The Man She Can't Forget

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‘Were you saying something about us eating outside?’

‘Yes. Lunch is ready. Why don’t you go and make yourself comfortable and I’ll bring it out?’

* * *

Lara couldn’t get Gabriel’s remarks about how she had looked at Sean’s party out of her mind. At no point had he given any indication that he remembered spurning her—first when she had lifted her face up to his for a kiss and then by tactlessly suggesting there must be boys her own age who were interested in her and telling her he had his sights set on the slim blonde who was his tutor.

He hadn’t even taken the bait when Lara had mentioned that she’d said something stupid that night that she regretted. Had her flirtation with him been so insignificant to him that he didn’t even remember it? The fact that he’d said he’d been dreaming about her with what sounded like genuine admiration seemed too unreal for words. But, however seductive it sounded, Lara would remain on her guard. She wouldn’t let the immature behaviour of her past rule her present by repeating it.

But she also couldn’t forget Gabriel’s stark and heartfelt admission that her dancing that day had represented a freedom that he longed for—a freedom that ‘no amount of money’ had been able to buy for him. Had he been feeling trapped in some way?

She couldn’t suppress the longing that infused her that one day he might reveal more of his innermost feelings to her—at least as a friend. It was easy to glean the fact that he was troubled. In the short time they’d spent together since his turning up at the door she’d begun to intuit that Sean’s death wasn’t the only grief that haunted him.

He didn’t talk much during lunch, except to remark on how good the chicken salad she’d prepared was. Lara didn’t mind. It was a glorious day and the warmth from the sun had helped ease any tension she might have felt because she was sitting opposite the man who had mesmerised her when she was just sixteen. The truth was he still mesmerised her. She’d fantasised about Gabriel so many times over the years—had even entertained the foolish hope that one day he might come back into her life, see the woman she’d become, and be enthralled by her.

But, seeing him again now, she knew that was just a pipedream. He was even more out of Lara’s league than he had been all those years ago.

However, as they sat in the garden together she realised that the past association Gabriel had enjoyed with her and her family had definitely engendered an unspoken agreement between them that they could at least let their guards down enough around each other for a while and relax. They didn’t need to present some awkward or uneasy façade that would prevent honest communication.

Reaching for the bottle of wine that she’d opened and stood in an ice bucket on the table, she poured some crisp white Chardonnay into their glasses and, raising hers in a toast, smiled. ‘To old friends.’

A fleeting shadow passed across Gabriel’s brilliant blue irises. His broad shoulders visibly tensed. Then he, too, raised his glass.

‘To Sean, who once told me that the best bottle of wine was the one you shared with a trusted friend, whether it was vintage or a common or garden bottle of plonk.’

The expression on his sculpted, handsome face was indisputably wry, but it was tinged with a sadness and regret he couldn’t hide.

‘Your brother was far too generous. I wish I’d exhibited more of that quality towards him when I had the chance. But I was too set on carving my own path to properly consider him. I certainly wasn’t around during the times he might have needed an ally or someone to confide in. Some “trusted friend” I turned out to be.’

‘You’re too hard on yourself, Gabriel.’

Not for a second could Lara deny the impulse that suddenly arose in her to touch him. God knew it was a big risk for her to give in to it, but she ached to give him some comfort. It was hard seeing him so down on himself like this.... Sean would have hated it, too.

Gently, she laid her hand over his. He stared down at it as though hypnotised. Then he shook his head.

‘The fact is I’m not hard enough. I’m constantly creating strategies and contingency plans so that I don’t have to face myself and confront the truth about who I’ve become...a man I’m hardly proud of.’

‘But you’ve already told me what a success people think you are, Gabriel. You should be proud of what you’ve achieved.’

‘So you think I’ve made a success of my life, do you?’

The pain Lara saw reflected in his gaze made her draw in a helplessly tight breath.

‘What I think isn’t as important as how you feel, Gabriel. You must have worked hard to get where you are, and you did it without help from either family or friends. That shows the kind of strength and determination that most people would love to have.’

‘Does it?’

Shockingly, Gabriel seized her hand, as though he meant to make her his prisoner, and the intense, hungry glare he swept over her face made her heart thump hard.

‘You’re too damn generous for your own good, Lara. Let me put you straight about the kind of man I am, in case you’re harbouring the belief that I’m somehow better. I’m not. I don’t consider others. I’m a taker—not a giver, like you and your family. In the kind of world I inhabit the weak fall by the wayside and are quickly forgotten. I’ve had to learn to be tough. On the road to achieving what I want I’ve learned not to let anything or anyone stand in my way. If I come back into your life again I’m guaranteed to hurt you and make you rue the day you met me.’

Her mouth drying, Lara couldn’t hold back the hot press of tears that surged into her eyes. His words had been like knives and her need to self-protect immediately kicked in.

‘You’re talking as if I’m nurturing some kind of hope that we might get together. Don’t worry about that, Gabriel. I’m not.’

She sniffed and wrenched her arm free.

‘New York has changed you, Gabriel—and not for the better. You used to be quite friendly and amusing. But it sounds like the path that you’ve chosen has corrupted you instead of made you happy. That worries me. And, just so that you know, I’m not looking for a man to be in my life. And I assure you that if I was I’m afraid it wouldn’t be you.’

‘Is that right?’

In a flash Gabriel was on his feet and yanking her up towards him, moving his hands down to her slim waist to hold her fast and pulling her against the iron wall of his chest. There was no time for Lara to think or even to feel alarmed. But her heartbeat went wild when his hand cupped the back of her head and forcefully directed her face up towards his.

Then the world as she knew it disappeared as though it was nothing but a hazy dream. Her eyelids shut tight as he crushed her lips beneath his, his hot silken tongue mercilessly invading and plundering the satin interior of her mouth in a kiss that seemed to be driven by passionate hunger and fury combined.

The frightening demand she sensed left Lara reeling. But it also stirred long-dormant feelings in her body, making them want to rise up and meet that furious hunger. Along with that shocking realisation there were other disturbing feelings and sensations that hit her. The foremost was how seductively delicious Gabriel tasted and how he exuded the most provocative scent—almost a primeval scent—that wasn’t just down to the expensive cologne he wore. And the sheer strength of the man’s hard, honed body against hers made her blood pound in her veins just as if he were some hungry lone wolf, intent on carrying her off to his lair to savour at his leisure.

But hers wasn’t the only heart that was hammering. And when Gabriel suddenly and without warning let her go, cursing vehemently beneath his breath, Lara stumbled. Her legs felt as weak as strands of damp linguine.

Retrieving her balance as quickly as she could, she stood on her father’s immaculately mown lawn and tentatively touched her fingertips to her lips. They were already slightly swollen and still throbbed from Gabriel’s savagely hungry kiss. The man himself had already distanced himself and stood shaking his dark head in what looked to be disgust. When his gaze lifted to meet hers she had never seen an expression more nakedly stark.

‘I’m sorry if I hurt you. Despite what I said, it was never my intention to do that,’ he intoned huskily. ‘But it’s better you know now what I’m really like than find out later. At least now you have the chance to shut the door on me and vow never to see me again.’

Wiping the back of her hand over her tear-moistened eyes, Lara unflinchingly met his tortured gaze. It was then that she made a silent vow not to abandon him as his mother and uncle had done. Her friends might not have understood her decision if they’d been privy to his little speech about being ‘a taker not a giver’, but then none of them had known the Gabriel of old, and nor did they know how it felt to set your eyes on a man and believe that he might—just might—be your destiny.

Despite her private feelings about that, Lara was still determined not to let Gabriel have the upper hand. Even if she couldn’t deny the powerful chemistry between them, she certainly wasn’t about to let him use her and then discard her as if he wouldn’t give her so much as a second thought. She didn’t want to be one of the ‘weak’ that fell by the wayside.

‘You probably didn’t mean to hurt me, Gabriel, but the truth is you did. Perhaps you need to leave and reflect on that for a while?’

His glance was more than a little bemused. ‘Do I take it that you’d be willing to see me again despite what just happened?’

‘I would. But you won’t behave like you have every right to kiss me like that again, Gabriel. Because I won’t let you.’

Folding her arms across the fresh pink linen shirt that she’d donned after their walk as if she meant business, Lara sighed.