Dare to Surrender Read Online Free PDF Page A

figured me out already. Ready to read and relax for the first time all day, I crawled into the luxurious bed, sinking into the mattress and cuddling into the duvet, planning to read.
    Next thing I knew, sunlight, muted by drawn curtains, streamed through the room. I blinked and instinctively knew the light wasn’t what had woken me. I forced my eyelids open to find Gabe staring at me from a chair across from the bed.
    “Morning, Sleeping Beauty.” He sipped coffee while he read the paper, as if being in my bedroom was perfectly normal, something he did every day.
    Mortified, I sank deeper beneath the covers. “Get. Out.”
    He looked me over from head to toe, heat in his predatory gaze. I had to be imagining things. I wasn’t vain and was well aware that my hair always looked like a bad eighties perm experiment in the morning.
    “What’s wrong? You’re completely covered,” he said, closing the paper.
    I blinked, wondering when my world had gone mad. “I was asleep. That’s private! It’s first thing in the morning. Why would I want you to see me this early?” I realized I was shrieking and forced air into my lungs, calming myself down. Hysterical shrew didn’t become me. “Look, if I’m going to stay here, I want a lock on that door.” There. I’d managed to regain control of my voice.
    He grinned. “There is one. But now that you’ve reminded me, I’ll have it removed.” He folded the paper and set it down on the table beside him.
    “This arrangement isn’t going to work out.” I mistakenly shifted, sitting up higher in the bed, revealing the tank top that barely covered my breasts and pulled too tight where it did.
    “Calm down,” he said, still clearly amused. “We need to talk.”
    “And it couldn’t wait until I was decent?” My voice rose again. Modulate , I muttered under my breath.
    “No. It’s something that needs to happen now, and I want you here when I teach Daltry a much-needed lesson.”
    I gulped in air. “Why in God’s name would you do that?”
    “Any man who lets a woman leave his home in the dead of night with nothing but the clothes on her back, a small stack of bills, and no cell phone deserves it.” He cocked an eyebrow my way, that possessiveness there in his blue-black gaze. “That he did it to you merely compounds his error.”
    I bolted upright in bed, forgetting all about modesty and coverage. “You really need to explain this.” I gestured back and forth between us, ending with a clean sweep around his sister’s bedroom. “You don’t know me well enough to care that much about what Lance did. You can’t expect me to believe you’d have taken in just any … stray,” I said, pulling his brother’s word out for good use. “But you took me into your home. Isn’t that enough without teaching Lance a lesson?” I asked in disbelief.
    His gaze darkened into an unreadable hue. “Not even close. And we can talk about the whys another time. Now tell me. Did you contribute to the relationship?” he asked.
    I nodded.
    “You obviously don’t have a bank account, so was yours joint?”
    I glanced over at Central Park behind the gauzy curtains, unable to face him while I, again, managed a nod.
    “And you’re not the type to sit around and eat bonbons while your man works his fingers to the bone to provide for you.”
    I swallowed hard. “I used to work. But later in the relationship … I think I was brainwashed,” I muttered, embarrassed.
    He burst out laughing. “Considering the you I’ve known for less than twenty-four hours, I’d have to agree with you. What brought you out of the fog and into the light?”
    I set my jaw. “I don’t want to talk about that right now.”
    He studied me through narrowed eyes. “Eventually you will,” he stated.
    I blinked. “What kind of lesson?” I asked, changing the subject. “I mean, no blood or broken bones, right?”
    He grinned. “No, I like my bones intact.”
    I rolled my eyes. “You know what I