by Unknown
If it had been anybody else, she’d have considered that last statement the height of bravado. But not Gabriel. In her experience, he said what he meant, then followed through.
Too bad that nobody—not even him—always got their way. “That’s not up to you,” she said flatly. “It’s up to me. And I’m not going anywhere.”
“Mallory.” He spoke in the ultrapatient way adults reserve for recalcitrant children. “Be reasonable.”
“No.” One little word. So much power. “I don’t want your help, Gabriel. I don’t need it. I can take care of myself.”
“You actually believe that?”
Of course she didn’t. Not yet. Not entirely. But she’d beg for change on the street before she’d admit it to him. “Yes. Absolutely.”
He stared at her, his expression once again guarded, displaying not a trace of surprise that she’d say something so outrageous. Trapped in the tractor beam of his gaze, with no clue what he was thinking and no words as a distraction, she found herself waiting.
For what, she wasn’t sure.
Yet as the silence dragged on, her mind began spinning scenarios. If he wanted to, she mused, he could toss her over his shoulder and simply carry her out of here. Or—the old familiar thrill of awareness slow-danced down her spine—he could walk over, tug her close to that hard, elegant body, tumble her onto the couch and—
“All right, then. I guess we’re done.”
His flat, uninflected voice startled her out of her reverie. Yet it still took a good long moment for his actual words to sink in.
That was it? They were done? Really?
For one appalling moment, she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Then her common sense, which she’d done her best to shun most of her life, kicked in.
Are you crazy? He’s throwing in the towel. For heaven’s sake, hurry up and hustle him out the door before he changes his mind.
“Well, fancy that,” she said with a calculated touch of mockery. “Finally. Something we can agree on.”
A nerve jumped in his jaw. “Watch yourself, sweetheart,” he advised, even as he took that first wonderful step toward the door. “You know what they say about little girls who poke at predators.”
“No. I can’t say that I do.” She forced herself to stand her ground as he approached, telling herself she was glad this was almost over. He’d go his way, she’d go hers, and in a day, a week, a month, he’d be nothing more than a hazy memory of another life. “Nor, for that matter, do I care—”
With no warning, he crowded close. Startled, she sucked in a breath and tried to scoot out of his way, but it was too late.
He caught her chin in one big hand, tipping her face up to his. “You should,” he murmured. “Because the adage goes that eventually the predator strikes back. And eats sweet little things like you—” her stomach flip-flopped at the silky note of warning in his voice “—for lunch.”
She swallowed. Hard. Yet somehow her voice sounded almost steady as she fluttered her eyelashes at him and said, “How entertaining. Now let go of me.”
“Not yet. There’s one other thing we need to get straight.”
“Oh? And what is that?”
“When we do have sex—” his gaze flicked to her mouth, lingering before he slowly raised his eyes to hers once again “—it won’t have a damn thing to do with payback. Trust me, Mal. You’ll be every bit as hot for me as I am for you.” And with that he released her as abruptly as he’d caught her and stepped away.
By the time she recovered her breath, he was gone.
Two
I mpertinent. Infuriating. Impossible.
And damn near irresistible.
That pretty much summed up Mallory Morgan, Gabe thought blackly, as he stepped out onto the cracked sidewalk fronting her run-down apartment building. Flipping his coat collar up against the chill March breeze, he checked for traffic on the litter-strewn street, then strode across to his SUV parked on the opposite curb.
He gave the vehicle a cursory look and handed a twenty to the sturdy little Latino kid who’d offered to keep an eye on it for him. “Thanks, mi’ijo.”
Since their deal had been for ten upfront and ten if the boy stuck, the youngster’s delight was understandable. “Muchas gracias, mister!”
Gabe inclined his head. “You earned it.”
“Sí. So if you come back to Lattimer Street and you need anything, you ask around for Tonio, okay? I take very good care of you.”
“I’ll keep it in mind.”
“Bueno!” The kid flashed him a quick grin, then sprinted away as a bus stopped at the far end of the block. Darting around a trio of tattooed street toughs who stood smoking before a boarded-up storefront, he waved as a tired-looking young woman trudged down the steps. “Mama, mama! Guess what?” he exclaimed as he raced toward her through the gathering twilight.
It appeared Gabe had just made somebody’s day.
Too freaking bad it was the wrong somebody.
But then, what did he expect? He, who was known for his shrewdness, his finesse, his ability to think outside the box—and yes, dammit, to always be three steps ahead of an opponent—had just behaved with all the subtlety of a Mack truck. He’d invaded Mallory’s space, demanded answers, barked orders, bullied when he should’ve cajoled.
He’d even made a more balls-than-brains promise about their sexual future, for God’s sake.
The only thing that kept the day from being a total bust was the very lucrative contract he’d inked at lunch to assess vulnerabilities and tailor protection strategies for the Lux Pacifica hotel chain’s overseas executives.
When it came to everything else, however…With an impatient shake of his head, he put the SUV in gear and set a course for the warehouse district where the Steele Security offices were located. It was slow going due to the Friday night rush hour traffic, affording him plenty of time to think.
There was no excuse for the surprise he’d gotten when he’d walked into Annabelle’s and realized the caramel-haired hostess all the men seemed to be admiring was Mallory. Just as there was no rational explanation for how strongly he’d disliked seeing her smoky gaze go from pleasant to hostile at the sight of him.
Given that in the four years he’d known her he’d never seen Mallory get worked up about anything—from being drenched with champagne by a hapless waiter at a Denver symphony opening to strolling onto a balcony at Meg Bender’s Halloween party and finding her father getting it on with one of her girlfriends—her ire had gotten his attention. So had her scathing denunciation of him.
But not, as Annabelle’s horrified manager had assumed, because he was angry or offended.
No, what had set him back on his heels, what had tested his normally abundant patience as he’d been forced to go ahead with what had seemed like an interminable business luncheon, was the desolation he thought he’d glimpsed under Mallory’s anger. That, and the suspicion that her transformation from lighthearted nymphet to go-to-hell working girl meant somewhere along the line he’d made a major miscalculation.
He didn’t make miscalculations. Major or otherwise.
That wasn’t to say he considered himself infallible. It was just that from his youngest days, after his mother had died and he’d found himself in charge of a brood of eight at the ripe old age of fourteen, mistakes had been a luxury he couldn’t afford. That hadn’t changed during his years with the military’s Special Operations Command.
As for his current circumstances, he hadn’t gone from penniless stand-in parent to powerful millionaire businessman due to faulty judgment. No. All that he had, the success, the sterling reputation, the respect of his peers, had come from shrewd vision, meticulous planning, superior instincts and razor-sharp situational awareness.
Not that you’d know by today’s performance, he conceded as he finally pulled into Steele Security’s underground parking garage.
In his world, where outcome was everything, the fact that Mallory remained ensconced in her
squalid little apartment suggested that his decision to chase her down before he’d fully vetted the situation wasn’t the smartest move he’d ever made.
Still, honesty forced him to admit that things hadn’t gone irredeemably to hell until she’d actually opened her door to him.
To say he’d been caught off guard was an understatement. It had felt more like he’d taken a shot between the eyes with a sledgehammer. Because dear God, the sight of her…
Wrapped in that flimsy siren-red robe, with her feet bare, that streaky brown-and-gold hair mussed and a faint flush tinting her petal-smooth cheeks, she’d looked as if she’d just tumbled out of some lucky man’s bed.
Lust had slammed him like a punch to the gut.
By itself, that shouldn’t have been a factor since he never allowed his libido to rule his head. But when moments later she’d made a valiant effort to control her trembling lower lip, something inside him had shifted.
What, he couldn’t say. But whatever it was, the combination of it and that blast of desire had taken him completely out of his game.
His jaw bunched at the reminder. Climbing out of his vehicle, he punched in the code for the security door and let himself in to the building core, choosing the stairs over the elevator. Once on the main level, he bore left, his long legs eating up the distance as he strode down the wide, airy corridor. He passed by his own spacious office in favor of his brother Cooper’s, glad to see the lights were still on.
He ducked his head in the open doorway. “Did you get that information I asked for?”
The younger Steele—number four in the nine-man birth order—glanced over from where he sat slouched in his tilted-back office chair. He was the picture of relaxation with his sneaker-clad feet propped on his desk, an illusion contradicted only by the rapid movement of his fingers over the computer keyboard propped on his lap.
“Do women swoon when I walk into a room?” he responded serenely. “The answer to both questions, big brother, is yes. Of course.”
“And?”
“And you’re giving me a crick in the neck standing over there. Why don’t you come in, take a load off, tell Uncle Cooper what’s put the stick up your ass.”
Gabe snorted inelegantly. “That’ll be the day.” Despite his words, he did walk farther into the room, although not to take Cooper up on his invitation. He was here to collect intel, not dispense it. “Well? You going to tell me what you found out or not?”
The younger man shrugged. “Nothing much has changed. The warrant for Cal Morgan’s arrest remains active, although my contact at the Feds says it’s currently not worth the paper it’s printed on. As long as Morgan stays in San Timoteo, they can’t touch him, much less a dime of all that stolen money. Which, FYI, my friend now puts at twenty million, meaning that you, once again, win the office pool.”
“Terrific.” He shrugged out of his coat and tossed it with more force than was necessary onto one of the navy suede chairs in front of the desk. “There’s nothing I like better than accurately predicting the extent of a disaster.”
“Not your responsibility,” Cooper said calmly. “You know damn well it would’ve been a whole lot worse if we hadn’t been brought in when we were.”
The hell of it was, Gabe did. And it wasn’t that he was the least bit sorry Steele Security had been the one to expose Caleb Morgan’s crooked dealings, he admitted, pacing restlessly toward the bank of windows at the far end of the room.
They’d done what they’d been hired to—check out Morgan Creek Investment. And they’d done it the way they did everything, thoroughly and completely.
It hadn’t mattered that it wasn’t their usual sort of job. Or that their client, a prospective Morgan Creek investor, had only expected them to give the company a quick once-over to placate his elderly mother, who swore that while on a recent trip overseas she’d been unable to locate the Taiwanese shopping mall featured in the company’s literature.
The son was now sending his mother flowers weekly, since she’d saved him a bundle when it turned out the mall really didn’t exist.
While Morgan, who’d fled the country the day after Steele had clued in the authorities, was most likely sipping mai tais on the veranda of his newly acquired tropical estate, living a life of luxury made possible by the pirated millions he’d socked away in untouchable offshore accounts.
No, if Gabe did have a regret, it was that they hadn’t brought the bastard down sooner. While it wouldn’t have changed what Morgan had done, it no doubt would have limited the extent of the ensuing damage. As it was, between unpaid taxes and first-position creditors, there hadn’t been much left but crumbs for his bilked clients to recover.
And then there was Mallory. Who, until five hours ago, Gabe had assumed was off in St. Croix or Monte Carlo or some other exotic locale, licking her wounds in luxurious seclusion. Not living all on her own in one of Denver’s worst neighborhoods, trying to scrape by on some minimum wage job.
And there it was, that unexpected, unacceptable miscalculation.
“What about Morgan’s daughter?” he asked abruptly, swiveling around to stare expectantly at his brother. “What did you find out about her?”
Cooper’s busy fingers stilled. “You mean, in addition to the fact that she gave you a shellacking at lunch today?”
“How the hell did you hear about that?”
Cooper rolled his eyes. “How do you think? Family grapevine, bro. Some woman Lilah went to school with saw what happened at Annabelle’s and couldn’t wait to call Lilah and tell her all about it. Lilah told Dom when he took her to her doctor’s appointment, and he told me when he stopped by to pick up the Lederer file on their way home.”
“Geezus.” The intrabrother communication network had always been good, but the addition in the past year of Gen and Lilah, his sisters-in-law, had definitely kicked it up a notch.
“Yeah. Pretty scary, huh?”
“You could say that. Is Lilah all right? No surprises at the doctor’s?” Leaving the windows, he walked back toward Coop’s desk.
“As far as I know, she’s as good as a woman six months gone can be. Dom, on the other hand, may not make it.”
“No news there.” Their brother, Dominic, a former Navy SEAL, had been the embodiment of the brash, tough, never-let-’em-see-you-sweat warrior until he’d signed on to rescue a pretty blond socialite from the banana republic where she was being held prisoner. Now he and Lilah were married and expecting their first child, and he was as overprotective as a five-star general with a troop of one.
“I guess that’s true,” Cooper conceded. “But still…Lilah mentioned today how much she’s enjoying working on some big charity ball, and you could practically see Dom’s teeth start to gnash. It seems like the closer she gets to her due date, the harder it is for him to pretend he doesn’t want to haul her off somewhere and wrap her in a nice safe protective bubble.” He sighed. “If it wasn’t so funny, it’d be pathetic. He used to be such a player.”
Gabe’s dark mood lightened fractionally at his brother’s mournful expression. He shrugged. “Love makes people crazy.” One of the excellent reasons why it wasn’t for him.
“I’ll say.” Sliding the keyboard onto the desk, he turned his attention back to Gabe, his melancholy vanishing as quickly as it had come. “While we’re on the subject of crazy, was the divine Ms. Morgan really working as a waitress?”
“Hostess,” Gabe corrected.
“And she actually called you an egotistical, scum-sucking sonofabitch?”
“She may have. I wasn’t exactly taking notes.”
“And?”
“That about covers it. As noted, she called me a few choice names, refused to seat me, then left when her boss tried to smooth over the situation.”
“Huh.” Cooper eyed him consideringly. “So what did she say when you went after her later? Was she still pissed?”
“Who said I went after her?”
“Please.” Cooper sniffed. “You canceled your
afternoon appointments, you asked for a Morgan family update, and it’s been obvious ever since you walked in here you’re tweaked about something. Plus Dom says you two have always had a thing for each other…”
A vision of Mallory’s robe drifting south and exposing her smooth, velvet-skinned shoulders flashed through Gabe’s mind.
“So yeah,” Cooper concluded. “You went after her.”
He thrust the vision away. “You’re right. I did. And yes, she wasn’t exactly thrilled to see me, which given the circumstances is no great surprise. As for the rest of what we discussed…”
He thought about Mallory’s attempt to act indifferent about her situation while foolishly insisting she was doing just fine, and once more felt frustrated, impatient, annoyed—and yes, although he couldn’t quite figure out why—touched.
“It’s none of your business.”
“Aw, come on. Don’t tell me you’re going to stone-wall your favorite sibling.”
“Hell, no. But then, last I checked, Deke’s still in Borneo.”
“Ouch.” Cooper gave him a faux-wounded look. “You could’ve just said no.”
“Like you’ve ever let that word stop you? Give me a break.” Leaning over, he planted his hands on his brother’s desk. “And as much as I’d love to share my innermost feelings, hear all about your and Dom’s riveting take on my love life—” with each word his voice acquired a little more bite “—it’s after six and I have plans for tonight. So what do you say you just tell me what I want to know, and we leave the rest for another time? Say, the next time you girls have a slumber party?”
Cooper made a reproachful face. “No need to get surly.”
Silent, Gabe continued to stare down at him.
