Daring Devlin

by Jessica Lemmon

  Also, Cade was about my size, and I knew we’d go a few rounds before I finally kicked his ass. I didn’t care to spend any more time in the back of my restaurant than I had to. If he got a hit or two in and busted my lip—and, much as I hated to admit it, that was a possibility—I’d be stuck in the kitchen for another few weeks.

  Keep it together. Beating the shit out of Paul’s bratty son wouldn’t serve me in the long run. I had to focus on the goal: Sonny’s cash.

  “We gave you a home,” Cade continued indignantly.

  “We?” I let out a dry laugh. “I didn’t see you footing any bills back then. And I heard you don’t do much beyond draining your father’s savings now.”

  “Boys…” Paul warned.

  I ignored him. Cade didn’t.

  “Devlin owes you, Dad.” Cade shoved me again. That was really starting to piss me off. “Remember back when he stole Mom’s jewelry?”

  I wedged my teeth together. Every part of me wanted to deny it, but I couldn’t. It was true. I’d stolen a necklace and three rings and gambled with them. I was able to win back one of the rings, but the others were lost in a risky all-or-nothing.

  “Cade, that’s neither here nor there,” Paul said.

  “Bullshit it’s not here. Devlin Calvary is right fucking here.” Cade, his voice eerily calm stood nose-to-nose with me. His brown hair fell over his lighter brown eyes—eyes that burned with fury. I understood. If he’d been the one who’d ripped off my mom, I’d have beat the hell out of him a long time ago. My mom took off when I was a toddler, though. Who knew where she was now?

  “How much was her jewelry worth, Dev?” Cade asked, still too close.

  “Back off,” I warned.

  “How much do you think you not living on the street was worth, Dev?”

  He shoved me again, and I jerked my shoulders to straighten my jacket. “Do it again, kid, and I won’t hold back.”

  Paul called our names again. Cade didn’t listen, and I’d stopped listening years ago. By the time Cade lifted his hands to shove me again, I dodged to the side, palmed the back of his neck, and slammed his face against the living room wall. Framed family pictures rattled from their nail hooks. Paul’s voice rose in warning.

  Cade managed to face me, so I pushed my forearm against his windpipe to keep him still.

  “This isn’t your fight,” I said, using all my strength to keep him there. “I keep pressing my arm into your throat, you will pass out.”

  He stilled. But he was pissed, teeth bared, eyes wild. If I let him go, he’d pummel me. His entire body hummed like a downed power line.

  “The money,” I shouted at Paul. “And I’ll leave.”

  “You’ve been sucking him dry for years,” Cade managed from his nearly compressed throat.

  “I’ll get it. Just let him go.” Paul sounded near tears.

  “All of it. Two thousand for Sonny, and then I’m gone for good.”

  Paul was silent for a beat before he said, “Five hundred.”

  “Dad!” Cade said.

  “Looks like Dad’s bartering for you. Not a good sign.”

  “You bast—”

  I pressed my arm into his neck and watched as his eyes widened. “Tell him the truth, Paul, or I’ll give him brain damage, I swear to God.”

  Cade’s bulging eyes darted to his father. I loosened my hold so he’d stay conscious long enough to hear Paul’s confession.

  “Paul…” I warned, wedging my knee into Cade’s thigh.

  “I haven’t dipped into your money yet,” Paul told his son.

  “My money?” Cade croaked.

  “I can pay Devlin the two grand, but only if…” His eyes cut to me then Cade. “If I do, I can’t pay for the Chrysler this month.”

  “Poor Caden,” I said. “No more free ride.”

  Caden tried to kick me so I drew back and socked him in the stomach. He oofed and doubled over at the same time Paul grabbed my arm. I elbowed Paul, catching the underside of his chin. He rolled to the ground, moaning while covering his face.

  “Don’t hurt him!” Cade yelled as I tightened my arm over his throat again.

  “You have five seconds before I cut off his air supply,” I told Paul.

  “Hang on, hang on!” Paul scrambled to his feet. His lip was bleeding. I’d tagged him good.

  “The truth!” I shouted.

  “Okay! Okay! I’m behind on your car payment two months!” Paul said, and some of the fight went out of Cade. “I borrowed from your college fund to bet on the last game.”

  Cade was pre-law. That shit ain’t cheap. Between college and car payment, Paul had known Cade wouldn’t find out about the car until much later.

  Cade pushed against my arm, his attention on his father. I let him go. His beef wasn’t with me, but with his old man. It was hard to watch him realize his father had turned into a lowlife, but every man must learn the truth in his own time.

  Because pride always came before the fall, I didn’t know Cade had thrown a punch until his fist collided with my kidney.

  I crashed to one knee and gasped for breath, gathering my strength so that I could kill Caden Wilson with my bare hands. But the moment I clambered to my feet, Paul shouted five words that stopped me cold.

  “Devlin, don’t hurt your brother!”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Devlin

  Oak & Sage was in the wind-down of a Wednesday night. I sat at the bar, slipped my new-hire bartender Matt a hundred dollars, and ordered him to leave the bottle of bourbon unattended.

  That was an hour ago.

  As far as plans went, this wasn’t a good one. But Wednesday nights were usually dead, so it wasn’t like there was anyone here to set an example for. I didn’t get the money from Paul, but I had received a call from Sonny, which I ignored. Then I got one from Nat, likely asking where Paul was so he could rough him up, but I didn’t answer that one, either. When it rang a third, fourth, and fifth time I decided I’d had enough and dropped my phone into a glass of water Matt brought that I hadn’t ordered.

  Thank God for bourbon, I thought as I took another swallow.

  I’d left Caden Wilson as confused and angry as I was. After hearing we were related—literally, as it turned out; Paul hadn’t been referring to how he’d been a father figure to me—Cade leapt on his dad and got in a few good hits. I had to pull him off, despite the temptation to leave and let him kick the crap out of his old man.

  His old man, not mine. We were brothers not by a shared father, but by a shared mother. How’s that for a kicker?

  “How could you do that to Mom?” Cade had yelled at Paul. He’d been referring to Joyce, the woman who had raised him, the woman whose jewelry I’d swiped, who was not, in fact, his actual mother. I could also see in his eyes that he wanted to pull me into the argument, maybe accuse my mom of being a whore who slept with his dad. But he couldn’t. Because my mom was also his mom. And Joyce was just the woman who’d raised him.

  I hadn’t stayed for a family powwow afterward. I had no family. My mom had split—leaving me with my dad when she was pregnant with Cade. I’d only been two at the time. My father had died years later, and now I understood why Paul took me in. So, my only living family was Cade, the spoiled-brat college kid with whom I shared a mother.

  A half brother. God. I couldn’t get my head around it.

  Why Joyce put up with Paul, and raised a baby that wasn’t her own as her own was anyone’s guess. I didn’t get it. I wondered if Mom and Paul had carried on behind Dad’s and Joyce’s backs after Mom dumped Cade on Paul’s doorstep.

  Christ. What a mess.

  I downed the final inch of bourbon, and though I was tempted to smash the empty glass on the floor just to hear the break, I refilled it instead. It wouldn’t surprise me if Cade was living in the bottle tonight—in similar fashion to me—trying to wrap his head around it, too.

  A memory popped up out of nowhere—the photo album my father kept in his closet. I used to dig it ou
t every once in a while when I was home alone and he was on a bender.

  I didn’t know what had become of that album, but I could picture it now, clear as if it was opened on the bar in front of me. Cellophane-covered, yellowed, sticky pages. Photos faded from age. My father and mother smiling and hugging in some photos, and in others alone and working in Oak & Sage. In one of my favorite photos, Mom wore high-waisted jeans and was sweeping the floor of the restaurant I sat in now. Back then the fancy wooden booths hadn’t been installed yet. There were metal tables and chairs. Another of Dad made me smile sadly. He’d been washing a stockpot in the back, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

  My parents had poured blood, sweat, and tears into this restaurant. This place was my only connection to my family—or was, until Cade.

  The album’s photos stopped when I was a year or so old. The restaurant had opened by then and there’d been photos of the clean and tidy dining room and the facade out front. Of the parking lot and Dad’s prized Dodge Charger. There’d been few photos of my parents, and zero of them together. No one smiled. Not then. What had driven Mom to sleep with Paul, and Dad to gamble his life away—literally? Which came first—her adultery or his gambling?

  I flipped a cardboard coaster corner over corner and came to a conclusion. My parents hadn’t planned on purchasing a restaurant and letting everything—including each other and me—go to shit.

  Whether it was the bourbon or… no, it was definitely the bourbon, I thought as I took another swig. I became introspective. I thought of how I lived, the businesses I was involved in—one legal, one not. Did I want to continue living this way? With ties to the life-draining addiction that sent my father into an icy river and an early grave?

  I deserved a shot at a life different from this one—from my father’s. A life that wouldn’t involve me in activities leading to me being beat to hell on a cold, snowy night. Maybe Sonny wasn’t as integral a part of my future as I’d assumed.

  I scowled as I lifted my glass to my mouth. Those were some big fucking thoughts.

  Melinda stepped up to the server’s well to collect the drink Matt had just shaken and poured into a martini glass for one of her tables.

  “Hard night?” she asked, spearing a chunk of pineapple on a small plastic pick shaped like a sword. Her lips curved into a flirtatious smile. “Girl trouble?”

  Seriously? She was coming on to me?

  “Desperation isn’t flattering,” I grumbled against the rim of my glass.

  Instead of leaving with her drink, she stepped in front of me. My eyes went to the very full glass in her hand, liquid wobbling close to the edge.

  “What happens when she falls for you, Devlin? Because she will. She’ll confess that she’s fallen in love with you and wants to marry you and have a bunch of babies. And then you’ll feel like you’re suffocating. Or drowning.”

  She shrugged with one shoulder and passed by after all. Marriage. Babies. Those two words were too alarming to comprehend. I pulled a hand over my face and left it to rest on my jaw.

  Drowning. Another interesting choice of word.

  Especially after thinking about how my father died—and how I was walking that same path.

  Rena

  I massaged my throbbing wrist before lifting the tray. The pair of plates were for my last table of the night, and I was so ready to get out of here.

  Wednesdays were slow, so to make up for lack of traffic I’d worked a double. I’d been here nearly twelve hours, having taken one ten-minute break to gobble down dinner. I was ready to collapse. On days like this, I missed the lazy hours I’d spent at Craft Palace stocking paintbrushes and scrap paper and listening to canned music over the speakers.

  “Grilled salmon with vegetables and a medium-rare filet with smashed potatoes,” I announced as I presented the plates to the couple at table 20. “Anything else I can get you?”

  The woman at the table gave me a polite “no, thank you,” and the man smiled pleasantly. Her hair was styled and neat in a way I was never able to accomplish, and she was wearing a cute blue blazer over a clingy yellow top. A delicate gold chain with a heart pendant rested on her neck. Her husband (I assumed) wore khakis and a collared plaid shirt. There was nothing dangerous or daring in his eyes or his smile.

  “We have a movie to catch,” the husband informed me. “If you want to bring the check now, that’d be good.”

  “No problem.” I let them know to flag me down if they needed anything else. They could be me and my husband in ten years… if I found someone safe and kind. The thought filled me with melancholy, longing, and disdain. It was an odd combination.

  In the kitchen, Melinda stood at the touch-screen computer, her face screwed in its usual scowl. “Your boyfriend’s hammered.”

  My heart skipped a beat. I felt it. There was only one person she might assume was my boyfriend. I didn’t know Devlin was here.

  “I don’t have a boyfriend.” I pretended nonchalance and studied my fingernails.

  “You think you’ll succeed in tying down a guy like Devlin?” Melinda faced me, eyes blazing. She propped a hand on her hip and glowered down at me from her Amazonian height. “He’ll screw you, but he won’t stay with you.”

  Spoken like someone who had or hadn’t tasted the sour grapes? I didn’t want to know, since the idea of Melinda and Devlin together twisted my stomach into a double knot. “I’m not—”

  “Oh, give me a break. Everyone knows you are, Rena.” Her tone was half know-it-all and half pitying. Which pissed me off. I hated being underestimated. “He’s using you. Everyone sees it but you.”

  A feather-light tickle of doubt niggled at the back of my mind despite trying to stop it. I wouldn’t give Melinda the pleasure of seeing it, though. I pointed at the touch screen. “Are you done?”

  Lips pursed, eyes still blazing, she turned and clipped away from me, her blond ponytail swinging.

  Out in the dining room I spotted Devlin at the bar. I forced myself to wait until I’d cashed out my table before I ventured over. I didn’t want to appear overeager. To Devlin or Melinda.

  With no reason to go over there (other than to see him), I put a bounce in my step and walked to the bar. Part of me worried he’d already left. Another part of me worried about the part of me worrying.

  Was Melinda’s bitterness over love lost, or love never found? I wanted to believe she was jealous of the hold I had on Devlin; that I’d had something she wanted for herself. But I couldn’t be sure.

  Devlin was hunched over a barstool, black boots hooked on the lower rung, muscular, tanned arms bent, elbows resting on the edge of the bar top. A glass with a scant inch of liquid in it hung loosely from his fingertips. Eyes unfocused across the room, he lifted the amber liquid to his lips and drank while I admired the bob of his throat.

  I’d like to kiss that throat…

  He noticed me and shot me a sideways look as I walked over to him. That glance was sexy as hell, and then he faced me and my knees weakened. His black hair was stylishly tousled, his dark brows low over those mesmerizing eyes. When he licked his full bottom lip and glanced at my mouth, I had to hold onto the bar to keep from rushing over to taste that throat after all.

  “Hey, baby.”

  A jolt of awareness shot through every female part of my anatomy. I tried to sound and look casual. “Whatcha doing?”

  “Drinking.” He scanned me from tip to toe and I tingled. Swear to God, tingled like he’d touched me instead. “A lot.”

  Two other customers sat at the opposite end of the bar, watching the muted televisions overhead. Melinda and the other server on the floor, Jeremiah, were taking care of their final, lingering tables and paying us no mind. Even Matt ignored us in favor of watching TV and chatting with the bar customers.

  Devlin hooked a finger into one of my belt loops and pulled me so that I was standing between his parted legs. He leaned close, his lips hovering over mine, his breath sweet.

  “Need a ride.” Were his liquo
r-laced words an invitation or a request? He seemed more relaxed than intense. Relaxed Devlin was even more irresistible than intense Devlin.

  “Maybe… we shouldn’t do this here,” I whispered. Because even though we weren’t being watched, we might be in a few seconds.

  “Okay.” He curled his finger into my belt loop. “My place.”

  “Y-your place?” I realized then that if I gave him a ride, he might in turn give me one. The one of my young life, I imagined. I was suddenly overly warm.

  Then, as if summoned, my tall, blond archnemesis stomped past us making a face like she’d just made out with a lemon.

  “Hey, Melinda!” Devlin called out.

  “Devlin, no,” I hissed.

  He ignored me and tipped his head at her.

  She tilted her head at us, took in his finger in my belt loop, and propped a hand on her hip. “Yes?”

  “Finish Rena’s tables and side duty tonight. She’s busy.”

  Her mouth dropped open, but before she could unleash a banshee’s screech, I spoke. “No, that’s not… he’s kidding.”

  He looked like he might laugh. Melinda looked like she might reach for the bottle at his elbow and brain him with it. I spoke before either of them did either of those things.

  “Fifteen minutes,” I told him. He watched my mouth, which was distracting. “My side work is finished and my tables are practically done, anyway.” Smiling at Melinda, I said, “Thanks, though,” as if she’d offered.

  Once she’d stomped away, he loosened his hold on me. “You’re no fun.”

  “What was that about?” I asked, half amused.

  “I was trying to show you that I like you better than her.” He lifted his glass, sipped, then pushed it into my shoulder. “You.”

  I liked him, too. Even drunk and babbling.

  He set the glass aside and took both my hands in his. Eyes on mine, he murmured soft and low, “I like you, Rena.”

  I wished I’d had a drink right then because my throat was parched. Being liked by Devlin carried with it a truckload of responsibility.