Glorious Rivals(72)

Lyra didn’t so much as lift her eyes from her work, and Rohan took it upon himself to aid her in clearing away the rest of the dirt. Words stared up at the two of them—another riddle.

OFTEN

NEVER

LITTLE LATE

YOU

AND TWO

TOO MUCH, TOO GREAT

NEVER, EVER

I TRAP YOU NOT

GO NOW

HOW

TO SHOOT YOUR SHOT

“A clue,” Rohan noted. “But still no ledger.” He lifted his gaze back up to the tree to see Grayson Hawthorne rapidly approaching. Lyra noticed the same and stood, and while she was distracted, Rohan slid his fingers around the side of the plaque, clearing dirt as he went. With the plaque free and clear, he tried subtly prying it from the ground. Firmly affixed, for now at least. Rohan skimmed his fingers around the outside of the metal and was rewarded when he hit a gap—a very tiny one.

Circular. A hole, a fraction of a centimeter in diameter. Rohan stood without letting on that he’d found anything at all, just as Grayson Hawthorne hit the ground.

“Savannah is not coming down until I’m gone,” Grayson told Lyra.

Rohan felt something pass between the two of them as Grayson crouched to assess the plaque. Rohan could see how this would play out. Grayson would soon use his watch to inform the game makers of Savannah’s intentions, if he had not already. Being intelligent individuals themselves, Avery Grambs and Jameson Hawthorne would almost certainly take precautions surrounding the announcement of this year’s winner, in case Savannah prevailed and won the game.

With her original plan thwarted, the Savannah Grayson that Rohan knew would nonetheless find a way to get what she wanted. Rohan thought back to exactly what Brady Daniels had offered her. A body. Proof.

Logic dictated that Savannah didn’t need to win this game anymore. All she needed to do was take Rohan out.

Sidelining that thought, Rohan tracked Grayson’s movements as the Hawthorne stood, having thoroughly studied the surface of its plaque—but not, Rohan noted with some satisfaction, the sides. Not that tiny hole.

So tiny, in fact, Rohan thought, the words little more than a whisper in his mind, that it is barely any larger than the tip of a dart.

A golden dart. Rohan knew without reaching for his pockets that he’d neglected to bring his—a result of changing clothes, a result of the fact that he’d believed the dart had already served its purpose in this game as the clue that had started them off.

Admit it. That voice was the Proprietor’s. You’ve lost your focus. She’s stolen it from you, and you have allowed it.

Rohan thought for a single moment of that not-light, not-teasing cliffside kiss, devoid of inhibitions—and mercy. He’d known, as he’d kissed Savannah Grayson, that she would betray him. And thanks to Grayson and his newfound knowledge, Brady’s offer to Savannah had just gone from tempting to unrefusable.

Rohan played out the scenario in his mind, in all its glorious variations. Grayson and Lyra would leave to ponder the words on the plaque. Savannah would descend and read it herself. And if Rohan left her alone… well, Brady Daniels was probably around here somewhere.

Watching.

Waiting.

Savannah would take his offer now, if she hadn’t already. All Rohan had to do was go to retrieve his dart and let it happen.

Chapter 61

ROHAN

The house on the north point was, to all appearances, empty. Rohan broke his own rule and entered through the front door, not even bothering to mask the sound of his footsteps. The spiral staircase awaited him, and he took it up one flight to the fourth-floor corridor.

My room. The door. It was open. Rohan slipped into silence as easily as another man might pull on a different shirt. That silence—unnatural to some but not to him—stayed with Rohan as he made his way down the hall, as he pushed the door open just a bit more…

Brady Daniels, it appeared, was not out in the forest after all. Not watching. Not waiting. No, Brady Daniels was currently standing over Rohan’s discarded tuxedo jacket—and he was holding a golden dart.

“Mine, I assume?” Rohan announced his presence. He eyed Brady’s hold on the dart, the way the scholar’s deep brown fingers made a fist around its barrel.

Rohan was no stranger to breaking grips.

“You’re welcome to try to take it from me,” Brady said, seemingly mild-mannered to the end, but he was not wearing the jacket of his armor, and there wasn’t a pair of glasses in the world thick-rimmed enough to mask the fact that, with muscular arms bare and his abdomen visible through a dark tank top, Brady Daniels did not look nearly so scholarly.

He did not look the least bit harmless.

Where Rohan’s muscles were long and lean, Brady’s were solid, defined enough that Rohan could make out, up and down his arms, where one muscle ended and the next began. Where Rohan’s skin was unmarked with scars, Brady had several, as well as a tattoo on the inside of his left arm, a black spiral lined with writing. His shoulders were as wide as Rohan’s own. But I have the greater wingspan.

Not that this was going to come to a fight.

“Violence would not be appreciated by the game makers,” Rohan commented, sauntering just a bit closer to his target. “It might even get us kicked out of the game.”

“Us,” Brady repeated. “Or you, if I refused to fight back. I am notoriously nonviolent.”