Watching the progression of Archer's reaction very nearly makes Adelaide smile, though it is a thoughtful one touched by all of the knowledge of what he is taking on. She knows, as he comes to decide, that he is the right person for the job. That doesn't mean that Adelaide doesn't wish it were someone else, someone competent who she doesn't happen to care for. But it's him, and it's right, and so she merely determines to help him in any way she can.
She understands all that he's trying to say, to show in his thanks, in the gesture of affection that nearly has her melting because it's just so sweet and more so from a man like him who doesn't do those things lightly. She understands those kinds of people best of all, so she fully realizes the significance. Then his joke elicits a small laugh, pressed against the top of Charlie's head while she rocks him a bit. "Archer darlin', if you get that kind of declaration out of me? It's you who's inspiring."
Then he tags her back in to the cooking, and she shakes her head like someone waking up. "Shoot, crust, I nearly forgot." She shifts Charlie, and then with a quirk of her brows she offers the now half-asleep infant over to Archer, an unspoken question whether he wants to hold him for a bit or he can go back to his chair. Once he's deposited, Adelaide's brief still oasis of Mommy Moment is over, and she moves to the pantry. "I got somethin' in mind for that," she says, looking pleased with herself, and she emerges with a blue tub that was familiar in old days but which they haven't seen around here in some time. "Look what came in the last shipment," she says, and she imagines she doesn't have to explain that the Crisco plus the flour that she has under her arm are about to equal something the likes of which is a treat even for somewhat spoiled Capitol eaters.
She sets about cutting the flour and Crisco and a little salt together to make a crust flaky enough for the old days, and as she does she settles back into the vein of their conversation. "But seriously. You are. You're gonna be the best. I wasn't... exactly raised to like cops, Arch, I'm sorry to say - but you prove that wrong at every single turn," she says. It may not seem like much, but knowing her like he does, Archer sees the significance. She's talked here and there about life in Boston, the early days with Thomas, the devolvement of things in Boston's City Hall and the fall of the shelters there, their journey south and the things they saw, but she has never talked about a family before that. She may have mentioned Tennessee, and surely the accent and her mannerisms are southern, but always she acts like maybe she sprung out of the ground at sixteen years old, in Boston. It always seemed like there was plenty there, but she never volunteered it.
So the reference to whoever raised her now is new. She doesn't know why she goes there, except that maybe it feels fair in light of what he shared - and because it's all so close to the surface right now anyway it feels dishonest not to speak the words that come to her mind.