“That’s not what this is about,” Luke said, his voice hollow, his heart all but bleeding inside his chest. “I told you that first night, before we made love, before anything weird happened, that you mattered to me. I told you I didn’t have any intention of letting you go.”
Slowly, he lowered her to the ground and took one careful step away, and then another. “Yeah, so what? I drove by your house a few times after that, just because I was a little worried. I’m crazy about you. Why wouldn’t I want to keep you safe?”
“Because you’re a decent guy, Luke,” Devon said softly. “You’ve got a do-gooder streak in you a mile wide. You want to help people. Take care of them. Fix them.” She shrugged her shoulders, shifted her feet.
“Take care of them,” he repeated slowly, trying to keep control of his temper. It was getting damn hard, though. Very damn hard. “Honest answer, Devon . . . Is that why you think I’m here with you? Because I want to help you? You think I look at you and see some wounded soul and feel obligated to make it all better and then pat you on the head and send you off on your merry way?”
He watched her throat work as she swallowed. In a thin, reedy voice, she said, “It makes more sense to me than anything else.”
“Really. Well, I hate to smash your image of me, but I’m not into pity fucks. I’m not that nice a guy. Hell, I’m really not that nice at all.” Screw being cautious. Screw taking his time. Once more, he reached out, grabbed the front of her shirt, and hauled her against him. This time, when her slight weight fell against his body, he banded his arms around her, lifted her up, and crushed his lips to hers. She opened for him almost instantly, moaning into his mouth. Her arms came around his neck, her hands fisting in his hair. She moved against him, hot and hungry, but Luke wasn’t going to lose his head, not just yet. Tearing his mouth away from hers, he fisted a hand in her hair, jerked her head to the side, and raked his teeth along her neck. “Make sense of this then, Devon Manning. I’m in love with you. Been that way for weeks—longer, practically from the first—and I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to scare you off.”
Lifting his head, he stared into her eyes, watching as huge, diamond-bright tears formed. “Can you make sense of that, Devon? Do you believe me, or are you going to find some way to rationalize what I say I feel?”
Stroking one palm down the long, slender line of her back, he slid a hand under her shirt. Her skin was warm, soft satin under his hand. “You think all I see when I look at you is some poor, sad woman in need of a little TLC? Is that what you think?”
She sighed, a soft, shaky little whisper of sound. “Aren’t I?”
Luke shook his head. Slowly, he lowered her feet back to the ground and then brought his other hand to her waist. Cupping his palms over the slight curve, he drew her against him. Brushing her tangled curls aside, he dipped his head and nuzzled her neck. “I look at you and see a fighter, Devon. A stubborn, sexy little fighter who won’t give up even when all you want to do is quit. I look at you and I see the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with—and if it takes years to make you see that, then so be it.”
TEN
“STOP hovering.”
Devon met Luke’s gaze in the mirror’s reflection, watched as he slid his hands into his pockets and rocked back on his heels. “Men don’t hover, Devon.”
Snorting, she gathered her hair into a loose tail at her nape and started to twist it. “Don’t know where that rule is written, but trust me, pal. You’re hovering.” With one hand holding her hair in place, she grabbed a clip from the top of her dresser and stuck it in her hair. A few loose tendrils escaped, but she ignored them as she turned away and went to dig through her closet, looking for a pair of black boots she’d bought.
It was cold out. The mild fall weather they’d been having was gone, and probably for good, from the looks of things. Outside, there was a hard frost covering everything in a soft, hazy white.
She grabbed the boots and settled down on the bed to put them on. “What are you doing today?”
Luke shrugged. “I was thinking about packing up my clothes. Bringing them over here.” From the corner of his eye, he glanced at her and said, “Although you never really did give me an answer.”
She didn’t need to ask what he was talking about. Their conversation from Friday had weighed heavily on her mind throughout the entire damn weekend. “I’m in love with you.”
She didn’t see Luke as the type to say something he didn’t mean. It just wasn’t who he was. Her first instinct was to pull back. Devon had happily gone most of her life without letting people get close. Her adopted parents, Eden, a few select friends, but that was it. Even Luke, although she knew she was getting completely tangled up with him, she wanted to keep him at some kind of distance. Enough so that she still felt in control.
Slowly, not looking at him, she finished putting her boots on, zipping them up, and then smoothing the legs of her wine-colored pants. “This is a big step you’re asking me to take, Luke,” she said, forcing herself to look up at him.
He watched her with those insightful, intense eyes, arms folded across his chest. “You think I don’t know that?” Luke crossed the room and hunkered down in front of her beside the bed. He laid his palms on her thighs, rubbing in slow, gentle circles. “That wasn’t exactly the way I’d planned on doing this. But it’s something that’s been on my mind for a while. Hell, forget about whoever this shit-head is, and just think about us—just you and me. Do you seriously hate the idea of me living here? Because if you do, fine—tell me. But if you don’t—”
“I don’t hate the idea,” Devon interrupted, laying one finger against his lips. “I don’t hate it at all. This is just very strange territory for me, Luke. I don’t know how to handle it.”
Luke’s lips parted, and he gently nipped her finger. “How about one day at a time? We’ll just take it as it goes.”
Swallowing around the huge knot that had taken up residence in the middle of her throat, Devon forced herself to go on, to get it all out. “You said you loved me.”
He reached up, laid a hand on her cheek. “I do.”
Blinking away the tears, Devon said hoarsely, “I don’t know if I’m ready to say that to you yet. I don’t even know if I’m ready to love you.”
“I’m not asking you to. At least not yet.” Then he grinned, a cocky, confident grin that somehow managed to lighten the weighted atmosphere. “But you will be ready, Devon. You’ll say it back sooner or later. I can wait until you’re ready.”
“Arrogant.”
“Nah. Just confident.” Hooking his hand over the back of her neck, he drew her close, pressed his lips to hers. “I know what I see in your eyes when you look at me, Devon. I see it, even if you aren’t ready to.”
He kissed her again, light and soft, and then he stood up. He tugged on her wrist, and Devon slid off the bed, standing in front of him. “I need to get going,” she whispered.
Luke said nothing else, just followed her out of the bedroom and down the stairs. As she got her purse, he took a long leather coat from the closet. “I got your car running for you—should be warm enough by now,” he murmured, helping her slide the coat on. “I’ll be here when you get off.”
Devon nodded, headed toward the door. Luke followed her, sliding the keys from her fingers and using the key fob to unlock the door and open it for her.
She tossed her purse inside and started to slide into the car, but then she stopped. Spinning around, she said in a rush, “If you want to move your stuff over here, go ahead.” Without waiting for his response, she climbed into the car and left.
At the end of the driveway, she glanced at Luke. He was still standing in the driveway, that faint smile curling his lips.
“SO how is school going, Tim?”
Devon had to force herself to focus on the boy in front of her. She’d been working with Tim Wilder since July, and so far, she could measure her progress with him in millimeters.
&nbs
p; As in zero millimeters. The follow-up interviews with him hadn’t been much fun even under good circumstances. Nothing she’d done the past few days had been under what she’d call good circumstances.
The fourteen-year-old was creative, intelligent, and a fast learner. He also had a world of anger inside of him, as evidenced by the fact that he had been arrested on battery charges back in July. It wasn’t the first time he’d been in trouble. Theft, vandalism, and truancy marred his record going back to when he was eleven years old.
But he hadn’t ever shown any kind of violence, not until last summer.
It had been an older kid that he’d beaten the crap out of. After reading the arrest report and doing some investigating of her own, part of Devon understood why Tim had lashed out. The sixteen-year-old had spent a great deal of time taunting Tim, making fun of him, and Tim hadn’t done much of anything in retaliation. But then, during the last week of the final session of summer school, Bryce Turner had shoved Tim in the hallway at school and sent him flying face-first into the floor.
Tim had come up swinging, and it had taken three teachers to haul him off of Bryce. Bryce was out of school for more than a week healing up, and Tim ended up in court. Since Bryce had set things off, Tim didn’t have to serve any time, but the severity of the beating hadn’t gone unnoticed. Tim was now under Devon’s watch, and he’d stay that way for a good long while.
There were secrets in that boy’s eyes, secrets and a fear that made her gut go cold, but all she had were her suspicions. The surprise visits to the Wilder household hadn’t given any sign for concern, and none of Tim’s teachers had ever seen any signs of abuse.
A troubled kid, she was told.
An angry kid.
A bad kid.
But it was Devon’s experience that most troubled, angry kids weren’t just born that way. Some were. But most of them ended up that way after years of abuse or neglect—or both.
There were a few rare occasions when she had to deal with kids who just plain and simple were bad, the kind who grew up to be blights on society. But there weren’t that many.
“Tim?” she prodded after he didn’t answer her question.
He shot her a look from under a fringe of matte black hair and shrugged. “Sucks. Boring.”
Typical teenage response. She flipped through the folder in front of her. Most of it held the typical teenage schoolwork. Tests passed with a grade either right at average or just enough above failing to pass. Pop quizzes, the same.
But there was one class where he excelled. She skimmed the essay he’d turned in for a grade in his creative writing class. “You’re a good writer,” she murmured, more to herself than anything.
“Whatever.”
Grinning, she continued to read the short story. “You know, this is proof. You can put together more than one or two words at a time.” The story was disturbing, as full of anger as Tim himself was, but it wasn’t directed at the world in general. It was all self-directed. Equally disturbing, but for different reasons. “This is a pretty dark story,” she said, flicking him another glance. “Who is it about?”
“Nobody. Just made-up crap. Called fiction, ya know?” He smirked as he said it, keeping his chin tucked low so he wasn’t facing her.
But Devon saw the look he slid her. It was quick. There, then gone. “Why do you think he hates himself so much?” she asked.
He’d written up a ten-page story about a twelve-year-old boy, the boy’s anger, the boy’s helplessness, his fear. There were hints of some unknown enemy, somebody who hated the boy, but nothing more than that. “Because he’s a loser,” Tim said, curling his lip.
“You know, usually when somebody gets called a loser, it’s because others just want to make themselves feel better about who they are.” She finished the story and tucked it back inside the folder, out of sight. It was very disturbing, very raw—and it rang of an ugly truth. Come on, Tim. Help me out . . . That story, if he would just give her something, it might be enough.
“Who says he’s a loser, Tim? Who is it that makes him hate himself?”
“He is a loser,” Tim muttered, his voice harsh. “Weak, pathetic loser. He oughta hate himself.”
Devon shrugged, lifted her shoulder. “Doesn’t seem weak to me. Reading it made me think that the boy had some bad stuff happen to him, lived a hard life. But he hasn’t given up. That takes strength, Tim. Weak people break.”
Slowly, his eyes lifted, and he stared at her. There was a bleakness in those pale brown eyes that cut right through her. “You haven’t broken, have you, Tim?”
She watched as his eyes slid away from hers, but he wasn’t evading her gaze this time. Keeping her face neutral, she relied on her peripheral vision, watched as he glanced through the glass window of the conference room to the waiting area outside.
Tim’s dad. An ugly knot settled in her chest. She felt the weight of Curtis Wilder’s gaze cut her way, but she didn’t once look at him, didn’t ever look away from Tim, didn’t let the neutral mask slip away for even a second. “The boy wants help, doesn’t he, Tim?”
He slumped farther down in his chair. If he could have disappeared into the floor at will, Devon knew he would have. Sighing, she settled back. God, let me get through to him . . . But even as that thought made its way through her mind, she heard a faint whisper. Hardly loud enough to hear.
But she heard it; she’d been listening for that very answer for months; there was no way she’d miss it once he opened up.
“Guess so.”
It wasn’t much of an opening, but Devon rarely encountered open doors in her line of work. Usually they were more like windows, opened just a crack. That was all she needed.
“I’m good at helping people, Tim.” Leaning forward, she willed him to look at her, to meet her gaze. He did, slowly. “Trust me. It’s what I’m good at.”
He sneered, but it lacked some of his typical anger. “It’s what they pay you for; you oughta be good at it.”
Devon laughed. “Tim, sweetie, if you had any idea what they pay me, you’d wonder why I bother. It’s not because of the money; nobody does this job because of the money.”
“Then why do it at all?” he asked, his voice sullen.
“Because I want to help.” She licked her lips, weighed her options. “I don’t usually tell people this. I was in the system, Tim. Got myself into trouble—even worse trouble than you’re in. I would have done worse, too, if somebody hadn’t cared enough to help. It was a social worker who cared. She helped me in ways I can’t even begin to explain. All because she cared enough to try.”
She watched as that crack spread open, bit by bit, widening. Tim lifted his head, looked her square in the eye. His pale eyes gleamed behind a veil of tears, and she watched, felt her throat tighten, as one tear broke free and rolled down his face. “Nobody can help, Ms. Manning.”
Although all she wanted to do was cry, she forced a smile. “Tim, I didn’t even realize you knew my name,” she teased.
A movement from the corner of her eye caught her attention. It was Tim’s father, and although his friendly, affable face had fooled the judges, had fooled Tim’s teachers, Devon wasn’t fooled.
She’d looked into his eyes and saw no soul. Nothing. Looking back at Tim, she leaned forward, said urgently, “Tim, listen to me. I think I understand—a lot better than you realize—what’s happening to you, why you’re so angry. But I can’t help you unless you tell me that you need my help. You don’t even have to say why . . . not right now. Just tell me, yes or no, whether you need my help.”
Curtis knocked on the glass. It was a polite, friendly tap, and when she glanced up, he gave her that affable smile and pointed at his watch. Slowly, she stood. Technically, their time was up. Tim only spent thirty minutes a week with her, and it had taken the past sixteen weeks to get him to open up this much. Moving around the table, she paused by Tim. “Tim?”
The door opened, and Curtis poked his head in. “Ms. Manning, I’m sorry to in
terrupt, but we’ve really got to get going. I’ve got a conference call this evening that I can’t miss. Come on, Tim.”
But Tim just continued to sit there. Devon watched as a change went over his body. He went from a sulky, broody teenager to a scared rabbit, all in the blink of an eye. There was a soft, almost soundless whisper. Kneeling beside him, she touched his hand. “Tim?”
“Come on, Tim.” Curtis’s voice was harder now, and Devon looked up. “We need to get going.” His eyes bored into hers, and she could feel the anger inside him, even though no sign of it showed on his face.
Dismissing him, she looked back at the boy. “Tim?”
He glanced at her. In that one brief glance, she saw a screaming, ugly hell, and that was all she needed. But he gave her more. In a low, desperate whisper, he pleaded, “Help.”
THANK God for U-Haul. Luke had spent half the day packing up clothes, the other half boxing up things like dishes, movies, and books. The clothes, he’d take with him. The other stuff, until he had a better idea on where he and Devon stood, would stay here.
His lease was up in another six weeks. He had every intention of figuring out who was trying to terrorize Devon before then. Luke didn’t know if he should renew his lease or not. Maybe he could sublet his place or something.
Of course, it might be wise to make sure Devon was okay with it. Might not be a bad idea to let Quinn know where to find him, though. His brother had a habit of dropping in with little or no warning. He needed to talk to him anyway. After that talk with Jeb a few days earlier, he’d been worrying about his brother, but concern for Devon had pretty much dominated his thoughts.
Right now, though, she was safe at work. Which meant he could focus on Quinn for a few minutes. He grabbed his phone with a smirk. “Like a few minutes would ever be enough to worry about him.”
Quinn answered with his characteristic abruptness. “I was just getting ready to call you. Heading your way. Can I crash with you?”
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