Guild Boss (Ghost Hunters #14)(75)

Lucy swallowed some brandy and thought about Gabriel’s answer. “Did you mean it?”

“You can call down lightning to smite your enemies. Of course you’re a goddess.”

“Do you think I’m sleeping with you because I’m grateful to you for saving my life?”

“What the hell makes you ask that?”

“You’re in the business of rescuing and protecting people. I’m sure many of them are very grateful to you. Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful to you, too. Even if you did abandon me to those Blue Amber rogues.”

“After which you rescued yourself.”

“With Otis’s help.”

“You stopped those two rogues cold in the Ghost City without my help, and this afternoon you rescued yourself and Veronica. I’d say there’s plenty of evidence that you can take care of yourself. By the way, you aren’t the first person I’ve pulled out of the tunnels. I’ve never slept with any of the others. Just you. Where are you going with this?”

She tilted her head back against the lounge cushion. “I’m just trying to confirm that you don’t think I’m having an affair with you because I’ve mistaken gratitude for … something else.”

“Something else? Are you talking about physical attraction?”

“Mmm.”

“We’re not talking about physical attraction?”

“Mmm.”

“I’m not good at guessing games, not when it comes to relationships.”

She fortified herself with another swallow of brandy and lowered the glass. “I’m not interested in a short-term affair. I can’t let this relationship continue unless I see a future for us. That means you have to see the same future.”

Gabriel swept his feet off the railing and sat up abruptly. The soles of his low boots landed with a resounding thud on the floor of the balcony. His eyes burned in the shadows.

“I saw a future for us the night I found you in the Underworld,” he said. “I have never stopped seeing that future. It’s the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing I think about at night.”

She took her feet off the railing and sat up. They faced each other across the short distance that separated the loungers.

“I’m glad to know I’m on your to-do list,” she said. “But where, exactly?”

He reached out one hand and threaded his fingers through her hair. He cupped the back of her head in his palm, leaned forward, and kissed her, a scorching kiss that aroused all of her senses. Energy heated the atmosphere around them.

He raised his head. “You’re not just on the list. You’re at the top. You’ve been there all along. Who do you think convinced the Guild Council that this sector needed its own Guild headquarters?”

Her pulse beat faster. Disbelief and excitement arced across her senses.

“You?” she whispered.

“After I pulled you out of the tunnels I went back to Cadence and told my boss that opening up the Ghost City was going to bring a lot of security problems to this sector of the Underworld. I gave him a list of excellent reasons for establishing a new Guild operation here in Illusion Town. He took those reasons to the Council. When I returned from the Rainforest mission, the position of director was waiting for me.”

“I was the real reason you moved to Illusion Town?”

“I had it all planned out. My strategy was in place. But when I got here, ready to pick up where we left off, I discovered that things had gone wrong. Really, really wrong. My to-do list was in chaos. But you were always on it and always at the top.”

It wasn’t exactly a Covenant Marriage proposal, but it was enough for now. Progress.

“I never stopped thinking about you,” she said quietly. “I dreamed about you. Sometimes good dreams. Sometimes nightmares. But you were always there.”

She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him, surrendering to the fierce urgency of the moment.

He picked her up off the lounger and carried her through the open slider, down the short hall, and into the green shadows of the bedroom.

He stood her on her feet, gripped her shoulders, and fixed her with his hot, intent eyes.

“Sometimes you scare the green hell out of me,” he said.

“I think being able to scare a Guild boss occasionally is a job requirement for a goddess.” She touched his hard jaw. “What was it that made you nervous? The lightning bolt in the hallway this morning?”

“I’m getting used to the lightning. What sent me into a panic this time was that conversation out on the balcony. I thought you were going to tell me you were ending our relationship.”

She started to unfasten his shirt. “What would you have done if I had said that?”

“Gotten down on my knees and begged you to give me another chance.”

“Hah. I don’t believe that for one minute.”

“It’s true.” He reached behind her and slowly lowered the zipper of the blue sheath. “Trust me, it’s true.”

“And if that hadn’t worked?”

He eased the straps of the dress off her shoulders and let the garment fall to her ankles. For a moment he simply drank in the sight of her standing in the paranormal light of the ancient ruins.

“If that hadn’t worked, I would have carried you down into the Underworld and made love to you until you changed your mind,” he said.