Perfect Fit (20 page)

“Yes, I can believe such a thing,” Rose said softly.

Sage frowned. “And just what do you mean by that?”

“Hey, just hear me out before you get in a huff. First of all, although Erol has his strong points, too, in good looks and being a fine brother and all, I think Gabe is a man in a class by himself. Not
only is he good-looking and fine as a dime, he’s also pretty damn wealthy. However, on the other hand, you just got out of a relationship that you’ve been in for five long years with the same guy, and for that reason, I can see how Gabe might think you really aren’t over Erol.”

When Sage tried to interrupt, Rose said quickly, “Sage, think logically for a moment. Most people, especially an emotional woman as yourself, aren’t able to wipe out five years of loving the same man within a six-month time period. I think it’s unrealistic for you to even want anyone to believe that you still don’t feel something for Erol.”

Sage nervously bit her bottom lip. “Okay, so my love for Erol hasn’t completely died, so what? That has nothing to do with Gabe, especially when there’s no way Erol and I will get back together.”

“And you’re absolutely sure of that?”

Sage inhaled deeply, feeling angry and frustrated. “Why won’t anyone believe me? I thought I had you in my corner, Rose.”

“And you do, girlfriend. I’m just trying to make you see reason and for you to understand why Gabe would possibly feel threatened by Erol’s memory.”

Sage raised her eyes to the ceiling. “But that’s just it. Erol doesn’t occupy my memory. There are days I don’t think of him at all.”

“Have you heard from him since you’ve left?”

“Yes, in the beginning when I first got here, he used to call occasionally, but then I finally asked that he stop calling because we had nothing to say to each other.”

“Have you seen him?”

“No.”

“And what if you were to see him, Sage? It’s
been six months since you broke off your engagement, and then you left Charlotte for Anchorage. I want you to be honest with yourself as well as with me. What would be your reaction if you were to see him now? Can you honestly say without a doubt that you and Erol won’t get back together? I know he hurt you by what he did, but when you think about it, the two of you had a pretty nice relationship before his screwup. He loved you, and I know for a fact that he still does. Whenever I see him he asks about you. And he looks so sad it’s a shame. And to make matters worse, I hear he still isn’t dating anyone. He actually believes that when you return to Charlotte, all will be forgiven.”

Sage rolled her eyes. “Well, he’s wrong.”

“Then, you need to tell him.”

Sage released a frustrated breath. “Don’t you think that I have? I don’t know what it would take for him to believe me other than for me to become seriously involved with someone else. But the craziness of it is that the one person I feel a desire to become serious about doesn’t trust my feelings for Erol. I feel caught between a rock and a hard place.”

Rose giggled. “Hey, that isn’t a bad place to be, if you get my meaning.”

Sage shook her head, grinning. “Is sex the only thing you can think about?”

“No, in fact, I haven’t slept with a guy since you left Charlotte.”

Sage lifted a brow. “Any reason for that?”

“No. I just want to make a few changes in my life, and before you ask, no, I’m not climbing the walls or anything. I’ve taken a pledge of celibacy for nine months.”

“To who?”

“To myself. I just want to see how long I can hold out. I have three more months to go.”

“And then?” Sage asked curiously.

“And then either of two things will happen. I’ll either be so proud of my accomplishment that I’ll try for another three months to make it a full year of celibacy, or I’ll be so horny at the end of the nine months that I’ll go out and make up for lost time.”

Sage couldn’t help but laugh, which was something she felt she needed to do tonight.

“But getting back to the subject of you and Erol,” Rose said, breaking into Sage’s laughter. “In this case I have to agree with Gabe Blackwell. Until you’re absolutely sure this thing between you and Erol is over, and I mean really over, it won’t be fair to get involved with Gabe. Sounds to me like he’s probably been burned by some woman who used him as a substitute for someone.”

Sage regarded what Rose said in silence for a while. Could that be the reason for Gabe’s attitude? She remembered what he’d shared with her over dinner about the woman he had wanted to marry and how she had broken things off,
just like that,
because she’d become involved with someone else. Had that someone else been an ex-husband or an ex-lover?

Sage sighed deeply. “Maybe you’re right, Rose. I’ll call and talk with Erol tomorrow.”

“Not good enough.”

Sage frowned. “Excuse me?”

“I said a phone call isn’t good enough. You should talk to him personally. The two of you should meet somewhere on neutral ground, without the interference of his family or yours, and get this matter cleared up once and for all. Think about it,
Sage. Think about it real seriously if you want things between you and Gabe to ever go somewhere.”

There was a long silence; then Rose said, “Oh, and before I forget, I’ve decided to come out and visit you after all. Lord knows after listening to your woes, someone ought to be there to help you straighten out the mess you seem to have gotten your life into without me.”

G
abe glanced at the clock that sat on the night-stand next to his bed. It was four in the morning, and he was still wide awake. Getting up, he strode to the bedroom window and peered outside.

According to the weather reports, it was supposed to snow again today, which seemed to be an everyday occurrence for March. Except for that one day it hadn’t snowed, the day he had gone to Sage’s office to apologize. And from the way it looked, he owed her another apology. His mother had been right. He could not go around placing judgment on every woman who’d had a breakup with a former boyfriend by what Lindsey had done. Yet he had because he was afraid to take a chance on letting any woman get close to his heart again.

But tonight had shown him one thing with Sage. She had touched him deeper with a kiss than he’d ever been touched before. What he’d told her was true; sexual chemistry was a powerful thing. As much as he’d enjoyed sleeping with Lindsey, Debbie
and a number of other women he’d dated over the years, none of them had elicited such intense and unabashed desire from him before. There was lust, and then there was lust. What he felt with Sage was something he couldn’t explain. He’d experienced sizzle with a woman before, and also skin-prickling heat. But with Sage, there was more, something different, something all-consuming. Without even trying, she was becoming elemental to his total well-being.

From the time he had arrived at her apartment to pick her up for dinner, there had been a frisson of immediate awareness flowing through every part of his body. But it hadn’t just happened then. It had happened each and every time he’d come within feet of her, but before he’d been able to play if off. Not last night. Whether she realized it or not, she had displayed her growing trust in him. She had been open with her feelings while sharing information with him—unpretentious, honest—and at the end when he’d lit her fuse, she had become a spitfire.

His accusation had questioned her integrity, and she hadn’t liked it one damn bit. It had made her furious, and in the heat of the battle she had gone from feminine to a confident hellion without missing a beat. Desire had sharpened her senses, armed her with more ammunition than he’d been prepared for. He thought she would accept what he’d said about not being a substitute without any fuss or argument. But that had not been the case. She had gotten madder than hell and had not backed down in her assertion that he was the one missing the point and not her. She’d been confident in her feelings and her belief in herself.

Why couldn’t she understand that he couldn’t
be that all believing and trusting because it was his heart that was at risk and not hers?

My heart is at risk.

He turned and moved away from the window as a piercing pain shot through his chest. A reminder of what was at stake. An involvement with Sage could put him at risk of another heartbreak, and he couldn’t survive that. His parents and Chris had been witnesses to the pain he’d suffered on the outside, but even they hadn’t known the depth of pain that had ripped into his body and soul on the inside.

He went back to bed vowing that somehow and someway, he would do everything in his power to protect himself from the pain of being another fool in love.

Sage hung up the phone and nervously moistened her bottom lip with her tongue. She had just finished talking to Erol and hoped she wasn’t making a mistake.

Their plans were set. Coincidentally, he had a business trip to Texas next week and was more than willing to prolong the trip a few days to meet with her. Although she had been careful not to say anything to give him false hope as to why the two of them were meeting, she could tell by the sound of his voice that he’d gotten it anyway.

She shoved away from her desk and walked over to the window. It was still snowing. She was grateful Malcolm had offered to be her chauffeur for their meeting at John Landmark’s office. She hated driving around in this weather, especially when there was a lot of melted snow on the ground.

She inhaled deeply. Gabe would be attending
the meeting, and she was trying to prepare herself to see him again. Sleep hadn’t come easily for her last night. First her body had lain there practically throbbing all night, and if that wasn’t bad enough, there was the fact that everything Rose had said about Erol had been in the forefront of her mind. Thoughts of both Gabe and Erol had made getting a good night’s rest impossible. After today’s meeting, she intended to have Malcolm drop her off at home. Her car could stay at the office all weekend for all she cared. She hadn’t planned on going out anyway. Since the weekend weather called for snow, snow and more snow, she’d decided to stay inside where it was nice and warm and survive off soup and sandwiches.

She turned at the knock on her door. “Come in.” She smiled when Malcolm entered.

“Are you ready to leave for the meeting?” he asked, going into her office.

“Yes, I just need to grab my briefcase. I doubt this will be a long meeting. All Mr. Landmark wants is for me to update everyone on the plans for the dinner theater as well as the other marketing ideas I have.”

Malcolm nodded. He then quickly crossed the room to help her put on her coat. “Did I hear you say you’ll be out of town a few days next week?” he asked when they were walking out of her office.

“Yes. There’s some personal business I need to take care of in Texas, so I’ll be gone, but only for a day. I’ve checked and there are no meetings planned, and if anything comes up, I’m sure you’ll be able to handle it in my absence.”

He grinned. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

She shook her head, smiling. “You’ve earned it.”

*  *  *

“So as you can see, with all these marketing ideas we plan to have in place, Eden will become a household name.” Sage finished her presentation. She glanced around the room. “Are there any questions you’d like answered?”

Gabe leaned back in his chair and watched his wonder woman in action. He was proud of the way she had conducted her part of the meeting. Even when Langley Mayhew, one of John Landmark’s junior executives, had tried cornering her with relentless questions, she had not lost her cool but had answered intelligently, expertly and professionally.

The one thing he did notice was that she had not tried to avoid meeting his gaze. In fact, it seemed that she had deliberately made eye contact with him several times, and each time she had done so with total indifference. It was as if what they had shared last night never happened. If he didn’t know for a fact that he hadn’t dreamed the whole thing, he would think he hadn’t actually taken such liberties with her like cupping her bare bottom in his hand or kissing her with such intensity her mouth had become swollen. Therefore, her indifference could mean only one thing.

She was still pretty damn mad at him.

He rubbed a hand along his jaw as he took a few seconds to continue to sit there and think about things, although the business meeting was now ending. Parnell lifted an inquiring brow at him, but otherwise said nothing as he packed up his belongings and left the room.

“You plan to spend the night, Blackwell?”

Gabe looked up into Langley Mayhew’s grinning face. He had never cared much for the man,
and after the way he’d badgered Sage during her presentation, Gabe liked him even less. In fact, he had a good mind to knock that silly grin off Mayhew’s face, which surprised Gabe since he normally wasn’t a violent person.

His gaze narrowed as he watched Mayhew cross the room to where Sage was standing packing her briefcase. Mayhew’s voice, since the man didn’t know how to speak softly, came across rather loudly in the room. Gabe decided to stay where he was and listen.

“That was a nice presentation you did, Ms. Dunbar. Perhaps we can go somewhere and have a few drinks and you can tell me more about it,” Mayhew was saying.

Sage, in the most professional voice she had, said, “There’s nothing else to tell, Mr. Mayhew. I covered everything in today’s meeting.”

Mayhew’s smile widened, but didn’t spread to his eyes, which were scanning Sage from head to toe. “Oh, but I’m sure there’s something we can talk about over drinks.”

Sage picked up her clipboard and pretended to study it. “No sir, I don’t see anything listed that we need to discuss. But I do note another marketing meeting scheduled in two weeks; perhaps you’ll have more questions for me then.”

At that moment, Malcolm reentered the room, unaware of the conversation going on between Sage and Mayhew, and of the fact that the man was trying hard to hit on her. “Ready for me to drop you off at home, Sage?” he asked, smiling.

She quickly turned to Malcolm, returning his smile. Before she could open her mouth to say anything, Mayhew cut in.