The third punch cracked bones in Richard’s face.
The fourth punch smashed out several of Richard’s teeth and turned off his lights.
It all happened so fast that she barely had time to blink before Gabriel was turning to her.
“Did he touch you?” It was a ferociously quiet question.
“No.” Deeply conscious that he was on a razor-thin edge, but not the least afraid he’d turn his anger on her, she went into his arms. “I whacked him with my handbag—it came in useful, see?”
He didn’t laugh, just crushed her against his chest. Breath harsh and pulse thumping, he held her for long minutes, his muscles vibrating against hers. She held him back, knowing her presence was all that was keeping him from beating Richard to a pulp. Not about to let Gabriel go to jail for a psychopath like Richard, she stroked his back until he got himself under enough control to say, “Call Detective Lee. I’ll keep an eye on the trash.”
THE DETECTIVE LAUGHED AT a newly conscious Richard’s snuffling, barely understandable accusations of assault against Gabriel. “He was protecting a woman against a psychopath armed with a knife. The psychopath would be you.” A grin that bared very sharp teeth as she put the knife in an evidence bag and held it in front of Richard’s face. “Mr. Bishop only used his fists. No prosecutor will ever touch him.”
Charging Richard then and there, she snapped the cuffs on him even as the paramedics lifted him onto a gurney for transport to the hospital. Gabriel had broken Richard’s face worse than Charlotte had initially realized—Richard would never again be as pretty, would wear his ugliness for the world to see. That seemed fitting. People should have a warning of his kind of evil.
“The fact he came after you so soon after his release is a significant aggravating factor,” Detective Lee said. “Hopefully we’ll get a judge who’ll throw the book at him this time.”
Charlotte hoped that too. She could handle Richard now, of that she was certain, but she hated the effect the attack had on Gabriel.
“Hey,” she said in bed that night, rising up on her elbow to look down at him. “You’re still furious. I can feel it.”
“Of course I’m furious. If I hadn’t forgotten you had my wallet and come back up, he would’ve had you alone.”
“I was doing a good job of beating him up,” she pointed out. “Richard expected me to be who I was, not who I am.”
“You’re fucking amazing.” Hauling her down, he kissed her, and it was all tongue and heat. “But he should’ve never been able to get to our floor. I’m getting the woman he charmed into bringing him up so he could ‘surprise’ his girlfriend kicked out of the building.”
Scowling, Charlotte shook her head. “He played her. He’s good at that. The poor woman already feels terrible.” That woman lived directly below the penthouse and had the keycard to use the same elevator. “Leave her be.”
One arm behind his head, Gabriel ground his teeth together. “I wanted to pulverize him until he didn’t have a single unbroken bone in his body.”
“I understand the urge.” She had the same one. “Now, forget about Richard. He isn’t worth the time or the energy.”
Gabriel wrapped his arm around her, his fingers on her bare hip. “It’ll take me a while to get to that point.”
“Want to spend that time being naked together?”
He took her up on her offer, but when it came time for him to leave her at her bedroom door, she held on to his hand. “Stay with me.”
“No.” A flat answer. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but if I see you afraid of me today—” He shook his head, then kissed her hard. “Go to sleep.”
She tried, but she tossed and turned for the next two hours, a jagged hole inside her formed of the knowledge that she couldn’t give Gabriel what he needed. When she heard movement, she got up and stepped out to find him seated with his back to the wall of her bedroom, his head in his hands.
“What are you doing here?”
“Making sure you’re safe. That fucking monster almost had you.”
He was breaking her heart. “No,” she said, “he didn’t.” Taking his hand, she tugged. “Come on. Since neither one of us is going to sleep, let’s go lie on the couch and watch movies.”
It was a rough night. Charlotte fell asleep in patches against him, and he dropped off now and then, but neither one of them could fully wind down. She was frustrated with herself, and he was still riding a wave of fury.
IT WAS A GOOD thing the next day was a Saturday when Gabriel’s high school team didn’t have a game. Grumpy and sleep-deprived, neither one of them was in the best of moods, and it didn’t help when she came downstairs after her shower to find Gabriel already on his laptop working.
Seated at the dining table, he’d grabbed a cup of coffee from the pot she’d put on to perk before her shower, but hadn’t bothered to get any food.
“Gabriel, it’s Saturday!” She threw up her hands. “Can you not forget about work for a single weekend?” He’d already brought work home every night this week.
A scowl over his bare shoulder. He was dressed only in sweatpants, his hair rumpled, and his jaw shadowed. “I’m just checking my e-mail.”
“Work e-mail.” Tightening the belt on her thin red robe, she began to crack eggs to make omelets. “None of it urgent if I’m guessing right—and even if it is, you pay people to take some of the load off. Delegate.”