by Cameron Dane
Devlin shifted to his side and looked up at Garrick. “That’s why you were so frantic that first time we were together.” Understanding lit his pale eyes. “You weren’t able to be with a man while you were undercover.”
“No, I wasn’t.” Garrick grimaced, and automatically rubbed a protective hand over his balls. “You are not gay in a biker club, open or otherwise. Not unless you want to get killed.”
“So the tattoos and the shaved head and the extra muscle mass were all part of the undercover work?”
“Yeah.”
A furrow pulled between Devlin’s brows. “But those tattoos were real. I licked them; I took showers with you.” He reached up and ran his fingers down the side of Garrick’s face to his shoulder. “And now I don’t see or feel a trace of them on you anywhere.”
“The CBI tapped the assistance of some scientists and doctors who are experimenting with new tattoo ink technology,” Garrick explained. “They were real tattoos. Before I agreed to have them put on, I talked to the creators, and they believed that I would have success in fully removing them with lasers once the gig was finished. It wasn’t one hundred percent guaranteed--they’d never done anything that big--but I felt good enough about the data they showed me to risk it.”
“Wow.” Devlin sat up next to Garrick. He studied the invisible line the previously tattooed side of Garrick’s body had taken, and he trailed his fingers right behind. “You put a lot of faith in them. You could have easily ended up living with that ink for the rest of your life.”
“It was worth it.” Images of missing children assaulted Garrick’s mind’s eye and brought up a growl. “The CBI hadn’t had any success getting an agent into this club and keeping him or her there for any length of time. Then they came across me--a hotshot all high on some success I had working an undercover operation as part of my job with the San Diego police department. I already knew cars and bikes inside and out from being half raised by my Uncle Chris, and that was a good way for me to nudge my way into the club. The CBI thought I was a good combination of raw and focused and could get the job done for them. They couldn’t afford to have another failure, and we all agreed to go balls-to-the-wall to make it a success.”
Devlin met Garrick’s gaze again, while his fingers traced an exact pattern the tattoo artists had put on Gradyn all those years ago. “Still...”
“This club was running some nasty shit.” Heat burned straight through Garrick as he remembered, and his hands curled into bone-crushing tight fists at his sides. “Forget the drugs, chop shops, and weapons you would normally associate with organized illegal activity--although they did that too. These guys were going into Mexico and other Central and South American countries and working as coyotes. They would take the money from desperate families and transport illegals over the border, only to kill the adults and sell the young ones. They made money off them twice, first from the families for entry into the US, and then trafficking the children into brothels here in the United States and Canada as well as other parts of the world.”
The color fled from Devlin’s face. “Shit.”
“Yeah. You don’t say no to that, and you don’t refuse any weapon that might sell your character and help get you inside the club. The tattoos were part of that weaponry.” Garrick’s lips twisted into a frown. “I hate that word ‘club.’ Makes it seem like a weekend social where you discuss your favorite books or movies rather than an organization neck-deep in illegal activities. Anyway, that’s why I agreed to the tattoos. I was willing to live with them forever, if I had to. I was already bulked up from the work I’d done on the San Diego job, and shaving my head wasn’t a big deal.” Garrick scratched his fingers through the overlong, dark stuff on his head now, and the reality of living with yet another new facade--this one for the rest of his life--settled an oppressive weight on his chest. He sought Devlin, met his gaze, and some of the tightness went away. “You got to see the outer shell of another person, but everything else I gave you that weekend, including my name, was the real me.”
“You must have succeeded in bringing down the biker club or I never would have met you in a gay bar that weekend.” Devlin’s voice was hushed. “Am I right?”
Garrick nodded. “We’d already busted the head guys. The CBI pulled me out so they could grumble about my ‘escaping’ arrest. They were busy rounding up the few remaining lieutenants when I got my weekend of freedom. I was prepared to have to go back undercover, or at the very least testify at trials but, in a race to save themselves, these guys turned on each other faster than I’ve ever seen.” A dry laugh escaped Garrick. “The CBI had one hell of a closer, and when the biker club lieutenants found out the death penalty was on the table, they tripped over themselves trying to be the one making a deal to stay off death row.” Garrick clenched his teeth so hard he could hear his jaw clicking. “Thinking about those kids, and the horror these monsters sold them into, made everyone involved real motivated to do their jobs. I didn’t have to do anything other than make my statement and sign off on the record of my time inside the club.” With an audible exhale, Garrick then rolled his eyes heavenward. “Then, the FBI came knocking on my door, and I was primed and ready for plucking.”
Devlin’s brows pulled inward, and he cocked his head to the side. “What does that mean?”
“They tapped me to work a tight-knit family organization out of Indianapolis, believe it or not.” Garrick nodded at Devlin’s comic disbelief. “Yeah, I swear. Close-knit clan of Irish descent, which because of my own heritage--my mother and uncle being very proud Irish folk--I also knew something about. The FBI had a man and a woman inside, but they weren’t sure the guy would make it the duration without breaking. They gave me the laundry list of illegal shit these people were involved in, and as I’m reading it, there’s a healthy amount of my ego being stroked that the fucking FBI want me to be the one inside on their behalf.”
Garrick owned his youthful conceit, along with a healthy bit of cynicism for the government officials who could spot the mix of intelligence and brash ego in its recruits and use it to their advantage. “There is an incredible adrenaline high that comes from taking down the bad guys, and when you’re in your twenties, like I was at the time, feeling invincible and important, and you’ve had success, you think you’ve got the world by the tail, and you’re David defeating Goliath. You don’t say no. Hell, you don’t want to say no.” Garrick reached up and brushed his thumb across the fullness of Devlin’s lush mouth. “Even if you’ve just met the most amazing guy and think you might be half in love with him.”
“That’s why you broke up with me,” Devlin murmured, his body going still. “Because you went undercover again.”
Garrick flattened his lips into a hard line, but forced out a nod. “It wouldn’t have been fair to ask you to remain faithful to me. I knew I could have no contact with anyone from my real life once I went undercover again. I couldn’t say ‘Devlin, I won’t be able to see or talk to you for anywhere from a two to five year period, and by the way, that’s only if I don’t die during that time and you simply never hear from me again.’ I couldn’t do that. You were a young man just getting the feel for your sexuality. It wouldn’t have been right to put you in a place of limbo.
“I should have ended our relationship right away,” Garrick said, his throat tightening with regret and loss, “but you were this wonderful truth in a new sea of lies I was about to dive into, and I couldn’t make myself cut off the contact with you. For that six months we were together long distance, I was having the tattoos removed and the FBI was also drilling information about this new organization into my head. Almost every second of that six months, I was learning to live in the skin of the new character I was about to play.”
Garrick suddenly surged upright and sank his hand into Devlin’s hair to pull him close. Clinging to the fact that Devlin hadn’t walked away yet, Garrick scraped his mouth across Devlin’s and drowned himself in the honesty and openness in his eyes. “And each day, i
n secret, I ached for that time we would talk on the phone or when I’d check my e-mail to find something from you. I craved every moment I had with you. But at the same time, each day, I hated myself more and more because I knew what we had couldn’t go on. I would have to break things off with you.” Garrick swallowed the bile wanting to rise inside him. “And I’d have to make it something so shitty you wouldn’t want a damned thing to do with me ever again.”
Devlin withdrew. He untangled Garrick’s hand from his hair but kept their fingers connected against his thigh. “I could feel you pulling away toward the end,” he said, his voice scratchy. “I knew something was wrong. You seemed less and less open, less and less like the person I thought I knew. Then when you told me you were getting back together with a girlfriend and getting married, it all fell into place for me. It made sense.” He looked at their linked hands, and his mouth pulled down at the edges. “Even though I couldn’t picture that self-assured man I knew in San Francisco as a person conflicted about his sexuality, I still believed what you said in that final e-mail. During our time in San Francisco, I never once thought you were deceiving me, yet the second I felt that blow of rejection,” he snapped his fingers, “I discounted everything I believed in my gut and accepted that you were dumping me for a woman.”
Garrick’s gut twisted with nausea. “Hey,” he lifted Devlin’s face and tried to wipe away the harsh lines around his mouth, “you don’t have any reason to feel bad about yourself. You were supposed to believe me. The e-mail was supposed to hurt you and make you angry and make you hate me. It had to. I couldn’t tell you the truth. It’s forbidden. Anything less than you despising me and thinking me the worst kind of coward and liar might have left you with some hope. That would have been worse, at least to me. I didn’t want you thinking ‘what-if’ forever.” Garrick wiped at what he thought might be a tear forming in the corner of Devlin’s eye. “Okay?”
Devlin swiped at Garrick’s arm. Then, with a surprising burst of strength, he shoved Garrick onto his back. He grabbed one of Garrick’s wrists, pinned it to the mattress, and planted his other hand on Garrick’s chest as he crawled on top of him and straddled his waist. Garrick yelped and put up a struggle ... just not much of one. He loved being under Devlin too much to risk actually shoving him off, and his chest swelled with too much love at the laughter he saw lighting Devlin’s pale gaze.
With his thighs squeezing against Garrick’s hips, Devlin looked down with a smile that went all the way up into his eyes. “Ego much, mister?” he asked. “Who says I would have pined for you forever?”
Garrick’s heart beat a furious rhythm under Devlin’s palm, but he didn’t break away from Devlin’s stare. “I already knew I would for you. Maybe I was projecting a hope that you felt the same.” Not an ounce of humor colored his voice.
The twinkle in Devlin’s eyes dimmed. “I did feel the same,” he said, his voice rough again. “That’s why it hurt so much. I hated that my instincts could have been so wrong. I didn’t trust myself for a long time after you.”
Pressure bore down on Garrick’s heart, and he almost couldn’t breathe through the pain. “I am so sorry about that. Not sorry I did it--I had to--but I hated causing you pain.” He reached up and cupped Devlin’s smooth jaw. “My instinct to push you away was right. I was undercover in that job for over four years, and it did almost get me killed.” The memory of the moon reflecting off the barrel of a gun flashed before Garrick’s eyes, and he used his other hand to rub his chest. “Twice.”
Devlin pressed a kiss to the center of Garrick’s palm. “I read Gradyn Connell’s obituary online the other day.” He dropped down on his side beside Garrick and curled his hand under his head. “What happened?”
Garrick wiped a hand over his mouth. Christ, this part still pumped insane amounts of adrenaline through his system ... and then ripped his heart right out of his chest. He turned on his side too, facing Devlin. “I made it inside the new organization. I met up with the other agent and together we climbed our way up to the second-in-command’s inner circle. We were so fucking close; I could taste the leader’s trust. I knew we were going to bring them down.” Garrick bit back a snarl and a howl of renewed rage. “Then one day I get a text. Two words: Breach. Run. Clarissa--she was my partner--got the same message. We got the hell out of there just as the whole operation imploded. Four years of work gone. She went one way and I went another in order to make ourselves more difficult to track. It took me a week to get back to my FBI handler, but I made it. Turned out the organization had obtained classified information about Clarissa and me and put hits out on both of us. That was when Gradyn Connell had to die.” Garrick’s chest constricted anew with the loss. “It was the only way to protect my mother, sister, and uncle.”
Devlin gasped, and his eyes grew wide. “They really believe you died in a car accident?”
“They have to.” It still rubbed Garrick’s throat raw to think about his family, let alone speak of them. “It’s the only way.”
“God, Denny.”
Garrick slapped his hand over Devlin’s lips in a snap. “It’s Garrick. You can never call me Denny again. If you call me that in private it increases the risk of you slipping up and saying it in public.”
Devlin pried Garrick’s fingers off his mouth. “You’re right. I apologize.” He offered a sweet smile. “Garrick.”
Grinning back, Garrick leaned in and pecked a quick kiss to Devlin’s upturned lips. “Thank you.”
Devlin snuggled back into the pillow, his hands tucked under his cheek. “So how did you end up in Redemption? Are you in witness protection?”
“No.” Garrick chuckled, but it sounded brittle to his ears. “Witness protection couldn’t protect me. The FBI set me up with a new identity in a home fifty miles north of DC. It lasted about two weeks.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed a lump in his throat.
You have to tell him everything, man.
Feeling as if he might throw up, Garrick said, “Thirty-nine days ago a man broke into that house and tried to kill me.”
The blood flooded from Devlin’s face again. He grabbed Garrick and pulled him into a suffocating hold as he whispered, “Shit.”
Garrick clung too, needing this warm body, desperate for someone to know everything and care. “I wasn’t sleeping.” He rasped the words out deliberately, one at a time. “Hadn’t done much of that in years; it was hard to break the cycle. The intruder was good, but I heard him breaking in, and I was ready. We fought. The element of surprise allowed me to kick his gun away, but like I said, he was good, and we tussled around for a long while.” Garrick’s body tensed, as if ready to do battle right now. “Until I finally dropped him and sliced his neck clean through with a steak knife. I killed him, Devlin.” Garrick pulled back. He needed to see Devlin’s eyes--study him--while he told the rest. “I don’t know if I had to, but it doesn’t matter because from the second he broke into my house, before I was even certain he was a hired killer, I knew it would be him or me, and it wasn’t going to be me.”
Every line of Devlin’s face and body remained loose and open, while Garrick was just the opposite.
“Hey,” Devlin caressed Garrick’s cheek with his knuckles, “it was reasonable to assume someone breaking into your house, whom you quickly assessed had a weapon, was connected to your undercover work and there to murder you.”
Jesus Jesus Jesus. He doesn’t understand.
“You have to listen to me.” Garrick grabbed Devlin’s shoulder and shook him. “I didn’t know it was an assassin when I first heard the noise.” Stirred up fears and old emotions seized Garrick’s insides and cramped his belly. “It could have been a kid breaking in on a dare. It didn’t matter to me. I’m so dialed into paranoia from living undercover for so long that I think every noise I hear or every stranger who looks out of place is someone watching me while thinking about how to kill me. In DC, I had already decided to take the intruder out, no matter what. It could have been a completely rand
om stranger not out to harm me at all, for all I knew. Shit,” Garrick’s chest heaved and his voice broke, “if it had somehow been you, I wouldn’t have stopped to look before I gutted you open and let you bleed out on my floor.”
Devlin’s eyes welled up with wetness. He grabbed Garrick into the circle of his arms and held him close. “Baby, you don’t know that.” He rocked Garrick against the solid frame of his body. “You can’t say for certain how you would have responded if it hadn’t become a life or death situation.”
Garrick buried his face in the crook of Devlin’s neck and clung to him with every ounce of his strength. “I don’t know.” Uncertainty--about everything--lived inside Garrick all the time now. “I can still remember how I felt that night. Primal. Like an animal protecting its cub, only I didn’t have a baby anywhere; it was just me.”
Big hands rubbed up and down Garrick’s back, soothing the stirred demons within. Devlin waited, as if sensing when Garrick had settled. He then withdrew, took Garrick’s face in his hands, and held Garrick’s attention with his piercing, pale stare. “It’s called survival instinct.” Devlin’s tone brooked no room for argument. “You’ve worked law enforcement so I know you understand it. It’s pretty powerful stuff. I’ve smelled a whiff of it once or twice during tight spots inside a burning building.”
Devlin’s eyes softened; he brushed the pads of his thumbs back and forth across Garrick’s cheeks--so fucking loving--and Garrick’s breath caught as he fell under Devlin’s spell.
“I understand that it’s going to take some time for you to get your perspective back and to live every day without believing someone is out there trying to kill you,” Devlin went on. “But know this: You are not a murderer. You did what was necessary in order to survive. That is all. Nothing more. Nothing less. Those are the facts. And that is what I believe. Okay?”
