Gabriel (9 page)

“My son’s murder avenged
.” Those four words shocked her more than Catherine’s accusation of who had killed
her son. Leah rocked back against the curved arm of the settee, her eyes widening.
She knew?
“You believe Richard is…?”

“Dead?” Catherine finished. “Of course he is.” Grief. Anger. Neither of those reactions
would have taken Leah aback. But fierce satisfaction crossed the woman’s face, and
Leah reeled with astonishment.

Catherine’s thin shoulders straightened, and a note of pride entered her cultured
voice. “If Richard had been alive all these years, I have no doubt he would have contacted
me. He was my son, my special boy, and he knew I loved him. He would have come back
to me if he could.” Her gaze hardened. “And since he didn’t, I can only surmise one
thing. He is dead, beyond my reach. I want to know who took him from me. His death
should be avenged no matter the length of elapsed time. Good men should not be forgotten,
and my son was the best of men. I want justice for his murder.”

Catherine’s fist clenched tightly. Thin blue veins bulged under white, paper-thin
skin, emphasizing her frailness, no doubt as a result of the cancer eating at her
body. Yet the fanaticism that glittered like stars in an obsidian sky in Catherine’s
gaze lent her a wild energy that belied her fragile state.

The uneasy foreboding that had scuttled down Leah’s spine earlier increased until
it felt like a troop of spiders crawling over her skin.

“I will do everything in my power to discover the truth, Catherine. I promise you.
But—” She hesitated, wary of setting the woman off in her delicate condition, yet
unwilling to be a participant in this witch hunt. Catherine seemed determined to appoint
Leah as lead pitchfork-carrying vigilante. “I’ll follow this investigation wherever
it leads. I can’t allow it to be turned into a vendetta or an act of revenge. Not
even for you and Richard.”

Catherine’s sooty fringe of lashes lifted, and her dark eyes sharpened.

“I have the utmost confidence you will redress the wrongs committed against my son.
Call it retribution or call it justice, I know you will bring his life and death closure.”

Chapter Nine

What Gabriel wouldn’t trade for the burn of Scotch down his throat. Not for the taste
or the warm glow after it hit his gut. Nope, he longed for the piggybacking forgetfulness—and
damn, he wanted to forget this day and mind-scrub yesterday. Since one drink inevitably
led to another…and then another…and then the bottle, he had to settle for the soda
in his hand.

Perhaps the neighborhood bar didn’t represent the wisest choice for a recovering alcoholic
to unwind, but the cop hangout was an old haunt of his. Near Leah’s old department,
the District D-4 police precinct in South End, many off duty and retired police officers
relaxed at the pub’s scarred tables. When she’d been on the force, they’d sometimes
met here after her shift for beers and burgers or the more-than-passable fish and
fries.

Framed photos of fallen officers lined the walls alongside glossy pictures autographed
by sports greats such as the Celtics’ Larry Bird, the Bruins’ Bobby Orr and Phil Esposito,
and the Patriots’ Tom Brady. The bar had been around for over sixty years, and its
patrons, ranging from grizzled old men to wet-behind-the-ears rookies, embodied its
history.

Leah had introduced him to the cop watering hole six years ago when she’d joined the
police force and he’d begun his series of novels revolving around hardened detective
Michael Rice. At first he’d been satisfied to people-watch, to soak up the atmosphere.
But it hadn’t been long before he’d started conversing with the regulars and receiving
a gold mine of information inaccessible through Google or Yahoo.

The bartender slid another soda in front of him, and Gabriel nodded his thanks. He
lifted the glass to his lips and sipped, but the cold drink did nothing to extinguish
the anger that had plagued him all day.

His fingers flexed around the icy glass. Hearing the old bitch speak about Chay as
if he were an ungrateful, dirty brat… Gabriel silently counted to ten. Deliberately
relaxed his grip on the soda. The idea of Chay being thankful for that son of a bitch
Richard in his life…

Catherine wore rose-colored Ray-Bans when it came to her son. Her fucking
special boy
. And after spending a minimum of thirty minutes with her in that cold crypt of a
house, Gabriel began to have an inkling of why Richard had turned out so damn
special
.

Gabe sighed, tired but so wound up he could be mistaken for one of the jonesing meth-heads
he’d passed on the way into the bar. Common sense dictated he should be at home in
front of his computer, pounding out the manuscript his agent expected in the next
several weeks. God knew his world of legal corruption, murder, and secrets was the
only place he could lose himself so completely. If he had an ounce of intelligence,
he would’ve gladly hibernated there after an afternoon inhaling Leah’s sweet vanilla
scent, reminiscing about her body pressed to his, and suffering Catherine Pierce’s
cold disdain.

Instead, after a silent, tense return ride to the city and Leah dropping him off next
to his car in the parking garage, he’d peeled out and headed to the South End rather
than Charlestown. To a comforting haunt in a world that had morphed into a strange
alternate universe where killers lurked, secrets upturned tombstones, and women who
were once safe havens had become the most dangerous threat of all.

Leah. It always came back to Leah.

He lifted the glass, drank from it again. The chilly condensation dampened his palm,
mirroring the ice coating his chest, making him shiver from the inside out. How he
wished he could rewrite the last two days. In his revision there wouldn’t be an investigation
into a twenty-year-old disappearance or the murder of an innocent man whose only sin
had been being in the wrong place at the wrong time. There wouldn’t be resented desires
for his best friend. His version wouldn’t sell a damn copy because the story would
be boring as hell. Yeah, that’s what he wished for his life. Boredom. Ennui. Tedious
monotony. Instead, he had an unsolved mystery—a crime—and unquenchable, guilt-ridden
need.

As Gabriel lowered his drink, his gaze rose to the mirror behind the numerous half-filled
bottles of alcohol. Immediately, the woman entering the bar snagged his attention.
If the long, black mantle of hair or the tall, slender figure hadn’t tipped him off,
then he would have identified Leah by her walk alone. The regal tilt of her head,
the confident, long-legged stride. The slight hitch in her gait was nearly imperceptible
and probably only obvious to him because he knew her so well. Yet, the barely there
unevenness in her step didn’t detract from the almost balletic gracefulness that drew
his and every appreciative male eye in the room—and some female.

Beauty in motion. A ballad made flesh.

Gabriel grimaced, glanced down into his glass. Had the bartender added a splash of
rum to his soda? He wrote gritty, often violent tales of murder and deception, not
sonnets of love, flowers, and warbling birds circling overhead.

Still, that didn’t stop him from hungrily tracking her progress through the room like
an animal on the hunt.

She wound her way through the maze of tables, waving as people called out to her,
responding with cheery salutes and jokes before selecting a small table near the back
of the room. She hadn’t noticed him at the bar. But then, why would she? It had been
two years since he’d been there.

Why was
she
here? He assumed hanging out in a cop bar after leaving the police department would’ve
been too painful for her.

The question tumbled in his head as she gave her order to the waitress with a smile.
She then pulled a paperback book from her bag and began reading.

Fascinated, he couldn’t tear his gaze from her.

With her ethereal eyes, small, narrow nose, and high cheekbones, she appeared almost
delicate, as fey as the tales his mother used to read to him at bedtime. But nothing
could be further from the truth. Even as she’d endured one of the most difficult periods
of her life with her resignation from the force, she’d dragged him through his own
crisis—at times growling and snarling.

The waitress arrived back at Leah’s table, beer bottle in hand. She smiled a thanks
and lifted the drink to her lips. As if sensing his intent study, her gaze slammed
into his. She held the connection, sipping her beer then lowering it back to the table.
Issuing a challenge.

He took up the gauntlet.

Clutching his own glass, he twisted around on the black, duct-tape-patched stool,
and rose to his feet. She reeled him in like a one-hundred-and-eighty-five-pound fish,
and he didn’t struggle against the line, even realizing he was good and caught. Even
realizing as he neared her, he may not be the same when he walked away.

She flipped the paperback down on the table, the spine facing up. A peek revealed
the cover of his latest release. A swell of tenderness rolled through him, followed
by a spike of pride.

“You didn’t have to buy it,” he commented, pulling the second chair back from the
table and lowering to its worn, grooved seat. “I would’ve given you a copy.”

“I know,” she said, a whisper of a smile curving her lips while she warily searched
his face. Not surprising considering how they’d parted. “But then I would’ve had to
explain why I’m just reading it a year after its release.”

Gabriel inclined his head. “I’d say you’ve been busy.” Busy with the ending of her
career, the onset of a new one, and of course, with him. “So you’re off the hook.”

He cleared his throat, set his drink down on the table. After a moment’s hesitation,
he stretched across the table, palms up. Leah placed her hands in his, and he curled
his fingers around hers. The sight of her slender hands enfolded in his wider, larger
ones stirred a longing in him. He wanted to curve his body around her, feel her skin
pressed to his, share her heat.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured, his gaze shifting to meet her eyes. “About today. I didn’t
prove to be much help with Catherine.”

“I couldn’t say it in the car, Gabe, but I’m so sorry for the way she treated you,”
she whispered. She shook her head, and her grip tightened. “I was so embarrassed and
ashamed of her condescension. And the way she referred to Evelyn and Chay…”.

Gabriel released her, leaned back against his chair, and curled his fingers into fists.
Either that or give in to the longing to smooth away the frown marring her forehead
with his fingertips.

“You were questioning her, Leah. What? Did you think I expected you to rip her a new
one for a couple of ignorant remarks?” he asked. “As a cop, how many times have you
had to swallow your tongue when a suspect made some off-color remark?”

A corner of her mouth hitched. “A few.”

“See?” He shrugged. “If you’d have told her she was an uptight, old biddy, it would
have been a very short interview.”

Leah chuckled. “Uptight, old biddy?”

“Hey,” he shrugged, “I call ’em like I see ’em. So what did you think? Was the drive
to Weston worth anything other than discovering that Evelyn and Chay were freeloading
bottom-feeders who tainted Richard’s life?”

Leah folded her arms on top of the table, and a curtain of black silk spilled forward
over her shoulder. He stared, mesmerized, and could almost feel the slide of the heavy
strands over his palm. Her hair would hold the vanilla scent he associated only with
her.

“Supposition and unfounded conjecture,” Leah said. “But nothing concrete. It was…unsettling
to see her like that. So”—she twirled her hand as if trying to conjure the description
she searched for—“spoiled. Damaged. Catherine actually believes Richard was planning
to break up with Evelyn, and Chay might have objected to his mother being hurt. I
know you believe it’s ridiculous—and so do I, by the way—but I think she’s convinced
Chay may be involved with Richard’s disappearance.”

Chapter Ten

Dread crept through Gabriel, dried his throat. He sipped his soda, moistening his
mouth. Wetting it for the evasion he prepared to spin.

“Her expression, Gabe,” Leah said, tracing the spine of the open book. “Her expression
when she said Richard was dead. God, did you see it? She seemed almost
gleeful
. Like she would rather he was dead and belonged to her than alive and not with her.”
She rocked back against the chair with a frown. “It was…”

“Creepy. Disturbing. Strange as shit.”

A corner of her mouth twitched. “Yeah.” She paused. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“Why agree to go with me to Catherine’s?” Her gaze pinned him to his chair, and suddenly
he knew what an amoeba under a microscope felt like. “You probably knew how she felt
about Evelyn and Chay.”

He nodded. “Chay confided in us about how hurt his mother was over Catherine’s refusal
to meet her or accept her relationship with her son.”

“So you knew Catherine would most likely not have flattering things to say about them.
Why subject yourself to hearing that hatred?”

He fell back in his seat and wondered how to reply without putting his foot in it—
it
being deep shit. “Like I told Catherine, you’re my friend, and you asked me for help.
Nothing more—”

“Nothing less.” She nodded. “Got it.”

It sounded logical, reasonable. Now if only his heart would stop kicking a hole in
his chest.

She nodded, the motion slow, measured. “Okay. I’ll give you that.” Her eyes narrowed.
“But why do I get the feeling you’re keeping something from me, Gabe?”

Smart woman
. “Leah, it was a long time ago. I haven’t thought about Richard or his mother in
years,” he lied with a coolness that amazed and scared him. Desperate to change the
subject, he tapped a fingertip on the book cover. “What part are you on?”

For a long moment, she didn’t respond. It required every bit of his will to meet her
intent scrutiny without squirming like a naughty schoolboy. Finally, she cracked,
and a small smile appeared. Translation: You won this round.

He didn’t feel like he’d won a damn thing.
Lies
.
So many lies
, and they were a noose strangling him with every second that passed.

She glanced down at the book and smoothed a palm over the glossy black and red cover.
“Michael Rice is entering the serial killer’s abandoned workshop.” Her lips formed
an adorable moue. “Such a technical word for a torture chamber. That the killer actually
regards it as a ‘workshop’ is even more unsettling.”

“You see it as torture; he views murder and mutilation as a talent, a skill to be
perfected.”

“I definitely get that. When the story is from his point of view, he’s so analytical
and rational I can almost understand his reasoning. But does it lower the ick factor?
Not even a little bit.”

Gabriel grunted. “I think a high ick factor is a compliment.”

“Oh, it is. This villain is your most compelling and disturbing yet.”

“So do you like the story so far?” It stunned him how anxiously he awaited her answer.
He wrote what he loved. He cared if his agent or editor enjoyed the books he submitted,
hoped others did, but the few negative reviews he’d received over the years hadn’t
bothered him. Yet with Leah, he
wanted
her opinion…and her approval.

When she nodded, he tried—he really tried—but couldn’t hold back the warmth tickling
his chest.

“It’s wonderful writing, Gabe,” she said, stroking the book cover as if it were a
cherished treasure. “The best book in the series, and that’s saying something.” She
paused, her fingers stilling. A wrinkle appeared on her forehead. “It’s more…” She
seemed to wrestle for the correct word.

“Just say it,” Gabriel urged.

“Dark,” she blurted. “This book is darker than the others.”

His agent had made the same observation, and he agreed. Though the characters and
plot were fiction, the emotions were very real. The book had been released a year
earlier but had been completed a year prior to his family’s deaths. How ironic that
the rage, bitterness, and grief he’d described on those pages would reflect the true
dark morass of pain he suffered months later.

“Yeah,” he said.

Her lips twisted into a wry smile. “And I thought Chay was the Chatty Cathy of the
group.”

He grunted and sipped from his now watered-down soda. Leah fiddled with her beer bottle,
her scrutiny focused on the glass container as if it was the most important task she
would accomplish that night.

“I wonder,” he murmured, placing his forearms on the tabletop and leaning forward.
“What thoughts are hiding behind those fairy eyes?”

Her chin jerked up, and she stared at him. In those eyes he glimpsed something raw
and tumultuous…vulnerable. Again he reached out for her. He wanted to cup her cheek,
stroke his thumb over that lush bottom lip, but he settled for her hand.

“What?” he asked.

“Fairy eyes. That’s two times today you’ve said that.” She shook her head. “It’s been…years
since I’ve heard it.”

Maybe he hadn’t used the description in a long while, but he thought it almost every
time he looked down into her lovely, exotic face. He’d witnessed those eyes light
up in laughter, darken with grief, narrow in anger. He’d yet to witness what they
would do in passion. Would the jade brighten as if lit by a flame? Or would they cloud,
grow hazy with desire?

He closed his eyes and the image solidified, sharpened in color and detail. Need throbbed
with every pulse of his heart, using his veins as an interstate to carry the hunger
to every part of his body. More than he craved his next breath, he wanted to experience
pushing deep inside Leah, losing himself in her wet, welcoming heat. Somehow he knew
the sweet oblivion he used to seek so desperately at the bottom of a liquor bottle
could be found in her arms, in her body.

Since sleeping in the refuge of her slim, strong frame the night before, he acknowledged
he needed her—needed the peace and forgetfulness her strength, compassion, and sweetness
offered. Yeah, he needed her body…but not her heart. Not her affection. He didn’t
want to be accountable for her emotional welfare.

Again, he released her hand, exiling himself from her touch.

This—coming over to Leah’s table—hadn’t been a good idea. Not when his gut, his soul,
cried out to taste her…to take her.

“I have to go.” He shoved back from the table and stood to his feet, the action as
abrupt as his tone. He flagged down the waitress but didn’t wait for her to approach.
Instead he tossed more than enough bills on the scarred tabletop to cover his drinks
and Leah’s beer, then hightailed it toward the bar’s exit.

“Wait, Gabe,” Leah called after him as his palm slapped the door and pushed it open.
The brisk October night enveloped him, cooling his flushed skin. But then the small,
firm hand at his elbow shot his inner temperature up to hot as hell. “What’s the rush?”
she asked, tucking her arm into the crook of his elbow.

“I have work to do,” he lied gruffly. Her palm and fingers seemed to brand him even
through the layers of coat and sweater.
Damn. It. Evade. Distract
.

“Why did you come here tonight?” he asked, desperate to divert his attention from
her touch and satisfy his curiosity from earlier. Killing two birds with one stone.
When she glanced up at him, he nodded toward the pub. “This is quite a distance from
Beacon Hill. Plus, I would think a cop hangout would be painful for you.”

She studied him for several long moments, silent. Just as he prepared to prod the
answer from her, she averted her gaze and stared straight ahead, her dark head at
a proud tilt, her shoulders rigid.

“Pride,” she admitted shortly. “To prove to myself, along with everyone there, that
I’m not hurt, bitter, resentful, or all of the above, about my injury and walking
away from my career. To prove that, at heart, I’m still as much a cop as they are,
and that I
chose
to be a private investigator and didn’t pick it as a booby prize.” She shook her
head and let out a short crack of laughter. “To show them—to show myself—that I survived.”

A beat of silence passed between them. Gabriel didn’t utter a word—he had no clue
what to say.

“And…” she murmured.

“And?” he prodded gently after several moments of silence.

She inhaled deeply and met his gaze once more. For some reason he imagined a soldier,
wet behind the ears, terrified, but still determined to face a battle head-on.

“And it was the last place I spent time with you before the accident. The last place
I saw you smile and laugh. The last place I saw you happy.”

Gabriel slammed to an abrupt, hard stop. His heart hammered against his sternum in
a wild, staccato beat as his hand shot out and gripped her arm in an implacable hold.
She stumbled, but before she could turn around and blast him, he claimed the few steps
that brought his chest flush against her back. Instantly, he recognized the mistake
he’d made by touching her, but damn if he could regret it or push her away. Not when
her confession sizzled through his veins like TNT with a side of petrol. Not when
the graceful line of her spine fit into the groove between his pectorals like a puzzle
piece. Not when his cock rode the small of her back.

The impact of her words—of
her
, damn it!—slammed into him with the force of a battering ram. This…this
need
for her hadn’t lessened in the last six months. No, it had grown big like the most
stubborn weed—unwanted but impossible to root out. There were so many reasons why
this craving was wrong, why it would only hurt both of them in the end…yet he still
pressed closer, still dipped his head to inhale the vanilla-and-sin scent of her hair,
still held her even when a shudder coursed through her and vibrated against him.

Desire roared through him like a virus—his skin was on fire with fever, shivers raced
over his body, and he ached.
God, did he ache
.

“Gabe,” she whispered, the sound tremulous, uncertain.

“Shh,” he soothed, and nuzzled her dark, sweet-smelling strands of hair.

She waited, trembling.
Fight,
he wanted to yell at her.
Fight me. Tell me to fuck off. Something.
Anything.
The plea echoed in his head, rebounding like a crazy game of dodge ball. If she didn’t
put up boundaries, didn’t warn him to keep on his side of the platonic line, then
they were both screwed.

Each breath carried the scent of her to his lungs, and his willpower took another
hit. Soon his control would tumble down like the Berlin Wall, and nothing—not memories
of Maura, his conscience, the Richard Pierce investigation, or the malicious plans
of a killer—would keep him from finding out if her kiss tasted like those peppermints
she popped like pills.

But hell
, he swore silently.
What can I offer her?
One night of sex? As good—as
hot
—as sex between them would be, she deserved better than a booty call. Yet a momentary
fling was all he could give her. He couldn’t commit to give anyone, not even her,
what he didn’t have. His heart had been buried two years ago.

His fingers flexed on her arm. Several moments passed. They could have been statues
posed in the middle of the sidewalk, the evening pedestrian traffic parting around
them like the Red Sea. Then the tension seeped from her body. She leaned back, resting
her weight against his chest as if she trusted him to hold her up.

And he would.

He did.

He lifted a palm to the flat plane of her abdomen, his fingers splayed wide. Her stomach
rose and fell with each breath she took, and he found the pattern of his breathing
mating with hers.

“You are a survivor,” he said, his lips grazing the shell of her ear. “And have nothing
to prove to anyone, including yourself. You’re stubborn as hell”—he smiled at her
soft scoff—“but that’s what aids you in being a dedicated, great detective, whether
you wear a badge or not. And whoever can’t see how valuable you are, how good you
are, they are the fools. Fools and fuckers.”

This time her chuckle sounded less bitter, less bleak. “Fools and fuckers? Jesus,
Gabe, you are so poetic.”

“It’s why I sell the books, darling,” he drawled, injecting an exaggerated brogue
to make her laugh, really laugh, and not that hardened bark she’d emitted earlier.

He received his wish. She chuckled, and he planted a soft kiss to the top of her head
before releasing her and stepping back. Turning on her booted heel, she faced him.
Her unblinking inspection made him feel like a butterfly pinned to a corkboard, trapped,
helpless. Since avoiding the unsettling scrutiny would smack of cowardice, he maintained
eye contact, but God, he wanted to glance away before she glimpsed something he couldn’t
afford for her to see.

“Thank you,” she murmured, and lifted a hand to his cheek. A latent sense of self-preservation
kept him from closing his eyes and indulging in the touch, but it was imprinted on
his skin all the same.

Even as her fingers fell to her side and she walked away from him, he knew he would
savor the fingerprint of her caress, feel it as he slept, as he dreamed.

…

According to the apostle Paul, love is patient.

Kind.

Doesn’t envy, and isn’t proud.

Obviously the apostle never suffered a case of unrequited love, or he would have added
“hurts like a son of a bitch” to that list. Leah squeezed her eyes closed. But an
instant later, she locked in on the solitary figure striding down the shadowed street.
She was unable
not
to look after him.

Sighing, she jabbed the key in her truck’s ignition. The engine roared to life and,
after glances in her side and rearview mirrors, she pulled out into the street. By
the time she passed the corner, she couldn’t help sneaking another glimpse in her
mirror, but Gabriel had disappeared. Already, she hungered for another glimpse of
his tall, lean frame, broad shoulders, and slim hips.