Chapter 16
The ache in my body wakes me, a dull throb that spreads through my hips. Not the sharp, jagged pain of violation I remember from juvie, but more an ache of muscles well-used, stretched in ways they’ve never been before.
I blink awake and find Gabriel already watching me.
Sunlight slips through the blinds, striping Gabriel’s bare shoulder in gold.
The sheets are tangled around us, warm and rumpled, carrying the mingled scent of sweat, sex, and his expensive cologne.
My pheromones are there too, woven into it, claiming the space as shared.
“How long have you been awake?” The question comes out scratchy with sleep and the remnants of last night’s revelations.
“A while.” His fingers rest on the mattress between us, not quite touching me but close enough for his body heat to seep into mine. “You sleep deeply once you allow yourself to rest.”
The observation lands closer to home than he realizes. Sleep has always been an enemy, a vulnerability I resist until exhaustion takes over. Last night, with his arm around me, I gave in without the usual fight.
I wait for the panic of waking beside someone after sex, but it never comes. Instead, a quiet awareness hums beneath my skin, alert but calm.
“Why me?” I ask the question that’s been circling in my mind since he first walked into Foundation. “Why are you following me around? Why are you teaming up with me when the Rockfords have an army at their disposal?”
Gabriel shifts, his shoulders tensing, and he focuses on the twisted sheets. “I don’t think I’ve been subtle about why I’ve been following you around.”
“Okay, then why are you teaming up with me on this trafficking case?” I ask. “It can’t just be because Micah was involved.”
He picks at a loose thread in the pillowcase, a nervous gesture I’ve never seen from him before. “The others have their assignments. Sebastian’s handling cyber security, Caleb and Damien are working their contacts in law enforcement, Raphael—”
“That’s not what I asked.”
His throat works as he swallows, the movement drawing my attention to the pulse jumping beneath the skin.
“I wanted to be the one to protect you.” The words come out quieter than before, almost reluctant.
I study him with new awareness. The Gabriel before me is different from the man who strode into my club with easy confidence. This Gabriel holds himself curled inward, his body language broadcasting fear. Not of me, though I’ve given him enough reasons to be cautious.
This fear runs deeper, older.
When I reach for his shoulder, he flinches before leaning into the contact, a reaction so familiar it sends a pang through my chest.
I slide my hand down to his bare waist. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Gabriel exhales, his chest deflating. “The family business is complicated.”
“I gathered as much.”
“Especially the succession. Not that anyone is fighting Aaiden for head of the family.”
I frown in confusion. “Are you worried that, as the fourth sibling of the head family, you’ll be cut off?”
He flinches. “Keeping the Rockford name pure matters, whether or not they come out and say it.”
The emphasis he places on “they” rather than “we” catches my attention. His breathing turns shallow, chest rising and falling in quick succession.
He stops fidgeting with the sheet, and his fingers curl into a loose fist. I wait, letting him decide whether to cross this threshold between us. After sharing some of my darkest secrets last night, I understand the courage it takes to expose the wounds you’ve spent a lifetime hiding.
Gabriel raises his eyes to meet mine, and in them I see a question. Do I care?
“Tell me,” I encourage, not because I need to hear it, but because he needs to say it. “Whatever it is, it won’t change my opinion of you.”
He takes a deep breath. “I don’t think I’m a Rockford. Not by blood, at least. Not where it counts.”
I massage his waist with my thumb, waiting for him to continue.
“It’s been whispered about since I was a kid.” Gabriel focuses on a point beyond my shoulder. “The rumor is that my mother had an affair, and I’m the result.”
His hands begin to tremble, and he curls his fingers into fists to hide the reaction.
“My father never confirmed it, but the way he looked at me sometimes…” He swallows hard. “Like he was searching for another man’s features in my face.”
Distress rolls off him in waves, cutting through his usual luxurious scent.
“My brothers never treated me like I didn’t belong,” he continues. “Aaiden, Sebastian, Nolan…they’ve always protected me. But my aunts and uncles… They’ve kept me at arm’s length.”
I can picture the subtle, unspoken ways people signal that someone doesn’t belong. The slight hesitation before including him in family traditions. Conversations that halt when he enters a room. Comparisons that emphasize differences rather than similarities.
“At family gatherings, they’d comment on how Aaiden and Nolan have their father’s eyes, how Sebastian inherited the Rockford intelligence.” A bitter smile pulls at his lips. “For me, it was always how much I resembled my mother’s brother. How I have my mother’s temperament.”
His breath hitches, a small catch in his throat. “When I was ten, my uncle got drunk at Christmas and called me the cuckoo in the nest. My father broke his nose, but he never denied it.”
Gabriel runs a hand through his hair, which leans more toward dirty blond than anyone else in his family, the movement jerky and uncoordinated.
His eyes, brown-green hazel instead of blue-green like his brother Sebastian’s, remain fixed over my shoulder, on the Freedom from Fear painting hanging on my wall, the artwork about hiding truths from those you protect.
“I’ve spent my entire life trying to prove I belong there, but my older brothers and cousins all coddle me. Like I don’t have it in me to handle the family business, because they all know I’m not a real Rockford.”
The words spill out faster now, a dam breaking after years of pressure. “I thought if I could be useful enough, no one would care that I might not share their blood. When Avery told me to go to the Blue Note to meet Orien—”
“And Avery is…family?” I break in, unable to stop my curiosity.
Gabriel huffs out a breath. “Yes, he’s my brother-in-law, Raphael’s mate. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, Raphael died in a car accident, but really, he gave up the family name to be with his mate.”
Gabriel touches the tattoo on his chest of the clock and gears. “He even had the family emblem removed, and Sebastian changed his medical records, so if he’s ever taken hostage or dies, no one will connect him to us. He gave it all up for love.”
The pieces slot into place. Gabriel’s desperate need for connection, his intense pursuit of me despite my rejection. It wasn’t arrogance driving him, but a fear of being no one’s first choice.
I withdraw my hand from him. “Is that why you kept coming back to Foundation? To prove something?”
“No, that wasn’t about proving anything.” He lets out a self-deprecating laugh. “I guess, even if I’m not a real Rockford, I’m still cursed like the rest of them. The first time I saw you, I fell hard, and I wanted…”
“You wanted what?” I urge, needing to hear it.
“To matter to someone who chooses me, not because of my name or what I can do for them.” The words come out stripped bare of pretense. “To be seen as myself, not as a maybe-Rockford.”
I understand the certainty of not belonging anywhere. The exhaustion of constantly proving your worth. The fear that if people see the real you, they’ll turn away in disgust.
It’s strange to see these familiar wounds reflected back at me from someone I’d categorized as privileged. I’d assumed Gabriel’s confidence came from a lifetime of security, of knowing who he was and where he belonged.
But he’s been desperate for a validation I recognize all too well.
I don’t offer empty comfort or platitudes. Words like “it doesn’t matter” or “they’re still your family” would ring hollow between us. Instead, I reach out to flatten my palm over his chest, where his heart races.
As the seconds stretch into minutes, his breathing steadies, his heartbeat relaxing. “You’re the only person I’ve ever told. Not even my brothers know how much it eats at me.”
“We all have ghosts that haunt us.”
Gabriel’s hand moves to cover mine, feather-light as if expecting me to pull away. When I don’t, his fingers settle, warm and solid on my skin. “Thank you.”
I shrug with discomfit. “For what? Not being an asshole about it?”
The corner of his mouth lifts in a fragile smile. “For listening. For not telling me it doesn’t matter when it does.”
I study Gabriel, realizing that what I once thought was arrogance hid a fragile uncertainty. Slowly, I shift closer, my hand trailing from his chest and down the center groove of his abs to toy with where the sheet covers his hips.
Gabriel goes still, his breathing shallow. He tracks the movement, uncertainty visible in the tightness around his mouth as he waits to see what I do next.
“I lied,” I whisper. “This does change things.”
Disappointment flashes before he locks down his emotions. “Worried you might not have bagged a billionaire?”
“No.” My hand dips below the sheet to trail through the curls that frame his cock. “I don’t need your money or your gifts. But I like knowing you’re not perfect.”
His body relaxes at the words, tension draining from his shoulders. His hand rises, pausing inches from my cheek, asking permission without words.
I lean into his palm, his skin cool beneath my cheek. The touch remains light, exploratory rather than demanding.
His thumb traces my jaw, following the line to the corner of my mouth. “Can I kiss you?”
My eyes narrow. “Don’t think, just because I let you top last night, that it will be a regular thing.”
His cock stirs, begging for my hand to move lower. “I’d never dare to presume.”
“Good.”