He strode inside the garage with fangs bared and murder radiating from his eyes.
“Cruz. You fucking asshole.” He yanked the gang leader out of his chair and shoved him hard, driving the human’s back into the drywall of Ocho’s office. “The next time you think about screwing me over, you’d better think again.”
Liquor splashed from Cruz’s dropped shot glass. He looked scared, which meant he wasn’t as stupid as Rafe thought. “Hold up, man. Hold up!”
The pleading barely registered through the haze of Rafe’s animosity. “You could’ve gotten a lot of people killed tonight. Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t return the favor to you right fucking now.”
“Wasn’t personal,” Cruz uttered, his words strangled. “I just . . . needed to know if I could count on you.”
Rafe snarled. “Did you know anyone would be working at the museum tonight?”
“No! Jesus, I swear it. No.”
Rafe wanted the asshole to lie to him. It wouldn’t take much more than that to push him over the edge. One dead gangbanger wouldn’t derail his entire hunt for a lead on Opus Nostrum.
And right now, crushing Cruz’s throat in his fist would feel damn good.
“Rafe.” Devony’s voice broke through his haze of anger.
He had told her on the way back to let him handle the situation and to trust that he knew what he was doing. At the moment, he wasn’t sure he could uphold that promise.
“Rafe.”
Her hand came to rest on his shoulder. He glanced at her, his eyes still ablaze with amber fire and his fangs enormous in his mouth. She gave a faint shake of her head, her warm eyes wide and imploring.
As soon as he let Cruz go, the gang leader straightened, tugging at his leather jacket. He spat on the floor, then glanced around Rafe and motioned to Ocho. The other man came over carrying two thick stacks of banded hundred-dollar bills. Cruz gestured for Rafe to take them.
He scowled. “What’s this?”
“Your share of tonight’s proceeds.”
Damn. Apparently, they hadn’t wasted any time delivering the stolen artwork to their contact. Rafe figured they must have made the drop to Judah LaSalle not long after they’d cut and run on Devony and him at the museum.
Now that he was freed from Rafe’s punishing hold, some of his bravado returned. “I told you, it was a test tonight. Congrats, you crazy motherfucker, you passed.” Cruz smirked, self-satisfied, as Rafe took the money and put it in his jacket. “You need a reason why I’m the last person you want to kill, vampire? There’s fifty-thousand of ’em. Keep proving your worth like you did tonight, and that’s only the start.”
He brushed past him without another word to accept a fresh drink from Axel.
Devony stepped away too, walking over to where the men had divvied up the rest of the night’s take into similar stacks. She tucked hers into the inside pocket of her leather jacket, then with a murmured goodbye to the gang she started heading for the back door.
Rafe strode up to her before she reached the exit. “Where are you going?”
“What does it look like? I’m going home.”
He shouldn’t be surprised by her curt response. Although they had reached some kind of understanding with each other tonight, it hadn’t come on the friendliest of terms. He had pushed her into a corner and that was obviously not a place Devony was accustomed to staying.
She was tenacious and bold. Fearless, as he witnessed tonight.
He had to admire that about her.
He admired a lot about her, including a host of things that he shouldn’t. Not if he wanted to keep his head in the game and his focus on his mission. A beautiful, headstrong woman like Devony was only going to be a liability to him in the end.
He’d known that even before he put his hands on her to heal her tonight.
He hadn’t even directly touched her skin, yet feeling her beneath his palms had taken on an intimacy he wasn’t prepared for. Her heat, her strength, the softness of her curves combined with the preternatural, uniquely Breed power that simmered beneath the surface of everything that was so unmistakably feminine about her.
He had been awed by her unique psychic ability, but it was the woman who intrigued him more. Far more than he should be willing to allow.
And when Devony had placed her hand over his while he healed her in the park, he’d nearly gone up in flames. If he hadn’t pulled away, his desire for her would have incinerated the last shred of his control.
