by M. Malone
Gabe enters the diner and when he spots me, heads to the back. Today he's wearing casual clothes again, jeans and a long-sleeved Henley shirt under a leather jacket. No glasses. No hat. Just Gabe. It's nice to see him like this with all the layers stripped off.
"Nice place. I like the fifties thing they've got going on in here." He slides into the booth across from me, his long legs bumping mine beneath the table.
"This place is an icon. I used to come here with my friends in high school a lot. It's been here for years."
I pick up my folder, busying myself in looking through the papers inside so he won't see how flustered I am. Gabe has agreed to help me but he's made it pretty clear that friends is all we'll ever be. I have to stop blushing and stammering like a schoolgirl around him or he's going to change his mind about helping me. If I'm ever going to prove to everyone that I can do this, I need his help.
Gabe peers at me. "Are you okay? You have dark circles under your eyes. You look exhausted."
I have to laugh. Honesty seems to be the thing that binds us together. "Is that your line today? I thought you were supposed to be charming?"
"Charm doesn't work on you. You cured me of trying that the first day we met. You'll always get the truth from me." He smirks and sits back in the booth.
I roll my eyes and hand him the two-page document. "Here's the budget I drew up."
Based on Eli's advice, I used online software to create the budget. The first page is the overview with a small graph and the second page contains detail on all the expenses.
"How did you come up with these numbers?" Gabe flips the page and looks at the detailed list of expenditures.
"Some of them are just rough estimates. But for the things like cleaning and construction, I got quotes from local businesses on how much they would charge for those services."
"Good. It's best to get as close as possible on the expenses. I can't tell you how many times I've been blindsided on how much things cost running the shop. How much contingency have you built in?"
We're interrupted when Patsy brings two glasses of water and my iced tea. "Hi, what can I get you to drink handsome?"
Gabe gives her that blinding smile and I can practically see her melting next to the table.
"Water is fine for now. But I'll have a cheeseburger and fries. Sasha?"
"I'll have the same. And a chocolate shake, too."
As soon as she leaves, I take a long drink from my iced tea. Gabe watches in amusement as I drain almost half of it away.
"Are you okay?"
I push the glass back. "No, I'm not okay. What is a contingency? And how was I supposed to know to get one?"
I'm in the middle of what feels like a full-scale panic attack when Gabe puts his hand over mine. Immediately I stop breathing.
“Relax. You've already done the number one thing any business owner can do if they aren't sure about something."
"What's that?"
He leans over and says, "Ask for help."
His calm, rational demeanor makes the panic recede. My hand flexes slightly under his and when I turn my hand over, our palms meet. That has my pulse increasing for another reason altogether.
He leans back and the cool air against my exposed palm reminds me where we are. I look around but luckily no one noticed my little freak out session.
"So, what is a contingency?"
Gabe points a finger at the bottom of the budget. "It’s usually the last line item under expenses. It's basically just a number that you estimate for emergencies. A cushion. Let's say that the cleaning you've budgeted at three hundred dollars actually ends up costing you five hundred dollars."
"I'd be two hundred dollars over budget, right?"
His eyes glow in approval. "Exactly. But if you have a one thousand dollar contingency, then your bottom line would still be okay. You'd actually be eight hundred dollars in the black."
Patsy appears then with our food, so I push the files to the side of the booth. Then she reappears a few minutes later with my chocolate shake. Gabe glances at me and then takes a bite of his burger.
"Chocolate therapy already?"
I pause with the straw halfway to my mouth. "How did you know about that?"
"You told me, remember?" His eyes twinkle with laughter as he takes another bite of his burger.
Mentally thinking back to all the things we talked about on the rooftop that night, I shake my head. "You remember that? I have to watch what I say around you."
"Paying attention to people is one of the things I do best. And you should definitely watch what you say around me. I have a long history of using the things I learn about people against them."
His reference to his past makes me wonder. Just who is he trying to warn off? Me or himself?
* * * * *
After we finish our burgers, Gabe takes out a pen and starts putting check marks next to the items he thinks I can trim. His suggestions line up with the same things I've been thinking. Cleaning, instruments and construction are the main areas where I think I have some wiggle room.
"Most construction estimates are heavy on the labor costs. But if you can find someone willing to help for a lower rate, then you'd have your stage built for a fraction of the cost and you could use the money budgeted for that elsewhere."
When Patsy appears with the check, she lingers for a few minutes making small talk while clearing our dishes. Her gaze is all over Gabe and she's asking him so many questions. Where he's from, what he's doing in New Haven. If he's my boyfriend.
I choke on the last sip of my chocolate shake. "Um, no he's not … we're not."
Gabe rescues me. "We're friends." He winks at her. "And now we're friends too, Patsy."
Patsy gives him a saucy smile. "I could use a few friends like you." Then she sashays off with her tray balanced on her shoulder, an extra swing in her step.
Even though I understand why getting involved with Gabe is a bad idea, it still sucks to watch other women flirt with him. Imagine how much worse it would be if you were dating. Gabe is the kind of guy who attracts women without even trying and a lot of those women wouldn't care if he was taken or not.
What if he hadn't been such a gentleman the night we met? I'm not fooling myself that he'd have fallen instantly in love with me. Chances are pretty good that the same thing would have happened with Gabe that happened with all my other relationships. I would have gotten attached and he would have left.
Same story, different ending. Except I'd be sitting across from him hurt and angry while watching him flirt with another woman right in front of me.
Mentally rolling my eyes, I pull out my wallet to pay for our meals. Before I can even open it, Gabe drops several twenties on the table.
"What are you doing?" I hold up my wallet. "This was a business meeting so I should pay."
He ignores me and pulls on his leather jacket. Whistling, he makes a show of looking around as though he can't hear anything.
Despite my attempts to be annoyed, a laugh finally escapes. "Gabe, I'm serious. You're doing me a favor so I should pay."
He makes a face. "Okay, that's never happening. And the second
most-important rule of business is, if someone is trying to give you money, let them."
Shaking my head, I stand when he does and slip into my coat. He gathers all the papers that we've been looking over and slides them back into the manila folder. He's taking this business mentor thing really seriously. I'm sure he's got plenty of other things he should have been doing today but instead he's here helping me.
It's kind of sweet.
"So, where is this little club going to be?" Gabe walks beside me out to the parking lot.
I pause next to my car, suddenly self-conscious about how rough it looks. Car payments eat up a lot of money and I learned early that if I wanted to survive as a starving artist, nice cars were out of the question. My eye is immediately drawn to Gabe’s sleek, black Audi on the far end of the lot. I don’t know much about cars bu
t I’m sure it’s expensive. My old clunker may not look like much but it's paid for. And that makes it very attractive to me. And whatever Zack did to it has it running like new.
"It's right across the street from here." I point to the buildings directly across. "This part of town has some of the oldest buildings in New Haven. Those used to be row houses and then they were converted to commercial spaces about twenty years ago. The landlord has been struggling to keep it leased since the economy went south. It was even rumored to be haunted at one point. I plan to use that in my promotional materials. Maybe I'll do a Halloween special next year and see if I can get some local theatre groups to perform."
"That's smart. See, now you're thinking like a business owner. I told you it wouldn't take long."
His praise feels good but even better is the way he's looking at me. Like he's proud of the progress I've made so far. I stuff that feeling down deep. I shouldn't have this giggly, euphoric feeling just because Gabe thinks I'm smart. Even though no one else has ever made me feel smart before.
"You're going to show it to me, right?" Gabe starts walking across the parking lot. I have to scramble to keep up. The heels I'm wearing are perfect for a business meeting but not for running.
"Wait, Gabe. What are you doing?"
He nods across the street. "I want to see where your club is going to be. After looking over the budget and listening to you talk about what it means to you, I'm invested in the outcome now. Plus, it's in a haunted old building."
His enthusiasm is catching. After looking both ways, we cross the street together. Gabe takes my hand once we reach the other side. "Where to?"
I point straight ahead and have to resist the urge to yank my hand back. What is it with this guy and the mixed signals? He's the one who said that we can't be more than friends but then he's holding my hand, telling me I'm smart and just making me like him.
I'm so deep in my thoughts that we actually pass the doorway. "Wait, it's right here."
My keys are of course at the bottom of my bag. Gabe is staring at something behind me. I turn and look over my shoulder. There's someone getting out of a car on the other side of the street and a woman holding a dress bag entering the store next door.
"Sasha, I don't mean to alarm you but we need to get inside. Right now."
My hands finally close around my keys. "Okay, here's the key right here."
He plucks the key ring from my hand and unlocks the door. It swings open and he pulls me inside with him. Then he shuts the door and flips the deadbolt.
"Gabe, what are you doing?"
He grabs me by the hand and pulls me further into the building. "I'm hiding."
Exasperated, I yank my hand back after he pulls me behind one of the bookshelves still sitting in the middle of the floor. "Yes, I can see that. But who are we supposed to be hiding from?"
Gabe leans down to peer between the shelves so I do, too. Where we're standing we have a clear view of the front window. "Him. We're hiding from him."
Just then a guy with dark hair strolls casually past. I hate stereotyping people but everything about this guy makes me want to take a step back. His dark hair is gelled down and he's wearing a worn black leather jacket. But it's not the clothes. It's his expression. Cold. Like anyone in his way had better move because he'll have no problem taking them out. He looks completely out of place in this neighborhood.
Just before he's out of sight, he turns his head to look directly through the front window. A shiver runs through me. At that angle, the dead look in his eyes is clear but worse is the thin scar that cuts across his cheek bisecting his face.
Gabe looks like trouble. This guy looks like he should be carrying around a body bag in the trunk of his car. He also looks vaguely familiar.
"Friend of yours?" I whisper.
"Not exactly."
"Okay. So why are you hiding from Scarface?"
Gabe looks grim. "Because this isn't the first time I've seen him. Would you excuse me for a moment?"
He moves away slightly and pulls out his cell phone. I take the opportunity to look around the space. I pull out my file folder and dig until I find the sketch provided by the general contractor who'd given me an estimate on constructing the stage. He'd decided that we could use the back right corner without impeding the flow of movement in the rest of the space.
It's so hard to imagine how different it's all going to look in just six weeks.
"Sasha?"
I look up to see that Gabe has ended his call. But he looks agitated. "Is everything okay?"
"Yeah. I just need to go check on something. Are you going to be okay by yourself?"
"Of course. I'm going to be here alone a lot over the coming weeks. There's so much to do. The first shipment of furniture should be here this afternoon. Then I can get started putting things in place."
I drop my tote bag next to the back door and open the blinds to let in the light. "There's so much I want to do here. I just hope I can do it justice."
Gabe comes to stand next to me and peers out the window. There's another set of row houses behind our block separated by a small garden pavilion. There's several benches arranged in a semicircle.
"I can easily see myself going outside to eat lunch some days or taking a break to relax before going home at the end of a long day. I can see myself here and that excites and scares me."
"Scares you?"
I shrug. "Because if this doesn't work out, I won't just be losing the club. This is something I see more as a purpose. Something my life sorely needs right now. I just want to feel like something I do matters."
I turn and he's looking down at me with an expression of wonder on his face.
"You're important to so many people, Sasha. How can you not know that? Your family, your friends, hell even Finn threatened to castrate me if I screwed around with you."
My mouth drops open. "Finn said that?"
A slow grin eases over his mouth. I love that expression on him. He's so serious most of the time that it's a joy to see when his guard drops.
"Not in those words exactly. It was a little more subtle, something about not wanting to have to make our business his business. It loses something in the translation. I think you had to be there to see the menacing look in his eyes."
A warm feeling flows through me. "So that's why you said we have to be just friends?" It makes me feel a little better to know that he wasn't lying about that.
"That actually happened after you left. But I knew all along that my brothers wouldn't be pleased if they saw us together. Tank and Finn both consider you family now. I heard about how you've been visiting their mom along with Emma."
I shrug, even though it makes me sad to think about it. "Emma lost her parents so she's really attached to Claire now. I was happy to go with her. Everyone needs a little laughter and girl talk sometimes."
"Maybe that's what draws me to you," he whispers. He's talking so softly I'm not sure he even means for me to hear him. "I couldn't figure out what it was that kept drawing me back to you. Kept me thinking about you even when we were apart. But it's that kindness. That sweetness. You're just so real. It makes me want that for myself."
His hand slips underneath my hair, his thumb tracing a drugging path back and forth behind my ear. I have to clench my stomach against a wave of longing. Everything about Gabe Marshall turns me on and I don't think he even realizes it.
"Gabe…"
That's all I get out before his mouth is on mine. We back up and I jump when my back hits the wall. I stretch up on my tiptoes and anchor my arms behind his head. Every time he touches me it's the same, this sudden scorching blaze that seems to tear through all my resistance. His other hand comes up to frame my face.
He's such a contradiction when he holds me like this, like I'm precious and like he wants to take me on the floor at the same time.
His hands move to my waist and his fingers inch down, down, down between my legs. I pant against his mouth as he rubs me through the
fabric of my jeans. I look up and he's watching me. I nod my permission and he slides the zipper down.
The sound in the quiet space is the most erotic thing I've ever heard. He holds my gaze as his hand slips beneath the waistband. Then I can't keep my eyes open anymore because he's stroking me, gentle little flicks across the lips of my sex, like he's just teasing me.
"I'm supposed to stay away from you. I'm not supposed to be here. But I just can't help myself." His words sound almost angry but then he takes my mouth again as one finger slides deep.
I break apart, crying out his name, the soft sound echoing around us in the quiet of the room. He stays with me, thrusting gently, letting me ride his finger. When I open my eyes he's watching me intently.
"That was beautiful. God damn." The hand on my cheek tightens, holding me still so that I can't avoid his eyes. What I see there shocks me.
He looks … hungry.
When he slides his finger free, I want to cry out again at the loss. I can see him closing up right in front of me, putting his desire back behind whatever wall he uses to keep himself so remote. It's heartbreaking to witness after seeing him so open just a few minutes ago.
He kisses me on the forehead. Part of me wants to drag him back down for a real kiss but I can sense that he's working through something. And I can't force him to want the same things I do.
"I have to go. I would stay and help but I need to check on something."
"You should be careful. If you want me to think you're a bad guy, you have to stop being so nice."
Gabe gives me a crooked smile. "It's all an illusion. Lock up behind me."
"Okay, I will. Trust me, I've gotten the safety lecture from Eli a million times."
He runs his hands over his hair, taming the strands that I set in disarray while I straighten my clothes. Then he follows me to the front of the building. At the door he pauses, taking one last look at me before he steps over the threshold. He waits, watching until I turn the lock on the door. Then with one final salute, he's gone.
As soon as he's out of sight, I sag against the door. My blood pressure is still high and if I close my eyes I can still feel his fingers, his lips, his tongue. To Gabe, fooling around is just a little fun and games but for me, it's just one more thing that pulls me in closer. Makes me forget myself. The man is dangerous and I don't have time for dangerous.
