Page 3 of The Billionaires' Gamble

Especially factoring in his attraction to one of said men.

“Talk to me,” she pleads, reaching for his hand. Letting mine go, she brushes his hair away from his forehead, grazing her fingers down his temple. He closes his eyes and leans into her touch. “What’s going on in your head?”

“I don’t want to lose you.”

“Okay.” She nods, urging him to continue. “I don’t want to lose you either.”

He seems relieved by that, and then glances at me. “We were on the elevator, and Gabe was talking me off a ledge. Thanks for that, by the way.”

“No problem.”

“And—”

“And what? What do you want?” she asks, twisting to face him more fully.

He shrugs.

Come on, man.

Those soft green eyes meet mine, and something twists in my chest.

Katherine doesn’t miss that glance, because of course she doesn’t. “You don’t need my permission, Kingston.”

2

KATHERINE

King’s lips part like he wants to argue with me.

Despite the little verbal bomb he dropped about kissing Gabe and his subsequent freak out, I can feel the urgency in him. How earnest he is. Just how much he’s fretted over the whole situation.

I tell him he doesn’t need my permission, but he obviously doesn’t believe me. I cup his cheek, and he leans into my touch. Such a happy golden retriever boyfriend. The most golden there ever was.

“I think I do,” he says, voice rough and strained. “I’d rather break both my wrists than hurt you.”

He looks to Gabe for back-up. That’s kind of adorable.

Given how often he’s doing handstands or climbing something, breaking both wrists is extra heinous in his world.

Smiling, I look back at Gabe. Those razor-sharp blue eyes flick from King to me and back.

“We wanted to talk to you. We’d never want you hurt,” Gabe says. “But then the elevator got stuck.”

He watches King the same way he watches Alex. Constantly checking in, making sure he’s okay, lots of heat and attraction,but also that hint of aloofness. Like, look but don’t touch—until I tell you to.

Kingston has worked his way into Gabe’s bubble. I’ve learned just how small that sphere is this last week. We’re both among the privileged few allowed inside Gabriel Rothburn’s life.

I never expected to feel so special where Gabe is concerned.

“This isn’t one of those ask for forgiveness rather than permission situations,” King adds.

“Okay.” There’s a tiny kernel somewhere deep down that worries that I’m not enough and that’s why he’s interested in Gabe. But that whisper is my past.

The old Katherine.

The woman who was never good enough for her mother. Who struggled to find her place and her people and felt like an outcast more often than not.

The new Katherine understands enough about chemistry and timing to see that they were on this crash course from the moment King showed up on the beach in front of Gabe’s house.