I wanted her.
Not just physically—though God knows the physical want was threatening to overwhelm me—but all of her. Her chaos and her incompetence. Her anxiety and her skill. Her terrible jokes and her genuine kindness. I wanted to know why she’d left Boston. Why culinary school hadn’t worked out. What had put that flash of pain in her eyes when she’d mentioned the restaurant?
I wanted to know what made her laugh. What made her nervous? What made her make those soft sounds of pleasure? I wanted her in my bed, in my life, in every way that was completely inappropriate given our professional relationship.
“Gabriel?”
I blinked. Cate was looking at me with concern. “Are you sure you’re okay? You seem distracted.”
Distracted?
That was one word for it.
Completely derailed by lust was more accurate.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Just thinking about work.”
Liar.
I was thinking about the curve of her neck. The way her hair fell across her shoulders. The soft swell of her full breasts above the neckline of her shirt. The way her hands moved as she ate, graceful and sure.
I was thinking about how those hands would feel on my skin.
How her body would feel under mine.
How she’d sound when I made her come.
“You work too hard,” Cate said softly. “You should take better care of yourself.”
The irony wasn’t lost on me. She was worried about my well-being while I sat here having increasingly explicit thoughts about her.
While I struggled to maintain basic composure.
While my body betrayed every professional boundary I’d tried to maintain.
“I’m fine,” I repeated, and took another bite of chicken just to have something to do with my hands.
Because what I wanted to do with my hands was reach across this table and—No.
Stop.
Megan was here. My daughter. The reason I needed to maintain control, to be the responsible adult, to not act on any of these impulses.
“Can I have more pasta?” Megan asked.
“Of course, sweetie.” Cate stood to get the serving dish, and I made the mistake of watching her move. The way her hips swayed. The curve of her waist. The way her jeans fit.
I was going to hell.
Or I was going to do something stupid.
Possibly both.
She returned to the table, served Megan more pasta, and sat back down. Our eyes met across the candlelight, and something passed between us. Recognition, maybe. Awareness.
She felt it too.
The tension. The pull. The way the air seemed thicker, charged with something neither of us was acknowledging.
