Chapter Twenty-Two

Eden finished updating Buchanan on last night’s outcome and got up from the kitchen table to refill her coffee. Sun streamed in the window above the sink, bathing her in light nearly as bright as the glow of satisfaction inside her. Everything seemed to be falling into place. Buchanan was happy with their progress. The op would conclude soon, hopefully with a successful bust, and Swain and she could start their “real” lives. From the table, her phone pinged with an incoming text. Probably Swain, she thought, and her buoyant mood floated higher. Last night had been a little thin on concrete plans and logistics, but they’d agreed on the most important matters—staying together, embarking on a relationship that extended beyond the parameters of the assignment. They’d work out the details.

Anything you want, choux.

His words floated through her mind, and her heart soared. She wanted him, plain and simple. If someone had told her two weeks ago that she’d fall head over heels for smug, infuriating Marc Swain, she’d have called them all kinds of wrong. But she had fallen for him—fallen deep, fallen hard, and fallen irretrievably in love with him.

Should she have told him?

Maybe. Probably. And yes, she’d cop to chickening out. She wasn’t normally stingy with the sentiment. She loved her family and freely expressed it. She loved many friends and had no problem saying so. But having never given those three little words to a man before in the romantic context, who could blame her for wanting to find the right moment?

Immediately after he says them to you?

Okay, fine. She wanted him to say it first. Not because of some outdated notion that the man should take the lead in all the milestones of a relationship—first date, first kiss, first “I love you.” No. Her reluctance to speak first, she was ashamed to admit, stemmed from a pathetic lack of confidence, because as unbelievable as it was that she’d fallen for Swain, it was doubly unbelievable that he’d fallen for her.

He was attracted to her, sure. He desired her. Also, he cared about her. That much she knew. But could a man who played with emotions so easily—his own and everyone else’s—really lose control of his heart? Was he equipped to? The man literally had nightmares about losing control. He’d had one just last night.

Despite the sunbeams slanting over her, she wrapped her arms around herself. She chose to think yes, but a leap of faith scared her. Cowardly or not, she wanted him to say it first.

The sound of a vehicle coming up the drive pulled her out of her thoughts. Not Swain. The Bronco roared. Through the kitchen window, she saw a Gas N Go tow truck park behind her Prius. What the…? She moved from the kitchen to the front door. Floorboards creaked under her bare feet as she walked. It had to be Dobie. Had he come over to deliver an answer in person? She straightened the white tank top she’d stolen from Swain, then dried her sweaty palms on the front of her cutoffs. Jittery. She was jittery. Swain wouldn’t be. If he was, he wouldn’t let it show. Neither would she. She checked the neckline of the tank and took a deep, calming breath. Releasing it slowly, she stepped out onto the porch.

Dobie, alone, walked up the steps. He must have come directly after finishing a tow. He wore his Gas N Go shirt and grease-stained khakis. She scanned his face, and her heart sank. He looked serious as a grave. Not the expression of a man about to give her good news.

“Hey, Dobie. Thanks for coming by. Can I get you something to drink? Coffee or a Coke?”

“No, thanks. Um…Eden?” The eyes he lifted to hers brimmed with misery. “Is Swain here?”

She shook her head. “No. He’s working. You want me to call him?”

“No.” His response came quickly, and it seemed especially abrupt followed by a long, awkward silence. Finally, he spoke again. “Can we talk inside?”

Swain would kill her, but… “Sure.” She held the screen door open. “Come on in.”

He stepped through into the entryway and hovered uncertainly.

“Let’s go in here,” she said and led him to the living room. He sat in the middle of the sectional, and she dropped down beside him. “What’s up?”

“Roscoe put me on an early shift this morning. Real early.”

Whatever she’d expected him to say, that wasn’t anywhere in the vicinity. Her mind raced to find a connection between this information and her request to meet his source. She couldn’t. The only thought she had was that Swain had headed out early, too. An echo of a text message dinged in her head. “I hope it went okay.”

He nodded. “It went fine, except…” He stopped, groaned, and scrubbed a hand over his face. “It didn’t go fine, Eden, and I wish to hell I didn’t have to tell you this, and”—he blinked red, watery eyes—“I hope you don’t hate me for doing it.”

Alarmed now, she took his hand. “I’d never hate you, Dobie. But you’ve got me on pins and needles here. Whatever you need to say, I think maybe you should just let it out, and then we’ll deal with it, ’kay?”

“Okay.” He blinked furiously and swiped his nose on his forearm. “Okay. The thing is, Eden, while I was getting into the tow truck at the Gas N Go this morning, I saw Swain come out of the motel across the street. Out of one of the rooms.”

“Oh. That’s…weird.” Very weird. Her heart started to race. A hazy conversation came back to her from the wee hours of the morning. One where he told her the text he’d received was “nothing.” “Are you sure it was him?”

“Yeah. I’m sure. He…um… There’s no easy way to say this. He wasn’t alone.”

“He wasn’t?” Her words sounded so calm, so far away. Inside her, everything shook. An earthquake of panic and dread set off shocks just under her skin.

“Uh-uh.” Dobie turned to face her head-on. “A little blonde stepped out with him. He had a gym bag over his shoulder, and they stood real close and chatted for a bit, and then she took his arm, and he went back inside with her.

“Are you sure?” Vaguely, she recognized she was repeating herself, but it was all she could say. Falling. Crucial parts of her crumbled and fell.

“One hundred percent sure.” He dug his phone out of his pocket. “They came out again a few minutes later. I took a video. I don’t know if you want to see it—”

“Show me.” She reached for the phone. He pulled up the video and handed it to her. She watched, outwardly still and quiet, as Swain—definitely Swain—exited a room, followed by a petite blonde, just as Dobie had said. He wore his day job clothes. She wore a T-shirt and lounge pants and looked like she’d just rolled out of bed. They spoke, smiling at each other, and then she hugged him, kissed his cheek, and said something. He nodded, released her, hitched the bag onto his shoulder, and walked to the Bronco.

Her mind fumbled for a simple, innocent explanation.

A sister? A cousin? No. He’d told her his father was his only relative.

Another op? They spent all their time together. Wouldn’t she have known if he had another case? Wouldn’t he have told her?

Nothin’, choux.

Why would it take two attempts to leave?

There were no simple, innocent explanations. Those crumbling pieces inside her fell and shattered. The shards flew through her, stabbing everything—cold bones, burning muscles, vital organs. The room took a dizzying spin. She closed her eyes and swallowed hard. No good. “Dobie, I… Be right back.”

She shot off the sofa and made it to the kitchen as her stomach seized. Someone held her hair back while she retched the better part of two cups of coffee into the sink. Sweating, shaking, she reached for the paper towels. Dobie, God bless him, pushed a handful at her. She turned the faucet on full blast to clean the sink, scrubbed hot tears off her cheeks, and croaked, “Sorry.”

“I’m sorry. Really sorry. Do you hate me?”

“No. I just…” What? She just what? She shut off the water and silence filled the room. “I’m… I need a minute to clean myself up.” Shoving herself away from the sink, she had the presence of mind to snag her phone off the kitchen table before walking blindly to the bathroom and closing the door behind her.

She barely recognized the glassy-eyed woman in the mirror with running mascara and trembling lips.

Get a hold of yourself, Eden.

Good advice. Whatever the condition of her heart, she still had a job to do. Pressing her hands to her forehead, she took stock. Think like Swain. How do you make this work in your favor?

The answers came to her, reassuringly fast. Then again, why shouldn’t they? She’d learned from a master manipulator—perhaps even a man who could lie convincingly to a woman’s face about wanting a future while already planning his next hookup. Or maybe an ongoing hookup?

A text message. His early departure.

He’d arrived in Bluelick a whole week before her, after all. He’d spent her first night at the house somewhere else. True, he’d claimed to have spent it in the back of the Bronco, but he’d also told her not to trust him. Why was she working so hard, right now, to do what he’d warned her not to do?

With brisk movements, she brushed her teeth, fixed her hair and makeup, then assessed her efforts. So what if she looked like a woman whose world had spun away from her? She didn’t have to worry about putting on an act for Dobie. It was all painfully authentic, and she’d use it.

A ping from her phone signaled an incoming text. She tapped the screen before the words disappeared and scanned the message.

Hey, hotshot. Too busy nowadays to talk to your dad? Call me.

That would have to wait. On unsteady legs, she returned to the front room and found Dobie sitting on the sectional. “Oh, God, Dobie. What am I going to do?” With the question hanging in the air, she plopped down beside him and rested her pounding head on his skinny shoulder.

“Kick him out?”

Her heart clenched, but she nodded. “Yes. I…I love him.” True words, but they cut like razors in her throat. “Still, I can’t forgive this. Even if I could, I can’t trust him. Without trust, there’s no point.” She should have faced that fact earlier.

“You want me to come back after my shift and hang out, in case he doesn’t wanna hear what you’re saying?”

Her heart clenched again but for a different reason. The idea of wiry Dobie standing between her and bigger, stronger, far more battle-ready Swain just about choked her with guilt. “You are such a good friend to me I hardly know what to say. But no. I’ll deal with him.”

But would she? The man could think on his feet, and she knew a weak part of her wanted to believe whatever excuse he tossed out, but if his explanation failed the logic test, she would call Alvarez in Lexington and beg to stay the night. Alvarez had been through worse. Her old roomie would offer a bed, a shoulder to cry on, and as many tequila shots as it took to dull the pain.

“You’re not going to take him back, are you?”

Maybe.

“No. But when I boot his ass, I have to leave, too.”

“Why?” Dobie’s voice shook. “Everybody here loves you, Eden. You’re a hero. Don’t leave.”

“Honey, I don’t have a job. I don’t have any money, and I’m not going to take a penny from that two-timing bastard who can’t keep his dick in his pants. I can’t afford this house on my own. To be brutally honest, I can’t afford anything on my own.” She buried her face in her hands. “What else can I do?”

Dobie hesitated. “Would you be willing to, you know, do the thing Swain was going to do to earn extra cash?”

She raised her head, looked at him, and very nearly willed him to take back the question, because she couldn’t possibly go through with it. Not like this. Then training kicked in. She could and would do her job. “Could I, do you think? On my own?”

“I’ll set up a meeting. I’m pretty sure our guy was more interested in talking to you, anyway.”

The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. “Does he…know me?”

Dobie offered up a hollow laugh. “He knows everybody.”

“Who is it?” She counted her own heartbeats while she waited for his reply.

“I—um—I should let him lay out everything, all at once. Does this afternoon work for you?”

This was moving fast. Very fast. Fine. Swain wasn’t the only one who could move. “Anytime.” She straightened and brushed her hair away from her face. “I need the income. I’ll make it work.”

“I’ll set it up and text you with the details.” With that, he stood. “I’m sorry, Eden. I hate to drop a bomb on you and leave, but I better get back to work before Roscoe docks me.”

She stood as well. “I understand. And Dobie, you’re not to blame for the situation I’m in. You did the right thing by telling me.” But oh, it hurt. “You’ve been a true friend, and I can’t thank you enough.” Going on impulse, she hugged him, then eased back. “I don’t even know where to start.”

Earnest eyes found hers. “Start by staying.”