Break the Day - Lara Adrian Page 0,23
individuals.”
“Does that include you?”
He didn’t have to confirm it. The sheer starkness of his expression took her aback. There was a bleak truth in his eyes, one that chilled her.
“You say you have your reasons for being here. So do I,” he said, speaking with the calm smoothness of a diplomat rather than the lethal male he’d just reminded her he was. “I’m not here to make friends . . . or anything else. But I don’t want us to be enemies, either.”
She scoffed. “What a relief. Either way, it appears we’re at an impasse.”
“Maybe it doesn’t have to be that way.”
She eyed him warily. “Then what would you suggest?”
“A truce, for now. A mutually beneficial one. I keep your secret, so long as you have my back inside the gang. That means you keep me informed of all activity, and you alert me if Cruz has plans to cross me or test me the way he did tonight. In return, I’ll provide cover when you can’t show your true nature in front of the men.”
She wanted to balk at the proposal, but what other choice did he leave her? And while she wasn’t looking to make friends either, the thought of having someone to confide in, to lean on, was sorely tempting.
Especially when the alternative was forfeiting months of effort in trying to find a link to her true enemy, Opus Nostrum.
Rafe held out his hand. “Do we have a deal?”
Devony slipped her fingers into his grasp, hoping she wasn’t making the mistake of her life in allying with him, even under the confines of their wary truce.
“All right, Rafe. We have a deal.”
CHAPTER 8
The parked delivery van was still warm in the lot behind Ocho’s garage when Rafe and Devony made it back there on foot some forty-five minutes later.
Soaked from the rain, Rafe’s mood following the near-disaster in the museum and his conversation with Devony afterward hadn’t been improved by the three-mile trek in the cold drizzle. He vibrated with anger as they entered the garage and found Cruz and the rest of the crew in the midst of pouring shots and celebrating as if the whole caper hadn’t almost gone as far south as it could have.
Rafe wasn’t usually the kind to lose his shit, but thinking about how Nathan and Jordana must feel about him now ignited a volatile rage inside him. That fury only amplified when he considered that in testing his loyalty, Cruz had also risked the lives of five innocent museum guards and Jordana.
Not to mention Devony.
And her life was still at risk, because after what happened with Jordana at the museum, there would be hell to pay from Nathan. Rafe wasn’t worried about his own neck, but he didn’t want to consider what might happen to Devony now that she had made herself his accomplice in a mission that was supposed to be covert and solo. He wasn’t sure how he could reverse that very lethal problem without punching a hole in his entire operation.
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