He had finally, two days previously, decided to take her up on her repeated offers. This was his comfort zone—being chased by women. His comfort zone was not one in which he pursued and was knocked back.
He looked between the women and the differences could not have been more startling.
Alice was nearly six inches taller in flats, slim, with her hair neatly tied back and her pale face intelligent and attractive rather than flamboyantly beautiful. She had a composure and a stillness that the much shorter, sexier woman lacked and Gabriel stifled his irritation at finding himself losing interest in his hot date for the evening.
‘Have a really nice evening.’ Alice couldn’t bear to see them together, to see her replacement who was everything she was not. She hated the thought that she had been the temporary aberration, and she wondered whether Gabriel had been drawn to her because she was so unlike the women he went out with as a rule.
Bethany had lost interest in Alice altogether and was preening for Gabriel’s benefit, smoothing her hands over her figure-hugging dress and then twirling round, demanding to know what he thought of her outfit.
Alice turned away, not wanting to see the rampant male appreciation in his eyes, appreciation that she had once seen directed at her.
‘I’ll leave you to it, shall I?’ She interrupted the love birds and Gabriel turned to look at her.
‘If you don’t mind.’ His voice was ultra-polite, his eyes flat and unreadable. ‘And, Alice, have a good weekend...visiting your mother...’
Alice reddened. ‘I happen to have other things planned,’ she muttered, because he had made her sound sad and pathetic, and he had done it on purpose. Or maybe he hadn’t. Maybe he had just pushed her back into the ‘efficient secretary without a life’ box whose weekend occupation was visiting her mother. Not that he knew the full story behind those visits.
‘Oh? Anything exciting?’ Gabriel’s ears pricked up. Bethany’s arm possessively linking his felt like a dead weight and it was all he could do not to shrug it off impatiently off impatiently.
‘Oh, just seeing one or two people,’ Alice told him vaguely. ‘You know...’
Gabriel didn’t know and the not knowing preyed on his mind for the remainder of the evening. He was irritated with his date, and then further irritated with himself, because before Paris Bethany would have been just the thing to relieve him of whatever stress he might have been having.
She had no interest in what was happening on the stage and several times asked him what the plot was. She spent quite a bit of time peering round her to see if she could recognise anyone, and was visibly relieved when the ordeal was at an end and they could get something to eat. Although, she said with a little moue, she really, really, would have loved to have something to eat at his place.
Sex was not going to happen.
In fact, nothing was going to happen.
Gabriel fed her, listened to her while his mind drifted in other, less welcome directions and then settled her into his chauffeur-driven car, made his excuses and headed back alone to his house.
So much for his attempts at distracting himself! The only thing on his mind was Alice’s remark about having people to see at the weekend. The thought of her having a man down there had lodged in his head, utterly destroying the self-assurance he wore like a mantel on his shoulders.
There was no getting round it—if he had been used, if he had been some kind of sick substitute for a man who couldn’t commit to her, then he had a right to know.
He knew where her mother lived. She had touched upon that topic in passing, had mentioned the house with a wistful smile on her face. She had talked about the little village and the picturesque country road which she was fond of walking down, breathing in the fragrance of the summer blossoms, the sharpness of the wintry air, dawdling in autumn on her way from house to village to appreciate the russet reds of the falling leaves.
Oh yes, he had a memory like a computer, and he hadn’t forgotten a single thing she had told him in Paris when she had let her guard down and confided, told him snippets of her past which had seemed to slip out in between their conversations about art and culture, work and deals, the state of the world.
Alice, he thought with a frown as he retired for bed much later that night, would have appreciated the opera. She wouldn’t have asked a bunch of idiotic questions, she wouldn’t have stifled yawns and she wouldn’t have kept looking around her like a bored kid at an adult gathering.
It all came back to Alice. He had never been this obsessed with a woman and he wondered whether it was because he still felt that they had unfinished business between them. If there was some mystery man in the background, then the business would be finished and she would be out on her ear looking for a new job. But if there wasn’t... Maybe what they had started in Paris needed to reach a natural conclusion.
She might say that she didn’t want that, but he did. Badly...and he was a man who always got what he wanted.
* * *
Alice finished preparing the supper and went to join her mother in the little sitting room that overlooked the tidy, pretty garden in which Pamela Morgan spent so much of her spare time, pottering and enjoying being outside where her phobia could not get a grip and drive her back to the safety of the four walls.
There was something that her mother was keeping from her and that was worrying. True, she would be seeing her mother’s therapist on Monday morning first thing, but she couldn’t help wondering if there had been some sort of setback.
The sitting room was bright and airy and very different from the sitting room in the house in which she had grown up. Here, photos of her as a girl were proudly displayed on the mantelpiece and the sofa and chairs were deep and comfortable. It was a cluttered room, which was something her father had loathed, preferring to have as few reminders as possible around that he was a family man.
‘You were telling me all about your trip to Paris,’ Pamela Morgan encouraged as soon as her daughter was sitting down, legs tucked underneath her, cosy and comfortable in her faded jogging bottoms and bedroom slippers, with her hair in a stubby ponytail.
Actually, Alice thought that talking about her trip to Paris was pretty much all she had done since she had arrived. It had been the same last weekend and, whilst she had done her best to skirt round the topic of Gabriel, she had found herself talking about him, recounting some of the anecdotes he had told her. Her mother had made a very good listener, hardly interrupting, and Alice wondered if she had confided more than she should have.
But if her mother wanted to hear more about the Louvre and what they had seen, or the Jardin des Tuileries and how beautiful it was, then so be it.
Alice was accustomed to handling Pamela Morgan with kid gloves. She tiptoed around anything too intrusive, permanently aware that her mother was not one of life’s more robust specimens.
Outside, the day had been surprisingly warm and sunny, and the sun was only now beginning to dip, throwing the garden into lovely, semi-sunlit relief.
In the kitchen, some meat sauce was simmering on the stove. Later they would eat together and, as always, it would be an early night.
As she chatted, her mind played with the thought of Gabriel and how he was enjoying his weekend with the pocket brunette. Had the opera been an aperitif, the taster course before the main meal? Of course it had, she chided herself scornfully. The main meal would have been the bedroom. Gabriel might be lazy when it came to every single form of emotional involvement, but he was just the opposite when it came to physical involvement. On that level, he was one-hundred percent active and engaged.
She wished she could eliminate him from her head, somehow press delete and get rid of all the inconvenient memories that were making her life a living hell.
She didn’t want to quit her job but that was becoming a very real possibility with each passing
day. Yesterday, seeing that woman in the office, had been the worst...
It was a reminder of how fleeting she had been for him. Her voice trailed off and she caught her mother looking at her speculatively; she grinned and tried to remember what she had been talking about. Paris? Work? Her flatmate Lucy’s new boyfriend?
‘You’re a million miles away,’ Pamela said softly. ‘Have been since you returned from Paris. It’s not your boss, is it? He seems to have made quite an impact on you.’
Appalled, Alice’s mouth dropped open and she blushed. ‘Of course not!’ she denied vigorously. ‘I wouldn’t be so stupid! You know how I feel about the whole relationship thing, Mum, after...’
‘I know, dear. After your father and that dreadful boyfriend you had. But...’ There was a tentative silence and then Alice was startled when her mother said quietly, ‘You can’t let those experiences dictate your future.’
‘I—I wouldn’t do that,’ Alice stuttered. ‘It’s just that you have to be careful when it comes to getting involved. It’s all too easy to make the wrong choices!’ She continued with heated earnestness, ‘I will make very sure that, if and when I become seriously involved with a guy, he’ll be someone who is right for me! Honestly, Mum, you want to meet my boss! He has a constantly revolving carousel of women who service his needs and, then, pouf! They’re gone, straight through the exit, and ten seconds later another version is heading in his direction. He plucks them off the carousel the way someone plucks fruit from a tree! Has a little taste and then chucks what’s left!’
‘You’re far too young to be so cynical about men...’
Alice bit her tongue but she and her mother knew each other well and she looked away because she could read what her mother was thinking.
If you’re not careful you’ll end up with no one because no one will fit the bill.
‘I’d rather be on my own than make a mistake,’ she said, her cheeks bright red, pre-empting the statement before it could be made.
Her mother sighed and lowered her eyes. She was not argumentative, and neither was Alice, but she had to be firm. She’d always had to look out for the two of them and it somehow felt treacherous for her mother to tell her that she was too cynical about men.
‘What’s the point of learning curves if you don’t learn from them?’ Fat lot of good that had done for her, she thought. She had been swept up in the same tidal wave of lust and desire that afflicted all the women who came into Gabriel’s magical range. And she hadn’t stopped at the lust and desire, which would have been bad enough. Oh no, she had taken it a step further and fallen in love with the man!
Her mother would have been distraught, had she only known. Like her, Pamela Morgan had worked hard to cultivate a healthy scepticism when it came to the opposite sex. There was nothing wrong with that. It was called reality. How many times had they joked that men were more trouble than they were worth? For her mother, it would have been more than just a joke.
They usually ate in the kitchen, unless there was something on the telly they both wanted to watch, in which case trays were brought—although her mother never failed to complain that eating in front of the television was a sloppy habit.
But her mother watched a great deal of television and there had been times when some detective series or gardening show had been too tempting to miss.
Tonight, Alice set the table for them, leaving her mother in the sitting room, where she was happily flicking between her crossword book and the television.
She had almost had an argument with her mother and she felt awful about that.
Not only was the man intruding into all her thoughts, her waking moments, her dreams, but he was now managing to interrupt the easy flow of conversation with her mother.
She slammed place mats on the table and was reaching for wine glasses when there was a knock at the door.
Everyone used the kitchen door, but whoever it was had banged on the front door and, after just a brief hesitation, she dropped what she was doing and arrived at the front door at exactly the same time as her mother.
‘You sit back down,’ Alice said firmly. ‘I’ll get rid of whoever is out there.’
‘No! I mean, dear, I’ll get this. I don’t like just telling people to go away. You know—it’s a small village and I wouldn’t want to get a reputation for being the sort of person who can’t be polite to visitors...’
‘Mum, if it’s a visitor, of course I’m not going to send them on their merry way! But if it’s someone trying to sell double glazing...’
‘I’m not sure they do that any more, dear. Do they?’
As they stood there, vaguely quibbling, there was another loud knock on the door and, with a sigh of exasperation, Alice pulled open the front door and stared...
‘What are you doing here?’ Her mother was right behind her and she edged out of the door and half-shut it behind her, then she poked her head through and told her mother, who was avid with curiosity, that the caller was for her.
‘Who is it?’
‘No one! You...er...go inside and I’ll be in, literally in a minute or two...’ For a moment, Alice thought that her mother was about to ignore that suggestion but, after a brief staring match, Pamela Morgan tutted and headed towards the kitchen, not before casting another curious glance in the direction of the front door.
‘What do you want? What are you doing here?’
Gabriel stared down at Alice. This was an Alice he had not seen before. Not the brisk, efficient secretary in the neat, uninspiring suit, or the glamorous, leggy woman in the designer clothes she had bought when she had been in Paris with him. A beautiful, fresh-faced girl who looked her age, with a ponytail and wearing stay-at-home, faded clothes and peculiar bedroom slippers with a cartoon motif.
Warmer weather had brought out a band of light freckles across the bridge of her nose. He had completely forgotten why he had come but he was damn glad that he had. Just seeing her did something to him and he fidgeted and looked away before resting his gaze once again on her upturned face.
‘I couldn’t get you out of my head.’ Hell, had he just said that?
‘What?’ Alice was so shocked by that statement that her mouth fell open. Her eyes were glued to his face, which the early evening threw into shadow. He looked tired and dishevelled and drop-dead gorgeous. He had pushed up the arms of his long-sleeved cotton jumper and the sprinkling of dark hair brought back vivid memories of those strong arms around her. His low-slung jeans clung to him, delineating his long, muscular legs.
She felt her nipples pushing in anticipation against her bra, wanting to be touched and teased and licked.
‘Shouldn’t you be with...that woman who came to the office yesterday?’ Alice asked huskily and Gabriel delivered a slow, amused smile that rocked her to the core.
Alice stared down at her feet. The pulse in her neck was beating fast and here, in these clothes, she had that weird, out-of-body feeling that she had had in Paris when she had thrown caution to the winds and jumped into bed with him.
He was making her aware of something better out there, something wild and free, and she hated him for that because she knew that it was all an illusion.
‘It turns out that she didn’t do it for me.’ Gabriel had made a decision; it was one that had come to him when she had pulled open the front door and he had looked at her.
He was done telling himself that he was not built for pursuit. He was done pretending that he wasn’t jealous whenever he thought of her with another man. If these reactions stemmed from the fact that what they had hadn’t run its course, then it was up to him to ensure that it did run its course. How else was he going to get her out of his system?
‘Are you going to invite me into the house?’
‘No. You shouldn’t be here, Gabriel.’ But she was light with relief that the pocket-sized brunette h
adn’t become her replacement. It was stupid and it was cowardly but she couldn’t help it.
‘I know I shouldn’t.’ He raked his fingers through his hair, not too sure where he went from here.
Alice looked at him, perplexed.
‘Is there a man in there?’ he questioned suddenly, roughly, and Alice’s mouth tightened with outrage.
‘I’m not you, Gabriel. I don’t hop from one bed to another without pausing for breath.’
‘I didn’t hop anywhere with Bethany. I put her in my car and my driver took her back to her house. End of story.’
‘Just go, Gabriel.’ She sighed and stared to the side of him, but his image was imprinted so forcibly in her head that every bit of him had been committed to memory. He was in her system like a virus which she couldn’t budge.
‘I’m not going anywhere.’
‘Why? Why? I’ve told you...’
‘Let me in.’
‘You always think that you can get whatever you want.’
Gabriel stared at her and she squirmed under his unrelenting dark gaze. What would she do if he kissed her right now? Melt. She was melting now, liquid heat gathering between her legs, dampening her underwear. He couldn’t get her out of his head. She told herself that those were just meaningless words, but they bounced around in her head until she was giddy.
‘Let me in.’
He was as immovable as the rock of Gibraltar, standing there in all his brooding, intense glory, and with a little sigh of resignation Alice stood aside.
Her mother was hovering in the kitchen and introductions were made. Pamela Morgan launched into a series of questions, her curiosity on red alert, and Alice groaned silently to herself. If she had never said a word about Gabriel, she might have been able to channel him out of the house without too much difficulty—as just her boss who happened to be down to see a client and had popped in for...reasons best known to himself.
But she had spent far too much time telling her mother about him, describing him, inviting the curiosity that was now unstoppable.
To Sin with the Tycoon Page 12