Chapter 15
GAbrIEL
Three weeks had passed since the weekend in the Hamptons, and Gabriel had a problem.
The problem lived in his desk drawer. A framed document with three signatures, face down for the last two weeks because Tessa had started staying over and he had moved it the night she opened the wrong cabinet looking for olive oil.
Hiding it was the lie. Not the Oath itself—a stupid college promise that had stopped meaning anything to him the night Tessa Thorne dropped a tray of champagne at his best friend’s wedding.
The lie was letting Knox believe it still held weight.
The lie was watching Tessa fall in love with a man she didn’t have the full map of.
His phone buzzed.
Tessa: Running late. Client emergency. Still on for 7?
Gabriel: Take your time. I’ll start cooking.
Tessa: You’re cooking?
Gabriel: I’m attempting to cook. Pray for my kitchen.
Tessa: I’ll bring a fire extinguisher.
He set the phone down and looked at the drawer.
His mother had called twice that week, and he had ignored both. The third call he had taken on Tuesday at his desk, because Camille Sterling was a woman who didn’t stop calling, and because she had finally tried him from a number he didn’t recognize.
“Gabriel. Where have you been?”
“Working. As usual.”
“You’re never too busy to take my calls. Something is different.”
“Nothing’s different, Mother.”
“When I couldn’t get hold of you, I called Knox. He tells me you’re seeing someone.”
The cold drop in his chest—the one he’d felt at seventeen, the day his mother cornered Tessa in the Ashford hallway and told her a scholarship girl from New Jersey would never be a Sterling—was still there.
“Knox has been busy.”
“Who’s she?”
“None of your business, Mother.”
“Gabriel.”
“None of your business.”
He’d hung up, skipped lunch, and spent the rest of the afternoon answering emails that didn’t require thought, and he still hadn’t told Tessa about the call.
It was Thursday now, and the duck was already in the oven.
By six thirty, Gabriel was reasonably certain he had made a terrible mistake.
Knox’s recipe had seemed straightforward when Knox walked him through it. Knox cooked when he needed to think, which was something Gabriel wished he didn’t know about his best friend, but found oddly comforting anyway. Brown the duck. Add the glaze. Roast until crispy. Simple.
Knox forgot to mention the smoke. Or Gabriel had been too focused on getting it right to listen.
He waved a dish towel at the smoke detector like he could negotiate with it. The detector shrieked anyway, loud enough to rattle the windows. The kitchen smelled like burned sugar.
This was supposed to be romantic. Thoughtful. A home-cooked meal to show Tessa he paid attention. That he remembered she had mentioned duck was her favorite three weeks ago. Instead, it was turning into a disaster.
His phone rang. Ronan.
“I’m cooking. Can’t talk.”
“You’re cooking?”
“Attempting to cook.”
“That seems unwise. Is something on fire?”
“Not technically.”
“Gabriel.”
“It’s under control.”
“Is it?”
The smoke detector went off. Full blast.
“I have to go.”
“Please don’t burn down your place.”
“No promises.”
He killed the oven and climbed on a chair to yank the battery from the detector. Silence. The duck sat in the roasting pan, significantly darker than the recipe photos.
His mother had been circling all week. Mrs. Whitcomb would’ve reported back from tea by now.
Knox had told her—forced into it when she couldn’t reach Gabriel and called him instead.
Camille was working her network the way she always had, with patience and charm.
He pushed the thought down. That was a problem for another day.
Right now he had a charred duck and limited time before Tessa walked in.
When Tessa arrived forty-five minutes later with wine and an expression that said she could smell disaster from the elevator, he had managed to air out most of the smoke.
“You burned it.”
“I caramelized it aggressively.”
“There’s smoke coming out of your vents.”
“Good. The ventilation system is working.”
She walked past him into the kitchen, took one look, and started laughing. Not polite laughing. Full-body, tears-in-her-eyes, can’t-breathe laughing.
“It’s not that bad.”
“It’s worse than bad.” She was doubled over, holding the counter. “Gabriel, what happened to the skin?”
“The recipe said high heat.”
“The recipe didn’t mean the surface of the sun.”
“There’s a difference?”
She laughed harder. He stood there with a stained dish towel, watching the woman he loved find his failure absolutely hilarious. He was smiling. He hadn’t noticed when he’d started.
A year ago, this would’ve bothered him. Six months ago, even.
He had spent most of his adult life being the competent one, the one who didn’t fail.
But now, watching Tessa doubled over in his smoky kitchen, there was nothing careful in it—no glance toward him to check if he was okay with it.
She laughed the way she laughed with Lucy, the way she laughed at Henry’s cart. Like she was at home.
“Okay.” She straightened, wiping her eyes. “Move. Let me assess the damage.”
“Can you save it?”
“I’m a professional.” She pulled the pan from the oven. “The skin is toast, but the meat might be okay. Do you have—” She opened a cabinet. “Never mind. I’ll find it.”
He leaned against the counter and watched her work. Someone who walked into his disasters and laughed and fixed them and somehow made him feel more capable instead of less.
Dinner was salvaged. Tessa improvised a cherry sauce that covered the burned parts.
They ate at his dining table. He let himself relax. This was his life now, and it mattered more than anything.
“I have the Plaza event coming up,” she said. “Two hundred people.”
“That’s incredible.”
“It’s terrifying. The good kind. The kind that means I’m doing it right.”
“You’re going to be great.”
“You have to say that. It’s in the boyfriend contract.”
“There’s a contract? You know how much I love a contract.”
“Section seven, paragraph four. Mandatory supportiveness in all professional endeavors.”
“I should’ve read the fine print.”
“Too late. You signed when you said I love you.”
“I meant it. Every word.”
Her expression softened. “I know you did.”
Tell her the rest. The drawer. Your mother. Knox. He stood and started clearing plates instead.
His phone buzzed on Friday morning. Knox.
Knox: Lunch. Today. The usual.
He couldn’t refuse without making the refusal a thing. He went.
Knox was already at the table when Gabriel arrived, ribeye in front of him and the roasted chicken ordered for Gabriel.
“You missed the Hartley call last week.”
“I was running late from Brooklyn.”
“You’re never late, Sterling.”
“I am now.”
Knox set his fork down. “Are we doing this conversation, or are we eating lunch?”
“Which conversation.”
“You know which one.”
Gabriel didn’t answer.
“Are you out, Sterling? Of the Oath? Yes or no.”
“Yes.”
“Since when?”
“Since the wedding.”
“Six weeks ago. And I’m finding out at lunch on a Friday.”
“I should’ve told you sooner.”
“You should’ve told me at the wedding.”
“I know, but I wasn’t certain. Now I am.”
Gabriel set his fork down too. He hadn’t been eating.
“You told my mother.”
“I told your mother you were seeing someone. I didn’t tell her who.”
“You didn’t have to. She’s been calling everyone she knows.”
“You think I’m sabotaging this.”
“Aren’t you?”
“Sterling. You don’t need me to sabotage this. You’re doing that to yourself.”
That landed harder than Gabriel had expected. He didn’t have a response.
Knox waited. When it was clear Gabriel wasn’t going to fight him, he picked up his fork.
“Does she know about the Oath?”
“No.”
“Sterling.”
“I’m telling her after her next event.”
“Why wait?”
“Because she needs to be focused.”
“Stop being a coward. Just rip off the Band-Aid. It’s less painful that way.”
“Stop pressuring me. I’m doing what needs to be done and it works for both of us.”
“No, you’re lying to both of you. Have you talked to your mother, because I’m tired of her calling me about your social calendar.”
“I’ve talked to her.”
“Did you tell her it’s Tessa?”
“No.”
“All of this posturing is going to backfire. You know that, right?”
“I love her, Knox.”
“Then act like it. Man up to both the women in your life.”
That was all. Gabriel paid the check before Knox could reach for it, and they walked back to the office without finishing the conversation.
He promised himself that he’d tell Tessa before the Plaza event. He didn’t.
He’d had more than one chance. A hundred small openings—every dinner, every quiet morning, every time she looked at him like whatever he was carrying wasn’t too heavy for her to share.
Each time, something locked in his chest and he said nothing.
It wasn’t strategy. It wasn’t planning. It was the calculation a man made when he could see, clearly and without illusion, exactly what he stood to lose.
The Thursday before the Plaza event, Gabriel left work early to cook.
Pasta this time. He had learned his lesson on the duck. Tessa had mentioned her grandmother’s tomato sauce once, in passing, three weeks ago, and he had written it down.
Finding her mother’s number had taken twenty minutes and a level of investigative determination he usually reserved for due diligence. Carol Thorne. New Jersey. He had stared at the contact for ten full minutes before calling.
She answered on the second ring. He introduced himself carefully. Gabriel Sterling. He was seeing her daughter. He hoped he wasn’t overstepping.
A pause that lasted long enough to make him regret everything.
“I know who you are. Tessa mentioned you.”
He hadn’t known what to do with that, so he had told her the truth. He wanted to make something special for dinner. Tessa had mentioned her grandmother’s tomato sauce once, and he thought, if Carol was willing, he’d like to try to get it right.
Another pause. Shorter.
“She likes fresh tomatoes. None of that canned. Fresh, and you cook them down slow. Don’t rush it.”
He had written down every word.
Before she hung up, Carol had gone quiet in the way people did when they were deciding whether to say the thing they actually meant.
“She has had people disappoint her. Be the man who doesn’t.”
He had been thinking about that all day.
He set the tomatoes on the counter. Fresh. Basil. Garlic. A splash of red wine. Cook it down slowly.
Tessa arrived at seven looking tired and beautiful and exhausted and buzzing with nervous energy. She talked through her event timeline while he plated pasta and poured wine and listened to every word, even though she had told him most of this three times already.
“I’m overthinking. I know I’m overthinking.”
“You care. That’s different.”
“It’s a little overthinking.” She took a breath. “I need it to be perfect. This client could change everything. Referrals, my reputation, the whole trajectory of my business.”
“It’ll be perfect. Because you’re the one running it. And you don’t do anything halfway.”
She looked down at the pasta. Her expression shifted.
“This looks like Gran’s.”
He sat down across from her. “I called your mother. I told her who I was and asked her for the recipe because you mentioned it once.”
She stared at him. “You looked up my mother.”
“She was very helpful. Also slightly terrifying.”
“Gabriel.” Her voice had gone unsteady. She reached across the table and took his hand. “You’re—“ Her voice caught. “You’re really good at this.”
“At pasta?”
“At being here. At showing up. At making me feel like I’m not doing everything alone.”
She was looking at him like he hung the moon.
He was the man who hadn’t told her the truth. He had a framed document in his desk, a young man’s word given years ago to never love a woman like Tessa Thorne. His mother constantly asking who she was. A best friend who deserved to know the firm had outgrown its founding terms.
He should tell her. But she was already carrying enough for Saturday.
Not tonight. After the event.
“I’m proud of you,” he said. “Whatever happens Saturday.”
She leaned across the table and kissed him. Soft. Grateful.
“Thank you. For this. For tonight. For being exactly who you are.”
The words hit him hard. He kissed her back and told himself he was protecting her.
They cleaned up together. She washed while he dried. Normal. Domestic. Easy.
Later, in bed, she curled against his side with her head on his chest. Her breathing slowed and evened out.
Gabriel stared at the ceiling.
Tessa stirred in her sleep, her hand finding his arm. Fingers loose. Trusting.
He’d spent his whole life going somewhere unreachable when things got close enough to matter. He’d been doing it since he was sixteen. He knew the move like muscle memory.
What he hadn’t counted on was how clearly he could see himself doing it now—lying beside her, watching the ceiling, choosing it anyway.
His mother had called twice that morning. He hadn’t answered.
The drawer was three rooms away.
Tomorrow was Saturday and Saturday was hers.
After. He’d tell her after.