Chapter 21
21
A s I was walking off with Storm, I glanced over my shoulder and saw Devlin look at his phone and then vanish. Instinctively I know something is wrong.
As soon as Storm drops me off at my house, I rush over to Devlin’s, racing to his front door.
Have I fallen and hit my head? Why am I so worked up?
Because there is no reason why Devlin would have left in such a hurry unless something is wrong.
“Devlin,” I call, entering the house.
“The kitchen,” he answers.
Relief immediately floods my body like a shot of adrenaline. He’s here. But that relief vanishes when I enter the room and see Hands. A bandage has been placed under his thumb and Hands is shaking—both of them.
Fear lodges itself in my throat, and it takes all my focus to arm wrestle it back down. “What happened? Are you okay?”
Devlin rises from a chair and moves to the sink. “Hands is okay. Someone broke in while we were on your date.”
“What?” Hands starts moving furiously. “I think it’s saying something,” I tell Devlin.
He finishes drying his hands and glances over his shoulder, watching Hands before he looks at me. “Someone broke in. Hands fought them off. The would-be thief wore black, so he didn’t get a look at them.”
“But who? Why?”
He levels his golden-green eyes on me. “Don’t know. I sent the video footage to my security team.”
I scrunch my face in confusion. “First of all—you have a security team? And secondly, what about the police?”
He tips his head and shrugs. “In answer to your second question, the police have already been here. To your first question—my security keeps an eye on the house and travels with me when I need them to. The house has many wards on it, so I don’t need them here most of the time. But whoever did this broke every single ward, which means they’re experienced. It also means that from now on, at least while you’re here, someone will watch the house.” He wags a finger at me. “I’ll give you three guesses as to who’s behind this, and the first two don’t count.”
“It’s not Storm,” I reply, sounding doubtful even to myself.
“Who else has the most to gain from my inventions?” Devlin counters.
“Storm,” I mutter. “But it could be that someone just wanted money—gold, loot, jewels. You’re rich. You could have all of those stashed here somewhere.”
I pause for a moment before dropping my purse onto the floor and sliding into a seat across from Hands. “Are you okay?” Hands does a little thing that’s supposed to be a nod—I think. “Is there anything that I can do?”
He brushes one hand with the fingers of the other, and I get it—it wants a massage. So I give Hands a little semi-massage, making sure to rub between the fingers and knuckles. When I’m done, Hands is lying flat on the table, completely relaxed.
This whole time, Devlin’s been watching from the sink, glowering. “Hands, if you’re feeling better, why don’t you get some rest?”
“I’ll put him to bed.”
“No,” Devlin says sharply. “Hands is perfectly capable of putting himself to bed. Right?” It slowly lifts from the table and shuffles off, leaving the room. “I’ll check on you in a bit,” Devlin tells him.
As soon as Hands is gone and hopefully out of earshot, I turn on Devlin. “Why are you being so mean? He was just attacked.”
“I’m not being mean,” he spits. “You just don’t need to be giving him hand massages.”
I fold my arms with a huff across my chest. “And why not?”
“Because…” He drums his fingers on the counter impatiently. “Because you just don’t need to, is all.”
I study him. Devlin’s jaw is clenching and unclenching, and he’s barely looking at me. “Are you…are you jealous?”
He scoffs. “The last thing that I am is jealous. I just don’t want him getting used to you, especially since you’re throwing in your lot with a man who sends his cronies to break into my home and steal my inventions.”
“It might not have been him.”
He glares at me. “And who else would break in here?”
“I don’t know.” I toss up my hands. “Maybe one of your trysts who’s gone psycho?”
“Would you quit it with the whole man whore thing? It’s getting old.”
“Would you quit it the whole Storm-is-horrible thing?”
“No, I won’t. You know he lied to you tonight.”
“Yes, I know,” I screech. Why am I screeching? I exhale a calming breath and drop my face into my hands. “But you can’t expect him to say that you bribed him into coming to the ball.”
“Oh, I can’t?”
I hear Devlin move toward me, so I sit up and there he is, standing beside me with a bottle of wine and two glasses. “Wine?”
“Yes, thank you.”
He pours me a glass of red and sits across from me, lifting his ankle and propping it on the opposite knee as I take a swig of wine. It’s good. It has alcohol. That is what I need.
The mood settles and I whisper, “I’m sorry about Hands. This is my fault, isn’t it?”
“No.” He scowls. “It’s Storm’s fault.”
“You don’t know that it’s him.” He shoots me a dark look, and I retreat to my wine, taking another gulp. “How did you meet Hands?” I ask when I sense that it’s safe to speak.
Devlin drums his strong fingers on the table. They are so strong. I’ve always noticed it, but in this second I can’t help but admire them. He also has nice forearms. I think most women are attracted to a man’s chest, his shoulders, his physique in total, but I love a good strong forearm.
Don’t ask me why, and Devlin has awesome ones—they’re rock-solid, and the muscles flex when he moves.
He wipes a hand down his tired face and settles back into his chair. It’s late, and he doesn’t have all the lights on—only a few that are casting an amber glow in the kitchen, making the place feel intimate. It would be perfect if there was food, but earlier I ate a fried sushi roll that was stuffed with crab and cream cheese and slathered in smoky spicy sauce, and I’m so full. But honestly the meal was so good that if it was offered to me again, I’d eat it right now, full or not.
“I met Hands a long time ago, when he was a person.”
My heart lurches in my chest. “What?”
He nods. “He helped me when I was just getting started in inventing. He was a good man, a great person, and he had the best advice. His real name is John, but after the accident he didn’t want to be called by his name anymore.”
“The accident?”
Devlin takes a long sip of his drink. “He was running an experiment on a traveling device. It exploded, taking his body with it, and leaving his hands.”
My eyes flare in surprise. It’s almost too much for me to even wrap my mind around. “So that was all that was left of him?”
“It was. He had a wife, but when she found out, she didn’t want to have anything to do with him. So she abandoned him. I took him, and it was then that he told me not to call him John anymore. Hands was just fine.”
My heart is breaking. This is the saddest story that I’ve ever heard, and Devlin looks broken too, even telling it to me now.
I cover his hand with mine and manage a smile. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not me who’s had to endure all the pain. It’s Hands.”
“Not about that. About earlier, when I yelled at you.”
He smirks and it’s glorious. “Is the great Blair Thornrose apologizing?”
I roll my eyes. “Don’t get used to it.”
We look at each other and laugh. His eyes hold so much warmth for me, so much that I can barely breathe. Maybe it’s time for me to forgive Devlin. The amount of care that he showed Hands proves that he’s not as selfish and awful as I’ve thought for so long. The man has a heart, even if he broke mine.
Maybe it’s time that I gave him another chance—a chance to redeem himself. I’m not saying that I want to give myself to him. But maybe Devlin deserves some credit. He is trying to get me and Storm together, and he isn’t using my power to frolic with a bunch of women—at least not in front of me.
“I’m sorry about the break-in,” I admit.
His jaw flexes as he looks out the window. “I think you could do better.”
“Better?”
“Than Storm.”
I bark a laugh. “Better than a billionaire?”
“Better,” he growls in a voice that makes the hairs on my neck soldier to attention.
Okay then. “Listen, if you find Mr. Better, let me know. Because right now my only option is Mr. Available, and that’s Storm Grayson.” Devlin’s silent for a long moment, staring into his wine. Finally I ask, “Why do you dislike him so much?”
He rubs a hand down his face. “No reason.”
“Liar.”
I suppose Devlin’s already been vulnerable enough with me for one night, telling me about Hands. If he’s any more vulnerable, I may take a blow torch to the steel wall I’ve erected around my heart and start melting that sucker down for scrap metal.
He exhales and shifts in his seat. I sense a conversation turn. “Want to have some fun?”
“Does this involve giant teddy bears?”
“Where’s yours, I might ask?”
“I left it on the doorstep of the house and messaged Chelsea about it. She has an affinity for giant stuffed things.”
“Uh-huh,” he says as if he doesn’t believe me.
I poke his leg with my toe. “It’s true.”
Before I can pull my leg away, he grabs my foot, pulls off my boot, and starts massaging the tendons.
Oh gods. I’m sure my foot stinks. I have, like, loads of feet bacteria. I’ve met people whose feet don’t smell. My sister Dallas is like that. She could wear sneakers without socks for an entire week, never once wash her feet, and somehow they’d wind up smelling like a field of lavender on a sunny day.
Not me.
But if Devlin gets a whiff of foul, he doesn’t mention it, and I’m pretty much sure that foot massages are not in the friends department of our relationship.
But oh, oh wow, this feels so good. It feels Meg Ryan fake-orgasm good, except for the fake part.
I melt onto the chair and close my eyes. “What were you saying?”
“I was saying that I have a surprise for you.”
“No, you weren’t. You were asking if I want to have fun.”
I hear the grin in his voice. “ Why did you ask if you remember?”
I shrug. “This feels so good I can barely think.”
“Maybe I should stop.”
My eyes pop open. “No!”
He chuckles and drops my foot. Then he stands and extends his hand. “Come on.”
I cock a brow. “What kind of fun are we talking about?”
“Not that, Miss Dirty Mind. Let’s go.”
He flexes his hand, willing me to take it. I do, and I shiver at the spark that flies down my arm when our flesh makes contact.
“You okay?”
I shake it off. “Yeah. Fine. Great.”
Just trying not to be electrocuted by you, is all.
I drop off my other boot, and he leads me through the house and down the stairs to the basement, which is all high tech with steel walls and doors. I note the scents of cotton and linen as he flips on a light.
“Holy smokes,” I whisper.
“Do you like it?”
“I love it.”
The room that he’s brought me to is filled with built-in shelves that are lined with jars filled to the brim with potion ingredients.
And they’re labeled alphabetically from A to Z. I could kiss him!
But I won’t.
“I thought we could play around,” he says, rolling up his sleeves, revealing more of those corded forearms. I almost wipe drool from my mouth. When did forearms become the sexiest part of the human body, ever?
My gaze flicks from his forearms (yes, I’m still staring) to the shelves and back to him. “You want to make potions?”
A slow smile curls on his face. “Yes. We can make potions.”
Oh, this is too much fun. I haven’t been in a room filled with this many ingredients since never , and I want to dive right in.
He gestures to a bookcase that’s loaded with tomes that have broken, cracked and crumbling spines.
“You’ve got ancient texts,” I squeal.
“I do,” he says proudly, crossing over and pulling one off the shelf. “One of the perks of being rich. I can find and pay for one-of-a-kind potion books. If you don’t know where you’d like to start, we can search until you find something that sounds good.”
“No, I know exactly where I’d like to begin.”
He quirks a brow. “I’m intrigued. And where, Miss Blair Thornrose, would you like to start?” I rub my hands together. When I tell him, Devlin laughs and agrees. “Then let’s go.”
We don’t stop developing potions until two in the morning, and that’s only after Devlin tells me that I’ve got to get some rest, that we can’t stay up all night. So I grudgingly stop.
But oh, the fun we had. We made potion after potion, and even tweaked some recipes that were in the books with ingredients that I remembered from my high school days that would work better.
We made potions just for the sake of it—just to watch butterfly wings erupt from a vial, just to smell the ocean in a bottle.
And it was fun.
A lot of fun.
And we laughed. We laughed a lot. Devlin would hand off ingredients to me, and I would crush them with the mortar and pestle, instructing him on what to do next. I haven’t felt so good and comfortable in my own skin in, well, years.
I yawn as I enter the bedroom.
“See? I knew you were tired,” he chides.
“Yes, I’m tired. But that was great.” I glance at him over my shoulder. “Can we do that again?”
“Anytime.”
He chuckles as he unbuttons his shirt, and I avert my eyes. Oh my gosh, this man. All I saw was the tan valley between his pecs, and I need the fire department to come hose me down, cool me off.
I really need help.
I turn away and move to unzip the back of my sweater. Yes, I’m wearing a sweater with a zipper. But I can’t grab the tab because it’s just out of reach.
Suddenly Devlin’s sweeping my hair over my shoulder, and his hot hands are on my neck. “Here, let me do that,” he purrs in a voice that sounds like sex.
My stomach quivers as he keeps one hand on my neck and slowly unzips my sweater, taking his sweet time, I notice, until it’s completely undone.
Speaking of undone, I feel about three seconds away from it.
Kidding. Not kidding.
I turn around and he’s right there, standing inches away from me, his hazel eyes having gone inky black.
“Thank you.”
“You’re very welcome.” His Southern drawl is pronounced tonight. Probably because he’s tired. I’m tired, too. So very tired.
But the thing is—he’s not moving away, and neither am I.
“Thank you,” I say again, even though it feels like a rock’s been shoved into my throat.
“Anytime.”
“Not for the zipper. Well, yes, for the zipper. But for tonight, too. For helping me while I was on the date and for showing me your potion room.”
He brushes a strand of hair off my cheek, and my knees nearly buckle. “Blair”—wow, the way my spine shudders when he says my name is a power no one else has—“you were meant to be a potion maker. You’re a natural, and it’s something that I wish you hadn’t given up.”
I nod and exhale, feeling like I’m releasing an entire atmosphere from my lungs. “I know, but my family needed me.”
“I know they’re important to you. But you need to be important to you, too.”
I bite down on my bottom lip. He’s right. I do need to be important to me. When did I stop being important?
I know when. When it became clear that I would have to take over the bookstore one day. But now that’s not my destiny. Addison’s in charge of it. She’s the witch the shop is attached to. It’s her magic that’s making the place work. Not mine, and it will never be mine.
Besides, it’s so clear that the customers don’t want me anymore. They want her, and her ability to choose their perfect book to read. Who could blame them? If I was faced with deciding which one of us to connect with, I’d pick her over me, too.
But that doesn’t mean I have to stay. It doesn’t mean that at all.
“You’re right,” I admit to him. “I haven’t considered what I wanted for a long time.”
“Maybe it’s time you start.”
“Maybe so.”
“You look nervous. Would you like a dust rag?”
I bark a laugh. “You keep your house so clean that it’s hard to find anything worth dusting, but I’m okay. Just tired.”
Then he reaches toward me and I can feel it coming—a kiss. Devlin’s going to kiss me, even after I told him that I just want to be friends. How dare he?
But I would really, really like to kiss him.
What is wrong with me? We’re just friends and barely that.
Oh, who am I kidding? He’s becoming a friend, a really good one, and I remember what it’s like to be around him, how easily we interact. I never have to think of something to say or work at conversation. It’s just easy.
Not like with Storm.
Give yourself a break, Blair. You just met the man.
Yeah, but everything feels so forced.
Must give things time to progress. Storm’s clearly interested in me. He has to leave town for a few days, but he promised that when he returned, we’d go out again.
He’s checking all the boxes. Wants kids? Check. Good provider? Check. Handsome? Check.
And there will be more things checked off my list as we get to know one another. I can feel it.
But right now Devlin’s closing in as he reaches toward me. When he pulls back, he’s holding a hairbrush.
I exhale a breath that I didn’t know I was holding.
“Brush?”
“Sure.” I take it from him. “Thank y?—”
Before I can get the word out, a flash flares in my mind, followed by a collage of images that flip like flash cards in my head, moving in sequential order. It all happens so fast that I’m barely able to register exactly what they all mean, and they’re gone almost as quickly as they appear.
As the images fade, I’m able to sort it all out and put them together.
“Blair,” he says slowly, watching me intently, “did you just have?—”
“Yeah.” I touch my stomach, stabilizing myself because I’m rocking back and forth. My gaze cuts up to his. “Yeah, I just saw your vision. I know how to fix the womb.”