Devlin gasped, and his eyes grew wide. “They really believe you died in a car accident?”
“They have to.” It still rubbed Garrick’s throat raw to think about his family, let alone speak of them. “It’s the only way.”
“God, Denny.”
Garrick slapped his hand over Devlin’s lips in a snap. “It’s Garrick. You can never call me Denny again. If you call me that in private it increases the risk of you slipping up and saying it in public.”
Devlin pried Garrick’s fingers off his mouth. “You’re right. I apologize.” He offered a sweet smile. “Garrick.”
Grinning back, Garrick leaned in and pecked a quick kiss to Devlin’s upturned lips. “Thank you.”
Devlin snuggled back into the pillow, his hands tucked under his cheek. “So how did you end up in Redemption? Are you in witness protection?”
“No.” Garrick chuckled, but it sounded brittle to his ears. “Witness protection couldn’t protect me. The FBI set me up with a new identity in a home fifty miles north of DC. It lasted about two weeks.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed a lump in his throat.
You have to tell him everything, man.
Feeling as if he might throw up, Garrick said, “Thirty-nine days ago a man broke into that house and tried to kill me.”
The blood flooded from Devlin’s face again. He grabbed Garrick and pulled him into a suffocating hold as he whispered, “Shit.”
Garrick clung too, needing this warm body, desperate for someone to know everything and care. “I wasn’t sleeping.” He rasped the words out deliberately, one at a time. “Hadn’t done much of that in years; it was hard to break the cycle. The intruder was good, but I heard him breaking in, and I was ready. We fought. The element of surprise allowed me to kick his gun away, but like I said, he was good, and we tussled around for a long while.” Garrick’s body tensed, as if ready to do battle right now. “Until I finally dropped him and sliced his neck clean through with a steak knife. I killed him, Devlin.” Garrick pulled back. He needed to see Devlin’s eyes--study him--while he told the rest. “I don’t know if I had to, but it doesn’t matter because from the second he broke into my house, before I was even certain he was a hired killer, I knew it would be him or me, and it wasn’t going to be me.”
Every line of Devlin’s face and body remained loose and open, while Garrick was just the opposite.
“Hey,” Devlin caressed Garrick’s cheek with his knuckles, “it was reasonable to assume someone breaking into your house, whom you quickly assessed had a weapon, was connected to your undercover work and there to murder you.”
Jesus Jesus Jesus. He doesn’t understand.
“You have to listen to me.” Garrick grabbed Devlin’s shoulder and shook him. “I didn’t know it was an assassin when I first heard the noise.” Stirred up fears and old emotions seized Garrick’s insides and cramped his belly. “It could have been a kid breaking in on a dare. It didn’t matter to me. I’m so dialed into paranoia from living undercover for so long that I think every noise I hear or every stranger who looks out of place is someone watching me while thinking about how to kill me. In DC, I had already decided to take the intruder out, no matter what. It could have been a completely random stranger not out to harm me at all, for all I knew. Shit,” Garrick’s chest heaved and his voice broke, “if it had somehow been you, I wouldn’t have stopped to look before I gutted you open and let you bleed out on my floor.”
Devlin’s eyes welled up with wetness. He grabbed Garrick into the circle of his arms and held him close. “Baby, you don’t know that.” He rocked Garrick against the solid frame of his body. “You can’t say for certain how you would have responded if it hadn’t become a life or death situation.”
Garrick buried his face in the crook of Devlin’s neck and clung to him with every ounce of his strength. “I don’t know.” Uncertainty--about everything--lived inside Garrick all the time now. “I can still remember how I felt that night. Primal. Like an animal protecting its cub, only I didn’t have a baby anywhere; it was just me.”
Big hands rubbed up and down Garrick’s back, soothing the stirred demons within. Devlin waited, as if sensing when Garrick had settled. He then withdrew, took Garrick’s face in his hands, and held Garrick’s attention with his piercing, pale stare. “It’s called survival instinct.” Devlin’s tone brooked no room for argument. “You’ve worked law enforcement so I know you understand it. It’s pretty powerful stuff. I’ve smelled a whiff of it once or twice during tight spots inside a burning building.”
Devlin’s eyes softened; he brushed the pads of his thumbs back and forth across Garrick’s cheeks--so fucking loving--and Garrick’s breath caught as he fell under Devlin’s spell.
“I understand that it’s going
