“COME ON, DEPUTY LYNCH, or can I call you Charlie?” Vivian DeMarco bit her lower lip as she gazed up at him beneath thick, black lashes. “My boss needs me to bring some life back to this story. You wouldn’t want me to get in trouble or lose my job.”

“Ms. DeMarco, that is the last thing I’d want for you.” He withdrew his arm from hers. “But I have a job to do—”

Charlie caught Lane watching him. The sadness he saw in her eyes before she looked away pierced his heart. Something was wrong. She moved farther into the tent, where the auction was already in full swing.

“Are you saying Judge Sullivan was wrong when he said you made progress in the Donovan case?” DeMarco moved in front of Charlie. The strong scent of her perfume wrapped around him like a noose ready to choke out the truth. “I’d hate to bother the judge again to verify the information . . . but I can.”

A threat? He had no idea what Judge Sullivan had said to set the obstinate reporter on his tail, but he had a job to do in keeping the event safe and couldn’t do that with Ms. DeMarco in his shadow.

His cell phone rang with an unfamiliar number. Didn’t matter. “I need to take this.”

“Don’t think you can get rid of me that easily, Deputy.” DeMarco elongated the syllables in the last word. “I have my ways of making men like you talk.”

He didn’t doubt that. The flirting game—if that’s what that was—had changed a lot in the years since his last girlfriend.

Charlie apologized as he excused himself to take the call. “Hello.”

“Deputy Lynch?”

“Speaking.”

“This is Agent Edmonds. I’m sorry to bother you, but I promised you an update and according to a Deputy Frost”—Edmonds released an audible sigh—“we probably owe you a favor.”

Charlie didn’t know what Frost had said or done, but tomorrow he’d be bringing him all the cinnamon rolls he could handle. Maybe a week’s worth. “You have something on the painting?”

“We ran prints and got a hit. One guess and I’ll buy you lunch.”

“Marco Solis.” Charlie walked to the edge of the yard and let his eyes roam. He found Lane taking pictures of a well-dressed couple holding the autographed football. Two men sipping drinks nearby stared at her with a hunger in their eyes that Charlie recognized in soldiers when they returned home from deployment. The lilac dress hugged her body in a way that made him possessive. He took a calming breath. Jealousy was never attractive.