Jameson whirled on him. “You don’t believe that.” He assessed Grayson’s expression, his posture. “But a judge might.” Jameson shot me a look. “He’ll use his letter against you if he can.”
He might have given his letter to Zara and Constantine already,I thought. But according to what Alisa had told me, that wouldn’t matter.
“There was another will before this one,” I said, looking from brother to brother. “Your grandfather left your family even less in that one. He didn’t disinherit youforme.” I was looking at Grayson when I said those words. “He disinherited the entire Hawthorne family before you were even born—right after your uncle died.”
Jameson stopped pacing. “You’re lying.” His entire body was tense.
Grayson held my gaze. “She’s not.”
If I’d been guessing how this would go, I would have guessed that Jameson would believe me and that Grayson would be the skeptic. Regardless, both of them were staring at me now.
Grayson broke eye contact first. “You may as well tell me what you think that godforsaken letter means, Jamie.”
“And why,” Jameson said through gritted teeth, “would I give away the game like that?”
They were used to competing with each other, to pushing to the finish line. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I didn’t belong here—between them—at all.
“You do realize, Jamie, that I am capable of staying here with the two of you in this room indefinitely?” Grayson said. “As soon as I see what you’re up to, you know I’ll reason it out. I was raised to play, same as you.”
Jameson stared hard at his brother, then smiled. “It’s up to the interloper of dubious intentions.” His smile turned to a smirk.
He expects me to send Grayson packing.I probably should have, but it was entirely possible that we were wasting our time here, and I had no particular objection to wasting Grayson Hawthorne’s.
“He can stay.”
You could have cut the tension in the room with a knife.
“All right, Heiress.” Jameson flashed me another wild smile. “As you wish.”
CHAPTER 33
I’d known that things would go faster with an extra set of hands, but I hadn’t anticipated what it would feel like to be shut in a room withtwoHawthornes—particularly these two. As we worked, Grayson behind me and Jameson above, I wondered if they’d always been like oil and water, if Grayson had always taken himself too seriously, if Jameson had always made a game of takingnothingseriously at all. I wondered if the two of them had grown up slotted into the roles of heir and spare once Nash had made it clear he would abdicate the Hawthorne throne.
I wondered if they’d gotten along before Emily.
“There’s nothing here.” Grayson punctuated that statement by placing a book back on the shelf a little too hard.
“Coincidentally,” Jameson commented up above, “youalso don’t have to be here.”
“If she’s here, I’m here.”
“Avery doesn’t bite.” For once, Jameson referred to me by my actual name. “Frankly, now that the issue of relatedness has been settled in the negative, I’d be game if she did.”
I choked on my own spit and seriously considered throttling him. He was baiting Grayson—and using me to do it.
“Jamie?” Grayson sounded almost too calm. “Shut up and keep looking.”
I did exactly that. Book off, cover off, cover on, book reshelved. The hours ticked by. Grayson and I worked our way toward each other. When he was close enough that I could see him out of the corner of my eye, he spoke, his voice barely audible to me—and not audible to Jameson at all.
“My brother’s grieving for our grandfather. Surely, you can understand that.”
I could, and I did. I said nothing.
“He’s a sensation seeker. Pain. Fear. Joy. It doesn’t matter.” Grayson had my full attention now, and he knew it. “He’s hurting, and he needs the rush of the game. He needs for this to mean something.”
Thisas in his grandfather’s letter? The will? Me?
“And you don’t think it does,” I said, keeping my own voice low. Grayson didn’t think I was special, didn’t believe this was the kind of puzzle worth solving.
