said simply. "Why else does anyone do anything?"
"I can think of a lot of reasons," I said. "I'm not sure curiosity even makes the top ten."
"I saw a post on social media the other day that listed curiosity as the third reason for why people did most things," he said.
I shouldn't have asked, but I couldn't seem to help myself. "What were the top two reasons?"
"The second reason was greed, the first reason was cats." He shrugged one shoulder.
I snorted a laugh. "That sounds like a good reason not to believe everything you see on the Internet."
"Cats aren't a reason for why you do the things you do?" Again, he seemed genuinely interested in the answer.
"I can't say they are," I said. "I haven't had a cat in a long time."
"Maybe it's lack of cats," he said, as if this was somehow a rational conversation. "You want to get a coffee?"
"I could use some caffeine," I said. "There's a café on the corner back there." I jerked my thumb over my shoulder.
He peered around before pulling out his phone and swiping at the screen. "The reviews look good." Decision made, he pushed his phone back into his pocket.
Shaking my head at him, I made my way through the press of people until we slipped into chairs opposite each other, beside the window. Where I could watch people passing and coming in and out. With a wall directly behind me, I could see everyone and everywhere.
Yes, it was paranoia, but I preferred to be ready.
"What brings you to this part of the city?" I propped my elbows on the table and looked over at him.
"The usual," he said easily. "I heard on one of the police channels about a man who broke his daughter's arm during visitation. Figured I'd show him how it felt." He didn't add 'before I kill him.' It was implied, and we both knew it.
We met after I killed my sister's second killer. Archer had come to do the same thing. We'd cleaned the place up in silence and had breakfast together afterwards. We struck up a friendship of sorts. As much as people like us could have friends.
"Have you finished with him?" I asked carefully.
"A little over an hour ago," he said. "In approximately eleven hours, the police will be informed. They'll find him in front of the TV, watching reruns of CSI."
"How ironic," I said.
Archer cracked a small smile. "I thought so. I saw a meme the other day that said how much a person would hate to die while listening to a singer they didn't like. Because the people who found them would assume they liked them. This guy was more into hard-core porn than he was into CSI."
"That's funnier than it should be," I said.
"I was going to put his TV on a kids channel, but that seemed wrong." He spooned four sugars into his coffee and gave it a stir. "Not to mention suspicious."
"Right, a guy found in front of his TV wouldn't look suspicious at all," I said sarcastically. From what I knew of Archer and his techniques, the man's death wouldn't be ruled a suicide. More likely, he had his throat cut.
"At least he won't be sullying Sesame Street," Archer said, sucking coffee off his spoon.
"Or hurting his daughter," I said.
"That too," he agreed. "So, who's the pretzel guy?"
He waited until I took a sip to ask that. I had to swallow while trying to think of how to respond.
"He's a friend," I said.
"He wants to be more than a friend," Archer observed.
"He might," I said evasively. "Are you trying to keep tabs on me?"
"Just an observation," he said. "I was going to come over and say hello, but you know the saying: two in every three people wish the third one would go away. I figured it was better to wait until he was gone. I didn't want to interrupt your date."
"It wasn't a date. Not exactly," I said, scratching behind my ear. I had a flower tattooed there. A lily. For no other reason than I liked them.
"He looked like he thought it was a date.
" Archer sipped his coffee. "You want me to talk to him?
Get him to back off?" He was a little burlier than Cass, with a similar, dark air.
An undercurrent of barely controlled violence.
Archer knew his way around a knife and wouldn't be remorseful in drawing blood.
"No, I don't want you to talk to him," I said quickly. "I like him. He's sweet."
"Does he pick up his own socks?" Archer asked.
I gave him a funny look. "I have no idea. I've never been to his place. Why do you care about his socks?"
"I read a study once, where if women started to pick up a man's socks at the beginning of a relationship, they'd be doing it until the end of it. Therefore, a guy who already knows how to pick up his own socks will be less of a challenge." Archer made it all sound so reasonable.
"Do you pick up your own socks?" I cocked my head at him.
"Is that your way of asking me out?" He drew his brows together. "So you can find out if I can pick up after myself?"
"That's some mental gymnastics," I teased. "I already know you can pick up after yourself. I've seen how meticulous your cleaning is."
"Are you asking me to marry you?" His expression was perfectly deadpan, only his fingers moving as they gripped his coffee cup. The rest of his arm, fully covered in a sleeve of tattoos, was perfectly still. "Because I sound like the perfect mate from your description."
"Did you read that online too?" I asked.
"Probably. The Internet is an endless source of information and entertainment." He brought his cup to his lips, looking back at me before taking a sip. "Three and a half stars. Not bad, but not great."
"The Internet is an endless source of something," I said, taking a sip of my own coffee. "For the record, no. I'm not asking you to marry me. I have no intention of marrying anyone." I waited for him to quote some random statistic, but he didn't.
"I have to confess, I was following you," he said. "Not just because of pretzel man."
"His name is Cassius," I said. "Cassius Titmus. Why were you following me?"
Instead of answering, Archer pulled out his phone and tapped Cassius' name into the screen.
"I didn't tell you that so you could stalk him," I said.
"Is this him?" He turned the phone around so I could look. "He has a golden ratio face."
"He has a what now? Yes, that's him." Cass was wearing a suit and sitting in front of a computer, looking like he wished he was anywhere but having his photo taken.
"Golden ratio," Archer said as if that would explain everything. "It's a mathematical proportion that determines attractiveness. You have a golden ratio face too."
"Um, thanks? You're not so bad looking yourself." It seemed like the thing to say.
"My face isn't symmetrical enough." He placed his phone down.
"I feel like I should say you shouldn't put yourself down," I said. Now I was looking more carefully, his nose did tilt a little to the left. So did his chin. One of his ears was bigger than the other. Not noticeably so, but still.
"Just being realistic," he said. "If I was bothered, I'd have surgery to correct it. As it is, I really don't give a shit."
"Good, I think that's a healthy way to look at it," I said.
"We are who we are. And if we don't like it, we can get tattoos and piercings.
" I raised my arm, almost as covered in ink as his.
Each of my ears was pierced four times in different places and my septum was pierced, although I rarely wore any jewelry in it.
"Exactly. What about matching ink?" He squinted at me. "You said you'd never get married, but would you get matching ink with someone?"
"I don't know," I admitted. "I've never given it any thought. I mean, ink is permanent and sometimes relationships aren't. I'm not sure I want that reminder on my skin forever."
"What if the relationship doesn't end?" He propped an elbow on the table and rested his cheek on his hand. “If, statistically, fifty percent don't last, then fifty percent also do. Those odds aren't so bad."
"Yeah, well." I shrugged. "I can't see myself getting involved in anything long-term with anyone. If I do, I'll figure it out then."
"You still have your tally?" He gestured toward my forearm, just below my elbow.
I pushed my sleeve back to show a row of seven lines, three with a strike mark through them.
There was nothing to suggest what they meant.
If you knew, you knew. If you didn't, you could guess because chances were I wouldn't explain it.
He only knew because I told him as we were cleaning up after our mutual kill.
Back then, I only had two lines struck through.
Archer nodded. "I have some information that might cross another one off. That was why was following you. I wanted a chance to talk to you."
"Some people call or send an email," I pointed out. Considering how attached he was to his phone and using technology, wanting to talk in person was somewhat contradictory.
"Someone might intercept it," he said. "The Internet is always listening. Have you ever searched for something, only to see ads for it turn up on your social media feed? This was better done in person."
He was right. He couldn't exactly send me an email saying, Hey babe, I found someone you're trying to kill, let's go and murder them.'
"Okay, so what—"
I was interrupted as Boner slipped into the chair beside us.
"Hello love, this is cozy."