“You’ll do no such thing, Sam Lloyd! You got us into this mess. Now we’re stuck.”
“Is that so? Tell me why I shouldn’t fess up to the news boys.”
“Do you know how many calls the radio station got today about us? One thousand!”
“A… thousand?”
“One-oh-oh-oh, brother. And they’re still calling! Mr. Phillips wants to put me on two nights a week. This is going to make me famous. More famous.” She glared at Sam. “You, too, I suppose.”
Sam rubbed his chin, grinning. “I bet I’d be good at being famous.”
“How lucky for us all,” Evie snapped. “The point is, if you tell them it was just a joke now, I’ll look like a joke, too. Nobody wants to back a joke. Makes people grumpy. There’s only one solution, I’m afraid. We’ve got to play out this hand for a bit.”
The waiter delivered a plate of rolls and Evie dove for it. Being anxious made her hungry. She could’ve eaten ten rolls. Sam laced his fingers and leaned his elbows on the table, inching his face closer to Evie’s. “Yeah? What do I get out of this deal, Baby Vamp?”
“I agree not to kill you,” Evie said around a mouthful of bread. She twirled the butter knife between her fingers.
“Your terms are generous,” Sam said. “But I have two conditions of my own.”
Evie swallowed her lump of bread. She narrowed her eyes to slits. “I will not pet with you. You can cross that one off the list right now.”
Sam smirked. He dabbed a spot of butter from her face with his napkin. “Doll, I have never had to make petting part of a contract. Every girl in my rumble seat has been happy to be there. I had something else in mind.”
Evie didn’t know whether to be relieved or insulted. “What?” she said, wary.
Sam’s smirk vanished. “Project Buffalo.”
Project Buffalo. Sam’s obsession. According to him, it was some secret government operation during the war, and his mother, Miriam, had been a part of it. She’d left home when Sam was only eight and never returned. The official record said that she’d died of influenza, but two years ago Sam had received a postcard—no return address—with the words Find me, Little Fox on the back in Russian. The handwriting was unmistakably his mother’s. Sam had run away from home and made it his mission to find her.
“Sam,” Evie said as gently as possible, “don’t you think maybe it’s time to let that go? You say you don’t believe in ghosts, but Project Buffalo is a ghost. And you let it haunt you.”