Chapter 9 - Gavin Was Never Just a Brother
Rhett had always known Gavin was useful.
He had not understood how dangerous that made him.
While Celeste charmed donors and played the gracious fiancée, Gavin moved in the operational shadows—driver coordination, staff notes, social filtering, event security, invitations, schedules. He was not formally powerful. That made him more dangerous, not less. People never saw the hand that rearranged the room before they entered it.
By late morning, Gavin sat in the mansion’s secondary office under private security supervision, his bruised chest taped beneath his shirt, looking less afraid than annoyed.
Rhett closed the door behind him.
“You forged access instructions in my name,” he said.
Gavin shrugged.
“You let people assume I spoke for you. That’s different.”
“You blocked Savannah from my office, my hotel, my house, and a private meeting.”
“That was family business.”
Rhett hit the desk so hard the lamp rattled.
“No,” he said. “That was betrayal.”
Gavin leaned back, trying for insolence. “You want the honest answer? Fine. Celeste told me you were spiraling. That this woman had become an obsession. She said if the relationship went public it would destroy the observatory deal, the donor board, the engagement, everything. She asked me to keep a problem contained.”
“A pregnant woman carrying my child was a problem?”
“At first, she wasn’t pregnant.”
Rhett went still.
“At first?” he repeated.
Gavin realized too late what he had admitted.
He had known before the clinic leak.
He tried to cover it. “I mean—before we knew.”
Rhett stepped closer. “No. Say it correctly.”
Gavin looked away.
Rhett’s voice dropped. “How long have you been interfering?”
Long silence.
Then: “From the night of the cancelled meeting.”
“So Celeste ordered you to keep Savannah away before there was any pregnancy.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Gavin’s jaw worked.
“Because she knew if you saw her that night, the engagement was over.”
There it was again, from a second mouth now.
Rhett absorbed it in silence.
“And after the pregnancy?” he asked.
Gavin gave a short, humorless laugh. “After the pregnancy, it stopped being salvageable and became containment.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means Celeste panicked.”
“What did she fear?”
“That you’d choose Savannah. Publicly. Completely. And once you did, she’d lose everything.”
“Everything what?”
Gavin hesitated.
This was the edge of a different secret.
Not the pregnancy.
Not the blocked messages.
Something else connected to why Celeste had clung so desperately to the observatory, the engagement, and the public life surrounding them.
Rhett saw it at once.
“She isn’t just afraid of losing me.”
Gavin said nothing.
Rhett leaned in.
“What else was she standing on?”
Gavin finally looked up.
May you like
And the fear in his eyes told Rhett the answer would reach much further than a ruined wedding.
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