That Friday saw Devon back behind the bar, and the house was packed. It took everything she and Nina had to keep the drinks flowing and the customers happy. Somehow word had gotten out that she knew Josh from way back, and most of the women kept trying to get her to talk about him. Women who had never before given her the time of day were suddenly pretending to know her.
It was like high school all over again.
"I've noticed you've made a lot of new friends," Nina said just before closing. Will was sitting at one end of the bar chatting up women but Josh and Kellan were being chatted up.
"Yes, I do, don't I? It must be my winning personality." Devon grinned and winked.
"Did you hear that Josh? Devon has a winning personality," Nina crowed across the bar.
"So I've heard," Josh said with a bored expression.
Nina had been trying to draw Josh out through Devon and it hadn't been working.
"Nina," Devon raised her voice for all to hear. "No one has ever been very successful drawing Josh out through me. Trust me many have tried."
"Hence, all of your new friends." Nina nodded.
"Just like high school," Devon agreed.
"No way, you two went to high school together?" Betty squealed. "Tell us all about Josh in high school." She set a tray on the bar and took a stool. "Tell us something that no one knows, a secret."
Devon had learned that Betty had a massive crush on Josh.
Josh sipped his beer, watching Devon as she wiped glasses and stored them overhead.
Grant joined them at the bar with a kiss for Devon and Nina. "You're in awful close to closing time," Nina said as she handed him a beer.
"Better late than never." He grinned as he took a swig from his bottle. "Besides, I couldn't resist seeing you two."
"Come on Devon, tell us all about high school with Josh, what was he like?" Betty urged.
"Yeah, did he have pimples or was he a fat kid." Will laughed. "I've been trying to get some dirt on Josh for over a month." He slapped Josh on the shoulder, "All Devon will say was that if it was something that you wanted people to know you would tell them yourself."
Devon had noted that there was some tension between Will and Josh, and it seemed to be getting worse. Will was always trying to pick a fight with Josh but Josh wouldn't acknowledge it.
"Should I share something, Josh?" Devon asked, a playful smile on her lips as she thought about the Josh she had known.
"Just remember, I know just as much about you." Josh smiled back. There was a pause as everyone looked at Josh and his killer smile. She guessed that it rarely made an appearance.
"So, not the principle's wife?" Devon asked innocently.
Josh laughed. "No, please, don't tell that one."
Again there was silence as everyone looked between her and Josh.
"I see the wheels turning in your head Devon. Don't make me tell tales on you." Josh warned.
"There are no tales to tell, Josh." She shrugged. Not unless he wanted to tell everyone about Bree and most everyone knew about that.
"Oh, I can think of one or two, Firefly," he said in a low voice that only she could hear since she was standing right in front of him, and it made Devon's mind race back to a kiss and a treehouse. She managed to play it cool but barely.
"Well, there is something." Devon hesitated for dramatic effect. She knew the knowledge that she was about to impart would make Josh even more desirable than he already was, if that was possible.
"What!" Betty all but shouted.
"Josh is an excellent piano player." Devon watched Josh as he frowned he hadn't been expecting that.
"Oh, Josh! Play something, please!" Betty begged, pulling on his arm.
"Go ahead," Nina said, curiosity getting the better of her. The piano was on the stage at the far end of the bar. There were a few lights but it was dim. Only a few patrons remained in the bar to witness Josh's show.
Josh could play by ear as well as read music. As a child, when she had been sick, he would put her on the couch in her parent's house and play all of her favorite songs. She was warmed by the memory as she turned away from Josh's broad form while he was lead to the stage by Betty.
He sat at the piano and all eyes were on him, except Devon's. Devon continued to put the glasses away, waiting to hear what song he would choose. He used to always start with her favorite and then move on to something fun, but she had already come to realize that she didn't know him anymore, so maybe he would choose something else.
His fingers ran over the keys checking out the cords, and then he launched into her favorite just as he always had, Debussy, Claire de Lune. She paused but didn't turn around. Everyone was looking at Josh and not her so she wiped the tear that had escaped.
Nina didn't miss it though as she approached her and helped her with the glasses. "He's the one," she whispered as she put her arm around her shoulders giving her a quick squeeze. "I always wondered who it was, and I must say I'm not disappointed."
Devon took a few moments to gain control and then turned around to see Betty sitting next to Josh at the piano as his fingers flew across the keys. She used to sit next to him just like that and rest her head on his shoulder, but those days were long gone.
He played for a few more moments and then stopped, stepping away from the piano. His eyes met Devon's as he sat at the bar and he tipped his beer bottle towards her.
"Where did you learn to play like that?" Nina asked, popping the till.
"My mother insisted." Josh drained his beer.
"But you don't do everything your mother insists on, do you? Otherwise, you'd be married to Devon's sister," Will said, a few beers past the brain to mouth filter.
Devon was mortified. She had told Will that before she knew the lay of the land, and now he was using it against Josh to embarrass him.
"No Josh is safe," Devon said the first thing that popped into her mind to take the attention off Josh.
"How's that?" Betty asked with a look of concern.
"Josh and I never dated, so she doesn't have the least bit of interest in him." Devon met Josh's gaze, at a loss as to what he was thinking. It was probably; here we go again, Devon with her sob story about her sister stealing all of her boyfriends.
Grant laughed. "That's true enough. Don't fall into that trap, trust me I did the girl's a-"
"That's enough for you Grant," Nina said as she took his bottle and moved to help him away from the bar.
Grant's outburst seemed to break up their little party, and everyone started to make their way home. Devon finished helping Nina who had very little to say and then left to make the short journey home.
She entered her apartment without turning on the lights, kicked off her shoes, let down her hair, took off her jacket, and had begun on the top buttons of her blouse when a light in the corner turned on and Josh was sitting under it.
"Jeeze Josh, you scared me!" Devon stopped on her blouse and plopped down on the couch across from him.
"Do you always undress by the front door?" he questioned.
"Generally, why?" she answered not really thinking about the oddness of the question.
"I appreciate you trying to save me tonight but I could have managed on my own," Josh said, changing the subject.
"You know, I should be mad that you're in my apartment without being invited, but," she shrugged, "you used to sneak into my room as a teenager all the time. I guess it's not really much different."
"It is when you undress by the front door." She could hear the amusement in Josh's voice.
"Betty seems to like you a lot, do you like her?" It was a question that proved she was jealous, and Devon sat up as the words left her mouth, realizing that she had once again given too much away. "Forget I asked that. It's none of my business." What was with her? She was saying all of the wrong things like a nervous school girl.
"I felt I needed to say something because I was the one who handed the information to Will at our first meeting, prior to my knowing how tense things were between you two." Devon returned to his previous statement with an explanation as to why she felt the need to intervene.
"Persine dated you and then Bree?" Josh asked, watching her closely.
"Mmmm," Devon said closing her eyes suddenly tired. "Why, does it matter?"
"Yes, it means you didn't sleep with him." Josh's voice was low and gruff.
Devon's eyes flew open, and she turned to look at him. Was he jealous too? Was this an admission that he was? "Does that matter?" she asked.
"Yes." He looked grim as if he wasn't pleased with the answer.
She debated asking why it mattered in an attempt to get him to admit his feelings, but games had never worked with Josh, so it was time for the direct approach. "It matters to me who you may or may not have slept with too, but why can't we give into it? Why do we have to fight it?"
"Too many reasons." Josh looked resigned.
"Is this why you've avoided me for ten years? Because you never wanted to have this conversation?" She had waited for him for ten years. She was twenty-nine years old, too old to keep waiting.
"Partly, and partly because it's easier to just stay away. I don't have to answer questions."It sounded incredibly selfish to Devon.
"Who else knows you're a SEAL, and why aren't you screaming it from the rooftops. You should be proud of the fact." Devon tried another tactic to draw him out relying on his pride.
"I am proud of the fact, but I like my privacy, and Mother would worry. The only one who knows, other than you, is my father, and that's in case anything happens." Josh lifted up the curtain from next to his chair and peered out of the window. His grey eyes skimming the neighborhood. How many times had he been in a war zone and done that same thing? It seemed to be almost habit the way he did it; as if it was a reflex.
"You knew ten years ago this was the path you were going to take." It was a statement, not a comment. "You could have told me then, I would have supported you." Devon's voice was a whisper.
"I don't doubt that," he stood, "but once with you would never have been enough, and I didn't want to ask you to wait for me. That wouldn't have been fair."
"Yet I did anyway." Devon missed Josh's look of frozen shock as she sat up rubbing her face. "I'm tired, I think it's time to say goodnight."
"Devon, would you repeat what you just said." His teeth were clenched.
"I'm hungry, are you?" she asked over her shoulder, mortified at what she had just said and not ever going to repeat it. Hoping he would let it go, she entered her bedroom.
Keeping her mind busy she made plans so she wouldn't have to think about what she had just said. She would make herself a quick meal before she went to bed. She planned to have a lazy Saturday.
She pulled off her clothes and slid into an old pair of flannel pajama bottoms and a sweatshirt with San Diego splashed across the front. Letting her hair down she shook it out messaging her scalp as she walked back into the living room.
Josh had done his disappearing act again, but for once she was glad. Afraid that if he had stayed she would have said more than she should.
When Josh played the piano and she had cried at his song choice, Nina had known. She knew he was the one that she had been holding out for, so did Grant. They had been her friends since college and they knew her better than most. They had always known that there was someone, but she would never say who. Funny that as soon as they met Josh and saw her with him, they knew.
She thought she had it finally figured out though, to him the attraction was not worth the headaches it would cost to follow through and act on it, but she couldn't agree. She thought it would be worth any price to be held in his arms. She shook her head lost in the thought of it. Her mind creating memories that had yet to be made.
*******
Josh slammed the door to his apartment, cursing himself. He had no idea what had made him lay in wait for her as he had. It had taken every ounce of his willpower to turn on the lamp and not let her continue to undress. He was only a man after all. A man that had wanted Devon Tatum for as long as he could remember. He stomped to the fridge and pulled out a cold beer, downing it as fast as he could and then reached for another one.
"Trouble?" Kellan asked from across the room where he sat at a table working. He had been staying with Josh for the past year since his marriage had ended.
Which, in its self, should be a great reminder of why people who did what they did shouldn't get married or have serious relationships. Josh threw himself down on the couch and leaned his head back letting Devon's last statement roll through his mind. Had he heard her correctly, had she said she had waited for him, and if that was what she said, what exactly did it mean?
Kellan rose and got himself a beer before joining him on the couch.
"I'm guessing it's the gorgeous redhead across the hall with the legs that stop at her neck and the great rack. Why don't you just get you some and get it out of your system? Unless you've already been there and done that and once wasn't enough." Kellan was being much crasser than he usually was and, had Josh not been so frustrated by the situation, he would have known that his friend was testing his reaction.
"That's enough, Hilliard!" Josh said before taking another swig of his beer. "I have never 'been there and done that' as you so poetically put it, and she has been a family friend since we were kids. I shouldn't think of her like that."
"But you do?" Kellen arched an eyebrow.
Josh remained silent letting that be his answer.
"Since you're not gonna make a move, can I?" Kellan was testing the situation again.
"No." Josh's answer was low and menacing.
The thought of her with any other man was driving him nuts. He never believed he could be so jealous. He never had been in the past. Granted, in the past, she hadn't been a woman who could take on a room of elite fighting men and not bat an eye, she wouldn't have been able to tend a bar and deflect unwanted advances with such skill that the person being rejected had no clue it was happening, or flirt back if that was her choice.
She had been telling him the truth when she had said that she was a different person away from her family. "What on earth is wrong with all the dumbass men who have chosen Bree over her?" Josh hadn't realized that he had spoken aloud.
"Who's Bree?" Kellan asked, watching his friend.
"She's Devon's sister?" Josh explained.
"Yes. the one you're supposed to marry right?" Kellan nodded.
Josh groaned. "That's a recent development, at least for me. Devon said it's been the plan of the Smothers for years. How I didn't figure it is beyond me."
"The Smothers?" Kellan asked.
"That's what we call our mothers."
"How appropriate. Is that why you never told your mother what you do for a living because she smothers you?" Kellan was using his shrink voice.
"Don't try to use your new-found skills on me. I don't need your psychobabble." Josh rolled his beer cap through his fingers. He was proud of his friend for getting his Masters in Psychology and continuing to strive for his Doctorate, but he had set down hard limits about his trying to psychoanalyze him for practice.
"If I was a teenage boy and Devon was living next door to me, I don't think I would have been aware of anybody or anything else, so the fact that you missed the bigger game plan that was being designed by your mother doesn't surprise me. What does your mother think you do for a living any way?" Kellan looked at his friend.
"Nothing," Josh said around a mouth full of beer.
"Nothing?" Kellan looked confused, but at Josh's distracted look he decided not to pursue the subject as he silently waited in case his friend wanted to talk. Josh wasn't a talker by any stretch. He was known as the quiet and stoic one in the group. He was good at listening but kept to himself. While other men on their team were talking about their exploits, in all things, Josh remained silent, which was probably why he was such a great leader. He never made it about himself and he never lost his cool.
"Ten years, I managed to avoid the woman for ten years. I could kill Will." Josh's outburst contradicted every thought Josh had just had.
"Why on earth have you avoided her?" Kellan was truly perplexed that he would avoid such a woman.
"If I had some of her I'd have to have all of her all of the time, and that's not possible with what we do, but it especially wasn't possible ten years ago, so I left and didn't look back." Josh was frowning.
"And you and she...?" Kellan hinted.
"No, I couldn't do that to her." Josh shook his head.
Kellan nodded. "You love her."
Josh slumped into the couch. "A regular Einstein aren't you," he said, not bothering to deny it.
"She's an impressive woman. What she did with that video footage was total skill." Kellan ignored Josh's smartass comment.
"Yes, it was, especially when you consider she had no clue I would be there that day." It was as if Josh resented having to agree with Kellan's statement that Devon was a strong woman.
"You're serious? She didn't know you were a SEAL either? She walked into that cold." Kellan sounded even more impressed.
Josh watched as his friend absorbed that piece of information. Disliking himself a little bit more for the assumptions he had been making about Devon for the past ten years.
"That's even more impressive. I had no clue, she played it cool enough. Why didn't Persine tell her?" Kellan's eyes darted to Josh at the mention of Persine.
Josh shrugged, "No clue, but it wasn't easy for her. I caught her throwing up in the bathroom afterward." Josh had a flash of Devon's drawn face as she had exited the stall. The fact that she had held it together amazed him.
"We've all been ordered to take her class next week. I found out this afternoon." Kellan informed Josh.
Josh closed his eyes and rubbed his face. "Why can't they just send us somewhere for six months instead?"
"Since when were you a runner?" Kellan rose and moved back to his table.
"When it comes to Devon its flight or fight and I don't think I'd win the fight." Josh stood and moved to his room. "Speaking of running, I'm going for one."
"Good idea. Need company?"
"No thanks." Josh was going to try and outrun her words and the fact that she had been waiting for him for the past ten years. The fact that she hadn't intended to tell him that little detail was evident when she wouldn't repeat it, but he wished to God that she hadn't said it.