Page 22 of Gabe

His hand pressed right against the scar on the back of my head. My brain short circuited and I couldn’t move. Newt was the only one to ever touch that sensitive spot since I was a teenager, and the feeling of someone else’s touch there sent a momentary wave of fear racing through me. Yet, at the same time, arousal still burned my veins, hotter than ever. I’d never considered myself to be someone who had a kink for hair pulling, but the prickling of my scalp as Gabe tugged at my braids was making my insides squirm in a way I’d never experienced before.

I remained frozen with indecision, torn between two conflicting reactions. Several moments passed where I didn’t respond, and I could practically feel Gabe’s confusion grow.

“Frankie...” He tugged my braids again, as if to remind me what we were doing. “Are you paying attention?”

“Uh...” My limbs suddenly started moving again, like someone had flipped a switch in my brain. I flailed, batting Gabe’s hands away from me and putting space between us. “I think that’s enough for today.”

Luckily, he let me go. I had completely missed his explanation for how to get out of the hair grab. If he’d expected me to free myself, I would have been trapped.

“Enough?” Gabe looked toward the sky. “It’s only been about an hour.”

The fact that he could tell that just from the movement of the sun, even with so many trees blocking the way, was an impressive feat, but I wasn’t in the right headspace to admire it. So many conflicting emotions still coursed through me, and I felt like I was about two seconds from fainting and getting an erection at the same time.

I needed to leave.

“Yeah, I, um...” I looked toward the house, where I thought I saw movement in the window. “I should check on Newt and Sebastian. See if they need anything. That is my job, after all. Right? As a physical therapist. Yeah, I’m just gonna...”

I pointed vaguely toward the house before making a quick retreat and bolting for the door of the house.

Newt was in the kitchen cleaning up the remnants of breakfast. My assumption that he had been the one to send Gabe out to me with food and an apology had been right, but I couldn’t even gloat about it.

“Everything okay?” Newt asked as I walked past.

“Fine,” I said without looking at him. “Just... bathroom.”

I kept walking and shut myself in the bathroom, one of the few places in the small house where I could get a moment of privacy.

Gabe’s papers and laptop took up almost every flat surface, including the floor. I stepped carefully over them and sat on the edge of the tub.

Rubbing my hands over my face, I tried to calm down.

What had happened back there?

I’d never reacted like that to someone. Granted, I didn’t have many opportunities to get so physically close to people except for Newt and my patients, but I’d been on dates before. I’d even slept with a few guys, but none of them had created such an intense and confusing reaction in me.

In an ideal situation, I would distance myself from Gabe until I could figure out what it all meant. Unfortunately, our situation was anything but ideal.

I groaned when I remembered the sleeping arrangements. Unless I wanted to sleep in the RV again—which Gabe was right about, it wasn’t safe for me to be so far away from the others—then I would be sleeping next to him at night.

That was going to make things a lot more complicated.

CHAPTER 8

Gabe

Time at the safe house never seemed to move properly. Everything seemed to be too fast and too slow all at once. My meeting with the director arrived as scheduled, and while I was eager to get it over with, I also wanted to delay it as long as possible.

I’d dealt with one mole in the FBI, but there were certainly others. So, I didn’t trust letting anyone, not even the director, know which house we were staying at. That meant that in order to meet with the director, I would have to leave the safe house again.

Just the thought of leaving the others alone, of what could happen to them when they were unguarded, gave me anxiety. It was a new experience. I rarely felt anxious. Even back in my army days, I’d been known for my unshakable nerves. Yet now, I was fighting off the urge to pace just from the thought of leaving the people in the safe house unguarded.

Teaching Frankie some self-defense moves had helped calm my anxiety a little. At least he had a chance of getting away if someone tried to attack him. I’d wanted to keep up the lessons as much as possible while I had the chance, but after the first one, he didn’t seem keen on continuing. Every time I brought it up, he found an excuse to do something else.

Some of the excuses had been pretty flimsy since there wasn’t much to do in the house. He was obviously avoiding me, but I hadn’t yet figured out why.

Was he still mad about our fight?

I’d apologized and he’d seemed to forgive me. Even Newt had assured me that Frankie wasn’t still mad, and the little nurse didn’t seem like the type to lie.

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