Tempting Gabe (The Hawke Fortune) Read online

  Tempting Gabe

  The Hawke Family Saga

  Victoria Pinder

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Also by Victoria Pinder

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Tempting Gabe

  Copyright©2017

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemble to actual events, business establishments, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials.

  Your support of author’s rights is appreciated.

  Published in the United States of America.

  Copyright © 2016 Victoria Pinder Love in a Book

  All rights reserved.

  This book is dedicated to my daughter, Diana, who is the joy of my life. Her coming into my life has been a life changing for the better event and she inspires me to prove to her that she can follow her dreams by being an example.

  Chapter 1

  Her brother, Maddox, had her mother's ring and she wanted it back. The will left it to her. It was all she had left now. Megan Murdock brushed her dark brown hair behind her ears and straightened her shoulders that slumped from the weight of her large, heavy pocketbook. She closed her eyes, swayed on her feet as the palm trees swayed in the wind behind her. Lawyers hadn't helped her get the one thing she wanted to keep, forever.

  Once she felt stable, she was ready.

  She knocked on the door and crossed her arms. A few seconds later, her brother's voice pierced the air. "Megan, go away."

  Normal people didn't talk to siblings through the intercom. She glanced at the door and wondered where the camera was while she crossed her arms. "I want Mom's ring, Maddox."

  "I'll send it in the mail."

  No. She refused to lose another day. Her mother had left everything to her brother, except the ring. On her hospital bed, their mother had said Megan was capable of taking care of herself. She had always wished her mother saw more than raw strength, but the promised ring meant she at least left her something personal that she had worn every day of her life. It had to mean she saw more in her. Megan knocked on his door again. "You haven't in the past month. I'm here to collect it."

  "Go."

  Her face felt hot as the hottest day in South Florida where the air itself felt like hot soup that covered the skin. Soon, she'd lose her cool. She pressed her feet into the cement ground through her high heels. "Open the door and give it to me. I'm tired of waiting."

  "Are you alone?"

  "Clearly." She turned so he could see beyond her and onto the street. This was insane, but again it seemed so was her brother, after the war. She pressed her hand to her temple. Somehow she had to get through to him. He needed help. She softened her voice. "Maddox, let me in."

  "Okay fine." The jingle and click of metal knobs told her that her brother was working on his half a dozen locks. The door opened to darkness, but then she saw the brown eyes that almost glowed from the sun beaming in the door. He wiggled his finger and indicated that she should come in.

  To get the ring, she followed. The second she was inside, he locked all six of his door locks. Once done, he pointed her toward the living room and a gray couch that had seen better decades. "Wait here and I'll find the ring."

  "Thanks." She brushed the goosebumps off her bare arms and stared at the mess in the room. Maddox had papers everywhere and the dust that came from her just walking in told her that he hadn't cleaned in years.

  He stormed down the hall and left her there. She refused to even touch that couch and moved toward the closest pile of papers.

  The same man's face was on the first half a dozen articles. She peered closer and read Gable Hawke. Her mind clicked that the Hawke name had something to do with computers, but she wasn't a techie like her last boyfriend. Neither was her brother, for that matter. She walked toward a different pile but stopped when she coughed on dust.

  At least her brother had made an appearance at the funeral, though he had only stayed for a half an hour and had jittered the entire time. Before he served overseas, Maddox never sent chills throughout her body.

  She called out, "Mom would have been happy you came."

  "I was always a disappointment."

  Bored, she glanced at the papers on the coffee table. Again Gable Hawke's name was highlighted, as was information about his family. He had two sisters and it seemed his parents were close to dying from an assassination attempt. Her brother doodled stars all over the news clipping. The back of her neck grew cold. "Did you find the ring?"

  "Almost."

  Good. She needed to go. Then she opened the red folder next to the news articles. The folder was like one of the ones they had used in school years ago, but inside she saw his handwriting and a print-out of an almost dead couple. Her stomach churned as she picked it up and read closer. She stared so hard at the papers until the words blurred into black pools. This letter with her brother’s name on it couldn’t say that her brother had murdered the couple on their way to help at a soup kitchen.

  No. This wasn’t possible. Maddox wasn’t that bad. He could have written a confession note for a number of reasons, right?

  Beads of sweat grew on her forehead.

  In her hands she held her brother's assassination plans. The drawings showed where he intended to stand, where the old couple went to buy Christmas presents and their route to deliver them to needy children at a shelter. Everything clicked in her head at once. The news article had said Mr. and Mrs. Hawke were hospitalized and in comas from gunshots near a homeless shelter and soup kitchen. Her heart raced.

  Her brother had tried to murder innocent people. Her hands curled on the folder. All those years as a sniper in the Marines could mean he was interested in the murder that his expertise written all over it. She stuffed it in her pocketbook and then wiped her sweaty palms on her yellow sundress. Perhaps outside, she'd read this differently, but right now her breaths became shorter. She edged to the door.

  Something fell in the other room and it felt like her heart might stop. She called out, "She'd want you to see a doctor regularly, Maddox."

  "Doctors can't help me."

  Despite how she shivered inside, she remembered how she’d promised their mother she'd do what she could for Maddox. She licked her cold lips. "Is there anyone that can?"

  "I think I put the ring in here. Give me a moment."

  Right. The ring. Her hands shook and she clutched her bag. Perhaps the schematics were of a football game or anything else and that her mind made up all those conclusions as she glanced to her right and saw another picture of the Hawke family. "Who’s Gable Hawke? That's an unusual name."

  "He ruined my life."

 
The statement hung in the air. All she could think was that her brother had intended to harm them. The papers against her chest might as well be bricks. They weighted her to the floor and she couldn’t move. She pushed her hair back again. Perhaps she should ask her brother, "How?"

  "He and his crowd left me for dead."

  "In the desert?" Footsteps echoed while he came closer to her. Bile filled her throat. Once she was home, she could look up what happened and perhaps, hopefully, her instincts were way off. As children, she'd never suspect her brother of murder, but the hollow ghost of a man that haunted this old house never felt like he was her brother. Course she hadn't seen much of him in years, but her instincts screamed it was possible that he was an assassin.

  "Yeah," he called down the hall.

  She stumbled backward closer to the door and knocked over a pile of papers. She knelt and picked them up to put them back. Even more pictures of Gable Hawke and his family. Her heart sped faster again. "A doctor would be..."

  Her teeth chattered so much that she stopped talking and stared at her brother's outlines.

  "I found the..."

  "I knocked it over with my bag and I was putting your pile back together. She stood and willed her hands to not shake and she put them out palm up. "Do you have it?"

  "Are you sure..." He scratched his head.

  "You have the ring?" No. Every cell in her body screamed to run. If she did, he'd know for sure what she thought. Okay probably not, but he'd figure her out too fast. Her fingers began to curl as she waited. To pretend she wasn't affected, she tapped her shoe and glanced at him and her empty hand.

  He dropped the diamond ring in, and she clutched it like it was a life preserver. Her breaths were still coming too short but she turned toward the door.

  "Were you going through my papers?"

  The image of being locked in a basement like those people in the last movie she’d seen ran through her mind. She shook her head and twisted the first lock. "I was looking for the ring. I want to go."

  He put his hand on the lock and stared at her. "Megan, you're lying to me."

  Coldness ate at her from her gut. The man staring at her wasn't her brother. Not anymore. She pushed her lips out. She had to get out of here. Now. In pretense, she shrugged. "I don't care what you think. I have the ring and now I have to go to work."

  "Go." He unlocked the other five locks.

  Her legs practically ran by themselves to her Mercedes. As she walked away, one by one she heard the multiple locks slip into place like they were bullets aimed at her chest. The sound made her jumpy, but she steeled herself. Her brother had locked himself and now the sunlight beamed over her head.

  Inside her car, her fingers wrapped around the steering wheel and she held tight. Breathing was a challenge, but in the rearview mirror she glanced at her brother's house surrounded by the weeping trees. Her heart was practically frozen, but she turned the key and listened for the sound of the engine that sparked her car to life. Her foot pressed the pedal harder than normal and she drove fast to get away.

  On her way to work at Morgan Enterprises, she picked up the phone. She needed to talk to someone, but there was no one to confide in about her brother. She told the phone, "I can't call Tess or any of my friends."

  Then her phone said, "How may I help you?"

  She laughed to herself and knew she looked foolish if anyone passed her, but she didn’t care. Se parked in her spot in the employee parking lot. She stared at the faceless phone and realized it was the artificial intelligence, so she asked, "Who is Gable Hawke?"

  "Here is what I found about Gable Hawke."

  Information about the CEO of a computer tech firm filled her phone. She glanced at her pocketbook to check on her brother’s confession letter. Her face felt cold, but she used her phone to research his parents’ recent attempted murder and how the police had no suspects.

  If she went upstairs, she'd sit at her desk and stare at her pocketbook.

  Tires squealed past her and adrenaline rushed through her body. She grabbed her bag and dug in for the folder while she tried to shift into her seat like it might mask her. She looked around the lot and saw no one, so she read.

  These were the schematics of an attempted hit and she reread the details about how the parents of Gable Hawke were practically executed. This wasn't an unknown assailant to her like the news report read. The boy who’d rescued frogs from the road after it rained so they wouldn’t get run over by cars? Had he been so screwed up by what he’d seen in the war to commit such an atrocity? This was her brother's work. Why else would he have written such a letter and signed it? She swallowed.

  If she didn't turn this in, she was now an accessory. Her heart slammed in her chest. She'd not go to prison, not for something her brother might have done. Her mother's words echoed in her brain to protect Maddox. In Florida, they had the death penalty. If she turned her brother in, she'd have to make a deal. She swallowed and tried to get a grip. She only had one hope and it was probably stupid. Her mind eased and started her car again until her courage grew and she told her phone. "I'll need driving directions to the Hawke Inc."

  Chapter 2

  "Scarlett, James is going to protect you just as I asked Conner to watch out for Olivia." Gable answered his sister for the tenth time with the same sentence. His sister, Scarlett, lived up to her namesake. He stared out the window in the high-rise office building that overlooked both Biscayne Bay and the Intracoastal waterways. The expensive yachts looked like rowboats from his current window. He turned away from his black Italian marble desk and stared at the blue waters. "Mom and Dad would expect me to protect you."

  He massaged his temples. After what had happened and with their parents in either a coma or fighting a raging infection, he'd like to think that Scarlett wouldn't mind extra security, but then his sister was beautiful, but never predictable.

  He brushed against the ugly skin under his shirt and knew no one saw how damaged he was. Scarlett, Olivia, and his parents deserved to keep their bodies without scars.

  Instead he heard the pout in her voice through the phone. "You're not hiring a bodyguard for yourself."

  Something buzzed inside him and his skin felt like he was near static electricity. He ignored the instinct. "I have a security team and unlike you, I'm not trapezing around the globe."

  "I'm not trapezing. That's a stupid word. I have a business meeting."

  The light flashed on his desk that he had another call. He clutched his cell phone but stared at his office phone. "Hold on, my secretary is calling in."

  "We're not done," Scarlett started before he cut her off with the mute button on his cell and placed it on his desk.

  He put his secretary on speaker. "You have a visitor, sir. She's quite insistent that she speak only to you."

  No urgent meeting came to mind, and his mind was blank. "Who is it?"

  "A Miss Megan Murdock."

  Murdock. Maddox Murdock had died. The image of standing near a blast site while Belle Jordan pulled Colt Collins out of the ditch as he tried and failed to grab Murdock replayed in his mind. Instead of pulling him to safety, his former friend was caught in enemy fire and had died a foot from him. His own skin burned from the heat while he fell backward. This time he recalled a gun pointed at him, but he blinked and that memory disappeared. He’d probably imagined it anyhow.

  His secretary coughed, which brought him back to the here and now. He sat stiff in his chair until he patted his side where the burn scars were. "Who is she?"

  "An accountant at Morgan Enterprises."

  His heart began to beat again while he took a deep breath. "I don't want to see a banker today. I’m not interested in whatever stock option they want to sell me."

  A fast discussion between women echoed through the phone. Then his secretary said, "She says that you'll want to see her."

  Perhaps she was Murdock's family and she wasn’t here to sell him something. If this was because of what happened years ago, then
he should at least listen. He closed the files on his desk. "She's that insistent?"

  "Yes."

  "Send her in." No memory of a memorial flashed in his mind as he stood to greet the woman. If must have skipped out when he returned and threw himself into work to build his company into a technology giant and tried to bury his memories.

  A young woman with dark hair and a body that curved in all the right places walked in. He leaned on his desk and picked up some papers, in case he had any evidence of how turned on he’d become. "How may I help you?"

  She walked and stepped right up to stand in front of him. The air smelled of rose petals. "Are you Gable Hawke?"

  "Yes." She held out her hand to shake. Her palms were cold in his warm and strong grip. He narrowed his gaze. "Are you related to Maddox Murdock?"

  She stopped shaking his hand and froze for a second. Her face was white, like she was hurt or scared of him. He narrowed his gaze and brushed his hand on her arm, to sooth whatever was wrong, and she finished shaking his hand and nodded. "He's my brother. How do you know him?"

  He stood and directed her to business chairs closer to a side office, where they might talk easier. "We served together. He died."

  She sat but clutched her bag in front of her like it was a shield. "He didn't die. He was taken captured."

  That made no sense. He pulled the chair closer to her. "I'm sorry. Repeat?"

  He placed his hand on her knee and she practically jumped out of skin while she pushed him off. "Don't."

  "Don't what?" He tucked his hand back onto his own seat and his heartbeat grew faster. "I'd never do anything..."

  She lifted her chin though she trembled. "I want you to call the police and tell them I asked you to call while I have information on your parents' case."

  There was no way he was attracted to his parents’ potential killer. His eyes widened. "You do."