Page 72 of Devoured By the Forbidden Mountain Man

Meredith closed her eyes for a few seconds. When she opened them again, she looked directly at him.

“I told myself I would fix it. Then I kept waiting for the right moment, and there wasn’t one. By the time Gavin made bail, I was so scared that changing my statement would make everyone think I had lied about all of it.”

“You came to me,” Gavin said.

The softness in his voice made Georgia glance toward him.

Meredith nodded. “You kept trying to talk to me because you knew something didn’t fit. I finally told you.”

Gavin’s jaw worked before he answered. “She told me enough that I knew the case against me was built around a timeline that wasn’t complete.”

Georgia turned toward him, still holding my hand. “And that’s when you decided to run?”

“Not that night.” Gavin looked at his sister rather than Meredith. “At first I thought there had to be a way to fight the case without identifying her. I kept asking questions. I kept hoping something else would clear me.”

He paused while a server hurried through the far end of the hall with an empty tray. The young woman looked toward us, hesitated, and kept moving without slowing down.

Gavin waited until she was gone.

“My attorney eventually made it clear that if we were going to explain the weapon and the missing part of the timeline, we needed to tell the court why. There wasn’t a version where I could clear myself and keep Meredith out of it forever.”

Georgia’s expression tightened.

“You chose her.”

“I chose what I thought I could live with.” Gavin’s gaze dropped for a moment before returning to her. “I was wrong about what that would cost everybody else.”

She stepped closer to him.

“You chose for me too. You left me with the debt, the questions, and no idea whether you were alive.”

Gavin absorbed that without reaching for an excuse. The man had spent seven years preparing to survive questions from courts, law enforcement, and anyone else who might find him. None of that preparation helped when his little sister stood in front of him.

“I thought if you knew anything, you would try to help me,” he said. “I thought keeping you ignorant meant nobody could use you to find me.”

Georgia shook her head before he could add anything else. The hand holding mine had gone rigid.

“I already heard that part yesterday,” she said. “It still doesn’t make it okay.”

Georgia stared at him for several seconds, and I stayed out of it. The anger belonged to her, and Gavin had finally come back to receive it in person.

Meredith watched them, tears slipping silently down her face. “I let him keep protecting me. Staying quiet afterward was my decision. That part is on me.”

Gavin looked sharply toward her. “Running was my decision.”

For once he had no immediate argument.

For several seconds, no one spoke. Meredith wiped at her face again, Gavin stared at the floor, and Georgia’s fingers stayed locked around mine.

The first flash of blue light reflected faintly against the front windows before the officers came inside.

Gavin noticed it at the same time I did.

His shoulders squared, but he stayed planted where he was.

I released Georgia’s hand and turned enough to maintain a clear view of the front. Case had already seen the uniforms approaching. He came around the end of the bar, intercepted them near the host stand, and spoke to them briefly before pointing toward the back hall. His disco shirt threw gold reflections under the bar lights while his expression remained completely serious.

Then he went back to work.