Daring Devlin Read online

  I cleaned myself up, wiped down the sink, and dropped the soiled towels in the tub, my mind on this evening’s events. Who were those huge guys with him tonight? Why would Paul clock me, then have me dumped on the side of the road over five hundred bucks? Unless I was right about the drug thing and those giants were his dealers.

  Possible, but it didn’t feel right. I leaned against the sink again, frowning at the mirror. None of this felt right.

  I heard a light tap on the bathroom door and watched as a small smile lifted the busted corner of my reflection’s lips. My eyebrows dipped in confusion. Why this girl intrigued me so much was a mystery. Why she’d let me inside, a bigger one. Sure, she knew me from work, but she didn’t really know me. Maybe she felt charitable since I’d shadowed her into the fridge and offered to give her a hand with the butter.

  Why had I done that? A rare moment of benevolence on my part?

  Tonight, when I’d rolled to my hands and knees on the shoulder of a road a mile west of here, I hadn’t set out for Rena’s apartment. I’d intended to walk to the restaurant and break in to use the phone, but then realized that would have set off the alarm. I knew plenty of people in this neck of the woods, all of them bettors. I couldn’t risk being seen in this state. How much confidence would they lose once they saw proof that I couldn’t protect myself, or their money, for that matter? At least I had protected my own money. My wallet hadn’t been stolen, and was sitting safely in my front pocket. But if a picture was worth a thousand words, the busted side of my face was worth a set or two of confidences lost.

  Halfway to the restaurant I’d paused by a sign near the road, my balls nearly frozen solid, feeling as if I might vomit as a result of several steel-toed-boot kicks to the stomach. The sign I’d leaned on read, crane lake apartments, and I remembered this was where Rena lived. I’d reviewed her employee file before we hired her. She lived at 802 Crane Lake Run.

  I had what some might call a photographic memory. It helped with remembering who bet on what and how much. Gambling in general. I was good at what I did and had made a nice life for myself. Rena Lewis’s address was one stat among many filed into a handy drawer in the back of my mind.

  “Devlin?” That light tap came again.

  I hadn’t intended to involve her—still didn’t—but she was the safest haven I had until I could find a ride home. Sonny wasn’t an option since I had no idea what to tell him yet, and I knew he had a cross-section of gamblers who were cabbies, so taking a taxi was out. That left either asking Rena to drive me home or calling one of Sonny’s guys who would keep his mouth shut. Nat was the first guy I thought of. He was a massive block of silent man. He didn’t gossip. He rarely spoke. And if he wasn’t too busy working someone over with a crowbar, he’d do fine.

  I yanked open the door and stepped out of the bathroom. Rena stood in the hallway, slender arms crossed over her middle, eyes wide behind a pair of large, black-framed glasses. Her brown hair fell around her face in soft waves in the front, the rest of it pinned into a sloppy excuse for a bun. The pencil she’d stuffed into her hair pointed straight up at the ceiling, making her look like a nerdy unicorn.

  A sexy nerdy unicorn. I winced to keep my smile away. I couldn’t understand why I noticed everything about her. Like how, at work, she wore her ponytail smoothed against her head, never wore glasses, and bit her lip whenever she was concentrating hard—which appeared to be most the time.

  Her Oak & Sage–issued white starched shirt and shin-length black apron over black pants should have her blending in with the rest of the staff. One in a sea of many. But I’d noticed her. Noticed not only how she looked, but that she was delicate and observant. Nervous. Cautious. And pretty.

  Really pretty. The kind of pretty reserved for guys not like me. Which made her as far from my type as they came. My kind of girl liked it fast and hard, typically a blonde with a short attention span who never expected me to call her later.

  I didn’t sleep with girls at work. I wasn’t stupid. Especially girls like Rena. Good girls who wanted to stick around, ask questions, get close. Close wasn’t something I could afford to be with anyone. Not while I toed the line of legal/illegal activities on a daily basis.

  I pressed my lips together and walked by my hostess.

  “Thanks,” I said, my eyes on the front door, my teeth clenching in preparation for the cold beyond it. Steeling myself, I calculated the distance to the restaurant and figured if I ran halfway, I might make it without collapsing. Though running was debatable. I suspected there was a broken rib or two underneath my thin T-shirt. Those bastards and their steel-toed boots.

  Rena stopped me as my hand closed over the doorknob. She asked the same question she’d asked me earlier.

  “Where are you going?” Scratch that. This was less of an ask and more of a demand. I didn’t like being told what to do… unless it was in the bedroom. I lapsed into a highly inappropriate, completely intriguing thought about the girl standing behind me. I heard her approach, or maybe I felt her there, like a curious rabbit sniffing a coiled snake. Maybe that’s what I was to her. Maybe that’s what she was to me. Too soon to tell.

  I released the knob and turned around. She didn’t know anything about me, and I would have liked to keep it that way. I wondered if I could trust her to keep her mouth shut about my being here. Maybe. Maybe not. But if I asked her to keep it to herself, that would guarantee she’d tell the first person she saw. I had to appear uninterested, as if this sort of thing happened every day.

  “Does it matter?” I shrugged and a dart of pain coursed down my back. I bit back a grimace.

  She crossed her arms over her breasts—small, perky breasts that shifted under her soft gray shirt. No bra. My dick stirred to life, and if that didn’t surprise me, the next words out of her mouth did.

  “It matters to me. I’m not letting you go out there and freeze to death. Tonight’s low temperature is twenty-two degrees, you know.” As if I hadn’t puzzled out the meaning behind this, she added, “That’s cold.”

  She was so damned adorable I had to bite my lip to keep my smile from emerging. Smiling by accident hadn’t been a problem for me. Ever. Sort of novel, that whole concept. And nothing surprised me anymore.

  Growing up fast had taught me there were three types of people in the world. Those who didn’t have their shit together, those who did, and those who would eventually. Rena struck me as the latter. And, other than tonight’s slight upset, mine had been together since my dad died.

  I cocked an eyebrow at her. “You want to take care of me, sweetheart?” I meant to insult her. Most women I encountered were borderline feminists and a line like that usually made them shy away at best, or slap me at worst. I needed Rena to see me as a class-A prick. Arguably, I was.

  She took the bait, her head jerking on her neck in surprise, eyes going so wide I saw the whites circle the browns. Dark eyes, dark hair, fair skin. Nothing like the girls I took home. I liked girls with spray tans, tons of makeup, everything waxed from end to end. Horny and needy and temporary. That was my style. Or so I’d told myself.

  My dick twitched in disagreement.

  Rena’s eyes narrowed. “Yeah, I do.”

  My turn to look surprised. No feminist rant, no haughty correction… just a look of determination and the damn unicorn-pencil sticking out of her hair. A sharp laugh—mine—cracked from my throat. I stepped closer, into her personal space. She bristled. She should. She didn’t know me.

  My eyes strayed from her face to her throat, then, like they couldn’t help themselves, they went to her braless breasts. I bet they tasted like cotton candy, her nipples bubble-gum pink.

  Her eyes darted around the room. A sketchpad rested on a sofa cushion, a few faint pencil lines that hadn’t become anything yet, and a lit candle on the coffee table—the same one I’d nearly knocked over when she helped me inside.

  Damn. Why had she done that? Hauled me in and dumped me on her sofa? Why had she touched me like she cared? As if
she’d read my thoughts, her palm landed on my arm. I’d never before been a sucker for a gentle touch, but there it was, the pull of longing from my gut on contact.

  Unless the pull came from my balls. Her eyes met mine, her hand squeezed my skin. Instead of twitching this time, my dick stood and saluted.

  Rena

  Devlin looked at my hand on his arm before his eyebrows centered over his nose. “No deal, sweetheart.”

  His voice was hard, his eyes as cold as when I’d towed him inside earlier. But, if I wasn’t imagining it, his eyes hadn’t been that way a second ago, when his gaze had traveled slowly down my body, making me feel exposed, and a little dirty… in the best way possible. He held the promise of rough kisses and strong hands tightening around my upper arms. Of being pushed against a piece of furniture and ravished.

  I wanted to be ravished.

  Snatching my hand away, I waited for shame to wash over me like an acidic shower, but it didn’t come. Only the same unexpected want I felt whenever I was around him. Even in a bloody T-shirt and jeans, Devlin did it for me.

  No man “does it” for you, I reminded myself.

  The throbbing between my thighs pounded out an argument I couldn’t ignore.

  “I will borrow your phone one more time.” He held out a hand. His palm still looked raw but gravel was no longer sticking to his skin.

  I pulled the cell from my pocket and gingerly placed it in his hand. Head down, he paused dialing to flick me a glance that could only be described as bemused. One brow lifted slightly higher than the other and his mouth quirked at the corner. His lips were free of blood, but the top one was still split. I had no idea if he was silently laughing at me or if I’d done something stupid. Was it the gentle way I’d handed him the phone? Because I’d been careful with him? Or was his head filled with fantasies as devious as my own?

  He watched me for a few beats as he held the phone against his ear. I tried to look away, honest to God, but his swelling face, and that one blue, blue eye staring me down held me captive. Then his eyes sank shut in a show of relief.

  “Nat, it’s me. I got into a tangle and lost my phone.” He surveyed his T-shirt. “And my coat. I need a ride.” A pause. Then, “How close are you to Ridgeway?”

  He’d gotten into a “tangle”? My heart skipped a beat as I pictured him launching a fist into another guy’s face. That should not be sexy.

  “Tequila,” he mumbled, sparing me a glance.

  If he was drunk, it was news to me. He didn’t smell like liquor, and his speech wasn’t the slightest bit slurred. Maybe he’d walked off his buzz from the bar to here? How close was the nearest bar? I frowned as I tried to picture the local dives, the image of Devlin in a bar fight not jibing with the kind of guy I thought he was. Then again, I didn’t know him. He could be as dangerous as I suspected. Dangerous and devastating.

  Devlin the Devastating Devil, my mind chanted. Oh. I liked that.

  You shouldn’t.

  No kidding.

  “Eight-oh-two Crane Lake Run.”

  I blinked at him. He’d been lucid enough to recall my address… to find my address? Had he come here on purpose? Witnessing my perplexed expression, he pointed over my shoulder in explanation. A copy of Us Weekly—my guilty pleasure—sat in clear view on my magazine pile, my address in plain sight. But how had he found me to begin with? That was the real question.

  He gave “Nat” general directions while I wondered if Nat was a Nat, as in Nat King Cole, or a Nat, as in Natalie Portman. Had he called his girlfriend?

  He ended the call and eyed me with a long, hard look. “I’m going to wait across the street at the office.”

  “No,” I argued, “it’s too cold.”

  He lifted my hand and slapped my phone into it. This close, I could feel the heat radiating off his body. He’d warmed some since he’d come in, but he’d freeze out there in short sleeves. His fingers left my flesh, grazing the back of my hand and leaving a warm chill behind.

  “Take this.” I yanked the multicolored throw off my couch.

  He lifted an eyebrow.

  “Just take it,” I insisted, shaking the blanket. “For me.” I couldn’t bear the idea of him being cold. When I’d helped him in earlier he’d felt like a slab of prime rib pulled out of the walk-in at Oak & Sage.

  “You’ve done enough, Rena. Explaining you”—he pushed my arm and the blanket to my chest—“or this situation to Nat would be… complicated.” He lifted his eyebrows as if waiting for me to pick up on what he was saying.

  “Oh. Oh.” Natalie. Most definitely. Inexplicably, my heart sank. I’d done nothing wrong and Devlin was nothing to me, but the idea that he and I never would be anything but coworkers stung like lemon juice to a fresh cut. I would know. My opening work yesterday had been slicing the lemons into wedges. The acidic juice stung my cuticles. Yeah, it felt like that, only in the vicinity of my heart. I wondered if he would be there tomorrow for my shift. Thinking that he wouldn’t crushed me in a way I couldn’t explain.

  “I’ll see you at work, then,” I said, hearing the hope in my voice as I curled my arms around the blanket he’d refused.

  “Yeah,” he said, turning from me and pulling open the door. “Maybe.”

  Chapter Four

  Devlin

  After dodging work, and Sonny, for a few days, I knew I had to go to him today. I hadn’t wanted him to see the worst of my injuries. Not that they looked good now, but I couldn’t exactly avoid him any longer. Outside a small pizza place on the west side, I squared my shoulders and walked in. I wasn’t scared of him, but I knew to go in with my confidence intact if I expected to sell the lie I was about to tell him.

  I never lied. I hated lying. But in this case, for Paul’s sake, I couldn’t tell Sonny the truth. I hadn’t made any headway. Paul had ignored my last several phone calls—and I wasn’t stupid enough to go to his house again and risk being jumped by Thing 1 and Thing 2.

  So. Sonny. Here went nothing.

  I walked in and inhaled the aroma of rich, seasoned marinara sauce and melting, fresh mozzarella. I’d had my first slice of Sonny’s Pizza when Paul brought me here years ago. Unlike the cold, wet air that chilled me to the bone the night I’d gone to Rena’s, that day had been balmy. A perfect seventy-four-degree May day with a slight breeze. A good day, all things considered.

  I thought I’d only been invited here to eat, but it turned out I’d been brought to meet Sonny, who, after my dad died, offered to help with the restaurant. Paul thought this was a great idea. I was skeptical, knowing how much cash my dad owed this guy, but Sonny kept his word. He helped me. I helped him. We still helped each other, me more bound by loyalty than debt. If I asked, he would probably call us square at this point. I didn’t want him to call us square. What would my life look like without Sonny Laurence? Not much scared me, but I was afraid to think about the answer to that question.

  “Son!” I called across the empty restaurant, lifting my chin in greeting to the new girl behind the counter. Her blue eyes widened and round cheeks lifted before shading pink. I stuffed my hands into my pockets and leaned a hip on the counter. “Slice of Triple Threat,” I ordered. Italian sausage, pepperoni, and salami. You couldn’t beat it.

  The girl—Donna, her name tag read—averted her eyes shyly, her hand shaking over the cash register buttons. She placed her free hand over her throat and toyed with her necklace, keeping her eyes on the screen. I categorized her as another good girl who’d fallen mute in the midst of a black leather jacket. It’d taken some doing, but I tracked my stolen coat down to near where I’d been dumped the other day. Not in perfect condition, but I told myself the scuffed sleeve added some personality. I thought of Rena and how she didn’t act like every other girl around me—flushed and batting her lashes. Of course, Rena hadn’t seen the leather jacket yet, I thought with a slight smile.

  Donna tapped in my order and called back to the kitchen, her voice thin. She pulled the ends of her ponytail. A ponytail th
at made me think of Rena’s sloppy bun.

  But then, lately everything had me thinking of the cute brunette who had practically carried me over her threshold.

  “Four-fifty.” Donna batted her eyelashes. I almost smiled at the expected reaction.

  I leaned in and licked my lips, watching her eyes go wider, and handed over a ten-dollar bill. “Why don’t you keep it?”

  I winked. What the hell. Always leave ’em wanting more.

  “Dev!” Sonny startled the filly I was play-flirting with. He liked me to be friendly with the staff. He’d taught me ages ago a little charm went a long way. Which made me think of Rena. Again.

  I hadn’t charmed her. I’d been trying not to charm her.

  Sonny slapped me on the back with one broad mitt. The man stood a few inches shorter than me, a square brick wall of a man. His hair, sticking up in the front no matter what he did to keep it down, was more black than gray, even for his age—which I guessed in the sixties. He might have looked young if it wasn’t for his weathered face. The man had a love for late nights, whiskey, and cigars. It showed.

  “Can we talk?” I asked him, keeping my voice even.

  He didn’t flinch. The man didn’t do drama. If someone caused drama, we removed the drama. Not easy to avoid drama in our line of work, but he liked keeping things neat. I thought of Paul again, of what Sonny might ask me, or Nat, to do in retaliation. It gave me more incentive to keep the cause of my injuries to myself.

  “Donna, bring the slice, and a fresh cup of coffee for me, over to the corner booth, will ya?” Sonny, his palm on my back, steered me to the back of the dining room. The show of propriety told anyone watching that I was revered and respected. Or so he said. It was his playbook. I just followed the rules.

  “Nice shiner,” he said as we sat.

  I tracked my hand along my face. Luckily, my hair hid most of the damage around my eye, but my split lip, colored an ugly purple-red, looked pretty bad. Donna at the counter must have a thing for rough guys. Which was alarming, because she looked too gentle for my taste, and I wasn’t rough with girls.