Page 97 of The Brothers Hawthorne

“Then I guess I should go. But don’t worry, Mr. Hawthorne.…” Emily looked at Jameson again, then Grayson, her gaze lingering there. “My heart and its defect are just fine.”

The old man didn’t say another word until Emily was long gone. The silence was uncomfortable. It was almost certainly meant to be uncomfortable, but Jameson and Grayson both knew better than to say a single word to break it.

Tobias Hawthorne reached one hand toward each of his grandsons, took them by their shoulders, and turned them toward the nearest tree house window.

“Look out there,” the old man instructed. Jameson watched as purple and gold exploded in the sky, points of light streaming downward, painting the air like a weeping willow. “Magic, isn’t it?” the old man whispered.

Jameson heard the words that went unspoken:I give you boys everything, and all I ask in return is focus.

“I didn’t have brothers,” Tobias Hawthorne commented, as another round of fireworks colored the sky red and white and blue. “Didn’t have what the four of you have.” The old man’s hands were still on their shoulders. “No one else will ever understand you the way that your brothers do. No one. It’s the four of you against the world, and it always will be.”

“Family first.”Grayson said the words, and Jameson knew, just by the way he’d said them, that he’d been told them before.

“Emily was right, you know,” Tobias Hawthorne said, suddenly dropping his hold on them. “You do look straight ahead when you’re scared, Grayson.”

He heard it all.Jameson didn’t have time to process that realization because their grandfather wasn’t done yet.

“Have I ever given you reason to fear me?” he asked—no,demanded. “Ever raised a hand to either of you?”

“No.” Jameson beat his brother to the answer.

“Would I?” the old man challenged. “Ever?”

Grayson answered this time. “No.”

“Why not?” Tobias Hawthorne posed that question like it was a riddle. “If it would push you to be what I need you to be, if it would make you better—whywouldn’tI get physical?”

Jameson felt like he had to answer first—and answer well. “Because it’s beneath you.”

“Because I love you.” The correction felt brutal, despite the sentiment being conveyed. “And Hawthornes protect those we love.Always.” He nodded to the window again. “Look out there. See it.” He wasn’t talking about the fireworks. “All of it. All we have, all we are, all I’ve built.”

Jameson looked. Beside him, Grayson did the same.

“It was just a kiss,” Grayson said stubbornly.

“Two kisses, I believe,” the old man replied. “You tread dangerous ground, boys. Some kisses are just kisses. A frivolity, really.”

Jameson thought of the moment he’d pressed his lips to Emily’s.

“You hardly have time for such things,” the old man scoffed. “A kiss is nothing. But love?” Tobias Hawthorne’s voice was quiet now. “When you’re old enough, when you’re ready, be warned: There isnothingfrivolous about the way a Hawthorne man loves.”

Jameson thought suddenly of the grandmother he’d never even met, the woman who’d died before he was born.

“Men like us love only once,” the old man said quietly. “Fully. Wholeheartedly. It’s all-consuming and eternal. All these years your grandmother has been gone.…” Tobias Hawthorne’s eyes closed. “And there hasn’t been anyone else. There can’t and won’t be. Because when you love a woman or a man or anyone the way we love, there is no going back.”

That felt like a warning more than a promise.

“Anything less, and you’ll destroy her. And if she is the one…” The old man looked first at Jameson, then at Grayson, then back at Jameson again. “Someday, she’ll destroy you.”

He didn’t make that sound like a bad thing.

“What would she have thought of us?” Jameson asked the question on impulse, but he didn’t regret it. “Our grandmother?”

“You’re still works in progress,” the old man replied. “Let’s save my Alice’s judgment for when you’re done.”

With that, Tobias Hawthorne turned away from them, away from the window, away from the fireworks. When he spoke again, it was in a tone that Jameson recognized all too well. “There are thousands of boards in this tree house. I have weakened one. Find it.”

A test. A challenge. A game.