The walls were closing in on me and there was nowhere to run.
I faced Baron. “What do you have on me?”
He crossed his arms, a smug smile on his face. “Come to the station and Roy can let you know.”
“Baron—” Rena started, as if she could talk me out of trouble.
“He’s got nothing on you, Dev, because there’s nothing to have.” Sonny gestured to a group of chairs on the other side of the waiting room. “Maybe we could get away from this nice lady,” he tipped his head to the nurse, “and talk elsewhere.”
Tasha joined our little group. Good. Rena had someone here for her.
“Can you give her a ride home?” I asked Tasha.
“No!” Rena’s eyebrows slammed down, her mouth dropping open. I hated to do it, but it’s what needed to be done.
“Yes.” I put my palm on her jaw. “I need to distance myself from you.”
“No.” Her fragile voice cut into me like a shard of glass.
“It’s for the best, Rena,” Baron chimed in.
I turned on him and got close. “Stay away from her.”
He reached for his belt and the variety of weapons hanging there. “That a threat?”
“Nope.” Our stare-down lasted only a few seconds. Baron blinked first, then without looking back, I walked away.
I heard Rena call my name and fought every instinct to turn around. To take her with me.
I stepped inside the elevator and kept my eyes on my shoes. As the doors began to close I heard Tasha say, “Let him go.”
Right then, I became a big Tasha fan.
Chapter 18
Rena
Oak & Sage was swamped with diners. Melinda hadn’t shown up for her shift tonight, leaving me with two extra tables on the other side of the restaurant. So much for pocketing extra tips. I’d been spread so thin, I would be lucky to get ten percent instead of the minimum fifteen or the good-natured twenty.
Devlin, his bruises faded to almost invisible, was dressed in a dark suit and blue tie and worked the front of the house. This was the first night I’d seen him since he abandoned me at the hospital the day he found out Baron and Sonny were working together to bring down Ridgeway’s “big bad” bookie.
Devlin’s eyes focused everywhere but on me since I clocked in. I began to wonder if he’d ever speak to me again. My texts went unanswered, and he refused to talk to me, and since I had a scrap of pride left, I decided not to text or try to talk to him again. And I sure wasn’t going to show up at his apartment.
Tasha and I had hung out almost exclusively for the last three days. Tony dumped her when he found out she was hanging around the hospital “for another dude,” and honestly, I’d never seen her so angry at him. I half thought they might never get together again.
That was the silver lining of this mess, I supposed.
The hours passed in a blur, me rushing around, and Devlin rushing around, and him avoiding me as much as I avoided him. Just as I was cashing out my tables—two at the same time, as fate would have it—a new server named Veronica burst into the kitchen. “You guys! The cops are here!”
Murmuring voices lifted on the air a split second before every server in the kitchen ran for the front. I waited for my credit card receipt to print—which seemed to take an eternity—dropped it off at table 9, and cut across the bar to find Roy and Baron talking to Devlin.
Roy stood, his back straight, his mustache-blanketed lip unsmiling. He held up a hand to silence Baron right when I crept closer to see what I could hear. Roy’s deep voice carried.
“…appreciate any information you could give us.”
Devlin crossed his arms. “I’m running a restaurant. Eat or leave.”
My heart hit my shoes. Surely Roy hadn’t come to arrest Devlin. I walked past the hostess station and stood next to him. “What’s going on?”
Devlin glared down at me, a minor improvement from his ignoring me completely. Baron took a step closer to me, but Devlin turned his glare on Baron, unfolded his arms, and wrapped one hand around my apron. A second later he tugged me so I was flush against him. They had a staring contest while I stayed still, ignoring every temptation to wrap my arms around Devlin. It felt good to be close to him. To be touched by him. I’d missed him.
Roy raised a palm. “Okay. Officer Monroe, I’ll meet you in the car,” he told Baron. I could see Baron wanted to argue but didn’t. Smart.
Devlin let go of my apron. “Get back to work,” he commanded, but his eyes were asking. Stubbornly, I didn’t move.
Roy’s eyes went to Devlin. “Nothin’ from you, huh?”
Devlin shook his head.
“And her?” Roy pointed to me.
I frowned. I didn’t like being referred to as a “her” by the man who would likely someday be my stepfather.
“I don’t want Officer Monroe anywhere near her.” Devlin curled his lip.
“I can help that along if you do one thing.” One of Roy’s thick eyebrows lifted.
“I’m not a rat,” Devlin said.
“Not that.” Roy’s voice was a low warning. “I want you to leave her be.”
I tried to argue with a muted “Roy!” but Devlin interrupted.
“You got it.”
I tore my eyes from Roy’s face to see Devlin, his cold gaze locked on mine.
“You’re fired, Lewis,” he said. “Cash your bank out with Chet and leave.”
My mouth dropped open as my heart tore in half.
“Officer.” Devlin nodded at Roy, then walked away.
Through the fuzzy veil that was my brain, I heard him ask Veronica to take my tables. Chet approached and took my apron. Roy offered to follow me back and wait while I cashed out. I did, unfeeling from head to toe, and a little afraid of what I’d feel when the adrenaline wore off. I was out of a job, out of a boyfriend.
Devlin had dumped me like I was nothing. Then again, he had dumped me long before Roy made his request to “leave me be.” We really were over.
Roy put my coat over my shoulders and walked me out the back door. Baron was waiting in the cop car. Roy must have radioed him to pull around while I was waiting on Chet to cash me out.
I balanced. I made forty-eight dollars. The last forty-eight dollars I’d ever make at Oak & Sage because I was fired.
Fired. I felt betrayed on top of everything else.
“Keys,” Roy said, and his hand appeared in front of me.
I fished my keys from my coat pocket and dropped them into his callused palm. His fingers closed around them.
To Baron, he said, “I’m driving Rena home. Follow us.”
“I can drive her,” Baron offered.
Proving he was good to his word, Roy said, “No, you can’t.”
Roy drove me home, Baron followed, and once I was ensconced in my apartment they left.
And me? I watched the headlights vanish on the road, and then I started to cry.
At one point I thought I’d never stop.
—
My mother’s tinkling laughter cut into the staring contest I’d been having with the saltshaker for…I don’t even know how long.
“Strawberry rhubarb. This time from the store.” She looked over at me, as did Roy, and cleared her throat. “Honey? Why don’t you eat something? You look pale.”
I was pale. Pale and more heartsick than I’d known possible.
“I’m fine.” My voice was low and flat, not a single peak or valley. My peaks and valleys had gone away when Devlin went away. Not that he’d “gone away.” Technically, he was right down the road, working at Oak & Sage. I hadn’t been back. Where I’d once been under Devlin’s intense blue stare, now I couldn’t take his ambivalence. I’d once feared he’d become my power source, and what might happen to me if he unplugged. Now that fear had been realized. He unplugged and I collapsed in on myself like a robot without a battery pack.
“Honey?” Mom’s insistent voice beckoned.
I turned my sullen gaze to her. “I
came over tonight for one reason.” I pegged Roy with an unforgiving stare.
“An update,” he guessed. He swiped his mustache with a napkin, the scraping sound giving me chills.
Out of my peripheral vision, I saw my mother clasp her hands together. I could read her thoughts like closed captioning: I can’t believe my daughter dated a criminal!
“Devlin’s safe,” Roy said. “Sonny fell on the grenade, and Devlin isn’t someone we’re interested in pursuing.”
Devlin was safe. I tried not to react, but relief flooded my limbs. “And Tex?”
“Split,” Roy answered. “He’s on the run.” He ate another huge bite of pie. “We’ll get ’im. Paired up with authorities in the tri-state area. We got eyes everywhere.”
“And Sonny?” I was curious about the man who had given Devlin so much.
“Honey,” my mom repeated, “none of this matters.” She gave me a hopeful smile. “You can return to your normal life now and get away from all of this.”
“I love him,” I choked out, a sob catching in my throat.
My mother’s face went winter white. “Sonny?”
“Devlin, baby,” Roy placed a rugged, wide palm over her arm, comforting her.
Hearing Devlin’s name, and the nickname “baby” even though it’d come from Roy and was said to my mother, was like taking a knife to the heart. I wondered if I’d ever not miss him. Maybe. I got through losing Joshua. Only Devlin wasn’t dead. Devlin was just…gone.
So if Sonny was detained, Tex in the wind, and Devlin was safe, why hadn’t he called? Why did he continue to push me away?
I stood up from the table.
“Where are you going?” Mom asked.
“Home,” I lied.
“Baron’s got guys watching Oak & Sage.”
I turned to Roy, my eyes wide. “What for?”
“Devlin’s request. To make sure you stay away,” Roy answered. “If he wants you, he’ll contact you.” His bushy eyebrows pulled into a sympathetic arch. “Let it go, darlin’.”
Devlin didn’t want me anywhere near him. Even though I felt as though my knees might buckle, I locked them and remained standing. I refused to cry any more than I had already. Even the memory of losing Joshua paled in the face of the grief I felt now.
It was still too fresh—no scar covering the wound. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
“Honey, sit down.” My mom was trying really hard to comfort me. I didn’t want to be comforted.
“I’m going home.” This time it was the truth. I wasn’t going to go near Devlin Calvary. He’d made it clear in every way he didn’t want me. Not any more.
“That’s a good move,” Roy agreed.
“Take some pie with you, dear.”
Since I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, and since the pie was store-bought, I agreed.
Chapter 19
Rena
I strode into Sarafina’s for a job interview, feeling like a traitor to Lyle Mullins, owner of Craft Palace before it closed. Then I saw him behind one of the registers and I didn’t feel so bad. His normally cheery smile was affixed to his face as he happily informed a customer about the return policy. I guess we’d all climbed into bed with our former competitor.
I passed racks of colorful paper, markers, and rubber stamps, but they all looked muted and dull. The cloud of depression hanging over me had skewed my view of life. Like I’d slipped into the same emo world I’d lived in as a prepubescent. All I was missing was a thick mar of eyeliner and dyed black hair.
“Rena,” came an insistent voice to my right. Tasha waved from a display of storage boxes. “I’ve said your name like five times.” She gestured to the stacks of pink, black, and turquoise patterned boxes and matching flowers and knickknacks interspersed between. “What do you think?”
“Nice.”
She dropped her jazz hands and sighed. I couldn’t hide my depression from my best friend, so I hadn’t tried. “It’s been a month, Rena.”
Four weeks since Devlin fired me and promised never to see me again. Four weeks. Four weeks of sadness, doubt, loss, and sleeping alone. I’d slept next to him twice. Twice was enough to make my body crave it more.
“Do you think he meant it?” I asked Tasha.
“Not this again.”
She’d been around for these past four weeks. She’d gotten used to my glass-eyed stare, my endless stream of “Why me?” consciousness. I couldn’t believe she hadn’t abandoned me for another friend who wasn’t as much of a downer.
“Come on, Reen, you can’t keep doing this to yourself.”
“Let me ask. One more time.”
“Fine. Ask.” She lifted and dropped her arms. “My answer will be the same as the last ten times you asked me this.”
I took a breath, and asked. I just needed to hear her affirmation one more time. “Do you think Devlin will stay away for good?” Every sign in the universe read yes. But still I hoped.
“No. I don’t think he meant it,” Tasha said. Relief flooded my body, tingling out to my fingers and toes. “I think he was angry. I think he wanted to spare you any more pain. Preserve your chastity or something.” She frowned. “Even though I’m sure there’s no getting it back after all you did together.”
“Tasha,” I begged. Thinking of sex with Devlin made my heart feel like it was chipping apart, the pieces blowing away in the wind.
“I’m jealous.” She held up her hands. “Sincerely. I’d love to have had the kind of connection you had, even if I lost it.”
I gave her a wounded look.
“Temporarily. He won’t stay away,” she reassured me.
“I wonder how he is.” I was the one having trouble staying away. I caved and went to his apartment last week. I found the door open and an old white-haired guy inside painting. When he noticed me in the doorway, he said, “Moved out.”
“I have no idea where he lives,” I told Tash.
She chewed her on her cheek. “I do.”
My eyes widened.
“Cade ran off his third physical therapist. Paul asked my dad if I could fill in. As a favor.”
Paul had saved Tasha’s father from a tax-evasion lawsuit a few years back, but I wondered what this had to do with Devlin.
“How’s that going?” I asked instead.
She shrugged. “I’ve only worked with him twice.”
“I thought you two hated each other.”
“It’s just a job, Reen,” she said a tad defensively, followed by, “He’s living with Paul.”
“Cade?”
“Yes. Also Devlin.”
My heart bungeed to my stomach and sprang back to my throat. “Devlin lives with Paul?”
“Yep.”
“How’s Cade doing?”
Tasha erased the gap between us and trained her big blue eyes on me. “That’s not the question you want to ask.”
“Has Cade spoken yet?” I pressed, so not ready to discuss Devlin.
“Not a word to me. He writes everything down. Or points.”
My mind spun. Devlin and Cade living together. There wasn’t a lot of love lost between those two. I couldn’t picture it. “Paul must have to keep them on opposite sides of the house.”
“They’re good, actually.”
My heart leapt again. I missed Devlin. So, so much. I wondered if he missed me.
“Devlin mentioned you.”
And I was going to throw up.
“Said your name,” Tasha said gently.
“What did he say, word for word?”
She looked worried. “Word for word?”
“Word for word,” I repeated. Tasha had a bad habit of embellishing. Under my scrutiny, she knew better than to lie.
“He said, ‘Is that Rena’s car?’ ”
She borrowed my vehicle the other day and, apparently, drove it to Paul’s house. “So he didn’t ask about me.” Hiding my disappointment proved impossible.
“Not exactly, but he didn’t say your name like he hated you.�
��
I rubbed my eyebrow with my fingers, feeling a headache coming on. “Let’s go talk to your manager and get me this job.” That’s why I was here, I reminded myself. Gainful employment. My mother paid my rent for the month. I appreciated her help, but it wasn’t a favor I intended to ask for again.
“Are you excited?” Tash looped her arms around mine and dragged me toward the back of the store. Soon, her internship would start and she’d be working in her field. Her manager knew this and asked if she knew anyone who might fill her shoes. She did, as it turned out. I happened to fill Tasha’s shoes nicely.
“I just want to get this over with and get settled.” But I wouldn’t be settled. I was decidedly unsettled. Especially knowing that Devlin felt no different about me than he had the last time I’d seen him. He was marinating in ambivalence, and I couldn’t breathe without missing him.
I should take it as a sign. Give up and move on.
But could I?
Devlin
I picked up the tray from Cade’s unmade bed where he lounged. He ignored me, playing Call of Duty.
I put the tray down on his nightstand, sat on the corner of the bed, and watched the flashing screen for a minute. Then I said, “I did the right thing.”
He ignored me. Or pretended to, anyway.
“So if you ever decide to open your mouth when Tasha’s around, if you’d let her know that what I did, I did for Rena, I’d appreciate it.”
He grunted, out of disagreement, I figured, eyes on his game, face blank. Maybe it was a grunt of disinterest.
“She’s better off without me,” I said to the screen.
Another grunt, only this one sounded more agreeable. I hated when he was right.
“I didn’t know if I’d get sucked down into the Sonny Laurence cesspool at the time,” I continued, defending myself. But then, of course, I hadn’t gotten sucked in. I had avoided the swirling waters altogether. I’d gone to visit Sonny and he’d smiled and assured me he was good, that the sentence he was serving was a fraction of what he would be serving if he hadn’t given up Tex, and then he said he was proud of me for not ratting.
Fighting for Devlin (Lost Boys #1) Page 19
