A Man Worth Remembering

by Delores Fossen

  That seemed to be the only encouragement Gabe needed to up the ante. He slid his rough, callused hand down her body and to her thigh.

  “Don’t look away,” he insisted when she started to close her eyes. “I’ve waited a long time to be with you like this. I want to see what it does to you.”

  Leigh couldn’t have refused if she’d wanted. She held his gaze, somehow. Even when he skimmed his hand to the back of her knee. He lifted it, positioning it, until it tucked against the outside of his thigh.

  Still, she watched.

  Her breath shattered when his hand began to move again. He took his time. Inch by precious inch. Just his fingertips brushing over her skin as he made his way from her knee. To her thigh. And then to her stomach.

  “Since the moment you came back, I’ve ached to touch you like this.” His voice was hoarse and hardly more than a whisper.

  Yes. She’d felt the same ache, even though she didn’t have the words to say it. But Gabe knew. She could tell from the way he looked at her that he knew everything that stirred inside her body and her soul.

  With that same torturous slow pace, he pressed his hand against her bare stomach. His fingers moved over the lacy panel of her low-cut panties. Leigh arched her back, and hips, to feel more of that touch.

  “Say my name, Leigh,” he told her, his voice thick. “I want to hear you say my name again.”

  “Gabe,” she obliged. But then almost immediately, she went stiff. “Gabe…”

  He must have noticed her reaction because he stopped. “What’s wrong?”

  She shook her head, already trying to move away from him. “I…”

  “Tell me what’s wrong.”

  She pressed her hands on each side of her head. “I remember something.”

  Only because she was looking at him did she notice the alarm that fired through his eyes. Just like that, the moment and the passion were gone. Those few words were obviously the slap back to reality they both needed.

  “Did I try to call you a couple of days ago?” she asked.

  He nodded. “You left a message at my apartment in New Orleans. You asked me to meet you at the lake.”

  Yes. That was it. That was the image that flashed into her head. Her on the phone…somewhere. And she was calling Gabe. “So that’s how you knew I’d be there.”

  Gabe slowly pulled the sides of her robe back in place, stepped away from her and reached for his beer. He finished it off in one quick gulp. “I arrived just in time to see the car speed away. I was about to go after it when I noticed the movement in the water.”

  And she was that movement in the water. “Do you remember if I said anything else in that message?”

  “I remember it word for word,” he admitted. “You said you had something to tell me. That I should meet you at Lake Pontchartrain on the east end of the old Slidell Bridge so we wouldn’t be seen. It’s been closed to traffic for years. You added that if something should go wrong then I was to get to Philip in Houston.”

  “Philip in Houston,” she repeated. Yes. That sounded right.

  At first.

  But then the prickle started up the back of her neck. The feeling that went through her made her feel on the verge of a panic attack. Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. “We have to get to Houston, Gabe.”

  He nodded and closed the window over the sink. “And we will, right after we’ve spoken to Frank.”

  Because her legs suddenly seemed wobbly, she sat down at the table. It didn’t help. The panic attack seemed so close to the surface that she didn’t know if she could control it. “There’s something…about Houston.” But what? Leigh tried to force herself to remember. “I think my brother might be in danger. All I know is that I have to get back to Houston right away.”

  Gabe sat down across from her and reached for her hand. Unlike his previous touch, there was nothing carnal about this. He obviously saw how close she was to losing it and wanted to comfort her.

  “Listen, Leigh, if Jinx hasn’t been able to find Philip, no one can. That means he’s safe. If Frank can tell us who Dayton’s accomplice is, then we have something to work with. We can get this person off our backs, and neither you nor your brother will be in danger.”

  Maybe. And maybe not. Still, Gabe was right about one thing. They did need to find out what Frank knew. It wouldn’t do any good for them to go racing to Houston when she had no idea where in Houston even to look for her brother.

  She pulled her hand from his and pressed her fingertips, hard, to her temples. “God, I hate this amnesia. There’s something I’m supposed to be doing. Something important. I just know it. I feel it. And I don’t have a clue what it is.”

  “It’ll come to you. Beating yourself up won’t help.” He stood and pushed the chair back under the table. “Why don’t you go to bed? You might remember something else after a good night’s sleep.”

  Leigh didn’t think she’d be doing much sleeping, but she did need to try. With a midnight rendezvous with Frank, it might be days before she got another chance to rest.

  “You can sleep in Maria’s old room,” Gabe said, helping her from the chair. “It’s at the end of the hall. I’ve already locked up, and I turned on the security alarm. It’s not state-of-the-art, but it’ll give us enough warning just in case.”

  Just in case those gunmen returned. With the other things that had gone on, Leigh had almost forgotten about them.

  She retrieved her gun from the table and stepped out into the hallway. “Where will you be?” she asked.

  “I’ll take the couch.”

  So he would be close to the front door, no doubt. In other words, he’d spend the night standing guard. “Let me know if you need some relief.”

  A short burst of air rushed out of his mouth. It was almost a smothered laugh. Leigh nearly laughed herself. That wasn’t the best choice of words considering what had just happened between them. “I meant if you needed me to take a turn standing guard.”

  “Yeah.” He paused. “I know what you meant.”

  No doubt. But knowing it didn’t do anything to lessen the strain she felt between them.

  She motioned toward the kitchen. “I’m sorry about what just happened, Gabe.” It was paltry at best. But it was the only thing she could offer him at the moment. “I would say it won’t happen again, but I’ll save my breath.”

  “Good idea.” He turned and walked into the living room.

  She stood there and watched while he sank onto the sturdy, floral sofa. There was probably something else she should say to him. Perhaps a confession that she no longer doubted that they’d once been in love. But that would probably only make things worse.

  It would for her anyway.

  Leigh didn’t need any verbal reminders as to how deep her feelings for Gabe once were. Nor did she need to dwell on the fact that once her memory returned, she just might realize those feelings, that love, was still there.

  Chapter Ten

  Leigh lifted her head from against the window when Gabe drove past the sign that announced the Grand Valley city limits. Finally, they’d reached their destination. They had taken what seemed to be the most roundabout route to get there, with Gabe meandering down one back road after another.

  “Do you have any idea where this place is that we’re supposed to meet Frank?” she asked, glancing around the pristine houses and shops that dotted the landscape. It wasn’t a large town, but it seemed spread out.

  “The house is on Outrider Street.”

  Since he didn’t check a map or even look at the road signs, she figured Gabe had been there before. But then, it was an FBI safe house. She, too, might have visited it when she was still on the Evidence Response Team.

  She glanced at the clock on the dash. It was still nearly a half hour until midnight. Not a vast amount of time, but they’d already spent the entire day just killing time.

  And trying to ignore each other.

  Gabe had been far more successful at it than she had. />
  Basically, he’d just clammed up. When he did speak to answer one of her chitchat-type questions, he kept his answers to a bare minimum. In the five hours it’d taken them to get from his childhood home to Grand Valley, Gabe had really only passed on a few bits and pieces of new information. Leigh now knew that she was twenty-nine and, other than sugary coffee, she had a fondness for old Bogart movies, chocolate ice cream and reading murder mysteries. Not exactly a storehouse of information.

  What he carefully avoided was any discussion about what had gone on the night before in the kitchen. Or any comment about their past relationship.

  It was just as well. She had no idea what to say to him about those things either. It was clear that Gabe wasn’t eager to resume a relationship with her, but he’d certainly had trouble resisting anything physical.

  But then, so had she.

  When Gabe slowed down the car, Leigh followed his gaze to the two-story house on Outrider Street. “That’s it?” It looked like the dozen or so other houses that lined both sides of the street. Nondescript. A cookie-cutter image of the other houses around it. And that was probably why the FBI had chosen it.

  Gabe nodded and drove right past it. He parked at the end of the block in front of a small park.

  “Do you think Frank’s already in there?” Leigh glanced out the back window. She could easily see the house, but there weren’t any lights on inside.

  “Maybe.”

  But since he settled against the seat, that obviously meant he didn’t intend to go in early. Maybe because it might scare off Frank, and maybe because he wanted to give Jinx a little more time to arrive.

  “So, what’s the plan?” she asked.

  Gabe made himself more comfortable, stretching out his arm so that it rested on the back of her seat. It wasn’t necessarily intentional. There wasn’t much room in the two-seater car, and his arms were long.

  “We wait, and when it’s time, I walk to the house and go inside.”

  “That’s it? It sounds too risky. What if someone used Frank to set a trap for us?”

  “Well, I obviously won’t knock on the door and wait for someone to invite me in. I’ll go around back and get in without being seen.”

  Leigh didn’t like that any better than the other part. “And what if Frank accidentally shoots you because he thinks you’re someone else?”

  Gabe lay back on the headrest. “He’s expecting me. Besides, no one else is supposed to be here.”

  “You don’t know that for sure. Jinx knows we’ll be here. He could have told someone.”

  He angled his eyes in her direction. “We’ve been through this. Jinx is a decent guy. I’ve known him for years.”

  That didn’t mean she would trust him. Leigh tried a different approach. “What if the accomplice is waiting inside?”

  Gabe shrugged. “It won’t change what I have to do. One way or another, I have to meet Frank. I’ll disarm the security system and hope for the best.”

  “Great day, this sounds like no plan at all. All right, Gabe, answer this one. After we get in and disarm the system, then what? Do we just pray that no one blows us away?”

  He leaned closer and cupped her chin. “Let’s get one thing straight right now. There’s no we to this plan. You will wait here in the car while I go inside. I have no intention of taking you into that house.”

  This wasn’t at all the way she thought things would be, and Leigh was sure her expression showed it. “But you’re going in,” she pointed out.

  “Because I don’t have a choice. I want to get in and out as fast as possible. I can’t do that if I have to worry about you, too.”

  Was he right? Leigh had to concede that he might be. Frank possibly held information that could save their lives.

  Or get them killed.

  Either way, they had to know. And either way with the stitches in her ankle, she would be a liability to Gabe.

  She huffed, frustrated at the conclusion she’d come to. “Why do you get to come up with the plans?”

  “Because I don’t have amnesia. When you get your memory back, you can come up with all the plans you want.” He glanced at her foot. “How’s the ankle holding up?”

  “Fine.”

  He took two painkillers from the first-aid kit and handed her a bottle of water. “These might help.”

  She took the tablets, wishing there were such an easy solution to the rest of her problems. “When we’re done here, will we leave straight for Houston?”

  “That depends. If Frank tells us what we want to know, then yes. But before we go driving all over Houston, I’m hoping Jinx will come up with an address for Philip.”

  Leigh hoped the same thing. There were too many hitches in her life right now—her brother’s whereabouts and safety were just part of them. She could add Houston to that list. Just the mention of the place sent her blood pressure climbing. And then there was Gabe. When they’d worked through all those other problems, she would still have to figure out what to do about him.

  The physical attraction was still there. The incident at the house had proven that. The heat still crackled between them even now. That meant whatever had happened to drive them apart, it hadn’t destroyed the feelings they had for each other. Well, not all of them anyway. However, it had put a wedge between them that seemed to dissolve with each smoldering glance they shared.

  If it’d just been those glances, Leigh could have dealt with it better. But it was much more than that. Gabe was someone she trusted. She no longer doubted that. That phone call she remembered making was one of the most important calls of her life, and she’d phoned the one man who could save her and her brother. She wouldn’t have made that call to just anyone.

  “You’re sure quiet over there,” Gabe said to her. “Are you thinking I owe you an apology for what went on back at the house?”

  She nearly choked on the drink of water she’d just taken. “No apology. I was a willing participant.”

  Incredibly willing.

  Leigh had already opened her mouth to delve into that can of worms he’d just opened, but Gabe spoke before she could. “It’s time to go,” he said softly. “I want to go over the rules.”

  “Rules?” she repeated. He’d made it sounds as if they were back in elementary school. “Why do you get to come up with the rules?”

  “They’re like plans—my territory.” He didn’t even pause after that glib remark. “Keep your gun ready and stay put. I mean, don’t move an inch. If and only if I signal do you come into that house.”

  “What’s the signal?”

  “I’ll flicker the lights.”

  She felt her eyes widen. “And how will you manage that if someone’s holding a gun on you?”

  “Mi vida, the only time I’ll flicker those lights is when and if the place is safe.”

  “So, I’m not supposed to come to your aid even if I can save your life?” Leigh asked.

  “That’s right. But don’t worry, I’ll be fine.” He put his hand on the door handle, but he didn’t open it. He hesitated a moment. Then, two. “By the way, if something does happen, Jinx will find you. He’ll take you someplace safe.”

  That sent her stomach into a tailspin. “But you just said you’d be fine.”

  She would have added more, much more, if he hadn’t kissed her. It happened so fast that Leigh didn’t even see it coming. It didn’t last long. Hardly more than a taste. He broke the contact and stared into her eyes. She was pretty sure she no longer looked argumentative.

  “You said that complicates things,” she pointed out. And it did. Big time. She couldn’t think her way out of a paper bag when Gabe kissed her.

  “I know. What can I say—I’m weak. And I’ve gotta go.”

  With that calmly uttered remark, Gabe got out of the car and started toward the house. She kept her gaze on him, watching until he disappeared into the darkness.

  Her fears certainly didn’t disappear.

  If something happened to Gabe… But
Leigh couldn’t even finish that thought. Instead, she forced herself to concentrate on something she could control—a backup plan of her own. If Gabe hadn’t returned within fifteen minutes, she would say to heck with his rules. She’d go in after him. After all, those kind of rules were made to be broken.

  The minutes crawled by.

  She kept a close watch on the house, praying that everything was all right. But she saw nothing. No flickering lights. No shadows. No sign of life. It made the muscles in her chest tighten even more.

  God, how many times had she sat through something like this? She didn’t have a specific answer, but Leigh knew this wasn’t a first. No, there’d been other cases, other assignments where she’d been in a position like this. Odd though, the potential danger didn’t frighten her nearly as much as the thought of Gabe going in that house alone.

  At the end of her self-imposed time limit, Leigh got out of the car, taking the gun with her. She didn’t know exactly what she intended to do, but if she could get closer to the house, she might catch a glimpse of Gabe. That glimpse would hopefully be enough to reassure her that he was all right.

  She walked toward the house, trying to stay focused on her surroundings. She didn’t want another gunman sneaking up on her like the one at the clinic. Nor did she want a neighbor to see her skulking around and call the cops. A squad car with flashing lights wouldn’t please Gabe or Frank.

  Everything suddenly seemed quiet. Too quiet. And her instincts screamed that something wasn’t right. Instead of staying on the sidewalk where she could easily be seen, Leigh went in the same direction Gabe had taken. She cut across one of the postage-stamp lawns and into a narrow greenbelt. Shrubs and mature trees dotted the area, providing her with an adequate hiding space.

  She hoped.

  A dog barked, and because it sounded nearby, Leigh froze. She hadn’t thought her heart could race any faster, but it did. Was is possible she had a fear of dogs? Well, it didn’t matter. This was no time to be neurotic. She had to make sure Gabe was all right.

  She reached the house and flattened her body against the side so she could peek into the kitchen window. The only light came from the dim bulb over the stove, but it was enough to see things she didn’t want to see.