Mine to Take(6)

“Because I’m not a nice man, sweetheart.”

“Sweetheart? Oh, please.”

He almost smiled at the look on her face. “Honor, then.”

“That would be preferable.”

“Good to see you, Honor.” He didn’t offer his hand again. He could still feel the warmth of her palm against his from their previous touch. A subtle heat that rested on his skin like a ray of sun. Dangerous. But useful.

Sure, he’d never hurt a woman but he had no problem with using her if it was necessary.

“Nice to see you again, too,” Honor replied with stiff courtesy. She didn’t say his name and he suspected that was deliberate.

Again he had to resist the urge to smile. Had she felt this electricity between them, too? And was she discomforted by it?

He watched her shift around on the seat, her knuckles white where they clutched the handle of her black leather briefcase. Oh yeah, she was.

“So where are we going if we’re not going to the pub? Or do you have a lair you’re dragging me off to?” she asked, again with the raised eyebrow and a certain dry humor. Nervous and trying not to show it, he guessed. Easy enough to tell by the way she was clutching that briefcase.

“I have a private club I’m a member of,” he replied. “I thought we’d go there to discuss your proposal.”

He wasn’t much for fancy restaurants or exclusive bars. That was Alex’s territory, not his. But Honor St. James didn’t belong in a place like O’Rourke’s. With her brother’s coloring, black hair, and blue eyes, she had a delicate, catlike beauty that drew the eye. Drew attention.

And he didn’t want attention. He preferred to get on with the job, not create a fuss.

“Okay.” She patted the top of the briefcase. “I brought along some information you might—”

“I’ve got the information already,” he interrupted. After the meeting with the others two nights ago, he’d got his research team to look into Tremain Hotels, turning up everything they could find.

The chain was, indeed, seriously in debt, which was excellent news from his perspective. And also the basis for the plan he’d been turning over in his head for the past couple of days now. A fairly simple plan when all was said and done—sink money into Tremain. Buy as much stock as he could. Make sure he had the controlling shares. Then maybe he’d bankrupt it. Or maybe he’d keep the lot and make Tremain Hotels part of his own empire.

Whatever he’d do, one thing was certain. He’d take something of his father’s and make it his. And he’d make sure Tremain knew who it was who’d made him pay. And why.

“You have?” Honor blinked. “Oh, right. Of course you have. And I guess you’ve read over the various reports that I sent to Eva?”

“Yes. But I’m not discussing that now. We’ll have plenty of time after we reach the club.”

She opened her mouth. Shut it again. “Perhaps we can talk about my brother then.”

He hadn’t quite decided how he’d tackle her questions, because obviously she would have them. Alex had just shrugged his shoulders when Gabriel had asked him about it. “Tell her or don’t tell her,” he’d said. “I don’t give a shit.”

“I’m still his friend,” Gabriel said, deciding. “If that’s what you want to know.”

Her eyes were dark, like Indian sapphires, the expression in them unreadable. “So you see him then? Regularly?”

“Semi-regularly, yes.”

“Does he know…” She stopped, looked down at her hands. “Does he know you’re meeting me?”

“Yeah, he does.”

“I see. I don’t suppose…” She trailed off again. “No, don’t answer that question.”

“Did he want me to pass a message on to you?” Gabriel finished for her. “No, he didn’t.” Brutally honest perhaps, but it was better to know these things straight up.

Honor’s posture stiffened a little but her expression remained neutral. So she had armor. He supposed a woman like her must need it, working as she did in such a male-dominated industry. “Well,” she said, a thin film of ice coating her words, “I didn’t expect him to. Not after nineteen years of silence.” Her blue eyes were very direct. “I don’t suppose you had anything to do with that, did you?”

“No. That was all Alex’s decision.”

“Ah, okay, then.” She looked down at her hands again. “That answers pretty much all my questions in that case.” The cold had bled out of her tone, leaving behind it a hint of pain.

Gabriel studied her. He’d never judged his friend for leaving his mother and sister after his father’s death. Mainly because he’d known a man driven by demons when he saw one and Alex seemed driven by the entire population of hell. So when Alex had told him he’d left home and wouldn’t go back, Gabriel had accepted it. Who was he to judge anyway? After the things he’d done? If Alex needed to leave to survive whatever was eating him up inside, then Gabriel had no problem with that.

Yet looking at Honor now, hearing the echoes of an old pain in her voice, he couldn’t help wondering at his friend’s continued refusal to make contact.

It’s not your business. And you can’t afford to get involved.

No. He couldn’t. The only thing that mattered was taking down Tremain. Honor’s stepfather. That was the extent of it.

He had to stay on target and that meant finding out more about her relationship with the guy. About why she was trying to save his company. Look for any weaknesses that could be exploited.

The car began to slow, coming to a halt outside the Second Circle Club.

Honor stared out the window, her eyes widening a little. She glanced at him, then back at the elegant old building outside. “Here?”

He rather enjoyed her look of disbelief. Part of him would always get a kick out of shocking people who judged him on his past and the streets he’d come from.

“Yeah, here. Pretty good for a working stiff like me, don’t you think?”

Her blue eyes flicked back to him. “You? A working stiff? I think you haven’t been a working stiff for a long time, Mr. Woolf.”

“Gabriel.”

“When I’m ready, Mr. Woolf. When I’m ready.”

A small thrill of unwelcome anticipation went through him at her resistance. Smooth, sophisticated women had never been his thing. He preferred earthier women. Women with no hang-ups, who could look after themselves and didn’t mind if things got a bit rough. Who had no expectations of anything more than a couple of nights of good, dirty fun.

Not women like Honor St. James, in other words.

Yet there were sparks in those blue eyes of hers. Sparks that promised a man a challenge. A good fight. And if there was one thing he enjoyed, it was a good fight.

Still, he needed to play it cool here because there were too many variables he didn’t know about. Before he made any move he had to do some more research. Into Tremain. Into Honor. Into the relationship between them and whether he could exploit that as well as this investment opportunity.

Guy Tremain had to pay for what he did. For what he had taken.

And the only one who could make him pay was Gabriel.

* * *

Honor didn’t know much about the Second Circle other than it was one of New York’s most exclusive private members’ clubs and getting your name on the list was supposed to be next to impossible. Well, that and the fact that her brother owned it. Not that that meant a damn thing to her.

She was surprised Gabriel Woolf was a member though. He didn’t look like the type who’d value such exclusivity. In fact, he was renowned as much for his down-to-earth business approach as he was for the fact that he never wore suits. She’d often heard the media make a big deal about how he was still a regular Joe—apart from the rumors about his past, of course—but looking at him now, Honor couldn’t understand how on earth they could have assumed that because he didn’t look like any workingman she knew.

She watched him as they entered the club, nodding a wordless greeting to the doorman, striding past the concierge in the foyer who murmured something about a table being ready for them in the restaurant.

A rough, brutal kind of power clung to him. An uncivilized, bad-boy charisma only enhanced by the jeans, T-shirt, and leather jacket he wore. Honor found it mesmerizing. The way he moved, with such innate confidence, as if the world was his to bend to his command and if it didn’t, then he’d make it. Perhaps with a baseball bat.

There were a lot of confident men in the financial sector. Men in expertly tailored suits with clean-cut college good looks and the arrogance to match. But in comparison to Gabriel they suddenly all seemed like little boys playing at being men. Playing at being dangerous.

Because this guy was the real deal. And why she should like that, she had no idea.

What she did know was that letting her fledgling fascination with him show would be a mistake.

“I’m not a nice man, sweetheart…”

No, she suspected he wasn’t. But part of her dearly wanted to find out just how bad he really was.

Gabriel showed her into the restaurant and she had to fight not to stare. The place was beautiful. High ornate ceilings with chandeliers that glittered like ice crystals, low booth seats upholstered in red velvet, and circular tables of dark wood surrounded by red velvet armchairs. Some of the tables had curtains and here and there were groups of people she recognized. Politicians for the most part, but she also spotted a couple of well-known actors and their entourages, a singer with a group of admirers.