“I’m practically perfect in every way,” Eve said lightly. “Do you really think he meant to kill me last night?”
Matt shook his head. “Too amateurish. He meant to scare you. When a guy who’s come up in the Strykers decides he wants you dead, he’ll do it himself, and he’ll do it in one of those empty warehouses by the river, where no one will find the body until it starts to stink. I think he planned on you being the same as you were in high school. Alienated from your family. Maybe he asked around before he approached you, heard about how your family felt about Eye Candy, maybe even heard you were estranged for a while. He thought you’d be alone, afraid, easy to persuade. He wants to own you.”
“I am not for sale,” Eve said precisely.
“Then he’ll steal you,” Matt said bluntly, trying to impress on her exactly how dangerous this was. “When I show up he thinks suddenly you’ve got someone in your life who doesn’t care if you’re a cocktail waitress or a bar owner, someone you can depend on.”
“You,” she said.
“Me,” he agreed, then stopped, because talking about the soft, secret thing growing between them in front of Hawthorn and Sorenson made his stomach clench.
She knew it too. After another one of those unreadable looks through her lashes, she peered into the cashew chicken container, set it aside, and said, “What, exactly, are you proposing?”
Hawthorn spoke up. “We give Murphy what he wants. We pull Detective Dorchester out, and put someone else in undercover to protect you. Or we wire up the bar and set up a surveillance operation.”
“Absolutely not,” Eve said. “I’m not giving up that level of privacy.”
“Natalie could take a long vacation,” Sorenson mused. “I could step in.”
“Nat’s never taken more than a weekend off,” Eve said doubtfully. “Her whole family lives in Lancaster, both sides, four generations.”
“You could fire her.”
Eve scoffed. “She’s my best friend. If I fire her, everyone on the East Side will be talking about it. Look, if the point is for this to look totally natural, that’s not going to work. We’re working under the assumption Lyle is pissed that I’m dating ‘Chad,’” she said.
“And?” Matt asked.
“If I thought someone shot at me because of my choice in men, the last thing I’d do is fire him or break up with him, and everyone on the East Side knows it,” Eve said. “I’d get the biggest, gaudiest engagement ring I could find and set a wedding date.”
Matt’s heart stopped dead in his chest. Could he put on the gold band sitting in his desk drawer for a fake marriage? To Eve?
Jesus Christ. Caleb Webber would do his level best to slice off Matt’s balls and feed them to rabid, flea-ridden dogs if Matt’s crash-entry into Eve’s life resulted in a sham marriage.
She gave him a glittery little smile. “Okay, maybe not a wedding date, but I wouldn’t break it off. Webbers don’t take intimidation well. We’ve had bricks thrown through the front window of the house and the church. When I was in the fifth grade Dad tossed two kids out of an after-school program. They stole our dog from the backyard, killed her, and left her body on the front porch. In honor of Goldie, we do not knuckle under to intimidation tactics. Lyle knows this. If I dump Chad because I’m spooked, he’s going to think I’ve lost my nerve, and I’m not a good front for him.”
“Maybe Chad got spooked and ditched you,” Sorenson said dispassionately.
Fuck that, because in this case, Chad Henderson was basically Matt Dorchester, and Matt didn’t spook. “If we keep going with this, then I stay undercover,” Matt said.
“As my bartender or as my boyfriend?” Eve asked.
“Both,” he said firmly, and hoped like hell he was doing the right thing.
“Detective Dorchester,” Hawthorn began.
“Sir, something about this has Lyle spooked. Maybe he’s getting pressure from higher up the food chain. We can’t leave her protected only by surveillance gear. Keeping me there full-time is a hell of a lot cheaper than detailing six officers round the clock to watch the bar.”
Hawthorn leveled a look at Matt that had Sorenson tilting back in her chair to examine the ceiling and a tiny grin dancing around Eve’s mouth. “Your concern for the department’s budget,” he said, stressing the last word, “is duly noted, Detective. If Eve consents to your continued presence in her life, I agree.”
Judging by the expression on Eve’s face, that was by no means a given. She picked up the takeout carton again, dug through it for a tiny piece of chicken, considered it, then put the carton back on the table. She sat in silence for a while, shuffling the photos together and aligning the edges, the careful, precise movements buying time to think things through. Pale pink stole into her cheeks, then she said, “Congratulations, Chad. You’ve got your job back.”