Sinfully Sweet

Sloss took out a cell phone and had a brief conversation. Devlin knew what the command from their greedy boss, Boris Cheney aka Fat Man, would be: get the ruby back from Devlin by any means necessary. Sloss was the man for the job. Even the most drastic method wouldn’t cost him a wink of sleep, though he didn’t look happy about the long night ahead as he flipped up his phone. He and Bonny waited for a delivery van to go by, spraying rainwater from its wheels, before stepping off the curb. Sloss stopped to fish something out of the gutter, but Devlin couldn’t see what had interested him. Bonny had already sprinted across the street and was buzzing apartments on the other side, trying to get into another building. That was good. They hadn’t pinpointed his location.

Devlin watched until they disappeared inside. There was always some idiot occupant who’d let a stranger in just to stop the buzzer noise from disturbing their TV program.

He turned. Mackenzie was there, waiting, curled up in a big, plush armchair. She’d wrapped her arms around herself to contain her shivering. Cursing the unexpected tenderness she made him feel even now, he took a blanket off the back of the couch and draped it over her.

The room was filled with shadows, but his eyes were accustomed to the dark and he was able to examine her furnishings. Matching decor, flower arrangements, family photos in silver frames. It was exactly the kind of place he’d expected Mackenzie to live in—aside from the lack of smiling hubby and two cherubic children.

He squinted at her. “Thanks for not turning on the lights.”

She shrugged.

He sat. No use waiting for an invitation anymore.

Mackenzie was silent. Although she’d calmed down as he’d known she would, she still didn’t look particularly accepting of his story. Smart girl.

She put a hand to her hair, restlessly fingering the short strands. He couldn’t get used to Mackenzie Bliss with short hair. She’d always had a long, luxuriant mane, the color of sable. Sometimes, back in high school, he’d caught himself wondering how her hair would feel, brushing over his bare chest. And how Mackenzie would feel naked, so soft and warm and curvy no pillows would be necessary if they spent the night together.

She opened her mouth. “I still want to know why you kissed me.”

“It was an impulse.”

Her eyes glinted like steel. That was new. “No, it wasn’t. You had a purpose.”

“You’re right.” She was much sharper than the dreamy girl he remembered. “I needed to convince you.”

“And you thought kissing me was the way to do it?” She tried to sound insulted, but the quaver in her voice betrayed her. “Do I look that des—that stupid?”

“Not stupid,” he said. And not desperate, either.

“Then what?” she snapped.

He gave her a cocky, I-know-you-think-I’m-sexy grin. “Susceptible.”

She clamped her lips shut and let a silence well between them, a silence filled with their mutual knowledge that she’d had a crush on him all through high school and that he’d known it and used her devotion to his advantage whenever it suited him. He hadn’t been cruel or thoughtless with her feelings. But he had taken her for granted, letting her do the homework he’d neglected, relying on her cram sessions to get him through exams, allowing her to cover for him when there’d been a school vandalism investigation. Back then, the one constant in his life was that she’d always been there, ready and eager to help, gazing adoringly up at him through her big dark eyes. She’d made him feel valuable, important. The buddies who’d believed they were so tough had mocked her as Little Miss Priss and urged Devlin to get into her pants already, but he’d actually liked and respected Mackenzie. She was a nice girl. He’d kept his hands off her because he knew she “loved” him and there was no way he was getting involved in heavy shit like that.

A good plan, even now. No doubt her crush was long over, but he was betting that she had remained the type of girl who took sex and relationships seriously. He never had and never could, as long as he continued in his present circumstances.

“Susceptible,” she repeated scornfully. “You have got to be kidding. High school was ten years ago. I’m not the innocent, gullible schoolgirl I was then.”

But she had covered for him. He wondered why.

Not because of the kiss. It had been even more fierce than he’d intended. Once he’d felt her mouth under his, sensation had taken over. Yes, his intentions had been manipulative and crude. But the emotion that had resulted was unexpected.

Blame it on auld lang syne. High-school reunion. Lost youth. A handy excuse, said the distant, stubborn, ethical part of him that refused to die.

“So then why don’t you call the cops,” he said, getting an idea.

Her head jerked up. “What?”

“Tell them there are two suspicious men prowling the area. You don’t have to leave your name.”

“But…” She blinked a couple of times, scowling deeply as the various scenarios hit home. He could tell when she figured it out. She inhaled with amazement, her mouth dropping open. “Those men aren’t the police.”

He ticked a finger at her.

“Who are they?”

Sloss and Bonny were in charge of a ring of thieves and petty criminals who fenced their goods at Cheney’s pawnshops. Devlin was supposedly one of their minions. For now Mackenzie would have to believe that.

“You don’t want to know.” He cut her off when she started to protest. “Trust me, the less I tell you, the better.”

“God, Devlin. What are you involved in?”

He shifted, becoming more and more aware of that uneasy, niggling voice inside him. Enough common decency was buried somewhere in there that he knew he shouldn’t be using Mackenzie this way. His being in her neighborhood wasn’t as complete a coincidence as he wanted her to believe. Ever since he’d seen the reunion invitation and class roster a month ago, he’d been thinking about her. Curiosity, he’d told himself, and nothing more. No way was he planning to come near her—that was too dangerous for both of them.

Yet here he was.

The irony was not delicious.

“I know, I know,” she said. “If you tell me, you have to kill me.” She laughed with a hollow sarcasm.

“That’s not even funny.”

Her face fell. She nipped at her bottom lip, then winced when that hurt. “Why do you want me to call the cops? I would think you wouldn’t want them anywhere near here.”

“They’ll do at least a drive-by and Sloss—” He tilted his head toward the street. “Those two will leave. Then I can leave.” He paused. “That’s what you want, right?”

“Yes, of course. But I don’t want you to get killed, either.”

“I’ll go out the back.”

“There’s not much cover back there. What if they’re waiting for you?”

Devlin had thought of that. Sloss was a bulldog—slow, thorough and unrelenting. He’d nose into every building and sniff out every avenue of escape before he was satisfied that Devlin had given them the slip. Even police intervention wouldn’t keep Sloss out of the way for long.

“Are you arguing for me to stay?”

Mackenzie looped the blanket over her shoulders, shawl-style. Her hair had dried into spikes and her nylons bagged at her knees and ankles. She looked like a punk grandma. “I guess you can sleep on the couch.”

“Thanks.” He let out a soft groan as he settled back. His ribs ached fiercely from Bonaventure’s vicious kicks. Judging by the stickiness where his shirt was plastered to his skin, the nasty thug had managed to draw blood, as well. After Bonny had caught Devlin supposedly stealing from the latest haul, he’d called in Sloss and they’d taken him to a waterfront warehouse and alternated between questioning and beating him. He hadn’t given up a single incriminating detail. After three months on this job, there was no way in hell he’d be made by two small-time crooks.

Mackenzie sat forward, rocking nervously. “Okay. I’ll make the call, if you think that will scare them off. But first you have to tell me the truth. How did you land on my doorstep? Were you waiting for me to come home?”

“No. This isn’t a social call, Mackenzie. I swear I wouldn’t be here if those two thugs hadn’t been breathing down my neck. I never meant to endanger you.”

“Yet you were ‘in the neighborhood.’ You knew my address.”

“I explained that. It was coincidence.” A slight exaggeration. He’d thought he’d lost Sloss and Bonny the first time, after he’d worked free of the ropes and slipped out of the warehouse while they argued over what to do with him. Getting out of their neighborhood had seemed like a good idea—until he realized that he had no money, no weapon, no ID and nowhere to go. It wasn’t as though he could walk into a pawn shop and cash out the ruby he’d managed to squirrel away.