Gabriel's Inferno

droplets of water splashed around her on the sheets. “Did you sleep well?”

She nodded slowly, feeling a good deal too warm.

“You’re not saying much.” He straightened up and smirked at her.

“You’re half-naked.”

“Right. Would you prefer me wholly naked?” He shifted the towel provocatively on his hips and grinned.

Julia nearly expired in shock.

“I’m just kidding, sweetheart.” He kissed her again, with a furrowed brow.

A discomforting thought occurred to him. He retreated backward with a very serious expression on his face. “I forgot about what happened to you in St. Louis. When you were little,” he clarified. “I’m sorry to barge in on you like this. I wasn’t thinking.”

Julia looked over at him with mute appreciation. She smiled shyly. “It’s all right. You’re just distracting. You seem happy this morning.”

He grinned. “Sharing a bed with you agrees with me. Can I make you breakfast?”

“Um, sure. But you know I don’t have a kitchen.”

“I’m a resourceful man.” Gabriel smiled at her genuinely, his warmth enough to overcome her embarrassment about her cooking facilities.

Just before he closed the bathroom door behind him, she was treated to the barest glimpse of the most beautiful gluteus maximus muscles as Gabriel dropped his purple towel.

Julia gaped like a codfish. P

The following evening, Rachel returned to Philadelphia from her romantic holiday with Aaron and promptly checked her voice mail. After a frantic call to her father, she immediately telephoned Gabriel and left a message.

“What the hell is going on up there, Gabriel? What did you do to Julia?

She only disappeared once in her life and that was when she was completely humiliated by her ex! So what the fuck did you do to her? I swear to God I’m hopping on a plane. Call me…

“By the way, Dad says hi and he’s glad you called. Would it kill you to call him once a week? He has decided to go back to work because he can’t stand being home alone. And by the way, he put the house up for sale.”

Then, more than slightly worried about her best friend, Rachel called Julia and left a message on her voice mail, as well.

“Julia, what did Gabriel do? He was raving like a lunatic on my voice mail. He isn’t answering his phone, so I can’t get his side of the story. Not that I expect the truth from him. Anyway, I hope that you’re all right, and I’m really sorry. Whatever he did, please don’t disappear on me again. Not when this is our last Thanksgiving in the house. My dad put it up for sale. Aaron still wants to get you a ticket, so call me, okay? Love you.”

Afterward, Rachel returned to her normal life in Philadelphia, anxiously awaiting news from her brother and her best friend. And quietly planning a wedding.

After Gabriel convinced his sister not to fly to Toronto in order to kick his ass, and he spoke to Richard about taking the house off the market, he promptly left a message on Julia’s voice mail, which he connected with while she was talking to her father:

“You never seem to answer your phone. [Fumes slightly…] Do you have call waiting? Would you order it, please? I don’t care what it costs. I’ll pay for it. But I’m tired of leaving messages. [Deep breath.] I’m assuming you’ve heard from Rachel. She’s furious with me, but I think I’ve been able to convince her that you and I had an academic misunderstanding and have since kissed and made up. [Chuckle.] Well, I left out the kissing part.

“Maybe you can call and reassure her before she fulfills her threat to get on an airplane. [Sigh… deep breath.] Julianne, I enjoyed waking up next to you yesterday. More than I can say on an answering machine. Tell me I’ll be able to wake up next to you again soon. [Lowered, smoldering voice…] I’m sitting in front of the fireplace wishing you were here, wrapped in my arms. Call me, principessa.”

* * *

Meanwhile, Julia was talking to her father.

“I’m glad you’re coming home, Jules. I’ll be on call, but we’ll be able to spend some time together…” Tom’s voice trailed off into a cough as he tried to clear his throat.

“Good. Rachel wants me to visit her too. She’s getting married, and I think she needs some help with the preparations, now that Grace is gone.”

“Deb invited me over for dinner with her and her kids. I’m sure she’d set an extra place for you.”

“No way in hell,” Julia muttered.

“What’s that?”

“Sorry, Dad. It would be nice to see Deb but there’s no way I’m going over there. No way.”

Tom paused uncomfortably. “I don’t need to, either. I, um, see Deb all the time.”

Julia rolled her eyes.

“What time should I pick you up at the airport?”

“Actually, Gabriel Emerson is living in Toronto. He mentioned something about going home that weekend. I’ll see if I can catch a ride with the Clarks from Philadelphia, if we fly in at the same time.”

Tom was quiet for a moment or two. “Gabriel is there?”

“He teaches at the university. I have a class with him.”

“You never told me that. Jules, you need to stay away from him.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s trouble.”

“Why do you say that?”

Tom cleared his throat again. “He never came home to see his mother when she was dying. Never spends time with his family. I don’t trust him, and I sure as hell wouldn’t trust him with my daughter.”

“Dad, he’s Rachel’s brother. She knows I’m coming home for Thanksgiving. She’ll probably pick us up at the airport, anyway.”

“Whatever you do, don’t carry anything for him on the airplane and don’t accept anything from him that looks suspicious. You’ll be going through customs.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means I’m keeping an eye out for you. Can’t I do that with my only daughter?”

Julia stifled the urge to say something cruel or rude in response. “I’ll buy my ticket and let you know what’s happening.”

“Fine. Talk to you later.”

And with that, Julia’s largely uninformative conversation with Thomas Mitchell of Selinsgrove came to an end.

She spent the next hour reassuring Rachel that yes, she was fine and no, Gabriel was (perhaps surprisingly) no longer being an ass. She also convinced Aaron that she had enough money from her scholarship to purchase a flight.

She mentioned her father’s scheduling conflict and promised that she would join the Clarks for Thanksgiving dinner Thursday night.

More than slightly exhausted, she spent another hour persuading Gabriel that it was not a good idea for them to share a bed every evening, especially when there was the possibility that someone connected with the university could see them entering or leaving one another’s apartments.

He had acquiesced, albeit grumpily, while exacting a promise for another sleepover before seven days had elapsed.

Julia did not want to be the cause of Gabriel losing his job, so she was determined to limit the possibilities that they might be seen together.

She was also determined not to spend every night in his bed, for she knew where that would lead. She was still struggling to trust him, her reticence more than reasonable given the fact that he had only changed his disposition toward her recently. And he’d all but admitted that his passion for her was teetering on the edge of his control.