Taming the Demon (9 page)

Chapter 9

T
he blade warmed Devin’s jacket pocket all the way to the estate. Smug and satisfied, as if it had somehow gained from those moments on the canal.

He faltered.

What if it had?
What if the whole thing—the intensity of his reaction to her, his lingering impulse to return to her—hell, to sweep her right off to the nearest excuse for privacy—was truly only part of what he’d been running from all along?

Hell, no.
He’d know. And those moments...they’d been so clear. So very real. None of the fog, none of the flickering pain and inner strobe.

And yet...

It made him cautious. By the time they returned to the estate, it made him mighty damned cautious indeed, here in this place where cameras watched every move and everyone pretended they didn’t.

That Compton was one hell of a control freak.

“Don’t tell me,” she said, eyeing him...seeing it. She paused to stretch out in a way that purely made him ache. “You don’t get involved with the people you protect. Some sort of professional code.”

“Wouldn’t know,” he told her promptly. “I’m not a pro. Told Compton that from the start.”

But his words rang a little hollow even to his own ears. He’d pulled back; he’d pulled in. And she knew it.

But she wasn’t a woman to be played with, either.

And he knew it.

* * *

That kiss.

It had been the kind of kiss every woman should savor.

At least once.

Natalie didn’t know what had come over him on the way back to the estate, but she knew enough. She knew what she saw.

A troubled man. A man full of darkness, if with contrary glimpses of sunlight in his humor, in the bounce of his step, in the unabashed grin he’d turned on her.

But still, full of darkness.

And now, with the mood on the estate wound tight and threat hanging over all, it was no time for exploring what was missing in her tidy little life.

So the moment had happened, and then it was over.

Or they pretended it was. Inside, she and Devin talked about the weather, the latest kitchen delight and Natalie’s schedule. Outside, they talked about her life here, or the estate, or sometimes nothing at all.

More rarely, they talked about him. But never what happened that night at the parking lot or at his home, because when she did bring it up, he simply looked at her—a little surprise, a little amusement. As if because she had asked him, again, that which he had made clear he wouldn’t discuss.

She sometimes found him in the workout room, practicing thoughtful walking...going through Tai Chi forms with a slow intensity that told her he’d applied the concept to existing skills as well as those she’d suggested. If he noticed her, he only grinned, that startling glimpse of who he might have been if—

If whatever rode him, didn’t.

And after a week, during which he took her on errands, walked her to appointments, scoped out the venues in which she’d be attending events and lurked on the grounds while she toiled in the office, he joined up with her for another walk around the estate, and his mood had changed. Troubled, now; reluctant.

He might well keep certain things to himself, but he’d not yet shown an ability to keep himself from her. Not the truth of him.

So when he bent to pick up one of the fallen elm branches, flinging it toward the canal with a practiced flick of his wrist, she caught the expression on his face and she said, “What’s wrong?” before she could even stop herself.

Because it said too much about her, too.

He glanced sharply at her; of course he’d noticed. “Nothing,” he said finally. “Other than the fact that I’m the worst kind of idiot for kissing you like that, and then not doing it again. But then, you knew that.”

She couldn’t help but laugh, as short as it was. “I hope you’re not expecting an argument.” She jammed her hands in her pockets, wishing for gloves on this deep winter day.

He, of course, wore nothing more than the hoodie under his vest. Devin James ran hot, no doubt about it. And he flashed her that grin, the one that made her hold her breath, if only for an instant. “I think I’d be disappointed if you offered one.”

Frustration reared into place. Never mind the thoughtful logic of it all—her recognition of his conflicted nature, her impatience with the secrets left over from that night, her growing awareness that his life touched too many pieces of those things she’d fought so hard to leave behind. Thoughtful logic was crap compared to that grin.

Or compared to the way she could
still
feel his touch from those few moments on the canal.

So she said, frustration evident, “Then
why
—”

He cut her short with a shake of his head, an oddly panicked look. And while she was in the astonishment of that, he looked away, gathered himself, and said—evidently unable to look at her at all— “Because I can’t do that to you.”

“I—” she said. “What?” She turned a scowl on him, drawing herself up. “Did I hear you right? You’re making that decision for me?”

“No.” He turned right back on her, and spat the words out low. “I’m making it for
me.
” And then spun away, walking a few hard steps down the property line, leaving her stunned.

Only a few steps, though—there he stopped, tipping his head back—she’d think he was simply regarding the bare branches overhead if she couldn’t see from this slight angle that his eyes were closed. After a moment, he reversed course, but only for a step. “There’s nothing happening here,” he said. “Whatever last week was about...there’s been no sign of it since.”

Stunned again, and blurting words without thinking them through. “How can you be so sure?”

His glance was wry. “I know,” he said. “Let’s leave it at that.”

“Let’s
not,
” she told him, so buffeted by the quick turns this conversation had taken, one after another, that she forgot to be smooth and polished.

But he only looked at her with regret, as if he understood entirely, and yet still...had no intention of explaining. And if his expression held a certain deep pain, she wasn’t inclined to acknowledge it.

“Maybe you’re right,” she said. “You
are
all kinds of idiot. And
I
can’t do that to me.”

* * *

Compton listened to Natalie with an increasing ire—one he found difficult to hide.

But she could have no sense of it, not for this to work.

“It’s not about the money,” she said, and though she stood before him in his office with her usual composure, a stack of newspapers tucked into her elbow, she couldn’t quite hide her flustered nature.

He wasn’t sure which was the greater distress—her awareness of failing him, or the dissent that had so clearly risen between her and Devin James.

Bitter possessiveness curled deep inside at the knowledge that while he preferred it to be the latter, the former would best serve him right now.

She took a deep breath, held the papers a little tighter. She slowly flexed her other hand, and some of the strain drained out of her. “It’s about the need. That’s what he said.” She shook her head. “As in,
other
people have need. He’s willing to work with us for specific events, but staying here—” She seemed to run out of words. “I’m sorry. I tried to talk him out of it. I’m afraid it might be my fault.”

Perfect.
Compton laughed shortly, gratified at her startled expression. “Natalie,” he said, “men like Devin James do the right thing.”
For now.
“The honorable thing. Fighting him on this would only backfire.”

She nodded, a slow gesture. “I’m glad you see it that way. How would you like me to handle it, then? He plans to leave in the morning.”

“I’ll talk to him before he goes,” Compton said, waving a deliberately negligent hand. “In one thing, he’s right. There’s been no sign of further threat. Perhaps those who sought to discourage me have thought better of it, or perhaps they see that the project has gone beyond stopping.” He shook his head. “I’ll arrange for him to work with us per occasion. It should be sufficient to then hire on an extra man from my usual source.”

She hesitated. “I’ll call them in the morning, then.”

Not that he was done. Not when he needed her believing, and trusting. He took a step away from the massive window that fronted his office, closing the distance between them. “Feel free to speak frankly, Natalie. Will you feel safe?”

He didn’t miss the wistfulness that passed so briefly over her features, clouding blue eyes. It didn’t show in her voice—it wouldn’t. Not his Natalie. “I believe in his ability to assess the threat, sir. He has a...” She stopped, shook her head. “He seems to have a sense of such things.”

“Indeed,” Compton murmured. And therein had been his mistake. He’d brought the man under his roof; he’d trusted his interest in Natalie and his interest in the job to keep him here while Compton studied him...felt out his weaknesses. He hadn’t given enough respect to James’s very real ability—his blade-gifted ability—to assess threat.

He hadn’t respected the way the blade thirsted for just that.

Compton, after all, should know.

And he also knew just what to do next.

* * *

Devin woke with the blade in his hand, rolling out of bed. Disoriented, lost in a fog of darkness and a pure zing of lust for action.

Toes.

The nubby texture of some expensive carpet beneath bare feet. The precise awareness of how much weight fell onto his heels and the balls of his feet; the swish of expensive high-count cotton falling away from bare legs.

The blade twitched, white-hot runnels of light flaring along the spine and front quillon, the belly of the blade gleaming an unnatural blue-white in the darkness, then subsiding. It was enough so he knew what he held, could feel the heft of it.

A knife eager to be deadly, with a double edge halfway down the spine, a finger ring at the butt...cool agate handle a contrast to the warmth it drew from within Devin. It had come to his hand in a reverse tactical grip; he flipped it, more appropriate to combat not yet engaged, the knife his primary weapon.

To think, once he hadn’t known these things.

The blade had taught him. Hard and fast.

But the pull of it wasn’t enough to get him outside in the cold without shoving his legs into jeans, his feet into shoes and his arms into sweatshirt. Not once he realized the threat wasn’t literally upon him.

And then it hit him.

Outside. The casita.
Natalie.
Dammit!

He bolted out into the wide hall, noiseless on the tile, and down the center-tread carpet of the old wood-and-wrought-iron stairs.
Alarm code—!
He skidded to a stop on a silent snarl of impatience, stabbing the code into the control box. Couldn’t risk alerting his quarry...or just as bad, risk alerting witnesses.

They weren’t all as discreet as Natalie had been.
Damn,
he had owed her an explanation.

Just as he had owed her the kindness of keeping her out of it altogether.

Out the door, finally, the blade blasting eager heat through his body, centering there beneath his heart...the mark it had left on him there. Threatening to burst out even as the tendrils of it spread into a fog of clouding obsession.

Get back, you demonic son-of-a-bitch!
He didn’t have time to slow down, to think of toes or movement or glimmers of reality.

He thought of Natalie.

Where the blade now tried to cloud his mind, it still left him its subtle advantages—the black and grays of the night distinct to his eyes, the scents strong to his nose, the sounds crisp. The hoarfrost told him they’d reached early morning; the moonless sky told him the same. Not long before dawn, when so many people slept the most deeply.

Natalie, beware—you’re not alone!

The blade told him as much, tugging him into a sprint toward the casita. The scent of old cigarette smoke on a leather jacket, unwashed hair...the crunch of a misstep on gravel.

Not one of Compton’s security hires—no unkempt habits for Compton’s men.

The casita’s motion-sensitive entry light flicked on with sudden, excruciating brightness. Devin flung a hand before his eyes and twisted away, but it was too late. Even as the intruder shot out the light—the short, sharp sound of a silenced pistol giving away his weapon of choice—Devin saw the significant bulk of him silhouetted against the entry.

But with the light gone, he saw nothing—his night vision squandered, his eyes watering. The cold bit into him as the blade absorbed the shock of it.

It wasn’t without its vulnerabilities.

He braced himself; it surged back with renewed fury—something personal in it this time.

“Hey, dumbass.” That was his own voice, barely recognizable. His own words, unplanned—an instinctive attempt to get the man away from Natalie’s door while stalling for his own vision to return. “She’s
mine.
”

The man was good. Too good to spar with words; too good to do anything more than pivot and turn the gun on Devin, the metal of it glinting dully in the sudden flare of the blade—no longer a tactical blade, but—spurt of flame and a shocking reverberation of pain up his arm and there it was, a throwing knife balanced and quiet in his hand, begging to fly.

He gave it that. A quick judgment of distance, a quick snap and release—the blade flew heavy and true, slamming home with a meaty thump. The intruder cried out, disbelief as much as pain, and the gun spat muzzle flash—aim wild, even if Devin hadn’t been rolling aside, coming up against the house and ready to dive in from the side.

No need for that. The man looked down at his abdomen, where the knife pinned his coat to his shirt and then to his body. Clear enough to Devin’s returning sight—liver hit to the hilt, blood gushing out to stain the shirt. One hand clawed at his belly; the gun grew limp in the grasp of the other. A few stumbled steps away from the house and down he went.

“Dumbass,” Devin growled. “She’s
mine.
” And then froze, hearing himself. Hearing both truth and distortion, and stunned by it.