“You’re a moron,” Sebastian said coolly.

“It’s my business.”

“So you always say.” Tipping back his beer, Sebastian eyed his cousin out of amused gray eyes. “You don’t change, Liam.”

“Why should I?” He knew it was a childish response, but Sebastian often made him feel defensive and annoyed.

“What are you trying to accomplish? What do you need to prove? She’s meant for you.”

A chilly line he refused to recognize as fear snaked up Liam’s spine. “It’s still my decision.”

Sebastian would have laughed, but he caught the flicker of unease in Liam’s eyes, felt the shimmer of it in his mind. “More fool you,” he murmured, but with some sympathy. “And if you feel that way, cousin, why haven’t you told her?”

“I told her who I am.” Liam spoke evenly, determined not to sound defensive. “Shown her. She nearly fainted.” He remembered that moment, and the fury, the guilt, he’d felt. “She’s been raised not to believe.”

“But she does believe. What she is has always been there. Until you tell her, she has no choice. And isn’t choice your most prized possession?”

Liam studied Sebastian’s smug smile with the active dislike only family could feel. When they’d been boys, Liam had competed ruthlessly against his older cousin, determined to be as fast, as clever, as smart. Under that competitive streak had been a secret layer of hero worship.

Even now, as a grown man, he wanted Sebastian’s respect.

“When she’s ready, she’ll have the choice. And she’ll make it.”

“When you’re ready,” Sebastian corrected. “Is it arrogance, Liam, or fear?”

“It’s sense,” Liam shot back, and fought not to let his teeth go on edge. “She’s barely had time to absorb what I’ve told her already, much less to fully understand. Her own heritage is buried so deep there’s hardly a glimmer of it in her mind. She’s just begun to discover herself as a woman—how can I ask her to accept her gifts?”

Or me. But he didn’t say that, infuriated himself that he would even think it.

He’s in love with her, Sebastian realized as Liam turned to scowl down at the beach. In love and too hardheaded to admit it. For a second time, a smile trembled on his lips, with laughter just beneath. So the mighty fall, he mused, fighting all the way.

“It may be, Liam, you don’t give the woman enough credit.” He glanced back to where Rowan sat with his wife at the table. “She’s lovely.”