“Of course not before tonight’s performance,” he told her with a grin. And then, when understanding dawned, he added, “I’m not going to distract your new best friend away from you when you need her most. Or any time you need her.”
“Maybe you should sometime.” Her response was more of the completely unexpected.
“What does that mean?”
“I mean that if you’re going to spend your whole life putting me first, not only above yourself but above anyone you fall in love with, you’re probably not going to be as happy as you deserve to be.”
Where had that come from?
“Did Chantel...?”
“No!” Julie interrupted him. “She didn’t. I have eyes, Colin. Not only that, I’ve been at the other end of your unblinking ones for ten years. Let me go, just a little. It’s not only okay, it’s healthy. That’s all I’m saying.”
He nodded. Said okay. But he didn’t understand. Not really.
The way things had been going lately, he wasn’t sure he would ever again have complete understanding. Of anything.
* * *
CHANTEL HAD THE seating chart memorized. She and Colin had already eaten and were in place at the front door, greeting everyone who came in, giving them their first clues for the evening. And directing them toward their tables. Julie would be seated with Leslie and her husband toward the front of the room. The Smyths, who were at the commissioner’s table, were on the opposite side of the room, toward the back.
She and Wayne still didn’t know how deeply involved the commissioner was with the David Smyth cover-up, but they had determined that, with Chantel’s plan, it didn’t much matter. That was the beauty of it. Even if he was in over his head, he’d still have to hold the man until he was arrested if he was caught molesting a woman in front of their entire crowd.
Most particularly since he’d know that the woman in question was one of his own.
But if he wasn’t in that deep, if he was the man she’d honored and respected above all else this past year, then he would not only help her take down Smyth Jr. but by so doing should be able to help her convince Leslie to come forward and tell the truth about what her husband was doing to her. Help her see that at some point James Morrison was most likely going to turn his fists on their son, too.
“You as ready as I am for this to be finished?” Colin leaned over to whisper after he’d given a long spiel about the pure gold pen and pencil set that were among all of the things he was soon to inherit.
Batting her eyes at him, Chantel leaned forward far enough for him to see down the cleavage of her low-cut, short black dress and whispered back. “I’m ready to see if that gold pen of yours means as much to you as this does.”
She was playing a part. And nervous as hell.
The Smyths had yet to arrive. He’d seen them many times over the years, spoken to them, treated them cordially, but that didn’t mean he’d be happy about introducing them to Chantel. She got that.
Brett Ackerman, founder of The Lemonade Stand—the unique women’s shelter that had provided Meri with a safe haven during the weeks she’d been on the run—was going to be there that night with his wife, Ella, the charge nurse in the neonatal intensive care unit at the new Santa Raquel Children’s Hospital. They hadn’t been sure they’d be able to make it because Ella was expecting their first child any minute, but she’d been adamant that if she hadn’t delivered yet, she wanted to be there.
A member of the High Risk team herself, she was on sabbatical from it only until after her son was born.
Though they knew nothing of the evening’s operation, they knew Chantel was undercover on a missive from the team. And, as they greeted her as if just meeting her for the first time, they managed to give her hand an extra squeeze.
Their presence calmed nerves she hadn’t expected to have or planned for.
She’d have liked to have had Max and Meri there. Unfortunately, they weren’t in the multimillionaire league.
As it turned out, the meeting between her and both David Smyth Jr. and Sr. was mostly uneventful. They’d come in with at least ten other people directly in front of them, and Colin was busy with the first few couples when the Smyths walked past his little grouping to seek her out.
Deliberately avoiding him? Probably.
She was glad they’d shown him the respect of letting him know he intimidated them that much.
She played her part with the father, making a comment about how handsome he looked that evening.
When David took her hand, holding it a bit longer than his father had, she leaned forward and whispered in his ear, telling him, in the obviously made-up accent she’d adopted for her character that evening, that he was exactly what she’d go for if she were free to go.