Comeback (The Holland Brothers Book 3)

Friday morning, I force myself to get up early, even though I’d like to sleep in for several more hours. We didn’t get home until late last night after our trip to the studio. After, I lay awake in bed for hours, thinking of Archer, replaying pieces of our conversation and the way it felt to have his stare on my lips all night.

When I get to the studio, I put on my respirator and gloves and start the gross task of cleaning the walls. I can’t stop thinking about Archer. I’ve been on actual dates that felt less intimate than talking with him at the bar.

I lift the respirator, resting it on top of my head, and bring a hand to my mouth as I get lost in my thoughts. The latex material on my hand tastes like dirt and cleaner.

“Yuck.” I drop my hand quickly and go over to grab my water bottle and drown the nasty taste.

The sun streams through the broken windows of the studio. I left the door open this morning to let in some fresh air. I also bought two air purifiers, and I rented a heavy-duty vacuum to finish cleaning the floors and walls. But there is still a lot to do to get this place cleaned up and I’ve accepted that I might have to break it up over several days or even weeks.

My AirPods are in, music playing, as I stare around the room, devising a plan. The floors are swept of all the big stuff, but there’s still a thick layer of dust and grime. Once I vacuum the cobwebs and dirt off the walls as well, I need to scrub the entire place from top to bottom.

It’s overwhelming, but one step at a time. I pull the respirator back down and drag the vacuum over to the far wall and get started.

In no time, my arms start to feel heavy and I’m sweating. I really need a ladder because even with the extension on the vacuum, I can only reach halfway up the wall.

Something catches the corner of my eye, and I glance over to the open doorway, then jump and squeak in surprise.

Archer’s lips pull into a smirk as I fumble to turn off the vacuum and remove my AirPods and respirator.

“Sorry if I startled you,” he says, walking into the studio. “But I did say your name a few times.”

His gaze roams over the space.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, moving in front of him like I’m trying to block him from seeing this place. I know he saw it last night, but it was dark. In the daylight, there’s no hiding just how much work it needs.

Then I remember the state of me. I’m pretty sure my face is coated in the same dust and grime as behind me.

“I have the afternoon off and I thought I’d see if you wanted some help.”

“Help?”

“Cleaning.” He walks closer. He’s in jeans and a white T-shirt and his hair is covered with a white Mavericks cap. It really isn’t fair, him showing up here looking so good when I’m in old leggings and a baggy T-shirt.

His gaze drifts from my eyes to my mouth then he reaches up and runs his thumb along my cheek. My stomach flutters and my knees wobble. He’s seriously throwing me off. I can’t believe he’s here.

“I’m a mess,” I say. “Like everything else in here.”

“It’s not so bad.”

“Gee thanks,” I mutter.

His lips quirk with another smile. “I meant the place. It’s not as bad as I remember.”

“Oh. Right.” I turn from him to look at it with fresh eyes. The vacuuming has helped, but there’s a lot of wall and floor space left to go.

“I can sort of see it now.” He steps up next to me. “I have to admit, last night while you were talking about your plans for this place, I was seriously doubting that you could turn it into anything but a landfill, but it’s got good bones.”

His words fill me with a weird sense of pride and hope.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, you have to look really hard.” He squints and holds his hands up in front of him, thumb and pointer finger up like he’s framing a picture on the wall.

I shove at his arm playfully, leaving a dirt mark on his white shirt. “Oops.”

“Guess I was asking for that by wearing white in here.”

“Pretty much.”

We stare at each other a beat. He’s unshaven and the scruff along his jaw is seriously sexy and distracting. He looks happier, lighter than last night too.

“Where do you want me?”

I’m not too proud to admit several delicious, dirty—and I don’t mean in the way this place is dirty—thoughts race through my mind before I realize he’s offering himself up to help me.

“You really want to clean this place on your afternoon off?”

“Yeah. The day after a game I can’t sit around, or I just end up running through every play, every mistake until I drive myself crazy. Plus, Brogan and London are cooped up in their room. You don’t want to be at the apartment right now. Even without my hearing aids, I can feel the vibration of the headboard banging against the wall.”

A small laugh slips from my lips.

“So I’m a last resort?” I ask, not offended in the least even if that were true. I know he could be doing a dozen different things – a dozen different women too. He might not have been in the mood to socialize last night, but I saw the looks he was getting from women all around the bar.

He smiles back freely.

“I’m not sure if I should feel honored or insulted.”

“Best not to examine it too hard.”

He’s here. Whatever the reason, I’m glad.

“You really want to clean?” I ask one more time to make sure because this place needs a lot of work and I’m not about to turn him away if he’s really offering.

“Put me to work, boss,” he says with a wink that I feel down to my toes.

After some minor swooning and gawking at his arm muscles, I get Archer set up with the vacuum. His height allows him to reach a lot higher than I could, and I follow behind him scrubbing with a mop.

He’s a lot faster than I was, too, which means I’m struggling to keep up with him. He stops a few minutes in and pulls out his phone.

“Is it okay if I play some music?” he asks.

“Yeah, of course,” I say, but with the respirator on it’s muffled, so I pull it back up and repeat myself.

A few seconds later, familiar rock music fills the space.

“What is this?” I ask.

“Poison.”

“Should I know who that is?”

“No.” He shakes his head. “My mom was into it. She played a lot of rock at the bar.”

“The Tipsy Rose?” I ask.

Archer’s lips twist in surprise.

“Brogan mentioned it. Several times.” And told me a lot of stories about Rose Holland, Archer’s mom and the woman who took him in when his parents kicked him out.

His grin widens. “Ah. It was called Rosie’s Place back then.”

“Your oldest brother runs it now?” I ask, though I’m fairly certain I remember all the details correctly.

“That’s right. Hendrick. He and his wife Jane own it. Brogan bartended there during our last year at Valley U.”

“I’ll bet he was a good bartender.”

Archer comes over and takes the mop from me. I don’t even protest. My arms are killing me.

“Of course he was. There isn’t a lot your brother isn’t good at.” He glances over his shoulder while he works on scrubbing the dirt from the wall.

I move to lean against the freshly cleaned area so he doesn’t have to crane to look at me while we continue talking.

“I’m starting to think I would have had a serious complex about being the less successful sibling if we’d grown up together.” I’m only half-teasing.

“Nah. He has this way about him of never making people feel less than. I should know. We’ve been best friends for as long as I can remember. He’s always been taller, smarter, more likable. He’s special, but if he knows it, he never acts like it.”

“You’re a good friend to him.”

“Only because he taught me how to be.”

My brows pinch together in confusion as I try to decipher his meaning.

“After I lost my hearing, I pretty much stopped making any effort to talk to people. I felt awkward and weird. I wasn’t very good at reading lips yet and I struggled to keep up in conversations, and just about any social situation was more effort than it was worth.”

My heart squeezes for him. That had to have been a hard adjustment.

“I only kept playing football because of Brogan. He was this big, goofy kid. He was pretty much the same as he is now. He had more confidence than should be legal, would do anything to get a laugh, and was always at the center of attention.”

I smile, imagining it. It’s not hard to picture.

“He had this knack for including me without making me feel like I was some charity case. And once he included me, the other guys did too. He showed up to practice one day and had learned how to sign all the play names. I’m still not sure why he did it.”

When he finishes talking, Archer’s face takes on a slight blush like he’s embarrassed he just shared so much. He clears his throat. “Anyway, Poison.”

It takes me a second to remember we got on this topic from the music. I listen for a few seconds, nodding my head along. “I don’t really like rock music.”

He grabs at his chest and makes a wounded face as he sings, “Shot through the heart and you’re to blame.”

“Uh…”

“Never mind.” He shakes his head. “Sabrina, Sabrina. You have so much to learn.”

The way he says my name, even teasingly, makes goosebumps spread over my skin.

“I’m sorry,” I say with a laugh. “It’s hard to dance to unless you want to play air guitar and head bang.”

“Never knock a good air guitar.” The corners of his lips twitch and spread wide again.

Then we just stare at each other while the rock music continues to blare in the background.

He clears his throat and breaks eye contact first, then moves back to the vacuum. We work for the next hour in silence. Despite my arms aching and the sweat and dirt covering me from head to toe, it’s not a bad time.

Archer is a hard worker, not that I’m all that surprised. But he works without complaint or stopping, except to empty out the vacuum. I give up on trying to keep up with him and instead enjoy watching him while I follow behind scrubbing the walls. He sings along to nearly every song, some louder than others.

“You have a nice voice,” I tell him at one point, and after that it takes a few songs before he resumes.

When he finally finishes, I’m grateful for an excuse to stop.

“Oh, thank goodness. I think my arms are going to fall off.” I drop the mop and take a seat on an old wooden chair I found in the back office area.

Grinning, he takes off his hat and wipes his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt.

“Did you know the walls were blue?” he asks as he glances at the area that has been scrubbed clean.

“Not for long. Painting is next on my list.” Although I may need a week or two to recover the use of my arms.

“What color?” he asks and then heads over to pick up the mop where I left it.

“I’m not sure yet. I think an off-white. I don’t want to detract from the architecture, but maybe that’s too boring.”

“Nah, I can see it. I think a light, neutral color will really brighten up the place.” He rinses out the dirty mop and then wets it again, continuing with the last wall.

I stare at him for a moment while he works. His back muscles flex and strain under the white material. He’s turned his hat backward now and it gives him a boyish, playful look. My stomach flutters and my chest tightens in a way that has nothing to do with my asthma.

With some effort, I force myself back up and help him finish.

When we’re done, Archer and I stand in the middle of the studio and turn in a circle together to take it all in. It’s clean. I’m in shock.

“I can’t believe we got all the walls done. I thought this was going to take me weeks.” It would have without him.

“Now you don’t have to wear this just to be in here.” He taps at the respirator covering my nose and mouth again.

“Sorry,” I say, lifting it. As considerate as I like to think I am, sometimes I still forget that he needs to read my lips.

“I could hear you fine,” he says, “But I like your mouth. The way you talk is beautiful.”

He makes a face, reconsidering his words. “That probably sounds creepy. It’s just, some people don’t really move their lips much when they speak and it’s harder for me, but I can read yours so well. I like it. It makes me more sure that I’ve understood you.”

As compliments go, it’s one of the better ones I’ve received.

“It’s not creepy and I’m glad. It has to be annoying trying to learn every new person’s habits and idiosyncrasies in order to communicate with them.”

“It’s like anything else. Some people you have better chemistry with.”

“So you’re saying we have good chemistry?” I don’t know what makes me ask it. Maybe I just want confirmation that he feels this too. The past two days we’ve gone from despising each other to something else…something that has me thinking a lot about kissing him.

He grins, but says, “I’m saying that talking with you is nice.”

He goes over to his phone and turns off the music, then pockets it.

“Thank you for today,” I say.

“You’re welcome.”

“Are you heading out?”

“Yeah. I need a shower and food. What about you?”

“I have to work at the club.”

“Bummer.”

My stomach swoops low. Is that a bummer because he was hoping to hang out more?

“Yeah, especially since I no longer have feeling in my arms.”

He steps closer and reaches out, both hands grabbing my upper arms and massaging gently.

I let out a little whimper and then a moan. Damn that feels good. His hands are rough and warm, and tingles spread through my body as he works out the aching muscles.

Yep. Definitely thinking about kissing him, but only if he never stops massaging my arms.

“Are you going back to the apartment first to get ready?” he asks. This close and with him touching me, his deep voice rumbles inside me.

I heard the question, but I’m struggling to answer. His eyes are lighter today, almost green in the sunlight instead of their usual hazel. And his finger is still rubbing soothing circles along my upper arms.

“No,” I manage to say. “My friend Olivia lives close. I’m going to her house to get ready. She’s having car trouble and needs a ride so it’s just simpler. And I need to catch up with Greer anyway.”

“Another friend of yours?”

“Sort of. Greer is Olivia’s daughter. She’s five. We became besties while I was crashing on their couch.”

His mouth pulls into that familiar half smile. “Being a good friend seems to run in the family.”