“I didn’t get a report on that.” Kim sat straight, looking every bit the strong and capable leader that she’d always been. “What details do you have?”
“Not much. It was spa gossip. All I know is someone was there after it closed for the night. Maybe this is connected to the theft and everything else that’s going on.”
“How come you didn’t tell me before now?” Kim asked.
“I apologize, but it was only a suspicion. No proof, and Gabby, nothing’s come up missing, has it?”
My common sense. She’d had no good reason to sneak into the Pearl with Geoffrey and to get hot and heavy with him in the kitchen where she worked every day. Shoshanna knew her secrets, but it didn’t seem enough to still hide the truth from her best friends. “No, nothing’s missing. We check inventory regularly. My staff’s on high alert.”
“Good.” But Kim still didn’t appear relaxed.
“You’d better get back to the condo, Gabby,” Robyn said. “Let yourself have a good time and try not to worry about the Belleza. Kim and I can hold things down.”
Grateful for an excuse to escape the table and her guilt, Gabrielle took an orange slice and got up. “If you need me—”
“We won’t need you. Have fun out there in an oasis with the sexiest music producer ever. Lucky woman.”
Forcing a laugh, it was all Gabrielle could do to walk and not run from the friends she’d lied to.
Chapter 7
Gabrielle made up her mind, staring down the suitcases next to her door. She would not be having sex. Eventually she might—she hoped, at least—but it wouldn’t happen while she was on a working weekend in Storey Springs, California. She couldn’t be more prepared to meet Geoffrey’s guests. Excitement mingled with nervousness, and the more she repeated in her head that this was strictly a business trip, the more she didn’t believe it.
The brand new undies she’d packed despite the celibacy vow she’d made to herself was proof.
Just as she impulsively grabbed one of her bags to take out the undies and leave them in the condo, the bell rang. A pair of panties in hand, she hurried to the door.
Stu came in, shrinking the place with his big lumberjack build. His hair was freshly highlighted and he appraised her critically through those classically Stu, thick fuchsia frames. “I’m about to start my shift at the restaurant and thought I’d say bon voyage first, Chef Royce.” He frowned at the underwear in her hand. “What are those?”
“Women’s undies.”
“Lord, I know what they are. I mean to say, what are you doing running around with them?”
“I’m changing my underwear. The underwear I packed for this trip. The luggage is full of sexy panties and stuff, and this trip isn’t about that.”
Stu rubbed his forehead. “Does it matter what kind of underwear you’re packing? Who’s going to see it?”
“That’s the problem.”
“How so? Oh, because you’re wanting the host with the most to see your vixen panties.”
Gabrielle nodded. “That’s kind of it exactly.”
“Put the underwear back in your suitcase and let’s go. Pretty soon you’re going to talk yourself out of the whole damn thing and I was planning to tear up the streets without you being all lonely and sad and sex-deprived and making me feel guilty about it.”
“You saying I drag you down, Chef Merritt?”
“I’m saying that for the past couple of weeks, I’ve been more concerned about finding you a man than finding myself one. No me gusto.”
As Gabrielle locked up behind her and walked with Stu to the parking garage, she said, “The trip was going to happen, despite the underwear drama. I’m just having trouble keeping things in check.”
“You’re so effing adorable like this, Gabby. You’re like the way you were when he first came into the kitchen at the Pearl and pissed you off. But now there’s more. You look gratified. Like you won the lottery jackpot or had great sex. Did you gamble?”
Getting involved with Geoffrey was a gamble with higher stakes than she could afford to risk. “No.”
Stu turned to her. “Chef Royce, did you have sex?”
“No. But we kissed.”
“You kissed? When and why am I just now hearing about it?”
“I don’t have time to get into the particulars, but it was good and unfortunately can’t happen again.”
“Why not? Isn’t he what you want? Besides the sexual pull, there’s something more to you and Geoffrey, isn’t there?” he asked gently. “How will I do my duty as a helpful friend if you won’t let me? Talk.”
“The kiss wasn’t enough for me, even though it’s got to be. I still feel a little bit unfulfilled, if you understand what I mean. Sex would unbelievable—hot, passionate, wild, reckless. But insanely, I want more than even that. I like being around him, talking to him, letting him charm me even if my reasonable mind says it’s wrong.”
“Tell your reasonable mind I said STFU.”
At her truck, she loaded her luggage and hugged him. “Try not to be too lax in the kitchen while I’m gone. When I get back, we’re all going to work harder. It’s going to be balls to the wall.”
“I know that’s an expression and all, but I have balls and that just sounds painful to me.”
Snorting a laugh, she got into the truck and activated the GPS, feeling better about the weekend ahead.
That buoyancy sank when she arrived at Geoffrey’s gated mansion and saw the flare of temptation in his eyes. One kiss was a tease. It was cruelty.
I’m either going to survive this trip by pretending that there’s nothing between us, or I’m going to have him naked before we get to the tarmac.
*
“This will be your suite.”
Gabrielle followed a maid into a stadium of a room that had a hall that opened to more rooms. The place was decorated in gentle colors and rich fabrics and sleek, modern furniture. The windows introduced her to a view of jungle-like trees and plants. “It’s beautiful.”
“What can I get for you?”
“Nothing. It’s beautiful,” she said again, mesmerized. She and Geoffrey had arrived a while ago, but they’d had lunch at a café before a driver had brought them to the oasis. An oasis, it was. Cool air, luscious scenery, acres of quiet tranquility.
“If you think of anything, page me.” The maid handed her a card with her contact information on it.
Gabrielle’s first order of business was a relaxing bath. The oversized claw-foot tub cradled her in fragrant bubbles and she was so soothed that she climbed out of the tub and fell into a dreamless sleep on the neatly made bed. Darkness had fallen by the time she awoke and rolled off the bed. Leaving the windows open to the summer breeze, she got dressed and checked her smartphone.
A text from Kim.
Stop obsessing about the Belleza. I know you are.
One from Robyn.
If you don’t let yourself meet someone on this trip, I’m setting you up with someone when you get back. P.S. I hate blind dates, so don’t think about retaliating in kind. Luv you!
Gabrielle was a confident enough explorer to not require the maid’s help in finding her way around the main house. There were several outbuildings and she figured she’d enjoy the journey more if she checked them out in daylight. Walking through the numerous halls, glancing into glorious room after glorious room, she began to feel overwhelmed. It was more extravagant than anything she’d ever seen. Her family was certainly well-to-do, but their wealth couldn’t compare to that of a man who owned an oasis the size of a moderately sized city.
“What do you think?”
“Geoffrey. Hey.” She smiled. He wasn’t this place. He was deeper than his riches. She wanted the man, not the money. “I was about to call out ‘Marco’ and see if you answered ‘Polo.’”
“So are you liking what you see here?”
“I like you,” she said honestly. When he frowned a little, she explained, “I appreciate that you’re sharing you
r private space with me. And I’m ready to meet everyone else.”
“Not everyone is here, but most of them are. A couple of producers, some of my clients and their guests. Phenom’s here.”
“I have orders to secure an autograph for our songbird Charlene.” To be completely truthful, Charlene had begged Gabrielle to pass along her business card to the performer, but Gabrielle already knew that wasn’t going to happen. It wasn’t in the best taste and it seemed an underhanded move to make when Geoffrey had already told the woman that he wouldn’t do it.
“She doesn’t want the autograph on one of her business cards, does she?”
“She didn’t specify,” Gabrielle said carefully. Why she constantly sheltered the woman from her own errors baffled her. Perhaps she felt sorry for Charlene. Or it had everything to do with their similarities. “Where is everyone?”
“Come on.”
He brought her to a studio inside the main house. She knew there was a separate wood-fronted building that housed his private recording studio, and according to him it was hardly used, since he didn’t sing professionally.
That nugget of info turned into a full anecdote when they entered the sleek recording studio and one of the guests played a bone-meltingly seductive R&B ballad and outed Geoffrey as the artist.
“That’s you?” she whispered, searching his eyes as the song wound around her again and again.
“Yeah. I was in my twenties and thought about performing, but I’d rather produce records and let folks like them have the stage.” He sent a menacing look to the man playing the track. “You got an ass-kicking coming.”
“Could you let the song finish before you kick his ass? I like it.” She drew him into a slow sway. “I’ve heard of actors who prefer to never watch their finished work and authors who refuse to read their own published books, but never of musicians who don’t listen to their own songs.”
“Now you’ve heard of one.” But Geoffrey didn’t stop dancing with her. “I’m only letting this play because you want it to, Gabrielle.”
“I’m a guest. You have to give me what I want. It’s a rule.”
“Really?”
“In this case it is.”
The song faded and she let him lead her around the room. It buzzed with expensively dressed people. Vintage guitars were mounted on one wall, and after introductions and some mingling with Phenom Jones’s girlfriend, who’d recognized Gabrielle’s name from her recent “The Hottest Kitchens in California” interview published in one of the country’s most popular entertainment magazines, she gravitated to the instruments. Behind her, she could hear Geoffrey requesting pricey liquor for his guests and the staff politely and promptly fulfilling those requests. No luxury had been spared, and she kept coming back to the thought that this oasis wasn’t the Geoffrey she knew. Which was the real man, she didn’t know. It burned her up that she even gave a damn. After July, he’d have no reason to cross her path and he would realize that he liked what was familiar: women who made themselves appear perfect and who were manipulated by wealth.
Was that the real reason he’d invited her here? To find out if he could mold her with his money?
Offended at the thought, she continued to look at the guitars.
“Gabby, you’ve been looking at those guitars so long you must’ve picked a favorite by now,” he said.
She whipped around. “Don’t call me Gabby. My friends call me Gabby. Not men who want to get me naked.”
A moment ago the control room had pulsed with a chorus of male voices and a harmony of deep male laughter. Now it was silent, and, turning her back to the blue-lighted guitar case, Gabrielle forgot about autographs and auctions and vintage instruments altogether.
Geoffrey sat relaxed in a plush leather chair, his body still except for the tap of his finger on the glass paperweight on the desk. The item probably cost five figures, easy. He kept his receptionists in diamonds and his guests in limousines. He’d had a recording studio built on a man-made hot spring. Of course he’d spare no expense to furnish the place.
The tapping mimicked the rhythm of her heartbeat, and when he suddenly stopped, she imagined her heart skipped its next beat. “I didn’t say I wanted to get you naked.”
“You didn’t have to. A lot of times, it’s what men say without words that counts.” Gabrielle walked past the men occupying the leather sofas and women holding crystal serving trays, not giving any of them the benefit of intimidation. She’d been raised in this world, and had fought hard to never let it control her. She rounded the consoles and mixers and stood in front of Geoffrey. She wouldn’t let his heartbreaking sexiness and her crazy thirst for him intimidate her, either. “You brought me to this billion-dollar oasis to show me that the music world thinks you’re a god. But, Geoffrey, that doesn’t impress me. Money hasn’t impressed me for a long time.”
“Good,” he said, still sitting so relaxed. Calm. Watching and waiting. Baiting, really. “I’m not going to get you naked. You’re going to get yourself naked. And when you do, it’s not going to be because you want my money. It’s going to be because you want me.”
Gabrielle slowly took in their audience, then the seriousness on Geoffrey’s face. And she laughed.
A few other people chuckled uncertainly, as though they weren’t sure whether to join in on the laughter or continue to watch with their mouths shut.
Geoffrey stood and then her hand was in his and they were moving toward the control room. She ended up in the lone chair and he was before her, his expression honest and tortured.
“I know you don’t want my money,” he said.
There were people on the other side of the booth, she knew it. But she couldn’t get herself to tear away from his gaze or the intense invisible hold he had on her. This wasn’t completely her choice. He had a say in what happened between them, too. For the first time, she was truly realizing that.
“I don’t know that you want me,” he finished.
“I do.”
“Show me.”
Gabrielle pushed his chest and wouldn’t let go until his back was to the wall. Her palms flattened on the wall, framing his head, and when he bent to bring his face to hers, she stretched up kissed him with a force she didn’t know she possessed. She didn’t know her tongue could be so greedy. She didn’t know her hands could be so demanding. She didn’t know she could bear the press of his cock against her belly.
“You,” she moaned. “It’s just you I want. It was never about your money. It never will be. Get it now?”
“When we go back, I want the chance to show you it doesn’t have to be about money. Let me prove I’m not trying to buy you. Give me that chance before you decide whether you want to be with me or not.”
She thought she said okay, but the word was shattered in a kiss.
*
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Gabby, but you look awful. Didn’t you just come back from a vacation upstate?”
Gabrielle scowled at her assistant but didn’t respond because she’d heard similar comments in the Belleza’s main lobby, in the elevator and at the coffee machine near her office. “I pulled an all-nighter, but it was well worth it. I’ve developed a menu for the Dunham Foundation for a Better Future gala and want to run it by Kim and Robyn and Jaxon this afternoon. You’re more than welcome to join us, too.”
“Sounds good.” Roarke shuffled through a scatter of papers on his desk. “Geoffrey Girard stopped by not too long ago. He said he wanted to confirm dinner on Thursday and to either call his assistant or his cell if you need anything. Don’t contact him at his office because he has an interview this morning.” He handed over a Post-it that had the same information and said, “Um, it’s not my business, but are you seeing him?”
Gabrielle’s mouth fell agape. “No,” she said, unexplainably flustered at the question. “Dinner tomorrow night is just a business thing,” she said, not exactly sure if that was so.
“You’ve been doing a lot of business things with
him that don’t include any of the staff, though. Again, not my business.”
“Why are you keeping at this, then, Roarke?”
“Since when is it a problem if I ask? We talk about this stuff, don’t we?”
“I don’t know. I had to hear from Charlene that you and your girlfriend broke up in June. Why didn’t you tell me? I would’ve inducted you into the Lonely Hearts Society.” She suddenly recalled Geoffrey’s accusation that Roarke was nursing a crush on her, and she dreaded to ask her next question. “Is this about you and me, Roarke?”
“What’s ‘you and me,’ exactly, Gabby? Define that.”
“We’re friends. Colleagues.”
“Yeah,” he said, dragging out the word. Disappointment dripped from every letter. “Friends. Colleagues. It’s not like you invite me into the Pearl after closing.”
Oh. Lord. No. “What?”
Roarke held her shocked stare. Smug satisfaction was a look she’d never associate with him, but there it was. “I know your habits better than you do. On top of that, I’m not a freaking idiot. I know it was you in the Pearl that night and I have this feeling that the man who was with you is the same one who’s bringing you gourmet lunches and taking you on trips.”
Two days ago, Geoffrey had come to her office with a delicious lunch that he’d prepared himself and afterward he’d taken her on a sunset Hummer tour of the Mojave Desert. That night he’d poured her wine and they’d ended up reading passages from Of Mice and Men.
It had been one of the most spectacular dates of her life and it hadn’t been about money or status. It had been just Geoffrey and Gabrielle.
“Um…oh…well, he said you were invited, too, but I didn’t think the Pearl could spare us both.”
“Like I’d want to watch you with him? No, thanks.” Roarke set his hands down on top of the desk. “Just tell me the truth, okay? Were you two in the Pearl that night? Kim Parker’s ready to fire the security on watch that night for not doing their jobs, and if you have information that’d save their jobs, you need to quit covering your ass if you want to save theirs.”
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