Daring Devlin (Lost Boys #1) - Jessica Lemmon Page 0,23

peeked around the wall and spotted Paul, wearing an ugly pair of pajama pants with reindeer on them, pulling a carton of ice cream from the freezer. His T-shirt stretched over his rounded belly when he stood.

“Hi, Paul.”

He dropped the carton to the floor and backed against the countertop, gripping it like I was threatening him with a pistol, cocked and ready. I pulled empty hands from my pockets and held up my palms.

“Man, what is with you? I didn’t come for revenge. I came to help.” I took a step toward him and he nearly crawled into the sink to get away from me. Where was the brave-slash-stupid guy who’d sucker-punched me in the face the last time I’d seen him?

I stopped advancing, keeping the kitchen island between us for both our safety. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on with you? Because if you don’t, then I might have to kick your ass after all.”

He licked his lips nervously. “Can I—can I pick up my ice cream?”

I sighed. “Sure.”

I rested my palms on the counter as he knelt. Outside the kitchen window stood a row of new-build houses in the complex behind his. Huge behemoths with no privacy whatsoever. Only a twiggy little tree here and there strung with blue-and-white Christmas lights.

Nothing like the neighborhood where I’d grown up, though the houses on our street had had no privacy either, since they were about a yardstick’s length apart. My parents had poured their money into Oak & Sage, and the house, well, the house was just for sleeping.

When I noticed Paul had been on the floor far too long to pick up a container of ice cream, I peeked over the island. Ice cream, but no Paul. I took one step toward the family room and found him army crawling across the carpet.

I was on him in a second. He yelped as I hauled him up by the scruff of his shirt. He tried to kick me, but I swung away. My hand around his throat, I squeezed his flesh through my fingers as I slammed his skull against the wall.

Through clenched teeth, I elicited a warning. “Listen carefully. I have not told Sonny about the shit you pulled last Friday. I will not tell him if you tell me what’s going on. If you don’t, I swear to God, I’ll tell him everything and you can deal with him instead of me.”

Paul waved his hands frantically and I loosened my hold on his neck. I kept my other hand pressed firmly against his chest and my hips turned to the side. I would not put it past the putz to knee me in the jewels.

His lip trembled. “Don’t tell Sonny. He’ll kill me, Dev.”

I moved my hand from his neck and rested it alongside my other one on his chest. “Why would he kill you?”

“I didn’t mean to get in this deep with Tex, but—”

“Tex? Tex Shooter?” His street name. A stupid one. He was an up-and-comer in the bookie world, and he and Sonny didn’t see eye to eye. Probably because Tex insisted on stealing our customers.

I dropped my hands and backed away. Paul looked sick. He should. He was in deeper shit than I’d thought. “So, those two guys…?”

“Came to pick up a payment for Tex. You happened to show the same night.”

“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?” I yelled as I pointed at the bruises still decorating half my face. “Instead of having me beat to hell?”

“Because they would have killed you if they knew you were Sonny’s guy!” His frantic whisper suggested he was telling the truth. Or at least what he believed to be the truth.

I propped my hands on my hips while I thought.

“Dev, what do I do?”

“Besides rent a time machine and avoid Tex altogether?”

He flinched.

My eyes slipped closed, memories rolling over me. My father had also left Sonny to bet with a bigger, badder guy in town. Dad had been in so far over his head, he had given the guy my baseball cards for payment. By the time he’d sacrificed the deed to our house, my father’s psyche had cracked.

It’d been cold and rainy the night the cops found my dad’s body. The undulating currents of the river had washed him onto the shore a day after he’d jumped. I blamed the rival bookie until I found the suicide note and three hundred dollars under my mattress. And one baseball card. My cherished Pete Rose.