Robin Schone by Gabriel's Woman (10 ebook reader TXT) 📕

silk drawers, mademoiselle.”

Peter Thornton had been the only man she knew who had had access to her bedchamber and intimate

apparel.

Who else would know—

“I sold all but one pair of my drawers on St. Giles Street.” Victoria did not look away from those

dangerous silver eyes. “Anyone who followed me could have went into the store after I did and purchased

whatever I’d sold.”

The thought that a stranger had dogged her footsteps did not comfort Victoria.

“It’s possible,” Gabriel admitted.

But not likely, his silver eyes said.

She would not beg. Cry.

She would not be hurt because an untouchable angel did not believe her.

Victoria notched her chin up higher. “I will not be a victim.”

The black of his pupils devoured the silver of his irises. “You already are, Victoria Childers.”

Awareness of her bare chest and shoulders above the pale blue silk spread and of her nakedness

underneath it inched over Victoria’s skin.

He was too close, the heat emanating from his body too hot.

How could he doubt her?

He had talk ed to her.... He had told her his needs. ...

“And whose victim am I, sir?” Victoria challenged. “You say there is a man who would hurt me; I have

not seen this man. You claim you will protect me; it is you who are threatening me. Whose victim am I?”

Her hurt was briefly reflected inside his gaze. It was replaced by cold calculation.

“A man is terrorizing you, mademoiselle.” Cinnamon-flavored heat feathered her lips. “Yet you won’t

give me his name. Why is that?”

“I don’t know his name,” Victoria repeated stubbornly. There was no disguising the desperation in her

voice.

“You said it was Thornton.”

“Yes,” she bit out.

“Why didn’t you give me his name?”

She licked her lips, tasting cinnamon, tasting Gabriel’s breath. “Because I was afraid.”

She was still afraid.

“Of what, mademoiselle?”

Both his voice and his breath were a caress. The coldness inside his eyes froze her eyelashes.

“I was afraid that you would find him,” Victoria said.

“But I did find him.”

“I was afraid you would talk to him.”

“I did talk to him.”

Black specks dotted Victoria’ s vision. “I was afraid he would tell you who I am.”

“I know who you are.”

“You do not know who I am!” she lashed out.

He did not blink an eyelash at her outburst—an outburst that proved anew Victoria was not the woman

she had always thought herself to be.

Calm. Rational.

Above the desires of the flesh.

Dark knowledge glimmered inside Gabriel’s eyes. “I know you, Victoria.”

He had seen her naked body, his eyes said.

Gabriel knew the size of her breasts, the narrowness of her hips, the curve of her buttocks. But he did

not know her.

“What do you know of me?”

“I know that you enjoy the feel of silk against your skin.” His gaze flicked over her naked shoulders,

toyed with the silk tucked between her breasts. “I know that you’re courageous. I know that you’re loyal.”

His eyelashes lifted, silver gaze pinning hers. “I know that you’re going to get me killed.”

Victoria’s breath caught in her throat—or perhaps it was his breath that snagged inside her throat. “I

would never hurt you.”

“I know that, too.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because of your eyes.” Gabriel’s eyes darkened, silver becoming gray. “You’re here because of your

eyes.”

She must not have heard him correctly. “I beg your pardon?”

“Madame René told you that Michael and I are friends.”

It took a second for Victoria’s thoughts to switch from one subject to another.

“Yes. She said that there are bonds between you that could never be broken.”

Except through death . . .

“When we were thirteen, a madame in Paris took us in.” The past crowded Gabriel’s gaze. “She trained

us to be whores.”

Six months earlier Victoria would have been horrified. In the last six months she had seen far younger

boys and girls on the streets pandering their flesh.

“Michael.” Victoria carefully phrased her next question, afraid of upsetting the precarious balance that

flowed afresh between them. “Was he also trained to please ... men?”

Gabriel’s face remained impassive. “Non.”

Victoria tried to imagine the sort of friendship that would grow between two boys trained so differently.

“Do not pity me, mademoiselle,” Gabriel said sharply.

“I do not.” Victoria’s throat tightened. “I think you are fortunate to have a friend like Michael.”

A friend who would understand the boy Gabriel had been and the man he had grown up to be.

A muscle ticked inside Gabriel’s left cheek. “You are here because you have Michael’s eyes.”

Victoria blinked in confusion. “Your friend has blue eyes?”

“Michael has hungry eyes, mademoiselle. The color doesn’t matter.”

Hungry eyes . . .

Heat coursed through Victoria. “I do not.. .flirt . . . ”

She had not invited the last six months . . .

“You want to be loved, mademoiselle.”

The five years Victoria had lived under her father’s care after her mother had left crashed down on top

of her. He had forbade emotional expression, physical contact, endearments.

A woman’s need to love, he had repeatedly said, was a woman’s sin.

“And is that so wrong?” Victoria asked, her voice echoing a young girl’s cry. “Is it a sin to need love?”

“Whores can’t afford to love.”

“Why not? Why should anybody be deprived of simple affection?”

Cinnamon-flavored regret flickered inside Gabriel’s eyes, silver to gray, gray to silver. “I am not capable

of loving a woman, mademoiselle.”

Victoria stood to her full height. “I did not ask for your love, sir.”

“I have shared with you more than I have ever shared with anybody else—”

“Thank you—”

“—but trust comes at a price.”

It always came back to one man.

Victoria could not keep the anger out of her voice. “I do not know who the man is that you seek.”

“I