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“You say that now, but wait until your firm is all over the news, and not in a good way, because of me.”
“Not because of you. You didn’t do this. My father was already involved in this.”
“But you weren’t.”
“He was looking for a way to bite us back. He would have found a way no matter what. We expected a war. We hoped we wouldn’t get one.” He rests his forehead on mine, his hand settling at the back of my head. “I will handle my father.” There is a rough quality to his voice that undoes me.
I pull back to look at him, his hand returning to my leg with his other. “He’s your father. Would he really want to ruin you?”
“He’s my father. Translation: yes.”
“What Reid said to you in the hallway—about your dark side—” I hesitate with how to continue and he reacts.
His hands fall away from my legs and settle on his own. “What about it?”
I press my hands to his. “Don’t tell me you want me here in your life, and then pull away from me. All in or all out, Gabe. I don’t care about your father. I don’t care about how dark you can get unless it includes killing people and hurting people just to hurt them. You’re an attorney. You have a job to do, and I’m not naive. I know you have to be hard. I know you have—”
“You don’t know, Abbie.” He untangles his hands from mine and reaches for his drink. “And never going to know those parts of me. That won’t change. If you can’t live with that—”
“I can’t. I can’t live with that. All or nothing, and at the park, you said—”
“You can have all that I amnow. Other parts are past and buried, where they need to stay.”
Like the reason he had a vasectomy, I think, and I want to say it, but my gut says, that’s pushing him too far, too fast. “Gabe—”
He downs his drink and stands up, walking to the window, where he’s told me he stands above the city, to escape the rest of the world. To that spot he allowed me to visit with him. He let me into his space, his kingdom, his head, just not his past. He needs that to be enough. I scoot off the stool and he presses his handsto the glass. I close the space between us and slide between him and the window.
He responds instantly, tangling his fingers into my hair. “I won’t ever show you that part of me. It exists. You know. Leave it the fuck alone.”
Now I’m angry. He’s holding me and pushing me away at the same time. “Because I’m weak? Because I’m this pathetic girl you need to save to feel like you aren’t whatever monster you’ve decided to call yourself? Because I’m scared? Or maybe it’s you who’s scared? You’re scared to show me the real you.”
“Maybe there’s a reason to be scared.”
“Maybe you want me to be scared.”
“You do like to run, Abbie.”
My chin lifts defiantly. “I’m not running now, now am I?”
He stares down at me, intense seconds crackling between us before his mouth crashes down on mine; his big body pressing me against the steel railing, a wild desperate hunger in him that isn’t gentle or funny as he can be, but rough, demanding, and edgy. This is the man who can be bad and I have this sense that he’s about to test me. That he’s about to show me the real Gabe Maxwell.
And I like it.
Chapter sixty-six
Abbie
“What do you want, Abbie?” Gabe demands, tearing his mouth from mine. “Say it. I need you to be clear. What do you want? But be careful what you ask for. You’ll get it.”
“More,” I say, twisting my hands in his T-shirt. “More of you, Gabe. All of you.”
He slides his hands under my leggings, palming my backside I left bare in the rush to take out Dexter. “More doesn’t get you a nice, funny guy, Abbie.”
“Thank fuck for that. Show me. Stop hiding. Stop trying to be only what you think I want, Gabe. Stop trying to be less than you are because that makes us less than we can be.”
“And if you can’t handle who I am?”
I’m on fire now, poking the bear and I can’t hold back. “And you’re afraid to find out. Is fear all I make you feel?”
