Daring Devlin

by Jessica Lemmon

  As I walked to the SUV, Rena’s hand in mine, I noticed the way our fingers linked together like they’d been designed to. Like she’d been created to slot into my life seamlessly. The bad girl looking for her counterpart.

  I knew now, and had suspected for a while, that she’d found him.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Rena

  A mini-blizzard had blanketed downtown Ridgeway while we were in the hospital.

  Devlin parked on the top floor of the garage and then we found ourselves in another elevator, snuggling close. He couldn’t seem to stay away from me tonight. I didn’t want him to. I felt fragile and tired.

  Hand in hand—another habit he’d started that I never wanted to end—we entered his apartment. He shut and locked the door, slid the chain into place, all with his hand in mine.

  His apartment was dark, the only lights coming from the buildings downtown that glowed beyond the wide windows. I reached for the light switch on the wall.

  “Leave them off,” he muttered, tugging me close. “I made you a promise.”

  He unwound the scarf from my neck and tossed it over the back of the couch.

  “Well, then, you should keep it.” My voice trembled. I remembered that promise. The one to make love to me in his bed if I agreed to stay the night.

  He unbuttoned my coat and parted the wool to place his hands on my waist. His actions were unhurried. Gentle. This wasn’t our usual frantic, feverish pairing.

  He closed his lips over mine as he trailed his fingers down my neck. The tip of his tongue darted out to touch mine tentatively as he toyed with the neck of my shirt.

  I arched toward him, moaning into his mouth. He tasted incredible. My entire body vibrated with need. When he palmed my breast over my shirt, I grabbed the lapels of his leather jacket and pulled. He resisted.

  “No, Rena.” His warm breath tickled my lips. He thumbed my nipple, and though it was over a shirt and a tank top and a bra, I jerked as if he’d touched my bare skin.

  “But I want you.” I tightened my grip on his coat.

  “I want you, too, sweetheart. But we’re doing this the right way,” he murmured, melting me with another soft kiss.

  His hand closed around my fingers. He led me through the living room and hallway, releasing me long enough to take off his coat. His bedroom was shadowed, the gargantuan bed against the wall. The blinds were drawn over the windows but I could make out the outline of his body as he stalked toward me like predator to prey.

  I was willing prey.

  He hooked his index finger in my waistband and I went to him, my palms resting on his chest. When I spread my hands over his pecs, he stopped me with two words.

  “Hands down.”

  Interested to learn the rules of this little game, I obeyed and dropped my arms to my sides. His head lowered, his open mouth suckling my pulse. The kiss was slow. Intentional. My world went black as my eyelids sank shut. His tongue slipped along my throat, down my neck, and his hands beneath my shirts burned a trail along my bare skin. He released me long enough to take off my shirt and my tank top. I rested my arms on his shoulders and played with his hair.

  “Hands down.” He yanked my arms away, his voice firm. “Don’t make me tie you up.”

  I pictured Devlin lashing me to the big bed behind me and, oh, the throbbing between my legs intensified. I was instantly wet. I bit down on my lip and squirmed.

  “What have you done to me, Rena?” he asked, amusement in his voice.

  Him? What had he done to me? I’d had one boyfriend before him, and here he was talking me into light BDSM with hardly any effort.

  “You ruined me,” he murmured. With a flick of his fingers, my bra was undone. He tossed it aside. “You’re all I think about. The only one I want.”

  Being wanted singularly by Devlin was a heady concept. I reached for his face but he pulled his head away. “What did I say?”

  With a huff, I dropped my arms. I’d let him have his fun for a few minutes, but after that I was going to be all over him and there was nothing he could do about it.

  He undid the stud on my jeans next, drawing the zipper down at a torturously slow pace. My nipples peaked in the brisk air. His mouth covered my breast, an appreciative moan echoing from his throat. He didn’t suck hard or rake his teeth like he had before, instead laving my skin with the flat of his tongue. Then he pulled my nipple deep into his mouth while I writhed, my fists clenching uselessly at my sides.

  Fuck it.

  I grabbed his hair and pulled, guiding his mouth to my other breast.

  “You are completely stubborn,” he told me, again sounding amused.

  He backed me to the bed and when my thighs hit the mattress, I sat. He tugged my jeans to my knees, made quick work of my boots, and had me naked inside of five seconds.

  “Scoot up. Head on the pillows,” he instructed. I scooted up the black comforter and laid my head on a pillow.

  He yanked off his sweater by the neck and undressed. Slowly. He revealed his smooth, muscular chest, six-pack abs, and my favorite part of him. His penis, standing at half mast. I was tempted to touch myself while I watched the show. That was what he did to me. How crazy he made me.

  “Spread your legs,” he commanded, now gloriously naked. A wicked grin parted his lips. “You’re going to want to hold on to the rungs of that headboard.”

  I clasped the cold iron overhead. He lay on his belly, palmed my thighs, and opened them wider. When his heated breath coasted over my center, my leg muscles seized. When his tongue touched my clit, I nearly launched off the bed. He held my thighs firmly and set his pace to leisurely. After a few minutes of gentle ministrations, my back melted into the bedspread.

  When the sensations became too intense, I tried to pull my knees together. He held them wide, and far from done with the blissful torture, stroked his tongue over my clit without mercy. I clutched and came, shouting his name as every part of me tensed and released. He let go of my legs, slid up my body, and rested his hand on my ribs.

  “Mmm.” I was boneless. Useless.

  “Like that?” He kissed the side of my mouth. I hummed, satisfied beyond belief. “You can let go now.”

  My hands still clung to the iron posts of the bed. I let go, flexing my numb fingers.

  He rummaged in the nightstand drawer. “Ready for more?”

  My laugh was breathless.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.” He rolled on a condom and covered my body with his.

  “Can I touch you now?”

  “You’d better,” he answered on a low growl.

  I locked my arms around his neck and he tilted his hips, entering me, filling me. A cry that started out as his name faded into an inarticulate moan. I was overcome. And so in love with him it hurt. I hadn’t meant to fall for him. But my heart could not be separated from my body.

  He slipped in to the hilt as his hair brushed against my forehead. “Say it, Rena.”

  I panicked for a split second—half afraid he’d read my mind.

  “Say my name.”

  Oh, that.

  He thrust in and out of me oh-so slowly and I sucked in a deep breath of pure satisfaction. My body tightened around him. He wound his fingers in my hair.

  “Devlin,” I moaned.

  “Say it again.”

  I pressed my mouth to his ear. “Devlin.”

  A tremor climbed his spine and branched across his back. I felt it. “Rena.”

  “Devlin.” The words “I love you” were behind it so I pressed my lips together. Love. It was as real as his body gliding into mine.

  His tongue mated with mine as he pumped his hips. He broke the kiss to take a breath, his eyebrows together, his lips peeled over his teeth.

  “God,” he said, and it sounded reverent rather than blasphemous. I put my hands on his face and his eyes popped open, his focus unwaveringly on me.

  What I saw in his eyes floored me. Naked vulnerability. I didn’t want to lose him. Not for a second.


  “Look at me when you come,” I instructed, holding his jaw.

  He smirked. “You first.”

  He pushed into me harder. Deeper. I cried out.

  “Rena.” My name rolling off his lips was as good as any three-word pronouncement. I was still shaking from my climax.

  I focused on his dark blues as fireworks exploded between us. His lips on mine, he continued stroking into me. I wrapped my ankles around his back and held tight, feeling the orgasm climb his body.

  When his release hit him he tensed, his eyes on mine, my name on his lips, and I knew.

  He belonged to me.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Devlin

  After the best sex of my life, I used the last of my energy to burrow beneath my comforter, Rena’s ass against my front, my arm wrapped around her waist, her breast in my hand. I slept so hard that a seismic earthquake wouldn’t have woken me.

  By morning, her hair was tickling my nose, and her nose rattled with a soft snore.

  “Hey,” I whispered, laughing.

  She barely stirred. “Mmph.”

  “Hey.” I smoothed her hair out of my face, and she rolled away, mumbling incoherently. I lay facing her, my smile glued on. She’d come to mean a lot to me in a short time. A novelty for a guy like me. So was sharing my bed with someone.

  Warmth unfurled in my chest despite the cooler air of the bedroom.

  Eyes still shut, Rena asked, “Why are you awake?”

  Her grouchy-slash-sleepy voice was even cuter than her waking one. I’d morphed into a romantic sap overnight, apparently.

  “Because the bedroom is filled with sunshine,” I answered.

  Her lashes fluttered and then she pinned me with bourbon-colored eyes. My heart lurched like a drunk hobo. She was more beautiful this morning than I’d ever seen her. Her petal-soft lips parted and then I knew it wasn’t her that had changed.

  It was me.

  This morning a future stretched out in my mind. I couldn’t see the end, didn’t want to, and had no idea where the path might lead. But I knew where it didn’t lead.

  I wouldn’t end up like Sonny—washed up. Lonely. Claiming to help people while breaking the law. I couldn’t go back to that life. Not when a new one waited for me.

  I tickled my fingertips along Rena’s arm. “We did my second favorite activity in this bed last night.”

  She smiled sleepily. “Did it involve me holding on to the headboard?”

  Deadpan, I replied, “Okay, we did my third favorite activity in this bed last night.”

  “And what was that?” Her light laughter made me feel ten feet tall.

  “Sleep.”

  For a long while we simply smiled and looked into each other’s eyes. Until her smile faded. “Sonny said you walked away.”

  I didn’t want to talk about Sonny. About any of it.

  “I’m worried about you.” She grasped my hand. “Are you in danger?”

  “Don’t worry about me.” I kissed her palm and started to get up, overwhelmed by the conversation. I didn’t want her to spend a second worrying about me. And I didn’t want to share my “feelings,” especially since I wasn’t sure how the fuck I felt about anything.

  You know.

  Okay, I didn’t want to acknowledge how the fuck I felt about anything.

  She squeezed my hand and whispered, “Try, Dev. Try not to run away when emotions run deep.”

  Was she not paying attention last night? I’d been drowning in emotions. Drowning in her. And I’d stayed curled around her in this bed all night. And all morning. That was big for me. Huge.

  But I couldn’t say any of that so instead I said, “I like when you call me Dev.”

  Her smile was cute, knowing. “Come here.”

  She held up the blankets. Her naked body was a good way to get me to comply. I caved, pulling the blankets over both of us and facing her, my head on my pillow. I was as ready as I’d ever be for this discussion.

  “You left Sonny,” she prompted.

  I swallowed and forced my answer through numb lips. “Yeah.”

  She touched my chest. Comforted, I rested my hand over hers.

  “For me?”

  Yes, for her. For us. For a future that involved us building the life my parents never got to live. A life I never imagined I’d have the freedom to live. I wanted to tell her… I just… couldn’t.

  “What now? Now that you don’t work with Sonny.”

  “I stay at Oak & Sage. I move out of this gorgeous place.” I would miss it, but it wasn’t right to keep it.

  “Because this is his place.” She quirked her lips, understanding. “Where will you live?”

  “I don’t know yet.” I begged her with my eyes not to make me the offer I thought I saw simmering in her eyes. Thankfully, she didn’t.

  “I’m going back to the hospital,” I told her. “I’ll drop you at home.”

  “I’ll go with you.”

  “No, baby.” I cupped her jaw and kissed her lightly.

  “Yes, baby.” The “baby” made me smile. She was so damn cute. “I’m coming with you and you can’t stop me.”

  I could have, but the determination in her eyes—and the shake of her ass when she wiggled her way into the bathroom—made it impossible for me to say no.

  Rena

  After Devlin washed me from head to toe in the shower, and brought me to orgasm twice, thank you very much, we drove to the hospital to visit Cade. I texted Tasha and was surprised to learn she was already there. She must’ve been riding out the whole fiancée thing for Paul’s sake.

  She met us in the waiting room. “Hey, guys.”

  “You want coffee?” Devlin asked me, releasing my hand.

  “Sure,” I answered.

  “Tasha?”

  She considered him for a beat, her smile curious. “Sure.”

  With a nod, he left us and walked to the coffee cart at the back of the room.

  Other than an elderly couple flipping through magazines, and the low volume of the television airing The Price Is Right, the waiting room was quiet.

  The second my butt hit the chair, my best friend said, “Devlin is hot, by the way.”

  “Uh, yeah,” I agreed wholeheartedly.

  “He seems like more than your boy toy.”

  “Yeah,” I admitted. “I guess he is.”

  My former boy toy returned with two coffees, creamed and sugared. Tasha accepted hers with a soft Thanks, and I accepted mine, and his hand on my neck. I’d pulled my hair up since it was still wet from our shower. Devlin’s scarf was looped around my neck and keeping me quite warm. So was the hand tucked beneath it.

  “Any news?” he asked Tasha.

  “You don’t know?” She raised her eyebrows.

  “If you didn’t tell me, I don’t know,” I said. We hadn’t heard from Paul or Sonny, or Nat for that matter. Remembering the sheer size and girth of Nat made it almost comical that I’d once accused him of being Devlin’s “girlfriend.”

  “Cade has a broken foot, a few broken ribs, and a sprained wrist,” Tasha explained. “He’ll need physical therapy for his injuries. They’re suggesting round-the-clock care until he can get around on his own. He will need help in the shower, and walking. Maybe even eating.”

  “Eating?” Devlin repeated, and I heard the concern in his flat tone.

  “The collision with the fire hydrant was on the side of the car. The resulting brain injury was different than if he’d had a head-on collision. He suffered what his doctor called a non-rupturing aneurism. Which is better than the rupturing kind, but it could affect his speech.”

  I gasped. Devlin cursed under his breath.

  “We don’t know yet, since he’s not awake enough to test, but the worry is that communication will be more difficult for him than it used to be.” She gave us a wan smile. “And he had a mouth on him.”

  “Did he ever.” Devlin’s hand slipped from my neck and he scrubbed his forehead. I reached over and squeeze
d his knee.

  “So… Cade might not be able to talk?” I didn’t want to believe it. He was our age. He had his whole life ahead of him. He was in school studying to be a lawyer, for God’s sake.

  “It’s not so much that they don’t think he’ll be able to talk, but getting the words from his brain to his mouth might not be as easy as before. He might mean to say one thing, but say something different. Or he could have a stammer or a stutter for a while.” She looked sad when she added, “Or for good. We’re not sure yet.”

  The three of us sat in silence for a long, long time, processing what life might look like for Caden after he was awake. I thought of his road to recovery, saddened for his plight but also grateful that he hadn’t ended up like Joshua.

  I finished my coffee at the same time the elevator doors opened. The end of my sip went down wrong and I coughed. Devlin, his hand on my back, asked if I was all right. I nodded, coughing again, my eyes on the man who’d just entered the waiting room.

  Baron.

  And he was coming straight for us.

  Devlin

  I’d been lost in my own head since Tasha gave us Cade’s sad diagnosis. There were lots of maybes in there, but it still sounded bad.

  We hadn’t always gotten along, but I wouldn’t ever have wished this on him. I’d assumed when I saw him lying there that his injuries were limited to his body. But, brain injury? He’d been gunning for law school for as long as I could remember. And once he’d been accepted to Ridgeway U, he was well on his way to becoming someone.

  Rena’s coffee went down the wrong way and she started coughing. I leaned over to console her and she nodded that she was okay. By the time she cleared her throat, though, I noticed her attention elsewhere.

  On a cop. He was young, maybe my age. Good-looking. He ambled over, a strut in his step like he had something on us.

  “Devlin,” Rena whispered, her eyes still on the cop.

  “You haven’t done anything wrong, baby. He’s probably here to see one of his buddies,” I lied.

  “No, you don’t unders—”