Tricia obviously noticed. Sex on a stick! she mouthed.
Sam thought quickly. “Alec is a friend. He’s, uh, helping me with some research.”
Seeing the grin Tricia didn’t try to hide, Sam knew what kind of research she was imagining. Her mother was smiling, too. Nate watched curiously, and poor Rick Young looked as if he wanted to climb under the table.
She took pity, bending over to grab her purse from the back of the chair, taking the opportunity to whisper, “Sorry; my mom’s a terrible matchmaker, but give Tricia a chance anyway. She’s fabulous.”
He mumbled, “Thank you,” which told her he might not realize she’d said that so he could save face.
Straightening again, she looped her purse over her arm and addressed the others. “Will you all excuse me for a minute?”
“Aren’t you even going to introduce us?” her mother asked, sounding highly excited.
Knowing she wouldn’t get away without doing it, she quickly made the introductions. Uncle Nate, always polite, asked Alec to join them.
“I appreciate the invitation,” he said. “And I hate to be a killjoy, but the truth is, we have a bit of a situation, and I’m going to have to ask Sam to come with me.”
Sam froze, her hand on the back of her chair, reading between the lines. Noting the tense way he held himself, she realized he definitely hadn’t come here to tell her everything was okay. That had been a ridiculous, wishful hope. His presence indicated the exact opposite. She’d just been so relieved to see him she hadn’t wanted to admit it.
This was bad.
“Darling, you can’t just run out!”
Walking around the table to her mother, she put her hand on the woman’s shoulders, bent down, and kissed her cheek. Her voice low, she gave the older woman the only excuse that would allow her to escape without a battle. “Mom, he’s someone special.”
Her mother’s mouth rounded. “Oh. You were going to tell us about him a few minutes ago, weren’t you? I’m so sorry.”
“Next time,” Sam muttered, avoiding the question,
“forget about the matchmaking, would you? I’m doing all right on my own.” Heck, maybe it wasn’t even too big a lie. She wouldn’t say she was having a wild, passionate affair with the handsome man waiting impatiently to take her out of here. But stranger things had happened. Even to her.
Lately? Especially to her.
Noting the thumbs-up from Tricia, she let Alec lead her to the door and help her with her coat. The moment they were outside, he pulled her out of view of the restaurant window. “I’m sorry I interrupted. I tried to call.”
She shook her head in silent apology. “I was accused of being incredibly rude for using the phone before we’d even been seated, and was glared into turning it off. Believe me, I would have called you again the minute we were finished.”
Staying close beside her, his strong hand warm on the small of her back, Alec led her to his car, which was parked up the block. He didn’t look at her, his gaze continually scanning the sidewalk, the side streets, even glancing back to the pedestrians behind them.
He looked like someone who expected trouble. “Let’s get out of here, go somewhere private where we can talk.”
Forcing herself to remain calm, she asked, “How’d you get here so fast, anyway?”
He paused. Not even realizing it, she kept walking, going two steps forward before having to turn around. “Alec?”
“I was in town,” he admitted. “Down by the harbor.”
“Has there been a break in the case?” A possible explanation suddenly arose. “Oh, my God, you haven’t been in Baltimore all night, since your boss called you, have you?”
“No.” He started walking again. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?”
They had reached his car. Alec unlocked it and opened the door for her, not replying until she’d climbed into the passenger seat. Then, with a firmness that didn’t disguise the hint of worry in his voice, he finally answered her question.
“Somewhere as far away from your apartment as I can take you.”
Figuring out Samantha Dalton was working with the authorities to try to capture him had been the most disappointing moment of Darwin’s entire life.
Worse than the death of his parents in that stupid, completely avoidable accident when he was a child. Worse than finding out he was an orphan, wanted by no one. Worse than being thrown into the foster-care system. Even worse than the first time his foster father had slipped into his room at night for a special lesson that was to be their secret.
He had not been crushed by any of those moments. Expecting nothing more than bad things made receiving them less bitter.
But her… He had expected more from her.
You betrayed me.
She had destroyed something inside him. Not only her actions, but the realization that he had misjudged her.
Betrayed me.
He would never allow himself to be vulnerable again. Never let anyone build his expectations, only to be crushed by their inevitable failures.
Betrayed.
Thank God he had been there to see that man leaving her apartment last night. If he hadn’t, his suspicions might never have been aroused. He mightn’t have gone snooping into Samantha’s e-mails, into her private files, using the passwords and account information he had obtained during his extensive visit to her apartment on Christmas Eve.
In the dark hours of last night, he had read her correspondence, all nicely archived on Gmail. Noting the absence of any mention of a man, he had grown more confused. Until, finally, he found one clue. A message from her whorish friend Tricia, apologizing for having left a rude voice mail the previous day when a mystery man had been there to hear it.
There had been nothing else. The trail had gone cold, and he’d almost given up. Then he’d thought of something. He had already figured out Samantha hadn’t been home a few hours after posting her article.Was it possible she had actually been gone much longer? A full twenty-four, perhaps, until the following night, when she’d come home with that man? Had she posted her entry and her follow-up comments from somewhere else?
And, if so, would knowing where help him learn whom she had been with?
Not as easy to find out, but not impossible. His notes from that night at her place were thorough, so he knew which blogging package she used. He’d been able to infiltrate her blog as if he owned it. Becoming an instant administrator, he saw what she saw, the history laid out in front of him like a well-traveled road.
One of the detours on that road had been a glimpse at the hidden server logs, specifically, information on her own posts for the week.
Samantha’s comments Thursday had come from a new IP address. Not merely a new ISP, which would be expected. But a completely different Internet provider than she had ever used before. One from Washington, D.C.
His suspicions at a fever pitch, he’d dug further. It had taken two more hours of research, visits to government Web sites, law enforcement databases, and conspiracy-theory blogs, but he had finally put it all together.
The IP she’d used to post her responses to him serviced the federal government. More specifically, the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Damn her. Damn them.
He had no idea how the authorities had seized upon his Darwin comments as being of any importance, but they had. And Samantha had helped them.
The man who had escorted her home had been an FBI agent.
Part of him was relieved that the stranger’s relationship with Sam was not a personal one.