by Lara Adrian
21
~ Evelyn ~
After nearly a week of incredible nights spent in Gabe’s arms, my Friday morning at L’Opale could not be off to a worse start.
Katrina storms into my office carrying one of our signature bespoke boxes and drops it on my desk with a hard thump. “I’ve had it, Eve. I have fucking had it with that man!”
Shocked at her outburst, I turn away from my design table where I’m working on one of Avery’s pieces. Kat’s temper is on a full boil, which is difficult enough to deal with in private sometimes, but especially when I know we have a sales floor and dressing rooms busy with shopping customers today at the other end of the corridor from our offices.
Frowning, I motion for her to shut my door, which she does with an equal lack of discretion. It bangs closed and I stand up, confused and displeased. “What’s going on, Kat?”
She reaches into the open tulle-stuffed box. “Too much lace,” she says sharply, holding up a lovely custom-designed bra. She chucks the piece into my trash bin and grabs a pale mint negligee from the box. “Wrong shade of green.”
That, too, is thrown into the bin. She pulls out a third, a beautiful black silk and Leavers lace bustier, some of Kat’s most stunning work, which I personally modeled and sized for Jane’s final stitching earlier this week.
“Too slutty,” Kat announces, sneering.
When she starts to toss that piece into the trash, I reach out and take it from her hands. “Enough.”
“Hennings has rejected them all, Eve. Every. Fucking. Piece. He’s just left the shop after refusing this entire order.”
It’s no secret that Katrina’s gotten off to a rocky start with Mr. Hennings. She hadn’t been excited when I asked her to take over his account for me after I landed Avery Ross’s project, and it seems their working relationship has only deteriorated. It’s been a lot of strain and miscommunication on both sides, from forgotten appointments with Hennings--which Kat not only denies but refuses to apologize for--to constant back-and-forth over designs. All unusual problems for Kat, whose work ethic with other clients has always been impeccable. But she and Walter Hennings have clashed from day one.
And now this.
I walk around to retrieve the other two pieces from my trash bin and release a heavy sigh. “Would you like me to talk to him?”
“No,” she snaps. “I’d like you to take back his account. It’s obvious that’s what he really wants. And I can’t keep working like this, Eve. I won’t.”
“What are you saying?”
Her jaw tightens. “Either you take me off his account, or I’m done.”
Her ultimatum hits me like a slap. “Done?”
She fists her hands at her sides as though girding for battle. “I have other design clients here at L’Opale and I’ve never had issues working with them. This man has been sabotaging me at every turn--”
“Sabotaging you?” I shake my head, taken aback by her drama. “Kat, do you hear yourself? You sound paranoid and that’s not like you.”
“I’m not paranoid, I’m pissed off. I take meticulous notes on all of his design changes, only to have him contradict everything the next time we meet. He signs off on paper, then finds fault with the finished piece.” She scoffs. “Honestly, I don’t know how you’ve been able to deal with him all this time, but I can’t. And for the record, I never scheduled that appointment with him on the day I requested off last week.”
“It was on your calendar,” I remind her. Gently, because I can see how upset she truly is. “Megan showed me the boutique client schedule. The appointment was on the computer, and Mr. Hennings certainly thought he was supposed to be here to meet with you.”
She shakes her head, a vigorous denial. “I never scheduled it.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose, feeling a headache coming on. “It doesn’t matter. I’m sure we can figure everything out. Maybe if you and I both talk to Mr. Hennings together--”
“No, Eve. Take me off his account, or I’m removing myself right now.”
She’s serious. But she’s also pushing me into a corner like a pouting child or a spurned lover, and I don’t like the feeling. “Dammit, I understand you’re frustrated. But you’re talking about a loyal client who’s spent more with us in the past few months than many accounts bring in over several years. We can’t afford to lose him. I don’t have enough hours in the day to personally devote to both him and Avery Ross. Especially now that she’s awarded L’Opale the design contract for her wedding and honeymoon collection.”
Kat stares at me, her cool blue eyes sharp, even glacial. “I guess I have my answer.”
She pivots around, reaching for the door. But as she steps out of my office she pauses, sending a brittle glance over her shoulder. “You know, I almost said no after I interviewed here and you offered me this job. I could have started over with my own boutique. I could have created designs under my own name. Instead, I poured everything into L’Opale because I believed in this shop, and in you. Because I thought maybe, for once, I had found someplace I could truly belong. I thought I was going to be part of something truly special. Whatever, though. My mistake.”
Her uncharacteristic display of emotion stuns me. She’s furious over Hennings, that’s clear. But right now, it’s obvious that she’s equally upset with me. She stalks out of my office before I can tell her that she does belong--that as a design team we have created something special together at L’Opale.
With her purse and keys in hand, she nearly crashes into Gabe and the middle-aged man accompanying him as she races out the back door of the boutique in a furious huff.
“Everything all right?” Gabe asks, resting his hand protectively on my shoulder for a moment before he catches himself and lets his touch fall away.
I slant him a weary look. “No, everything’s a mess. Kat just quit.”
He frowns. “I’m sorry to hear that. If this isn’t a good time, we can come back.”
It’s only then that I recall he mentioned he’d be stopping by with an electrician today to prep the utility room for the security system upgrade. I shake my head, offering a smile to the man with the tool belt around his waist and the coil of wires and cables looped over his shoulder.
“No, it’s fine. Now is as good a time as any.”
Gabe nods to him. “Go ahead and get started, Don. I’ve got some things I need to discuss with Ms. Beckham and then I’ll come back and check in with you.”
The electrician lopes off and Gabe follows me into my office. He closes the door behind us and quietly turns the lock. My blinds are already closed, so there’s no one to see when he gathers me into his arms and gives me a slow, sweet, toe-curling kiss that I wish could go on forever.
“I missed you last night,” he murmurs against my parted lips.
“I know. I missed you too.” He was at the hospital with his family, then stayed overnight at his parents’ house in Bayside to help install a hospital bed and other temporary accessibility modifications in preparation for his father’s imminent return home. “How’s your dad doing?”
“He was discharged this morning. The doctors say he’s doing great.”
“That’s good news.” And because I can see the reticence in his handsome face, I have to ask the real question. “Have you spent any time with him yet?”
He shrugs. “I will . . . eventually. He’s trying to get settled back at home now. Mom says my brothers are keeping a close eye on him, so I’m sure he doesn’t need me. Which is just as well.”
“Oh, Gabe.” I sigh, wishing there was a way to mend the wound that exists between him and his father. Death may have taken one of my parents, but Gabe’s loss is worse, I believe. Because he’s been living with the inexplicable, prolonged absence of his father’s love all these years.
And whether he wants to admit it to himself or not, I see the pain it’s caused him. I’ve felt the grief in him this past week that his father’s been ill.
He draws back, frowning. “I did
n’t come in here to talk about my old man. Tell me what just happened with you and Katrina. You both looked awfully upset.”
“She inherited a client from me recently and let’s just say it was a bad fit for both of them. Today he rejected a box full of Kat’s custom designs and she decided she’d had enough.”
Gabe cocks his head, gaze narrowed. “He?”
“Walter Hennings. He’s a widower with a large bank account and a young girlfriend from overseas whom he likes to spoil with expensive, bespoke lingerie.” I roll my eyes at his dubious look. “I know. But he’s one of our best clients and Kat demanded I either let her drop him or she was going to walk.”
“Not the smartest thing to say to your boss.”
I rub my temples and slowly shake my head. “I’ve been working with Katrina for a long time. We haven’t always agreed on everything, but I respect her. She’s an amazing designer with a great work ethic. Today I saw a different side of her.”
Gabe’s brow furrows slightly. “How so?”
“She was mad, Gabe. Worse than that, I think I really hurt her. It wasn’t my intention, but she wasn’t allowing me much room to find a compromise. I must’ve really wounded her, if she was mad enough to quit like she did.”
“Do you think she might be a problem?” His question is so guarded, so grimly protective, it takes me aback.
“What do you mean? A problem, as in dangerous?” I sound incredulous because I am. And Gabe looks too serious to be joking. “She’s angry and upset, that’s all. Granted, I’ve never seen her like this, but no, I’m not worried about anything like that. Why? Do you think I should be?”
“Just needed to ask.” An odd emotion flickers in his gaze, but it’s shuttered by the fall of his thick lashes almost as quickly as it appeared. His expression relaxes as he draws me against him once more. “I’m in the security business, remember?”
I smile up into his intense, hazel eyes. “And you’re never off duty, right?”
He grunts, his mouth a flat line. “Right.”
I move my thigh between his, rubbing my hip against his erection. Wetting my lips, I can’t resist sliding my hand down to caress the hard ridge of his cock over the fabric of his dark suit pants. “Definitely armed and ready for duty right here.”
His nostrils flare and he closes his eyes on a low groan. “You’re playing with fire. I’ve gone without you for an entire night now. Don’t think that was easy.”
“It wasn’t easy on me, either.” I tilt my mouth to his and kiss him, pushing my tongue past his lips as I tug down his zipper and slip my hand into his boxer briefs. He fills my hand, his skin hot and velvety, his thick shaft pulsing in my grasp.
“Ah, Christ,” he hisses against my cheek. His hips jerk as I stroke him, his breath sawing out of his lungs. His hands are on the hem of my skirt, inching it higher up my thighs. His fingers sweep aside the crotch of my panties and cleave into the wetness of my pussy. He moans. “I don’t have any protection on me.”
“I don’t care.” I kiss him some more, using both hands to unbuckle his belt so I can free him completely. “Right now, I just need you inside me. Right here.”
He rears his head back, a desperate look in his heated stare. “I always use protection. I promise you, I’m clean.”
“Me too. And I’m on the pill.”
“Fuck.”
I grin up at him and nod. “Now you’re getting the idea.”
His hands move around to grip my ass. He squeezes tightly, possessively. Then he spins me around and bends me over the top of my desk, moving aside the lingerie box and potted rosebush with a sweep of his arm. One hand moves under me to knead my breast while his other hand strokes my back for a moment, before sliding onto my backside, which is fully exposed to him. On a jagged curse, he yanks my panties down and spreads me open with a harsh grasp.
“You’re so fucking beautiful like this,” he whispers, his voice rough and raw as he urges my legs apart then slips his hand between them. “One of these times, I want to tie you up with some of these pretty things you make.”
Oh, God. My sex throbs at the very idea.
“Yes,” I gasp.
And then it’s all I can do to bite back my pleasured scream as he takes hold of my hip in one hand, his cock in the other, then plunges into me in a powerful thrust that makes me see stars.
There is no need to take things slowly, or to ease into what we both crave the most right now. My sex is drenched and aching for him, and his cock delivers everything I need and more.
He pounds into me fast and hard, brutal strokes that excite me for their ferocity as much as I am aroused by the realization that I am the one driving him to this wildness. I feel it inside me too. As much as I want to prolong the spiraling tempest of the wave that’s cresting beneath me, I can’t hold on. My orgasm breaks and splinters, carrying me away on a flood of bliss and pounding, delicious release.
Gabe bends over me, our clothing rasping, his hips rocking against me in a fevered tempo. His breath is rapid and shallow as he pumps deeper and stronger inside me, and then he slams home on a low snarl as he comes, his big body shuddering with the force of his climax.
He holds me for a moment, his lips brushing the side of my cheek as we both recover from the aftershocks of our pleasure and the Earth slowly tilts back onto its axis.
Pressed atop me over the desk, he kisses the corner of my slack mouth. “Are you okay?”
I hum a little moan. “Better now.”
“Me too. Except now I don’t want to stop.”
Outside my office, muffled voices carry from the rest of the shop. I’m not afraid anyone heard us or could be aware of what just occurred, but at this moment I wouldn’t care either way. Having Gabe on top of me--still moving in a slow rhythm inside me--makes everything else reduce to total insignificance.
But then he groans and I feel him carefully withdraw even though he’s still hard. He nips my shoulder before leaving my body completely.
I’m smiling as he helps me up and turns me around to face him. “That was amazing.”
“You’re amazing,” he says, as I adjust my skirt as he stuffs his firm cock back into his tailored suit pants. “Let’s do this again soon, Ms. Beckham.”
“I’d like that very much, Mr. Noble,” I say, playing along. “What are you doing for lunch?”
“Hopefully you.” His grin is pure sin. He reaches over to my desk and picks up the black silk corset I spared from Kat’s fury. “What are the chances of my convincing you to wear this for me later?”
I arch a brow. “With or without panties?”
“Definitely without,” he growls, closing the distance between us and taking me in a bone-melting kiss. Then he smacks my ass. “I need to get out of here before you give me any other wicked ideas.”
We straighten ourselves and arrange our clothing, then Gabe walks to the door and silently unlocks it. He sends one last heated glance at me before he exits. No sooner does he step outside than the electrician calls to him from the back room of the boutique.
“Hey, Gabe? There’s something here I think you should take a look at.”
“Sure thing, Don.”
I walk out of my office a second after him, just to get another glimpse of Gabe striding down the hallway looking all business once more and sexy as hell.
It’s virtually impossible for me to curb my satisfied smile--or to tamp down my desire for the man who’s not only seduced my body, but my heart as well. With my purse in hand and my body still buzzing with residual pleasure, I head for the staff washroom to freshen up and wait impatiently for that lunch date he promised me.
22
~ Gabriel ~
Dominic Baine and Andrew Beckham are seated together at the executive suite conference table reviewing a large collection of blueprints when Nick’s assistant, Lily, shows me into the office.
“Sorry to interrupt,” I tell both men. “I didn’t want to discuss this over the phone, but I didn’t think it should
wait.”
In fact, I left L’Opale as soon as I saw what the electrician had discovered in the utility room a short time ago. Making excuses to Evelyn about postponing our lunch date, I headed directly back to Baine headquarters. I hated lying to her about my abrupt need to leave. Realizing that she trusts me so implicitly she had accepted those excuses without question doesn’t make me feel any better, either.
I owe her the truth. Not only about my role as her protector and my suspicions that her safety could be compromised, but about everything. Including how much she means to me.
But as I step inside Nick’s office, the only thing stronger than my guilt over all of the secrets I’ve been asked to keep from Evelyn is the grave concern that’s sitting like a cold rock in my stomach.
Nick glances up in question. “What’s going on, Gabe?”
Once Lily has left and closed the door behind her, I reach into my jacket pocket and remove the small square of black plastic and the singed wires attached to it. The men stand up to look at the device I’ve placed on the conference table.
“What the hell is it?” Beck asks, his dark brows furrowed.
“Some kind of digital intercept device. The electrician found it in the boutique’s utility room.”
Nick frowns. “Someone bugged the shop?”
“From the looks of it, yes.”
“Jesus Christ,” Beck hisses. “Bugged it for what reason?”
“Specifically? I haven’t determined that yet. But this kind of device coupled with specialized software can enable someone to hack into just about anything. Computers, mobile connections, cell phones, cameras. It can even tap into security systems, if the operator knows what they’re doing.”
“Shit.” Beck swallows, and I see some of the same cold fear in his face that I’ve been feeling ever since I was alerted to the problem. “Are you saying someone had to be physically inside the shop in order to install this fucking thing?”
I nod. “I’m going to be looking into L’Opale employees, current and former, as well as chasing down a list of service and maintenance workers. Anyone who may have had access to the shop in recent weeks or months.”
