“Gav.” Pleased to see him and equally desperate for a distraction, Demon rose and rounded the desk to embrace his brother and give him a firm slap on the back.
Gavin, who was taller and broader and generally possessed the build of a barbarian, thumped him back with so much force, he knocked a cough out of Demon.
“Oh, Christ. Too hard, was it?” Gavin stepped back. “Sorry, old cuff. Didn’t mean to make you nap the bib.”
Demon was older than Gavin by a year, and yet, their almost inconsequential age difference was a common source of nettling between them.
“I wasn’t crying, you arse,” Demon said, giving Gav a brotherly jab in the ribs with his elbow.
“Looked upset when I came in,” Gav countered.
Gavin Winter could smash a man with his fist, no question. But he was also damned good at reading a man’s mood.
“Head’s aching,” he lied. “Took a knock to the old knowledge box a few days past.”
“Aye. Wine merchant, Hugo. The crooked bastard who was cheating you?”
“Gen told you?” he asked needlessly. It was a foregone conclusion that Gen would have spoken to her brother about it.
She and Gav were the only two bastard Winter siblings who shared a mother. Not that anyone would have told they were full-blooded siblings by having a look at the pair of them. Where Gen was fair-haired, Gavin’s hair was dark as the night. Her eyes were light blue and Gav’s were bright green.
“Gen and Dom both,” Gav confirmed. “Devil and Blade too, at various times. No secrets to be had in this family.”
Demon ought to have known that. Although they had found each other at different times, their bond was deep and true. The inkings they shared attested to that. The only one of them who didn’t have any was Gen, and that was on account of her being the one with the needle and also being the one who couldn’t bear the sight of her own blood.
“Like a bunch of old hens, the lot of you,” Demon grumbled. “Clucking and pecking.”
Gavin flattened a hand to his heart in mock outrage. “If I was to be any sort of fowl, I’d be a rooster on account of my big—”
“Enough,” he interrupted.
“—beak,” Gavin finished with a grin. “Here now. What did you think I was going to say?”
He glared at his brother. “Was there a reason for your visit? You didn’t say.”
“Gen told me you’ve gone and lost your heart to one of the ladies.”
Mother of all saints, this was all he needed. He could only assume Gen had good intentions in involving Gav. However, the visit had poor timing.
“Gen is wrong,” he said, clenching his jaw.
“Gen is never wrong,” Gav countered.
Not incorrectly, either. Their sister was a wise woman. Every Winter brother held her in highest esteem.
He sighed. “Doesn’t matter, either way. The lady has made her lack of interest known.”
Gav raised a brow. “Demon Winter, the man who can seduce any woman in London out of her petticoats, has been rejected?”
It was true that Demon had bedded more than his share of women in his younger days.
His ears went hot. “In the past, I may have enjoyed playing at rantum scantum.”
“Christ, you sound like an old woman.”
He delivered a playful punch to Gav’s arm. “I ain’t an old woman.”
“How is your sconce after that knock you took?” Gavin asked.
