that Walt might even drop the charges after this.”
“Do you believe that?”
“To avoid the publicity that you could throw on him? Yeah. I think we have a good shot.”
“But...?”
He chuckled. “You’re beginning to know me too well,” he said. “The but is that he’s a wild card, and I don’t know what —”
“Oh!”
Devlin glanced over and saw that she was looking at her phone. “What is it?”
“It’s from Ellie. She says there’s an emergency. That we need to go back right away. Shit, can you turn the car around? I just texted that we’re on our way.”
He already was, turning into the parking lot of a strip mall that was in the midst of renovations. He made a circle, avoiding the few cars and workmen’s vans that dotted the lot. He was aiming Shelby’s nose back at the street when those same cars gunned it, racing forward to surround Shelby.
Men in black wearing masks jumped out, guns aimed at them.
Two fired, taking out the tires. Four others aimed the guns directly at them.
Beside him, Brandy whimpered, and he reached for her hand, hoping to ease her fear even though he knew it wouldn’t help at all.
“Out of the car,” one of the men said. “You’re coming with us.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Before…
Devlin stood in the lobby of the magnificent concrete, steel, and glass office building of the Devlin Saint Foundation. He’d spent hours with architect Jackson Steele discussing Devlin’s vision of the foundation and the image he wanted to project to the world.
Now, he turned slowly in a circle, taking in the incredible floating staircase, the welcoming reception area, and the incredible wall of glass that could be pushed aside to open onto a stunning outdoor patio with a view of the Pacific. “It’s perfect,” he said to the man standing beside him. “It’s everything I imagined and more.”
Jackson Steele grinned. “I thought it would be,” he said, not a man for false modesty. “There’s a sense of acceptance here. But the materials are hard and harsh, not warm like wood.”
“Reflecting what the people we’ve helped have been through.”
“Exactly,” Jackson said. “No one will notice consciously, but somewhere inside themselves, they’ll understand that this building matches your mission.”
Devlin nodded, in full agreement. He could see how the world-renowned architect—or “starchitect”—had built his reputation so quickly. “I’m glad you accepted the commission,” Devlin said. “I don’t think I could have asked for a better face for the public.”
“You’re going to do incredible work here at the Devlin Saint Foundation. I had to do justice to the mission of the DSF.”
That was true, Devlin thought. The whole purpose of the DSF was to remediate the damage caused by his father and men like him. To help women and children. To assist those who needed rehabilitation or job training after being imprisoned or forced against their will to work in sweatshops and drug manufacturing and other equally vile arenas.
He wanted to assist and educate. To offer counseling and adoption services if needed. To do whatever he could to try to make the world right again for the people who has been caught in the spider web cast by vile men like his father. He wanted to make those people strong again, so they could shake off the label of victim and become the people they were meant to be in the first place.
The fact that Jackson understood that, even a little bit, affected Devlin more than he’d expected. The man had talent and vision and believed in his project. And that feedback and support was worth the world.
At the same time, he couldn’t help but wonder what Jackson Steele would say if he knew about Devlin’s less-than-public endeavor. An organization—really more of a loose collective—that his friend Ronan had dubbed Saint’s Angels.
The Angels had no affiliation with the DSF, but as far as Devlin was concerned, it was an equally important entity. Whereas the foundation provided help in a very public manner, the Angels’ mission was more private—to prevent men like his father from creating victims in the first place, or to exact retribution when they did.
It was a mission he’d fantasized about since he’d been a child on the compound. A mission he’d worked toward from the moment he’d left Laguna Cortez all those years ago.
Saint’s Angels was the reason Alex Lopez had disappeared, and Devlin Saint had been born. He’d been a ghost in those between years, and a lethal one, taking out the type of people the Angels now pursued. He’d honed his