She searched his face, holding her breath. But no memories rushed through her, no recollections of the hard curve of his cheek or the slightly wicked twist to his sensual lips. No memories of a thousand little intimacies between lovers. Nothing!
He helped her sit up. His hands lingered possessively on her back, causing a sudden heat across her body. A heat she couldn’t understand. Calleigh licked her lips nervously.
“Um… You are… You must be… Gabriel De León?” she ventured, giving him a shy glimpse.
After saying those words, Calleigh almost hoped he would deny it, and that her real boyfriend, a kind-faced man with gentle eyes, would walk through the door. The Spanish tycoon’s hands on her back paused and she felt ice going up and down her spine.
“So… You do recognize me.”
She shook her head.
“No, I’m afraid not. Miguel and Rafael, your two employees… and Doctor Levi… They told me your name. They also said you were on your way to join me here.”
Gabriel looked down at her, searching her face.
“Dr. Levi told me you had amnesia. I didn’t believe it. I really didn’t want to. But it’s true, isn’t it? You really don’t remember anything about me?”
Calleigh looked at him, more thoughtfully this time. She could only imagine how that must hurt him!
“I’m so sorry…” she whispered, rubbing her forehead. “I keep trying to remember people, places, experiences… Well, there’s one thing I can remember and that is your employee, Miguel, pulling me out from my car. I will never be able to thank him enough for saving my life. It was a lucky thing he and Rafael were in the car behind me!”
His lips seemed to curve imperceptibly.
“Yes. Very lucky indeed…” Gabriel said and sat up straight. “You will be leaving the hospital today.”
‘To go where?’ Calleigh said to herself then she took a deep breath.
“Today?”
“Right now,” he replied briskly.
“But…”
She bit her lip then blurted out.
“But I still can’t remember anything! I hoped when I saw you…”
“You hoped seeing me would bring your memory back?”
She lowered her head and nodded miserably. There was no point in feeling disappointed, Calleigh told herself fiercely, or making him feel worse about it than he must already!
But she couldn’t stop the lump in her throat. She’d been counting on the idea that when she saw the face of the man she loved, the man who loved her, her amnesia would end. Unless they didn’t love each other as much as they should... Unless she’d gotten pregnant by a man who was barely more than a one-night stand.
“I’m sure you must feel so hurt,” Calleigh replied, trying to push away her sudden fear, then she continued haltingly. “I can only imagine how it must feel, to love someone who can’t remember you.”
‘Do you love me, Gabriel De León?’ she thought desperately, trying to read his face. ‘Do I love you? Why can’t I remember how it was between us? Why can’t I remember your kisses, your embraces? How we were together?’
“Shhh, querida (Spanish for ‘dear’). It’s alright. You will remember… soon.”
Lowering his head, Gabriel kissed her tenderly on the forehead. The warmth of his nearness was like the summer sun on a winter’s day. Then he lifted her chin, and his dark eyes whipped through her like a blast of heat.
“Don’t worry, Calleigh. In time, I’m sure everything will come back to you… Everything. I promise.”
Looking into his face gratefully, Calleigh realized that her first impression of him had been utterly wrong. Gabriel De León wasn’t cruel. He was kind, sweet, patient. How else to explain the fact that he could be so gentle and patient and loving, pushing aside his own hurt to focus only on her?
Calleigh took a deep breath and made a silent promise to herself… and to the man near her. She would be as brave as he was. Ignoring the lump in her throat, she pushed the blankets aside, decided to start dressing.
“I’ll get dressed right away and we can go,” she said quite determined.
Gabriel stopped her.
“Wait just one second. There’s something else we need to talk about.”
She knew instantly what he meant to discuss. And without the barrier of blankets between them, in just her paper-thin hospital gown, Calleigh felt painfully bare, vulnerable in every way. She yanked the blankets back over her body, tugging them halfway to her neck.
“Dr. Levi told you, didn’t he?” she whispered.
“Yes.”
His voice was low, almost grim.
“Are you… happy?” she said slowly and her voice trembled. “About the news?”
Calleigh held her breath as his darkly handsome face stared down at her. When he finally spoke, his voice was charged with some emotion she didn’t recognize.
“I must say I was surprised.”
“So… this baby wasn’t something we planned?” Calleigh asked while searching his gaze.
Gabriel’s hands tightened, twisting the blanket in his grip. He glanced down at it, then looked at her.
“You’re so different… I’ve never seen you like this,” he said in a low voice.
His black gaze hungrily caressed her face. With his fingertips, he brushed some dark tendrils from her cheek.
“No makeup. Bare.”
She tried to pull away.
“Oh… I’m sure I look terrible.”
But he drew her closer. His eyes were dark as he looked down at her, making her shiver from deep within.
“Gabriel, please, answer me. Be honest with me… Are you happy about the baby?” she asked softly.
He put his arms around her.
“I’m going to take good care of you.”
‘Why won’t you answer? What’s going on?’
She swallowed, then lifted her head to give him a weak smile.
“Don’t worry, I’m not an invalid. I’m able to take care of myself. I just hope the amnesia will disappear in a day or two. I believe Dr. Levi said something about a specialist…”
His arms tightened around her, cradling her against his hard chest.
“You don’t need another doctor,” Gabriel said roughly. “You just need to come home with me and let me take care of you.”
She could feel the beat of his heart against her cheek through his black button-down shirt. She was enveloped in his masculine scent, sandalwood, and amber, exotic and woodsy.
Against her will, she closed her eyes and breathed in his smell, heard the beat of his heart, felt his warmth. Everything else faded. The private hospital room, the nurses and doctor visible through the window of the door, the sound of one of Gabriel’s men speaking urgently into his cellphone in Spanish, the antiseptic smell, the beeps of the machines…
Everything faded… There was only this. Only him. Held securely in his strong arms, for the first time since her accident, Calleigh felt safe and loved. She felt as if she had a place in the world. With him.
He kissed her hair softly. She felt the warmth of his breath, the hot caress of his lips, and a shiver went over her. Fear? Desire? Did he love her? Calleigh reached upward, cupping his rough jawline with her hands.
Though his clothes were sharply pressed, the dark shadow on his chin suggested he’d changed clothes on the plane without bothering to shave. He’d rushed here from the States. He’d flown all night. Did that mean love? That he really loved her?
“Why didn’t you come to London with me for my stepfather’s funeral?” she asked slowly.
He paused. When he spoke, he seemed to choose his words with care.
“I was busy in New York acquiring a new company. Believe me, querida,” he said, “I never wanted to be away from you for this long.”
Calleigh felt there was something he wasn’t telling her. Or was that just her own confusion playing tricks on her? She couldn’t trust anything in this hazy, empty world, not even her own mind!
“But why…”
“You are so beautiful, Calleigh,” he said, cupping her face, then exhaled in a rush. “I almost feared I’d never see your face again.”
“When you heard about the accident, you mean? You were worried about me?” she said in a small voice.
When he didn’t answer, she licked her lips. With a deep breath, she asked the question that had been burning through her like hot lava.
“Because we love each other?”
His jaw clenched as he took a deep breath.
“You were a virgin when I seduced you, Calleigh,” he replied in a low voice. “You’d never been with a man before I took you to my bed three months ago.”
She’d been a virgin? A wave of relief washed over her. Learning she was pregnant by a boyfriend she couldn’t remember had been a tremendous shock. She’d wondered why they weren’t married… wondered all sorts of things.
Well, if Gabriel had been her one and only lover, if she’d been a virgin at twenty-five, surely that said something about her character? But did it also mean love? She looked up into his handsome face, opening her mouth to ask those same questions running around her mind since he entered her room.
‘Do I love you? Do you love me?’
But then Calleigh stopped. There was something beneath his darkly penetrating eyes. Something he wasn’t saying. Something hidden beneath his words. But before she could understand what her intuition was telling her, Gabriel placed his broad hands over hers.
The warmth of his fingers burned her, intertwined with her own. Trapping her, but not against her will. Her heart pounded faster.
“Get ready to leave, bebé. (Spanish for ‘baby’)”
Gabriel lowered his head to kiss her on the temple, running his hands up and down her bare forearms.
“I want to take you home.”
Her breathing became short and shallow as he touched her skin. Little prickles of sensation sped up her arms, down her back, making her hair stand on end. The tingle swirled across her earlobes, down her neck, making her naked breasts beneath her thin hospital gown suddenly feel tight and full.
She tried to remember the question she’d been asking, but it had already swept from her mind.
“Alright,” Calleigh breathed, looking up into his gorgeous face.
Gallantly, Gabriel helped her from the bed, lifting her gently to her feet. She was more aware than ever of how much taller he was, how much more powerful. He was at least six inches taller, with an extra hundred pounds of pure muscle.
Looking up at him, Calleigh forgot everything but her own longing and fascinated desire for the man towering over her like a dark angel.
“I’m sorry it took so long for me to reach you, querida,” he said in a low voice. “But I’m here now.”
He kissed her head softly, his arms tightening around her as he pulled her into an embrace.
“And I’m never going to let you out of my sight again.”
Beneath heavily lidded eyes, Gabriel watched Calleigh as he led her to the black limousine purring on the street in front of the hospital. She wasn’t faking her amnesia. In spite of his initial incredulity, he now had no doubt. She had no idea of who he was or what she’d done. And now she was pregnant with his child. This detail changed everything. He gently helped her to the car. She had no luggage. One of his men had taken her smashed Aston-Martin to the garage, while the other had gone to make quiet amends for the smashed postbox. Calleigh wore the black silk dress and carried the black clutch purse from her stepfather’s funeral yesterday. The black dress clung to her breasts and hips when she walked, the silk shimmering and sliding against her hips and breasts. 
Marry him? ‘Yes!’ Calleigh thought in a daze, looking up into his handsome face. Feeling his strong, rough hands against the softness of her skin, the warmth of his touch seared her, tracing down her neck to her breasts and lower still. How could any man be so masculine, so beautiful, so powerful all at once? So perfect? Gabriel was everything her tore, empty, frightened soul had desired. He would protect her. Love her. He would complete her life. ‘Yes, I will!’ But even as the words rose to her lips, something stopped her. Something she couldn’t understand made her pull her face away from his touch.“Marry you?” she whispered.&nbs
Sunlight reflected off the water as Calleigh and Gabriel took the motoscafo, a Venetian private water taxi, from the Marco Polo Airport. The September weather was bright and warm as they crossed the lagoon, passing by the Piazza San Marco and the Rialto Bridge on the way to their hotel. Italy… Venice… Memories started to pierce his heart. Gabriel had never expected to return here again. But he said to himself that sometimes a man had to change the cards in the middle of the game. He swore to himself that he would do whatever it took, be as romantic a fool as any man could be, in order to lure Calleigh into marriage before her memory returned. It was the only way to make her pay for the wrong she had done to him. Gabriel loo
They stood on the dock as his bodyguard-assistant, Miguel, paid the young Italian taxi driver and organized the luggage. But all Calleigh could see was Gabriel. He was so breathtakingly handsome, tall, and strong... He seemed a demigod… like he left Heaven and came to Earth only for her… At this thought, she smiled slightly, almost imperceptibly. He really was there for her, to help her remember their wonderful love story, to recall how it has been between them before she lost her memory. Seeing her wardrobe in her stepfather’s house, Calleigh knew, without the shadow of a doubt, that she had been extremely hard to handle before the accident. The way she dressed, all the useless parties, her continuous running around from one city to another… It was time to put that aside and embrace this strange, ne
The sun was starting to set, giving the twilight a pink-and-orange glow with a rapidly chilling autumn bite in the air. As a light fog blew in from the lagoon, Gabriel reached for Calleigh’s hand. His hand wrapped around her smaller one, their naked palms pressing together, and she gave an involuntary shiver that had nothing to do with the cooling night. He paused on the walkway between the piazzetta and the canal.“Cold?” She nodded, because… how could she tell him the truth? How could she tell him that his every touch exhilarated and frightened her in equal measure?“Then we should do something about it.” Behind his head, Calleigh could see the Byzantine white domes, arches, and sharp
She swallowed, staring at his profile, very aware of what he just said and the bed behind her.“Well, um… Not anymore…” Calleigh whispered.“You won’t be hearing me complaining…” Gabriel said and a little mischievous smile appeared on his lips.“Nope… Thank you very much. New me… new habits.” Anxious, she looked at the bed and the couch.“You take the bed,” he said and the smile was now long gone. Standing up, he closed his laptop. His dark gaze, which had been so hot when he’d nearly kissed her near St. Marco’s Piazza, had suddenly cooled.“I’ll work in the office so I don’t disturb you. I’ll sleep on the couch when I’m tired.”&n
Calleigh had been smiling at him, but now she felt suddenly shy and kinda frightened. She put her hand to her hair, which yesterday had hung past her breasts and was now touching slightly her collarbone.“What?! What it looks like? I just had cut my hair. I felt it was time to make some changes about myself, about my image. So, I decided to start with my hair… These romantic waves caught my eye in a magazine and… here’s the result! A new wonderful haircut.”“I can see that…”“So, since it’s so obvious, why are you so mad about it? Was I supposed to ask for your permission?” she retorted pertly, squaring her shoulders. “Come on, Gabriel! Get used to it! It’s not like I cut an arm or something. It will grow back.” H
Gabriel looked just like the dark pirate she’d imagined, the one who’d come to plunder the medieval city, to take what he wanted and burn the rest. Calleigh blinked. How had she come up with such a brutal, cruel image? Where had that come from?“I saw you coming down those stairs in a long red dress… Such a powerful, wonderful vision. Pure perfection,” he said softly. “You were on the arm of my greatest business rival, but I knew at once that I would take you away from him. He had no chance against my determination to have you as part of my life.” Slowly, he walked up the stairs toward her.“I had to have all to myself. I would have taken you from the devil himself.” As Gabriel came up the stairs toward her, Calleigh was unable to move. Un