him of showing even a veneer of civilised behaviour.
A loss of control that had touched an equally primitive need deep inside Bryn.
Heat gushed between her thighs, the nubbin swelling, pulsing, in the dampness of her curls as Gabriel lowered his head and sucked one nipple deep into the heat of his mouth even as the thumb and finger of his other hand captured and plucked its twin into the same throbbing needing.
Again and again he suckled her nipple, remorselessly caressing and squeezing its twin, both just short of pain, until Bryn was wild, mindless with hunger, with a need that pulsed and ached between her thighs and caused her to groan, to arch her spine, forcing her breast even deeper into the tormenting heat of Gabriel’s mouth as he pressed his thigh rhythmically against that swollen nubbin.
‘Gabriel?’ Bryn gasped in protest as he released her breast to look up at her.
‘Come for me, Bryn,’ he encouraged throatily. ‘Watch me as I take you over the edge. No way, Bryn!’ he refused fiercely as she used the last slender thread of her control to defy him by turning her head away. ‘Do you want me to stop?’ he rasped harshly. ‘Look at me now, Bryn, and tell me you want me to stop!’
A sob caught in her throat as she slowly turned back to him, instantly losing herself in the glittering black pools of his feverish gaze.
‘Tell me to stop, Bryn, and I will,’ he encouraged huskily.
‘I—I can’t,’ she sobbed. ‘Don’t stop, Gabriel!’ she urged achingly as her fingers tightened in his hair, drawing him back towards her breasts. ‘Please don’t stop!’
‘Look at me this time, Bryn,’ he encouraged softly, his breath a warm caress across the aching moistness of her swollen nipple. ‘I want to look into your eyes as you come for me.’ His tongue flicked out, a tormenting lash against her swollen and aching nipple, continuing to rasp that tongue against her, his gaze continuing to hold hers as he released the button of her jeans before sliding the zip slowly down.
Bryn couldn’t have looked away if she had tried, her pleasure swelling, rising out of control, at the eroticism of watching Gabriel as he now parted his lips about her nipple before suckling, gently at first, and then more deeply, her breathing hitching, fracturing as she felt his hand against the heat of her abdomen as it slid beneath the red lace of her panties, his fingers lightly circling her swollen nubbin.
Again and again those tormenting fingers stroked, above and then below that swollen nubbin, dipping his fingers into the dampness of her channel before slowly caressing but never quite touching her right where she most craved his touch, never giving her the pressure there that she ached for.
‘Please, Gabriel,’ Bryn gasped when she couldn’t bear the torment a moment longer. ‘Please! Oh, yes,’ she gasped, her hands clinging to his shoulders, her thighs thrusting up instinctively as his fingers finally brushed lightly over that aching nubbin. ‘Harder, Gabriel! Harder!’ She cried out as the pleasure built, higher and then higher still as he increased the pressure and speed of his stroking fingers.
‘Let go, Bryn,’ Gabriel encouraged harshly against the creaminess of her breast. ‘Come for me.’ He captured the swollen nubbin between his fingers, squeezing as his mouth returned to her breast, drawing greedily on her nipple as he felt that nubbin throb and then pulse between his fingers as Bryn shattered into a shuddering, gasping climax, as he took it all, unwilling, unable to stop, until he had wrung out every last shuddering, trembling ounce of her orgasm.
‘Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God!’ Her head dropped down weakly onto Gabriel’s shoulder as she continued to quiver and shake and cling to him in the aftermath of her pleasure.
Gabriel took her into his arms and held her tightly against his chest, his breathing as ragged and uneven as hers. ‘And that, my beautiful Bryn, is why I refuse to walk away from you. From this. From us,’ he told her gruffly. ‘Not even if you beg me to.’
Bryn wanted to beg, not for Gabriel to walk away, but for him to continue making love to her.
Again and again.
Which was why she had to walk away.
CHAPTER TEN
THE NEXT TWO weeks were absolute hell for Bryn, compelled, as Gabriel had promised she would be, to go to Archangel and see him on a daily basis as they dealt with putting the final details of the exhibition into place.
Not that he ever attempted, or even indicated he wished, to repeat the intimacy of that night at his apartment. Oh, no, Gabriel had a much more subtle torment than that, as he took every opportunity to touch her, always seemingly accidentally: brushing lightly against her to emphasise a point, placing his hand on hers, or at the sensitive base of her spine, or the glide of her hips, whenever the opportunity arose.
And he did it all without saying a word or showing outward acknowledgement of the attraction that sparked and burned between the two of them every time they were together.
Bryn quickly realised that Gabriel really was intent on torturing her.
And how well he was succeeding.
As day followed torturous day Bryn’s awareness of Gabriel grew to such a degree that she began to tremble and shake even as she approached the Archangel Gallery. Her nerves would be strung tightly, her body tingling with awareness, as she wondered if that would be the day Gabriel would relent and kiss her, caress her, before she went quietly insane with this growing need for him.
By the day of the exhibition Bryn knew she had never been so aware of a man in her life: his smell—that seductive male smell, a spicy musk, that was uniquely Gabriel—the rippling play of muscles across his shoulders and back when he removed his jacket and tie. He’d unfasten the top two buttons of his shirt to reveal a light dusting of dark hair on his chest whenever they weren’t in the public galleries, allowing her to fully appreciate that masculinity. Her fingers literally itched to become entangled in the glossy dark hair she could see on his chest, to caress the firm line of his back, the silky hair at his nape.
She only had to get through one more day, just a few more hours of this torture, Bryn told herself on that final morning as she made her way to Archangel and the closed west gallery, where the paintings of the six artists were finally ready to be exhibited at a private invitation-only showing this evening.
Unfortunately, Bryn realised as she came to an abrupt halt in the doorway to the west gallery, today was going to be the most difficult twenty-four hours of the past two weeks of torture. Her breath caught in her throat and her face paled as she saw, and easily recognised, the three men talking quietly together across the room.
Gabriel was instantly recognisable, of course, but the unmistakable likeness between all three men—tall and lean, dark haired, with hewn and handsome olive-skinned faces—told her that the other two men had to be Gabriel’s two brothers, Michael and Raphael D’Angelo.
Two men who had absolutely no reason to feel in the least kindly towards Sabryna Harper.
* * *
Gabriel sensed Bryn’s presence in the gallery even before he turned and saw her standing pale and still across the room; his senses had become so heightened to her presence during these past two weeks that he now felt a thrum of awareness beneath the surface of his skin whenever she was anywhere near. His shaft would harden, becoming a painful throb just at the smell of her perfume—that exotic spice, and the womanly smell that he knew was all uniquely aroused Bryn—the husky sound of her voice enough to raise the hairs on the back of his neck and send shivers of pleasure down the length of his spine.
Gabriel had lost count of the amount of times he had been tempted to put an end to the torment that made his days a living hell and his nights a sleepless nightmare, to just take Bryn in his arms and make love to her, to keep her there until she admitted she wanted him with the same fierce hunger that he wanted her.
The only thing that held him back from doing that was Bryn herself.
For both