Page 68 of The Final Gambit

“Leave her alone, Alisa.”

I looked up to see Jameson striding toward us. He was wearing a crisp white dress shirt, cuffed to his forearms. “A trust isn’t necessary. Avery can make do with financial advisors.”

“Financial advisors won’t calm anyone’s nerves about the idea of an eighteen-year-old calling the shots with one of the world’s biggest fortunes.” Alisa offered Jameson a closed-lipped,the defense restskind of smile. “Perception matters.” She turned back to me. “And to that end, there’s something else you should see.”

She took her phone from me, toggled to a new page, then passed it back to me. This time, I found myself looking down at the celebrity gossip site that had broken the story about Emily and Eve.

Switching Hawthornes? Hawthorne Heiress and Her Swinging New Lifestyle.

Beneath thatlovelyheadline, there was a series of pictures.Jameson in his tuxedo and me in my ball gown, dancing on the beach. A still frame taken from an interview I’d done months ago with Grayson—when he’d kissed me.The last picture was of me with Xander, standing on the porch at Rebecca’s house less than an hour earlier.

I hadn’t realized the paparazzi had caught us there.Then again, maybe it wasn’t the paparazzi.It was getting harder not to feel like our adversary was everywhere.

“Let’s look at the positives here,” Xander suggested. “I look dashing in that photo.”

“There’s no reason for Avery to see something like this,” Jameson said forcefully.

Jameson Winchester Hawthorne in protective mode was a thing to behold.

“Perception matters,” Alisa reiterated.

“Right now,” I replied, handing her phone back to her, “other things matter more. Tell me you’ve found something, Alisa. Who’s pulling the strings?”

She’d said that she was on it days ago—and then I hadn’t heard a word.

“Do you know how many people there are out there with a net worth of at least two hundred million dollars?” Alisa said calmly. “About thirty thousand. There are eight hundred billionaires in the United States alone, and this wouldn’t take billions.”

“It would take connections.”

I looked up to the stairs—and Grayson. He walked down them to join us but stopped short of looking at me. He was wearing all black, but not a suit.

“Whatever you have,” Grayson told Alisa, “send it to me.” Finally—finally—his eyes made their way to mine. “Where’s Eve?”

I felt like he’d struck me.

“The cottage.” Rebecca answered. “With my mom and grandpa.”

“If we find anything,” I said, trying not to let Grayson’s cutting look cut me, “we’ll call her.”

“Find anything…” Jameson’s eyes laser-locked on mine. “About what?”

“The person who took Toby is getting more aggressive,” Oren said.

“More aggressive how?” Alisa pressed.

Xander held Tiramisu up to his face and spoke in the puppy’s voice. “Don’t worry. The fire was very small.”

“What fire?” Jameson demanded, and he closed the space between us taking my hand. “Tell us, Heiress.”

“Another envelope. The message caught fire when it hit the air. Seven numbers.”

Jameson’s thumb traced the heel of my hand. “Well then, Heiress. Game on.”

CHAPTER 53

We had two potential clues: the seal and the number. Given that we were no closer to identifying the disk than Jameson and I had been for months, I opted to concentrate on the number.

Divide and conquerwasn’t a Hawthorne family motto, but it might as well have been. Grayson took financials: bank records, investment accounts, transactions. Xander, Thea, and Rebecca took the date angle:December 29, 1982. That left a myriad of possibilities for Jameson and me, among them the phone number. If we really were missing an area code, then filling in the blank would accomplish two things: First, it would give us a number to try calling. Second, it would give us a location.