“It's a beer, sweet cheeks; una cerveza, if you wanna get bilingual with it.” A big shit-eating grin creeps across my face as I tilt back the cold bottle and take a big swig.
Leaving the room the second she ducked out to get us food, after that ridiculous little speech about her being in charge, was my little way of saying “yeah, sure.” Sure looks like it’s working.
“Where did it come fro- never mind.” She mutters, slamming the door shut and putting the bag on the table by the window; “I got you turkey.”
“I'm more of a hamburger guy.”
She narrows her eyes at me before all but overhand throwing the sandwich at me; “Deal with it.”
I grin and reach for another beer and offer it her way; “Beer?”
Chelsea huffs and rolls her eyes, and my own gaze lingers a bit longer than it probably should on her as she brushes a strand of blonde behind her ear; “Uh, yeah, I don't think so.”
I smirk, already anticipating this exact conversation; “Why not?”
She's going to say something about being on the job, or how I am who I am, or some other way of trying to tiptoe her way around saying she just flat out doesn't trust me. The fantasy I've got is that she actually doesn't trust herself around me, but I'm pretty sure that’s just the dry-spell talking. I shake my head and cut her off before she can utter whatever lame reason she was about to toss out; “Have a beer, spy-girl; you've earned it.”
She eyes me warily and I laugh; “Look, I just went out for beer, sweetheart. I won't leave again; scout's honor, or, thieves honor, or, whatever. You're in charge, alright?”
I hope it doesn't come off too much like I'm stroking her ego, since that's exactly what I'm doing. The old me - the normal me - would use this sort of thing all the time to gain an upper hand on someone. Stroke their ego, build them up, give them false confidence and trust in you, and then you strike.
Except for the first time in, well, ever, that's not my goal here in this motel room with Chelsea Archer. Right now, I actually just want her to fucking relax and have a damn drink with me.
“One beer, princess,” I grin at her, seeing the dead-set resolve start to melt from her face; “We've had a crazy two days, and hey, you've got the notorious bandito in custody. The little town on the prairie is safe, and you’ve earned a beer, sheriff.”
She grins then, and I feel a strange sense of, I guess it’s happiness, inside seeing her finally relax. The old me would have felt triumph, like I'd won; seeing her cave to my suggestions like that. But for some bewildering reason I feel different now.
Must be prison, I mutter to myself, shaking my head and trying to search deep for the old me. The old me was a real piece of shit, but the old me also didn’t get twisted up inside trying to make some cop of a chick like him; like I fucking need her attention or give a flying shit what she thinks about me.
I crank the top off the bottle and pass it her way as she sits on the second bed opposite me and starts to unwrap her sandwich; “So, the C.I.A., huh?” I raise an eyebrow at her; “I mean how does that even work? You just walk in and ask for a job application or something?”
Chelsea snorts; “It's slightly more complicated than that.”
“Why?”
She frowns; “Because it’s the C.I.-”
“No,” I chuckle through my bite of mediocre turkey sandwich; “No, I mean why did you join. You don't strike me as the 'For God and Country' type.”
She shrugs; “Who says I'm not?”
“Me, right now.”
A smirk teases her lips as she chews, before she take a sip of the beer; “My dad.”
I bark out a laugh; “I knew it.”
“And what's that supposed to mean?” She scowls.
“Nada, princess, nada. I just knew it had to do with pleasing daddy.”
Her eyes narrow at me; “You don't know a fucking thing about my father.”
“I know more about William Archer than you could possibly know, actually.” I put my sandwich down and catch her eyes; “I met him, you know.”
She freezes, the beer bottle inches from her pouty lips; “Excuse me?”
“In Africa, when he first met those boy-toys of yours.” I can feel the familiar grip of malcontent inside just thinking about that particular past; “I was there, in the camp with them when he came in and- oh now what was it? He 'saw promise in them'? Isn't that the fuck-all rhetoric I used to hear Logan moaning about?”
She chews slowly, her eyes locked on mine.
“Yeah, well, apparently I didn't pass muster with the great William Archer; no 'promise' here.”
The briefest smirk passes over her face, as if to say yeah, no shit; “So is that why you blackmailed Logan and kidnapped him and my sister?”