Page 29 of Into These Eyes
I do just that, grateful for the relief after standing in my heels too long. As he busies himself with mugs and tea bags, I can’t resist the urge to kick my shoes off under the table, freeing my feet from the torturous devices I loathe.
“Sugar? Milk?” he asks.
“Just one sugar, thanks.” With his back to me, I study his smooth movements, the way his muscles ripple and flow beneath his tight t-shirt and, with his head mere centimetres from the ceiling, how imposing his size is in this small space.
I close my eyes to stop the thoughts. My father just died. My father, the man who killed my mother and kept it a secret for sixteen years. My father, who willingly allowed an innocent young man to go to prison. That’s what I need to think about. Nothing else.
After resting my tired, puffy eyes for a while, Gavin places a mug of black tea in front of me and takes the seat opposite, his bare knees briefly brushing against mine. He frowns slightly and looks under the table, and I realise he must have touched one of my shoes.
“Good,” he says simply, and takes a careful sip of his tea. “Do you have someone, Jamie? So you’re not alone tonight?”
“I … No. Not really.” His curious stare sends heat crawling up my neck. “I work a lot,” I explain, though why I need to explain anything to Gavin Lake is a foreign idea, but I don’t seem capable of stopping myself. “Raising my sister and building a career takes up a lot of time.”
He nods with understanding, though he has no idea what my life’s been like.
“And your sister’s away, training?”
“She’s down in Goulburn at the Police Academy. Only has a few more weeks until she’s finished.”
“So,” he says, turning his mug around and around, “you’re alone for the first time in your life?”
I glance up from the large, strong fingers spinning the mug and look into his eyes. That hasn’t even occurred to me. The last few months have been a little strange with Anika gone, but I’ve been busy with work and visiting Dad in hospital every night. Now that he’s gone, there’s only work left. “Yeah, I guess I am.” A lump grows in my throat, but I force it down, focusing my attention elsewhere. “Why are you so good at this?”
He tilts his head. “At what?”
“How you’re treating me, how you’re keeping me calm, being so kind when I’m the last person who deserves it?”
“Well, for one, youdodeserve it.” He shifts uncomfortably in his seat and his knee brushes mine again. “And secondly, I managed to get a degree in psychology while I was locked up.”
I stare at him, seeing him through new, thoroughly astonished eyes. I’d never put any thought into what he’d been doing in prison. If I had, I don’t think getting a degree of any kind would have been on my list of possibilities.
“Is that what you’re doing? Shrinking me?”
He shakes his head. “No. What I’m doing, is just being here for you.”
Those expressive eyes of his tell me he means it.
He lets out a long breath. “Besides, I’m a convicted murderer, which means my degree is useless. I’ll never be able to practice.”
As his words sink into my muddled brain, without any thought at all, I reach across the table and gently wrap my fingers aroundhis wrist. His busy hand stills on the mug, my touch snapping his eyes from mine to the grip I have on him.
“Gavin. I’m going to change that. I’m going to make sure you’ll be able to do whatever you want with your life. Without restrictions. As a free and innocent man.”
With a reassuring squeeze, I let go and wait for him to acknowledge what I’ve just said. But he can’t stop staring at his wrist, leaving me wondering if he even heard me. Until his eyes swing up and meet mine.
“You?” he asks. “You’ll do that?”
“Of course. You’re the reason I became a criminal lawyer.”
He blinks at me, and when his hand comes up to his neatly trimmed stubble, I notice the tremble in his fingers. He seems completely rattled. “You don’t have to,” he says quietly.
“No one’s going to fight harder to clear your name than me.”
The way he looks at me in that moment sends my temperature skyrocketing. There’s something I can’t read in those blue eyes. Even though I can’t name it, whatever it is, whatever he’s thinking feels … special.
Breaking eye contact, I clutch the front of my blouse and fan it against my skin. “It’s so hot in here. How do you stand it?”
“I’m used to having no choice in the matter.”
