She forced her eyes away from Noah’s face and her mind back to the work at hand. “This is the father of a man you and Jack almost arrested about a year ago. His name is Harvey Farmer. His son was Harvey Farmer, Jr., but folks called him V.”
Noah nodded slowly. “Yeah, okay. I remember V Farmer. He robbed a convenience store and killed the owner, shot him in the face. We found V hiding in a friend’s house. He ran, we pursued. Jack chased him and V ran across a highway to escape.”
“At night, in the snow,” Eve said, recalling the Buckland article she’d finally found after pages of search results. “The truck that hit him tried to stop, but couldn’t.”
“Right. V was dead at the scene and we closed the case. How do you know this?”
“Kurt Buckland covered V’s funeral. In the Metro section.” She toggled to the article. “ ‘Harvey Farmer, Jr., known as V to his friends, was buried today. He is survived by his father, Harvey Farmer, Sr., and his brother, Dell Farmer.’ Who you’ve met.”
“The reporter? How do you know?”
“I’ll show you. The father was at V’s funeral and Buckland snapped this picture of him for the piece.” She clicked on a picture showing the bearded man standing at a graveside. “I think that’s Dell standing next to him, but you can’t see his face.”
Eve brought up her favorite design software into which she’d already imported Farmer Sr.’s face, enlarged and grainy, but usable. “Take away the beard, the gray in his hair, a few wrinkles, and make his eyes a little closer together…” She worked steadily as she talked. “And voila. One faux reporter. Dell Farmer.”
Noah blinked and stared. “Wow. That’s amazing. I never would have seen the resemblance based on that little picture. It’s not obvious at all. How did you see it?”
His praise warmed her. “I study faces. You know, what makes people trust one face and not another. Which features make us comfortable and which make us afraid.”
“And you used that when you started up your avatar design shop in Shadowland.”
She shrugged. “Might as well get some semipractical use out of it.”
He was studying her again. “You trusted him,” he said quietly. “Rob Winters.”
She flinched. “Yes. I was young and stupid.”
“And you’ll never let that happen again.”
“I’ll never be that young again and I pray I’ll never be that stupid again.”
His eyes never left her face. “And you’ll never trust a man again?”
“That’s not it. I trust you. I never would have gotten into a car with you otherwise.”
“You don’t trust yourself, then. You don’t trust your judgment that you trust me.”
She nodded, both relieved and sad that he finally understood. “Convoluted, I know.”
He rose. “I’ll get Olivia this information.”
“You’re not going after him yourself?”
“It’s Olivia’s case. If she needs my help, she’ll ask for it.”
“Of course.” Eve busied herself putting her laptop away. “If you could take me back to the station, I’ll get David’s truck. Callie’s working tonight, so I’ll just hang out at Sal’s. I’m sure one of the off-duty officers will see us home, so it’ll be perfectly safe.”
“Eve.” His eyes glittered with determination, but his voice was gentle. “Let’s go to dinner. Then you can decide where you’ll stay. Give me your bag. I’ll carry it for you.”
He understood, but he wasn’t walking away. “My friend, Tom… wants to meet you.”
Noah’s eyes lit up. “The ballplayer? Sweet.” He put his arm around her shoulders, possessively. “Is this like being brought home to meet the family?”
“Yes. I guess it is.”
Chapter Nineteen
Wednesday, February 24, 7:20 p.m.
I do like your house.”
Noah closed the oven door and turned to lean against it. Eve sat at his kitchen table, her annoyance mostly gone. “And I liked your friend Tom.”
Her mouth lifted. “And the tickets to Sunday’s game?”
He grinned. “Those didn’t hurt.” He sobered. “So… you’re not angry anymore?”
She shrugged. “I wasn’t angry. Just surprised you brought me here.”
“I have to meet Jack soon, so I didn’t want to spend what little time we have waiting on waiters. Next time we’ll go somewhere with tablecloths and fancier food.”
“Frozen pizza is fine and better than a lot of meals I’ve eaten.”
She was nervous. So am I. He took the chair next to hers, took her hand. “I’m going to get to the point. You said you trusted me. Why? Is it something about me? My face?”
“I don’t know why. I just do. At the risk of sounding trite, this isn’t about you. It’s me.”
“So that you trust me for absolutely no good reason is what frightens you?”
Arousal warred with the apprehension in her dark eyes. “I behaved impetuously six years ago,” she said. “I have paid dearly for that mistake, every day since. I don’t do impetuous things very often anymore.”
“You play it safe. With men, anyway.”
“Essentially, yes.” She lifted her chin. “And I won’t apologize for that.”
He recognized the lifted chin as a warning and detoured, approaching from another direction. “You said you hid in the dark for two years after Rob Winters attacked you.”
She didn’t flinch as he’d expected. “I lived in a shelter for battered women. I rarely left the house, took most of the night shifts.”
“Because you were afraid to sleep.” Afraid she’d dream, that she’d hurt someone.
“Yes. I took care of the babies, ones too young to scare. My scars were bad then.”
“What happened after two years?” He knew, but wanted to hear it from her.
“We unknowingly brought a murderer into our shelter, a woman who’d kidnapped a child for her own revenge. But you know this. You’ve read all the news archives.”
He had, and had been chilled to the bone. “You saved the boy but were nearly killed.”
“Alec was a brave kid. He helped save us both.”
“Where is he now?”
She smiled. “Chicago. He’s a senior in high school. Well-adjusted and happy.”
“So what happened after you’d saved the day and the boy?”
“Dana and Ethan took the woman down, delivered her to the cops. Dana’s kind of like my mom and big sister and probation officer, all rolled into one. She is best friends with David’s sister-in-law, Caroline, and Olivia’s sister, Mia. That’s how we all connect.”
“You love them, the people you left behind in Chicago. They’ve earned your trust.”
Her eyes sharpened. “You should be the psych major.”
“Just trying to understand,” he said mildly. “You’ve been here in Minneapolis for two years, so where were you in the two middle years?”
“Hiding,” she said, one brow lifted. “I’m good at that.”
“I know you are. Where were you hiding?”
“Well, having a killer in our secret shelter kind of compromised our secrecy. Dana closed down, she and Ethan bought this big house, and now she’s foster mom central. I could have moved in with her, but I needed my space. So I got a job at what I thought then was the perfect place—a rehab center for people who were newly blind.”
Noah frowned. He hadn’t known this. “Because they couldn’t see you?”
“Pretty much. I liked it there. I could work on my degree at night and never needed to leave the grounds.”
This made him angry. “For two years? Why did you leave there?”
“I got a kick in the ass from one of our clients. He’d lost his sight in an accident—hard enough, but he was a surgeon. His career, in his mind, was over.”
“Was it?”
“Of course not. He couldn’t do surgery, but he could other things. Over time, and with a lot of nagging, he began to accept that. He r
estarted his life, reinvented himself.”
“You saved him.”
She shook her head, embarrassed. “No. I was just his friend.”
“I can see that.” For all she’d endured, Eve was a nurturing soul with a full heart. That was the quality that had first attracted him. “You take care of people. That’s a gift.”
He’d surprised her, he could see. “Thank you.”
“So your friend left this rehab center?” he asked and she nodded.
“He’s teaching now. But before he left, he did a little confronting of his own, with me. Told me I’d been hiding in the dark. Gave me hell. And even though Dana and all my other friends and family had told me the same thing, it meant more coming from him.”
“He’d earned your trust, too.”
“Yeah. He did.”
“So, coming full circle, you trust me even though I’ve done nothing to earn it. Let me ask you something.” He leaned closer. “What are you afraid I’ll do to you?”
Her cheeks darkened, causing her scar to appear under the makeup she so carefully applied. He could tell her the old scar had never bothered him, even before her surgery, but he knew she’d never believe him. Not yet.
“Eve?” he prompted when she said nothing. “Are you worried you’ll lose control with me?” Her eyes flashed and he knew he’d scored a hit. He didn’t stop, because he knew if he had a prayer of reaching her, it would have to be now. Once she got away from him, she wasn’t likely to come back soon. “Are you afraid I’ll make you feel something? That after six years of watching from the sidelines you’ll finally feel something?”
“No,” she snapped. But she didn’t move an inch.
“Then what are you afraid of?”
“That I’ll get dependent on feeling something,” she snarled. Abruptly she stood, shoving her chair. “It’s better to choose to have no one than to get dependent on someone, only to lose him. That ‘better to have loved and lost’ shit? It’s shit. I can’t go through that. I won’t.”
He leaned back, his heart pounding as he watched her. “Do you want me, Eve?”
“Yes,” she hissed. “I did the first time you walked up to the bar. You looked me in the eye and if you knew how rare that was, you’d know what it meant.”
“And I didn’t make a move for a year,” he murmured. “You thought I didn’t want you.”
“It wouldn’t have mattered. Knowing you were interested has been a major ego boost, but it doesn’t change anything.” She turned away, pretending to check the pizza in the oven, but her hands were shaking. “It doesn’t make sense to go forward if we want different things. You had a wife before. I assume you want a wife again. A family.”
“We covered this,” he said patiently. “I told you it didn’t matter that you can’t have kids. I told you I’d hide the knives if you walked in your sleep. I’m a really light sleeper,” he said teasingly, then sobered. “None of that matters, Eve.”
“I don’t believe you. You think it doesn’t matter, but one day you’d start wondering what it would be like to be a dad.”
“I know what it’s like to be a dad,” he said, more sharply than he’d intended. “I had a son. He would have been fourteen last November.”
She went still. “He died in the accident, too?”
“Yes. And losing him and my wife was the hardest thing I hope I ever go through. You’re right. ‘Loved and lost’ is shit, but I have no regrets that they were part of my life.” He drew a steadying breath. “I don’t need more children. If I had a baby, I’d love him, but I’ve done that. I don’t need to do it again.”
“And I still don’t believe you.” She touched his sleeve, her fingers trembling. “But I know you believe it.” She pursed her lips, fighting for composure. “I’m not very hungry. Would you mind taking me to get David’s truck now?”
He’d promised himself he’d let her go if that’s what she wanted. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll have a cruiser watch your house tonight, wherever you stay.” He got an oven mitt and pulled the pizza from the oven, then stared down at it. “You asked me this morning why I wanted you. I told you I’d tell you over dinner. Can I at least still do that?”
“Sure.” It was the smallest whisper.
“It was right before Christmas, a year ago. Somebody was retiring and they had his party at Sal’s. It was the first time I saw you.”
“I remember.”
“You were behind the bar. I remember thinking how pretty you were. My last relationship had fizzled a natural death, and I hadn’t met anyone else I liked enough to move my schedule for. I thought maybe I’d say hello to you, ask you out. Then the door opened and this woman came in. Had the look of a lifetime drunk. She was dirty and she stank of sour whiskey. Do you remember her?”
“Yes, I do. A couple of the cops tried to throw her out.”
“But you wouldn’t let them. You sat her down, gave her some coffee, and listened while she told you her story. You even cried when she did.”
“Her son had died. Christmas is a hard time for people who’ve lost someone.”
“I know. I thought you’d let her finish her story and maybe hail her a cab. But you kept her talking, asking her questions until you had enough information to call her surviving son. He came to get her, so embarrassed, but grateful that you’d cared enough not to push her out onto the street into the snow.”
“Who would have done that?”
He turned to look at her. “The dozens of bartenders over the years who did that to my mother. I’d get phone calls— ‘Noah, your mom’s wandering down the street without a coat.’ I’d rush to get her, and find some bartender had thrown her out. Called her a bum. I guess she was, but she was still my mom. You were kind to that woman when you didn’t have to be.”
“I did what anybody should do.”
“But few do. I came back to Sal’s with Jack the next week, and the week after that. Ordered my tonic water and watched you. As time passed, I watched you be kind to more people than I can count. You asked me why I came in and ordered my water all those nights. It was because I couldn’t stay away. Now I’m kicking myself for waiting so long.” She said nothing and he knew he had to let it go. For now anyway. “Come on, I’ll get your coat and take you wherever you want to go.”
He moved toward the door, but she stayed where she stood, uncertainty playing across her face, and his heart lifted in hope. “Are we going or staying?” he asked.
“You’ve put me on a pedestal I couldn’t possibly live up to. If I stayed, if I tried… you’d be disappointed.”
He came back, taking her shoulders in his hands. “Maybe. But then maybe you’ll be disappointed with me. But how can you know if you don’t try?” He kissed her hard, relieved when she lifted on her toes, kissing him back. He broke it off, his breathing unsteady. “Aren’t you tired of watching other people’s lives go by? I know I am.”
Her pulse was knocking at the hollow of her throat. “Promise me something.”
“If I can.”
“If you are disappointed, walk away. Don’t stay because I’ll crumble if you leave.”
He let his forehead rest against hers, his hands trembling as they kneaded her shoulders. “You worry too much, Eve.”
“I know,” she said. “But then so do you. Can we consider that common ground?”
He cupped his hands around her face. “I think we can find better common ground than that.” But he hesitated, unsure of where he could touch her. “What can I do?”
Her jaws clenched against his palms. “I don’t know.”
Noah felt his spine go rigid. “There hasn’t been anyone since… ?”
She shrugged. “One. Didn’t go so well.”
He made his mouth curve. “So, no pressure here. I have an idea. You trust me?”
Her dark eyes had shadowed, fear crowding away all that beautiful arousal. But despite her fear, she nodded. “Yes. I trust you.”
“Then get your coat and come with me.”
Wednesday, February 24, 7:45 p.m.
One would think people would be more careful about locking their doors. Especially when they’d just told the police they were the last people to see a woman just before her murder. But the Bolyards hadn’t been careful. And now they were dead.
By killing this couple before they could talk to the police, he’d shown his hand. They’d wonder how the killer had known about the Bolyards. They’d look internally, thinking they had a leak. They wouldn’t suspect each other, because that’s not how cops were wired. But it didn’t matter. He’d managed any potential fallout, cut off any search in his direction before it started with a single, well-placed phone call. Because I think. They just react.
Now the only other threat to his plan, to his identity, was Eve Wilson. She was smart, and careful. It was time to rattle her cage harder.
Wednesday, February 24, 7:45 p.m.
Eve found herself laughing when Noah had led her into his garage, dominated by a rather decrepit Dodge Charger. She’d picked her way through the parts and now sat in the backseat, watching as Noah struggled to climb in next to her.
He huffed, his breath hanging in the cold air. “See, I told you it would be fun.”
“You’re going to need a chiropractor,” she said.
He wedged his big body next to her. “Are you saying I’m old?”
“No, just big.”
He lifted his brows, his grin wicked. “How would you know that?”
She shook her head, trying unsuccessfully to hide her smile. “You’re bad and it’s cold. And this car definitely has seen better days. It’s not going anywhere.”
“We’re not going to drive it.” He put his arm around her, his gloved hand patting her shoulder through her heavy coat. “We’re going to park in it.”
She looked up at him. “You’re insane.”
His grin softened to something so very sweet her heart turned over. “And you’re smiling. That’s worth a trip to the chiropractor.”
Touched, she looked away. “Is this your car?”
“It is.” He swatted at the vinyl roof that was sagging into the interior. “I got it a couple of years ago, but I don’t have much time to work on it.”