Page 38 of Hollow Court
A pained expression passed over my cousin’s features.
“I suppose so,” she allowed. “But whydoyou trust her?”
Did I trust her? There was a loaded question, let alone why.
“It’s complicated,” I said truthfully.
Gwyn’s cheeks flushed with indignation as she sat forward on her side of the carriage.
“I’m here, Davin.” She flung a hand between us. “I’m going along with your plan, willing to play bait, willing to consider that men I train alongside every day are the traitors rather than a woman I met a week ago, all on your word. So, you don’t get to tell me it’scomplicated. Uncomplicate it. What is there between you?”
I opened my mouth to saynothing,but Gwyn cut me off with a scathing glare.
“And don’t you dare saynothing, because as much as I absolutely despise feeding into your ego, even the Socairan ladies weren’t immune to your charm. Yet this one is willing to play house with you for half a year, and I know you aren’t cruel, so you clearly aren’t concerned about her getting attached.”
I scoffed. “I seriously doubt Galina has ever gotten too attached to anything in her entire life.”
She had walked away once already. Stars, she had practically sprinted. The life she wanted might have been in Lochlann, but it sure as hell wasn’t with me.
“See, that right there, Cousin,” Gwyn growled. “I might not be Gal, but I’m not an idiot. Why are you so sure she won’t care, and why is she the only woman in two kingdoms who is unattached but appears to want nothing to do with marrying you?”
Suddenly this carriage was a little too cramped, and I was far too sober.
I ran a hand through my hair, wanting nothing less than to have this conversation right now.
But one look at my cousin’s sincerely frustrated expression as she fidgeted with the Socairan gown she hated reminded me that she was right. She was putting her life on the line for my half-arsed scheme. I owed her this much.
Besides which, Gwyn was family. I didn’t want to lie to her.
“We were…friends,” I began slowly. “Close friends.”
Gwyn already looked dubious.
“You don’t have female friends outside of your cousins. Hell, you don’t really have any close friends outside of…” she trailed off before she could mention Mac, and I forged ahead.
“Nonetheless, we were. And then, for a brief time, we were…more than friends.”
She relaxed back against the bench again, apparently satisfied now that I was talking. Pulling one of her ever-present snacks from her satchel, she shot me a small smirk.
“Averybrief time?” she teased. “Is that why she hates you?”
I narrowed my eyes at her implication.
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m quite certain she enjoyed herself immensely.” It took everything I had not to lose myself in memories of just how immensely, the flush on her cheeks, the frantic whispering of Socairan words I didn’t have the capacity to define until much later.
“So she, what?” Gwyn pulled me from my thoughts, which was probably a good thing. “Felt taken advantage of?”
I forced myself to think about the rest of that night, her showing up at my door.I don’t want to take it back. I want to take it for myself.
Then the next morning.I came for a bit of fun before I had to get back to real life.
The last part was like a bucket of ice water, sufficiently dousing any of my feelings about the former memory in a wave of bitterness once again.
“No.” The word came out in a single sharp breath. “She didn’t feel taken advantage of.”
“Then what in the storms-damned hell happened?” Gwyn demanded, a trace of impatience in her tone.
“I…don’t know,” I said, wishing the words were a lie. “She was fine one minute, leaving to make sure no one noticed she was gone. I assumed she would come back, but then…she didn’t,” I shrugged.