Glorious Rivals(78)

“Toby.” Rohan could feel the final pieces of this puzzle coming together “Your father blamed Toby Hawthorne for Colin’s death?”

There was something about the way that she was standing with hands to her sides that made Rohan imagine that each of those hands held a blade. “Grayson,” she said, her voice low, “wants me to believe that my father thought Avery was Toby’s daughter, that my father went after her—for revenge.”

“But you don’t believe that?” Rohan pressed, stepping into her personal space once more.

This time, Savannah did not step back. “I don’t believe it matters. Whatever happened to my father, however it happened, Avery Grambs and her people—they covered it up.”

There was a danger in understanding someone a little too well. The bigger danger, however, was that Savannah Grayson was letting him understand her.

Letting him in.

Letting him see her bleed.

You were never enough, were you, love? For anyone. Not your father. Not even Gigi, in the end.

With anyone else, Rohan would have used the intimacy of that understanding to his advantage. He would have taken her head into his hands, brushed the pad of his thumb gently over those sharp, sharp cheekbones of hers like he was ridding her face of an imaginary tear. If she’d been anyone else, he would have made her feel like they were in this together, so that when he did betray her, she would never see it coming.

But touching Savannah Grayson, even pretending to feel for her—Rohan couldn’t risk it. He couldn’t risk this, whatever it was, a moment longer.

Take the knife and cut the rope. “Winning won’t get you what you want now.”

Savannah’s voice went low again. “And you are so sure that you know what I want?”

She wasn’t letting go. Damn it, why wasn’t she letting go?

“I know you,” Rohan said. “And that is enough.” She was mercilessly in pursuit of his own ends. Just. Like. Him. “We’re far too much alike, you and I. Best not to trust either of us, really.” His British accent took a turn—less aristocratic, playful in the darkest way. “You never know when the switch might flip.”

Savannah stared at him like she was Helen of Troy, staring out at a battlefield her beauty had sown. “So this is done, then?” she said, her voice going dangerously neutral. “This? Us?”

Us. “I didn’t say that.” Rohan told himself that he was still playing with her, that no part of him was trying to hold on—not when she was going to betray him.

“You’re not saying anything.” Savannah’s neutrality began to slip away, like water dripping off a razor-sharp icicle in the sun. “A picture is worth a thousand words, Rohan, and you are nothing but smooth talk and double entendres, meaningless nicknames and never telling me anything real.”

“That isn’t true.” Rohan felt, as much as heard, his own voice go brutally low. “I told you from the start, love: I want it more.”

He’d told Savannah Grayson about the Devil’s Mercy. He’d told her about dark water and drowning. About the child he’d once been.

No more.

“This really is it, isn’t it?” Savannah was far too calm.

“The end of the line,” Rohan agreed. “Do your worst, love.”

“Believe me,” Savannah told him. “I will.” Her expression like glass, she turned and walked away.

And just like that, Rohan flipped the switch.

Chapter 67

GIGI

Gigi stared at the Woman in Red—at her eyes. One blue eye. One brown. Gigi knew those eyes. She’d seen those eyes before—in a picture belonging to Brady Daniels.

As the cloaked woman interrogated them about the Grandest Game, about the players, about the game makers, all Gigi could think about was the triangular scar at the base of Knox Landry’s neck, the one the girl he’d loved had given him when she left.

He’d called it a Calla Thorp good-bye.

“You must know something else about her.”

Gigi blinked. She’d lost track of the present for a moment. “Who?”

Eve shot Gigi an incredulous look. “Lyra Kane.” Apparently, Eve did not believe this was an appropriate time to be zoning out, but Gigi’s brain was a mess of memories and what-ifs and revelations.

Calla Thorp. Not missing. Here. Alive.

“Or we could return to discussing your brother,” Calla—the Woman in Red, the Lily, the Watcher—told Gigi. “Or his brother.”

Gigi swallowed. “Grayson has three brothers.”

“Three,” Calla repeated. “That is a number of some significance. Tell me why that is the case, and I will let you go—all of you.”

Gigi glanced at Slate. Still out. If he’d been awake, he probably would have told her to just answer the question, but the number three didn’t mean anything to Gigi—and those eyes did.

“You’re… her,” Gigi said. Some people loomed larger than life, even if you didn’t know them, even if you’d only ever heard their name. “Calla.” Gigi’s heart twisted in her chest. “Brady thinks he’s playing for your life. He thinks you were taken.”

“I am not Calla.” The voice that spoke those words was eerily detached. “Calla is no more, and I am no one, by design.”