“Now I want to dig the bastard up, kill him and then bury him all over again,” Kenan spat, standing in front of the desk. He shook his head, his blue-gray eyes shadowed. “I’m sorry, Cain. About everything.” A muscle ticked along his jaw, and his mouth hardened. “I knew something was off about Gregory Cole. And I’m not going to lie, I had my suspicions about the relationship with Devon. But you only need to be around her for five minutes to realize she’s not like her father. She proved that by going against him to give you the material on your mother.” His voice lowered but didn’t lose the adamant edge. “I know we haven’t been in each other’s lives for very long, but you are my brother. And so I’m going to tell you this—you fucked up by letting her walk away.”
“I didn’tlether walk away,” Cain insisted. “And she was right about one thing. I don’t know if I could trust her. I don’t know...” How to explain that his greatest fear wasn’t losing the company. It wasn’t even leaving his mother exposed to Gregory’s extortion.
It was letting someone in, loving them, and being hurt by them.
It was opening his heart and being deemed unworthy...unlovable. That fear had kept him from committing to anyone or anything except his job. Because the work, the company, he could control. Other people? Their hearts? Hell, his own heart? No.
“If you can’t trust her, then who?” Achilles insisted. “I get it, Cain.” In his eyes, identical to Cain’s, he again saw the shadows that deepened his suspicion about his brother’s past. “But you deserve happiness if any of us do. And she’s it for you. I don’t care how this started, we saw how she looked at you...and how you looked at her. Don’t continue letting your father control and manipulate you from the grave.”
That man has stolen so much from you. Your childhood. Your innocence. Your brothers.
Achilles, Kenan, Devon... They were right. Barron had stolen so much more than his childhood. He’d robbed Cain of his ability to believe in the innate goodness in people. If the man who was supposed to love and protect him had hurt him so deeply, had destroyed his trust, how could he have faith in, depend on, others?
He couldn’t. He could only trust himself.
But not with Devon.
From that first meeting in his mother’s garden, she’d shown him compassion, kindness, humor, given him comfort. Him, a stranger to her at the time.
He’d asked who she really was. The shy, funny woman from the garden? The loyal daughter? The gentle, loving youth coordinator? The passionate lover?
His answer: all of them.
And he loved each one.
God, did he love her.
Maybe he had from the moment she admitted to wondering about the color of his eyes. Or when she’d called out everyone in that god-awful party for being ghoulish when he’d needed comfort.
The exact second didn’t matter. What did was that he’d allowed her to leave him without any intention of brightening his life again.
“I fucked up,” he whispered.
“Yeah, you did,” Achilles agreed, nodding.
“But luckily you have something on your side now that you didn’t before,” Kenan announced.
Cain frowned. “What?”
Kenan spread his arms wide. “Me,” he scoffed.
Achilles snorted, and Cain laughed. An honest-to-God, full-belly laugh from a place that had been locked up tight for so long.
He felt good. He felt...free.
He had his brothers.
Now he had to go find the woman he loved and convince her to give him another chance.
He had nothing to lose, and the world to gain.
Because Devon was his world.
Eighteen
Devon sighed as she entered the lobby of the community center. A fatigued but good sigh. It’d been a long day, but she loved those. Especially now. They tired her out, didn’t leave her time to think. And by the time she arrived home—home now being her apartment in Charlestown—she ate whatever takeout she picked up and dropped into bed.
For the first time, she was on her own—no, that wasn’t true. The past weekend, she’d driven the five hours to New Jersey to spend the weekend with her family. It’d been like stepping back into the past when everything had been innocent and happy. Being with her aunts, uncles and cousins had been a balm to her battered soul. The only hairy moment had been when her aunt had asked about Cain and her father. She’d been so tempted to unload everything. But in the end, she’d just said they were both fine and left it at that. As selfish and, hell, criminal, as her father had been, she didn’t want to tarnish his image in his brothers’ and sisters’ eyes.
