A Bride For Abel Greene by Cindy Gerard

out of there. He was marked in L.A. And it was just a matter of time before they killed him.
    “That’s when I ran across your ad,” she said, holding his gaze levelly. “I was on break at work and someone was giggling over the extreme measures a person would take just to get a little—” she cut herself off with a delicate smile “—company.”
    Growing increasingly more uncomfortable, with both her candor and the magnetic pull of her eyes, he rose and added more wood to the fire.
    “I laughed, too,” she said, as he stabbed at the flames with the iron poker. ”At first But I hadn’t come up with a solution to Mark’s problem. Every day I lived in fear that he wouldn’t live to see the next one. I had to get him out of L.A., but we couldn’t just relocate. That took money. Money I didn’t have.
    “My parents weren’t an option. I couldn’t send him there. After all they’d done to him, he would have just run away. And I’d promised myself and Mark that I’d always be there for him.”
    He heard her shifting and settling deeper into his sofa, but he didn’t turn around.
    “I kept thinking about your ad. A part of me was appalled by the idea of answering it. But when nothing else presented itself, I began looking at it more and more as a viable option. You offered security. Safety. Seclusion.
    “And then something happened that made the decision for me.”
    The desolation in her voice had him turning to face her.
    “A boy was shot. A fourteen-year-old kid. In front of our apartment building. A boy who looked like Mark—by a bullet that was meant for him. I answered your ad the next day.”
    She closed her eyes, shook her head. Swallowed hard. Then met his gaze.
    “Was I scared? Yeah. I was scared. The thought of actually committing to this outrageous agreement scared the bejesuz out of me. The reality was, I was willing to make a life commitment to a stranger. The harsh reality was, if I didn’t, I was going to lose my brother. Either way, I was damn scared.”
    He couldn’t look away from her.
    “Ask me if I’m afraid now, Abel.”
    Her voice held him with the same strength as her gaze.
    “Ask me,” she repeated softly, “if after seeing you with my brother, after seeing you bring out a spark of the little boy behind those hoodlum eyes, after seeing him safe, if my desperation paid off.”
    He braced a palm on the mantel and made himself look away.
    “I’m not afraid anymore,” she said on a whisper. “I’m not feeling desperate anymore. I’m confident that there is a place here for Mark. That there’s a place here for me.
    “You’ve given me an option, Abel. The only one I have. And if you’ll give me the chance, I’ll put everything I have into making it work.”
    The conviction in her voice made his chest hurt.
    He needed to say something. He needed to warn her that she’d be running from one source of heartache to another if she hitched her hope to the likes of him.
    But he didn’t. He couldn’t. In truth, he didn’t want to. He wanted to think about what she’d told him. He wanted to accept the trust she’d invested in him.
    And underlying it all, he wanted to savor the sound of her voice saying his name. Like satin and softness it wove itself around him. Like sin and salvation it tempted him to let her stay.
    The cabin suddenly seemed cramped and suffocating. As big as it was, there wasn’t enough room to contain all the feelings that closed in on him.
    Without a word he walked away. Snagging his coat, he shrugged into it and stalked outside. He fed the horses. Stayed with them for a very long time. Thinking of her honesty. Humbled by her valor. Damning her candor—and damning his desire to do right by her.
    He felt cornered. Backed against the wall. She was asking too much. She was asking if she could put her trust in him. A trust he hadn’t earned. A trust he’d told himself was only for hire when there was money on the line.
    He almost wished she’d tried to lie