“I love playing for my team,” he said right then, “but these are my favorite games. I reckon Esme’s got what it takes to make a rep team.”
“She’s good,” agreed Gabriel. “Em’s doing well at soccer—I caught one of her school games a month back.”
Feeling content, Charlotte lay there under the sun as the two spoke. A dragonfly buzzed somewhere, and she could hear the girls playing with Jake and Sailor, the atmosphere warm and alive and happy. This, she thought, was what she wanted. A big, rambunctious family that welcomed everyone, even prodigals who’d made awful mistakes.
Gabriel’s phone buzzed into the hazy quiet. He’d left it on the sideline during the game but now slipped it out of his pocket. “Bishop,” he said, then paused. “What’s the situation?”
He left ten minutes later, heading to deal with an unexpected supply issue that could derail a nationwide campaign set to launch tonight. “No, stay here,” he said to Charlotte when she readied herself to accompany him. “I’ll sort out this headache and be back in time to eat.”
“Can’t Arnett handle this?” He was Gabriel’s Chief Operations Officer, and highly competent.
“He’s meeting me there. I want to make dead sure we put out this fire.” A kiss and he was gone.
Charlotte frowned after him, thinking once again of family. What kind of family would they create—if her hang-ups didn’t sink them after all—if Gabriel was never around or always obsessed with work when he was around?
35
A SLIGHT GLITCH (OKAY, FINE, A BIG FREAKING GLITCH)
GABRIEL DIDN’T, IN FACT, return in time to eat. Charlotte caught a ride home with Jake and Esme, and didn’t confront Gabriel about his work habits when he came in late. He looked so stressed that she didn’t want to add to it.
There was kissing and petting, but she went to sleep in the spare room that night and on Sunday, the latter being a quiet day where Gabriel only spent a few hours on work. It worried her, but again, she let it go because he finally relaxed in the afternoon—bringing it up at that point would’ve likely led to an argument, wiping out any mental rest he’d managed to get.
The next day at the office, she was still musing over how to handle things when a dozen red roses were delivered to her desk. Her heart threatened to crack, but unable to believe he’d break up with her so callously, she reached for the card, opened it.
“Gabriel!”
He was beside her in a heartbeat. “What’s the matter?” Seeing the flowers, he picked up the card she’d dropped.
“That pathetic piece of shit!” Though the words were hot, his tone was ice-cold. “You okay, sweetheart?”
She patted his chest. Her heart still raced, but now that she’d calmed down from the first stab of shock, she was angry more than anything. “I’m good,” she said, taking the card and putting it in an envelope so she could pass it on to Detective Lee. “I’m going to give these to Tuck for his girlfriend. No point in good roses going to waste.”
Wanting the bouquet out of her sight, she carried it to the mail room herself. Tuck was over the moon.
“You sure you don’t want them?” he asked, touching his fingers to the petals of one. “They look real expensive.”
“I’m sure.” Charlotte smiled, pleased that Richard’s sliminess hadn’t had the intended effect. “Hope you get lucky.”
Tuck grinned. “No question. She’s going to love me today.”
Gabriel was looking out the window in his office when she got back, his hands on his hips and his shoulders so tense he was like a stone statue. Ignoring her ringing phone, she shut the door to his office, then went over to him.
“I’m fine,” she said, her hands on his chest. “Come here.” She petted his nape, kissed his jaw, claimed his mouth.
It took time, but his muscles finally began to ease. “You’re really okay?”
“I am. A whole lot of that has to do with you.” She’d come a long way on her own, but she’d become stuck in stasis at a certain point. It had taken Gabriel challenging her, expecting her to handle him, that had pushed her to go further. “So thank you.”
His arms came around her, and they stood there for a long time. Charlotte had never felt safer, and the fact that Richard had sent her flowers right after his release, along with a card that said “I miss you,” was not about to change that. “Don’t let him inside your head,” she said to Gabriel when they drew apart. “That’s how he gets you. He’s a bug, and we ignore bugs or we squash them. We don’t think about them.”
Gabriel’s lips curved
“That’s my Ms. Baird.”
“Yes, I am.”
RICHARD MADE FURTHER ATTEMPTS at mental manipulation over the next two weeks, but Charlotte shrugged them off while continuing to pass everything on to Detective Lee. Richard was being very careful not to cross the line that would shove him back in jail, but eventually, he wouldn’t be able to help himself, and then they’d have him.
In the interim, she settled into Gabriel’s apartment and into his arms. He kissed her on the back of her neck every morning, rippling a shiver through her body. And he kissed her there when he walked her to her room every night. They made love in his bed but she slept in her own.
The one time they’d tried sleeping together, she’d woken so panicked that she’d given him a black eye. Of course, that was only because he’d been trying to calm her without holding her down. Her resulting emotional mess of a mind threatened to unravel all her progress.