Once more, he tried to speak, but there was nothing. No words. Words were filling his head, however, and so was concern. None of this made sense. How had he ended up in the alleyway behind The Sinner’s Palace? He had not been going there, had he? Gavin didn’t give a damn about gaming, and if he wished it, he could always scratch that itch at his own family’s hell, The Devil’s Spawn.
Caro’s expressive face showed her concern. “Can you not say anything, darling?”
He shook his head.
“Water?” she asked.
Aye, maybe that would help. But what he truly required was arrack. A whole damned bottle of it, poured straight down his gullet. That way, he could dull the pain and chase the memories until he was ready to confront them.
There was a rush of movement as she left the bed. Had he not been in utter agony, he would have admired her curves, her waist, all that glossy auburn hair cascading down her back to brush the perfect handfuls of her rump. But he was in misery, so all he could do was stare and hope the water would loosen his tongue and mind both.
She was at his side in a breeze of cool morning air, holding a cup to his lips. He allowed her to tend him as she had done when he had been an invalid. It was an eerie echo of the last time he had awoken from a deep sleep to find Caro Sutton at his side. He drank greedily, his mouth somehow drier than it had ever been.
At least swallowing was an action he was capable of performing.
When he’d had his fill, she withdrew the cup. “Enough?”
“Aye,” he managed past a throat that felt thick and unused.
But that wasn’t true, was it? He had spoken plenty in the last few weeks when he had been a man with no name and no past. It was somehow the oddness of speaking as Gavin for the first time in so long, coupled with the ache in his head, that had rendered him badly shaken.
“Speak to me, my love,” she coaxed gently, perching on the bed beside him.
She was completely naked. Even in his strange state, he could not keep his eyes from her bare breasts and pretty pink nipples, hardened by the chill in the air. He recalled in exquisite detail just how much she liked it when he sucked them.
The buoyancy in his chest was sudden and strange. He felt as if he were inhaling fresh breath, new life. As if he were reborn. The man he had been before and the man he was now joined.
“I remember,” he said, dragging his gaze to her wide hazel eyes. “I know who I am.”
“You remember?” The cup in her hands fell to the floor with a dull thud, sending the rest of the water spilling across the carpet.
Neither of them paid it much heed.
He was too fixated upon her, upon the memories returning to him, the odd change overtaking his body and mind. He wanted to smile, but could not. Was it the pain of remembrance? Or was the return of so much information at once too damned much for his mind to bear?
He couldn’t be sure. “I remember everything except what happened the night I was wounded. It’s the devil of a thing, but I woke with my name in my mind. And as I saw the sunlight, it all came rushing over me like a flood.”
“This is wonderful,” she said, but she did not smile.
Nor did she seem particularly happy to hear he once more had memories and an identity. Was it because she feared he would change his mind now that he knew who he was?
“This changes nothing for us, Caro,” he said softly.
Which was a lie. He was a Winter; she was a Sutton. Uniting their families would be damned difficult. But remembering he was Gavin Winter had done nothing to dim the love he felt for her. He would do anything necessary to make Caro his wife.
She worried her lip, her fingers plucking at the counterpane which had fallen around his waist. “Surely it will change some things.”
“Not the important things.” He grinned despite the throbbing in his skull.
He was so damned happy. Relieved.Hell. His family must have been worried about him. Had they believed him dead? There was so much he needed to discover. He had to make his way to them as soon as he could, to let them know he was alive.
“Gavin,” she said, her countenance ashen, “there is something I must tell you.”
He noticed her use of his name. And how odd it was, hearing it on her lips. Of recognizing it, of the feeling of belonging that went along with it. He was Gavin Winter, and how right it felt to finally know who he was. To have a name, a past, a memory, a family, a purpose. He had returned to himself.
Thank God.
But Caro…
