Devon Read online

  Why am I involved to this extent? So much that I would dare to barge into his personal bedroom? I expected to get an eyeful, but an earful from him, too?

  I’m only here because his mother asked me to try and persuade him to come. She has been suffering during the last eighteen months, ever since Devon and Damion quit talking to each other. They have not been together in the same room for eighteen months. Since before Dayshia was born. Devon didn’t attend her birth. He saw her a few times, but only when his mother took Dayshia to Vancouver to visit Devon.

  Everyone is growing weary of the ongoing sibling war.

  Their feud is known to all. Devon had a girlfriend, Ireena, who later cheated on him with Damion. She left one twin for the other, and she got pregnant. The child was Damion’s and… well… what more needs to be said? How does one adequately explain the ick factor on that? Sure, Damion bears every bit as much responsibility for the betrayal as Ireena, but there was a unique, ceaseless doggedness with which Ireena pursued Damion, and she did so right under Devon’s nose. Yet Devon failed to notice until it was far too late. Damion also failed to grasp how his decisions would affect his brother and result in him making all the wrong choices. In my book, he paid the ultimate price—something which Devon doesn’t yet see—when he chose to marry Ireena. Even if she did provide half the DNA to create the most precious baby, those are the only kudos I can give that woman. She isn’t fit to clean the soles of either twin’s shoes, in my opinion. But neither of them ever asked my advice. So here they are: screwed up. Not talking and completely breaking their family’s hearts.

  And I was elected to drag Devon to his niece’s birthday.

  “I think you can be a better person than either of them. She’s just a baby. She isn’t going anywhere and neither are your parents or your grandparents, and they all miss you. How long do you intend to punish them for what Ireena did?”

  “They. Don’t try to pretend that Damion wasn’t equally as involved as Ireena.”

  “She set out to do it. He didn’t.”

  “Claudia…?” His tone drags out my name as he shakes his head and leans against the counter, slouching his shoulders forward. “Why does this matter so much to you?”

  “Your mom asked me to talk to you.”

  He sighs. I know he has a hard time defying his mom or her advice. His nature has always been competitive, difficult, and exacting, but he is also incredibly close and connected to his family as well as Silver Springs in general. He glances back at me. “She really shouldn’t drag you into this. But I doubt she expects you to come into my bedroom. Especially unannounced.”

  “There was no other way of getting to you. You ignored all my calls and texts and when I stopped by, you never answered the door. Does that sound about correct?” I put my hands on my waist, jutting my elbows out for emphasis in my scolding of him.

  “When will you find a life that doesn’t include babysitting me?” he grumbled.

  I want to bite my tongue. He ranges from red-hot anger to abysmal sadness. The depth of his depression nearly breaks my heart. He is quiet and rarely says anything about what happened last year, but all the acting out, which I see in his sleeping around with strangers, infects the rest of his behavior.

  I fist my hands methodically to ignore his intentionally inflammatory words. That’s what he expects from me. He wants me to overreact. He likes to goad me because it seems to give him more fodder to continue projecting his cynical attitude. I’ve had enough of Devon Willapana over the past year-and-a-half, and now I literally want to kick him. Not metaphorically, no. Right now, I dream of swinging my leg back as far as I can and smacking his shin or his knee or better yet, his groin. I mean it this time. I imagine myself kicking him hard if only to alleviate my own anger that he incites deliberately.

  “Get dressed, Devon. I swear to God, I’ll get you fucking fired if you don’t attend your niece’s birthday today.”

  He stops dead in his tracks. His entire body jolts upright and his shoulders tighten; even his butt cheeks clench. Sucking in a deep breath, he slowly turns around to face me. His jaw clamps tight, and I know I pissed him off. The thing is that he’s been pissing me off for a very long time. I can take a lot, but I refuse to allow him to take it out on little Dayshia.

  Being long-time family friends, I grew up following Devon and Damion around. I was always wanting to play and hang with them when I visited my Aunt Tara and Uncle Ryder during the summers. It was something I always looked forward to. I’ve had a crush on him since I was about five and yet… I’m technically his boss.

  It’s rare for me to point it out. Rarer still when I act on it. After all, I’m usually the chipper, nice, smiling person I continually try to tone down. But this? Taking an adult mistake, problems, and emotions out on a baby? I can’t abide it for a second.

  My dad, Tristan Tamasy, owns the corporation where Devon and I are both employed.

  My parents don’t speak to the rest of the Tamasy family. Not until I was older did I learn the truth. My parents started their corporation years ago, before they were married when my dad left his family. He worked for his grandfather and his dad in a multi-generational corporation. He had to leave his family. Unlike Devon, who chose to.

  My dad’s brother raped my mom, and the family sided with his brother. So… yeah, he doesn’t see his parents anymore, and his grandfather died a long time ago. There is no contact with the rapist or his family now, other than Tara Kincaid, my dad’s sister, the last link to Silver Springs, and why I spend so much time with Tara. Having no girls of her own, she is always so gracious and welcoming to my two sisters and me. But that isn’t the only reason I love being here; a lot of it has to do with the Willapana twins, who were my friends. My cousin Wyatt is so much older than me, and Wesley joined the family later, but he is the same age as Wyatt. So for me, the twins were my general orbit.

  “That’s a shitty thing to threaten.”

  “No threat. I mean it. If you can’t grow up and be an adult about this, then I can’t have you at work.”

  My stomach churns in knots.

  “You can’t hold me hostage. I can work other places.”

  “You can. But don’t forget about your hefty mortgage and car payment right now.”

  Will his jaw shatter? I wonder. He’s clenching it so tightly. He wants to mutter something rude in reply. But he jerks around and heads toward the bedroom, slamming the door on me.

  I grip the edge of the counter and breathe heavily. Oh, my God, I’m being such a bitch. I’m sure that’s what he intended to say to me, and I deserve it. Totally. I’m not often like that. But he’s been a prick too many times to count, and now he is trying to project it onto Dayshia. If he wanted to annoy Ireena, I support that. But not this way. Not through the baby. Not at the expense of his entire family either.

  It doesn’t feel so good to do this part.

  But he knows as well as I do that I can’t and won’t get him fired. Our jobs are integrally linked. My dad’s the managing boss, not me. Dad wouldn’t listen or care if I advised him to fire Devon for no reason, something which Devon should freaking know I would never really do anyway.

  I took an entry-level job when I was twenty and right out of college. I’ve worked there ever since even while earning my master’s degree. Yes, my last name is the same as the owner so there is no denying the nepotism happening there. But Devon was hired, too. He asked my dad for a job. We’re like the spoiled kids who got put in charge, and we both happen to have the right degrees for the positions. The thing is, we’ve earned our lofty status. Together, we have increased the profits of our branch significantly, and most of our coworkers have grown to respect us and accept us as legitimate employees.

  Devon eventually emerges from the bathroom, showered and dressed in jeans and a white, button-down shirt. I feel jittery because he looks so appealing to me. It’s hard not to stare at him, but he won’t even look at me. I slide off the barstool and wander over to glance out the windo
ws overlooking the river while trying not to freak out. My stomach is still in knots over what I said to Devon today.

  I wonder why he never seems nervous or concerned about me? Or doesn’t seem to care what I saw in his bedroom today? How often I’ve seen him like that and yet, I’m still here as his friend. I can’t count all the hangovers he’s endured when I came over to take care of him. And all the times I covered for him with his family. But does he ever take notice of all the unconditional effort on my end? No.

  He picks up his keys, and I naturally assume he’s driving us. Will he take me along with him? I press my lips together and can’t just assume that. But it is stupid if we don’t ride together. We’re going to the same location, a good forty minutes up the valley.

  He doesn’t acknowledge me but stomps out the front door. I scurry after him, grabbing my purse strap as I fly through the hallway, trying to catch up with him.

  He’s close to the small parking garage when I reach him. I’m winded since he’s going so fast. As he ducks into his two-seater sports car, I grab the passenger handle and pull on it. He doesn’t even lift his head. He doesn’t seem to realize I’m there as he flops into his seat. It’s a low, sleek car, designed to look as expensive as it is. The payments on this flashy set of wheels make me shudder. I’m a saver. I’m always frugal, and I don’t like to spend money. Especially on things like a vehicle—it’s simply four wheels to me. My base model sedan will get me to my destination just as surely as his pricey sports car.

  He reverses and then peels out of the parking lot, his wheels screeching as he hits the clutch and goes through several gears before rocketing down the quiet two-lane street. I roll my eyes. Could he be more dramatic? Or more typical? He might as well be flashing his dick in public with his juvenile, show-off stunts. Just wait until he receives the speeding ticket for this. I harrumph my disapproval. I hope he gets caught. Please. He completely deserves it, doesn’t he? Maybe then he’d quit being such an ass to me.

  Miles drift by and his icy treatment starts to annoy me. I’m not used to it, and I hate it. No, I detest it. I avoid confrontation and especially with someone I truly care about. That’s the rub: I care about Devon very much, despite his less than stellar behavior on this day.

  “Are you going to talk to me?”

  “You don’t want to hear what I have to say to you.”

  I lean forward and turn my knees away from him as I stare out the passenger window. I fight the urge to outright scold him. He was in the wrong, not me. How dare he treat me like this.

  But then again, Devon has been like this since he discovered the woman he was dating, Ireena Monroe, had been hooking up with his twin brother. The day it became known to Devon is permanently etched into my brain.

  He and I were together, which wasn’t unusual. We always hung out together, especially after I moved to Portland to attend college. On most of the weekends and holidays, it was expected and natural for me to spend my leisure time with the Willapana family.

  I went to school with Ireena. She is two years older than me, but we had several business classes together. She took five years to graduate, and I graduated in only two. I was always an overachiever. She and I were not very good friends but only acquaintances for a long time. We grew closer during a class when we worked on a project together. It required quite a bit of extracurricular time, so we became friendlier and eventually started going out to dinner or drinking or dancing. She is extremely beautiful. Standing five-foot-ten on her bare feet and weighing less than I do at five-foot-three, her legs reach up to my ears. They are as long and slim as pencils. She has dark, olive skin, and her black hair ends at her waist. Her face is perfectly symmetrical with high cheekbones, a long, slender nose, and deep-set black eyes. She always wears red lipstick, her signature color.

  Devon often came over to my school apartment and knew we were working on our project. I once told Ireena about the guy I liked, Devon. When I introduced them, I remember she had an odd smile. Her gaze looked predatory.

  I’d never been with Ireena around a man before that, and she wasn’t half as talkative or kind to me. She was friendly as we’d began to know each other better, but the minute a guy entered the equation, she was a different person. She was suddenly all deep, sultry laughs and full of suggestive questions. They were all directed at Devon, and she used the appropriate hair flips and eye flutters to enhance her interest. I watched Devon growing enchanted with the attention she gave him. I knew at once he was enthralled with her.

  She knew I liked him. Yes, she also had every right to date Devon, despite my crush. Duh. I thought she was my friend, but she didn’t even once seem to care that it might hurt me. She proceeded to say cutting, sarcastic things about me and liked to remind me as often as possible that she got him, and he never even noticed me.

  They dated for three years. I said nothing when I saw them groping each other the night they started sleeping together, which she later recounted to me in gruesome detail. I saved my sanity by cutting off my friendship with Ireena, except when Devon was involved. But they still dated.

  So I was still hanging out a lot with Devon and Damion. The day Devon found out the truth, I was inside his apartment. He had a small studio and Damion had asked to come over. He assumed, I can only guess, that Devon was alone. But Damion came over quite often, so it was not a big deal to either Devon or me.

  When Damion came over to tell Devon the worst thing a brother could say to the other, it was a pivotal day. Damion walked into the apartment, but he didn’t smile. There was no greeting or casual hello. Odder still, Ireena was right behind him. They arrived together, which surprised me. She acted fine, normal. There wasn’t anything different about her expression, actions, or even how she said hello to Devon.

  “What are you guys doing?” the innocent Devon asked. “Did you run into each other?”

  “Yeah.” Damion answered. “Can we sit? We need to talk.”

  Damion’s mouth was bracketed with stress lines, and his jaw went rigid. Something was wrong. It was as obvious to me as my own hand. Devon flopped down on the chair across from the couch since that’s all the seating there was. I sat on the bean bag chair that was beneath the only window. Sitting upright now, I felt sure something wasn’t right. When I glanced at Devon, he didn’t seem to notice.

  Damion sat on the very edge of the couch cushion, with his butt only half perched on it. His knees were bent and bounced up and down relentlessly. He stared down at his hands, which he clasped between his legs.

  “What’s up? You guys want to go out tonight?”

  Oh, poor Devon. He was not getting it. But even I wasn’t sure what it was. Ireena flopped back on the couch, crossing one leg over the other, putting her arm on the armrest and the other along the back of it. She faced Damion and fastened her eyes on him. Yet he never once glanced her way. An ominous sense of foreboding filled my guts.

  “No. We… we really have to talk. It’s bad. Really bad,” Damion admitted.

  Devon became visibly somber as he noticed his brother acting so strange. “What is it?”

  Damion glanced up only once, studying his brother’s face before losing his nerve and dropping his gaze down. He rubbed his hands together. “We did run into each other. At Planet X a few weeks back.”

  Planet X was a dance club that catered to the college crowd, but sometimes, we all went there, too. “Yeah, the night I had to work.” Devon originally signed on with another corporation after college and later on, he decided to ask my dad about becoming an employee for Tamasy.

  “Right.” Damion ran a hand over his head. Nerves made his hands shake. I all but gulped at seeing what Devon was too blind to see. They fucked. “Uh… yeah, we ran into each other and hung out and all that. Had some drinks… a lot of drinks actually… and one thing led to another… and… fuck!” He ceased his jumbled explanation and dropped his face forward, all but planting it into his own knees.

  Devon was too innocent and trusting to believe what
they were spelling out to him. “Damion, what’s going on?” His tone was deep and quiet, clinging to his faith in his brother and his girlfriend, and never suspecting they fucked behind his back.

  Damion’s head shook, and he never looked up again. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Devon. I’m so fucking sorry.” He muttered it like a chant or a prayer, and I didn’t fail to notice the incredulity and heartbreak in his tone. I really did. But he didn’t. Devon refused to believe his twin.

  “What’s… what are you so, so—” Devon asked, glancing at me, then at Ireena. She stayed silent, the coward. I shook my head, and my eyes grew huge. I wanted to let him figure this out on his own. Then his head shook slowly. “You… you didn’t… no. I mean, no. You two… wouldn’t…”

  “We shouldn’t have. It was a mistake, and I’m sorry… but there’s more… we did it… and… and—”

  “We did it, and I’m pregnant.”

  Ireena leapt in with the precision of a medical scalpel. With six words, she severed the tie that bound the twin brothers. And did she care or realize the damage she inflicted? About as much as if she just informed them she was planning to start a new diet or change her hair color.

  “I’m sorry,” Damion whispered. Head down, he slumped his shoulders and looked so miserable, I almost felt sorry for him.

  Devon just sat there with his mouth half open, shell-shocked. The percussion bomb dropped by his brother stunned him into disbelief and deafness. “No. No. You… she… wouldn’t do that.”

  Oh, God, he was still under the delusion of Ireena Monroe. Yes, she would do it, and she did. The only surprise for me was Damion. Gripping my hands around my knees, I tucked them to my chest, feeling so uncomfortable. I really shouldn’t have been here.