by Lara Adrian
Rafe wasn’t usually the kind to lose his shit, but thinking about how Nathan and Jordana must feel about him now ignited a volatile rage inside him. That fury only amplified when he considered that in testing his loyalty, Cruz had also risked the lives of five innocent museum guards and Jordana.
Not to mention Devony.
And her life was still at risk, because after what happened with Jordana at the museum, there would be hell to pay from Nathan. Rafe wasn’t worried about his own neck, but he didn’t want to consider what might happen to Devony now that she had made herself his accomplice in a mission that was supposed to be covert and solo. He wasn’t sure how he could reverse that very lethal problem without punching a hole in his entire operation.
He strode inside the garage with fangs bared and murder radiating from his eyes.
“Cruz. You fucking asshole.” He yanked the gang leader out of his chair and shoved him hard, driving the human’s back into the drywall of Ocho’s office. “The next time you think about screwing me over, you’d better think again.”
Liquor splashed from Cruz’s dropped shot glass. He looked scared, which meant he wasn’t as stupid as Rafe thought. “Hold up, man. Hold up!”
The pleading barely registered through the haze of Rafe’s animosity. “You could’ve gotten a lot of people killed tonight. Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t return the favor to you right fucking now.”
“Wasn’t personal,” Cruz uttered, his words strangled. “I just . . . needed to know if I could count on you.”
Rafe snarled. “Did you know anyone would be working at the museum tonight?”
“No! Jesus, I swear it. No.”
Rafe wanted the asshole to lie to him. It wouldn’t take much more than that to push him over the edge. One dead gangbanger wouldn’t derail his entire hunt for a lead on Opus Nostrum.
And right now, crushing Cruz’s throat in his fist would feel damn good.
“Rafe.” Devony’s voice broke through his haze of anger.
He had told her on the way back to let him handle the situation and to trust that he knew what he was doing. At the moment, he wasn’t sure he could uphold that promise.
“Rafe.”
Her hand came to rest on his shoulder. He glanced at her, his eyes still ablaze with amber fire and his fangs enormous in his mouth. She gave a faint shake of her head, her warm eyes wide and imploring.
As soon as he let Cruz go, the gang leader straightened, tugging at his leather jacket. He spat on the floor, then glanced around Rafe and motioned to Ocho. The other man came over carrying two thick stacks of banded hundred-dollar bills. Cruz gestured for Rafe to take them.
He scowled. “What’s this?”
“Your share of tonight’s proceeds.”
Damn. Apparently, they hadn’t wasted any time delivering the stolen artwork to their contact. Rafe figured they must have made the drop to Judah LaSalle not long after they’d cut and run on Devony and him at the museum.
Now that he was freed from Rafe’s punishing hold, some of his bravado returned. “I told you, it was a test tonight. Congrats, you crazy motherfucker, you passed.” Cruz smirked, self-satisfied, as Rafe took the money and put it in his jacket. “You need a reason why I’m the last person you want to kill, vampire? There’s fifty-thousand of ’em. Keep proving your worth like you did tonight, and that’s only the start.”
He brushed past him without another word to accept a fresh drink from Axel.
Devony stepped away too, walking over to where the men had divvied up the rest of the night’s take into similar stacks. She tucked hers into the inside pocket of her leather jacket, then with a murmured goodbye to the gang she started heading for the back door.
Rafe strode up to her before she reached the exit. “Where are you going?”
“What does it look like? I’m going home.”
He shouldn’t be surprised by her curt response. Although they had reached some kind of understanding with each other tonight, it hadn’t come on the friendliest of terms. He had pushed her into a corner and that was obviously not a place Devony was accustomed to staying.
She was tenacious and bold. Fearless, as he witnessed tonight.
He had to admire that about her.
He admired a lot about her, including a host of things that he shouldn’t. Not if he wanted to keep his head in the game and his focus on his mission. A beautiful, headstrong woman like Devony was only going to be a liability to him in the end.
He’d known that even before he put his hands on her to heal her tonight.
He hadn’t even directly touched her skin, yet feeling her beneath his palms had taken on an intimacy he wasn’t prepared for. Her heat, her strength, the softness of her curves combined with the preternatural, uniquely Breed power that simmered beneath the surface of everything that was so unmistakably feminine about her.
He had been awed by her unique psychic ability, but it was the woman who intrigued him more. Far more than he should be willing to allow.
And when Devony had placed her hand over his while he healed her in the park, he’d nearly gone up in flames. If he hadn’t pulled away, his desire for her would have incinerated the last shred of his control.
Even now, his fingertips vibrated with the indelible sensory memory of how she felt beneath his hands.
Inside, he smoldered with the need to touch her again.
To do much more than that.
“Hey, Brinks.” Fish jogged over holding a shot of whisky. He held it out for her. “You can’t leave without a little toast.”
“Sure.” She took the glass and wanly clinked it against his before taking a small sip.
Fish glanced at Rafe. “What about you, my man? Care to partake?”
“I never touch that shit.”
The human chuckled. “No worries, I got you covered. We’re heading out to one of the strip joints up the street. I’m sure you’ll find something to wet your whistle over there.”
With a cackle, he swaggered back to the rest of the gang.
Devony set her glass down without taking another sip. “Enjoy the show. I’m out of here.”
She walked out to the parking lot without a backward glance. A moment later, the low rumble of her motorcycle sounded as she sped away.
Shit.
Rafe knew he ought to just let her go.
His interests would be better served spending time with the gang, making sure they all got good and drunk so he could prod them for details about Judah LaSalle or anyone else who might be orchestrating their activities. Hell, this might be his first real opportunity to get close enough to trance each one of the humans and extract the information he needed directly from their minds.
But not while Devony was out there in the city alone.
She might be a daywalking Breed female, but that didn’t mean Rafe wanted to imagine her being confronted by his old friend Nathan’s wrath.
If something happened to her now he would never forgive himself.
That feeling had nothing to do with gratitude for what she did for him in the museum, either. It went deeper than that, which disturbed him all the way to his marrow.
Devony wasn’t his to worry about or protect. Caring about her wasn’t part of his mission, and there was no place for compassion when his quest to destroy Opus Nostrum demanded only cold, lethal focus.
One misstep, one careless miscalculation, could cost him everything.
Like letting his concern for her ignite a reckless rage inside him tonight with Cruz.
The ferocity of his anger shocked him. It had shocked Devony too. He saw that in her stricken expression when he’d leapt on Cruz. When her voice had been the only thing that reeled him back from the edge.
Fuck.
It was obvious to him what he needed to do, before he let things get more complicated than he already had.
He could not risk his mission by bringing her into the equation. Not in any form.
Which meant he had to remove her,
the sooner the better.
While he considered the unpleasant task ahead of him, Cruz walked over with the rest of the gang. “We’re getting ready to roll out in a few. You coming along, or what?”
“Another time.”
He didn’t offer any further excuse before heading out to his bike. The rain had finally stopped, and the storm had thinned the nighttime traffic. He didn’t know where Devony lived, but he knew the distinctive purr of her Triumph. His Breed hearing was acute enough to zero in on that sound amid the rest of the vehicles moving through the streets.
He followed his ears until he spotted her taillight heading north toward the affluent neighborhood of Back Bay.
Rafe stayed about a mile behind her, watching in curiosity as she made one stop along the way. Parking outside one of the city’s homeless shelters, she jogged up to the donation box and dropped all fifty grand in cash into the slot.
What the hell?
After risking her life to earn it, she just gave her entire share of the theft away.
Rafe hadn’t imagined she was participating in Cruz’s gang out of personal greed, but this was a revelation all on its own. It was an unexpectedly tender side to the tough-as-nails Breed female.
That she was harboring other well-guarded secrets as well, he had no doubt.
Tonight, he intended to unwrap them all.
CHAPTER 9
Devony felt eyes on her.
The prickle of awareness had settled at her nape on the drive home to her brownstone and hadn’t let up in the ten minutes since she had arrived.
Which is why she hadn’t yet changed out of her lug-soled boots, fine-gauge turtleneck and stretchy, form-fitting black tactical pants.
The semiautomatic pistol she’d carried with her into the museum job tonight was still holstered on the belt around her hips, too, although she doubted the weapon would be much use against the intruder she knew was currently inside her house.
Breed.
She stepped out of her father’s study and found Rafe standing in her foyer.
He had slipped past the deadbolts and security system in silence, and now had the audacity to give her a wry smile. “I was in the neighborhood. Sorry I didn’t knock.”
Outrage burst through her veins. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” She couldn’t believe the arrogant male had actually found where she lived and barged in as if he owned the place. “Get out of here right now. Or I’ll throw you out.”
There was no need to pretend she wasn’t fully capable of doing exactly that. Or at least willing to try.
“We need to talk, Devony.”
Was he serious? She glared at him, her vision snapping with amber sparks. “We already did that earlier tonight, remember?”
He slowly shook his head. “No. You haven’t told me anything yet. I need to know what you’re doing in Cruz’s gang. I mean what you’re really doing.”
So, he had followed her all the way from Ocho’s garage. Tailed her. Spied on her. Right before he broke into her house.
“I don’t think you’re actually with them at all. You’re only playing a role, using them for some reason. So, what are you after? Not money. I saw you leave yours in a charity box in town.”
She swallowed as he took a step toward her. “I said you need to leave, Rafe. I’m not going to ask again.”
He didn’t look like he had any intention of complying. He scanned the opulent entryway of the old brownstone, taking in the dark mahogany millwork and stairs, the glittering chandelier overhead, and the sumptuous antique rug beneath his heavy boots.
“Whose Darkhaven is this?”
“It’s mine.” That wasn’t a lie, even though it felt like one as she used it to evade his real question.
He glanced into the spacious family room to his left, with its polished grand piano and the delicate Louis XVI furnishings her mother had loved so well. On the other side of the foyer was the cozy library where she and her brother had spent countless hours as children devouring all of the stories and biographies and thought-provoking philosophical texts that lined the floor-to-ceiling shelves.
That was before. Before her parents moved the family back to London for their work with the government.
And long before the heinous and cowardly terror act that stole them all away from her earlier this year.
Instead of leaving as she’d told him to, Rafe stepped further inside her home. “Do you live with someone?” He frowned. “Are you mated to someone, Devony?”
“No. Not that it’s any of your business. This is my family’s home.”
“Your family lives very well. Where are they now?”
She shook her head. She hadn’t spoken the words to anyone in all this time. She wasn’t even sure she could say them now.
Not without breaking down in front of him—or worse, revealing some of the burning hatred that had lived inside her ever since their murders by Opus Nostrum.
“I want you to go, Rafe. Please.”
Part of her worried that he would take his knowledge of her Darkhaven, and his questions about it, immediately back to Cruz. But a bigger part of her worried that his reason for coming here right now had nothing to do with the gang.
He was here for his own personal reasons. For his own personal gain somehow.
“I need you to tell me what’s really going on, Devony. I promise, everything will go a lot easier for you if you do.”
He sounded so reasonable, even concerned about her. But there was a dark resolve in his eyes that was pure warrior. She fisted her hands on her hips, her feet braced beneath her. “Easier for me? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I tried to explain that to you earlier tonight. You’re in over your head. You’re dealing with some very dangerous people—”
“Yes, I remember. Dangerous people like you and your old friends in the Order.”
“And others,” he added grimly. “I don’t mean only Cruz and his ilk. I’m talking about people you never want to meet.”
She shrugged. “I’m not afraid of anything anyone can do to me.”
He gave her a dubious look. “Because you’re a daywalker who was born with a hell of a powerful gift?”
“No. Because there’s nothing anyone can take from me anymore,” she answered evenly. “I’ve already lost everything I care about.”
“What do you mean?”
She held his searching stare. “You need to leave now. This conversation is over.”
To drive home her point, she mentally threw open the front door behind him. Night air rushed inside, cold and damp.
Without as much as a blink of reaction, Rafe slammed the heavy oak panel shut with the power of his own mind.
“What have you lost, Devony?” He walked toward her, studying her face. “I want to understand. I need to understand before I can help you.”
“Help me?” She scoffed. “I don’t need anyone’s help, especially yours. I work alone. I am alone, dammit.”
He frowned, processing the small admission she’d so carelessly let slip.
And he was still approaching her, moving closer to where she stood outside her father’s study. Her pulse kicked into a harder tempo as he ate up the space between them. He was close enough to reach out to her, but he kept his hands loosely fisted at his sides.
“Something happened to your family,” he said, not a question at all. “They’re dead?”
She swallowed. Hearing him say it reinforced the awful reality of her loss. “Rafe, please. Just go. Leave me alone.”
“Someone killed them. Is that what happened?” When she only stared at him, his gaze narrowed on her, zeroing in on the pain she couldn’t keep from showing on her face. “Does Cruz have anything to do with their deaths? Or is it someone else, someone the gang is connected to?”
Oh, God. He was getting too close to the truth.
She saw him attack Cruz tonight—partially on her behalf—but that didn’t mean she could trust him to keep this secret too. She h
ad already given him one weapon to use against her. She couldn’t hand him another.
Most certainly not this one.
“I said I want you to leave. Now.” She punctuated the demand with a mental shove against his muscular bulk. He skated backward a pace on his heels.
At twice her size and girded in masculine sinew, Rafe was a formidable Breed male. But as a daywalking female, she was nearly an equal match for him. If he thought he could come in here and make her cower, he was going to be in for a fight.
One dark blond brow arched and he stepped forward, closing even more distance between them. “Devony, all you have to do is talk to me. Trust me.”
She pushed him back again, less gently this time.
Her heart hammered, and not only from the anger that was coursing through her veins. It was all she could do not to lick her lips as he calmly, boldly, took a step closer, unfazed by her attack.
“It doesn’t have to be like this between us,” he said, his deep voice vibrating through her and making the rapid beat of her pulse throb with a heavy anticipation. “We’re not enemies, remember?”
“We’re sure as hell not friends,” she shot back.
Her breast heaved as the air between her and this dangerous Breed male seemed to electrify. That unbearable tension only mounted as he closed the distance even more.
“We’re not anything else, either. Isn’t that what you said tonight, Rafe? Isn’t that what you want?”
He exhaled a short breath. A look of regret swept over his handsome face, and something even more unsettling to her.
Desire.
There was no mistaking it, even with her limited experience.
And what terrified her now was just how intensely he aroused her too.
In a wave of stark panic, she tried to shove him back again, this time with her hands.
He caught them in his grasp, his reflexes lightning-fast, unerring. His hold on her was impossibly strong.
Infinitely tender.
His gaze pierced her, intense and smoldering. Slowly, he lowered her fisted hands between them. Then he reached up and caressed her cheek.
Before she took another breath, he bent his head toward hers and kissed her. Not the swift, aggressive claiming of his first kiss back at Ocho’s garage, but a gentle coaxing that wrung a helpless moan from somewhere deep inside her. She couldn’t fight the sweet onslaught of arousal that spiraled through her. She didn’t want to fight it.