Her Every Pleasure by Gaelen Foley Page A

didn’t you make your presence known?”
    She lifted her shoulders in a delicate shrug. “You looked like you did not want to be disturbed. Besides,” she admitted, “I was a little afraid of you. I thought it might be best to wait until morning to come and knock on the door. But the candles,” she said again. “Do you light them for someone you loved?”
    “No.” He dropped his gaze, silent for a moment. “I light them for the men I’ve killed in battle. Glad you asked?”
    When he glanced at her again, the trace of a frown wrinkled her smooth brow, but she appeared undaunted.
    She picked up the bottle of wine and refilled his glass for him. Maybe he looked like he needed it. “Does that have something to do with why you’re living out here in the middle of nowhere?”
    He shrugged. “All I seek now is peace.” Then he eyed her cautiously. “You Gypsies are said to possess occult abilities. Perhaps from your people’s lore, you can explain how this can be. The strangest thing…” His words trailed off as he hesitated, fearing she might doubt his sanity if he revealed his secret to her.
    On the other hand, God knew he had to tell someone.
    “Gabriel?” she whispered, tilting her head as she studied him more closely. “What is it?”
    He passed a guarded glance over her lovely face. “I saw something when I was wounded. The surgeon…later told me that my heart stopped.” He watched her reaction with cloaked intensity.
    She narrowed her eyes, then folded her arms along the edge of the table. “Do you mean to say you were…?”
    “Dead. Briefly. Yes.”
    She appeared to have been rendered speechless, then she lifted her eyebrows, taking this in stride. “I see,” she said after a moment.
    “The surgeon said my pulse came back approximately two minutes later. I remember that. The choking feeling. I could see him trying to revive me. I could see them all working on me—as if I were a ghost floating up above my body.”
    “Really?”
    He nodded. “I told my brother, but not even Derek believed me. What say you? Can your Gypsy secrets tell me what this means?”
    Perhaps the tone of quiet desperation in his voice had roused her sympathy. She reached out to him, laying her hand on his forearm. She gave it a firm squeeze of steadying comfort. “All it means is it wasn’t your time.”
    “I didn’t want to come back,” he breathed, shaking his head. “I wanted to stay there, where it was peaceful, but they wouldn’t let me.”
    “Who?”
    “I don’t know. I could not see their faces. The light was too brilliant. Angels, maybe. Ghosts? They told me I had to go back. That there was still something I had to do.”
    Her eyes were wide as she searched his face in amazement.
    Gabriel summoned up a rueful smile. “Now you think I’m mad.”
    “No—”
    “Believe me, Sophia, I know how absurd this all sounds. I am a commonsense man. A military man. I have never indulged in flights of fancy.” He shrugged. “But I know what I saw.”
    She tossed back the last swallow of her wine, probably needing it at this point. She mulled over his words for a moment, then slid him a guarded look. “Do you have any idea what you’re still supposed to do?”
    He shook his head. “That’s what I came out here to try to figure out. It’s quiet here. Peaceful. If there’s any place meant for contemplation…” His words trailed off.
    “Hm,” she said.
    He had not told her
all
of what he had seen in those weird, suspended moments, but he had said too much already. If he told her about the fiery part of his vision, that brief, hellish tour of the smoky battlefields of his past and all the death and agony he had caused his fellow man, she would think he was a lunatic for certain.
    “At least I know one thing,” he declared in a confidential tone after a moment. “I know what my destiny isn’t. It’s not going back to the cavalry. I could not possibly kill another human being ever again. After what I saw,