For a moment, she was flummoxed. “Why, what?”
“Don’t play the fool,” he muttered. “It does not suit you. Why did you go to see Gabriel?”
Without me.She heard the unspoken words.
“Because I thought, foolishly so, that he would come to his senses and stop this rumor madness,” she sighed. “It was all for naught.”
He was silent for a moment before he rose fluidly and stalked to her, backing her up against the nearest wall. The incensed glitter and gleam in his eyes made her suck in a quick, ragged breath—and for once, she saw another side to him, yet she was not afraid.
Her heartbeat quickened to the point it was a steady beat in her ears, but still no fear. Cassian slammed a palm over her head on the wall and leaned in. “Why did you go to himalone?”
“I did not go alone,” she replied calmly. “I took Abigail.”
Cassian did not look comforted, but rather, his eyes narrowed. “Why do I feel you are leaving something out?”
“…Promise me you won’t try to kill him,” she whispered.
“That response tells me I have grounds to kill him,” Cassian swore. “What did he do?”
Heart pumping, she said, “He tried to persuade me into being his mistress as he said you cannot give me what I truly want. I dismissed him and made to leave, but he tried to kiss me—”
He spun toward the door, and she lurched to grab him and tried to turn him—but his body was a slab of stone. He did stop, however. Swallowing, she quickly added, “I slapped him and told him in no uncertain terms that I will never be anything to him anymore.”
Cassian’s head twisted over his shoulder, and his grey eyes were steel. “Do you still love him?”
Her eyes flew open, as did her mouth. “What? No! How—how could you think that?Whywould you think that?”
“Because the moment he summons you, yourun,” Cassian muttered coldly, and she flinched. “Was hispetthere?”
“If you mean Lady Ophelia, no, she wasn’t there,” Cecilia replied. “Please don’t call her a pet. It is disrespectful.”
His jaw ticked, and something flared in his eyes again.
“Cassian—” she began softly, “—you are not jealous, are you?”
He pushed away, and then she noticed the strips of white cloth wrapped around his right hand, and her attention shifted. So many things were tugging at her attention, but she had to keep to one topic at a time.
Following him, she pressed, “Cassian, you cannot possibly be jealous of Gabriel.”
He had reached the doorway when he stopped. Not turning, he frankly said, “I am not.”
With that, he walked away. And while he did not slam the door, the soft close behind him made her heart hurt as much as it would have if he had slammed it in rage.
Slowly, she sank to the nearest seat, unable to fathom what had just happened. How had Cassian just shut her out like that, when she’d been completely honest and upfront the whole time?
He’d sworn he was not jealous—and while she had no history with a jealous man—she couldn’t shake the ideathatwas what it was.
Or it could be that Cassian does want to follow on his threat to bring Gabriel to Rotton Row for a shootout.
Sighing, she felt the beginnings of a headache spark at her temples. Mentally, she tracked the time to Lady Horatia’s garden party and rubbed at a prick of pain in her chest. “This is going to be the longest five days of my life.”
CHAPTER 24
“Are you a betting man, Tressingham?” Henry Hartwick, Cecilia’s father, bellowed as they entered the private box at Tattersalls.
“Occasionally,” Cassian murmured as he shot a look at Cecilia.
Things had been strained of late; since that night when she had returned from Whitmore’s house, it felt like a wall made of iron and ice had slammed between them.
