“If you say ‘dangerous,’ I am going to hit you again. And this time, it won’t be a love tap.”
Fuck, he hated this. If something happened to Vaughn or any of his brothers because of this case…
Unable to stay still, he paced across the office. “I need some air.”
Greer stepped in front of the door, blocking his exit. “We’re not done. Tell us about Dunphy.”
“There’s nothing to tell. I haven’t looked into him yet. I had a restraining order against him for a while after he attacked me in a bar, but it’s not active anymore. And, honestly, he doesn’t have any reason to come after me now. I have no influence over his brother’s case.”
Greer nodded once. “I’ll take a look at him. Reece, dig into Cam’s old cases and see if you can’t find us more suspects. We’re gonna turn over every rock and see what comes scampering out.”
…
The air hit Cam like an icy hammer to the face when he stepped outside, and he gratefully sucked it down until his lungs burned from the cold. Something damn near panic had sunk its claws into his heart, and he hadn’t been able to draw a full breath inside the office.
He had to fix this. Throw himself into the investigation and figure out who was behind the contract before his brothers had time to get in too deep. Whoever it was hadn’t had a problem killing Soup, so that person would also have no qualms about offing a handful of private investigators for asking the wrong questions in the wrong places.
He couldn’t let that happen.
But first, he had to find Eva. Explain himself. Beg forgiveness. Then ask her not to pursue Soup’s information because the thought of her getting caught in the crossfire just about crippled him.
And it was time to come clean about more than this case. All these years, he’d kept his relationships few and far between—just enough to take the edge off because his heart had never been into any of those women. His heart belonged to Eva and, fuck it, he wanted her too badly not to give this thing between them a shot. So he couldn’t give her exactly what she wanted. Maybe his love would be enough. At least, he hoped it’d be enough. And if it wasn’t—well, maybe he could try to do things her way. Marriage, two-point-five kids, a dog, a minivan, and a motherfucking white picket fence. Either way, he couldn’t let his personal demons paralyze him into inaction anymore.
If he did, he got the sickening feeling he’d lose her forever.
…
The restaurant wasn’t anything Eva would have picked for dinner, casual but with a faint enough whiff of upscale that she wasn’t one-hundred percent comfortable. Preston was all smiles as he pulled out her chair for her and settled across the table. He’d ordered them red wine, which she hated. She took a sip anyway because she thought a splash of alcohol would do her good.
Then again, alcohol is what got her into this mess in the first place.
She nudged the wine glass away precisely because the temptation to get drunk was so great. Like mother, like daughter.
“I’m so glad you agreed to meet me,” Preston said, shaking out his napkin.
God, this was a mistake. She pushed away from the table. “I shouldn’t have.”
“No. Eva, wait.” He scrambled around the table and caught her hand. “Please, hear me out. Garth Brooks will come on the radio, and I’ll remember that town in West Virginia, the one we got stranded in when my car overheated? Remember you played darts at the dive bar with all those bikers? You impressed the heck out of me that night.”
She smiled, relaxing a little at the memory. It had been a fun trip, one of the best she’d ever taken with him. “They loved us until they found out I’m a cop.”
He released a breath as if relieved that she remembered. “And I can’t even watch a Nationals game anymore because you’re not sitting beside me making inappropriate comments about the opposing team. I miss us. I miss what we had.”
She pulled her hand from his grasp. “How can you say that? You cheated on me. After I specifically told you when we first started dating that cheating is a stupid, high-schooler thing to do, and if you ever found someone you’d rather be with than me, you should just tell me.”
“Yes,” he admitted.
“But instead of telling me you wanted someone else—”
“I don’t. Will you let me explain?”
She refused to answer. She didn’t want an explanation. She wanted to get the hell out of here.
Taking her silence as a go ahead, he continued, “There’s this permeating idea that a man can’t get anywhere in the modern political climate without the right kind of wife backing him and—this is no excuse, but you don’t fit that mold. Lark does, and I’m ashamed to say, I gave in to the pressure. I made a horrible mistake, Eva. I hope you can forgive me, and maybe, if I haven’t screwed things up too badly, you can give us another chance?” He dropped to one knee in front of her, and her heart dropped right along with him.
Oh no. What the fuck did he think he was doing?