Chapter Thirty Archer #2
Grant was drumming his thumb on the surface of the desk.
I kicked the side of his foot. “The letter,” I hissed.
“Oh.” He scrambled to his feet and grabbed the envelope, rushing it to the judge’s bench.
Her facial expression was the kind of patience you’d usually reserve for a wayward child. “Why don’t you take a seat now?”
“Yes, ma’am—Your Honor.” He gave me an apologetic look, and I shook my head as he did as she’d asked.
As she pulled the paper out of the envelope, she asked, “Mr. Evans, did this give you the kind of experience I’d hoped for when we discussed your sentence?”
I kept my eyes forward as she skimmed the letter in her hands. “Yes, Your Honor. I found it to be life changing. It’s all in there.”
Her mouth fell open, a shocking burst of pink washing over her cheeks. Her dark eyes darted up to mine. “Mr. Evans, this is . . . unexpected.”
“It is?”
She let out a shocked exhale. “I had no idea I’d made such an impact on you,” she said, tone wondrous.
My brow pinched. “I . . . Yes? You did?”
“Almost inappropriate, but I’ll let it slide.”
Inappropriate?
My eyes flew down to the desk, and the entire fucking floor could’ve given way underneath me and I wouldn’t have noticed.
The only envelope sitting on the table in front of me was the one with the judge’s name on it. Which meant . . .
My eyes snapped back up to the judge as she skimmed the rest of the letter with a shocked smile on her face. Fuck. Fuuuuuuuck.
I kicked Williams again.
“Ouch, what?”
I leaned down. “You gave her the wrong fucking letter,” I hissed.
His eyes widened. “I thought it was a copy. You didn’t tell me which one to give her.”
“Give her the one with her name on it, you twit.”
The judge cleared her throat. “Is everything all right?”
“Yes, Your Honor,” we said in unison.
“Good. I haven’t even finished it yet, but I’m going to read a section of this, if you don’t mind,” she said, a regal tilt to her jaw. “This is lovely, Mr. Evans.”
I was going to fucking kill the rookie.
“Your Honor,” I started haltingly, “if you don’t mind, I—”
“Sit, Mr. Evans,” she instructed, not taking her eyes off the words in front of her.
She held the letter out so she could see it clearly and began to read.
“The moment I saw you, I knew my life had changed. I should have known that it would, because looking in your eyes made everything clearer and sharper than it ever had been.”
I covered my mouth with one hand and pinched my eyes shut.
Please, I prayed fervently. A natural disaster. Fire in the building. Anything.
The rookie groaned under his breath and braced his elbows on the table, covering his face with his hands.
“When you walked away,” she read, “I should have trusted life would find a way to put you in my path again, because that’s where we’re meant to be.
We’re meant to be in each other’s lives.
You bring a light and warmth to everyone who knows you, but what you brought me wasn’t just about those things, though I experienced that too.
” She paused and gave me a delighted look.
“This is just incredible, Mr. Evans, I had no idea our first meeting meant so much to you.”
I gave her a weak smile. “Your Honor, please—”
“Yes, yes of course, I’ll keep going, my apologies.
” She cleared her throat. The court reporter kept typing, and I was so very glad there’d be a record of this for all eternity.
“But I needed more than just light and warmth. I needed change. And while you’ve kick-started mine, I won’t only be changing for you.
I’ll change for me. For my sister. For a family I hope to have someday, the family I pray you’re a part of, where I can teach my own children how to be imperfect and mess up and love each other.
Trusting me will be difficult. If that takes time, I understand.
I’ll never be a poet, and I don’t know how to say pretty things that put into words what my time with you has meant, but I’ve realized something in the time we’ve spent apart.
“It feels better to work really fucking hard to be the best version of myself, and not allow myself to be the worst simply because it’s what everyone expected.
I’d let them—let you—form those expectations, but it’s also in my power to try to break apart the notions people held of me.
I want to do that with you. For you. But for me too. ”
If it was possible to feel the weight of a dozen or more shocked gazes on the back of my head, then I was feeling them, and I sucked in a fortifying breath and turned slightly, hoping I was right and just one of them was hers.
I was.
Her eyes were big, her cheeks flushed. Her mouth hung open.
I smiled and shook my head, giving her a helpless shrug. For you, I mouthed, tilting my head back toward the judge.
A shocked laugh burst out of her mouth, and in the stunned silence of the courtroom after, Remi slapped a hand over her lips, eyes widening in horror.
The judge stopped. “Is everything all right?”
Slowly, I stood and held up my hands. “Your Honor, please, if I can finish what I was saying. You have the wrong letter.”
Her head reared back. “What do you mean?” Her eyes scanned, mouth moving as she neared the bottom.
“Oh. Oh.” With careful movements and color flooding her cheeks, she folded the letter back up and slid it back into the envelope, eyeing the rookie over her glasses.
“Why don’t you come get this?” she asked politely.
Among the quiet tittering in the room, he kept his head down and retrieved the letter, ignoring her pointed glare as he set it back down in front of me.
“You can rejoin your teammates, Mr. Williams. I think we’ve had enough of your help.”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
I let out a slow exhale. “Sorry,” I told her. “Really, really sorry.”
“Mm-hmm. And who was that letter meant for?” Her eyes skimmed the faces behind me. “Someone here, I’m assuming.”
The thought of outing Remi in front of her boss, in front of my teammates, made my lungs squeeze. “Your Honor, with all due respect, that was meant for a private moment.”
“And yet it’s become so very public.”
I picked up the second letter and held it up. “This was meant for you. If you’ll allow me to approach?”
She continued, undeterred, as if I hadn’t spoken, “In my many years on this side of the courtroom, I’ve found something to be almost universally true, Mr. Evans. Do you want to know what that is?”
Given I didn’t really think I had a choice, I found myself nodding. “Yes, Your Honor.”
“Every person in the world is born with the ability to change. To better themselves. But we fail to dig deep enough when it’s only our own happiness and satisfaction on the line.
What I’ve found is that the love of others, what we give and receive, is the most powerful motivator for change.
” Carefully, she removed her glasses and set them down on the desk in front of her.
“I hope the intended recipient of that letter is aware of what your love for them has done, because it’s a wonderful sight to behold. ”
Anxiety had a fucking choke hold on my ability to breathe properly. I’d practiced. I’d practiced how I was going to say it, when, the intonation—everything. We’d be alone with no eyes on us, and this was not how I’d intended it to go.
I’d get her fired.
She’d hate me.
She didn’t want attention ruining her life and Gavin’s life and—
“I am aware, Your Honor.” Remi’s voice was clear. No hesitation.
I whipped around, eyes finding hers. “Remi—”
“May I approach?” she asked, gaze locked on mine.
The judge made an amused sound. “I think you better.”
She was standing. Why was she standing? God, I couldn’t fucking breathe.
Then she was moving.
Then she was running.
It only took one stride and I had her in my arms, holding her as closely as I dared. Arms tight around my neck, Remi buried her face against the side of my neck and exhaled shakily.
I pressed my nose into her hair and filled my lungs with the clean, sweet scent of whatever crack shampoo she used. The courtroom filled with claps and whistles, and I couldn’t even pretend to be embarrassed.
“What are you doing?” I whispered.
She pulled back, eyes watery, and she cupped the side of my face. “I’m making a change too,” she said. “No more holding back because I’m scared.”
I set my forehead against hers and exhaled a shocked laugh. “I’ve missed you so—”
She kissed me before I could finish my sentence. In front of the entire fucking room, in front of every person in the world who mattered to me, Remi Sinclair staked her claim.
The applause was raucous—loud and obnoxious and perfect—as I kissed her deeply, tightening my hold on her body. I was never letting her go again.
We broke apart, and Remi smiled.
In the space of a heartbeat, my entire world shrank down, with that smile dead center.
“We did this all wrong, didn’t we?”
She laughed. “I don’t know. It feels pretty right to me.”
Ignoring the eyes on us, I leaned closer and let my lips brush hers. “Are you gonna get fired if I tell you I love you right now?”
“Probably not, since I told Muriel about an hour ago that I was in love with you too.”
My head reared back. “You did? You do?”
Her gaze was filled with adoration. “You gonna believe me when I tell you?”
I kissed her again, my chest filling with something warm and soft and perfect. Love, probably. Whatever it was, it was hers.
“Yeah, firefly, I think I will.”
The judge allowed Remi to take Williams’s seat—an upgrade in just about every way that mattered for me—and with her by my side, I read my actual statement for the court.
Remi cried. So did Williams. And I held her hand when the judge gave me a fond smile and told me she never wanted to see me again outside of her TV on Sundays.
The entire group filtered out of the courtroom, and the amount of hugs and backslaps and congratulations I received made my head spin, all of it with Remi’s fingers wound through mine.
We took the elevator downstairs, and I dropped a kiss on Remi’s head, then leaned down to whisper in her ear. “There’s journalists outside,” I told her. “Just a heads-up.”
She wound her arm around my waist and hummed in acknowledgment. The thought of letting her go, even for a moment, sounded like fucking torture, but this was the kind of patience I was ready for.
My teammates left the courthouse first, and before we walked out behind them, I took a deep breath and dropped her hand, even though we were still walking side by side.
I hated it. I hated it.
Hated pretending like she wasn’t my entire fucking world.
Eventually, I’d be able to. Small steps. Building to the thing we wanted. And for her, I could handle the waiting.
As we left the building and moved into the harsh sunlight, I pulled out my sunglasses and slid them on my face. Remi paused, glancing up at me.
“What are you doing?” she asked with a tilt of her head.
The click of camera shutters came closer, and I ignored them.
Archer, how did court go?
Archer, tell me who’s with you?
Archer, give us a picture!
I kept my eyes on her. “I’m . . . going to my truck. You’re coming over, right?”
Remi smiled again, then stepped forward, sliding her hands up my chest. “Not just yet.”
Then she tugged my face down for a deep kiss, and I wound my arms around her waist, clutching her as close as I could. Could she feel the hammering of my heart? There was no way she couldn’t.
I was breathless when she pulled back. Lightheaded from the kiss. From the statement it made.
From her.
“What are you doing?” I asked against her lips, my hands still anchored tight around her ribs.
“Setting the record straight,” she whispered.