Treasured by Thursday (Weekday Brides Series Book 7) (29 page)

The knit top hugged her breasts and slimmed over her waist before sitting low on her hips. The silk pants felt like a layer of soft skin, and the three-inch heels offered the right amount of sex appeal she desired.

The entire routine took an hour of her morning and reminded her of how strong she was. No more tears.

No more trust.

No more mistakes.

She moved into the kitchen to find Andrew sitting with a morning paper. He jumped to his feet when she walked in. “Good morning, Mrs. Blackwell.”

The need to remind Andrew to call her by her first name stuck in the back of her throat.
Cold and detached.

“Good morning, Andrew.”

“I’ve made coffee, or would you prefer tea?”

“Coffee’s fine.”

He was around the counter and pulling a cup from a cupboard before she could stop him.

She accepted the cup and took a sip before muttering her thanks.

“Hunter asked me to tell you that he’d gone to the office.”

She glanced at the clock on the wall. It was after nine. “Fine.”

She heard footsteps and then the familiar call of her new name. “Mornin’, Mrs. B.”

“Good morning, Solomon.”

He headed straight toward the coffeepot and hummed his approval as he gulped the brew.

“I’ve been perfecting my pancake skills, if you’d like some,” Andrew said.

“I’m fine with this,” she told him.

His smile flattened.

The sound of the buzzer of the gate interrupted the silence that followed.

Andrew answered and let in whoever rang.

Gabi sipped her coffee and contemplated her day, her life, as the men in the house regarded her in strained silence.

Andrew pulled her out of her thoughts after he opened the front door.

Gabi set her coffee aside and found the valet standing at the door, his hands behind his back.

A deliveryman, one with an armload of flowers, stood with a mocking grin. “Special delivery,” he said as he thrust the bouquet into her arms.

Her nose flared, her eyes swelled with unshed emotion. “Who sent them?” As if she didn’t know.

“A Mr. Blackwell.”

She didn’t trust too many coherent words to pass her lips. “Andrew,” she lifted her free hand. “Can you—”

“I have it, Mrs. Blackwell.”

Andrew dug into his pocket and tipped the man before shutting the door.

They were beautiful. Much like the ones Hunter had sent her the first time they’d met.

I can’t do this again.

Gabi plucked the card from the flowers and enjoyed the fragrant blooms for the time it took to cross into the kitchen. Once there, she opened the door to the garbage receptacle, and dropped the flowers inside.

She knew, without a doubt, that every move she made would be reported to her husband.

As much as it killed her to throw away perfectly lovely flowers, it was the crossing to the fireplace and the strike of the match that gutted her.

She lit Hunter’s note with a flame, watched it lick up the sides of the waxed paper before threatening to burn her skin. Then she tossed the card into the cold, dark fireplace unread. “Fool me once,” she whispered to herself.

As the note evaporated into ash, so did Gabi’s concern about the thoughts of others. “Solomon?”

“Ah, yes, Mrs. B?”

“I’m not a very good driver,” she said in a monotone voice as she watched the rest of the note smolder and smoke.

“Yeah, I, ah . . . Neil mentioned something to that effect.”

She turned away from the message that she’d never read and tried to smile.

Both men were staring at her as if she suddenly sprouted a tail.

“You’re a good driver.”

Solomon stood a little taller, added a half-ass smile. “I considered the NASCAR circuit before I joined the service.”

A thought formed in her head.

“The Aston is back from the shop, right, Andrew?”

“It is . . .”

That solved that.

“How do you feel about offering a lesson in defensive driving?”

Solomon lifted a brow . . . blinked.

“We’ll take my car.”

Blink.

Blink.

“The Aston Martin?”

Gabi shrugged. “What’s the worst thing that can happen?”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

He couldn’t concentrate. All it took was one text sent to Hunter to blow his entire day. Andrew took a picture of the flowers he’d sent to Gabi in the trash and added the message:
The card is in the fireplace, unread and smoldering.

The next message simply said,
Duct Tape!!!

He needed to fix this. Admittedly, he had no idea how. All his life, money and power fixed his problems. With more money came more power and a quicker resolve. Andrew’s words stuck in his head.
Slow down.
He needed to slow his personal life down or watch it spiral out of control. Flowers in the trash were a sign of an impending tornado.

He twisted his desk chair until he was staring out over the city. It was gray . . . not at all the Southern California weather he’d grown used to. It matched his mood, he supposed.

Gabi’s, too, he guessed.

His goals were easily defined a few months ago, now they were mucked up with emotion and consequences. Having Gabi by his side, having his back with something as simple as decorating a nursery in support, was a priceless example of the depth of her heart. With all she’d been through, he’d think she’d be jaded and dead on the inside.

Her family and friends adored her, would think nothing of burying him if he harmed her. Even Andrew was squarely on her side of the swinging pendulum.

A conversation . . . flowers . . . these things weren’t going to duct tape his relationship back together.

He wanted it back together.

He took in his colorless office and thought of the penthouse condo that held the same empty, quiet life. He wanted more.

And he wanted it with Gabi.

A plan began to form in his head.

A plan that meant slowing down his objectives and speeding up hers.

The cell phone in his suit jacket buzzed. He considered ignoring it before he pulled it from his pocket to check the caller.

Hope flared when he saw Gabi’s name.

“Gabi,” he whispered her name as his answer.

Silence met his ears.

He was close to begging. “Talk to me, Gabi.”

He heard laughter . . . male laughter.

Hunter froze, looked at the screen again, saw Gabi’s name.

“Who is this?”

“Mr. Blackwell . . . I’m your new best friend.” The voice was deep, with a south of the boarder accent.

“Who is this? Where’s my wife?”

“Ah, your caring wife is right where she’s supposed to be . . . for now. That can change, my friend. I don’t take kindly to people stealing my money. Makes my fingers itchy to take from others. You understand, no?”

“What are you talking about? Who are you?” Hunter leaned over and took his office phone off the hook.

“Ten million, Mr. Blackwell.”

“Excuse me?”

The voice laughed. “Check your e-mail. Gabriella . . . beautiful woman your wife. She sent you a picture.”

Hunter started clicking, found a message in his private inbox, and opened it.

His stomach twisted. Gabi, from what had to be during the darkest days of her life, looked like the shell of the woman he knew. Dark circles under her eyes, the white dress hanging on her thin shoulders . . . her arm extended with a needle hanging out.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“A man who will be ten million dollars richer very soon, eh? And so you know not to fuck with me . . . I will give you ten minutes to keep your wife alive.”

Hunter gripped his desk and stood.

“Do I have your attention, Mr. Blackwell?”

“Yes,” he gritted out between his teeth.

“Aston Martins have been known to blow up in those Bond films. You might encourage your driver to end his driving lesson to watch the fireworks from
outside
the car.”

“What the—”

“I’ll be in touch.”

The line went dead.

His heart sped and the light inside him threatened to fade as he dialed his home number and yelled to the closed office door, “Tiffany?”

Andrew answered on the first ring. “Find some duct tape?”

“Put Solomon on the phone.”

“He’s not here.”

Tiffany ran into the room.

“Where is he? Where’s Gabi?” There was no mistaking the urgency in his voice.

Hunter glared at Tiffany. “Get Neil MacBain on the phone. Now!”

Tiffany fled the room as quickly as she entered.

“Driving around. Gabi wanted a driving lesson.”

“In the Aston?”

“Yeah. What’s going on, Hunter?”

Oh, God. “No time.”

He hung up as Tiffany scurried back in. “Line two.”

“Neil?”

“Talk to me.”

“I just received a death threat for Gabi. I have nine minutes to get her and Solomon out of the Aston.”

Fear kept Hunter’s hands moving. The cell phone sat on his desk, he took a chance and redialed Gabi’s number. It went to instant voice mail. He slammed his hand against the desk.

He heard Neil barking orders through the phone.

“Do you have him?”

“Not yet.”

“Eight minutes, Neil.”

It was a closed course, so why was Solomon gripping the side of the car with such intensity? Gabi let up on the gas and concentrated on avoiding the cones. She’d done rather well, when she kept the speed under thirty.

At fifty, things became a little dicey.

“You’re oversteering,” Solomon instructed her. “Relax your grip on the wheel and let the car balance itself out.”

The car jerked in the opposite direction.

“Relax, don’t let go.”

“Oh . . .” Gabi took the next curve a little faster and attempted to
relax.

The phone in her purse rang, and she glanced behind her.

“Don’t even think about answering that.”

She looked at him with a frown. “Well of course not.”

Solomon swung his gaze out the window and gripped the door rail. “Watch it.”

Several cones went down as she missed the next turn completely.

She straightened the car as Solomon’s phone started to buzz. “Straighten her out and let’s try again. You can’t let phones and people distract you, Mrs. B., or you’re going to end up getting hurt.”

Gabi squared her shoulders and started again. They rounded the second turn for the umpteenth time. When Solomon’s phone went off again, Gabi praised herself on ignoring the noise.

She didn’t even look when Solomon answered his phone. “I’m a little busy right now,” he told whoever called.

“What?”

Ease into the corner; let the wheel do the work.

Perfect.
Not one cone off course.

“Oh, fuck.”

Gabi wanted to look toward the passenger seat but thought Solomon was testing her resolve to avoid distractions.

She smiled and kept driving.

“Stop the car!”

The S curve was next. Gabi kept going.

“Stop the car!” This time Solomon grabbed the wheel.

Gabi hit the brake, hard.

As soon as the car rolled to a stop, Solomon hit the button of her seat belt. “Get out.”

“What? What’s—”

“Get out!” He reached over, opened the door, and pushed.

She couldn’t move fast enough before Solomon was out of his side and dragging her from the car. He grasped her hand and ran. She had no choice but to move her feet or risk taking them both down.

“What’s going on?” The words no sooner fell from her lips than noise, heat, and an unknown force pushed her off her feet.

Solomon tucked her into his side as the ground rushed to meet them. Her left arm took the brunt of her fall and pain shot through her.

She couldn’t hear, but the flames coming from behind told her why.

Gabi shielded her eyes when the second explosion went off.

Solomon forced his face in front of hers, his lips were moving but all she heard was ringing.

The Aston blazed in flames.

Solomon placed a hand on her chin. His mouth moved in what she thought was a question.
Are you OK?

She nodded even as she began to shake.
I can’t hear.
She felt vibration in her throat but couldn’t hear her own words.

Solomon pointed to his own ears and shook his head. He lifted his hand that still held his cell phone and said something into it before dropping it to his side.

One of the back tires blew and Gabi’s entire body shook.

Her life could have ended today.

Solomon reached around her and held on.

She let him.

The closed driving course belonged to the police department,
making them first on the scene. Gabi knew her hearing loss wasn’t per
manent when she heard the high pitch of the fire department sirens.

Dazed, she watched a dozen officials running around the otherwise empty lot. The orange cones close to the Aston melted in a surreal slow death. Someone lifted her arm and encased it in a bandage. She looked down, noticed blood for the first time. Adrenaline must have taken over, because she hadn’t felt a thing after her first kiss with the ground.

Shock, she realized on a level outside her consciousness.

People around her were speaking, but she couldn’t hear any of the softer sounds.

It wasn’t until a paramedic attempted to get her to stand that the adrenaline left her system.

Pain shot in her arm, her knee, and her head was on fire.

The medics lifted her onto the gurney and laid her down.

Solomon shook off the men at his side and stayed close. Watching life, and feeling the pain begin a series of explosions inside her without all the sound that came with it, offered a twist in her conscious.

Movement to her left had her twisting her head.

Hunter . . . his crisp suit slightly ruffled . . . why she thought of the condition of his clothing wouldn’t occur to her for hours, but his clothes stuck out. The frantic man under them, however, wasn’t something she recognized.

He pushed through the police at the scene, pointed her way, and rushed to her side.

Sound was muffled, a mix of sirens and low-pitched bass that made it impossible to hear single words.

Hunter was talking to her, but she couldn’t take in a single word.

He gripped her hand and turned his attention to the paramedic.

Hunter nodded a few times, then looked at her.

That’s when she saw it.

Emotion . . . raw, unscripted.

Unshed tears sat behind his eyes, desperation filled his face.

He climbed into the ambulance with her, spoke to someone behind him. When the door closed and what she could hear was nothing but the screech of a noisy emergency vehicle, she closed her eyes.

Hunter squeezed her hand.

She squeezed back.

Apparently patience was something Hunter was going to learn in the course of a week. He arrived in time to sit beside Gabi on the way to the hospital, but he couldn’t talk to her. The second she was unloaded from the back of the ambulance, the emergency room staff whisked her away.

Someone dragged him away to ask questions . . . most of which he couldn’t answer. Allergies to medications, previous medical conditions?

He didn’t know his wife at all.

It wasn’t long before Neil and Gwen arrived. Shortly after, Samantha ran in. When Judy arrived, she was on the phone with Gabi’s family.