to speak with her ever again, she needed to try to persuade him against this fight.
“Thank you for telling me, Pen,” she told her sister. “I know what I must do.”
Finding Gavin Winter the second time had not proven nearly as easy as finding him the first time had. Caro had gone to The Devil’s Spawn but had been denied entry on account of her being female. At the rear entry, she had finally cozened the guard into allowing her inside. Within the maze of halls, she could have wandered forever. In the end, it was Gavin who found her, apparently having been alerted to her presence by the guard.
He came stalking toward her, his handsome face a frozen mask. “What the hell are you doing here?”
She took a moment to drink in the sight of him, so welcome after their days apart, before she shook herself from her thoughts. “I came to see you, Gavin.”
He held up his hands, making a sweeping gesture toward himself. “And here I am. Now go.”
He did not want to see her. She knew she ought not to be surprised, but she could not deny that his reaction hurt.
“I will not go until you listen to me,” she said, holding her ground. “I know you are angry with me for keeping the truth a secret—”
“Angry does not begin to describe it,” he interrupted, seething.
Even in his outrage, his posture so rigid and indifferent, his voice cold and cutting, he was beautiful. Beloved. She would never stop loving him. He owned her heart, and he always would.
Whether he wanted it or not.
“I never wished to deceive you,” she tried again.
“And yet you did.”
She longed to reach for him, to touch him, but she did not dare. The tender lover of several nights before had vanished, and in his place stood a cool, harsh stranger. “Will you not at least hear what I have to say?”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “No.”
A dark-haired man peered around one of the doorways behind Gavin. “Chrissakes, Gav, if you’re going to have a conversation with your woman, have it in one of the private rooms instead of the damned hall.”
Caro’s cheeks went hot. She wondered just who the man was and what he had overhead, what he knew of her.
“She ain’t my woman,” Gavin snarled, glaring at Caro. “She’s a Sutton and a liar.”
“Whatever she is, I don’t want to hear the two of you bickering while I’m balancing the bloody ledgers,” the man countered, his voice calm, his tone firm.
“Fine,” Gavin growled, moving toward Caro and seizing her arm in a grasp that was not painful but would nevertheless be difficult indeed to extricate herself from. “Come with me, Sutton.”
Sutton.
She was no longer Caro to him now.
Pain howled through her as he hauled her into a small salon and closed the door behind them. Not the physical sort of pain but the sort that could crush a woman from the inside out.
He released her instantly, as if he found the very notion of touching her repellent, and with such abruptness, she nearly lost her balance. When he turned his fierce green gaze on her, her tongue refused to cooperate. For a moment, all she could do was think of the man he had been before. Was this angry man before her the true Gavin Winter? Or had she created him with her deception?
“Go on then,” he said, “tell me what the devil you are doing here.”
“I was told you intend to fight Jeremiah Jones.”
His full lips thinned. “Aye, not that it’s any concern of yours.”
Merciful saints, he intended to do it. What Pen had told her was true. Instinctively, Caro stepped toward him, closing the distance between them, reaching for him. “Gavin, please. I am begging you not to fight. You are still healing, and from what I have been told, Jeremiah Jones is a ruthless man.”
“Save your begging,” he snarled, shaking her touch from his arm.
“You will not be able to defend yourself,” she continued, fear prodding her despite the rage emanating from him. “I am told he has already killed a man.”
“You needn’t fret over me, Sutton. I know where your loyalty lies.”
She flinched, for the words possessed the force of a blow.
Because they were true. Her loyalty had not been to Gavin as it should have been. Instead, she had kept the truth from him, and she would forever hate herself for the choice she had made. An impossible choice, it was true; either