Page 21 of Fragile

He pushed his hands into the pockets of his joggers. “I wouldn’t bother. You probably won’t like what you find.”

My eyes searched his face; he was so good-looking it was unreal and his tanned skin was flawless, almost like he’d been airbrushed. “Well, maybe I can make my own mind up about that.” Gabriel Knight would photograph well and wouldn’t need any filters.

“We’ll see.” His tone had a challenging ingredient to it and a jet of heat fizzed through me.

“Everything OK with your room?”

“Yes, thank you. It’s amazing. I really appreciate you letting me live here,” I replied, giving him a thankful smile.

He didn’t reply straight away, just watched me in brooding silence. We held that connection for a moment longer before I forced my tongue to move. “Anyway, I’d better get changed. I need to get to class.”

“Yes, I too have work to do.”

“I imagine you’ll be studying today. Asher said you have exams soon?”

“Yep.”

I pushed off the counter and made to walk past him. “OK. I’ll leave you in peace then.”

“Oh, Leonie?” Gabriel’s voice stopped me in my tracks and I turned to face him, our bodies were much closer than before.

“Yes?”

His gaze ran over me from my head to my feet before his eyes met mine again. “Can I give you a piece of advice?”

“Of course.” I batted off the urge to cross my arms over my breasts. I suddenly felt on display and I knew what he was going to say.

“I would suggest you don’t walk around the apartment so scantily dressed in the future. You no longer live alone. You live with two men. Something to think about.” The last sentence was tagged on as an afterthought.

Wrinkling my nose, I pointed out. “But, one of them is gay and the other is you.”

His expression twisted and he shook his head in disbelief. “Yes, Asher is gay, but I’m not.”

I shrugged my slight shoulders. “But you clearly don’t like me.”

Gabriel took another step towards me, invading my personal space. My neck hurt from attempting to retain eye contact he was so much taller than me. My heart thumped against my chest as he stated. “I don’t have to like you to want to put my dick inside you.”

I gaped at him, almost rendered speechless. The way he aired this comment suggested he could have been talking about the weather, He was unfazed, unruffled, and unfiltered. Shock licked up my spine along with another feeling I didn’t really want to analyse.

His words were blatant and, in my face, but I mouthed the word, “What?” Suddenly out of my comfort zone.

“You heard me kitten,” Gabriel said with a cruel twist to his lips. His eyes dug into mine, like daggers.

My body slumped in defeat and I knew I needed to go to my room. It was day one, I didn’t want to tip the applecart just yet and he had a point. “Oh, OK. Fine. Sorry.” I shouldn’t be strutting myself in front of him, braless in a small T-shirt. It wasn’t appropriate really.

I flinched as Gabriel raised his hand and pushed a strand of my hair behind my ear, his expression now appeared fond. “Don’t be sorry on my account. I enjoyed the view but I’m not made of stone. You wave a juicy bone before a dog and eventually, he’ll bite. You get that don’t you?”

My brain must have rattled in my skull I nodded my head so furiously. “I see. Yes, sorry again. I’ll see you later,” I managed coolly, pulling my gaze away and moving past him. In a rare moment of clumsiness, my elbow brushed past his arm and an electric-type jolt shot across my skin.

“Oh, and Leonie.”

I stopped again and slowly turned to face him. Now what. “Yes?”

A ghost of a smile played around his mouth. Our eyes locked. Gabriel’s hands were now by his sides as he watched me across that small space. “A cowboy,” he said.

A cowboy? What, did that mean? “Pardon?”

He smiled, what I would describe as a genuine smile. “That’s what I wanted to be when I grew up. A cowboy, not a lawyer.”

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