"Please tell me," she said, picking at her food, studying him. "I'm not like you, Eliot. I don't like suspense."

He wiped his mouth with a napkin and smiled at her. "I guess you don't realize you're dining with one of the most powerful figures in city government."

"Powerful? City government?"

"Your husband is Cleveland's new Director of Public Safety."

Her face lit up the room as she clasped her hands together. She rose, and came over and sat in his lap. She was soft and warm and smelled very good, like the flowers he'd (sort of) brought her, and her face was glowing.

"I'm so proud of you," Eva said. "This is the day, the day we've been waiting for."

He squeezed her. "Yes, it is. We've been working toward this for a long time."

"You deserve a big kiss."

"I think I do."

She kissed him-a long, soft, sweet kiss that nearly ended dinner.

"Eliot," she said, blue eyes flashing as she fell into a private joke of theirs, "is that your gun?"

"Maybe I'm just glad to see you."

She slid off his lap. "Maybe you should finish your roast beef. I have apple strudel for dessert."

"We may have dessert all evening."

"We may," she conceded, and she sat across from him and began eating with more enthusiasm now.

He had met Eva Jonsen in elementary school so perhaps it could be said they were childhood sweethearts. But they had gone to different high schools and, in truth, barely knew each other in those days. Both had grown up on Chicago's South Side, in Roseland, a working-class residential area outside the Pullman industrial district. Her father had worked at the Pullman plant, in fact, while Eliot's had owned a small but successful bakery. They hadn't gotten to know each other until years later, when she'd been Alexander Jamie's secretary.