Page 134 of The Brothers Hawthorne

“Peek-a-boo!” Xander jumped down from the rafters. “And welcome home. Your nine-one-one was bare on details, so I took the liberty of extrapolating a bit.”

Grayson eyed his brother, then scanned the tree house. Xander “extrapolating” was rarely a good thing. “I don’t want to talk about it,” Grayson said.The reason for that nine-one-one. What happened after you and Nash left Phoenix.

“So don’t talk,” Nash called from down below. Without another word to Grayson, he hauled a series of brown paper grocery bags up into the tree house, handing them off to Xander.

“You heard from Jamie yet?” Nash asked.

Xander raised a hand. “I have. He and Avery are on their way back. ETA tomorrow morning.”

Nash swiveled his gaze back to Grayson. “Guess that means we’re having ourselves a little slumber party out here first.”

Jameson made it back just as they were waking up the next morning. Like Nash, he, too, had come prepared. Unlike Nash, Jameson didn’t make the rest of them wait to find out what was in his bag.

The first thing he took out was a massive water bottle. A massive,emptywater bottle. The next three things out of the bag were ketchup, a gallon of milk, and a liter of root beer.

Grayson saw where this was going almost immediately—and so did Xander, who gleefully adopted an announcer’s voice. “It’s time,” he boomed, “for that standby Hawthorne classic… Drink or Dare!”

Ten minutes later, the empty water bottle was very full—and a disturbing shade of milky brown.

“I’ll go first,” Xander volunteered. “Jamie, I dare you to tell us the absolute most banana pants thing that happened while you were in England.”

“Met my father. Won a castle. Saved a duchess from certain death. Not in that order.” Jameson leaned back against the wall of the tree house, pretending—as the rest of them had all night—that it was still fully intact.

“Which one of those explains your face?” Nash asked Jameson. The bruises and swelling clearly suggested that their brother had been in one hell of a fight.

“Some faces need no explanation,” Jameson replied. He gestured to his own. “Work of art. And now it’s my turn. Nash.” The gleam in Jamie’s eyes was downright wicked. “I dare you to eat your hat.”

Grayson very nearly laughed but covered it with a cough.

“Excuse me?” Nash drawled.

Jameson leaned forward. “Literally. Eat. Your. Hat.”

For the first time since Gigi had found that picture of the passwords on his phone, Grayson almost smiled.

“A bite will do,” Jameson continued.

Nash ran his hand along the brim of his cowboy hat. “And how am I supposed to…”

“I brought utensils!” Xander volunteered, because of course he had. “And kitchen shears. You never know when you’re going to need kitchen shears.”

Nash looked to the murky liquid in the water bottle. Per the rules of the game, any player who failed to fulfill a dare had to take a nice, long swig, at least three seconds in duration. “Remind me what’s in there?”

“Milk, root beer, ketchup, pickle juice, oregano, chili powder, beef broth, and chocolate syrup,” Xander announced happily.

Nash removed his cowboy hat and narrowed his eyes at Jameson. “How big a bite are we talkin’ about here?”

Three hours later, Grayson had no shirt, and there was a giant face drawn on his stomach in permanent marker. Jameson’s eyebrows were neon purple. Nashstillsmelled like dog breath and peanut butter. And Xander had successfully built a Rube Goldberg machine the purpose of which was smacking his own ass.

The tightness in Grayson’s chest and the heaviness in the pit of his stomach were gone.

So, of course, Jameson took that as his cue to push things. “Grayson.” Green eyes met Grayson’s ice-blue ones. “I dare you to admit that you’re not okay.”

He wasn’t. Of course he wasn’t. But a Hawthorne didn’t just admit such things—especiallythisHawthorne. Grayson reached for the now half-empty bottle, but Nash swiped it before he could.

“This is a safe place,” Xander told him encouragingly. “Unless you’re my ass.”

Grayson snorted, then the snort turned to a laugh, and then the laugh turned to something else, this horrible, strangled sound in his throat. He’d known, when he sent that nine-one-one, that the end result wouldn’t be all fun and games.