Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)
    Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)
    Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)
    Ebook188 pages2 hours

    Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)

    By Carole Mortimer

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2) is the 3rd story in USA Today Bestselling author, Carole Mortimer’s, new contemporary series, Knight Security. This is a spin-off series to the #1 Bestselling Alpha Series.

    When Angel’s son is taken there is only one man she can turn to for help. Gabriel Knight, CEO of Knight Security. Unfortunately he’s also the last man she should go anywhere near, ever again. He’s hard and cynical, utterly ruthless, and the last time the two of them met did not end well.

    When Angel Sinclair walks back into Gabriel’s life, utterly beautiful, and just as much of a threat as ever to his ordered life, his first instinct is to tell her to leave and never come back.

    But no matter what happened between the two of them in the past, or how badly it ended, Gabriel isn’t cold enough to turn his back on Angel when she explains her son, Daniel, has been kidnapped. She has been warned not to go to the police, and given a limited time to come up with the ransom money. If she fails to follow either of those instructions she will never see Daniel again.

    Can the two of them forget the hurts of the past, and work together to save the life of an innocent seven year old boy?

    Carole Mortimer has written over 280 books, in contemporary and Regency romance, and is the Recipient of the prestigious 2015 Romance Writers of America’s Lifetime Achievement Award. She is an Entertainment Weekly Top 10 Romance Author—ever. 2014 Romantic Times Pioneer of Romance. Was recognized by Queen Elizabeth II in 2012, for her “outstanding service to literature”.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCarole Mortimer
    Release dateSep 23, 2016
    ISBN9781910597330
    Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)
    Author

    Carole Mortimer

    Carole Mortimer was born in England, the youngest of three children. She began writing in 1978, and has now written over one hundred and seventy books for Harlequin Mills and Boon®. Carole has six sons, Matthew, Joshua, Timothy, Michael, David and Peter. She says, ‘I’m happily married to Peter senior; we’re best friends as well as lovers, which is probably the best recipe for a successful relationship. We live in a lovely part of England.’

    Read more from Carole Mortimer

    Related to Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)

    Related ebooks

    Romance For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Just good FRIENDS

      Nov 9, 2022

      Just good FRIENDS
      8 min read

    • Article

      Haunted

      Sep 27, 2023

      Haunted
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Invitation

      Aug 21, 2023

      York, October 1644 Before I’ve even mustered the courage to knock, the door to the townhouse flings open. I drop my hand. “It is me, John Falmouth,” I say and wince at how loud my voice carries into the night. My greeting falters when I look up and n

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Escaped Jaguar

      May 9, 2019

      The Escaped Jaguar
      5 min read

    • Article

      Never Meet YOUR HEROES?

      Apr 2, 2020

      Never Meet YOUR HEROES?
      7 min read

    • Article

      Performance

      Nov 10, 2022

      “Wait here,” the guard said as he shut the door behind him, leaving me by myself. The floor inside the lab was polished, and the air smelled of disinfectant, and yet the room felt unclean. Leaves shook on a tree outside the window, making shadows on

      18 min read

    • Article

      The After

      Jun 10, 2023

      He is sitting opposite me, staring blankly like a dead fish. Stone eyes. Cobalt and lifeless. Pale gray skin, dripping scales. I imagine him hauled out of the water and dumped on the riverbank, gasping for breath. Just as he deserves. I only agreed t

      13 min read

    • Article

      A WING AND a prayer

      Sep 28, 2021

      A raven saved my life Cate McMurray, 47, from West Midlands I ’d always known I was different. As a small child, I used to see and hear people who weren’t there. One day, I was playing hide ‘n’ seek with my two sisters, and tucked myself away in a cu

      4 min read

    • Article

      Meeting Eve Babitz

      Jan 7, 2019

      Meeting Eve Babitz
      7 min read

    • Article

      The Duplex

      Jun 9, 2020

      I moved to Los Angeles to sing. When was this? August? June? I was twenty-nine, and those were shapeless months, when the days blended together and I refused to pull them apart. My landlord was unusually close to her adult son. His name was Jeffrey,

      21 min read

    • Article

      A Hard Man To Forget

      Jan 8, 2024

      A Hard Man To Forget
      4 min read

    • Article

      My modern FAIRY TALE

      Dec 3, 2020

      The distinction between good and evil in fairy stories is always very clear, and though good doesn’t always win, evil is, if not vanquished, then at least exposed for what it is. However, the fairy stories I grew up with were very different to the ‘s

      3 min read

    • Article

      The Man I Should Have Married

      Dec 29, 2019

      The Man I Should Have Married
      11 min read

    • Article

      An Afternoon In Her Shoes

      Jul 26, 2022

      An Afternoon In Her Shoes
      6 min read

    • Article

      Freedom

      Aug 6, 2020

      Freedom
      7 min read

    • Article

      Supportive Husband

      Sep 12, 2023

      There were less intimate places available, so it was odd when a woman took the seat directly facing mine across the subway aisle. I looked up from my book and right back down: a couple of months before, we’d gone home together. She had a Southern acc

      22 min read

    • Article

      LOVE, Virtually

      Feb 16, 2020

      LOVE, Virtually
      5 min read

    • Article

      Righteous

      Jan 22, 2019

      Righteous
      8 min read

    • Article

      Unknown caller

      Jun 23, 2021

      Unknown caller
      2 min read

    • Article

      VISITOR From Hell

      Nov 26, 2019

      VISITOR From Hell
      4 min read

    • Article

      Secrets and LIES

      Mar 17, 2021

      Secrets and LIES
      6 min read

    • Article

      Australia Reads At Home

      May 18, 2020

      Australia Reads At Home
      7 min read

    • Article

      A Little About Why

      Jun 1, 2023

      A Little About Why
      15 min read

    • Article

      Philip Roth

      Jun 4, 2018

      Philip Roth
      25 min read

    • Article

      Cast Out

      Jul 10, 2021

      Verity pushed back the quilts, rolled off her straw mattress onto the floor, felt for the poker, and stirred the ashes. The embers glowed. She wouldn’t have to go fire-borrowing again. Her chilled hands were clumsy. One glowing bit of wood rolled fro

      21 min read

    • Article

      The Convict

      Jul 10, 2020

      The Convict
      5 min read

    • Article

      Planetesimal

      Aug 15, 2022

      Planetesimal
      3 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)

    4/5

    19 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2) - Carole Mortimer

      PROLOGUE

      Eight years ago

      She’s here.

      I don’t know where she is or how I know she’s here. I just do.

      I’ve been coming back to this club night after night for three weeks now. Hoping to see her again. To talk with her. To be with her.

      Finally, she’s back. I can’t see her yet, but I know she’s here somewhere. I can feel her. The air is charged with her presence. My body is charged with the same expectation.

      She’s here, somewhere.

      I fucking know it.

      When I breathe in, I even think I catch faint wafts of her perfume. Citrus and spice, and that unique feminine aroma that’s all her. As usual, it’s caused my cock to harden in anticipation.

      I ignore that ache as I slowly turn and allow my narrowed gaze to scan the booths to one side of the club, searching for that familiar golden hair cascading down the length of her spine. I look at couple after couple. Group after group. But I know at a glance none of them is her.

      The dance floor next. My gaze passes over the gyrating bodies, one by one. Searching. Half dreading finding her again, only to see she’s with another man. That had better not be the case. For his sake. Because anyone who gets in the way of my being with her will be dealt with. Eliminated. Quietly. Efficiently.

      None of the women on the dance floor are her.

      So where the fuck—

      My breath leaves my lungs with a noisy whoosh as I see her standing at the other end of the bar. She’s ordering a drink, laughing and talking with the redhead serving behind the bar.

      My quarry is a little over five feet tall, with long blonde hair and gray eyes, and skin I know is as smooth as silk to the touch, and tastes of heat and honey. She’s so beautiful, looking at her is like gazing directly at the sun. Blinding. Dazzling. Sucking all the air from my lungs.

      My eyes remain narrowed as I step forward, uncaring of who stands in my way as I walk determinedly toward her. No one is unwise enough to check or rebuke me for that single-minded pursuit. Maybe because they know, by the coiled tension that must be rolling off my body, if anyone tries to stop me from reaching her, I’ll walk straight over or through them. Their choice.

      I’ve waited three hellish long weeks for her to come back to the club, and she isn’t going to get away from me a second time.

      Not ever again, if I have my way.

      And I invariably do.

      CHAPTER ONE

      Present day

      She’s here.

      He can sense her. Feel her. Breathing in, his senses are flooded with her perfume, citrus and spice, along with that unique feminine aroma that is all her. He can almost taste the sweet honey between her legs, the hot and heady musk—

      Your eleven o’clock appointment is here, Gabriel.

      What the fu—!

      Gabriel gave a start as he was jolted back into the present by his secretary’s announcement. It took several disorientated seconds for him to even realize he was sitting in the chair behind his desk, in the CEO’s office in the Knight Security building.

      One minute he had been leaning back in his chair, staring out the huge picture window at the London skyline as he waited for his next appointment to arrive, and the next he had been transported back into the past. No explanation. No warning. Just there.

      God, so completely there.

      Every part of him had been saturated with her. Touch. Sight. Smell. Taste.

      It had all been so fucking real, his cock was hard and engorged and tenting the front of the tailored trousers of his suit.

      Why the fuck was he thinking about her now?

      He hadn’t thought about her in years. Hadn’t allowed himself to think about her for years. His dreams were another matter, however, and in the early years, he had often woken, saturated in sweat and his own cum, after a particularly graphic dream about her. As the years passed, the memories hadn’t grown dimmer, but his self-control had grown stronger, and he had managed to banish her from his thoughts, from his memory, and eventually from his dreams.

      But even in those early years, he had never zoned out the way he had just now. Becoming so immersed in memories of her, he had no awareness of where he was, or what time it was.

      What could have triggered the memories today? Why the hell—

      Gabriel?

      He turned his head round so fast, he gave himself whiplash.

      Standing in the doorway of his office, slightly to the left of his secretary, was another woman.

      A woman who smelled of citrus and spice, and a feminine aroma that was uniquely her.

      Angel?

      The perfume was the same, but otherwise…

      The black tailored knee-length dress the woman wore was sophisticated and obviously expensive, her legs long and silky above three-inch-heel shoes. Her figure was a bit on the thin side, even though she had curves in all the right places. The blonde hair was trimmed to shoulder length, and styled professionally in wispy layers. Gray, long-lashed eyes looked at him coolly, almost dispassionately.

      Without recognition?

      If that was so, then that lack of recognition didn’t quite tally with her familiarity in addressing him by his first name a few seconds ago.

      Whether this woman was Angel or merely a woman who looked very much like her, Gabriel felt at a complete disadvantage at being caught daydreaming in his office in the middle of the morning, when he was expecting clients. Even when he wasn’t expecting clients. Jesus, Knight Security was his place of work. A serious place, where he carried out serious business. Lives depended on him keeping his shit together. Which meant he didn’t allow himself to go off into fucking daydreams and getting hard-ons thinking about a woman he hadn’t set eyes on in eight years.

      I’m your eleven o’clock appointment. The woman spoke evenly in that voice that was Angel’s and yet somehow not. This woman’s voice was cold, controlled, whereas Angel’s had always been infused with life. Or screaming his name as she came.

      He eyed her guardedly. You are?

      A cool dip of her head. I have some…business I need to discuss with you. She gave his secretary a pointed glance.

      Gabriel checked the screen of his laptop. "You’re Mrs. Sinclair?"

      Her mouth tightened. I am, yes.

      He glanced down at her slender left hand, noting the ring finger was adorned with a thin gold wedding band. Which explained why he hadn’t made the connection between her and his next appointment. If this was his Angel, then her surname had been Jones eight years ago. Angela Jones.

      Angel.

      His Angel.

      Until she wasn’t.

      The woman standing in front of him wasn’t his Angel either. This woman was composed, sophisticated, every inch the well-dressed, impeccably coiffured wife of a very rich man. A man who expected his beautiful wife to always look perfect and behave with gracious self-confidence. The ideal hostess to his business associates, the trophy wife on his arm whenever they went out together.

      Gabriel’s Angel had been just twenty years old, alone in the world after her mother had died when she was fourteen and her father a year before he met her. She was using the money they had left her to put herself through university.

      The night Gabriel met her, she had been wearing an only-just-decent skirt and a fitted tube top, her almost waist-length hair a cascade of blonde waves. He almost groaned aloud as he remembered how warm and sweet-smelling those curls had been when they moved in a caress across his naked thighs as she bent over to take his cock into her mouth.

      His gaze fixed on the fullness of the coral-painted lips of the woman who had introduced herself as Mrs. Sinclair. Were they the same lips that had once wrapped themselves about his cock and pleasured him? He couldn’t say for sure.

      Gabriel gave a frustrated shake of his head. I’m afraid Knight Security isn’t taking on new clients at the moment. Even if it transpired this woman wasn’t Angel, he didn’t want to work with her. For her. This woman brought back far too many memories he would much rather forget.

      That he needed to forget, if he wanted to function properly. He might have tried not to think of her for years, but his brief time with Angel had become the yardstick by which he measured all other women. They always came up wanting.

      She turned to Josey. Is that true?

      His secretary looked uncomfortable. I… Well—

      Obviously not. The woman sighed. If you will excuse us? She smiled politely at Josey. I believe Gabriel is about to spout a load of bullshit, and it’s probably for the best if you don’t stay around to witness my reaction to it.

      Josey gave a surprised bark of laugher, which she quickly brought under control as Gabriel glared at her. I’ll be right outside in my office if you need me. She hurried from the room and closed the door behind her.

      A blonde brow arched over mocking gray eyes. Are you going to need her, Gabriel?

      Fuck, this woman certainly treated him like Angel had. He had been thirty years old eight years ago, a soldier, a trained warrior, but Angel had never been in the least frightened or in awe of him. As so many others had been, and still were.

      Gabriel might have tried to convince himself—hoped—this wasn’t Angel, but he knew, in his heart of hearts, it was her. She might look different, act different, but the reaction of his cock didn’t lie. That part of him had known Angel was somewhere near long before Gabriel’s other senses had. There might have been an office wall between them, but he had no doubt her perfume must have wafted through that barrier, and the slightest hint of that perfume had transported him back eight years in time. To Angel. To the hunter and the hunted.

      Are you? she challenged.

      Fuck, he had to stop staring at her as if she were an apparition, and start behaving like Gabriel Knight, CEO of Knight Security. One of, possibly the most, prestigious security companies in the world. As Gabriel Knight, head of that company, was known to be one of the scariest bastards in that same world.

      He might have a more sophisticated appearance too, in his tailored suits, and silk shirts and ties. But underneath those civilized trappings he was still the same man who would walk straight over, or through, anyone who tried to get in the way of what he wanted.

      As he had once wanted Angel to the point of obsession.

      Doubtful, he drawled.

      That’s what I thought. Mrs. Sinclair nodded. Are you going to invite me to sit down?

      No point, he bit out. I’ve already told you, we aren’t taking on new clients right now.

      Temper flickered briefly in her eyes before it was quickly brought under control. Knight Security isn’t, or you, personally?

      "I don’t take clients personally."

      Surprise widened her eyes. No?

      His mouth thinned with derision. I’m strictly a sitting-behind-a-desk man nowadays. I tell other people where to go and what needs doing when they get there.

      That’s new.

      When they met all those years ago, Gabriel had still been in the army and hyped up from the years he had spent on special ops all over the world. He’d been the one to plan and execute dozens of those successful missions.

      One of them had been to hunt down and capture the woman he wanted.

      This woman.

      He shrugged. I’m eight years older.

      She quirked a brow. And wiser?

      One would hope so.

      Angela wanted to reach across Gabriel’s desk take him by the shoulders and shake him, hard, all while screaming at him that he had to help her. Had to help Daniel.

      She didn’t, of course. Too many years of guarding her emotions, expecting nothing and so never suffering disappointment when nothing was given, held her back from displaying such uncontrolled emotion.

      Besides, Gabriel wasn’t only those eight years older, he was no longer the same man who had chased her down until he caught her.

      The man she had never been able to forget, no matter how hard she tried.

      She knew from her search for him that he had never married. Not for want of trying on the part of the women who had shared his bed, she was sure. At thirty-eight, Gabriel was not only everything that was tall, dark, and handsome, but the joint ownership of Knight Security with his three brothers had made them all extremely wealthy men.

      Instead of the mellowing that marriage and having a family could have given him, those intervening years had made Gabriel even harder, with a more dangerous edge. His body was raw, defined muscle beneath the perfectly tailored suit he wore, but it was also leaner, more finely honed, and filled with a restless energy no amount of sitting behind a desk had succeeded in taming. His hair was still short, but the darkness was now tinged with gray at his temples. There were also fine lines beside his mesmerizing green eyes and chiseled lips.

      But Gabriel still looked ready to take on the world with the absolute certainty that he would win. Because he always won. Losing had never been an option for Gabriel. It wasn’t even in his vocabulary.

      Which

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1