Page 30 of The Final Gambit

Tobias Hawthorne stares back at me from across the table. “The thing about strategy,” he says, “is that you always have to be thinking seven moves ahead.” He leans across the table.

The next thing I know, he has me by the neck.

“Some people kill two birds with one stone,” he says, strangling me. “I kill twelve.”

I woke up frozen, locked in my own body, my heart in my throat, unable to breathe.Just a dream.I managed to suck in oxygen and roll sideways off my bed, landing in a crouch.Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.I didn’t know what time it was, but it was still dark outside. I looked up at the bed.

Jameson wasn’t there. That happened sometimes when his brain wouldn’t stop. The only question tonight wasstop what?

Trying to shake off the last remnants of the dream, I strapped on my knife then went to look for him, making my way to Tobias Hawthorne’s study.

The study was empty. No Jameson. I found myself staring at the wall of trophies the Hawthorne grandsons had won—and not just trophies. Books they’d published, patents they’d been granted. Proof that Tobias Hawthorne had made his grandsons extraordinary.

He’d made them in his own image.

The dead billionairehadalways thought seven moves ahead, always killed twelve birds with one stone. How many times had the boys told me that? Still, I couldn’t help feeling like my subconscious had just served up a warning—and not about Tobias Hawthorne.

Someone else was out there, strategizing, thinking seven steps ahead. A storyteller telling a story—and making moves all the while.

I always win in the end.

Frustration building inside me, I pushed open the balcony doors. I let the night air hit my face, breathed it in. Down below, Grayson was in the pool, swimming in the dead of night, the pool lit just enough that I could make out his form. The moment I saw him, memory took me.

A crystal glass sits on the table in front of him. His hands lay on either side of the glass, the muscles in them tensed, like he might push off at any moment.I didn’t let myself sink into the memory, but another slice of it hit me anyway as I watched Grayson swimming down below.

“You saved that little girl,” I say.

“Immaterial.” Haunted silver eyes meet mine. “She was easy to save.”

Another outdoor light turned on below.The motion sensor by the pool.My hand went to my knife, and I was on the verge of calling out for security when I saw the person who had tripped the sensor.

Eve was wearing a nightgown, one of mine that I didn’t remember her taking. It hit her mid-thigh. A breeze caught the material the second before Grayson saw her. From this distance, I couldn’t make out the expressions on their faces. I couldn’t hear what either of them said.

But I saw Grayson pull himself from the pool.

“Avery.”

I turned. “Jameson. I woke up, and you weren’t there.”

“Hawthorne insomnia. I had a lot on my mind.” Jameson pushed past me and looked down. I took that as permission to look again, too. To see Grayson placing an arm around Eve.He’s wet. She doesn’t care.

“How long would you have stood here, watching them, if I hadn’t come?” Jameson asked, an odd tone in his voice.

“I already told you, I’m worried about Grayson.” My mouth felt like cotton.

“Heiress.” Jameson turned back to me. “That’s not what I meant.”

A ball rose in my throat. “You’re going to have to be more specific.”

Slowly, deliberately, Jameson pushed me up against the wall. He waited, as he always did, for my nod, then obliterated the space between us. His lips crushed mine. My legs wrapped around him as his body pinned mine to the wall.

Jameson Winchester Hawthorne.

“That was very… specific,” I said, trying to catch my breath. He was still holding on to me, and I couldn’t pretend that I didn’t know why he’d needed to kiss me like that. “I’m with you, Jameson,” I said. “I want to be withyou.”

Then why do you care how Grayson looks at her?The question was alive in the air between us, but Jameson didn’t ask it.

“It was always going to be Grayson,” he said, letting go of me.