Chapter 4
4
Devon
BEING THIS CLOSE to Janie was probably a bad idea. He’d always been careful to keep a safe distance between them—even while trying to look out for her. It was something she likely appreciated considering he wasn’t her favorite person. Unfortunately, it wasn't an option tonight. She’d made the stupid, stupid decision to mix pain meds and whiskey, and there was no way he was leaving her with Mariah.
Not that he didn’t trust Mariah, there was just no way she'd be able to handle Janie on her own. And he’d be damned if he was going to let one of the dumbass ranch hands packing The Watering Hole put his hands on her. Especially with the state she was in. He had to practically carry Janie out of the bar, her movements getting slower and less coordinated with each step.
Luckily, his cruiser was right outside the door, idling at the curb a few strides away. When they reached it, he supported her weight with one arm while opening the passenger’s door. As he angled her into the seat, Janie’s head fell back against the rest and she glared up at him as he buckled her in. “You piss me off all the time.” Her words were slow and a little slurred. They were also unsurprising.
“I know.” He tested the belt, making sure it was secure. “You drive me fucking crazy, so I’m gonna call us even.”
“Even?” She grabbed the front of his shirt when he tried to straighten, keeping their eyes level. “We’re not even close, buddy.” Her nose wrinkled, lip curling in what looked like disgust. “Ugh. Are you kidding me?” She released him, pushing at the center of his chest. “You shouldn’t smell so good. It’s annoying.” Her lips pressed into a frown. “Everything about you is annoying.”
He worked hard to smother out the smile trying to work across his lips. “At least I’m consistent.”
She rolled her eyes, but they only made it halfway across before her lids lowered and a long yawn dragged free. “Just take me home so I can get rid of you already.”
Since her eyes were closed, he set the amused expression he’d been fighting free, softly chuckling as he closed her in and rounded the front of his cruiser. He’d never met someone like Janie. A woman ready to go toe-to-toe with anyone, anytime, anywhere. She was fearless and full of fight.
She was also full of piss and vinegar, and most of it seemed to be directed at him. If he really wanted to dig into it, there were probably a couple good reasons that appealed to him, but it was yet anot her thing he didn’t have time for.
Blowing out a long sigh, Devon pulled away from the curb. The only light in town turned red right as he reached it, offering the opportunity to figure out where he was going. Turning to Janie, he found her slumped to one side, mouth hanging open, breaths slow with sleep.
“Janie.” He reached across the console to smooth back a wayward strand of dark, curly hair. “I need your address.”
She jolted when the tips of his fingers brushed against the soft skin of her cheek, her brows pinched together as she slowly blinked his direction. “I was sleeping.”
“I saw that.” He glanced around as the light turned green, making sure he wasn’t holding anyone else up, but the street behind him was empty. “But I need your address if you want me to take you home.”
“I don’t want you to take me home.” She smacked her lips and yawned again. “You just didn’t leave me any choice.”
“Do I need to remind you that you were falling over when I found you?” He gripped the wheel a little tighter thinking of what might have happened if he hadn’t found her. If he hadn’t decided to take a little stroll through The Watering Hole to make sure no one was giving Paige any problems.
“No. You don’t.” After crossing both arms over her chest she let out a long sigh. “Fine.” Janie rattled off an address, her eyes sliding his way as she spelled out the street name. “W-I-L-L-O-W-D-A-L-E.”
“Thank you.” He didn’t need to put it into the GPS. He knew exactly where they were headed. “You can go back to sleep now.”
“Whatever.” Janie’s head rolled away from him, turning to face the side window.
He chuckled, shaking his head. The woman acted like him helping her was the worst thing she could imagine. And that only made him want to help her more. Seek her out just to watch the way she scowled at him. The way she set her emotions free—good or bad—making how she felt blatantly obvious.
To be fair, his daughters frequently acted the same way—and he usually loved it just as much when they did it. He didn’t want them to spend their lives being somewhere they didn’t want to be because they didn’t know how to express their feelings.
That was likely another reason Janie’s forthright temperament appealed to him. If he were to suddenly find time to bring a woman into his life, it would take someone like Janie to hold her own with his three hormonal teenagers.
And while his interest in the crabby, tightly wound woman snoring beside him was undeniable, so was his demanding schedule. Between the extra hours he picked up to pay for things like braces and extracurriculars, taking care of the horses, chauffeuring Olivia and Gwen around when Riley was at school or work, and all the other time sucks that came with being a single parent, this could ne ver be more than it was.
It was nothing, and had to stay nothing.
So he kept his eyes on the road instead of where she sat beside him, even though the trip to Janie’s home was a path he knew by heart. He’d driven it countless times, and every turn took him both closer to their destination and back in time. To a part of his life he could only just now think of without feeling the stabbing pain of all he’d lost.
After pulling up to the trailer Janie called home, he sat for a few minutes, taking it in. The place looked exactly the same as it did the last time he was here. The pale blue exterior was spotless and the attached deck was swept clean. Even the narrow flower beds at the front were weed free and edged. It was almost like his mother-in-law had never left.
Janie started beside him, jolting upright with a sharp inhale. After a few hard blinks she seemed to notice where they were and reached for the door handle.
“Wait for me.” He automatically used his cop voice and it had her head whipping his way, eyes wide. And for once, she didn’t argue.
Maybe he should have brought that out earlier.
When he reached her door, Janie had a brow cocked at him and her eyes seemed a little clearer. Reaching one hand out, he waited as she stared at it, wondering if she would finally willingly accept the assistance he offered.
But in true Janie fashion, she lifted her chin, gripped the door frame and hoisted herself upright.
Almo st.
She barely had her legs under her when the effects of her cocktail of meds and alcohol tipped her sideways, sending her falling right into his ready arms. Her lean, tall body hit his as she let out a little squeak before going totally still.
Devon froze along with her. It had been years since he'd had a woman's body pressed against his, and the impact was a bigger blow than he'd been prepared for. He expected Janie to immediately pull away, and readied for the uncoordinated retreat it would no doubt be.
But she didn’t budge. Her body stayed stiff against his for a few heartbeats before beginning to relax bit by bit. Slowly, her rigid stance softened. The feel of her arms wrapping around his back was shocking, but only for a second. In the next, he was pulling her closer, dropping his nose to the top of her head and breathing deep against the thick pile of her curly hair. His eyes fell closed as he took another deep breath, inhaling the faintly floral scent as he soaked up the contact.
It'd been so fucking long since he'd been touched like this. Held. Embraced. His daughters dished out grudging squeezes here and there, but each came with an eye roll. He knew they loved him, but also remembered his own teenage years. Navigating the path from child to adult and all the ways it changed not only you, but also how you interacted with the people around you.
But even if his girls still snuggled up to him the way they did when they were little, it still wouldn't be the same as the kind of touch he was receiving now. There was nothing sexual or romantic about it, but it was still different. Still something he'd been working hard to pretend he didn't desperately crave.
And it was over too soon.
Janie wiggled free, her movements jerky since she still wasn't completely steady on her feet. He released her as much as he dared, keeping one hand on her arm as they silently moved up the wooden stairs toward her front door.
She unhooked her keys from the small cross body bag strapped over her chest, blinking hard as she fumbled through the assortment until she got to the one for her home. But, while she was sober enough to be able to identify the correct key, she wasn't quite capable of getting it into the lock.
Devon gently took the keychain from her hand, slipping the key into the deadbolt and twisting the lock open before turning the knob. He braced, expecting the familiar smell of White Diamonds to hit him. Instead, his lungs filled with a rich hit of rose and plum. It was deep and a little dark. A little wild. Acutely feminine.
“Come on.” He used his hold on Janie’s arm to angle her through the opening. “Let’s get you in bed.”
Janie took one step inside, then planted her feet with a firmness that caught him off-guard. “Take your shoes off.” She pointed down at his feet. “What kind of heathen are you?”
Heathen? For not taking his shoes off at the door?
Devon glanced around the dimly lit space, taking it all in under the moody glow from a lamp centered on a small table just inside the door. Th e trailer was tiny, only two small bedrooms with an eat-in kitchen and a living room that barely held a full-size sofa and a TV stand, but Janie had made the most of it. An overstuffed couch was fitted along the only windowless wall and an upholstered ottoman sat between it and a dresser that had been repurposed as an entertainment center. A giant arrangement of partially used candles on a wooden tray dominated the center of the ottoman. He could almost imagine how cozy the place felt when they were all lit.
Cozy and clean. The place was immaculate. Possibly even cleaner than when his mother-in-law lived there.
His eyes dropped to the laminate flooring she put in before moving to Florida. There wasn’t a speck of dust or dirt anywhere to be seen. It was exactly the type of floor people were referring to when they used the line, ‘so clean you could eat off it’.
Crouching down, he reached for the laces of his work boots, but had to pause midway to catch Janie as she started to tip again. After propping her up against the wall so she could kick away her pull-on Converse sneakers, he worked off his own shoes, catching her yet again as she started to sway.
“Careful.” He kept his grip gentle as she wobbled her way toward the bigger of the two bedrooms, and he let out a sigh of relief that she’d chosen the room Mags’s parents had used instead of the one where he’d lost his virginity over two decades ago.
“I’m being careful.” Janie leaned more heavily on him as she reached her room, barely making it to the bed before collapsing face first onto th e queen-sized mattress.
Like the main portion of the single-wide he’d been in countless times, this room was cozy and well-decorated. The bed took up a good amount of the square footage, but since it didn’t have a large frame, the area didn’t feel claustrophobic, even with a small dresser and a chair eating up more of the limited footprint. A thick comforter and mountainous pile of pillows added a softness the space didn’t have when his utilitarian mother-in-law had occupied it.
Like the living area, there were candles of different colors and scents arranged on every available surface, each in varying stages of use. The room was also just as immaculate. The area rug covering most of the laminate even had vacuum lines on it, as if Janie backed out of the room to ensure not a single footprint marred the plush surface. Nothing was out of place, including the carefully organized charging cords on her nightstand.
With one exception.
A large heating pad sat in the center of her bed, sticking out like a sore thumb among the artfully draped throw and perfectly positioned pillows.
He looked from Janie to it, then back to the woman sprawled across the comforter as he put together the pieces. Pain pills and a heating pad were a combination he was becoming quite familiar with.
Facing down the realities of menstruation had been trial by fire, and after a few years of tackling the discomforts and emotional roller coasters that came with it, he’d learned enough to ha ve a pretty good handle on navigating a safe course.
He’d also learned it was hard as hell to get bloodstains out of sheets, which was why he decided to risk waking the bear.
Moving to Janie’s side, he gently rolled her toward him. “Come on, sleepy pants. If you pass out now you’re going to be pissed in the morning.”
Janie groaned. “For the love of God, can’t you ever leave me alone?” She flung one arm over her face. “Why are you even still here?”
“I’m here because I have to make sure you’re safe to be on your own.” He hooked one arm behind her knees, using the hold to bring her legs over the edge of the bed. “And I’m pretty sure you want to make a trip to the bathroom before you crash. Otherwise you’ll have a lot of laundry to do in the morning.”
Janie stilled, her arm slowly lowering until she peeked over it. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, I have three teenage daughters, so I know when a woman’s on her period she needs to wear something with a little more coverage at night.”
Janie’s brows slowly climbed her forehead as her arm fully slipped away. “How do you know I’m on my period?”
He pointed at the only out of place item in her home. “Between that and the pain pills you said you took, it’s a pretty easy conclusion to come to.” He took both her hands in his and hauled her up from the bed. “Now go get situated so you can go back to sleep.”