“Ah, but you put it so much more colorfully before when you called me a patriarchal woman-hating asshole. In this very restaurant. Over there.” He pointed to the booth where he’d been sitting. His regular table, she supposed.

Twice in the last six months she had crossed swords with Mayor Eli Cooper. The first time, he had made it clear that firefighting and breasts were incompatible. The second time he was pissed to all hell at her and she was woman enough to admit he might have had good reason. That foul-mouthed big shot with the Lamborghini? Only Mayor Cooper’s preeminent donor, another guy who thought his dick had its own zip code. After her luxury car slice-and-dice, the mayor had summoned her to his townhouse in Lincoln Park—by text, which is why he now had her number—and proceeded to ream her ass. For a long time. The guy did not like Alex or her family or the CFD.

Goes both ways, Mr. Mayor. Alex did not like a man who had no respect for what she devoted her life to, day in, day out.

“My opinion of you hasn’t changed,” she gritted out. “Putting aside your caveman pronouncements about what women can and cannot do, during your reign of terror, you’ve managed to cut funding to libraries, drive city pensions to the brink of bankruptcy, and reduce social services to a fraction of what they were before. All so we can beautify the tourist traps of our fair city and fete George Lucas for the Star Wars museum.”

Because a man like Eli Cooper was undoubtedly used to the blows from the opposition, her words had no discernible effect on his ice-compacted heart. “Hard decisions are made by people in charge every day. Someone in your profession should know that.”

She imagined she heard a compliment in there, but her passion rolled right over it. “And don’t think I’ve forgotten how you fired your press secretary for taking my side and almost ruined everything between her and my brother.” Thank God Kinsey had come to her senses and returned to Chicago, though Luke had been ready to up sticks and move to California to be with her. Eli Cooper’s megalomania had almost lost Alex a future sister-in-law and her brother.

“The course of true love never did run smooth,” the mayor said quietly. “Firing Kinsey was the best thing I could have done. Made them face what’s important. And I still haven’t received that thank-you card.”

“Is there anything you won’t claim credit for?”

Eying her speculatively, he took a sip of his scotch, likely something expensive and triple-distilled from the tears of Scottish virgins. Everything about him screamed privilege, from his monogrammed cuff links to his Wall Street suspenders.

“I even paired off Gage with Brady. Perhaps I should add that to my campaign ads.” He swiped a hand across an imaginary billboard. “Vote for Cooper, the Matchmaking Mayor.”

She snorted. “Well, you can forget the Dempsey vote.”

His steely stare penetrated to the blood boiling beneath her skin. “Oh, I know,” he murmured. “In fact, you and your family seem to take great pleasure in doing what you can to make me look bad.”

“Believe me, when I was cutting up Cochrane’s car, you were the last thing on my mind.”

“Exactly. You don’t think.”

She tamped down the growl fighting to escape her throat. Do not engage.

He flicked a glance over his shoulder. “I must say your date is taking an awfully long time. Perhaps he’s a little intimidated by all this passion of yours and he’d rather risk a twisted ankle by escaping through the restroom window. Getting on your wrong side could be costly for any man.”

Unavoidably, her gaze traveled toward the restrooms just as Detective Martinez appeared, ankles none the worse for wear. Praise Jesus.

“Looks like this one is brave enough to stick around and take me on, Eli.”

Shit. She had called him by his first name.

The dimple did a jig.

“Beware of men who claim to be able to handle you, Alexandra. While I’ve always found our exchanges extremely provocative, I doubt others will be as entertained by you as I am.”

“I’m not here for your entertainment.” Covering a fake yawn with her hand, she picked up her phone. “I’m going to delete you from my contacts list. If you text me again because you’re bored, I won’t know who you are. As I was raised to never speak to strangers, it’s unlikely we’ll be chatting again.”

The dimple quickstepped into a samba. “I’m in your contacts list?”

Double shit, another damning admission. So what if she’d kept his number from when he’d called to chew her out all those months ago and had even gone to the trouble of completing an entry in her contacts? Forewarned is forearmed.

Discombobulated by that dumb dimple, she turned the phone to him, grasping for the upper hand in this unnerving conversation. “There you are. BFT.”

As he leaned in, the smokiness of the whiskey and something indefinably male struck her nostrils. Her stomach gave a treacherous flutter.

“Best Friend Totes?”

“Big. Fucking. Tool.” Plastering on a saccharine grin, she added, “But I don’t need a contacts list entry to remember that.” She went ahead and deleted it, each tap more indignant—and gratifying—than the last.

“Want to know what I’ve called you in mine?”

Her heart rate spiked at the notion he had worked up an entry for her as well. “Dying over here.”

He tipped the screen toward her to reveal “Splinter” in the contact name field.

Splinter?

“Short for Splinter in My Side. I was going to call you Thorn, but you’re not worthy of being a thorn, Alexandra. You’re a minor annoyance.”

“Glad to hear it. Would hate to think you’re wasting valuable mental real estate thinking about me and my family and all we do to make you look bad.”

The detective arrived at the table, his expression curious. Eli—no, Mr. Mayor—uncoiled to a stand. Just running her eyes over all that slickness made her shiver, but neither could she help comparing his physique to that of her date. Eli Cooper had a couple inches in height on Michael and maybe, just maybe, slightly more girth on those biceps. She would think with all his fancy tailoring he could find a shirt that fit him properly instead of one that outlined his bull-like shoulder muscles so obscenely.

“Enjoy your meal, Alexandra. As I said, the quail is excellent.” He nodded curtly at her date. “Detective Martinez.”

As he walked off toward the restroom, three things stuck with her.

One, the jerk’s personality did not improve on acquaintance.

Two, in under five minutes, he’d managed to sour the most promising date she’d had in months.

Three—and how she hated herself for even going there—those gray pinstripe pants shaped his ass really, really well.

In the mirror of the restroom at Smith & Jones, Eli Cooper took a long, assessing look. At thirty-six years old—the last four as leader of this great city—he should be seeing telltale streaks of gray by now, but his jet-black strands refused to show any sign of surrendering to the stress.

If only he could say the same thing for his sputtering reelection campaign.

Gripping the sink, he hauled in a deep breath. Was he ready for four more years? Chicago was buckling under crippling debt. Gang violence was at an all-time high. The municipal pension system was close to bankruptcy. Solutions were hard to come by—not even Caroline Jenkins, his most dogged opponent in the election, had a good answer to appease the police and firefighter unions on that.

Everyone felt they were entitled to something. A piece of the city. A piece of him.

Opponents and allies alike accused him of being overly passionate. Better that than apathetic. Eli couldn’t stand apathy. And as someone who was passionate and disdainful of the apathetic, he really shouldn’t be giving Alexandra Dempsey such a hard time.