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“Let’s go out for a little bit,” I said. “What do you say? Get some coffee like I suggested?”
Alyssa’s face visibly brightened at that. “Let’s do it.”
“I’ll get changed. There’s an old coffee and ice cream shop around here that my dad used to take me to.” I forced a smile on my face. “I think it’ll cheer you up instantly. What do you say?”
“I say it sounds perfect,” Alyssa said. “Let me tell my dad where we’ll be. He wanted to make sure that we didn’t run into my mom.”
“Sounds good. I’ll be out in a second.”
I slipped on a pair of jeans while I half-listened to Alyssa and Gabriel’s muffled voices in the next room. I needed to figure out what I was going to do. I knew that I couldn’t go home to New York, but I was no longer sure that I could stay here either. Though I told myself I could stay away from Gabriel, I knew it was a lie. It would take very little for me to end up in his bed.
CHAPTER NINE – GABRIEL
I awoke Saturday morning to the sound of Alyssa and Penny’s chatter as they walked down the hallway in the direction of the kitchen. The smell of brewing coffee followed a few minutes later. I rolled over to gaze out the window at the slow drizzle of snow outside. No matter how hard I tried to comprehend the past few days, I couldn’t wrap my mind around any of it. I couldn’t get past why I felt this indescribable urge to kiss Penny Marshall all the time. Things had transformed between the two of us at a startling pace, visibly alarming Penny.
It wasn’t right. I knew that it wasn’t, but I kept thinking about how good it felt to touch her, and to kiss her. All of it had felt so sinfully good that it left my erection throbbing with excitement all over again.
“Fuck,” I groaned, rubbing a hand over my face. “What am I going to do?”
I had other things to concentrate on that needed my undivided attention. Like the Miller lawsuit lingering over my damn head like a dark storm cloud. I handed over the papers to my own legal team yesterday, and while they assured me much of it was ridiculous, I knew it was meant to do one thing—to rattle me. Throwing my worries over my daughter into the mix only rattled me more.
For years, anxiety plagued me constantly over Alyssa’s need to have a female presence in her life to help her through womanly things that cropped up as she grew. She never once complained, but I knew that she needed that feminine influence.
Oddly enough, I noticed having Penny around seemed to fill in those gaps. She had someone to go shopping with, to get her hair and nails done with, and take trips to the spa. She’d had none of that growing up with me. It added to the guilt coursing through me that morning as I slipped out of bed. I padded over to my private bathroom to take a shower.
Penny’s gorgeous face resurfaced in my thoughts, and I reminded myself it had been a one-time thing. It had to be a one-time thing. That much, Penny was right about. Nothing could happen between us anymore. I made a mental vow to myself when I stepped under the hot spray to keep my distance until the girls went back to college. I would have to keep my urges under control, no matter how difficult it might be.
Penny and I still needed to talk about it, though. I needed to make it clear that I had no intentions of pursuing anything further. Penny was young, on the cusp of graduating college and about to enter an adult world for the first time. She didn’t need to get tangled up with an older man like me, who had more than a few issues clinging to his back.
The hot water eased the headache pounding furiously in my temples. I finished washing up before I could concentrate on any lingering memories of touching and kissing Penny. I dressed quickly in the slightly chilly air of my room before heading down the hallway to find Alyssa and Penny both sitting in their sweat pants in the kitchen with cups of coffee in hand.
“Morning,” Alyssa said. “Want some coffee?”
Penny glanced over her shoulder at me. Our eyes clashed together, and it sent jolts through me. I nodded to Alyssa’s question, and she got up from her chair to grab a cup for me. I kept the kitchen island between Penny and myself while I waited patiently for Alyssa to pour me a cup.
“What are your plans today?” I asked casually. “Anything exciting?”
“I think we are just going to hang around here,” Alyssa replied, sitting back down. “Maybe brave the Christmas traffic again to explore Chicago a bit more. I don’t want to be cooped up here all the time.”
“There are some nice museums here,” I suggested with a small smile. “I believe Penny might enjoy them.”
“How’d you know that I like art and museums?” Penny asked.
She gave me a long sideways look, but it was Alyssa who spared me from answering. “Because you’re always reading those books about art. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.”
“Oh.” Penny’s cheeks reddened as she looked back over at Alyssa. “A few museums would be nice. Something different than the chaos of downtown and the Christmas shoppers.”
“Dibs on the bathroom first,” Alyssa said. “I’ll get showered since it takes you longer to wash all that long blonde hair of yours.”
She reached forward to tug on an errant strand of hair framing Penny’s face before breezing by me. An awkward silence hung in the kitchen while I listened for the shower to turn on down the hallway. Once it did, I felt safe to try and talk to Penny.
“About yesterday—” I said.
“It’s fine, Gabriel,” Penny interrupted. “Please don’t make this more awkward than it already is.”
Penny slid off her chair, not willing to face me fully. I drummed my fingers anxiously on the counter top as I tried to figure out what to say that would lessen both of our nerves. I didn’t want to spend the rest of the week with this hanging over my head like everything else.
“I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable here,” I said.
