Page 22 of Purchase Power
Chapter 7
Gabriel Manor was one of the strangest, yet most beautiful places Lucy had ever encountered. Too bad she couldn’t see most of it.
She could see some of the grounds, though. As soon as she woke up to the sounds of breakfast delivered in the other room, she threw on a sweatshirt and took a peek outside. The overnight rains had given way to sunlight streaming through trees and illuminating the green grass growing twelve feet below window. On the other hand, this made things look much warmer than they felt, which drove Lucy back inside to put on some yoga pants.
She almost took a few pictures before remembering the request that she explicitlynotdo that. After breakfast, she rolled out the yoga mat by the window and stumbled her way through a few foreign poses that stretched out her thighs but left a small kink in her back. A shower warmed her back up, and by the time she dressed in a simple shirt and pair of jeans, she was ready to take on the day.
Except she couldn’t really do much with it.
Lucy turned on the TV and opened her laptop, taking in the sunlight before the cloud cover returned. She had to put down her laptop and get her sweatshirt again, though, because the longer she sat, the more she realized she was surrounded by cold air. She had sat back down and opened her Google Docs when a maid knocked at the door and offered to take out the trash and make the bed, as if this were a hotel and Lucy was due proper turn-down service. The only words to pass the maid’s lips after announcing herself were “sorry” and “I’ll be back tomorrow.” Lucy glanced at the clock. Apparently, turn-down was at ten-fifteen. She should probably remember that, if she didn’t want people walking in on her when she was naked from the shower.
Lucy logged back into her laptop, ass on couch and bare feet up on the coffee table.
“My first day in Gabriel Manor.”She made a note off to the side that she needed to change the name for any future publication, but she could come back to that later.“So far, Mr. Gabriel has no sexual interest in me. He came by to say hello last night and make sure I was comfortable in my quarters, but didn’t even stare at my tits or give me a come-on. I was almost sure that he would want to have a quickie, at the very least, but now I’m wondering if he’s saving himself up for something crazier. Maybe he’s a total kinkster? There are metal loops on my bed. It’s definitely a BDSM bed, not that I’ve found any other evidence. No sex toys and no whips or chains. Kinda disappointing.”
Anytime now… she would come up with a better angleanymoment…
“Noah Gabriel is…”
Is what?Waswhat? Lucy tapped her finger against her chin, the laptop balancing precariously between her knees.Hot? Has a nice dick? Smells good? Made me come? Oh, is stinking rich?That was all she knew about him so far. That and he had a nice house, assuming it was actually is.
Lucy opened a new browser window and typed in Noah’s name. Right away, she was presented with a Midwestern folk band with the same exact name.These Bible names, man. They’re in everything.Upon further scrolling, she found a jewelry company that seemed almost promising. Yet upon perusing the website, she realized they had nothing to do with the man who had bought her acquaintanceship for a month. What had Candace the steward said the night before? That Noah was scrubbed from the internet?
That didn’t make any sense. He might not have social media or a website, but he must be mentionedsomewhere.Dating gossip…. LinkedIn… a corporate page describing how he made his money. A person, no matter how much money they made, could not simply scrub themselves that well from the internet. It didn’t work. The internet was forever. As soon as an article was up, it was findable. Maybe it was buried on page ten of search results, but Lucy would find it, damnit. She simply needed the right keywords.
Noah Gabriel Billionaire.
Nothing.
Noah Gabriel New England New York Jersey Connecticut Massachusetts Rhode Island.
Nada.
Noah Gabriel thirties.
Nope.
Sighing, Lucy flung her head against the back of the cough. Her laptop teetered between her legs.What am I supposed to do? I don’t know this guy well enough to know what to search for on the internet.She wasn’t even looking for a Wikipedia page or journal articles about his business anymore. She simply wantedsomething.Proof that he existed outside of her head.
Voices raised outside the window. Lucy’s interest was piqued enough that she set aside her laptop and strolled to the sliding glass door that led out to the balcony.
She barely had one foot out in the chilly morning air before seeing a big, brown horse trot by below.
“Hang on! I’ll be right there!” The horse cantered as Noah picked up the pace, one hand on his hip and a thick sweater around his chest. Lucy barely caught a proper glimpse of him before the horse turned the corner of the house, its tail swishing in the breeze. “You need to slow down!” Noah’s voice eventually faded away. “She’s getting away from you!”
There had been nothing but curt confidence in his voice. Whatever he was after, he wasn’t afraid of it getting hurt and inconveniencing his day.There’s something to be said for the way he was riding that horse, though.Such precision and posture suggested that Noah was more comfortable in the saddle than most people ever would be. Certainly not Lucy, who had ridden a horse before, but only with the supervision of camp counselors and a giant helmet on her head.
She returned to her couch and wrapped a blanket around her shoulders.Noah Gabriel horse ridingshe typed into Google.
Bingo.
It was an old article for nearly twenty years ago. A regional equestrian quarterly had written a piece about “Young & Impressive Noah Gabriel, A Burgeoning Master of the Horse.” The text itself was nothing for Lucy to aspire to copy. Besides, the only pertinent bit of information was that Noah had recently won the first place trophy at the Juniors’ Equestrian Championship of New England, where he beat out boys older and technically more experienced than him. Lest Lucy worry that it wasn’t the same Noah, a picture was provided. A large, rectangular picture depicting one boy and one grown man.
The boy was very much Ten-Year-Old, Pre-Pubescent Noah Gabriel. The nose. The hair. The rigid way he stood, even when he was supposedly celebrating a win. The boy may have been barely five feet tall and squinted at the camera, but Lucy would never see anyone but Noah in that grainy black and white photo.
“Crowned champion, Mr. Noah Gabriel (L) poses with his stepfather, Mr. Ronald Gray (R ) in front of Countryside Stables and Pastures. Young Mr. Gabriel has a promising future ahead of him as a master equestrian.”
Stepfather, hm? That was always ripe for fucked up emotions and messed up feelings. Good thing Lucy wasn’t the type to exploitthat.
