The Fall Of Jacob Del Garda (23 page)

He turned on his heel and walked away.

The room swam.

Sophie stood utterly still as she watched him leave, heard the door to his bedroom close.

Her heart weighed too heavy in her chest.

Dear heaven, he was so terribly upset.

She'd hurt him.

Badly.

Guilt slapped her hard.

Well, what did she expect?

She knew that secrets and lies broke hearts.

Look at what had happened between her sister and Jacob?

Had she learned nothing?

Now her fist went to rub the spot over a heart that hurt too much.

Tobin was a wonderful man. He'd always been great with little kids. Probably because there was still a part of him that was like a big kid himself.

Then the tears started to fall.

He would have made a wonderful father.

A devoted and loyal husband.

She sank to the sofa, held her head in her hands.

How had everything that had been so right, gone so dreadfully wrong?

He'd tossed and turned all night.

And hadn't slept a wink.

The scene with Sophie played on a continual loop in Tobin's weary brain.

Bleary-eyed, he switched on the bedside light.

Four-thirty in the morning and the ache in his gut just would not go away.

And he recognised the ache for what it was.

Guilt.

He'd lashed out and hurt her.

But, Christ, who could blame him?

Sitting on the edge of the bed, he exhaled a deep sigh.

Gina Gregory was the person he should be furious with.

Sophie had simply been an innocent bystander.

He slapped his forehead.

Why the hell had he not put two and two together?

The day Gina had drugged him, was the day Sophie had fled.

Why
had he not connected the events?

Okay, he'd had the mother of all migraines, a side-effect of the drug apparently. And work had been a crazy bastard that week. He and Lucas had been up to their necks in a variety of sponsorship negotiations that had made them, and their clients, millionaires almost overnight. Plus, he'd blacklisted Ms. Gregory. And had thought he'd put the whole sordid mess behind him.

But that was no excuse. He hadn't dealt with the impact of what had happened to him, not really.

Sophie was right.

Once he was back in New York, he'd report what Gina had done to him to the authorities. Get the event on record. And move on.

Then his tired brain took him on another journey.

A journey that had him place himself in Sophie's shoes. What would he have done if he'd been her? So happy and excited to tell the one he loved good news. And then found that person in bed with another?

No matter how hard he tried, he just could not conceive of how the blow must have felt for Sophie.

He remembered what Sophie had been like in those days. Tall and blonde and tanned. With those endless legs that went on forever. Smart as a whip, coasting through her degree. All big golden eyes, filled to the fucking brim with love, for him. Tobin held his head in his hands. She'd been full of fun, super-bright, beautiful, open, loving and trusting, loyal, and straight.

In his head he could just see her doing a happy jig in the elevator as it whisked her up to his apartment. Her face all pink and happy, those big eyes filled with excitement as she couldn't wait to surprise him. And then... the shock, the hurt, the utter fury. Hell, yeah. The Sophie he knew would
never
have forgiven betrayal. Never. Not a chance.

But then he caught his breath as he realised that the damage Gina had inflicted on Sophie must have hurt her so badly it was beyond torment. And then she'd been all alone in London. Terrified and with no one to turn to, she'd lost their baby. How must that have felt? He couldn't imagine it.

The moan in his throat was almost a whine.

Instead of letting the loss of her dreams and the one she loved break her, his baby girl had worked her ass off, gaining her masters with honours no less. And then she'd thrown herself into helping others in the third world by working on research on malaria. Christ, he'd been so fucking proud of her.

And then the only person she had left in the entire world, Gabriella, had got sick.

Instead of avoiding the person who had shattered her heart,
him
, Sophie had faced him head on and kicked his sorry ass. Never giving an inch. Yeah, that was his girl.

Then tonight, instead of keeping a secret, she'd been amazingly honest, fearless, as she'd stood before him and told him straight to his face that she'd been thrilled to be pregnant with his child. Then he'd seen the utter heartbreak in her lovely face, in those big hazel eyes, as she'd told him she'd lost their baby.

And what had he done?

He'd verbally kicked her when she was down and turned away from her.

Because he was a selfish son-of-a-bitch, only concerned with his feelings first.

Not once had he considered hers.

That wasn't loving her.

He'd seen the emotion swimming in her eyes and had done nothing.

Now he stood because he could not bear thinking of her lying in her big bed, alone, and hurting so bad she was in tears.

Tobin didn't take time to think as he flew to the door and raced down the hallway to her room.

The endless night was worse than torture for Sophie.

Everything she'd suffered over the last three years had all been her own stupid fault.

Why hadn't she confronted Tobin and Gina at the time?

If she had, she might have saved herself and Tobin a huge amount of heartache.

And, the bitch would have been caught in the act, might even be rotting in prison by now.

Sophie knew the American authorities had a zero tolerance for people convicted of sexual assault using tranquilizers like Rohypnol.

But she hadn't confronted Tobin and Gina.

Instead, she'd run as fast and as far as she could.

Then another of Tobin's accusations spun into her exhausted mind.

She should have told her sister everything.

Tobin was right, and she'd sort out that mistake later today. However, telling Ella that she'd lost a baby was going to floor her sister. A sister who believed that she would never have a child of her own.

Sophie curled up into a little ball and buried her face in the pillow.

What a mess.

When the door to her bedroom flew open, she shot up in bed and switched on the light.

A wild-eyed Tobin raced to her side and dropped to his knees on the floor.

His hands grabbed hers, brought them to his mouth, as his eyes burned into hers.

"I'm sorry, babe. I shouldn't have walked away like that. Forgive me?"

A heavy weight lifted from Sophie's heart.

He buried his face in her lap and took a deep inhale.

Her hand trembled as it stroked his hair.

"We can't live the rest of our lives with regret, Tobin. It's not healthy."

His head lifted and those grey eyes held hers. The deep and abiding love she read there, for her, made her eyes well-up again.

"Please don't cry," he begged in the voice of a man who simply couldn't take any more. "It kills me when you cry."

She blinked frantically, gave him a wobbly smile.

"They're happy tears. Don't you know I've never stopped loving you?"

And knew she'd done the right thing by telling him she loved him first when his eyes went too bright.

He'd needed to hear it, she realised.

And she needed to say it.

"Baby, even when you've been kicking my butt, breaking my heart by hating me every single minute of the day, I've loved you. Nothing you could do would make me love you less. And if you don't stop crying you'll make me cry, too. No way would Sophie Dolman marry a wimpy pussy."

Her heart was doing a weird little happy dance against her ribs.

"Marry?" Her voice was no more than a whisper.

His eyes stayed on hers and she saw a soul-deep adoration that made her throat ache.

"I've waited long enough. We'll fly to Vegas, just us."

She couldn't help but laugh as he crawled into her bed, hauled her into his strong arms.

Then they simply stared at each other.

And the laughing stopped.

His breath was on her lips as he whispered in a voice breaking with love, with need, "God, how I've missed you."

Oh, it was wonderful to have his mouth on hers. How could she have forgotten how skilled his tongue was? It did things that made her body liquefy and yearn and want. His lips grazed their way to the frantic pulse beating in the soft spot below her ear. Tasting and licking the faint dip of her neck. Nibbling along her collarbone. And it was marvellous.

Her bones were melting like liquid wax. And Sophie was sharply aware of a thrum through her system from her head to her toes. Her blood throbbed a rhythm so deep, so powerful, as if it had found the beat of the universe.

Feelings, too many to handle, filled her. Love, lust, regret, betrayal, loss, ran so high within her she had to battle the sting of tears in her eyes, her throat, her lungs.

God, his body was on fire.

He couldn't get enough of her.

Her taste, the sweet scent of her breath, was driving him insane. He needed to get rid of pyjama bottoms that had begun to feel too tight. He shifted to lie between her legs but it didn't help. Only one thing would relieve the ache and that was the woman he held in his arms. He needed to be buried deep, deep with Sophie's tight, slick...

Instantly, Tobin felt the change in her.

Dragging his mouth from hers, he lifted his head to stare into her face.

Shit.

She was crying?

His hand shook as his knuckles stroked a single tear from her lovely face.

"Did I hurt you?" he whispered.

She shook her head as she buried her face into the hollow of his neck.

"No. I love kissing you, loving you. It's just that everything feels too raw, too much..."

Caging her under him, he lifted his body from hers to study her face.

"If you're not ready for this, honey. We can wait."

Now her forehead creased.

Her hands reached up to cup his face, to smooth his cheekbones with her thumbs.

"No. I want this more than you do," she assured him.

Tobin bent his head to check out his monumental erection.

Lifted his head to give her big eyes.

"Somehow, I doubt that."

Her gaze followed his.

And the big grin made him smile.

"My goodness. Has it been a while?" Then she wrinkled her nose, shook her head. "Sorry, I can't believe I just said that."

Not offended in the least, his mouth found hers as he gave her a single kiss.

"Six months." Then another realisation hit him. "Shit," he said and rolled onto his back to stare in utter dismay at the ceiling.

"What's the matter?"

He turned his head to find her looking at him with serious hazel eyes.

"No condom," he said.

Those eyes went huge.

"Careless. Lucky for you I have plenty of party-hats, check out the bedside drawer."

Party-hats?

Now, that admission should have made him one happy horny guy.

Shame it didn't then, wasn't it.

Deep down inside Tobin knew he was being ridiculous, but dammit, he'd been her
firs
t.

A curious mix of disappointment, hurt and outrage had him glare at her.

"What the hell are you doing with condoms in your drawer?"

For some reason his voice had got higher and higher as he'd spoken those words.

Sophie was a grown-up. A beautiful woman. Logically, he knew she must have had plenty of lovers. But the thought of her being intimate with anyone else... well, it just... killed him.

He was being totally unreasonable, and he knew it.

And the way she bit down hard on her bottom lip trying hard not to laugh, along with the way sheer wickedness entered her eyes, seriously annoyed him.

"I'm prepared for any eventuality," she said.

She was, was she?

Now he leaned on his elbow to look down into her fabulous face.

"How long has it been for you then?" he growled the words, and could have kicked himself when her eyes went all sad.

"Too long."

His head dipped as he pressed a kiss of apology for being an ass-hat on her sweet mouth.

"I'm behaving like a fool," he admitted.

She kissed him back.

"Shut up, Fool, and make love to me.

It was like coming home.

She was naked, and couldn't remember him stripping her.

The combination of a big strong man with a gentle touch was unbelievably erotic to Sophie.

"You know that there has only ever been you," he murmured. "Only you can make me feel like this. Only you."

"'Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye.'" Feeling the sudden fierceness of love, her fingertip traced the line of his jaw. "I never really understood that until this minute. Even when my head told me you had betrayed me, my heart refused not to love you. I haven't been with another man, Tobin. It's only ever been you. Only you."

The way his eyes went wide and thrilled, the way they filled with a soul-deep love for her, made her open her arms to welcome him.

Suddenly, agonisingly, he needed her... her softness, her heat.