“I work here.”
He paused, surprise shooting through him. “Volunteer, you mean?”
A ghost of a smile teased the corner of her mouth before she shook her head. “No, I mean I work here. Draw a paycheck. I’m the youth coordinator for the community center.”
Giving her his complete attention, he crossed his arms over his chest and frowned. “Why?”
“Why do I work here? Because this place is important to the community. It provides not only after-school care, but much needed services for children and senior citizens. The center is a safe place—”
“No.” He waved his hand through the air. “Why do you need to work here? You can’t convince me Gregory doesn’t provide for his own daughter.”
“I don’t need to—well, I take that back. Yes, I do. This is where I belong, where I’m useful and have a purpose. These kids don’t just need me, I need them, too. But a paycheck isn’t just about money. It’s insurance, security and stability. It’s independence. I earned this job on my own merit, and no one can take it away from me.” A shadow passed over her face, momentarily darkening her eyes. “At least not without a fight.”
“What are you saying?” he asked, unease and suspicion crowding into his mind. “Has your father threatened not to support you? To kick you out? To get you fired?”
Gregory Cole had gone to extreme and illegal lengths to obtain an advantageous match for his daughter. He knew the man had no moral compass.
She shrugged a shoulder and gave a short shake of her head before striding over to the large desk in the front of the room. “Everyone’s capable of anything under the right circumstance,” she tossed out, her voice nonchalant. But the tension transforming her normally graceful movements into stiff ones belied that tone.
What did that mean? Was she referring to her father...or him? Guilt swarmed inside him, buzzing, stinging.
But dammit, they weren’t friends. Weren’t allies.
The battle lines had been drawn between them when she and her father had extorted him. For the last few weeks, he’d been fighting for autonomy over his professional and personal life. No one had ever accused him of fighting dirty, but when it came to never again being that powerless boy, he would get down in the mud and roll around in it.
Yet, the urge to pull her into his arms, to comfort her, to apologize, lingered like a grimy aftertaste.
“Who are you, Devon?” he murmured, the question out before he realized it had even formed in his head.
But he didn’t rescind it.
She stared at him, her expressive eyes unreadable. Then that same small smile, this one containing a touch of wistfulness, teased her mouth before dropping away. “You don’t really want to know the answer to that, Cain,” she replied softly.
Before he could demand clarification, she pulled open the desk drawer and removed her purse. “My dress is in my office. Just give me twenty minutes to change, and I’ll be ready to go.”
He nodded, quiet as he followed her from the classroom.
This woman was an enigma. A beautiful, seductive enigma. And while he’d always loved to solve puzzles, she was one he would be better off leaving a mystery.
Ten
Devon glanced at the ornate clock mounted on the foyer wall.
6:28.
Cain should be arriving any moment for another night out—another performance as the loving, happily engaged couple. Cupping her left hand, she brushed her fingertips over the gorgeous four-carat, princess cut diamond ring encircling her finger. Any woman would be delighted to receive it—including her. Not ostentatious, but elegant, with small, flower-shaped emeralds decorating the band and adding a touch of whimsy. Oh yes, it was a dream ring, and she would be a liar if she claimed the sight of it hadn’t squeezed her heart.
But in the next moment, a deep sadness had filled her.
Because the ring was a lie.
Another lie in a chain of them that slowly strangled her more and more each day. And each time she slipped it on her finger, the weight of it became heavier and heavier. A constant reminder that she was so enmeshed in this sordid mess that her father had created, she couldn’t inhale a breath that didn’t contain the acrid, bitter tang of deception.
And ever since Cain had visited the community center two weeks ago and revealed the man who existed beneath the cold, embittered executive, the act had become even harder to perpetrate. The truth had become more difficult to confine.
When he’d asked her who she really was... Her throat had ached with restraining a plea for him to see her. Take a hard look past his preconceptions and reallyseeher. The need to inform him that he wasn’t the only victim of her father’s blackmail clawed at her. But she’d glanced around the empty classroom, envisioned how it’d appeared only minutes earlier, packed with excited kids safe from the dangerous lures of the streets, learning and having a ball.
And she’d remained silent.
