A Bargain with the Enemy

‘How is your mother, Bryn?’

She looked at him warily. ‘Why are you asking?’ she came back defensively.

He shrugged. ‘Because I’d like to know?’

‘My mother is fine. She remarried two years ago. Happily.’

‘That’s good.’ He nodded.

‘Gabriel, if this is some sort of guilt trip on your part—’

‘It’s not,’ Gabriel cut in harshly. ‘Damn it, Bryn, I have nothing—absolutely nothing—to feel guilty about. Am I sorry for the way it happened, the way your mother’s and your own life were affected? Yes, I am. But your father was the guilty one, Bryn, not me. Am I sorry that he died in prison only months later? Yes, of course I am,’ he rasped. ‘But I didn’t put him there. He put himself there by his own actions!’

Yes, he had. And part of Bryn had never forgiven her father for that.

Which was something she had to live with. ‘You kissed me the night before my father was arrested!’ she reminded accusingly.

He closed his eyes briefly before opening them again. ‘I know that. And I wanted to tell you— Despite being warned by the police, and my lawyers, not to discuss the case with anyone, I almost told you that night! It almost killed me not to do so.’ He gave a shake of his head.

‘I don’t believe you,’ she breathed heavily.

‘No,’ he accepted heavily. ‘I tried to see you, Bryn. Against the advice of my lawyers I tried to see you again, after your father was arrested, during the trial, after the trial. I tried, Bryn! I wanted to explain, to— I never wanted to hurt you, Bryn,’ he assured earnestly.

‘But you did it anyway.’

‘I told you, I had no choice, damn it.’

Perhaps he hadn’t, but that didn’t stop Bryn from resenting his silence. From resenting the fact that he had kissed her that night. From resenting the fact that he had broken her heart the following day....

‘I didn’t want to see or speak with you again.’ She gave an abrupt shake of her head. ‘You had nothing to say that I wanted to hear.’

‘I guessed that,’ he said bleakly.

She breathed in deeply. ‘So where do we go from here?’

Gabriel looked at her from beneath hooded lids. ‘Where do you want us to go?’

To his bed. On top of his marble desk. On the sofa. Up against a wall! Bryn didn’t care about the ‘where’ as long as Gabriel finished what he had started in his car last Friday evening. The desire she had felt then was nothing compared to what it was now, after days of not seeing him, not being with him.

And she hated herself for it. Hated that in spite of everything, she still felt that way, still wanted him!

She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. ‘I need to know— Have these past few days all been some sort of sick game? An act of revenge for what my father—’

‘I could ask the same of you!’ he grated harshly, anger flaring in those deep brown eyes, lips thinned, a nerve pulsing in his aggressively set jaw. His body was rigid with that same tension, his hands clenched at his sides before he reached out to pick up the whisky glass he had put down earlier, drinking down the contents in one swallow. ‘In fact, my brothers insist on it!’

‘Then ask, damn it,’ Bryn bit out shakily. He looked at her guardedly.

‘Why did you do it, Bryn? Why did you enter your paintings in a competition being run by the gallery, the man, who helped put your father in prison?’

Bryn drew her breath in sharply, all the colour draining from her cheeks as the starkness of Gabriel’s words hammered into her like a blow she wasn’t sure she was ever going to recover from.

The truth was completely out in the open now, spoken aloud between them with no going back, and no fooling herself, allowing herself to indulge her desire for this man, by assuring herself that it was okay to do so because Gabriel had no idea who she really was. Because he did know. He had always known.

She avoided meeting that accusing gaze. ‘The truth?’

That nerve pulsed in his clenched jaw. ‘In the circumstances, I’ll accept nothing less.’

Bryn nodded. ‘I was desperate. I’m an unknown artist who wants more than anything to succeed, and the best way to do that is to be exhibited in the most prestigious private gallery in London.’

‘Thank you,’ he accepted derisively.

Her anger flared again at his obvious sarcasm. ‘I was stating a fact, not giving a compliment!’

Gabriel knew that. Knew Bryn. Not as well as he wanted to, but he did know her as being determined, gutsy and proud. All traits he could admire. It was the beautiful and desirable that destroyed him!

‘Heaven forbid you should ever do that,’ he drawled, eyeing the whisky bottle longingly as he placed his empty glass down on the bar before walking away. The enigma that was Bryn might be enough to turn any man to drink, at the same time as that same man—namely Gabriel!—would be well advised to keep his wits about him whenever he was in her company.

‘Yes. Well.’ She turned to walk over to the long picture windows, hands thrust into the back pockets of her jeans as she stood with her back towards him, her spiky hair in silhouette. ‘Believe me, nothing less would have induced me to come anywhere near your gallery or you ever again!’

Gabriel gave a wince. ‘Perhaps a little less honesty on your part might be preferable after all.’

‘What do you want me to do now, Gabriel?’ she continued tersely. ‘Quietly withdraw from the exhibition?’

‘I’ve already said that isn’t an option,’ Gabriel bit out.

She turned back slowly, stance defensive, breasts thrust forward, hands in her pockets. ‘Then what are my options?’

That was a good question.

Having made the decision to put an end to this pretence, Gabriel had gone over the possible scenarios of this conversation over and over again in his mind on his flight back from Rome.

There seemed to be only two possible outcomes.

Outcome one—the one that was undoubtedly the best one for Bryn—was that they would continue with the business-only relationship they had agreed upon, and she would exhibit her paintings in the gallery next month. Outcome two—the one that Gabriel disliked the most—was that Bryn would walk away now: from the gallery, the exhibition and from him.

There was a third outcome—the one that Gabriel wanted but knew was never going to happen. In that Bryn continued with the exhibition, and the two of them agreed to put the past behind them and continue from where they had left off on Friday evening!

An outcome that Gabriel knew to be pure fantasy on his part, following on from Bryn’s blunt comment.

His mouth tightened. ‘What’s going on between you and Eric?’

She blinked, lashes long and dark around those dove-grey eyes. ‘Sorry?’

Gabriel’s days in Rome, persuading an elderly count to sell two small frescoes to the Archangel Gallery, had been something of an ordeal as his thoughts had constantly wandered to the problem of what to do about Bryn rather than concentrating on the task in front of him. And his flight back to England had been consumed with thoughts of the conversation he needed to have with her.

He had only called in at the gallery for a few minutes to drop off some papers in his office before going to Bryn’s apartment. He had been surprised to learn from the night security that Miss Jones and Mr Sanders were still in the building. Going down to the basement and seeing Bryn there with Eric, obviously totally at ease with him, laughing with him—being invited to go out for a drink with him—had not improved Gabriel’s already taciturn mood.

‘If you decide to go ahead with the exhibition at Archangel, and the business-relationship rule, then that rule will apply to all employees of the gallery, not just me,’ he bit out harshly.

Bryn gave a slow shake of her head. ‘I don’t— Are you suggesting— Do you think that Eric and I are involved? Romantically?’ she added incredulously.

It had occurred to him, yes.

Eric Sanders was only a year or two older than Gabriel, and pleasant enough to look at. He was also an extremely well qualified and respected art expert, and Archangel was lucky to have him.

Even so, Gabriel knew that he wouldn’t hesitate to find some way to dismiss the other man if it should turn out that he and Bryn were now ‘romantically involved’.

Bryn stared at Gabriel D’Angelo in disbelief. This was the same man she had almost allowed to make love to her in his car just days ago, a lapse on her part that still made her feel hot all over every time she thought of it—and she had thought of it a lot since Friday evening!

Did Gabriel really think— Did he believe that she would have become involved with another man in the time he had been away in Rome?

‘If you bothered to find out a little more personal information about your employees,’ she snapped angrily, ‘then you would know that Eric is engaged to a very lovely girl called Wendy, and that the two of them are getting married in three months’ time!’