Gabriel's Rule Read online

  He was so far gone that he didn’t notice when she used her hand to steady the base of his erection and prevent him from pushing too far down her throat. Her inexperience also didn’t seem to bother him as she experimented with different types of strokes and grips. She licked him up and down once and then took him back in her mouth. He started thrusting into her mouth urgently.

  “Riley, stop, I’m gonna come” he said hoarsely. She felt his hands in her hair trying to pull her off but she ignored him and sucked harder. When she swallowed, he groaned and his grip changed so that he was holding her head tight against him as he tried to shove his cock further down her throat. Luckily, she had a good enough grasp on his base to prevent him from gagging her again and she was able to keep up a steady rhythm of sucking and swallowing.

  Within seconds, she heard a harsh shout and then his hot semen coated her tongue. She swallowed instinctively which drew another cry from him as he continued to spurt down her throat. When she felt his hands relax their grip on her head, she gave him one final suckle and then released his softening cock. Before she could say anything, he was dragging her up and over him, his tongue plunging into her mouth. He pushed her back on the bed and began rubbing his cock roughly against her clit. Even only half-hard, the stimulation was enough to have her coming within seconds and she felt her own release coat her thighs. He dropped his head to her chest and held her that way until she could feel his breaths even out as he fell asleep.

  Chapter 14

  Riley knew something was wrong the instant she opened her eyes. The room was pitch dark and the clock said it was two o clock in the morning. A chill ran through her when she saw the empty spot beside her and a light coming underneath the bathroom door directly across the hall from the bedroom. She hurried out of bed and didn’t even hesitate to push the bathroom door open.

  He was sitting with his back against the shower stall, tears streaming down his cheeks. She dropped down in front of him and touched his face. He was ice cold, his skin clammy.

  “Gabe, what’s wrong? Talk to me,” she said, trying to keep the panic from her voice.

  He looked up at her as if just realizing she was there. “Riley?”

  “It’s me Gabe. I’m here.”

  “It’s bad Riley…really, really bad.” The agony in his voice seemed to scrape against her skin like a live wire.

  “Tell me,” she pleaded as she dropped her hands to clasp his wrists. He shook his head, shame burning in his eyes. “Please Gabe.”

  “I saw her. Before…before she never had a face but I saw her tonight.”

  “Who?”

  “I didn’t want to Riley, you have to believe me. She kept telling me she needed me. She told me I had to take care of her. She kept saying my name over and over.” He suddenly pulled free of her and hunched over the toilet and threw up. She stroked his back as he emptied the contents of his stomach over and over. When he sat back again, she stood quickly and dumped emptied the glass holding his toothbrush and filled it with water. She put it in his hands and helped him take a little bit of water into his mouth so he could rinse it and spit back into the cup.

  “I don’t know if it’s real, what I’m seeing.”

  “Did you have a nightmare tonight?” she asked gently.

  He nodded. “It’s always the same woman and she’s in my bed and she’s telling me what to do but I didn’t understand…I didn’t know what she wanted.”

  Riley froze as understanding sunk in. Bile rose in her own throat but she swallowed it back down.

  “Did a woman hurt you Gabe?”

  He nodded again and dropped his head in his hands. His breathing was harsh and strangled.

  “Do you remember how old you were?” She stroked his arms to try and get some warmth in them.

  “Thirteen, maybe fourteen.”

  “It’s okay Gabe, you’re safe now.”

  “I tried to stop her after the first time but she kept coming back and begging me to take care of her.” He started sobbing. “Oh my God, what did I do?” he shouted. “What did I do?” He began hitting himself in the head.

  She grabbed his face between her hands. “Gabe, stop, listen to me.” When he didn’t stop she screamed at him, “Gabe, I need you to come back to me!” He finally stopped and dropped his hands.

  “I’m sorry Riley, I thought I could be what you needed me to be.”

  “You are Gabe. You’re everything I need.” She folded him in her arms and he clung tightly to her. Exhaustion seemed to overtake him and he lowered himself so that his head rested against her abdomen, his arms gripping her waist.

  “Maybe it wasn’t real. Maybe it’s just a bad dream,” he whispered.

  “Maybe,” she said as she stroked his hair, but she knew it wasn’t. Tears streamed down her face as she realized that the man she had fallen so deeply in love with had been raped by his own mother.

  ***

  Gabe stared at the framed degrees on the wall. There were a bunch of plaques on the wall too. It meant the doctor was probably smart. He looked at the schools on the degrees and realized they were ivy-league universities. That was worse because it meant the guy was really smart and that what he had told Gabe was probably true. The door opened from somewhere behind him and he smelled peaches. When she sat down beside him on the stiff couch and took his hand in her own, he smiled.

  “Did you know you smell like peaches?”

  She chuckled and shook her head. “I didn’t know that. Do you at least like peaches?” He smiled and nodded. She stroked his fingers with her thumb. “Dr. Henderson thought you might want to talk to me so he said we could use his office for a while.” Her voice was soft, gentle. There was no censure in her tone, no condemnation.

  She’d stayed with him on that cold bathroom floor for at least an hour, maybe more, and had whispered how much she loved him over and over again. Eventually she had coaxed him back to his bed. He’d been so cold, but she’d wrapped herself around him until he’d drifted off to sleep. When he woke, she was laying on top of him as if protecting his body from some unnamed foe. He’d stayed in bed as she made some phone calls and when she asked him to come and talk to someone he’d said yes. He would do anything for her.

  “I didn’t tell you how much I loved what you did to me last night.” She blushed prettily when she realized what he was referring to.

  “I’d never done that before,” she confessed.

  “I’d never had it done to me before,” he responded. “I love you Riley. I meant to tell you that last night but you distracted me,” he said as he smiled. He watched as she swiped at a stray tear.

  “I love you too Gabe.”

  He pulled their joined hands on his lap and she snuggled against his shoulder. “Dr. Henderson doesn’t think I’m imagining it,” he said quietly. Her hand tightened in his but she let him continue. “The…the woman in my dream always called me Gabriel. My…” he ground to a halt but then finally forced out the next words. “My mom’s the only one who ever called me that when I was growing up.” He let out a harsh sob and felt Riley sit up and kiss him on the forehead.

  “She was always high when it happened so in my head it wasn’t really her. Dr. Henderson says I repressed the memories to protect myself when I was younger but something triggered them.”

  “Like me?” she said carefully. When he felt her tense up, he tightened his hold on her.

  “Or her showing up. It’s not important,” he said, his eyes firmly on hers. He wasn’t going to let Riley blame herself for this. “It was just a matter of time. The way I was with all those women, the way I acted afterwards, it’s all tied to being…” He searched for the right words.

  “Raped,” Riley said softly but the word was so ugly that it felt like she had screamed it. He had yet to say the word out loud even though Dr. Henderson had said that’s what it was.

  “I should have been able to stop it,” he said in a hushed tone.

  “Gabe, if the roles had been different, if it had been
a father and his daughter, would you have expected her to stop it?”

  “No,” he admitted.

  “Then why is it different for you?”

  He shook his head. He didn’t have an answer. “Dr. Henderson wants me to come see him for a while so I can straighten some stuff out in my head.”

  She nodded and put her hand on the back of his neck. She rested her forehead against his cheek.

  “I told you it wouldn’t be easy to be with me,” he finally said.

  “Oh Gabe, being with you is the easiest thing I’ve ever done.”

  Chapter 15

  Gabe’s lungs burned as he slowed his pace to a jog. Running around the neighborhood wasn’t exactly his favorite place for a workout but there hadn’t been enough time to drive up to the park. So he’d clipped a leash on Bella and she had happily run next to him for the last three miles. Even when he sprinted, she easily kept up with him. It had been almost a month since he’d found her and she had settled into his and Riley’s life like she had been there all along. He smiled when his thoughts drifted to Riley and the surprise on her face when he’d joined her in the tiny shower stall this morning and pressed her against the wall. It was still his favorite way to take her but they’d been having fun experimenting with other positions too.

  He’d been to therapy three times already but it was still a struggle to comprehend what had happened to him. He knew in his mind what the doctor and Riley told him about it not being his fault made sense, but it was still a challenge to admit that his choice had been taken away. The rehab facility had called the day after his first meeting with Dr. Henderson to let him know his mom had taken off again. He’d been a mess because he couldn’t stop thinking about how he would react if and when she showed up at his apartment.

  An emergency session with Dr. Henderson had helped but it was Riley’s suggestion that he move that had intrigued him. Not only because he would get that distance from his mother that he needed, but also because it would be an opportunity to move things forward with Riley. He still had moments of panic that she would leave him, but she never showed any signs of being disgusted with him and she told him she loved him every chance she got. He was starting to believe she was in it with him for the long haul.

  Gabe rounded the corner and slowed to a walk when he saw his building. He would have liked to have run longer but Riley had talked him into taking her bowling again. This time she’d made a party out of it and invited Shane, Logan and Logan’s younger sister, Savannah, who had just moved back to Seattle after graduating from college someplace in the Midwest. Gabe stopped when a scream pierced the air. He heard a man’s voice shouting and then another scream. His heart stopped when he saw Riley at the other end of the block struggling with a man by her car. He shouted her name and started running. Fear pierced his gut when he saw the man punch Riley and she went limp. He screamed her name again as he the reality hit him. No matter how fast he ran, he would never reach them in time.

  ***

  Riley’s vision had dimmed when Paul hit her and she tried to struggle against him as he pushed her into the black sedan parked next to her car. She thought she heard Gabe shouting her name, but Paul was screaming practically in her ear so it was hard to make anything else out. She’d left the apartment to grab something from her car and he was just there and on her so fast it had taken several precious seconds to even realize it was him.

  “Get in the car you fucking bitch!” Her head bounced off the top of the car as he shoved her down into the driver’s seat. “Do you think you can destroy my life and just walk away you slut?” He was so enraged that spittle actually landed on her as he ranted. “You are coming back to Texas with me and you are going to tell you parents that you fucked up and that we are getting married.”

  “You’re insane,” she said softly as she realized he truly was. She suddenly knew that if he got her all the way in his car, she wouldn’t walk away from this. She wouldn’t ever see Gabe again. Adrenaline surged through her as she kicked out at his knee. It didn’t drop him like when Gabe had done it all those weeks ago to Stubby at the bar, but it gave her the advantage she needed to scramble free of the car. She only made it a few steps before he grabbed her by the hair and slammed her down against the roof. He spun her around to face him and then she felt the cold metal of the gun pressed to her forehead.

  “You don’t get to ruin my life and walk away,” he said coldly and she saw his finger move on the trigger. A split second later he was gone and it took Riley several seconds to figure out why. Paul was on the ground, the gun laying several feet away, and Bella was latched on to his arm. He screamed in pain as he tried to push the dog off but she dug in and held on. And then Gabe was there, pulling her into his arms.

  “Riley? Riley, talk to me honey, are you okay?” She nodded but couldn’t get any words out. He checked her quickly and before she could stop him, he had dropped to the ground and was punching Paul over and over. As blood spurted from Paul’s nose and mouth and he stopped screaming, Riley finally came to her senses.

  “Gabe stop!” When he ignored her she ran around so she could face him and she dropped down in front of him. “Gabe, please stop. He’s done.” When he kept pounding, she screamed at him to stop and he finally seemed to register her presence. She reached out to him with shaking hands and glanced down to see if Paul was still alive. Panic seized her when he didn’t move and visions of Gabe in prison flashed through her head. Bella, sensing Paul was no longer a threat, released his arm and went to sit next to Gabe.

  “Did he hurt you?” Gabe was asking her. She shook her head and then cried out in relief when she saw Paul move. She threw herself into Gabe’s arms and he pulled her away from the bloodied man. She clung to him as people started gathering around them and when the police showed up she hoped to God they wouldn’t take him from her.

  Epilogue

  “Guys, can you find someplace else to do that?” Shane muttered to the two lovebirds who were making out in the doorway as he stood in the hall, a heavy box in hand. Riley jumped back in embarrassment but Gabe wasn’t about to let her go.

  He pulled her back in his arms, turned to Shane and said, “take a break” and then slammed the door shut in his face.

  “They’re at it again, huh?” Logan said as made his way towards the apartment, a lamp in one hand, a decorative pillow in the other.

  Shane dumped the box on the floor and motioned to the stuff in Logan’s arms. “Could you have possibly picked anything lighter to carry up here?”

  Ignoring the snide comment, Logan put the stuff down and looked around. “They picked a nice place, huh?

  It was nice. The apartment building was in a wooded area with plenty of trails nearby. There were only 4 units per building and Gabe and Riley had snagged an upper unit. He hadn’t been inside yet, but based on the position of the building he guessed they had a nice view of the huge pond that the complex surrounded.

  “They deserve it,” Shane said softly.

  “Logan?”

  “Up here Savannah,” Logan said as he leaned over the railing and waved his hand. “I’m gonna go get another load.”

  “Yeah, maybe a pack of tissues this time,” Shane said sarcastically. Logan gave him the finger as he walked away, but quickly dropped it when he passed his sister at the top of the stairs. Shane gave in to his need to watch the beautiful young woman walking towards him, Bella in tow. But then he remembered who she was and who and was and he forced his eyes away from her. He bit back a curse and then turned to pound his fist on the door.

  ***

  “We need to let them in,” Riley said against his lips.

  “They can wait. It’s a nice day out,” Gabe said as pulled her closer and slipped his tongue into her mouth. She kissed him back and rubbed her body against him.

  He pulled her tight against him as a brief flash of losing her went through his mind. He’d get them every once in a while since Paul’s attack. The man would rot in prison for a long time, but G
abe still found himself reluctant to let Riley out of his sight. She seemed understanding about it and stepped up her efforts to keep in touch with him wherever she was. If his protectiveness annoyed her, she didn’t show it.

  It had been almost six weeks since that horrific day. They’d gone to the hospital so Riley could get checked out for her injuries, which turned out to be minor, thank God, and that’s when he had asked her to move in with him. They’d been surrounded by people and chaos but he needed to know that she would always be with him. The new apartment they had found was close to the vet Riley had found a job with and the university was just a few minutes away by car.

  It was scary to be going back to school to finish his degree in architecture but he’d always wanted to finish his education one day. He knew it meant seeing less of Riley every day since he would be taking different hours for his construction work, but she assured him that they would make time for each other. His therapy had continued to be a struggle and he had made enough progress where he could admit what had happened to him hadn’t been his fault. But using the words ‘mother’ and ‘rape’ in the same sentence was still something he couldn’t do.

  He hadn’t seen or heard from his mother at all and he was still working through how to confront her with what she had done to him. Dr. Henderson thought it would help him move on, but Gabe wondered if his mother would even comprehend anything since she seemed to be on a constant high. He’d deal with it when the time came, he reminded himself, and focused on the woman in his arms.