Glorious Rivals(6)

Rohan gauged Savannah’s response to that final word in the slow rise and fall of her chest.

“Henry the Sixth, Part Three,” he clarified.

“I am well aware,” Savannah replied. She didn’t take the bait, didn’t say a word about her motivation for playing this game—or her plot for revenge. “Perhaps you should be going.” She picked up Rohan’s clothes and tossed them at him. “We have hours yet before phase two, and there’s no reason for you to spend them here.”

No reason. Is that right, love? “You mentioned strategy.” Rohan lowered his voice, a move aimed at forcing her to lean slightly toward him. “Here’s a tip, Savvy: divide and conquer.” Now it was Rohan’s turn to lean forward ever so slightly. “And here’s another one: The fewer players there are left in a game, the more important it becomes to control the board.”

“The board,” Savannah repeated, intensity in her tone. “The island.”

“The island. The house. The objects.” Rohan held Savannah’s gaze a moment longer, then brushed past her and stepped into the bedroom. “Think fast, love.” He tossed something back over his shoulder at her.

He heard her catch the glass dice—the white dice, hers, lifted from her pocket, along with his room key—as he’d passed.

“And that,” Rohan called back, as he sauntered out of Savannah’s room, “is why I’m the one in charge of securing our sword.”

Chapter 5

GIGI

Good. You’re waking up. You’ve been out for hours.”

The first thing Gigi was aware of was the voice—male, quiet, a little rough.

The second thing was the feel of a fur throw beneath her body, soft and warm.

And the third thing was ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING ELSE, including and especially the fact that there was a distinct possibility that she had been kidnapped.

Gigi blinked rapidly. No need to panic! she told herself sternly. I’m sure it was a completely amiable kidnapping. Maniacal optimism in the face of danger was a real strength of Gigi’s—and so was taking in every last detail of any situation.

The room around her was large, circular, and dimly lit. Light crept in through cracks in the stone wall, tiny, concentrated beams shining in the air like stars in the sky. Somewhere up above—the building was at least forty feet tall—there must have been windows, but Gigi couldn’t see them, only the faint light they let in, which cast shadows on a twisting staircase made of stone.

Absolutely nothing to worry about here, Gigi assured herself. As far as she could tell, there was nothing else in the room except for herself, the criminally soft blanket beneath her, the staircase, a door…

And the person blocking the door.

“I’m not going to hurt you.” He made that statement sound less comforting than matter-of-fact.

“That’s my line,” Gigi replied, trying to buy herself some time to study her captor. Blond hair hung in his face, partially obscuring eyes so dark brown they looked nearly black. She knew from their last meeting that he had a scar through one eyebrow, but she couldn’t see it now—not with his hair in his face, not from this distance, not in this light. Instead, Gigi’s gaze was drawn to the tattoos on his arm, thick, black, semi-jagged lines that looked like nothing so much as claw marks.

“I’m not going to hurt you is your line?” He may or may not have been amused by that. His stone-cold expression and utterly flat voice made it hard to tell. “Glad to hear I’m not at risk of bodily harm.”

Oh, you definitely are. Gigi considered the merits of an unexpected flying tackle, but she’d obtained a head wound during the Grandest Game, and it was pounding just a teensy bit. A thing like that could really throw off a person’s tackling calculus.

“Actually,” Gigi informed him, adjusting her legs to sit crisscross, “my line is You’re not going to hurt me—said with a smile.”

“You say everything with a smile.”

“Not everything. Observe.” Gigi pointed an emphatic, jabby finger at her captor. “You knocked me out! And kidnapped me! You broody-faced muscle-goblin!”

She really hadn’t meant to say anything about his muscles.

Can’t say I wasn’t warned, Gigi thought with an internal sigh. A year and a half earlier, her brother had warned her that this mysterious stranger—Code Name: Mimosas—was Very Bad News. Grayson had told her to run the other way if she so much as saw the guy. And what had Gigi done when she’d realized Mimosas was on Hawthorne Island, interfering with the Grandest Game?

She’d gone looking for him.

“Kidnapped is a bit harsh, sunshine. I’m just doing damage control. As soon as the game is over, I’ll let you go.”

“What are you up to, Mimosas?” Gigi narrowed her eyes. “What is Eve up to?”

Gigi didn’t know all that much about this guy’s employer, but she knew that Grayson considered Eve dangerous. She knew that Eve had resources—and a personal connection to the Hawthorne family.

“Mimosas?” her captor said.

Gigi did not dignify that question with a response. Instead, she plotted. Mr. Very Bad News had made a key error in taking her. In addition to being an Olympic-level optimist, Gigi was also very skilled at the art of interrogation.