“I’m not playing againstthe Mercy,” Jameson told his uncle. “I just need a way in.”
And what then?Avery asked in Jameson’s mind.Do you even have a plan, Hawthorne?
I have a thousand plans, Heiress.There was just no way for Jameson to know which way the wind would blow until he was standing at the eye of the storm.
“Branford.” Jameson swallowed his pride.“Please.”
“Now I am officially concerned.”
Jameson set the phone to speaker and turned to Xander. “He’s concerned.”
“Don’t be!” Xander said cheerfully. “I wouldn’t let one of my top three favorite brothers climb down an elevator shaft in an attempt to break into a high-powered secret society without personally attempting to hack that elevator first.”
Branford let out a pained sigh. “Xander Hawthorne, I presume?”
“Indeed,milord,” Xander replied with a faux British accent. “And Ican also assure you, for your peace of mind, that I amverygood with complex systemsandexplosives.”
Branford clearly did not find that comforting. “Jameson, why are you and your brother in London—anddo nottell me that you cannot tell me.”
“I wouldn’t have called,” Jameson said instead, “if it wasn’t important.”
There was a long pause on the other end of the line. A very long one. “Stay where you are,” Branford ordered—and then he hung up.
“I think that went well,” Xander said optimistically.
“If we stay here, he’ll find us,” Jameson told his brother. “We might be able to talk him around, or he might pull a Nash.” In other words, they might well find themselves hog-tied—or the British, aristocratic version thereof.
“So,” Xander said, “got any other uncles?”
Chapter 40
JAMESON
Nine King’s Gate Terrace looked exactly as Jameson remembered it. He handed the guard out front a card, a facsimile of one his father had once given to him, though this was notIanJohnstone-Jameson’s residence. Nine King’s Gate Terrace belonged toBowenJohnstone-Jameson, a man Jameson knew only by reputation, the kind of man who had powerful political figures working for him, the kind whose name was almost always spoken in a hushed tone.
Except by Zella, Jameson remembered, as the guard handed his card back to him. The duchess—orThat Duchess, as she was known in London—had spoken Bowen’s name casually enough.
“Youmay go up,” the guard told Jameson. “He stays here.”
Xander took absolutely no offense to that. “I’m sure I can find a way to entertain myself.” The guard didn’t seem to find that concerning, but he probably should have.
Jameson pulled Xander aside. “If a tall, red-haired man with a thousand-yard-glare and a solid gold stick up his ass shows up—that’s Branford. Do your best to stall him.”
“My best,” Xander vowed, “is also my worst.”
Jameson deeply suspected Branford was going to kill them. The viscount had made it clear on multiple occasions that his middle brother was not a man to be trifled with, but Jameson knew for a fact that his mysterious—and possibly nefarious—uncle Bowenwasa man in the habit of collecting cards, leverage to be held in reserve and played at the exact right time.
So let’s play.
Bowen Johnstone-Jameson looked very little like his brothers. He’d already started balding, a fact he masked by keeping his remaining hair shaved close to his scalp, matched in length to the stubble that artfully covered his jaw. The effect made Jameson’s uncle look at once highly groomed and just a little rough.
“So you’re Ian’s son.” Bowen looked Jameson halfway up and down, like he reserved full assessments for those he did not already know a great deal about, which Jameson suspected left pretty much no one.
“And you’re the guy who had a giant, glisteningBlaid into this white marble floor,” Jameson replied, gesturing to the foyer. “I love a man who loves his first initial that much.”
“Oh, that wasn’t me,” Bowen said in a voice neither rough nor smooth. “The prior owner of this place was, shall we say… less thandiscreet.” Green eyes that were an exact copy of Jameson’s own glinted with just a hint of a challenge, and Jameson wondered if he’d imagined the emphasis his uncle had put on the worddiscreet.
“I’m here to make a deal,” Jameson said.
