“It’s a little overthinking.” She took a breath. “I need it to be perfect. This client could change everything. Referrals, my reputation, the whole trajectory of my business.”
“It’ll be perfect. Because you’re the one running it. And you don’t do anything halfway.”
She looked down at the pasta. Her expression shifted.
“This looks like Gran’s.”
He sat down across from her. “I called your mother. I told her who I was and asked her for the recipe because you mentioned it once.”
She stared at him. “You looked up my mother.”
“She was very helpful. Also slightly terrifying.”
“Gabriel.” Her voice had gone unsteady. She reached across the table and took his hand. “You’re—“ Her voice caught. “You’re really good at this.”
“At pasta?”
“At being here. At showing up. At making me feel like I’m not doing everything alone.”
She was looking at him like he hung the moon.
He was the man who hadn’t told her the truth. He had a framed document in his desk, a young man’s word given years ago to never love a woman like Tessa Thorne. His mother constantly asking who she was. A best friend who deserved to know the firm had outgrown its founding terms.
He should tell her. But she was already carrying enough for Saturday.
Not tonight. After the event.
“I’m proud of you,” he said. “Whatever happens Saturday.”
She leaned across the table and kissed him. Soft. Grateful.
“Thank you. For this. For tonight. For being exactly who you are.”
The words hit him hard. He kissed her back and told himself he was protecting her.
They cleaned up together. She washed while he dried. Normal. Domestic. Easy.
Later, in bed, she curled against his side with her head on his chest. Her breathing slowed and evened out.
Gabriel stared at the ceiling.
Tessa stirred in her sleep, her hand finding his arm. Fingers loose. Trusting.
He’d spent his whole life going somewhere unreachable when things got close enough to matter. He’d been doing it since he was sixteen. He knew the move like muscle memory.
What he hadn’t counted on was how clearly he could see himself doing it now—lying beside her, watching the ceiling, choosing it anyway.
His mother had called twice that morning. He hadn’t answered.
The drawer was three rooms away.
Tomorrow was Saturday and Saturday was hers.
After. He’d tell her after.
Chapter 16
TESSA
