“And we didn’t do that why, exactly?” Outrunning that maniac sounded freaking fantastic to her.
“Because that’s what he thinks we’ll do. Probably,” he tacked on.
“Probably,” Kylie repeated, her heart pounding so hard surely Devon could feel it where his fingers still splayed over her shoulder and neck.
He shifted his weight against the driver’s seat, swiveling his gaze through the shadows being cast by the lone dingy bulb at the opposite end of the scrap yard. “You told your brother Fagan has connections with some bad police. Did you call nine-one-one tonight? Even for a second?”
“Oh.” Kylie blinked, trying like hell to keep her mind on the question and not the fact that they might get discovered, brutally shot, and left for dead. In that order. “Um, Xavier bragged that he has half the police force in his back pocket, all the way up to the Feds. I was scared that if I called nine-one-one, he’d know where I was, so, no. I didn’t even try.”
Devon tipped his head in a nonverbal smart move. “If Fagan’s got cops on his payroll, it explains how he found us. He probably pulled your registration from the DMV database. A red Mustang with California plates doesn’t exactly blend in. After that, it was just a matter of looking for places you might try to hide.”
Kylie cursed her stupidity for staying put. “I knew I should’ve kept driving.” Her pulse picked up the pace, and she cut a glance in the direction of the road beside them. Not that she could see anything other than the shadow-lined interior of Devon’s car with how she was slumped way down in her seat. “Don’t you think he’ll find us again? I mean, we’re only what? Five miles from the motel?”
Devon lifted a bulky shoulder, his leather jacket shushing in the dark. “We just have to lie low and wait to find out. Speaking of which, slide down lower in your seat so you’re completely out of sight. You can move it back a little farther if you need room for your legs.”
She did what he asked even though logic warred with her instinct to trust him. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t this make us sitting ducks?”
“No. It makes us tactically smart. Fagan is probably tearing up the highway right now with his hair on fire trying to find us in a place that we’re not. We have a clear path to the on-ramp as an exit strategy on the off chance he didn’t bite. I know I can outrun that Escalade he’s in.” Devon flicked a glance through the windshield at the hood of the muscle car. “But I don’t want to unless I have to.”
“Oh.” Way to offer up the dumbest response in the galaxy, girl. Devon’s plan made sense, she guessed. At least, it would have, if sitting still wasn’t going to give her the mother of all panic attacks.
Kylie’s heart began to race, threatening to burst free from her already-too-tight chest. No, no, no. She wasn’t going to freak out. She wasn’t. She swallowed hard, forcing herself to focus on something that wasn’t the possibility of Fagan finding them in short order. Her eyes landed on Devon, and she took a minute to really check him out.
He looked so different than the quiet, easy-to-smile guy she remembered from five years ago, to the point that she hadn’t recognized him in the parking lot even though he’d spent a whole day with Kellan, hanging out at the beachside restaurant where she used to work.
Now that her vision had adjusted to the scant light and the shadows in the car, Kylie could make out his harder features in detail—the sharp blade of his nose, strong cheekbones, firm mouth. His hair was dark blond, but really, that was half a guess since it was short enough to make her unsure. His light brown stare pierced right through her every time it landed on hers, settling right in her center like an arrow. Although he’d lifted his hand from her shoulder in order to take a low, defensive position in the driver’s seat, Devon was still within less than arm’s reach, his body coiled with controlled tension.
Kylie’s pulse raced faster, but for a totally different reason now. Devon’s body was a rough, tough work of fucking art. Even through his jeans and leather jacket, she’d been able to discern right away that he was bigger and more imposing than he’d been five years ago, one hundred percent muscle and probably just as lethal. Hell, he’d been pressed against her hard enough in the parking lot to prove it. But Devon wasn’t just bulk, clumsy force with no follow-through. His body was dangerous and graceful all at once, as if he was spring-loaded, just waiting to unleash that intensity onto something. Someone. Her.
O-kay, it was hell-hot in this car.
“Devon, I?—”
“Shh!” His demeanor changed in an instant. A ripple in the shadows on the dashboard at eye level told Kylie headlights had appeared at the top of the side road leading back to the highway, and oh, God. She knew—she knew Xavier was too smart and too mean not to find them.
“Devon. Oh, my God, if that’s Fagan, what do we do?” Panic lanced through her chest, spreading out to seize all four of her limbs in less than a breath.
With a lightning-fast turn of his wrist, Devon had his weapon at the ready, his frame dropping low across the front seat. The move flattened his back across her chest and belly, and even though his legs remained on the driver’s side of the car, considering the size of his six-foot-plus frame? He couldn’t be comfortable draped halfway over her, blocking her body with his yet angling his shoulders to give himself a good line of sight on everything in the front of the car, including her.
“Shh. Easy.” The sound arrived on less than a whisper, Devon’s whiskey-brown eyes flashing up to hers as the headlights drew closer. He gripped his gun with his right hand, holding it carefully at his side, but no way could they just sit here and wait to get blasted.
“Devon.” She pushed the word out as calmly as possible, but his body tensed all the same. His free hand lifted to her mouth, his forefinger and middle finger applying just enough pressure to keep her from adding to the convo. Kylie noticed then that he’d moved so his mouth was only an inch or two from hers, his breath slow and warm between them, and she scraped for an inhale despite the cold shards of fear spiking all the way through her.
We’re not going to die. Devon’s voice echoed in her head. His stare penetrated the changing shadows, calculating, watching, taking in every shift and nuance. The headlights approached at a steady pace, ratcheting Kylie’s heartbeat faster and faster as the interior of the car grew brighter.
Devon’s fingers curled against her lips just a fraction harder as if to say, steady…steady…
And then the car passed by without any fanfare, not even braking as it continued down the side street and off into the dead of the Wyoming night.
“Kylie. It’s okay. We’re safe.”
Her breath escaped in a dizzying whoosh. Afraid that if she opened her mouth to respond, she’d do something stupid like start to cry, Kylie simply nodded, but holy crap, she wasn’t going to be able to keep it together much longer.
Her boss was dead. Murdered. Fagan was after her; he knew who she was. He wasn’t going to stop until he found her, and when he did, he was going to?—
“Kylie, look at me.”
Under any other circumstances, she’d probably have bristled at being bossed around. But somewhere between the blood and the bullets and the bad guy, everything had hurtled out of her control, and God, why couldn’t she breathe?
