Page 37 of The Billionaire's Angel

“I'll get the cards,” I said, resigned. I couldn’t make a fuss about sitting next to Gage or Amelia would call me on it. I retrieved a pack of cards from a drawer in one of the end tables and turned back to the couch to find Gage sitting almost in the middle. If we were going to play cards on the coffee table, I'd have to sit right next tohim.

Both of them had expressions of innocence, which was enough to tell me that they were up to something. I had the unmistakable sense of being maneuvered bymasters.

I still hadn't figured out what I wanted to do about Gage, so I resolved to ignore the situation for the rest of the day. That proved both easy andimpossible.

Easy because Gage and Amelia made it so, picking a card game and dealing the cards, keeping everything lighthearted and friendly. We had fun until lunch, laughing and joking, and trying to catch Amelia cheating. Gage almost always spottedit.

I never did, mostly because I was impossibly distracted by Gage sitting beside me. Every time his hand grazed my arm, I had to fight a shiver. When he tangled his right foot with my left, I started in surprise, only to see the glint in his eye and realize that he was teasing me. I tried to pretend I was unaffected by his presence, but I don't think I pulled itoff.

After lunch, Gage disappeared into his suite with his papers and laptop. It was still too cold and drizzly to go outside, so I drove Amelia to Phipps Plaza where we window shopped for a few hours. Well,Iwindow shopped. Amelia actually boughtthings.

It would've been a completely normal day, if it hadn't been for the presence of Gage, woven through the hours like bright spots. The flash of his smile, a touch of the back of my hand. It was a little scary how much I wanted to see him, the way my heart jumped in my chest when his eyes metmine.

My protests to myself were growing weaker. Getting involved with Gage Winters was inappropriate andfoolish.

Every time I looked in his eyes, I was less sure I cared. Something was happening between us, and I wanted to see where it wouldgo.

Yet again, I fell asleep with relative ease and woke gasping for breath, tangled in my sheets, my heart racing as if I were being chased. Which I had been, in mydreams.

Lost in the dark and running from Anthony. That had never happened in real life. In real life, I'd been too scared to run. His anger was explosive when I did nothing to earn it. The few times I’d tried to leave him… I'd learned mylesson.

The thought of actually running in Anthony's presence brought a sense of dread.He's dead, I reminded myself.He's dead, and it was just another baddream.

I got out of bed and straightened the covers, erasing the evidence of my troubled sleep. My hair had come loose from its braid, and I ran my fingers through it, thought about putting it back up, and then decided I needed tea more thananything.

The house was dark and silent when I left my room. No light flickered from the library fire. I was alone. I tried not to be disappointed. If Gage was in his room, it might mean he was sleeping, and that was good. I didn't want him to be up all night, even if it meant I'd be with him. Neither of us had gotten much rest the nightbefore.

There was no reason to feel let down. We hadn't made any arrangement to meet. That was a step I wasn't ready totake.

My mind on Gage, and on a cup of tea, and whether I wanted a snack to go with the tea, I didn't see the shadow move in the hall between Aiden's office and the library until I was almost on top ofit.

I turned in greeting, a smile curving my lips, only to see the shadowy figure stop short in shock. I barely had time to register that whoever it was, they were too short to be Gage or Aiden and not broad enough to beAbel.

The intruder lunged across the space separating us. I opened my mouth to scream, and everything wentdark.

Chapter Fifteen

Gage

Ineeded to sleep.I'd barely slept the night before, though laying on the couch in the library, Sophie in my arms—the sweet and sultry scent of her, the silk of her skin under my hands—had been light years from the punishing insomnia I was usedto.

I could've lain with her like that forever, her legs tangled with mine, her body relaxed and languid. She’d drifted in and out of sleep, her fingers stroking my chest, her breath warm through my shirt as she dozed and woke and we whispered about everything andnothing.

If I could have that back, maybe I wouldn’t notice that I was awake. I tried to go to sleep. I did. After dinner, I'd hit the gym in the basement for two hours, trying to wear myselfout.

It didn't work. I lay in bed for an hour, staring at the ceiling, before giving up and going to my desk. If I couldn't sleep, I’d get some workdone.

I'd rather hunt Sophie down and talk myself into her bed. I wasn't doing that. Sophie hadn't told me much about her marriage, but from Aiden's comment and small things she'd said here and there, I had the feeling she'd had enough of pressure and coercion to last alifetime.

I wantedher.

After spending the morning with her and Amelia, listening to her laugh and her dry sense of humor, I knew this was more thanlust.

I wanted more than her body. I wanted everything that was Sophie to be mine. If I pushed her into something she wasn't sure she wanted, I'd never getclose.

I could be patient. Sophie was worthit.

I worked at my desk for hours, watching midnight come and go, hearing Aiden come home. The beep of the alarm being deactivated and then turned back on, the thuds of his feet on thestairs.