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“I got you and I got this. Okay?”
It would be so easy to just let him do this. It would be so easy to play the damsel, but I did that for years and it got me here. I don’t think Gabe is like my ex. Not at all. I just don’t want to drag him to hell with me. “You are a bull when you decide something, aren’t you?”
“More like when I want something,” he says. “And I want you, Abbie.”
My teeth scrape my bottom lip. “I want you, too. I do. I just wish we were past this hell.”
“We came together because of this problem, because you sought out Reid. We’re the silver lining.” He leans in and kisses me, his lips brushing mine, lingering, a wave of warmth rushing over us, a flutter in my belly with the intensity of our connection. “Let’s go check on Ella and see how her leg is.”
“Yes. Let’s go check. I’m eager to see her.”
A few minutes later, we’re inside the medical area with animals with various medical conditions. I’m watching Gabe where he kneels in front of a cage on the floor, offering an abundance of love and attention to Ella, and my heart swells for him and the dog. He isn’t faking his love of animals and they sure aren’t faking their love of him. My ex—he faked everything with me, even passion, I believe. How did I not see that? But then, maybe I’d never seen real before—until Gabe.
I just don’t know why he was with me. I know why I stayed and it’s nothing I care to share with anyone who doesn’t know and that means no one but my mother really knows, though she all but told Gabe today.
He glances up and spots me watching him and motions me forward. I happily join him, kneeling beside him, and Ella is happy to offer me a lick in reward. I laugh with her greeting. “I’ll lick you, too,” Gabe murmurs, “if it gets me that smile of yours.”
I blush, heat tingling through my body and puckering my nipples. “You’re bad.”
“Very,” he promises. “So bad that I’m thinking about licking you right now. Want to guess where?”
“Gabe,” I warn.
He laughs. “You think the animals will be offended?” He looks around. “I don’t see anyone else around.” He leans closer. “And I actually don’t think the smile is what I’m after. It’s those sweet little sounds you make.”
“There you two are.”
At the sound of my mother’s voice, I elbow Gabe. “Behave,” I whisper, and he offers a low, masculine rumble of laughter.
“Do I have to?”
“Yes,” I chide, as my mother adds, “I see you two found Ella. She’s doing well.” She glances at Gabe. “Thank you for helping with her.”
“Thank you for fixing her leg,” he says, sealing the big cage with Ella inside and standing up, helping me to my feet.
My mother’s eyes warm, but there is a sharp knife of emotion in them before she looks at me. “I need to speak to you.”
“Hint taken,” Gabe says. “I’ll leave you two to talk.” He eyes me. “I’ll meet you back with Gabbie and the pups.” He leans in and kisses my cheek to whisper, “Remember your promise,” before he quickly moves past my mother.
My mother is even quicker to close the distance between me and her, and motioning me around a corner to a set of small cages. “Does he really know what he’s getting into?”
“He does. I told you, I went to him because his firm has worked with Jean Claude. They know how to fight him.”
“Are you sure they’re to be trusted? How do you know—”
“Are you serious, mom? Gabe has been helping us.”
“Helping us get out of the New York City facility,” she says. “I’m not trying to be ungrateful, Abbie. I’m just nervous. I don’twant you to get hurt again. Gabe seems almost too good to be true. And anything too good—”
“I’m the one who’s too good to be true. I come with trouble. He’s walked right into it.”
“Then walk him back out of it. Go back to New York and say goodbye until this is over. Then you come back together. Protect him if he’s a good man. Protect us if he’s not.”
“You tend to be overly suspicious, mother. We both know where that comes from.” Her past. Not mine.
“Protect him. Protect us. Break this off right now.” She grabs my hands. “Honey, I like him. I like him a lot. He seems like a good man, and that’s why I say there is no win here by keeping him involved. Kenneth is evil. You told me stories, you told me things he did.”
I didn’t even begin to tell her stories or what that man did, but that’s not the point. She’s right. I was right when I told Gabe I was being selfish. I can’t stay with him and the break-up doesn’t have to be for long. I have a plan. It protects everyone. “I’ll think about it,” I say because I can’t make her a promise I won’t keep.
