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He smiled. “There’s a feast awaiting you in the cabin. Your clothes are here.” He pointed to the neat pile at the foot of the bed. “But before you put on your jeans, I need to bandage your wound again.”
She nodded and dressed in everything but the jeans. The cut on her leg had some bruising around it, but the pain was no more than a mild throb.
“Sit beside me,” Gabriel said, opening the first aid kit on his lap. Pulling out a cleansing wipe, he cleaned his hands before he spread antibiotic ointment over her cut with a touch so gentle it felt like a feather brushed her. The tenderness of it brought tears to her eyes.
He positioned a gauze pad over the wound and taped down the four sides in a neat square. When he was done, he traced his finger around the outside of the tape. “I nearly lost you today,” he whispered.
He turned to meet her gaze, his gray eyes shadowed with fear. With a sudden movement, he swept the first aid kit onto the floor and pulled her into his lap, his arms wrapped around her while he buried his face in her shoulder. His body was racked by shudders.
“Gabri, they weren’t aiming at me,” she said, working one arm free to stroke his glossy hair. “It was you who almost got shot.”
The truth of that slammed into her again, and she nearly joined him in shaking.
He lifted his head. “It does not matter who they were aiming at. They could have killed you.” His arms tightened around her. “When this is over, when you and Mikel have caught the people who are doing these terrible things, I want us to go public. I want the world to know that you are the woman I love with every breath in my body.” He nuzzled her neck, his breath warm on her skin. “I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”
Cold reality engulfed her like an avalanche. She couldn’t let him go on believing that this was possible. Now that he had his musical confidence back, Gabriel was headed for the top of his profession. He had recruited an international rock star and a famous tocaora for his festival. More celebrities would follow.
Gabriel was returning to the stratosphere where he should be, where she would be a weight that dragged him down.
“Talk to me, cariño.” How did he do that? Combine a command with such caring that she wanted to weep?
She breathed out a long sigh. “We both know that can’t happen.”
He straightened but did not release her. “Of course it can happen. I love you. I thought you loved me. Am I wrong?”
The confusion in his question clawed at her heart. She should tell him it was just sex, but she couldn’t hurt him that way. “No, you aren’t wrong, but how I feel doesn’t matter.”
“It matters more than anything else in the world,” he said.
“Really? You’re third in line for the throne, and you think it doesn’t matter to your uncle that I’m a convicted felon?” She pushed against his chest, but he didn’t release her.
“My uncle is more a father to me than my father. He wants nothing but my happiness.”
She wasn’t so sure about that. “It’s not only your uncle. You’re going to become famous for your music and your festival. Everything about you will be subjected to scrutiny by the media, including your girlfriend with the criminal record.”
“I should have thought about… That will be very hard on you, won’t it?” His voice had lost its certainty. “But the palace PR staff is skilled at dealing with that kind of situation. With the support of Tío Luis, do you think you could get through it? After the first uproar, everyone will forget about it, I promise you.”
Each sentence jabbed at her like a blade. He thought she was worried about herself. She pushed away from him to stand. “There’s more to my past. Much more.”
“Does it explain why you went to prison?” His face held only an expectant interest. “Because I am ready to hear that.”
“I lied under oath.”
Puzzlement drew his brows down. “About what?”
“About the cryptocurrency scam.” She looked away. “I lied to keep my father out of jail. Brendan was the one who set up the scam. I knew nothing about it until it began to unravel. However, he had a criminal record already. If he had been convicted, he would have been sentenced to decades in prison. I had no history with the law, so we came up with the scheme to have me confess to the fraud. I thought I could distance myself from my father, but I failed.” The memory wracked her with shame.
She turned back to find comprehension dawning on Gabriel’s face. “I am glad to hear the whole truth.”
“How can you be glad? I committed perjury to allow a criminal to escape punishment for his crime. My father is a professional con man who robs people for a living. I enabled him to get away with it. I broke the law when it suited me, just like Brendan does. Don’t you understand how wrong that is? I’m no better than my father.”
“You are very different from your father. You went to jail to protect someone you love.” Gabriel’s voice was quiet but filled with conviction. “You did the same thing for Brendan that I did for Raul.”
“No! You put yourself in harm’s way to save your prince. It was an honorable act. What I did was dishonest and illegal. My actions allowed a criminal to remain free to commit more crimes. And it won’t take much digging for a determined reporter to figure it out.”
Gabriel frowned. “Now I understand why you are worried. If an overzealous reporter finds out your father is the true culprit, he might receive the long sentence you saved him from.” He glanced at the coat of arms over the bed. “We will have to find a way to prevent that.”
“My father is a criminal, Gabriel. God knows what new scheme he already has planned because I kept him out of prison. I wouldn’t trust him not to use my connection with you to leverage his own ends.” She huffed in frustration. “In the world’s eyes, I am a criminal too. You need to come to terms with what that means.”
