Devlin's Grace (19 page)

Devlin snorted. “It’s Black
Friday, babe, so I have to be there, busiest damn day of the year.
 
Besides, I’ve missed too much work already.”

“What about the weekend?”

“I work Saturday and Sunday to
make up for last week,” he said. “It sucks, yeah, but I can’t help it.”

She sighed and he paused. “Wait,
do you want to go shopping? If you want, you can stay here and I’ll come back
for you later.”

“No,” she cried. “I hate Black
Friday, and I don’t give a crap about shopping.
 
I just like being with you.
 
Don’t
you dare try to leave
me.
”

He laughed. “I think I’m
corrupting you, babe.
 
I want you with me
anyway, so let’s get ready to roll.”

After a round of farewells and
hugs, they headed out, first to leave.
 
By the time they rolled down the driveway to the dirt road, full dark
blanketed the Ozarks.
 
Gracie scooted
across the front seat to snuggle close against Devlin.
 
Night brought cooler temps, and she
appreciated his warmth.
 
Part of her hated
to leave her folks, but she’d rather be with Devlin.

“It turned out to be a good day,”
she said with a yawn as they reached the highway.

“Yeah, it did,” Devlin answered.
“Better than I thought.”

Gracie nodded. “I’m glad the
shooting didn’t bother you.
 
I think you
impressed them with what a good shot you are.”

Devlin chuckled.
“Maybe.
You sound sleepy, Gracie.”

“I am.”

“Go to sleep.
 
I’ll wake you when we get home.”

Content and relaxed, she sighed.
“Okay.”

Drowsiness crawled over her
consciousness, heavy and thick.
 
Gracie
slept until Devlin said her name with urgency.
 
She pushed through the layers of sleep as he said it again, sharper this
time.

“Gracie!”

“What is it?”

“Hang on, babe, hang on tight,”
Devlin said.
 
His tone sounded serious.
“There’s about to be an accident.”

She woke fully fast. “What are
you talking about?”

Even as she asked, an eighteen
wheeler roared down the on ramp from the James River Freeway to shoot past them
at full speed.
 
Devlin slowed as it
passed and eased the car onto the green median, a grassy strip between the oncoming
lane and their own.
 
The Ford bumped over
the rougher terrain as Devlin brought it to a stop.

“The truck’s out of control,” he
said. “I wanted to get us out of the way.”

Just ahead, the red taillights of
the big rig swung in wild arcs and Devlin shouted. “No!”

Gracie watched with horror as the
truck caught up to a mini-van driving at the speed limit.
 
Without ever slowing, the rig struck the back
of the van and spun it around.
 
The sound
of the impact boomed loud, followed by the eerie sound of breaking glass.
 
A woman screamed and as they stared, orange
flames bloomed beneath the hood of the truck, now buried deep into the wreckage
of the mini-van.

“Shit,” Devlin said.

A single figure climbed out of
the passenger side, a woman in a dress hanging past her knees and hair piled
high on her head.
 
She screeched over and
over something Gracie couldn’t make out, but apparently Devlin did.

“Oh, fuck,” he cried. “She’s got
kids in the van.”

Before Gracie could say a word or
react, Devlin thrust the car door open.
 
He ran in a low crouch across the grass, over the pavement where other
vehicles were just beginning to stop, moving straight for the accident. Gracie
realized what he meant to do, and she cried out with wordless horror.
 
“Don’t, Devlin!” She chanted it over and
over.
 
Tears streamed down her face, and
she wrenched the door open so fast she almost fell out onto the grass.
 

Black smoke streamed from the
truck’s engine, and she inhaled the stench of burning oil.
 
Somewhere Gracie smelled diesel fuel, too.
 
“Devlin!”
She
screamed with all the volume she could muster.
“Devlin!”

He paused, fifteen feet away,
halfway to the burning truck. “Stay in the car, Gracie! Go back!”

“I can’t,” she hollered.
“Devlin!”

Devlin turned and sprinted toward
the fire.
 
She ran after him, the soles
of her shoes slapping against the pavement.
 
Fear devoured her, ate her heart and gnawed her belly until it
hurt.
 
By the time she reached ten feet
back from the flames, the heat became so intense she didn’t go forward.
 

Devlin donned a pair of heavy
leather gloves someone handed him and approached the van.
 
On the other shoulder of the road, the woman
screamed about her children while two other onlookers held her in place.
 

With shock and awe, Gracie stared
at Devlin in full Marine mode, battle ready.
 
His lack of fear was apparent and so was his sheer power.
 
He could be a Viking, she thought, in full
berserk, his focus not on death but on saving lives.
 
Somewhere she caught the idea he did it in
atonement.
 
He couldn’t save the little
Iraqi girl, but maybe he could rescue these kids.
 
Dear
Lord, let him do it, please,
she prayed,
but keep him safe.

The rising flames lit the night,
but the smoke drifted, blocking Gracie’s vision.
 
Through the moving black shadows, she watched
Devlin jerk open the back door of the van.
 
He hauled out a little boy, maybe five years old, who ran to his
mother.
 
Devlin climbed into the rear
seat as Gracie wept.
 
She couldn’t find
words to pray, and her brain refused to think coherent thoughts.
 
Somewhere she heard a woman shrieking, and
realized it was her.
 
She was the one
making the steam whistle sounds and tried to stop.

“It’s gonna blow,” shouted one of
the men standing safely at the side of the road. “That idiot better get out of
there.”

“He’s saving her baby,” a woman
cried. “He’s a hero.”

No
, Gracie thought,
he’s my Devlin and he’s going to die.

Unable to bear the thought, she
moved closer, face burning and choked on the fumes.
 
Through the swirling smoke Devlin emerged
with a crying baby clutched against his chest.
 
He stumbled as he careened away from the vehicle and she wept with
relief.
 
He’ll
make it
, she
thought, triumphant.
He’ll make it
.

He wasn’t five feet away from the
vehicles when the explosion roared through the night, the sound like the great
cry of a wounded beast.
 
The force of it
knocked Gracie to the ground and she screamed.
 
So did others and their cries filled the night with terror.
 
By the time she sat up, the flames shot
skyscraper high toward the clouds, and the red lights of a dozen police cars
turned the scene crimson.
 
Two ambulances
skidded up, sirens blaring and stopped on the median.

Gracie, knees skinned where she
hit the pavement, came to her feet. She peered through the swirling smoke and
the terrible fiery light, but she didn’t see Devlin anywhere.
 
Someone walked the mother toward one of the
ambulances, a blanket draped over her shoulders, her son clinging to her legs,
the baby in her arms.
  
People
talked,
their voices strident and shocked. She struggled to
focus, to understand what they said.

“Dead by God,” a man said. “Poor
bastard never had a chance.”

Snatches of conversations and
stray words reached her in a jumble.
 
“Hero…dead…brave…Marine…burned…died…”
The disjointed words plagued her until she thought she’d die.
 

If Devlin died, she’d die too,
right here on this road.
 
Gracie pushed
through the crowd, which seemed to increase by the minute, but she didn’t see
him anywhere.
 
At some point fire trucks
made the scene.
 
She didn’t remember
their arrival, but they spewed water over the flames, taming them down.

In her confusion, she got turned
around and ended up way behind where the car remained on the median.
 
Gracie worked her way back, slowly, knees
burning and the acrid smoke searing her throat.
 
Tears blinded her and her heart clenched into a tight ball of pain.
 
The more time that passed without finding
Devlin eroded her hope, but she pressed onward.

 
At the car, she looked inside but it remained
empty.
 
Gracie stood by the open door and
stared at the burning wreckage, unable to breathe.
  
Behind her, footsteps approached across the
grass, but she didn’t move or bother to look.
 
Devlin must be dead.

“Gracie?” At the sound of her
name, spoken in a hoarse, broken voice, she whirled around to find Devlin.
 
His eyes reflected the hellish scene.
 
Black grime coated his face, but clear tracks
marked where his tears trailed down.
  
Something didn’t seem right about his face,
and she noticed his eyebrows were gone, singed away in the fire.
 
He took a step toward her and limped,
favoring his right knee.
 
Bedraggled,
injured, and dirty, nothing she’d seen could be as beautiful as Devlin in this
moment.

“Ohhh.”
She moaned with wonder, and he
opened his arms and folded her against him.
 
Gracie clung to him, tight, and he held her in a viselike grip.
 
He talked into her ear, his voice strained
and smoke-choked, but she listened.

“Jesus, I couldn’t find you,” he
said. “Why in hell didn’t you stay put? Are you all right?”

Trembling, she struggled to find
her voice but when she did, it warbled, unsteady. “I skinned my knees but
that’s all.
 
Oh, Devlin, Devlin, you’re
alive.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said, with a grin
breaking through his grim expression.

Gracie pulled back so she could
touch him.
 
Her fingertips traced the
curve of his face, outlined his nose, and followed his lips.
 
As if she couldn’t believe it any other way,
Gracie ran her hands over his body to find it intact.
 
“Are you hurt?” she asked.

“Not much,” he said.
 
“I thought I’d die when I couldn’t find you,
but you’re here.”

Relief turned to anger that he’d
risked his life, then shifted to pride as she realized he’d saved the two
children.
 
Victory over death aroused her
in a way she’d never known before.
 
Every
bit of her body charged with sexual need, and she grabbed him by the
jacket.
 
Gracie pressed her mouth over
his, wild and needy.
 
She bit his lip and
kissed hard, her mouth devouring his in a celebration of life.
 
His body responded and his hard cock pushed
against her leg.

“I want you, Devlin,” she gasped.
“I need you, now.”

He glanced at the emergency
vehicles, the stopped cars, the blocked road, and sighed. “Babe, we can’t
here.
 
Get in and we’ll be home in a few
minutes.”

“How?”

“Watch me.”

 
Too roused to fuss, she did as he asked.
 
They jumped into the car and he drove
straight up the median, past the emergency vehicles and the smoking wreck.
 
Then he pulled back onto the smoother highway
and
rocketed
the car into Springfield.
 
Devlin sped through the familiar streets and
pulled up at the apartment in record time.
 
She bailed out of the car, stumbled, and he picked her up.
 
Devlin carried her inside, unlocking the door
and slamming it shut behind him with one foot.

Gracie stripped away her clothing
and threw it down.
 
Her shoes flew from
her feet, striking the wall in two directions.
 
Devlin came toward her, removed his jacket and she attacked.
 
Her hands clawed his shirt off and raked his
back.
 
Heat rose between them and he
ripped off his jeans.
 
As caught up now
as Gracie, Devlin kissed her, savage and swift.
 
His mouth bit hers and latched on with the force of a snapping
turtle.
 
He drank her mouth and his
tongue forced entry.
 
She tongued him
back then moved her mouth to nibble his throat, her teeth bruising his flesh,
marking him with ownership.
 
Gracie’s
long hair fell between them. She pushed it away, but Devlin’s hands caught in
her curls and pulled her close for another long kiss.