“From the moment I saw him, I could tell he had one thing on his mind.” Gabriel’s deep growl shot through me.
“Yeah, well, not happening. When I have sex, it’s on my terms.”
I met Gabriel’s eyes. Heat and desire rose in their glittering, green-gold depths, and I wanted to press my mouth to his and rub my cheek against his raspy scruff. He had to see it. Feel the current between us. His lips parted, breath puffing out in short bursts. I could almost taste him, and my heartbeat accelerated, thundering in rhythm to the blood pumping through my veins.
The memory of my lousy date faded, and I was in the here and now. With Gabriel.
And I wanted him.
I could see us, naked in my bed, Gabriel pinning me beneath him, pounding into me, our cries rising—
“I’d better turn in.” Gabriel got to his feet, and I sat in the dark living room, aching, hard, and confused as hell.
Gabriel worked for me. I couldn’t fuck him. That would complicate everything.
Not like my life wasn’t fucking complicated enough.
Chapter Ten
Gabriel
Several weeks passed, and we’d fallen into a routine. I always got up earlier than Ronan, and after exercising, I would go over the daily calendar, which, aside from his visits to his parole officer and going to the hospital to do his community service, was pretty empty. He hadn’t made any moves toward getting a job, volunteering, or doing much aside from sitting at home, watching television or staring out the window. Ronan led a mostly solitary life, and after his disastrous night with Seth, made no other attempt at dating or socializing. This was turning out to be the cushiest job I’d ever had, but I was certain he was as unhappy as he was lonely. No one called him, and he had no friends visiting.
And then there was the physical temptation…
I’d catch his eyes on me, and even though he was the most attractive man I’d seen in years, I knew he was hands-off. It would be so damn inappropriate, especially after what happened with DJ. That was what I’d told myself, and I almost believed it. I could control myself during the day, but my nights? They were filled with heated dreams of what a kiss from Ronan Michaels would taste like. What his skin would feel like under my touch.
That morning, I was on the couch when he shuffled in at eleven, disheveled and bleary-eyed, as if he’d spent a night wrestling with the devil. I’d heard a few painful cries coming from his bedroom that weren’t from pleasure. After everything he’d been through, it wouldn’t surprise me to discover Ronan suffered from nightmares.
“Morning,” he mumbled and headed straight for the coffee machine. It took two cups before he looked at me again. “You’re disgustingly awake.”
“It’s close to noon, and I’m on the clock.” I cocked a brow. “Rough night?” Would he tell me?
Breaking eye contact, he directed his gaze to the floor. “Yeah, kinda.” He shrugged and picked up the mail, tossing aside the bills. A single letter remained in his hand, and he handed it over to me. “Could you open this? I don’t see a return address.”
“Yeah, sure.” I slit it open, revealing a single sheet of white paper with one line:You’ll pay for what you did to people. A surge of anger rolled through me.
Ronan’s eyes narrowed. “What is it?”
He had a right to see it, so I held it for him to read. His chin tipped up in defiance.
“Fuck them. I did pay. Six years in jail, goddammit. When is it ever going to be enough?”
He stormed away, and I heard the bedroom door slam and the faint sound of the shower. I placed the letter into the envelope and slipped it into a plastic bag. Even if Ronan didn’t want to report it to the police right now, the time might come when he’d change his mind.
He reappeared fifteen minutes later, dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans. His dark hair lay in wet swathes over his forehead, and tough, dangerous vibes rolled off him. There was nothing remotely resembling the vulnerable, broken man I’d so desperately wanted to comfort during the night.
“I need to go to the bank. I’ve put off changing my account representative long enough. And then I want to walk around. I can’t sit here all day, staring at you or the walls. It’s like I traded one prison cell for another.”
I glanced at the sun-drenched rooms. “Hardly the same, but I understand. I’m ready when you are.”
His assessing, slow gaze raked over me, and I cursed my lack of self-control in response to that intense, blue-eyed scrutiny. Heat flooded me, and a lazy grin tipped the corner of his generous mouth. Damn, he was intuitive. I’d have to watch myself. Ronan might prove harder to resist than I’d initially thought, and that would be disastrous for my future in the business.
“I get the feeling you’re always ready, Gabriel Sachs.”
“It’s what I get paid to be.”
Once outside, I was glad to see there were no protesters, and I hoped it was the beginning of the public’s waning interest in Ronan. I followed him to the bank, where he met with the head of the private client group and arranged to have a new client-services manager assigned. To Ronan’s credit, he didn’t bad-mouth Seth, who’d whitened when Ronan walked in and ignored him. The loss of Ronan’s multimillion-dollar personal account would hurt him, but at least he had his job. Maybe Seth thought that with all the time that had passed, Ronan had forgotten. Hopefully, it would teach him to listen when someone said no.
