“Isn’t that what a man who is now in his late thirties and unmarried wants to hear?”
My lips thin. “Not with you, Abbie.”
“Just sex, Gabe.” She grabs my shirt, fingers balling the cotton, her eyes on my chest, and even after all that time at the shelter she smells sweet, soft, tempting. “Just sex,” she repeats, and there’s almost a desperation to her that I understand a bit too well. I was in her state of mind. I was in a time in my life when I was wounded and I felt like everything was spinning around. To a time when “just sex” gave me security. It also walled me off, shut me down, and did so in a way I’m not letting her wall off.
“Not happening, Abbie baby. It’s too late for that.”
She presses against my chest and looks up at me. “Too late for what?”
“Just sex. That ship already sailed.”
“We’ve known each other a day.”
“Your point?” I challenge.
“Gabe—”
I cup her face. “I know you’re scared.”
That sets her off, her eyes flashing with temper. “I’m not scared. You don’t get to make me scared to fit your narrative.”
Every reaction I provoke from this woman tells me a story. This one tells me that her ex was controlling in a way that reaches well beyond his money. “Maybe it’s just me that’s scared.” Her cellphone starts ringing. “That’s probably your mother.” I push off the wall and give her space to take the call.
She checks the number and glances up at me. “It’s her,” she confirms.
“Tell her we’ll go on out to the ranch and check things out. I need to get Dexter.” I leave and she doesn’t stop me, but I don’t expect her to. Not when her mother is going through hell and the bullets seem to be flying.
I round the corner as she says, “Mom. Yes. We’re already in the Hamptons.” I keep walking. If she needs me she’ll get me. I don’t believe there’s any question at this point that I’ll help her.
My walk is short and I enter the desolate front lobby. I find Dexter sitting on the floor in the center of a bunch of empty seats not far from an unmanned counter, with Mia and Grayson kneeling beside him, both holding treats. Such a good serial killer, I think. He lures them in and then goes for the throat, which means I need to act fast. Grayson and Mia are too good to die this easy.
I hurry forward to claim the beast before he misbehaves. “Thanks for the ride and pet sit,” I say “I need to get the pooch to my place.” Grayson stands, helping Mia to her feet, and handing me the leash. “Can we go out to the ranch and make sure we’re ready for the animals?” I ask.
“I’d like to go too,” Mia says, as Dexter paws at me and I obediently pat his head. “I’m also starving.”
Grayson pulls her around the dog and under his arm. “I’ll feed her and we’ll meet you out there in forty-five minutes. I’ll text you the address.”
“Works for me,” I say. “I’m sure it will for Abbie. She’s talking to her mother now and I don’t need the address. I picked up the location while we were at the shelter. I know the Ellisons.”
When we would part ways, Grayson stands his ground. “You hear we’re working on an NFL deal?”
“Holy shit, man,” I say. “Of course, I heard. How can I not hear about something that big? I mean, who buys into an NFL team?”
“It’s not done yet. I never count my chickens until they’re hatched. My pops taught me that. Eric’s looking for a new player to help it close. You and Reid interested?”
Eric being his right arm and best friend who masterminds many of his money-making deals. “Hell yeah, we’re interested.”
“Shoot Eric a text. He’s got a lot going on, but he needs to know you could be a player.”
I pull my phone from my pocket and text Eric. “Done.”
Grayson gives me an approving smile. “Need a ride home?”
“I’ll call a car,” I say. “You two take off.”
Mia hugs me because that’s Mia. “I love that you’re helping her. I love you with her.”
She doesn’t know me all that well, but since I’ve started coming to the Hamptons, I see them often. The truth is, she knows me more than most. I don’t let people know me and she’s a female who I haven’t had sex with who has become a friend. Those women read me a little too well, like my damn sister.
The two of them take off and I take care of a car. Still waiting on Abbie, I bend down to check on Dexter’s state of mind and find myself subject to a tongue bath that ends when we both watch Abbie hurry in our direction. I swear I can feel Dexter’s heart thrum harder with excitement beneath my palm at the sight of her or maybe it’s mine beating faster. Just watching this woman walk, the sexy sway of her hips, has my cock hard but that’s not where it stops. There’s more with Abbie, so damn much more. Every woman who was ever my type could walk by in this moment, they would no longer be my type.
She hugs herself and shivers. “I packed my coat because why wouldn’t I pack my coat?”
“You’ve been on an adrenaline high,” I say. “You weren’t cold. I can grab it for you before we go outside.”
“Thank you. I’d love that.” She bends down to greet Dexter. “How’d he do?”
“Good enough to have him playing nice guy. Grayson and Mia think he’s an angel. I saved them from certain death.”
She laughs. “Where are they now?”
“They went to eat. We need to drop off Dexter at my place and we can do the same if you want before we meet them at the ranch.” I don’t wait for a reply, because I haven’t asked what’s important. “Everything okay with your mother?”
“Yes,” she says, straightening. “She has no idea that we’re being attacked right now.”
“Don’t underestimate your mother. I’m good at snap decisions about people. Your mother is no fool and she’s not filled with the kind of naiveté that dummies out brains.”
“Dummies out brains?” She smiles. “The things you say, Gabe.” Her eyes meet mine and this time she doesn’t cut her stare. This time there isn’t the desperate need to push me away. There’s warmth. The kind I could turn to heat in thirty seconds flat. The kind she’s already turning to heat for me and it didn’t take thirty seconds.
“Yes,” I say. “The things I say.” And I’m thinking about the part where I told her that fucking wasn’t enough.
She steps into me and presses her hand to my chest, and there’s no hiding the way my heart thunders under her palm. “You’re scared?”
It was one of those vulnerable admissions that I don’t make and haven’t allowed myself to think about since I made it. I mold her to me. “You scare the hell out of me, woman, but I can’t seem to care. And don’t ask why. Not here. Not now.”
“You’re scared but I’m the one who feels like I’m going to end up hurt.”
“That’s just another way of saying you’re scared.”
“Okay then. Yes. You scare the hell out of me, Gabe.”
We stand there in the vacant sitting area of the airport, the dog by our feet, emotion pulsing between us, seconds ticking by, the next words we say perhaps the most important of our relationship. I cup her face and tilt her chin up. “Want to go get naked?” I say because what I want to define us, is her laughter, her happiness.
She rewards me with a laugh and my soul sings for that sweet, sexy sound. It sings for her. I’m fucking singing for her in all kinds of ways that a man like me should be calling nuts, but I’m not. I’m in deep with this woman, with no regret but I wonder… if she knew my past, would she feel the same?
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Abbie
Gabe grabs my coat from my suitcase without me reminding him and he has now had the hired SUV pull right up to the door. I try to remember a time when Kenneth was that protective and thoughtful, but I can’t. It had to have existed, though. I married the man.
A warm blanket of awareness settles around myself and Gabe as we claim our spots in the back of the hired SUV
with Dexter on the seat next to Gabe. The driver, an older man with a goatee and a strong New York accent, greets us. “I’m Joe,” he announces. “How you doing?” I plan to answer, but then I realize that he’s not talking to us. He’s talking to Dexter, which has me and Gabe sharing a smile.
“Come on up here, pal,” Joe invites, and Dexter, showing no serial killer tendencies at all, happily claims his spot. “We need supplies for that pooch,” Gabe announces. “Can you stop by the store?”
“You got it, man,” Joe says, rubbing Dexter under the chin, while Gabe’s hand comes down on my knee, pulling me closer.
I glance up at him, and we share this look that I can’t explain. It’s connection, attraction, friendship and desire all wrapped up in one. It’s us and I’m finding us to be incredibly addictive.
A few minutes later, we pull into a small grocery store. “I can watch the pooch,” Joe offers, “if you’s like to go on in.”
Gabe glances at me, looking concerned, lowering his voice to speak to just me. “He can get mean.”
I reach up and cup his cheek. “I’ll stay with him. You go buy your supplies.”
“What if he is mean to you?”
I laugh. “I can handle him, I promise.”
He hesitates, but he nods. “I’ll be fast. Where’s your phone?”
“My phone?”
“I want to be sure you have my number in there.”
His number in my phone. Of course, I need his number in my phone. Even if we were just having sex. I hand him my phone. “Should I put it in as Gabe or some nickname we can use when we’re naked, like Big Gabe or—”
I elbow him. “You’re bad.”
He wiggles his brows and finishes inserting his number in my phone. “Bad Gabe it is.” He hands me my phone. “Call me so I have your number.”
“Okay.”
“Now.”
I call him. He pulls his phone from his pocket and saves the number. Once he does, he shows me his phone that reads “Redheaded Goddess aka Abbie” as the ID. I laugh. “You.”
“Hmmm,” he murmurs, leaning in and kissing my cheek, his breath a warm tease on my neck, his lips by my ear, “Most definitely you,” he whispers, before he exits the SUV, leaving me with goosebumps and tight nipples, neither of which are from the cold gust of air from the winter night. I want him. I always want him. I want him like I have never wanted before.
I sink back into the seat and as much of a worrier as I am, instead of thinking about all the trouble that came our way tonight, I think about Gabe—just Gabe. His smile. His jokes. His Big Gabe reference. His body, God, what a body he has. All that hard muscle and the way he wears a suit. Heck, the way he wears a T-shirt. His lion tattoo that I want to hear more about. Who am I kidding? That I want to touch and lick. His intensity beneath the surface. His secrets. I do want to know his secrets, but I don’t think he wants me to know and I get it. I have my own. I have a past that’s become shameful in so many ways but it’s all rooted in things he already knows about me. I can’t help but wonder what Gabe dreads me knowing about his past, and he does. I feel that. I sense that.
I’m still thinking of nothing but Gabe when he returns and has Joe pop the trunk. I twist around to find an insane number of bags being loaded and when he joins us again, Dexter goes nuts. Gabe rewards his happiness with a treat. “I’m armed now,” he says. “Treats. Food. Bones. Even a bed the size of Texas.” He shuts the door and nods at Joe in the rearview window. “We’re a go. You have the address, right?”
“Got it,” Joe confirms and we’re off.
Gabe’s hand comes down on my leg and he leans in and kisses me, his lips warm despite the cold wind he just left behind. The natural way he reaches for me, warming my heart, the romantic in me trying to take over, trying to smash my “just sex” declaration as fast as I’d made it. “I needed you in there,” he says, further reeling me in. “I’m out of practice with the whole dog owner thing. You’ll have to help me shop all over again in the city.”
“Does this mean you’re adopting Dexter?”
“You think the owner of the shelter will approve me?”
I laugh. “I can put a word in for you. I think you have a good chance.”
“Then I guess I’m adopting Dexter. I didn’t even think I wanted a dog.”
“Funny how an animal can find you and then change you.”
“Do you have an animal at home?”
“I have the shelter,” I say, “and I foster the ones that really need extra help. I like to stay open to be able to do that.”
“But no forever animal? Sounds like commitment issues.”
I lower my voice. “Says the man who’s never been married.”
“Yes, well, I’m not afraid of commitment,” he says. “I just haven’t found a reason to make one. Until now.”
Maybe he’s talking about Dexter. Maybe he’s talking about me. I tell myself that I don’t want him to be talking about me. I just want to have a hot fling and enjoy him. That kind of freedom is nothing that I have ever allowed myself in life. I do not want to fall in love with this man. I won’t fall in love with him. I repeat these words for reinforcement on the drive to his house, which turns out to be a charming cottage on the ocean.
Joe pulls us into the drive, and Gabe helps me out of the SUV, setting me on the ground and molding me close, all those hard muscles I was fantasizing about earlier pressed close to me. “Welcome to my second home, Abbie,” he says, softly, and my God, he makes it one part seduction and one part Hallmark movie. I’m never going to be able to resist this man and right now, I don’t know why I’m trying. I honestly can’t remember why, at all.
He opens the SUV and retrieves Dexter and we head toward a sprawling wonderful porch that seems to stretch the entire front and all the way around the right side. Dexter is excited and Gabe opens the door and sets my bag inside the door while the happy dog charges inside. There’s a crash and Gabe curses. “Damn dog,” he murmurs, tugging me inside the house with him, and shutting the door.
Dexter is missing and Gabe takes off looking for him while I take in the giant living room with hardwood, a rock fireplace, and cozy brown couches. I’m about to help with the hunt when my cellphone rings. I dig it from my purse and grimace as I find my ex-husband’s number. I hit decline and set my purse on the floor to remove my coat. I hang it on the coat rack when a text sounds on my phone.
I inhale on the dread filling my chest because I know who this will be from. Sure enough, it’s my ex: I’m trying to play nice. I’m trying to be the guy you want me to be. But Gabe Maxwell changes everything. Gabe is a problem. Get rid of him or I will.
And there it is. The reason my life can’t be a lusty version of a Hallmark movie.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Abbie
I’m still standing in the entryway to Gabe’s Hamptons cottage, staring at that message when he steps in front of me. “What’s wrong?”
My gaze lifts to his, and my first thought is my God, this man is gorgeous. I didn’t even think I liked men with blond hair, but Gabe is devastatingly handsome but lots of men are good looking. Gabe has charm. He has a heart as proven by Dexter. He has commitment issues and yet he’s here with me, asking for more. “Before I tell you—what are we doing? You and me—this, this—what is this we’re doing? What is this?”
He steps closer and cups my face. “What do you want this to be?”
His touch is fire. His nearness is warmth and somehow, as new as we are, safety. And I have not felt safe in a very long time. “I don’t know how to answer that.”
“Then I’ll give you my answer, my version of what this is. I’m addicted to you. I can’t get enough of you. I want to try. I really want to try but I know already, that won’t be possible. I know I won’t ever get enough.”
“How can you say that now, after just meeting me?”
“Because it’s always enough, too much even, before it ever starts. So, I repeat: I’m addicted to you. I can’t get
enough of you. Right now, that’s what this is to me. No. What this is to me, is something I can’t walk away from and I don’t even want to try. How’s that for an answer?”
“Terrifyingly perfect,” I dare.
He strokes my cheek and tilts my gaze to his. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
I decide at this point that I’m not walking away. If I tell myself or him that I am, neither of us will believe it to be the truth. I hand him my phone and let him read the message from my hellish ex. He reads it out loud: I’m trying to play nice. I’m trying to be the guy you want me to be. But Gabe Maxwell changes everything. Gabe is a problem. Get rid of him or I will.
He hands me the phone back. “He’s scared. Good. Come help me get Dexter settled so we can grab a bite and get to the ranch.”
“That’s it?”
“He’s spinning out of control, Abbie, and shaking in his shoes. That’s why you’ve been served fake papers and received a love note by text from your ex.” He kisses me. “Come on, woman. I need food. Dexter needs your attention. And I need you naked.”
I laugh. “Gabe. You are so—you.”
“Yes, I am,” he says, “and I’ll help you define what that means, in all kinds of ways, I promise.” He laces his fingers with mine and leads me through the house, and it’s this action, this romantic gesture that has nothing to do with sex, and yet everything to do with us, that has my heart swelling for this man.
“What do you think of the house?” he asks.
“The fireplace is incredible,” I say, as we pass the massive stone structure.
“That fireplace sold me on the house,” he says, leading me out to an enclosed garden room where Dexter is now on a bed, with a massive chew bone under attack by his mouth. “There’s actually a dog door,” he says, pointing to it, “and an enclosed side yard, which he already found.”
“This is perfection, Gabe,” I say, scanning the rectangular-shaped room that is bare except for Dexter. “You haven’t done anything with this room, why?”
“I can’t figure out what the hell to do with it. I guess I need to get someone in to help, but I haven’t really put that high on my things to do list.”
His Demand (Dirtier Duet Book 1) Page 13
