“Tell him what? That he’s the only person I think I’ve ever fully and completely loved?” Eve snorted. “After the trouble I brought him—brought you and this town—I don’t think I have the right to flood the waters any more than I already have. Not after I left him alone here.”
The last part Eve hadn’t meant to say. Truly, it had been the only part of her feelings she had hoped to keep close to her chest.
Because it was guilt.
Winnie’s eyebrow arched high.
“You mean when you went to Texas with your dad to take care of him? It’s not exactly like you had a choice.”
That guilt in Eve soured the warmth she had finally been able to identify in her chest.
“Then, what was my excuse for the last twenty years?” she asked. “Why did I only come back when there was trouble?”
It wasn’t a question that was meant to be answered. Not by Winnie and certainly not by Eve. There was no answer that would ever be enough in her opinion.
She had made a promise to Darius’s mother that he was hers. For life.
Then she’d disappeared from his for twenty years.
Loving Darius Williams was one thing.
Asking him to love her back was another.
And Eve just couldn’t do that to him.
Winnie opened her mouth, probably readying to encourage her, if Eve had to guess, but the attempt was cut off by a knock against the doorframe.
Eve swiveled in her chair to see Theo and his laptop bag swung over his shoulder. He shared a quick look between them before pointing in the direction of the front of the department.
“Everything has been taken care of for now, which means it’s time for us to head home,” he announced.
Eve stood at once, the chair rolling back behind her and hitting the desk with a little too much force.
“Is there any more news? What do we do when we get there? What happens next?”
Eve and her confession were replaced by Eve and her anxiousness to be done with Scott Keys and his potential retaliation.
Theo put his hands up in self-defense against the interrogative onslaught, but it was Darius who spoke next. He came into view with his eyes down on the phone in his hand.
“What happens next is us going to get some sleep, since none of us got anything worth anything last night,” he said.
“Wait. You can’t just go back to your house,” Winnie pointed out. “What if another hired killer or someone else shows up to attack you? Especially now that they know about the flight records?”
Winnie the Feral Fighter of Theo-attackers was coming back up to the surface. Her words were no longer gentle and warm. Theo’s eyes went to her at the change. It might have been Eve’s imagination, but it almost seemed like his cheeks reddened a little at it.
Darius didn’t look up from his phone as he answered.
“Everyone has a place to go that should be safe. Theo is going with you back to your dad’s place, Mitchell is going with Deputy Gavin to his sister’s place since she’s out of town for a while, and Eve and I are going to my second house. Since only two people know about it, it’s the best option for now.”
“Your second house? You have asecondhouse?”
Eve tilted her head to the side, once again physically moving like the act would shake an answer loose before he could give one.
Which would have been nice considering how slow it felt for Darius to answer her with a nod.
Those eyes—dark and familiar—met hers a moment later.
“If you want to find out, follow me and see.”
