Page 65 of My Cruel Salvation

I offer him a smile, and I know he means it, but at the same moment I wonder if I’m losing my edge. I grew up dreaming of a career in law enforcement. To get the bad guys and put them away. I switched to trying to seek justice with a pen and paper, and I think I’ve done good along the way. But the whole thing is exhausting. I’m tired of looking for bad guys around corners. I have love back in my life now, and I want to revel in it. And maybe, just maybe, the world is about to let us do that.

“You’re thinking too loud,” Devlin says, reaching out to stroke my hair.

I shrug. “It’s one of my bigger flaws.”

He feigns shock. “You? Flaws?”

I take my pillow and smack him, grateful that he’s lightening the moment. He grabs the pillow and since I don’t let go of it he manages to pull me toward him. I laugh, then shift so that I’m settled on his lap, naked now that the sheet has fallen off me and all there is is a thin sheet between us. I can feel his arousal again and I shake my head. “Oh no. We’ve already had that part of the evening’s entertainment.”

“What if I want an encore?”

“I could be talked into it.”

“Good,” he says, twirling a strand of my hair around his finger. He meets my eyes, and the love I see reflected back at me makes me feel like the luckiest woman on earth and the most humbled, because what did I ever do to deserve a man like this?

“I do think he really loves her,” Devlin says softly. It takes me a minute to realize that he’s talking about Christopher and Brandy.

“I think so too,” I say.

“The documents that the team found in Blackstone’s house suggest that he was pressured. So you’re probably right. He’s probably not a threat to us.”

“I don’t like that he hurt her,” I say. “I don’t like thinking that he’s bad or that he did bad things. But now that he’s gone I really do think all of this is over. His relationship with Brandy, and all the threats to us and the people close to us.” I draw a breath. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“You don’t want us to go after him.”

“I don’t. I think he was a victim of circumstance. I think he was a victim of his own lack of backbone. But I think he really loved Brandy. And I think if you find him and either aim the police toward him or even do your own kind of justice, all that’s going to do for Brandy is make it last even longer than it would have. She’s in mourning now, much like Lamar is. But Tracy can’t come back. Christopher could. We could bring him back, and that would be like bringing a ghost back into her life. I don’t want her to be haunted.”

“The man almost killed you. He took an SUV and almost ran you down.”

I nod slowly. “I’m not discounting that. But there are other factors. Brandy’s my very best friend. I don’t want this whole thing to linger for her any longer than it has to. It’s a tragedy, and I want her to get past it. God knows it’s not the first tragedy she’s had to endure. But she won’t move on if you keep investigating and it keeps getting tossed in her face or if he ends up dragged back.”

I study his face, trying to read whether or not he agrees with me, but Devlin can be the most unreadable man on the planet when he wants to, and right now, it appears that he’s trying very hard.

“Devlin, what are you thinking?”

He leans back, his expression tense. “I do want Christopher to pay,” he says, making my heart sink. “I want him to pay for what he did to you, for the way he helped Anna keep her secrets and enact her plans. For all the things he’s done for Joseph Blackstone over the years. Selfishly, I think what I want him to pay for the most is the fact that he made me feel a kinship toward him. The fact that we were both tainted with the sins of our family. I don’t deserve that label, and I didn’t think he did either. But he does.”

“And that hurts. He played you.”

Devlin chuckles. “Well, I wouldn’t put it quite that way, but yes, he played me.”

“I’m sorry. He did, and it’s a terrible thing. But I stand by my own decision. If it were up to me, I would let him walk.”

He crosses his arms over his chest and studies me, the corners of his mouth turning down. He’s silent for so long that I start to get edgy.

“What?”

“This man committed crimes, you know that right?”

“Yes, but —”

Devlin shakes his finger. “No, no, no buts. He committed crimes, and you’re saying that we should let him go. That the justice system shouldn’t do its job.”

I’m not entirely sure where he’s going with this, but I have an inkling. And so I bite my lower lip and wait for him to answer for me.

He does. “How is that different from what Saint’s Angels does?”

“Because I’m not suggesting you kill him.”