Tara Randel - The Lawman's Secret Vow

“No. I mean, it’ll give me time to plan something fantastic.”

She chuckled. “Dinner and a movie is fine.”

“Not for you.”

She smiled at him. He was handsome, with round cheeks, nice green eyes, sandy-blond hair. All in all pleasant, but nothing to get her heart racing like when she was with Dante. The few occasions she’d spent with Tom, they’d had a decent conversation. No witty banter, but still...nice. So why wasn’t her tummy doing somersaults at the thought of dating him? Her heart not pounding out an excited rhythm?

“Listen,” she said, troubled by the direction of her thoughts. She’d said yes about going out with Tom and had meant it. “I should get back.”

“Sure. Okay.” They rejoined the crowd. “Call me when your assignment is over.”

“I will,” she said, watching as he walked backward, waving goodbye.

“What was that all about?” Dante asked as he sauntered over to her side.

“Tom asked me out on a date.”

Dante glanced in the direction of Tom’s path and back to her. “Told you he was an admirer.”

“I suppose.”

“Tell him we have an op coming up?”

“Yes. He was cool about it.”

Dante raised a brow.

“What?”

“I don’t know. He doesn’t seem like your type.”

“I have a type?”

“Everyone has a type.”

Hers seemed to be Dante, she realized. A depressing thought because she was no competition for the leggy blonde.

“Look, who I go out with shouldn’t be of any interest to you,” she said with a little starch in her tone.

“Are you kidding? Monday you become my wife.”

Her heart shivered. “For the op. Not real life.”

“Still...”

“Leave it alone, Dante. Let’s enjoy the day.”

“Sure.” He glanced over at the blonde he’d been chatting up. “I’m going out for drinks later, anyway.”

“Great. Have fun.”

He scowled at her. “I will.”

She stood her ground. Waited for him to leave.

He stared back, then finally shook off his mood. “Go home and get some shut-eye,” he suggested before walking off. “We’re setting up house bright and early Monday morning.”

CHAPTER FOUR

RISING AT DAWN to get his five-mile run in for the morning, Dante had taken a quick shower afterward. Now, with a mug of aromatic, freshly brewed coffee at his elbow, he scanned the computer screen after signing into the videoconference call with his brothers.

Since his siblings were scattered along the eastern seaboard—Derrick in DC, Deke in Atlanta and Dylan on the other coast of Florida—this was the most efficient way to meet at an agreed upon time and carry on a conversation. All accounted for, they could discuss their mother before he left the house to pick up Eloise and start their undercover married life.

His pulse kicked up, but he ignored it.

“Hey, guys. I’m starting my undercover assignment today. I’m on the clock,” he said in lieu of hello.

“Dangerous, Pretty Boy?”

Derrick always managed to annoy him. You’d think he would be used to it by now.

“Shouldn’t be. Auto theft ring.”

“Are you on it alone?” Deke asked.

“No. New partner.” Whom he didn’t want to discuss with his older brothers. “But we’re together to talk about Mom.”

Dante took this time to look over each brothers’ face before they got into the family discussion. They all sported dark hair and varying shadows of blue eyes, carrying the olive-skinned coloring of their mother. Derrick resembled their father more than the others, with his blue eyes a lighter shade just like the man they’d all loved. Daryl Matthews had doled out wisdom, laughed liked there was no tomorrow and touched each son in a deep and lasting way. For Dante, he and his father had shared a love of cars and motors. It led to building a sense of trust with his dad that he’d never shared with anyone else. They’d spent hours hunched under the hood of one make or another, taking apart engines and reassembling them, only to make the cars faster, much to their mother’s chagrin. But if his father could be remembered for one trait equally and above measure with all his sons, it was the listening and abiding love of a father.

“Let’s get to it,” Dylan said, taking the lead since he was the one with the limited intel on their mother and her new beau.

“Who is this man?” Deke asked, wasting no time in getting right to the heart of business. Studious and more logical than the other Matthews boys, his reserved nature served him well in forensics.

“That’s the problem. I don’t know.”

“You don’t know, or you don’t want to know,” Derrick, always outspoken, threw into the mix.

Dylan frowned. He’d been protective of the entire Matthews clan for as long as Dante could remember. “I want to know, but she’s giving me the runaround.”

“Which you should be used to,” Derrick said, then slurped from a mug.

Dante tried a different angle. “Has Kady learned anything?”

“She overheard Mom on the phone making a lunch date for tomorrow. Once she learns the location, I’ll stop by to pick up an order.”

“If the place has takeout,” Deke pointed out.

“Yeah. If it doesn’t, I’ll take Kady there for an impromptu lunch. One way or another, I plan on meeting her date.”

“Whatever you do,” Derrick warned in his oldest-brother tone, “don’t scare him off.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Dude, you get all serious and scary on people. This guy isn’t a perp, so tread lightly.”

“I think I know how to handle an interrogation.”

“See,” Derrick said after a chuckle. “You view this as work. It’s life. Go easy.”

“Life?” Dante snorted. “When did you become so Zen?”

“The minute I learned my mother was interested in a man who isn’t our father.”

“May he rest in peace,” Deke said in a low voice.

They all went silent for a beat.

Dante swallowed, his throat tight as he thought of the larger-than-life man who had affected all their lives.

Derrick, the troublemaker of the tribe, held up a silver coin in the small square of video space. “Let’s flip to see who leads this mission.”

Dante groaned. “Really? The coin toss?”

“It’s tradition,” Derrick countered, a slick smile on his lips.

“And not necessary,” Deke chimed in. “Dylan is right there. Let him take the lead.”

“That’s not how we do things.”

Since they were kids, the boys had always used a coin toss to determine which brother would be responsible for a task. Clean the pool. Coin toss. Cover for the brother who slipped out of the house late at night? Coin toss. The latest had been the last time they were all together at a family wedding when their mother had requested that one of her sons accompany her to a florist convention. Dylan, needing an excuse to tag along to solve a case, lost the toss, but ended up winning the girl.

Derrick deftly rolled the coin between his fingers. “C’mon, guys.”

“I know how this ends.” Dylan shook his head, his bluish-gray eyes glittering.

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