He stood and said good-bye to the wife of an aging rock star to his left, who couldn’t keep her hand in her own lap, and the elderly woman to his right, who couldn’t remember why she was at the dinner.
Interrupting Simon’s conversation with a bone-thin model, Henry whispered in his ear. “We need to go. I have a strange feeling about Gabe.”
“I’m done anyway.” Simon pushed back his chair and stood.
“You’re leaving, Simon?” the doe-eyed skeleton asked with a New York accent.
“Darinda, darling, meet Henry Elliott Chilton, Earl of Ripon. When he tells me I must go, regrettably, I must go.”
Her eyes blinked as though she were telegraphing Henry a message. “An earl? Wow. What should I call you?”
“You shouldn’t.” Henry pulled on Simon’s arm and walked away.
They returned at 1:00 a.m. in a downpour. Henry parked and rushed into the house to see Gabe. The kitchen was empty. He called out to her, but no one answered. She wasn’t in the study, either. He climbed two steps at a time to her bedroom. The door was open, the bed was made, and the room was empty of any trace of a woman named Gabe, except for her combat boots. He stared out the window.
Where the hell was she?
After circling through the other rooms in the house, Henry called over to Simon. “She’s gone. You backtrack by foot. See if you can find her at a nearby pub. I’ll take a drive.”
Oxford wasn’t close to the size of London, but it wasn’t a small village, either. She could disappear easily.
“I’ll ask around at some of the local pubs about our pink-haired whiz kid. If I locate her, I promise not to interrogate her without her express permission.” Simon pulled his black wool coat from a hook by the door.
“Permission freely given, not coerced.”
“I promise. I have enough to do without creating work for myself. Besides, I intend on watching Chelsea take down Reading this afternoon. So find her or not, I’m calling it quits in time to grab a few hours of sleep.” He gave Henry a salute and walked out the front door.
Henry drove around Oxford a few times. The pubs had closed and streams of people started bumbling home. Most of the women walked in groups after a night out drinking. Gabe would be alone.
He traveled to the train station, spoke with the ticket office, staked out the automatic ticket machines, and walked up and down the platforms, but she never appeared. Mozart’s Arietta in G blasted out of his mobile.
“Did you find her?” he asked Simon while heading out of the train station toward his car.
“No, but when I returned to the house, I noticed your bike is missing from the garage.”
Henry, finding his breath again, became encouraged. He needed to locate this enigmatic creature who had invaded his life. “Brilliant. I think I’ll take a scenic drive out of the city.”
“Good luck.” Simon had done his part and was probably headed to bed.
Two hours later, he was about to give up when he noticed a petite woman in a mud-splattered dress by the side of the road.
He pulled over and grabbed his umbrella. She didn’t lift her head when he approached. Instead, she remained crouched in a puddle examining a flat tire on a bike. Rain soaked her hair and her sweater, and pasted a thin blue dress to her lean, muscular legs.
“I’m all set, thank you. I’ll be leaving in a minute,” she called out to him without turning around.
The familiar voice eased the tension knotting the muscles in his neck. That bike, his bike, would be going nowhere. She needed a lift.
“Gabe, are you okay?”
Her head whipped around, and her mouth fell open. She struggled to get on the broken bike and ride away.
He reached her in three long strides and grasped the handlebars. Her damp body shivered. She could warm up in the car. He didn’t anticipate the backpack that smacked him in the head. The umbrella flew out of his hand as he tumbled into a puddle. The cold water leeched through his pants and shocked his system. He looked up to see her biking away. Damn it. He was trying to help her, not harm her.
The flat tire impeded her progress. He sprinted forward and caught the seat of the bike.
“Henry, why are you torturing me? Let me go.” Her voice strained. She swung around, her newly black hair stuck to her cheeks, and glared at him with demonic brown eyes. He caught the bag when she swung it toward him again, yanking it out of her hand.
“Get in the bloody car. Now. It’s almost four in the morning, and I’m not in the mood to discuss your daft excursion across the countryside on my bike.” His head now hurt. Instead of mud-wrestling with a woman on the side of the road, he wanted a shower and some coffee.
Gabe’s feet, however, remained planted on each side of the bike. Rain drenched the hair that had been lopped off at the shoulders in a most unflattering way. She must have done it herself. To hide from her abuser or from him? Her eyes glanced beyond him toward Abingdon.
He slung a strap of the pack over his shoulder before gripping her arm to keep her from running again.
“I have to leave. Please,” she pleaded.
Her cheeks glowed red and puffy from exposure to the cold rain. She tried to pull herself free, but he wouldn’t let her go. She was standing drenched to her knickers to evade discovery of some unknown malevolence, all because he’d lost his temper in the art gallery and probably scared the hell out of her.
“I’m sorry if I scared you earlier. I was upset about the painting, not you. I mean it. I would never harm a woman. Ever.”