But the girl was gone, almost to Royal Street already, running faster than Sara was capable of. Great. Wonderful. How the hell was she supposed to explain to Gabriel that she had potentially ruined his love life? Not that she’d known he had a love life. He had never indicated to her in any way that he was involved with anyone. There had been no phone calls when she’d been around, and he spent the majority of his time with her, so how was she supposed to know he had a Rochelle on the side?

And why was he inviting her to sleep in his bed if he had a girlfriend? That was just wrong on so many levels.

Irritated, jealous, and yet somehow fairly certain he didn’t have a girlfriend, Sara was still standing in the doorway five minutes later when she saw Gabriel come around the corner carrying a brown bag.

“Hey,” he said as he approached her. “What are you doing?”

“Your girlfriend stopped by,” she said, trying desperately not to grimace at the words.

“My girlfriend?” He looked legitimately puzzled. “I don’t have a girlfriend.”

“Rochelle.”

His face was still blank. “Who’s Rochelle?”

That was interesting. “About five foot three, long, black hair—bad dye job, by the way—fair skin, wearing an ankle-length burgundy skirt and an olive green tank top.” Gabriel still didn’t look like he was making a connection, so she added, “Tattoos of butterflies all over her arms. She said you stopped coming into the shop, but she never said what the shop was. Just that she was your girlfriend.”

Which she obviously wasn’t, which gave Sara no small amount of satisfaction.

The butterfly tattoos appeared to have jogged his memory. “Oh. I know who you’re talking about. She’s not my girlfriend, she never was. We never even went out. I’m not even sure I knew her name was Rochelle.” Gabriel looked totally perplexed. “She works in the sandwich shop on Decatur. For awhile I was going there a couple of times a week. But I got burned out on po’boys.”

That almost made Sara laugh. “You just got burned out on po’boys? She acted like you were seriously hot and heavy. Wow. That’s weird.”

“How did she know where I live? Or hell, my name, for that matter.” Gabriel held out his arm for her to move into the courtyard ahead of him.

Sara turned back to look at him as she walked. “Do they ask for your name when you order your food?”

“Yeah.” He made a face. “But just my first name. I wonder if she followed me home or something.”

“She looked like the stalker type. Though now that I think about it, she didn’t actually say she was your girlfriend, just that she was in love with you.”