30
Liv sippedher wine as she watched Zeke navigate her mother’s numerous and, no doubt, probing questions.
Not once did he exhibit frustration, irritation, or the multitude of other emotions Regina Thornton could bring out in her victims.
On the drive over, she and Zeke had hashed out a backstory on how they met. One that didn’t include a steaming Jacuzzi and hot stranger sex, but could withstand a curious mother whose daughter hadn’t brought a guy to dinner since Tyler.
Regina wasn’t a matchmaking mama. Far from it. She never tried to set up her children with her friends’ kids, nor did she pry incessantly into their love lives. But her on-again, off-again parent’s insatiable curiosity would discover what made Zeke so special as to warrant a family introduction.
Aunt Belinda caught her eye and winked as she moved to join the interrogation. Liv shook her head hard and made a don’t-you-dare motion with her finger.
The older woman ignored her. Why she bothered to try to intimidate a thirty-year law enforcement veteran she didn’t know. If she’d been close enough to tackle the old tarheel in order to keep the two Thornton women away from Zeke, she would have.
Although Regina and Belinda were as different as winter and summer, the two found common ground when it came to the Thornton kids’ happiness.
“What I wouldn’t do to be a fly on your boyfriend’s shoulder right now,” Kayla Krowne said, absently swirling her wine around her glass.
Liv sent her friend a quelling look. “Enjoying yourself?”
“Immensely.” Her generous red lips broadened into a wide smile. “I feel like one of your—What do you call them? Confidential informants?”
Liv’s fingers tightened around her wineglass. She hadn’t thought to ask Zeke what his brother had shared with Kayla to get her cooperation. Caught up in her own emotional turmoil, she hadn’t stopped to consider what she’d say when she and Kayla found themselves alone together. “Informant?” She forced out a chuckle. “How so?”
“Don’t play coy with me, Agent Westcott. I know you and these Blackwell boys are working a case together. Phin’s good, but I wrote the book on the art of artifice.”
Liv’s mind scrambled for a response that would appease her friend without giving too much away or deepening her involvement. “Why did you agree to bring Phin tonight if you knew he wasn’t giving you the full story?”
“To get the full story, of course. I love a good mystery, especially if people like Nicola St. Martin are at the root of it.”
Kayla loved nothing more than mingling with strangers and ferreting out their secrets. She had built her lobbying firm on the strength of the connections she had curried over the years. But Liv also knew such demanding work came with a price. One her friend gladly paid, but pay it she did.
Kayla sent her a sidelong look before sipping her wine. “What I don’t understand is why you sent Phin to get information from me, rather than ask me yourself.”
The note of hurt in her voice made Liv flinch. “Sorry, Kayla. My work on this case is supposed to be behind the scenes. More advisory than anything. Definitely not boots on the ground, but he”—she nodded toward Zeke—“is as tenacious as someone else I know.”
Kayla laughed. “You make tenacity sound like a disease.”
“Isn’t it?” Liv watched Phin work his way toward them. “Besides, your former intern seemed to see you as a challenge.” She leaned into her friend and spoke in a conspiratorial whisper. “Anything going on there?”
“With Phin? I’m like six years older than him.”
Liv chuckled.
“Wow, that really made me sound ancient, didn’t it?”
“Here I thought you were a modern woman.”
“Phin’s like family. Now, if his older brother were to look my way, I’d be tempted to take an evening off of work and go play.”
Liv’s heart leapt into her throat. “They’re all older. Which one would inspire the mighty Kayla Krowne to ignore politics for an entire evening?”
“Since you don’t have a claim on Zeke…”
An image of Kayla’s curvy body snuggled in Zeke’s arms caused the blood in her veins to sizzle. “Bossy isn’t your type.”
“Not out of bed, no.” Kayla slanted a glance at her. “In bed, I do love a man who—”
“He has a lot going on right now.”