Kitabı oku: «New York Nights», sayfa 3

3

GABE’S FIRST INSTINCT was to hammer on the door and ask what was wrong. Tessa wasn’t a crier, wasn’t the emotional whirlpool that the other females at the bar were. Time after time he saw her move from place to place, moving from day job to job or whatever life threw at her, and she took it all in stride. There was only one other person he knew who was so emotionally stable. Him. No, Tessa was solid rock all the way. Which was why he’d been so shocked to see her upset.

However, Tessa had been very clear about things. The first being the ground rules. She wanted her space, and he’d been fine with that, although that was before she’d turned on the waterworks, and tears always got him hinky.

He crumpled the beer can in his hand, then tossed it in the trash across the room.

Damn.

Damn, damn, damn.

He didn’t give a damn about the personal boundaries at the moment, so he went and knocked on the door. Loudly, so she wouldn’t pretend not to hear, which is what he knew she’d do.

“Tess? I’m getting kinda bored out here. Let’s go out, get some drinks. You know, celebrate your first night here.”

“Go away, Gabe. It’s that time of the month.”

Aw, hell. When females freely admitted to PMS it meant serious danger ahead. He knocked again.

“Leave me alone, Gabe.”

“I know you have your rules, Tess, but at least talk to me.”

“No.”

Gabe fought the urge to pound on the door, but now wasn’t the time to be heavy-handed and go all caveman on her. He needed to use finesse and psychology. He was good at that, he was a bartender, a very good one. There was one easy way to get to Tess.

“Can you open the door? It is mine, after all.”

The door opened and Tessa flew out. He grabbed her arm before she could run.

“Stop it.”

She faced him down, every trace of a tear scrubbed away, her eyes sharp as daggers. All nice and neat and as tidy as she could get.

“I won’t pry. I won’t ask what’s bothering you. However, I will treat you exactly like I’d treat any other friend who’s had a hard day. There’s a party upstairs. I’m a popular guy—sorry, you’ll have to get used to that, but we should go. You’ll get a chance to meet some of the people in the building, but watch out for Stevie Tagglioli—he’s a basket case and will hit on anything in a skirt.”

Tessa pulled her arm free and stared at the wall. “I don’t feel like doing anything. I need to study.”

So this was going to be tricky. She was playing the academic-scholar card. But there was one thing that trumped academics: guilt. “You’re going to be boring, aren’t you? I thought this would be fun. Somebody to eat with, hang out on the couch with, go shoot some pool—but, no, you’re a closet dweeb, aren’t you?”

She lifted her tiny chin, her eyes starting to spark. “I’m not a dweeb, and you’ll be wise to remember that in the future.”

“Prove it. Come on, it’ll be fun.”

“It’s going to be hell.”

“So we dip into the bowels of hell together? Besides, there’s this one girl in the building—Vanessa—and she’s been hitting on me, can’t get enough of me. You can be my cover date.”

And voilà. There it was. Fire-breathing rage. This was the Tessa that he knew and loved.

“You want me to keep some skank from hitting on you? This is the sole reason you’re inviting me?”

“Does there have to be another one?”

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “This won’t work. Now we’re living together. If people in the building think we’re a couple, what happens if I want to date someone in the building? Do I have to sneak out on you? See what sort of tangled webs evolve when you keep the skanks at bay with false pretense?”

Okay, she had him, but at least, she was smiling and contemplating the social world again. Progress. Definite progress. Gabe mentally congratulated himself.

“Does that mean you’ll go?”

“No.”

“You can’t spend all your time locked in your room. You should get out and have some fun.”

“I don’t have time for fun.”

“Everyone has time for fun.”

“Oh, yeah, everyone has time for fun,” she said, her eyes sharpening, her voice snapping, and Gabe wasn’t sure exactly who “everyone” was, but he was definitely glad that it wasn’t him, because judging by the daggers in her eyes, Tessa Hart was nursing a grudge the size of Brooklyn.

“It’s exactly what you need. Take a break. Let yourself go for a night. You get too focused sometimes, Tess, and you miss out.”

“You think I miss out?”

“On lots,” he said, no longer sure what they were talking about, but she wasn’t mad anymore, she wasn’t sad anymore, and that was progress.

She twisted a lock of hair in her fingers. “There’ll be people there? Fun people?”

“Yeah, tons.”

Her eyes sparked. “I think you’re right. It’s time to move forward, and a party with fun people is the perfect way to start.”

Ah, success. It was a sweet thing. Gabe gave her a friendly smile and watched as she went to get changed, the bounce back in her step.

It was a mere ten minutes later when she emerged from her room decked out in a miniskirt, a sheer blouse over a camisole and heels.

He looked once. He looked twice, and then his vision started to blur. Mother Teresa had left the building, and the woman that was left was…Tessa.

His roommate.

Small, supple and increasingly bedable.

Aw, no.

From out of the dregs of his imagination burst pictures and, even worse, full-motion videos. And from those images burst forth a hard-on that was excruciatingly painful—and it wasn’t even nine o’clock.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“Good,” he answered, because if he told her what he really thought, he was absolutely sure some personal boundaries would be violated.

He was used to her in jeans, a Prime T-shirt, and an absence of makeup. But, gawd, tonight she was smokin’ and ready for anything. There was a do-me flicker in her eyes that threatened to knock him flat on his ass.

Gabe nodded stupidly and went to guide her toward the door, but that would involve touching her. He knew—even crazed and unthinking as he currently was—that was a bad idea. His hand dropped and he waited for her to open the apartment door.

A drop of sweat beaded on the back of his neck.

Hell.

THE PARTY WAS ON the thirty-seventh floor, hosted by one Jonathan Wilder, who worked in advertising sales and seemed to know the world. The apartment was packed and loud, and Gabe could see Tessa’s eyes light up like a slot machine when she entered.

Trouble, and he spotted it right off the bat. He knew Tessa. He knew that tilt in her chin, that kick in her walk. When she got like that at the bar, a drink would end up right over some jerk’s head.

Those sorts of safe and familiar thoughts pulled him back into a place where his Johnson didn’t hurt quite so much and where that skirt didn’t look quite so…easy.

Okay, he’d play bouncer tonight. He knew that role. He’d watch her back—not her ass, only her back—and keep her out of trouble.

However, tonight trouble was her middle name. She launched into a tequila shot contest with Stevie Tagglioli, and Gabe waited, thinking she was going to splash some tequila all over Stevie, but she didn’t. She kept drinking…and touching…and drinking…and there was more touching. Eventually Gabe insinuated himself between the two, accidentally elbowing Stevie in the gut.

“Hey, Steve? Meet my new roommate, Tessa Hart.”

“We’re not involved,” said Tessa, downing another shot.

Gabe laughed. “She’s such a tease. Come on, babe. Let’s move along while you can still walk.”

Little Stevie was enthralled, spending more time staring at the thin silk of her shirt rather than her face. Prick.

Tessa’s fingers bit into Gabe’s arm. “Leave me alone,” she huffed.

“You’re in a mood, and I don’t know why, and you don’t have to tell me why because you want your space, but if you do something that you’ll regret with somebody in this building that you’re going to see every day, then you’re going to experience history’s longest hangover.”

She pulled him aside, her eyes lit with some weird fire, ready to combust. “I’m merely trying to have some fun. Isn’t that what you said? It’ll be fun? I think that’s an exact quote. Well maybe I want to have some fun.”

She was mad at him?

Gabe swore and let go of her arm as if it burned. He couldn’t reason with her, he wasn’t going to try. “Fine. Your life. Your mistake.”

And so it went on. Gabe watched from the sidelines, glaring when the females approached him. Tessa was the only one that drew his eyes. She drank shots, she flirted with every single male in the room—not one man left unflirted with, except for Gabe, of course, because she was shooting him death stares every few minutes. He stood, waiting for the crash, but that would be a long time coming because, truly, there were few people who could drink Gabe under the table, but Tessa was one. She had the tolerance of a T. rex. In fact, when faced with the mighty beast, she’d probably drink Godzilla under the table, too.

So he watched her, silently seething, seeing a completely new side to this woman. She’d pulled her hair back, exposing those killer cheekbones and a long, slender neck, and she’d put on red lipstick. Hooker-red lipstick—which, of course, looked like sex. Goddamn.

He didn’t want to notice the full, red, glistening lips, didn’t want to notice how long her legs were in heels, didn’t want to notice how her nipples stood at attention under the flimsy silk, but she’d been right earlier.

It was hell. His mood got more foul, his cock got more hard, and when she started dancing on the coffee table, Gabe was pretty much at the end of his rope.

“We’re going—now,” he said, watching her hips sway, like a hypnotizing cobra, twisting, begging him to follow.

“Go home, Gabe,” she said, raising her arms up over her head. A goddess reaching for the heavens, which only angered him even more because, dammit, he did not think poetry.

“Without you? No. This isn’t like you, Tess.”

That stopped the sway of her hips. Thank you, God.

“How do you know? Do you know the real me?”

“Yes,” he replied, lifting her down. His hands lingered for a moment too long, but she didn’t notice.

“Maybe I’ve changed.”

“Not over the period of four hours.” He grabbed her hand and pulled. She pulled back.

“I want to stay with Stevie.”

And that was it. Gabe didn’t care anymore. Stevie was the world’s biggest jerk and loser, and once he got his fangs into Tessa, he wouldn’t let go. Gabe picked up Tessa and threw her over his shoulder. She’d be furious, but she’d thank him in the morning.

The nasty jab between the shoulder blades indicated otherwise, but Gabe didn’t even blink. He was willing to earn a purple heart for this one.

“Sorry. We had a bad fight. Go on, ignore us. Get some more of that spinach dip. It’s really good,” Gabe said encouragingly, shouldering his way through the crowd with Tessa beating on his back.

She didn’t seem to remember that Gabe was used to dealing with drunk and disorderlies. But then, Gabe didn’t usually cup their asses in such a familiar manner, either.

“Put me down, Gabe O’Sullivan.”

“When I get you home, Miss Hart, and not before.”

He almost let her down in the elevator, but she tried to run, so he hefted her back on his shoulder. God, the woman needed to gain weight.

“Gabe, I really hate you for this.”

“In the morning, if you still hate me—which is a big if— I’ll apologize. You’ll probably be thanking me, and I’ll let you grovel in gratitude for a while, but right now you’ve had too much to drink—”

“I’m not drunk.”

“Then it’s even worse, Tess. Are you going to tell me what happened?”

“No.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

The doors opened, and she slid down his body, slow and seductive. She probably didn’t mean it to be that way, but his cock jumped just the same. Tessa shot him a look—not an invitation but coy and aware.

She knew.

So maybe it was time to stop playing games. Gabe trapped her outside the elevator against the wall, her lean body tight to his. He could feel every inch of her. The fluttering pulse, the tight nipples, the soft hips. She drew in a breath, soft and shaky, and the air burned. His hands itched to go lower, to explore and discover this new and marvelously arousing Tessa. But Gabe was still hanging on to the last edges of his control. His body wasn’t happy, but his body would get over it.

“Inside. Now,” he said, unlocking his apartment door. This time she didn’t argue and went inside, but he knew from the tight set of her shoulders that she wasn’t happy either.

Once in the apartment, he shut the door with a bang and ran a frustrated hand through his hair.

“It’s late,” he said because he needed to be alone. Needed to have her out of his sight. He needed to reclaim the image of Tessa from before. Hopefully it was still there, embedded somewhere deep in his brain.

“I’m not a kid,” she answered, pushing her hair back from her face, and—God help him—gawky and angular had turned exotic.

“Then stop acting like one,” he snapped, not leaving her alone as he had planned.

“You’re not my father,” she blurted, hands on hips—lean hips that he could still feel against his chest.

“I’m your friend, your boss and currently your roommate,” he answered, mainly to remind himself of those key facts.

She walked toward the dining room table, away from the sensible safety of her bedroom. His gaze locked on her hips, tracking the sway with lethal intent. Stupidly he followed after her.

“Some friend, Gabe. I bet you wouldn’t do this if Cain was hitting on some woman.”

“No, Cain outweighs me by fifty pounds.” Humor—another excellent way to defuse tense situations. He could feel the sweat on his brow, the rapid pulse vibrating under his skin. He stood frozen, needing her to break into a grin, or whap him on the arm.

But the room fell eerily quiet, and he waited, watching the rise and fall of her breasts, not moving, just waiting.

Eventually she moved, her breath coming out in a rush, and she came toward him, jamming a finger into his chest, which was completely the wrong thing to do. Completely. She shouldn’t touch him. Not now.

“Do you want to know what’s bothering me? I haven’t had sex in four years. Tonight I wanted to have sex.”

Four years? His already pained heart stopped completely, before kicking in again. He shouldn’t have been happy about this bit of information, but his cock was.

Oh, it was thrilled.

“You want to have sex? Good. I want to have sex, too. We’ll have sex. Together.” It wasn’t the most sterling moment in his life, but as the words came out, he didn’t regret them. He wanted Tessa, he wanted to touch her, taste her, sink deep into her.

And Miss Frisky Pants, with the need to hit on every man in his building, looked him dead in the eye and said, “No.” The word was carefully enunciated, clearly spoken, with no room for misunderstanding, but Gabe was four years past no. He moved closer, skin brushing against skin. He could smell her perfume mixed with her desire, and it burned inside him.

“What’s wrong, Tessa? I’m not good enough?”

She put a hand to his chest to push him back, but the touch was soft and so tempting. “Don’t do this.”

“Do what?”

“Don’t get all stupid on me now, Gabe.”

He pressed into her and her body pressed back.

“Don’t come any closer,” she warned.

He didn’t listen. He backed her completely into the table. There was always a moment in a poker game when the bluff becomes a need, when rational logic exits the brain and all that’s left is the game itself.

Her mouth was inches away. Full and waiting…

“If you kiss me, I’m going to scream,” she whispered.

He took her mouth with a hunger that he had never known before. Her mouth was so soft, so perfect. And, oh, the taste of her. There was the bite of lime, the mint of toothpaste and…her. His tongue thrust into her mouth, and he felt her fingers dig into his arm.

“I’m sorry, Tessa,” he said, and it was the last rational thing out of his mouth.

4

GABE. GABE. GABE.

It was Gabe who was kissing her, eating her alive, making her feel and—worst of all—making her want. Tessa wanted to kill him for it.

Tessa pushed against him—hard—because she couldn’t want Gabe. Not now. She’d done that in the past, her dreams-can-come-true phase, but this time nobody—no man—would interfere. She had a plan. A career. An apartment. After that, yes. But now? No way in hell.

And especially not with Gabe.

In the world of men she trusted, there was only one, and he was currently kissing her as if he were about to have sex with her.

Gabe.

Tessa stood there, frozen, so many variations of no forming on her lips, but then his mouth fastened on her breast through the thin silk material and all thoughts of trust flew out the window. He sucked there, driving all doubts from her mind. Her head listed back, her knees weak because the sensations inside her were stealing the life from her.

The man swore, then pushed aside the straps of her top, and the cool night air blew across bare skin. His mouth was hard and brutal, but she didn’t care. He was pulling, sucking, arousing, awakening, until her whole being shifted down to the piercing ache between her thighs.

Sweet mercy, she thought. Over and over again, Tessa focused on the pleasure, the sweet, merciful pleasure, because this was new, exquisitely new. So she closed her eyes, pretending this was some dark, handsome stranger who was making her burn. With her eyes closed, she could pretend this man wasn’t Gabe.

Her hands braced against the table, because she didn’t dare touch him. That much she knew. Better to stay frozen, unfeeling, than for him to guess what rash thoughts were pounding inside her brain. But then one of his hands moved lower, diving to the apex of her thighs. Tessa wanted to clamp them together, to keep her secret safe, but her body had a will of its own.

Shamelessly her thighs parted, his fingers shoving damp panties aside, and her body shook as he pushed one finger inside her.

One traitorous, decadent finger.

Oohhh…

She heard his sigh, a man finding victory.

The next few moments were a blur of skin, pleasure and erotic dreams. Her back braced against the table, and then he was there, filling her up with something much more dangerous—himself.

At first there was pain—four years was a long time—and he was big, hard and throbbing with life. Tessa didn’t want to find pleasure, she wanted to keep Gabe locked in a different place, but there wasn’t a choice because right now she could think of nothing but this. The smell of his body, the sharp bunch of his muscles as he moved, the sound of her sophist ideals being exterminated one spine-melting thrust at a time.

Her eyes stayed firmly shut, her fingers clenched at her side, only her muscles betraying her. Each time he drove into her, her thighs clenched tighter and tighter, automatically pulling him home.

His breathing matched hers, fast, strained, two people rapidly losing their precarious hold on sanity. For Tessa, sanity was overrated. Better to reimagine his face into a shadow. Better to cast his mouth—that talented mouth—into one that was sensual, hard and unforgiving. Her image of her dream lover settled deep in her mind, and her body shook as that fantasy man took her over and over.

Never before had it been like this, so physical, so animal, so…fascinating. He thrust hard and deep, and she whimpered.

Immediately he stopped.

“Tess?” She heard the ache in his voice, the pain, the guilt. He pulled out of her fast, but her body wasn’t done. She needed this, she needed release, she needed to come.

“Please,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry.”

“Please,” she tried again, her mouth dry, but she desperately needed to find that place again. It’d been so long….

“You get dressed. I’ll leave you alone.” He sounded so lonely, so sad, and her heart lurched. At first in pain and then in something more savage. She wasn’t going to let him leave. Not until she finished. Tonight this was all about her. After four years, she had earned this one night.

“No. Must finish,” she managed, low and pleading.

“Tessa?”

“Finish,” she said, and this time there was a snap in her voice. A command. This was about her. About taking control. One step at a time.

Tessa waited, half expecting him to leave her decimated and desperate. Then she felt his body move, heard his breath catch, and she knew that he would cure this lonely ache inside her.

“I’ll make this right,” he said, picking her up in strong arms, which helped fuel the fantasy-man image. Gabe wasn’t a carrier, he was a goofball without a serious bone in his body. The wide chest underneath her head? That belonged to someone else.

With those thoughts, she kept her eyes screwed shut, determined to keep his face from her mind. She heard the rustle of clothes, felt his hands gentle as he undressed her, and then his mouth was on hers—soft and seductive. She sighed a little, settling into the kiss, and strong hands stroked her, exploring and discovering her pleasures.

Denny had never been so attentive, so careful, and Tessa’s mind began to soar. She was floating, high as a cloud, where the world existed only for her delight. He was hers, existing only to please her. His mouth tarried at her breast, and her back arched up, wanting to keep him close, but the merciless mouth moved lower, pressing soft, pliant kisses against her skin, her belly. Lower he moved, settling between her legs, and her heart raced because the pulse at her core was aching now, dripping with need. His lips swept the inside of her thighs, the stubble at his jaw rasping against her flesh. Wickedly he teased her, his tongue moving close, so close, so close, and she squirmed to lead his mouth where she craved.

His hands locked on her hips, and she fought to free herself, to feel him against her lips, but he continued—slow, steady, heartless. She moaned, her hands fisted against the mattress, until…

Until…

Heaven.

Slowly his tongue moved inside her, playing her at his leisure. She cried out, and his mouth turned. He captured her inner lips, sucking and pulling, hard and insistent, until she was begging, pleading because this pressure was killing her.

Frantically Tessa clawed at his shoulders, finally daring to touch him because she wanted much more than teasing. She wanted him to fill this emptiness inside her.

The dark stranger laughed, not cruelly but so knowing, and then he slid into her. Tessa sighed because this was what she needed, what her body craved. He thrust slow and deep, reaching farther and farther, as if they had all night, as if they had forever.

Still her eyes were closed, and he didn’t seem to mind. Without her sight, her other senses took over, the sounds of the late-night city noise, the barges on the river, the far-off wail of a siren and the sound of breathing. Air pulling in and out. Life.

Her mouth ached to taste him, to taste the salt that she could smell on his skin. But that would be touching. That wouldn’t be wise in Tessa’s world. If she touched him again, she would know this man who was filling her, this man who was teaching her what pleasure could mean. And she couldn’t have that because she desperately needed someone she could trust.

So she listened…and floated…and felt. Mercy, she felt. There were a thousand nerve strings inside her, stretching, pulling, threatening to break, and with each thrust the strings pulled tighter.

Tessa wanted more. “Faster,” she said in a whisper. But he heard. She heard him rise over her, bringing her hips higher, and he began to move faster, pushing inside her, the strings pulling tighter and tighter.

Her body arched, taut, and she twisted with each powerful stroke because she could feel it coming closer. She could see it, the streaking lights that shone behind her lids. Harder and harder he went, this dark man she didn’t want to know, touching her, taking her deeper and deeper into his world.

Higher she went….

Higher…

Higher…

And there.

Tessa came on a sigh, felt his body jerk. And then he held her close, cradling her to him. Her eyes stayed shut. Keeping his image far from her mind.

“TESSA?” GABE STUDIED HER peaceful smile, trying to figure out what part of the movie he had missed.

“Ssshhhhhh,” she answered in a sleepy voice. “No names. Two strangers.”

What the hell? Okay, he’d either traumatized her or screwed her into a break with reality, neither of which seemed viable.

“Tess?”

“No names,” she muttered.

Nope, not that either, Gabe. “Miss?” he asked, trying to come up with some anonymous yet personal mode of address.

“What?”

“Are you okay?”

She smiled again. “I’m lovely. I feel lovely.”

That didn’t sound bad. “You’re not hurt?”

“I think I’m going to hurt in the morning,” she said, her eyes still closed, and he wished that she’d open them, look at him, so that he would know she was okay. “Can we do that again?” she asked, her voice dreamy.

“I don’t know,” stated Gabe, the first and only time in his life that he’d ever said no to a naked female. And Tessa was marvelously naked. Her skin was smooth, and lightly tanned, like pale scotch on a summer’s night. Her breasts were firm, exactly fitting…

No, no, no…

He didn’t need to be thinking about Tessa’s firm breasts with nipples the color of…

Gabe shook his head.

“Let’s do it again,” she repeated, sending a new rush of blood to his cock.

“I can’t,” he lied.

“You must,” she ordered, and he heard it again, that trace of Napoleon-like command in her voice. Where the hell had that come from?

“This is a bad idea, Te—miss,” he said, but his no-conscience hard-on was ready and waiting, not really caring about personal boundaries or morning-after complications. And Gabe, at his heart, was merely a man.

“You must,” she said.

Gabe, the weak-hearted coward that he was, obeyed.

THEY MADE LOVE another three times during the night because Tessa had four lost years to make up for. Four times in all, once for each year of her life that she’d given up. Her dark stranger never asked her questions again, words were rarely used at all—a fact that she was grateful for.

She wasn’t going to dwell on who was next to her, wasn’t going to delve into that never-never land where man dreams were supposed to come true but they instead ended up tattooed in permanent red ink. Instead she was going to focus on this pleasure, this sex, this dark stranger who could make her body ache. As long as she didn’t think about who he was, her heart—and her own Tessa dreams—were safe.

Finally, when the morning sun was creeping through the window, she fell asleep, curled up next to him, feeling the dusting of chest hair tickling her back, feeling his flaccid sex settling comfortably between her thighs, feeling his lips soft against her neck.

Tessa smiled and fell into a sated, dreamless sleep.

THE PHONE RANG, hellishly loud, and Gabe reached out a hand, searching for it.

“Did you see her naked yet?”

Instantly Gabe was wide-awake. The word naked did that to a guilty man.

“What?” he asked, focusing on Sean’s voice, keeping his attentions far away from the trim, tight body that was currently curled into his Johnson as if she owned it. Which she did.

Gabe sprang out of bed.

“Did you see her naked yet?” Sean repeated. “Daniel put money on one night, but I knew you were too honorable to do anything more than sneak a long look when she came out of the shower. So? Listen, bro, I could use the inside track on this one. The Mets’ losing streak is killing my discretionary income, and I was counting on something to bail me out. Any fever looks last night?”

“What’s a fever look?” asked Gabe, already knowing the answer.

“I know you don’t get ’em like I do, but it’s the sloe-eyed thing that women do when they want to test out your equipment. So…Tessa giving you the sloe-eyes?”

Gabe turned his back to the bed, not wanting to know if Tessa was giving him the sloe-eyes, at least not while he was on the phone with his brother. “Nothing. I went to a party last night. Fell asleep. Get your mind out of the gutter.” He heard a soft moan, and his mind, still in the gutter, turned to see the naked female in his bed.

The tight, trim body stirred under the covers, a tousled head of honey-brown hair starting to emerge. Gabe pushed her head back down before she forgot she was wearing no clothes.

“Sucks,” answered Sean, master of the crude yet precisely effective come-back. “Better luck next—”

“What do you want?” interrupted Gabe, searching for his shorts and finding them hung over the lamp. While pulling them on, he kept one eye glued to the dark head, waiting for signs of life—or anger, whichever came first.

“I wanted to talk to you about the building permit for the renovations….”

One green eye opened, widened in horror, nothing even close to sloe-eyed fever.

“’Bye, Sean. We’ll talk later,” Gabe finished, quickly slamming down the phone.

Tessa bolted upright, clutching the blanket like a lifeline.

“Tessa?” he asked carefully, fully prepared for a five-alarm tongue-lashing on the proper respect for personal boundaries.

Gradually the alarm in her eyes dimmed.

“I’m fine,” she answered, dodging his gaze.

Gabe heaved a glorious sigh of relief and began pulling on his jeans. He had screwed up royally last night, he knew it, but this moment of forgiveness—nay, acceptance—really did his heart good. “I can bunk with Daniel if you want—if it’ll make you feel better.”