immediately fell back down. What was Mercy thinking? Not only was
Mercy’s waist three times the size of Devin’s, but the pants were a
mile long on him. He would have to roll the bottoms a hundred times
in order not to trip over them.
This wasn’t going to work.
Kicking them aside, Devin walked over to the dresser to find a
pair of either jogging pants or leisure pants. Devin spun around when
the bedroom door opened and Mercy walked in.
They both stood there frozen, Devin having nothing on from his
waist down. His heart was beating so hard that it felt as if it were
trying to escape his chest. Mercy’s eyes slid down, staring at Devin’s
exposed cock.
Devin’s Mercy
59
“Sorry.” Mercy spun around, giving Devin his back, but not
before Devin had seen the lust in Mercy’s dark-grey eyes. “Go ahead
and get dressed.”
Devin quickly grabbed a pair of pajama pants, the easiest thing to
slide on, and then tied the strings tight to hold them up. He bent,
cuffing the pants that were so long that by the time he was done, there
was a heavy weight at his ankles.
“I’m dressed.” His voice was unsteady, sounding a bit squeaky.
Mercy turned, but kept his eyes averted. “You’re needed
downstairs. I caught an intruder in the woods, and he isn’t talking.
Sage wants to see if you can identify him.”
Devin’s knees nearly buckled. He didn’t want to see any of
Martin’s men. He didn’t want to be reminded of the nightmare he had
survived. He took a step back, rubbing his hands up his arms. “Do I
have to?”
Mercy looked at him then, his eyes full of steel. “He won’t hurt
you, Devin. He’s in the cage.”
That wasn’t what scared Devin.
“Could you take a picture of him and show me?” He was grabbing
for straws and he knew it, but Devin wasn’t willing to face any of
those men.
Mercy’s face softened. “That bad?”
All Devin could do was nod, turning away so Mercy couldn’t see
the humiliation in his eyes. He didn’t want Mercy’s pity. It would
destroy him if the man who he had cared about for so long treated him
like a victim.
“I’ll see what I can do.” Mercy left the room.
Devin took in a shaky breath, praying Mercy would show him a
picture instead, and dreading even seeing the face on a still frame. He
wanted to put his abuse behind him, not be reminded of it.
His head snapped up a few minutes later when Mercy walked
back into the bedroom. He had a cell phone in his hand. Devin felt his
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Lynn Hagen
gut wrench into knots so tight that he felt as if his insides were going
to tear him apart.
“Whenever you’re ready.”
Devin would do this. He would help the men he had once
considered friends. Men he still considered friends even if they had
turned their backs on him. Martin had to be stopped. Charles had to be
killed.
With that thought, anger rose to unyielding heights inside of him.
“I’m ready.” His voice was steadier, determination helping him take a
step toward Mercy.
Hesitating, Mercy finally lifted the phone and showed Devin the
man in the cage. Devin inhaled sharply and then took a step back. As
brave as he had been, seeing the man who had held him down while
Charles…
Devin spun around, knocking the contents on the dresser to the
floor, screaming as he tried to rip the room apart. Every emotion he
had held inside, had tried to lock down, came flooding back to him.
His skin crawled, his head hurt, and he was seconds away from
vomiting.
When two strong arms circled around him, Devin fought like a
madman. “Don’t touch me! Never touch me again!”
But Mercy held firm as Devin crashed through the memories,
reliving them, fighting them, and feeling just as mortified as he had
when it originally happened. He wanted blood. He wanted revenge.
But most of all, he wanted to forget.
He clawed at Mercy’s arms, shouting out his rage. But Mercy
didn’t let him go. “Let it out, Devin.”
Devin bucked, trying to physically fight the memories that
wouldn’t let him rest. He wanted them gone, to no longer plague him,
following him into his sleep.
Finally, his strength dwindled, leaving Devin an open and raw
wound as he slouched in Mercy’s arms. He didn’t want to appear
weak in front of this strong man, but Devin had nothing left to give.
Devin’s Mercy
61
“Let me be your anchor, Devin. Give me your demons so that I
can slay them,” Mercy said softly, but gruffly in his ear. “I’m not your
enemy.”
“Everyone is my enemy,” he finally admitted out loud.
* * * *
Gods, this man was screwed up. Mercy wasn’t sure what he
should do. He’d never been through anything like this and prayed he
didn’t fuck it up. One wrong word and Devin would be lost to him.
He didn’t want that.
“If you don’t trust someone, they’ve won.” Mercy wasn’t even
sure if he should say
they
or
he
. He prayed it wasn’t a
they
.
“They won the moment I couldn’t fight them anymore.”
Mercy closed his eyes, cursing silently at the plural. His arms
tightened around Devin, wishing he could pull the memories from this
man so Devin would no longer suffer. But he couldn’t. The only thing
he could do was try to win Devin’s trust and help him heal.
“You survived, Devin. You’re standing here alive. That’s winning
in my book.”
Devin’s hands curled around Mercy’s forearm. “You believe
that?”
A crack in his armor.
“I do.”
“But…the things…”
“You. Survived.” He emphasized his words with a tighter hold.
“But they won’t leave me alone.”
Another crack. Devin was talking. That was a start.
“Let me handle them from here on out. I won’t let them hurt you
ever again.” It killed something inside Mercy to use the word
them
. It
would have been bad enough if Devin was fighting just one person in
his nightmares, but he wasn’t.
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Lynn Hagen
Devin was quiet for a long moment, and then the one word was
spoken so low that Mercy almost didn’t hear it. “Promise?”
“With my life.”
Releasing Mercy’s arm, Devin reached up and brushed the tears
from his face, clearing his throat. “You can let me go now.”
Mercy didn’t want to. He wanted to keep Devin in his arms where
the man was safest. The feelings were new to him, and Mercy wasn’t
sure what to do with them, but he knew one thing. Devin wasn’t going
to be hurt ever again.
He relaxed his hold, allowing Devin to escape. Mercy’s skin felt
instantly cold. The compulsion to pull Devin back into his arms was
brutal, a fucked-up beat in his body that he couldn’t push away.
Mercy took a step back. “How do you feel?”
“Stupid.” Devin pushed past Mercy and then stopped, staring at
the door as if he had changed his mind at the last minute. Devin
turned, walked back to his cot, and took a seat, glancing around the
room but never settling his blue-grey eyes on Mercy.
“I’ve felt that way once or twice. You know what the cure is?”
Devin finally settled his eyes on Mercy. “What?”
Mercy grinned. “Food. I’ll go get us some.” Because he really was
hungry, but he also wanted to wipe that insecure look from Devin’s
face. Mercy slipped from the room, closing the door behind him and
taking a deep breath. He hadn’t fucked Devin up further. He had no
clue what he was doing, but he hadn’t pushed Devin away.
He didn’t know why he was feeling this way, or what
this
even
was, but Mercy wasn’t going to allow Devin to go this alone. Not
while Mercy had anything to say about it.
He was a lycan, an ex-enforcer, having an unflinching will and
being stubborn to the bone. But Devin was threatening to crush his
loner status. The man was like a slow-acting drug that was inching
through his veins, and Mercy feared becoming addicted to the one
man he had fought to stay away from.
Devin’s Mercy
63
He’s twenty-five, not as young as you thought. What excuse do
you have now?
Devin was damaged. Mercy wasn’t going to take advantage of
that. The man needed a friend, not a lover. Mercy did have his honor,
after all. He would cut off his right arm before allowing his craving to
take root and destroy the little bit of trust Devin had given him.
Mind made up, Mercy walked downstairs to get him and Devin
something to eat. But first, he had to confirm to Sage that the man
being held captive was one of Martin’s men.
Mercy just wasn’t sure if he would leave the basement with the
intruder still alive.
* * * *
Sage paced in front of the cage. It disturbed him that he didn’t
know the man behind the steel bars. He thought he knew all of his
father’s whack jobs. Apparently Martin was recruiting. That thought
chilled him.
That meant Sage wouldn’t be able to identify any threat coming
near him or this house. He knew Martin’s men, could spot them in a
crowd. But if his father was bringing in fresh blood, then they were in
for a fight Sage wasn’t sure he could win. Martin’s numbers were
growing, and that worried him.
His head snapped up when he heard a low whistle. Sage could see
Mercy standing at the top of the steps.
“I’ll be back.” He snarled the warning at the prisoner.
“Take your time,” the man snidely replied.
Gods, what Sage wouldn’t give to be able to swipe the man’s head
from his shoulders. It was tempting, but he needed information, and a
dead man couldn’t talk.
“Devin identified him as one of Martin’s men.”
“I already knew he worked for Martin. What I need to know is if
Devin can tell me who he is, if he has a higher position with Martin.”
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Lynn Hagen
Mercy looked hesitant, something Sage had never seen before. If
anything, Mercy was the epitome of calm steel.
“What’s wrong?”
“Devin is pretty fucked up in the head right now. I’m not going to
push him.”
Sage heard the underlying threat. If he tried, Mercy would take
Devin away. He wanted to demand that Mercy get the information
Sage needed, but since he relinquished his claim of being alpha, he
didn’t have a leg to stand on as far as leadership and hierocracy. It
would undermine what he was striving for, a pack-free town. Whether
Sage liked it or not, he had no choice but to back down.
Which didn’t sit well with him.
“Think about the mates, Mercy. We need to know what we are up
against. I don’t want to go out to that cabin and be outnumbered.
Knowing the odds could be the difference between life and death.”
So, he wasn’t going to back down all the way. But Sage wasn’t going
to walk into a slaughter.
Mercy looked conflicted. Sage was starting to think that maybe
Devin didn’t really have a choice. He never thought the man one
hundred percent on Martin’s side, but in this war, people who he had
once trusted could become his worst enemies. His father would stop
at nothing to achieve his insane goal, even turning longtime friends
against him.
But Mercy was no fool. If he was protecting Devin, then maybe,
just maybe, Devin could be trusted once more.
“Let me see what I can do, but don’t hold your breath. Like I said,
Devin is pretty screwed up right now, and I won’t let anyone hurt him
again.”
Sage mentally took a step back. Since when did Mercy care that
deeply? Sure, he knew the man cared about his friends, but Mercy
was a loner, never before taking on a charity case.
And he had a feeling Devin was anything but a charity case.
“I appreciate anything you can do to help.”
Devin’s Mercy
65
Mercy’s hackles relaxed. “Have you decided when we are going
to strike the cabin?”
Sage shook his head. “I want to charge in there and save those
boys, but I won’t risk you guys. Isaac and Jeremiah are sneaking in
after nightfall tomorrow to get a better idea of what we are up against.
It would be easier to get it from this guy, but he’s not talking.”
“Have you asked Kell to give him something to loosen his
tongue?”
Sage grinned. “I knew we were friends for some reason.” Sage
walked back down the steps, only this time he went over to the side of