Endless Summer Nights (8 page)

She began to unbutton her blouse and slid it from her shoulders.

“The rest.”

Her heart was pumping a mile a minute. She reached behind her and unhooked her bra. She let it drop. His eyes caressed her bare breasts as surely as if he’d touched her. Her breath hitched.

“Finish.” His voice had grown raspy.

She unzipped her skirt and let it fall around her feet, leaving her only in her panties. His gaze flashed. His nostrils flared.

She hooked her thumbs around the band of her panties and wiggled out of them. She watched the rapid rise and fall of his chest as if he’d been running. Then, all at once he advanced on her, propelling them both across the room until she fell back on the couch.

Gabriel sank to his knees. “Open your legs for me,” he commanded.

Oh, my God.
She was going to come in one second.

Sydni spread her thighs. Gabriel roughly grabbed her hips and pulled her toward him until her everything was open and spread inches away from him.

He lowered his head and paid homage to her with his mouth, his tongue, his teeth. Teasing, tasting, suckling, licking, nibbling, drinking of her until her body lifted up as if electrified and a climax so powerful slammed through her over and over and shook her like a rag doll, while Gabriel held on to her, forcing her to climb higher.

After what felt like forever, she collapsed on the couch whimpering and shaking in the aftermath, but Gabriel had no intention of giving her a respite. He quickly undid his pants and kicked them to the floor along with his shorts. He tore his T-shirt over his head and tossed it onto the pile of clothing.

His cock was so hot and so hard that he felt as if it would either explode or break if he didn’t find his way into her and relieve the agony. He wanted her in his bed but he’d never last that long. Not now.

He returned to his knees and lifted her legs over his shoulders and entered her in one long, deep plunge, knocking the air out of her lungs.

Her scream of release once again jettisoned through him and ignited his own gush of sublimation.

Their pounding hearts and rapid breaths slowly quieted. Gabriel lowered her legs from around him and pulled himself upright. He turned away, gathered his clothes and went into his bedroom without a word.

Through silent tears Sydni picked up her clothes and slowly got dressed. She’d never imagined that she would feel so sad and empty inside at the thought of never being with him again. But business, ambition and distance trumped the heart. As much as she wanted to run as far away from him as possible, she couldn’t leave. She was miles away from her hotel and Hector was nowhere to be found. That reality only added salt to her wounded spirit. She could call Lynn and tell her to come and get her, but she didn’t want to see the “I told you so” in her eyes.

She walked out back, started toward the beach and sat down on the bench facing the water. She wasn’t sure how long she sat there going over everything that had transpired since she’d arrived in Rio, the complicated feelings she had for Gabriel and the mission that she’d been sent on. Whatever her mind had thought this was between them, clearly it was something else. There was someone else that he was in love with and she was an idiot to ever think that it could be her. What she needed to do now was get her head together, pack up and go home. In a few months this would all be a distant memory, a sexy fling with a sexy South American bachelor.

Sydni glanced out toward the horizon. Who was she kidding?

* * *

Gabriel stood in front of the panoramic window of his bedroom and looked at the lone figure sitting on the bench. His insides twisted. What had he done to turn her so cold, to no longer want anything from him but his signature on a piece of paper? He’d done everything he could to show her how he felt about her, show her that he had fallen in love with her, as crazy as that may seem. And yet... He turned away. Max was right.

* * *

Sydni didn’t hear him come up behind her. She turned with a start at the sound of his voice.

“Hector is out front. He’ll take you back.”

She glanced up at him but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. She stood. “Thank you.” She walked past him and back toward the house.

“Have a great life,” he said to her back.

Her body flinched but she kept walking.

Chapter 12

“W
hat do you mean, you didn’t discuss the merger with him?” Paul boomed.

Sydni sat across from her father at the conference table. “I decided against it.”

“
You
decided against it? Since when do you make unilateral decisions for this company?”

She stared her father down. “You sent me there to do the job that I was hired to do. I did it. You also sent me because you trust my judgment. There is no reason for this merger other than to build a bigger Lawson empire,” she said with disdain. “What St. James does as a business goes against everything that we stand for. It’s not a good fit for our company. If you want a merger with St. James Enterprises, then I suggest that you handle it or find someone who will. As a matter of fact, I’m turning over the St. James project to Lynn so that I can concentrate on other things.” She stood. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a lot of work to catch up on and clients who are depending on me.” With that she got up and strode out.

Paul sat back in his chair. A smile on his face. He always knew his daughter had a tough streak in her. She’d proven it. He wanted a merger with St. James even though his associates had advised against it. He knew that Sydni was shrewd and honest. It was her opinion that mattered. What he also wanted was to see if his daughter had what it took to stand up to him and she had. That was the kind of strength and the wisdom that she would need when he handed Epic over to her. It was also clear that she’d fallen hard for Gabriel St. James. He was curious to see how that would all pan out. For as smart and business-savvy as Sydni was, she was also stubborn as a mule.

* * *

It had been almost three months since Sydni had walked out of his door, his life and back to whatever or whomever she’d left behind. He’d thought that at the very least they would be in contact because of their business dealings, which, much to his annoyance, were well under way—in Lynn’s very capable hands. The reviews in the international press had already begun, interviews were scheduled and his altruistic endeavors were creating the positive buzz that Sydni had promised. He had nothing to complain about. The investors and contractors for the resorts were on board, contracts had been signed and plans to break ground were scheduled. Everything was going according to plan except that he had not planned to fall in love with a woman who lived halfway around the world and who made it clear that she was only in it for business reasons.

Knowing all this and having his hands full with his new venture didn’t stop him from boarding a plane from Brazil to Louisiana and standing in front of the reception desk at Epic International and asking to see Sydni Lawson.

* * *

Since her return from Rio, Sydni had buried herself even deeper into her work than ever before. She wanted her head so clouded with other people’s issues and her body so exhausted from the long hours that she wouldn’t be able to think about Gabriel or long to be held and loved by him. But nothing she did could strip her of the memories or the longing. There wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t think about him, remember the fun, the laughter, the days and the nights and his words of love to another woman.

She’d done what she had always rolled her eyes at other women for doing—seeing or hearing your man do wrong and walking away without a word only to be told later that “it wasn’t me,” or “you got it all wrong.” Every time she thought about that night she could kick herself. So the last thing she would have ever expected was to hear the receptionist on her phone telling her that
the
Gabriel Santiago was in the waiting area, requesting to see her.

Sydni hung up the phone and worked on remembering how to breathe. Her heart was beating so fast that she grew lightheaded. Gabriel. Here. What... Oh... She had to call Lynn.

She hit Lynn’s extension on the phone. Lynn picked up on the second ring.

“Hey, what’s up?’

“He’s here,” she hissed into the phone.

“Who’s here?”

“Gabriel. He’s at the front desk waiting to see...” Her attention was drawn to the commotion an instant before her door was opened.

“Ms. Lawson, I’m so sorry. I asked him to wait.”

Sydni slowly hung up the phone and stood.
Oh. My. God.
He was more devastatingly handsome than anything she could have remembered. A flush of heat flooded her. “It’s all right, Cherise. Mr. Santiago won’t be staying long.”

“Yes, Ms. Lawson.”

“Close the door behind you, please, Cherise.” She gripped the edge of her desk to keep from wobbling on her weak knees. “What are you doing here?”

Gabriel’s gaze glided over her from head to toe, recommitting every inch to his memory. “I came for you.”

She was definitely going to pass out. She swallowed. “Really?” Her right brow rose skeptically. “You came a long way for nothing. The days of our being together are over.”

He tilted his head slightly as he processed her words. Then his mouth twitched in a grin. “Good to know that you haven’t lost the spice that I enjoy so much.”

She was not going to let him charm her out of her panties. Not this time. She folded her arms as if that could keep him at bay. “What do you want, Gabriel?”

He advanced toward her, slowly, like a predator setting up his prey. She held her breath and held up her hand to stop him but he kept coming until he was a heartbeat away, forcing her to either stare at the expanse of his chest or up into his eyes.

Gabriel clasped her upper arms and a jolt of electricity hit them both.

“I’ve missed you,” he confessed, and the heat of his words melted the ice around her heart.

Her eyes filled with the tears that for months she’d refused to shed. She pressed her lips tightly together.

“I don’t want to think about another day without you.”

Tears slid down her cheeks. He wiped them away with the pad of his thumb only for them to return. So he kissed them away, nourishing himself on the salt of her tears. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her tightly against his body and for the first time in months he felt alive again.

His fingers threaded through the spiral twists of her hair and pulled her head back to give him access to the tenderness of her neck and the lush sweetness of her lips.

She moaned with incomprehensible longing as he took her mouth, reclaimed what he knew to be his, what must be his. He’d come for her and he would not leave without her.

He broke the kiss and held her face in the palms of his hands. “I love you, Sydni. That’s why I came all this way. I came to say that to you.”

Sydni blinked back her surprise as reality settled in as the third presence in the room. She stumbled back a step. Her brows drew together in a frown of hurt and confusion. “Love me? The same way you love the woman you were talking to that last night?”

Now Gabriel was stunned. “What woman? What are you talking about?”

Sydni spun away from him and got some distance between them so that she could think and regain clarity. She turned toward him. “That night when Hector dropped me off, I heard you on the phone when I came to look for you. You were in your office. You... You said, ‘I can’t wait to see you. I love you, too.’ And then you had sex with me.” Her chest heaved. She pressed her fist to her mouth to muffle her hurt.

“And you treated me as if I were no more than a business transaction,” he tossed back, and walked toward her and kept coming until he had her pressed against the wall. “You overheard me talking to a woman I love.... My sister, Isabelle.”

Sydni stiffened.
That’s what they all say
was her first thought. “What sister? You don’t have a sister.”

“I thought you were better than that. You are so thorough with everything else.”

“What are you saying?”

“You should have researched both sides of the family. Isabelle is my mother’s daughter from her second marriage. She’s nineteen and she lives in Portugal. She was supposed to visit with me for Carnival but it didn’t work out.”

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“I’d wanted to surprise you with her arrival, have my sister meet the woman I’d fallen in love with. When the plans fell through, it wasn’t necessary. Had you only asked me.” His jaw clenched. He ran his hands down her arms. “Was it so easy for you to believe the things that had been written about me that you would believe that I could make love to you with all that is in me and be in love with another woman? I suppose—as you Americans say—you didn’t believe your own hype.”

He stepped back. “The man that you created on paper is the man that I truly am. That other man that the world thought they knew,
he
was the fabrication. But you weren’t able to see the difference.” He took another step back. He pressed his hand to his chest as if his heart truly hurt.

“Believing that you were in love with someone else...made it easier to leave.” She shook her head as the words tumbled out. “I could hold it against you and absolve myself—convince myself that on top of the distance and our lives being so different, that you weren’t the one.” Her voice broke. “And as long as you weren’t the one...I couldn’t get hurt and I could stop loving you. I should have...”

The rest of her confession was swallowed up in his kiss.

Lips and tongues that were long denied access to each other savored the taste, the feel and the reconnection. Before either of them knew what was happening they were on Sydni’s couch. Her skirt was up over her hips. He pushed her light sweater up to her neck to expose her breasts to his eager mouth. With his free hand he freed himself, tugged her panty aside and found his way back home.

The contact was powerful enough to make them both gasp in awe while shivers of delight spiked through them. The coupling was hard, fast and raw, propelled with long overdue need. They clung to each other with Sydni burying her head in Gabriel’s neck and he in her hair to muffle their cries as that first desperately needed climax ripped through them.

With great reluctance, Gabriel eased out of her. He kissed her. “Don’t move,” he said and stood, “you’ll be a mess.”

“I couldn’t even if I wanted to,” she murmured and closed her eyes. “Bathroom is that way.”

He walked over to the closed door that he’d already surmised was the private bathroom. He found a hand towel, soaked it in warm water and quickly washed himself and straightened his clothes. He took a second hand towel and brought it to administer to Sydni.

After she’d gotten herself together and fixed her clothes, she had that weak and vulnerable feeling again. The same feeling she always had when she’d been made love to by Gabriel.

They sat next to each other on the couch.

“How long are you going to stay?” she finally had the courage to ask.

He gave her that smile that always had the power to melt her heart. “As you know, I am a man of means.”

“So they say,” she teased.

“And I’ve decided that since I have been a remade man—by the woman that I love—I should continue to live up to the image that she has created.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying that I should meet your father and tell him of my intentions.”

Her pulse pounded in her ears. Her eyes raced over his face.

“In my country it is a sign of respect that a man goes to the father of the woman he loves and asks for the father’s blessing.”

She stopped breathing.

“We could live wherever you want, anywhere in the world. I could get used to Louisiana if that’s what you choose.”

He cupped her chin even as her tears fell onto his hand. “Spend your life with me. We can conquer the world together. Let me love you, take care of you, challenge you to do even greater things.” He kissed her slow and sweet. “Be my partner, my friend, my soul, my lover, my wife.”

Sydni could barely see him through the cloud of her tears. She was crying in earnest now. The days, nights and months of emptiness, loneliness and heartache were over. Theirs was not a conventional romance. It didn’t follow the formula. Instead it was like finding an exotic flower in the middle of the desert. Its beauty took your breath away, and finding it in the most unlikely place made it that much more precious.

“What do you think of my proposal?” he softly asked.

“I wouldn’t want to be the one to break a tradition,” she said and wiped her eyes. She stood and took his hands, urging him to his feet. “My father’s office is down the hall. He should be out of his meeting by now.”

As they walked hand in hand down the hallway to Paul’s office, Sydni knew that she was stepping into a brand-new world, filled with excitement, new experiences, challenges and the love of a man that she knew she didn’t want to live without. It wouldn’t be easy. Nothing worth having ever is. More than any venture she’d ever tried, love was a risky business, but it was a risk that she would willingly take over and over again with Gabriel at her side.

They stopped in front of Paul’s office door. They looked at each other and smiled.

Sydni knocked and together they crossed the threshold.

* * * * *