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“I have no idea.” He unfurled the paper and stared at it for a moment. “Just like I have no idea why he’s using my past against me to win. If he wanted it this bad … I would have given it to him. I can’t believe bringing this stuff up doesn’t hurt him as much as it does me… She was his wife.” He didn’t seem to be speaking to me as much as he was to himself, so I left all my questions unanswered when his eyes flicked back to mine, and I smiled nervously. “Anyway.”
“You need help,” I said knowingly.
“I do, but I have no idea what kind of help I need. I have no intention of playing dirty, so what’s the point?”
I reached to grab Silas as he went to chase the train in front of a group of people passing by. “I’ll get it for you, bub.” I let go of him and retrieved the train before holding it back out to him. “Why don’t we go over to those tables to enjoy our cinnamon buns, and you can play there?” He followed my gaze and nodded his head, toddling over to the table as I followed behind.
“I can help with your campaign if you pay me.” I teased Beau with a grin. I helped Silas onto the bench as I set the cinnamon buns down and popped the saran wrap open to pull one out for him.
“Really? I’d love that.”
I looked up in alarm to find he was being sincere. “I was kidding!”
“If you help, I’ll pay you. I don’t mind. But we can’t play like … this.” He looked at his hand, “I want a clean campaign. I want to win on merit.”
“Well,” I said, holding the cinnamon bun out to him, “I can do that, I think. I haven’t done a campaign like this since high school, but from the looks of your best friend’s, we shouldn’t be too far off the mark.” I offered him a wry grin as he took the bun and walked around to the other side of the picnic table.
I sat beside Si and got my own treat out, taking a bite. Groaning internally, I closed my eyes. My ex would have never let me eat something like this. When I was pregnant, he always warned me not to eat too much and get ‘any fatter than you already are...’ And after? Well, I probably never would have eaten anything like this around him for the shame he would’ve made me feel.
“Good, huh?” Beau was watching me with a hungry look in his eye that told me cinnamon wasn’t what was on his mind.
“I can make better,” I smirked as I finished another bite, licking the corner of my mouth. His eyes tracked the movement, and he dragged his teeth over his bottom lip before schooling his features again.
My stomach was knotted with the knowledge of being desirous to someone as handsome as he was. It had been a long time since a man looked at me the way he was. A long … long time.
“You’ll have to make me some.”
I grinned and nodded. I might not be ready for a date, but playing couldn’t hurt too much. “Only if you’re good.”
5
Beau
The next morning,I had a shift with Landon, and I was dreading it. All night I pictured his face and wanted nothing more than to sucker punch him in the mouth, but then I saw Rose’s smile, and it was like a balm to my soul.
It only had so much of a pacifying effect as I reached the precinct and saw another one of those damn posters on the front door. I pulled it open with more force than even I thought was possible, making the glass of the door’s window shatter on impact. But I didn’t even slow as I walked through the entryway, past my alarmed secretary to where my best friend—mydeputy’sdesk sat.
“Landon.” I slammed the poster on the table and glared at him. “What the hell is this?!”
He at least had the decency to look sheepish as he cringed when he read the words.
“Ah, damnit, I told her not to.”
“Toldwhonot to?”
“Sophie. I told Sophie not to.”
My eyebrows both rose as I continued to stare at him, silently imploring him to give a little bit more detail than that because I had no idea who the hellSophiewas. And then it hit me, a flash of a memory with a name on an email asking for an interview.
“The reporter.”
Landon frowned. “She told you she’s a reporter?” He shook his head and his grimace deepened. “I’m sorry, Beau. She’s not a reporter. She’s my … erm—well, my campaign manager.” I frowned as the betrayal hit me in the gut for the second time.
Why hadn’t he told me? Why spring it on me like this? And more importantly, why hire a campaign manager and tell secrets in order to smear my name?
Despite all the history between us, we’d remained friends. I had his back, and I thought—well, I thought wrong apparently.
Grabbing the poster off his desk, I crumbled it in my fist before giving him a tight smile. “Well, alright then, good luck with your campaign, Deputy.”
