Storm Ravaged (Storm Damages 2) (Storm Legacy) (16 page)

Her breath hitches. “Would you like the X-rated or the PG version?”

“Oh, the X-rated version by all means.” While she talks, I wander to the stateroom on the back of the plane and lie down on the double bed. All alone in the dark with her sexy voice whispering in my ear, I dig into my trousers, curl my hand around my erection and listen to the exquisite details of her erotic dreams.

“So I yank down your briefs, and you bob up, hard, randy, so eager for me.”

“I’m always eager for you, love.” My voice’s gone gravelly.

She lets out a husky laugh. “Yeah, you are. So I take your cock in hand and pump, nice and slow.” I do the same.

“Your balls I take in my other hand and play with them. You know, the way you like it.”

“Yes, I know.” My balls tighten up.

“And then I take you into my mouth, curl my tongue around your hard cock and . . .”

“Yes.”

“Suck.”

I shout out a curse and ejaculate so hard I see stars.

Her sexy giggle transmits over the line. “Gabriel, did you just come?”

“Yes, darling girl, I most surely did.”

“Wish I were there with you.” Her voice wavers, so I know it’s time to cut the conversation short.

“Me too. You sound tired. Better go to bed.”

“Goodnight, Gabriel.”

“Goodnight, darling girl.” I head to the bathroom and clean up. With all the running around today, my leg’s killing me, so I down a pain pill, lie down once more and glance out the window at the stars. Wonder if she’s doing the same tonight.

What seems only minutes later I’m jarred awake by the pilot’s voice announcing we’re landing at Dulles. One of Liz’s new guards meets me at the private hangar. We don’t arrive at the Cathedral Arms until after three. Jorge takes my coat and disappears into the depths of the apartment. I ride the elevator up to our bedroom suite where I see the last thing I expect to see.

Chapter 21

______________

Elizabeth

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING AWAKE?” His bag hits the floor. He doesn’t seem too happy to see me.

And after our phone sex I was so looking forward to his coming home. I hitch a shoulder. “I couldn’t sleep. Kept thinking about . . .” The thing with an over active imagination, you don’t have any trouble picturing the worst. Images of an assassin breaking into the place, hurting me, killing our baby played in my mind until I had to wake up to keep the phantasms away. And then wide awake I worried about somebody getting to Gabriel as well.

His face softens. “Come here.” He opens his arms, and I fly into them.

“I was so worried, Gabriel.”

“About the baby.”

I nod against his chest and mumble. “And you. No telling what your mother will do. She might be targeting you as well.” I pull back to glance at his face. “Have you eaten?”

“At the airport.”

I glance out our bedroom window where the curtains are pulled back. This side of the suite faces the Cathedral of the Nativity. No way a sniper could get on its roof. Still. “It’s so out in the open.”

He nods toward the window. “That glass and the one downstairs? They’re bulletproof. And both the front door and the kitchen door are reinforced steel. It would take a tank to break through.”

“Really? Whoever lived here before must have had some enemies.”

“Something like that.”

“Gabriel, I’ve been thinking.”

“Always a dangerous thing.”

“Hush.” I bop him on the arm. I’ve spent the last two hours staring at the cathedral. Somewhere along the way, I found the answer, the thing I must do. “This isn’t working out for me.”

His lips tighten, and his gaze narrows. “I’ll make it bloody work.”

“You don’t understand. Sit.” After a seven-hour flight, his leg has to be killing him, so I tug him toward our bed and bend down to remove his shoes.

He loosens his tie, tosses it on the chair along with his jacket. “Stop doing that and tell me what the blazes you’re talking about.” Patience has never been Gabriel's strong suit, except when it comes to making love. And then he’s got all the patience in the world.

Rising, I rub a finger across his lips. “Be quiet.” I push at him until he's lying prostrate, crawl over him, leaving just enough room for me to loosen his shirt. As I unbutton him, I kiss his skin—warm, fragrant, smelling of soap, his expensive cologne and him. Done, I slip him out of the garment and lay over his heart which thuds heavy and deep beneath my breast. Except for my gossamer-thin robe, we're almost skin to skin. “I’ve missed you. So much.”

He curls a finger beneath my chin, bends down to kiss me. “Me too.” His voice's gone husky, and his body's hard with need. He might be tired from the flight, but there's no doubt in my mind what he wants to do. He pushes back his hair.

And, of course, that simple motion is enough to strike me stupid, like it usually does. He’s so beautiful with his hard hewn pecs, rippled abs, steel-roped arms.“What a magnificent beast you are, Gabriel.”

His heart somersaults beneath my cheek; his gaze turns wary and hopeful at the same time. “Stop stalling and tell me what you mean.”

“I didn’t want any of this,” I say.

“The apartment you mean?”

“Shh, I’m talking. You can speak when I’m through. Like I said none of this was in the cards. A baby, marriage, you.”

“You want a career in law. I get it.”

“Gabriel, hush!” I tweak one of his nipples.

His sensual lips quirk in amusement, but he doesn’t say another word.

“And then one hot summer day you blazed into my life, making me burn. God, I wanted you so much. Still do.” My hand roams over the hard muscles of his pecs, down to his washboard abs. He makes a noise of some kind, but, other than that, remains still. A statue made from warm, living flesh.

“Within a day you seduced me. No. That’s not right. I allowed you to seduce me. I fell into your arms, so, so eager to taste you, to hold you deep within me.”

He reaches for me, but I slap back his hand. “No.”

Blue fire flashes from his eyes, but he obeys.

“I told myself I would have sex with you only that once. I’d get what I needed from you, and that would be that. That resolve lasted less than a day when I allowed you to fuck me. At my office. Over a desk.” I shake my head. I couldn’t believe it at the time. I still can’t.

He starts. Clearly, he doesn’t remember.

Rolling to the side, I rub my hand over my belly. “That’s when I got pregnant with him. Your condom tore, and my birth control did not work.”

“I wondered how it happened.”

“You still don’t remember?”

“Only glimpses and that moment in the kitchen. But other than that? No.”

“That’s too bad because we were great together.”

“I don’t doubt that for a second, love.” He twirls a finger around one of my curls. “May I talk now?”

“No. I’m not done.”

He tucks the curl behind my ear, I take comfort from that gesture. He may not remember me, remember us, but his body seems to remember enough.

“In London, I no longer had the strength or desire to fight you off. You’d become something I needed, as necessary as breathing. I told myself that it was fine. Our affair would end when I returned home. After all, you had your life in England and I had mine here. And then I discovered I was pregnant with your child.”

“You never told me.”

“I was terrified of what you’d do when I did. You see, regardless of what I told myself, I wasn’t ready to let go of you. But then your mother took that choice away, blackmailing me into silence, forcing me to break up with you.”

“Going by my reaction, you must have done a bang-up job of it.”

My face crumbles. “Did our break up cause your accident?”

His eyes take on a closed in look. “I have no way of knowing what happened that night. I suppose we’ll never know.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Me too, but not for the same reason. I’m sorry because the accident stole my memories of you.”

“Oh, Gabriel.”

“Can I talk now?”

I shake my head. “Not done yet.”

“No wonder you want to be a lawyer. You love to talk.”

I hit his arm but don’t pack much heat in my punch.

“Whatever else you plan to say, you better hurry. I don’t know how much longer I can keep my hands off you.”

“I’m almost finished.” The living, breathing strength of him gives me the courage I need to go on. “The two and a half months after London were some of the hardest I’ve lived through. I wanted to pick up the phone and call you so many times. But I couldn’t. Because I knew what your mother would do. When you walked into the conference room for the signing, I almost lost it. You acted so cold toward me.”

“I forced myself not to react, afraid I’d give away my secret.”

“It hurt. A lot. But then the next day you asked me to marry you, and I panicked. I knew your mother would hurt you if you found out.”

“I found out anyway.”

“Yes. And then your mother disappeared and you convinced me to move here to keep our child safe. You bought me clothes, provided me with guards, staff. Oh, and one more thing. You paid off my school loans. I got a letter in the mail yesterday.”

“I didn’t want you burdened with such heavy debt.“

“When you asked me to be your mistress in London, you offered me an apartment, money, jewelry. I told you I didn’t want any of it. And yet, here I am. With an apartment, clothes, money. All of it paid by you. And it took your mother to point it out. She called me—”

“Don’t say it. You’re no such thing.”

“To you and me, Gabriel. But the outside world won’t think so charitably about this arrangement. My mother . . .” I pin my gaze on him, to gauge his reaction to what I’m about to say. “She was a prostitute.”

He eyes me steadily. My revelation is no surprise to him.

“You knew?”

“Yes. You’re not her.”

“I know I’m not, but if I continue to take from you—”

He curses. “You’re not taking anything. I’m sharing what I have. Gladly.”

I sit up on my elbow. “Please let me finish.”

He gnashes his teeth, but goes along with my wish.

“I can’t be like my mother. I won’t be like her. So I see only one way out of this.”

He grabs my shoulders, shakes me a little. “You’re not leaving me. Do you hear me?”

I smile inwardly. He has a tendency to imagine the worst. Not a surprise, given his upbringing. “No matter how hard I fight, the universe keeps spinning me in your direction, or maybe it keeps spinning you in mine. You were right when you said I didn’t want commitment. I would have been happy to give up our child for adoption. But now?” I rub my baby bump. “I don’t want that anymore.”

He eases his hold on me; a tentative grin flits across his face. “What do you want, love?”

You. Only you. Always you. “Peace. I can’t fight anymore. Not your mother, not fate, not you. So, yes, Gabriel I’ll marry you and make our son your heir.”

If I thought his eyes grew bright at the doctor’s office, it’s nothing to the way they’re shining now.
“My turn to speak?” he asks, in a choked voice.

“Yes.”

One by one, he slips loose the robe buttons, until I’m exposed to the air. His hand, that big hand I love so much, cups a breast, thumbs a nipple. And I grow liquid.

“Moon goddess. Fertile moon goddess.” A great big moon hangs in the sky. Huge and luminous, it shines through the glass window right on us.

Oh, geez, he’s gone lyrical on me. “Gabriel.” If I sound peeved, it’s because I am. I wish he’d get on with whatever he’s got to say.

He lays a finger across my lips. Okay. Fine. I get the hint.

He kisses me, stealing my breath. His hand skims my belly, his touch so tender, it brings tears to my eyes. What is he doing? And then it dawns on me. He doesn’t have to speak. He’s telling me without words what I mean to him. So I let him do what he will.

His hand roams up and down my skin, stroking, caressing. And everywhere he touches, little sparklers go off. His hand roams past my belly which he leans down and kisses. And all I can do is go, “Ahhhh.”

His only response is a smile imprinted on my skin. He pulls my head back and takes my mouth, ravages, owns me. He doesn’t stop at a simple meeting of lips but delves deep inside, hungry for the taste of me. As he’s kissing me, a long finger teases me, almost touching my bud. I want it so badly I rise up to meet it. But as soon as I do, the finger scoots away from me.

It’s only when I lie quietly, he returns, pressing against my clit, tweaking, circling it with expert fingers until I’m soaking wet. His mouth wanders down my throat to my ear. He nips the lobe. And that’s all it takes for me to come.

Once I stop shaking, I don’t have long to wait to see what’s he’s planned next. He turns me to the side, goes back to work on my mons. And soon I’m writhing on the bed once more. He slides his cock into my sheath from behind. So big. Always so big. But this time, I don’t know how he does it, he slides right in.