“The very best. Don’t get me started, Gaby.”
“I won’t. That’s why I wanted to say goodbye here.”
“Okay.” She sniffed. “Tell me what you’re going to do. Let’s go over it one more time.”
“I’m going to take a taxi to Girls’ Village. After I’ve talked to Irina, I’ll take another taxi to the airport and fly to my parents.” Gaby hugged her friend.
“We’ll always stay in touch.”
After she released her, she walked around to the driver’s door. “Sister Paulina?” Her voice trembled. “I’ll never be able to thank you enough.”
“The news that the child’s mother is still alive was worth all the trouble.”
“May I come and visit you one day?”
“You’ll always be welcome.” She made the sign of the cross, then drove off. Gaby waved until the black car disappeared into traffic.
Thankful she wasn’t at her apartment where she had the luxury of crying her eyes out, Gaby pulled out her cell phone and rang for a taxi. While she waited for it, she went into the station’s minimart and bought a couple of magazines to read on the plane.
On her way to the airport she would phone Anita, then make calls to a couple of her attorney friends and arrange to go over her clients’ cases with them. There were other phone calls to be made, as well, including ones to her landlord and her family. They had no idea she was coming home.
But there was a yawning emptiness growing inside her. In a little while she’d be leaving the world that contained Anatoly. She couldn’t comprehend never seeing him again, never laughing with him, teasing him, kissing him. Loving him.
Though he hadn’t been her lover, she had felt loved.
How on earth would she pick up the pieces of her life a second time?
She honestly didn’t know.
CHAPTER TWELVE
MAX BOUNDED UP the stairs to Gabriella’s apartment three at a time. After she let him inside, he didn’t plan on them coming out of there for a while.
His heart racing from long-suppressed hunger, he rapped on the door, desperate to have Gabriella in his arms. He would love her and take whatever she was willing to give him until proof of her duplicity made it impossible to go on.
“Gabriella? Open the door.”
He knocked again.
After a couple of minutes he had to face the fact that she hadn’t returned from her lunch with Hallie. He realized it would be hard for them to say goodbye. But Gaby had no idea how much he’d been anticipating this time alone with her.
His disappointment was so acute he couldn’t stand to wait in the hall for her. It would be better to go out to the van. The guys tailing her could tell him her exact location. Maybe she was still at the restaurant. If that was the case, he would drive there and pick her up.
He punched in the number on his cell phone and waited for one of them to answer.
“Calder here. Where’s Ms. Peris?”
“We followed her friend’s rental car to Our Lady of Mercy Convent and Parochial School out on Fairfax. They both went inside. They’ve been in there all that time. A few minutes ago the other woman came back out alone and drove off in her rental car. Ms. Peris hasn’t made an appearance yet.”
Max frowned. They must have had lunch there. Maybe Gabriella had taken Hallie’s departure harder than Max had imagined.
“Stay on it. Let me know the moment she leaves.”
“Yes, sir.”
For security reasons he’d never tried to reach Gaby on her cell phone. But right now he didn’t give a damn about that.
One of the guys had gotten her number. Max had already programmed it into his cell phone. With a jabbing motion of his index finger he punched in the two digits. While he waited for her to pick up, a spurt of adrenaline charged his body.
“The party you wished to reach is not available. You may have reached this recording in error. If so, hang up and try again.”
He tried it a second time and got the same recording.
Hell. She’d turned off her phone.
He was surprised, considering her many responsibilities, legitimate or otherwise. But if she was upset, it was reasonable she wouldn’t want to be disturbed. Reasonable, but very unlike her.
In place of his former euphoria, he felt a strange foreboding that created a pit in his gut.
In a distinctly different frame of mind than he was a few minutes ago, he started up the van and headed into traffic. If he exceeded the speed limit, it would take twenty minutes to reach his destination. But the traffic was impossible.
The faster he drove, the more convinced he became that something was wrong. He got on the phone to the guys tailing him.
“It’s Calder. I’m headed for Our Lady of Mercy on Fairfax. Get me a couple of patrol cars to give me an escort. Siren and lights.”
“We’ll get right on it.”
GABY ENTERED the front doors of Girls’ Village and hurried upstairs to Sandra’s room. No one was there. When she went back down to the main desk, she learned that most of the girls were still in the auditorium watching the end of Titanic.
Much as she hated to disturb them, she knew Irina was barely holding on while she waited for word about her mother.
Once Gaby stepped into the auditorium, it took a minute for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Finally she was able to walk down the side aisle searching profiles. Sandra’s advanced stage of pregnancy made it easier to find them.
Bending over, Gaby asked the girl on the aisle seat to pass the word that Svetlana was wanted out in the hall.
Barely through the back doors herself, the three girls caught up to her. “Come with me. We’ll go to your bedroom.” On the way upstairs, Gaby put an arm around Irina’s shoulders.
“Your mother’s all right,” she whispered. The girl caved in right there and started sobbing. “I have a plan to get her out of there, but I’ll need your permission to contact the authorities.”
Irina stared hard at Gaby without responding, but at least she hadn’t said no.
The second they reached the bedroom, Sandra pulled her aside. “Gaby? There’s something important you need to know.” Juanita shut the door as if to punctuate the seriousness of this meeting.
Alert to the urgent inflection in Sandra’s voice, Gaby sensed she wasn’t going to like whatever it was.
“All right. We’re alone. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“Go on, Irina.”
Her gaze darted back to the Russian girl. “I was hoping the news about your mother would make you happier.”
“Yes!” she cried. “But now you in danger.”
Gaby smiled. “Irina, you don’t need to worry about me.”
Irina acted as if she was in pain. “Yes. You know Anatoly Kuzmina one week. I know him twelve, maybe more.”
What? “What do you mean, Irina?”
Juanita handed Gaby the scrapbook. It was opened to the last page where she’d put the photos of yesterday’s outing. “Irina saw his picture and recognized him. He’s one of the men who’s been coming to her mother’s apartment.”
“No!” Gaby shook her head, dropping the scrapbook on the bed.
“All men at apartment are bad. Do bad business.”
She felt so sick she had to sit down. “You must be mistaken.”
“No. Anatoly very important man. Very smart. Much money. Big car. He bring flowers to my mother. Nikolai hate him.”
Dear God. Gaby started to cry. She buried her face in her hands. The girls crowded around her, patting her back.
“We’re so sorry, Gaby.”
She finally lifted her head. “Was he one of the men who tried to come into your room?” Her voice shook.
“No. He nice to me and my mother. He there just for business.”
If Irina had said anything else, Gaby would have died right there on the spot.
“Was he there when you escaped?”
“No. Nikolai say Anatoly take vacation.”
I am
on vacation from my second job, so I have time to take you where you have to go, Gabriella.
Shuddering uncontrollably, she got up from the bed. Irina’s eyes followed her. “If Anatoly choose you for girlfriend, you never get away.”
She sucked in her breath. “Thank you for telling me, Irina. Unfortunately your news leaves me with no choice but to talk to my uncle about this. He’s a police detective. He’ll advise me what to do so that you and your mother, and I, are safe. Will you trust me?”
The other girl nodded.
“I have to go now, but I promise I’ll be in touch with all of you very soon.”
Gaby left their bedroom so frightened and heartsick both at the same time, she could scarcely function. But she had to! It was imperative she get to the airport as fast as possible.
She pulled out her cell phone and rang for a taxi to take her to the terminal. Thank God she’d listened to Hallie’s advice. With her credit card, she’d already purchased her plane ticket.
Earlier in the day, Hallie had driven her to the bank. She’d withdrawn three thousand dollars from her savings account to make certain she had enough money on hand for any eventuality.
She’d been able to make all her phone calls to Anita and her colleagues. Hallie had talked to the landlord. He’d agreed to let a moving company come in and box up Gaby’s things to be shipped to the East Coast. On the way to the airport she would call her parents and let them know she was coming. They’d probably have the whole family out to greet her.
After putting the phone back in her purse, Gaby hurried to the main staircase. Her legs wobbled so badly, she could hardly make it down the steps. Somehow she had to find the strength to pull herself together.
It was one thing to wonder if Anatoly might be involved in illegal activities. But hearing it from Irina’s lips had changed everything. Gaby was no longer in denial.
“Gabriella?”
Dear God! He’d found her!
If Anatoly choose you for girlfriend, you never get away.
Earlier in the day she’d had to impersonate a nun when she and Hallie had gone to check on Irina’s mother. Now it seemed her acting skills had to be called upon once again. Without question this was the most important role of her life.
Her first priority was to get Anatoly out of the building before Irina happened to come down the stairs. If he saw her, Gaby couldn’t bear to think what would happen. She’d promised Irina she’d be safe here.
Propelled by fear for the frightened teen as much as for herself, she hurried toward him and grasped his hand. “Anatoly, I owe you an explanation, but I don’t want to talk about it here. Is your van outside?”
He put his arm around her shoulders to guide her toward the front doors. “It is waiting for you.”
One burden was lifted the moment they stepped into the late-afternoon sunlight, leaving Irina inside the building undetected.
“You look pale.” He ushered her toward the van.
“I am worried about you.”
“You don’t need to be. I had a call from Juanita while Hallie and I were eating lunch. She said Sandra was having labor pains and wanted me to come right away. Hallie dropped me off here before she left for Los Angeles in her rental car.”
“Sandra is having the baby now?”
“No. It was a false alarm, but there was no way to contact you. I’m so sorry I wasn’t at the apartment at three. How did you know I was here?”
He helped her inside the van. “When you did not come, I searched everywhere for you. I thought to look here, hoping one of the girls knew where you were.”
Anatoly always had a logical answer for everything.
“At last we are going to be alone. My heart is racing too fast, Gabriella.” He gave her a swift kiss on the lips before moving around to the driver’s seat.
A shiver, part ice, part fire, ran down her spine.
Irina had said he was an important man. Powerful. He probably had spies everywhere. It was possible he knew she’d been lying through her teeth just now.
From the moment he’d surprised her in the hallway with the roses, he hadn’t left her alone. Coming and going, she would barely blink and he’d be there, day or night.
Unless a man was a law unto himself, he didn’t have the resources or the time to pursue his own pleasure to that degree. In Gaby’s case, he’d been relentless in his pursuit of her since the accident.
Because she’d made the fatal mistake of trying to reach him at the florist shop the first time, she would never know if that phone call was the catalyst that had made him come after her.
If she was honest with herself, it was probably her instant attraction to him that had tempted her to contact him at all.
Obviously men who lived their lives in the underworld had women and families who loved them. There’d been hundreds of books written about such men, especially the Italian mafia dons.
How incredible that she, Gaby Peris, a New Jersey girl, now found herself deeply involved with a Russian mobster. A man whose physical and mental traits were perfect for her in every way.
It had happened so fast, so naturally, she’d become enamored without realizing the severe consequences of such a liaison.
Like Gaby, Irina’s mother had been vulnerable after her husband’s death and had fallen under Nikolai’s spell. By the time she’d figured out why strange men kept invading her apartment on a regular basis, she’d tried to get away from him. No doubt that was when the beatings had started.
For the moment, Gaby recognized that she wasn’t in mortal danger from Anatoly, not in the sense that she could expect to be eliminated any time soon. He wanted her too much for that. His desire for her was as great as her hunger for him.
Since she hadn’t made it to the airport in time to escape, that meant she was going to have to be cunning and bide her time.
In order to survive, she would have to go on living exactly as she’d been doing. In case he’d put her under surveillance, even to the extent of tapping her phones, she’d tell no more lies so she wouldn’t raise any alarm bells with him.
For the past week Gaby had been living in denial. There was no question about that. But she wasn’t naive. Men like Anatoly did whatever it took to keep their women in line.
If she could lull him into a state of total trust, whether it took days or weeks, there would come a moment when she would be able to slip away and disappear from his world.
“You are more quiet than I have ever known you to be.”
They had come back to her apartment, something she’d been looking forward to until Irina’s damning testimony.
Her eyes traveled over him as they’d done earlier that morning. His impact on her senses was as profound as ever. But the blinders had come off.
Could he tell? Was he that shrewd? She knew she’d have to put on a convincing performance.
“Maybe it’s because today marks the end of one era and the beginning of another.”
She saw fire in his eyes. Her body started to tremble.
“I have been living for it.” He reached for her hand. “Come over here.”
Slowly, like a person being led through water, she followed him to the couch where he pulled her down on his lap. His hands went to her hair.
“Since the moment I walked up to your car and saw you at the wheel, I have been wanting to do this.”
In an economy of movement he undid the elastic tie. The release felt electric as her hair sprang free to fall about her shoulders. He touched the strands experimentally. She heard his sharp intake of breath. “Your hair…it is heavy yet silky. Why do you never wear it this way?” His eyes flicked to hers. “You have done this to torment me. You know you have.” Their lips were only centimeters apart.
“Long hair gets in the way, Anatoly. If you’d let yours grow out, you’d understand the necessity of tying it back. Come to think of it, you’d look pretty good like that.”
He frowned. “Only pretty good?” But he was tracing the line o
f her lips with a finger as he asked the question. It was making her crazy.
“You want compliments now?” The tension between them had become unbearable.
A low sound of delight rumbled from his throat. “I want so many things, I hardly know where to begin.”
“Don’t take too long,” she teased, trying to quell the frantic pounding of her heart. “There’s an American adage that says, ‘He who hesitates is lost.’”
She knew he was going to kiss her and realized she’d have to let him. But she had no intention of going to bed with him. If he suggested they move to the bedroom, she would use the excuse that she needed to start dinner.
His hands had moved to either side of her face. “There is an old Russian expression that says, ‘He who devours caviar in one swallow does not deserve to feast.’”
“Is that what we’re going to do? Feast?”
“You sound impatient. Breathless. First we will enjoy an appetizer.”
She swallowed hard. “What kind?”
“Look into my eyes, Gabriella.”
“No, Anatoly. Don’t make me do this.”
“You are shy. Tell me. Am I the first man to touch you since your husband?”
“Yes.”
“It was good with him?”
“Yes.”
“It will be different with me. But it will be good. Let me show you.”
Then his mouth covered hers.
It wasn’t like his kiss in the stairwell that had left her panting and unsatisfied. She found her mouth opening to the urgent pressure of his until there was a communion so total she couldn’t think about anything except the way he made her feel.
This man holding her in his arms was kissing her as if he was starving for her. She couldn’t tell where one kiss ended and another one began. Their hunger was mutual. Insatiable.
She couldn’t stop moaning. Anatoly had turned her into a wanton. They should have satisfied themselves much earlier than today. Holding back until now had only fed the fire. She was on fire. So was he.
Accidentally Yours Page 18