CHAPTER NINETEEN
“Why are you waving a piece of paper in my face like you’re a matador? Do I look like a bull to you?” Gia snatched the paper out of Eva’s grasp.
“I need a favor,” Eva said, wrinkling her nose in anticipation of a big, fat no. “Donovan needs you. Blue Moon needs you.”
Gia scanned the text. “This is an application to join the Beautification Committee.”
“Surprise!” Eva spread her arms wide. “Our assignment is to go undercover and keep them under control until this apocalypse deal gets straightened out and Ellery is reinstated. Fun, right?”
Gia hugged the application to her chest. “You don’t understand. I have been dying to join the B.C.! I mean what could bring greater joy than pairing up true loves?”
“Have you ever thought about writing romance novels?” Eva asked.
Gia skipped over to the desk in the kitchen and grabbed a pen. “I’m filling this out right now! Oh, my God. What if they don’t want me? Do you think Beckett could use his influence?”
Eva rolled her eyes at her sister. “You’re the first lady of Blue Moon, and you’ve had stars in your eyes since the B.C. shoved you at Beckett. I think you’re a shoe-in.”
“This is the most exciting thing that’s happened since Lydia was born,” Gia said, cooing at her daughter in her highchair.
Lydia, bald and beautiful, banged her spoon happily on the tray.
“Hey! Didn’t finding out your sister is an excellent romance novelist rate up there?” Eva reminded her.
“That is a close third,” Gia promised. “Okay. Let’s see what they want from us. ‘Do you believe in happily ever after?’ Yes,” she said, as she resoundingly checked the box. “‘How opposed are you to involving yourself in the business of others? Definitely, slightly, or love is everyone’s business?’”
Eva snorted.
“Not even the slightest challenge here,” Gia announced working her way down the application.
“Oh, boy,” Eva whispered to Lydia. “I think your mama is going to be part of the problem.”
Lydia giggled and threw a glob of pureed carrots onto the floor. Diesel snarfed it up and then spit it back out. Tripod Jr., the three-legged cat, meandered over and rubbed against Gia’s legs meowing.
“Not now, Tripod. Mama has to rank these movies in order of most romantic.”
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Eva texted Donovan on her way across the back yard.
Eva: Mission accomplished. The Merills will attempt a takeover of the B.C.
Her phone rang, and she got a little jolt at the picture of the winking Donovan Cardona that popped up on her screen.
“When did you find time to sneak a selfie and add a contact photo to my phone?” she asked in lieu of a greeting.
“A law enforcement officer never reveals his secrets,” Donovan told her. She could hear the smile in his voice. “We’re supposed to be sneaky. That’s how we catch the bad guys.”
“You sound like you’re in a good mood,” she teased.
“Waking up with a beautiful redhead snoring in my ear has that effect on me.”
“I wasn’t snoring!” She let herself in the door.
“Like a lumberjack. It’s amazing I got any sleep at all.”
“You slept for ten hours,” Eva reminded him. “So, should I wear a wire for the Beautification Committee meeting tonight? Because I have this fantasy of you taping a microphone between my—”
“Stop right there, Evangelina, or I’ll leave this town to fend for itself and drive through Beckett’s yard to get to you.” His voice was rusty, rough.
She blew out a breath. A hot rush of lust and something else, something softer, scarier, swept over her. “Don’t say it if you don’t mean it.”
He growled and that made it even worse.
“Changing the subject before I get any harder and have to get out of my car in front of the entire town. Thank you for last night.”
Eva picked up her laptop and wandered out to the skinny stretch of sunroom off her living room. She flopped down on the god-awful flower print couch that looked as though it had barely survived since its heyday in the seventies. “What exactly about last night was gratitude worthy? We both stayed mostly clothed,” she said lightly.
“You knew I needed a break, and you took care of me. And when I felt guilty about taking a break, you told me I was being an idiot.”
What was that warmth in her chest? Was it heart burn?
“That’s not exactly how I remember it. I think I was much more delicate than calling you an idiot to your face.”
“You took care of me, and I appreciate it.”
“Any time, Sheriff. Just try not to push yourself so hard that you pass out on a mailbox again.”
She heard the chirp of his radio on his end and the sigh that he bit back. “I have to go, Eva. I’ll call you later.”
“Bye, Donovan.”
“Bye, beautiful.”
Eva let her breath out in a rush when she disconnected. What was it about that man that made her feel so damn much?
He was so honest, putting things out there as if it were completely natural to share feelings and thoughts. To be fair, he’d grown up in Blue Moon, the small-town answer to talk therapy. She’d grown up in a family that tried to protect each other by not ever blabbing about their feelings. It wasn’t that the Merills weren’t close. It’s just that, after the trauma her mother had caused, no one wanted to open old wounds. No one wanted to hurt anymore.
And that’s why Eva hung on to her secrets.
She worked through the rest of the morning and well into the afternoon from the couch on the sunporch. When the story flowed, she abandoned all other distractions and went with it. Inspiration was a fickle bitch, and when she showed up to play, Eva knew better than to try to tame her. After stalling out while trying to find a synonym for “smirk” that didn’t sound too dickish, she took a popcorn break. And while the house filled with the heavenly scent, she paused to roll out her shoulders.
She wondered if it was the subject matter that had her inspiration firing on all cylinders. Her small-town sheriff hero was admittedly modeled after Donovan, even before she’d started pumping him for information, before he’d admitted his feelings. Eva hadn’t needed to be on the receiving end of his lips to know he was a genuine romantic hero, and she had a feeling her readers were going to fall hard for him.
She just hadn’t had the opportunity to bring up the topic to Donovan that he was about to become a romance novel hero. Okay, that was a lie. She’d had the opportunity but not the right motivation yet.
“Oh, hey, there, sexy guy with a gun. I hope you don’t mind that I’m using you in the nicest possible way,” she said aloud to herself.
Eva shook her head. Yeah, she was going to have to come up with a better way to broach the subject. Maybe if they ever made it out to dinner? Somewhere cozy and dark. She’d lean forward and take his hand in hers. The candlelight… no. Scratch that. The firelight would glint off her hair. Yeah. That worked.
The microwave dinged, temporarily quieting her writer’s imagination.
Eva had always known her brain worked differently than the organized, number-loving Emma. Gia, too. Her middle sister lived in a big picture kind of world where details often slipped through the cracks, but the plan was always still the plan.
Eva, on the other hand, spent her mental energy rearranging words to paint pictures in her mind. Her own little world, as her family had called it when she spaced out, had been a romantic fantasy since she’d discovered boys at thirteen. She’d penned embarrassing short stories about junior high true love that took place in the hallway between gym and biology.
And now she was living one, Eva thought, scooping a handful of popcorn out of the bag.
She had a handsome hero ready and willing to sweep her off her feet and profess his over-the-top instalove that her readers would swoon over. Her sisters and father had all found happiness here. And despite the present circumstances of being in the throes of an epic town-wide temper tantrum, she felt like maybe her happily ever after could be on the horizon.
If Donovan was willing to give her a little wiggle room in the truth and honesty department.
She took another handful of popcorn, sighed, and then choked when a kernel tried to sneak down her windpipe.
“Dang it,” she coughed. She hoped that wasn’t a warning from karma. She had her reasons for not dragging anyone else into her mess. She was going to fix it once and for all this time. And maybe once the shadow of shame that had followed her everywhere was finally vanquished, maybe then she could really think about a relationship with Donovan.
Her phone dinged, and she saw a new text from Donovan.
Donovan: “Did you make out with the band director or was that a dream?”
She smiled at the screen, feeling like a teenager with a crush all over again.
Eva: “Ask not what your town can do for you but what you can do for your town.”
Another text popped up. This one stole her smile and her good mood.
Unknown: “I think it’s time we talk face-to-face. You owe me.”
Her reaction was visceral and instantaneous. Anger and hurt coiled together in a molten ball in her belly. Why couldn’t this shadow stop following her? Maybe it was because she tried to escape the confrontation rather than face it. Over and over again. But she wasn’t going to be chased out of Blue Moon. She’d stand her ground here. Her thumbs flew over the screen.
Eva: “If anyone owes anything. It’s you. I’m not playing your games anymore.”
Unknown: “You’ll play any game I tell you to.”
She shuddered at the response, then straightened her shoulders. No. It was far beyond time to put a stop to this. She had a future to think about, and there was no room for the person at the other end of the text in it.
Eva: “Not happening this time. Leave me alone. Permanently.”
Eva tossed her phone on the couch and paced in front of it. She wouldn’t break this time. Not here. Not now. She was finally living out her dream of being an author. She shared this lovely little town with everyone who mattered in her life. She wasn’t letting anyone take this from her.
“Yeah,” Eva nodded in agreement with her inner pep talk. She wanted to be here. She was earning her place, surrounded by family, getting to know Donovan, writing her books. Blue Moon was home, and she wasn’t going to let anyone take that from her. Not this time.
She blocked the number and, feeling brave, went back to writing about love.