The Inheritance Games (The Inheritance Games #1)(85)

Had Emily known that? Used it to her advantage? Had it ever hurt her?

“The thing was…” Grayson choked. “She didn’t just want us. She wanted what we could give her.”

“Money?”

“Experiences,” Grayson replied. “Thrills. Race cars and motorcycles and handling exotic snakes. Parties and clubs and places we weren’t supposed to be. It was a rush—for her and for us.” He paused. “For me,” he corrected. “I don’t know what it was, exactly, for Jamie.”

Jameson broke up with her the night she died.

“One night, I got a call from Emily, late. She said that she was done with Jameson, that all she wanted was me.” Grayson swallowed. “She wanted to celebrate. There’s this place called Devil’s Gate. It’s a cliff overlooking the Gulf—one of the most famous cliff-diving locations in the world.” Grayson angled his head down. “I knew it was a bad idea.”

I tried to form words—any words. “How bad?”

He was breathing heavily now. “When we got there, I headed for one of the lower cliffs. Emily headed for the top. Past the danger signs. Past the warnings. It was the middle of the night. We shouldn’t have been there at all. I didn’t know why she wouldn’t let me wait until morning—not until later, when I realized she’d lied about choosing me.”

Jameson had broken up with her. She’d called Grayson, and she hadn’t been in the mood to wait.

“Cliff diving killed her?” I asked.

“No,” Grayson said. “She was fine. We were fine. I went to grab our towels, but when I came back… Emily wasn’t even in the water anymore. She was just lying on the shoreline. Dead.” He closed his eyes. “Her heart.”

“You didn’t kill her,” I said.

“The adrenaline did. Or the altitude, the change in pressure. I don’t know. Jameson wouldn’t take her. I shouldn’t have, either.”

She made decisions. She had agency. It wasn’t your job to tell her no. I knew instinctively that no good could come of saying any of that, even if it was true.

“You know what my grandfather told me, after Emily’s funeral? Family first. He said that what happened to Emily wouldn’t have happened if I’d put my family first. If I’d refused to play along, if I’d chosen my brother over her.” Grayson’s vocal cords tensed against his throat, as if he wanted to say something else but couldn’t. Finally, it came. “That’s what this is about. One-zero-one-eight. October eighteenth. The day Emily died. Your birthday. It’s my grandfather’s way of confirming what I already knew, deep down.

“All of this—all of it—is because of me.”





CHAPTER 79


When Grayson left, Oren escorted me back to the house.

“How much did you hear?” I asked him, my mind tangled with thoughts and emotions I wasn’t sure I was ready to handle.

Oren gave me a look. “How much do you want me to have heard?”

I bit at the inside of my lip. “You knew Tobias Hawthorne. Would he have picked me to inherit just because Emily Laughlin died on my birthday? Did he decide to leave his fortune to a random person born on October eighteenth? Hold a lottery?”

“I don’t know, Avery.” Oren shook his head. “The only person who ever really knew what Tobias Hawthorne was thinking was Mr. Hawthorne himself.”





I made my way back through the halls of Hawthorne House, back toward the wing I shared with my sister. I wasn’t certain that either Grayson or Jameson would ever speak a word to me again. I didn’t know what the future held, or why the idea that I might have been chosen for a completely trivial reason felt like such a punch to the gut.

How many people on this planet shared my birthday?

I stopped on the stairs, in front of the portrait of Tobias Hawthorne that Xander had shown me what felt like a lifetime ago. I racked my mind now, as I’d done then, for any memory, any moment in time when my path had crossed with the billionaire’s. I looked Tobias Hawthorne in the eye—Grayson’s silver eyes—and silently asked him why.

Why me?

Why were you sorry?

I pictured my mother playing I Have A Secret. Did something happen the day I was born?

I stared at the portrait, taking in every wrinkle on the old man’s face, every hint to personality in his posture, even the muted color in the background. No answers. My eyes caught on the artist’s signature.


Tobias Hawthorne X. X. VIII



I looked back at the old man’s silver eyes. The only one who ever really knew what Tobias Hawthorne was thinking was Mr. Hawthorne himself. This was a self-portrait. And the letters next to the name?

“Roman numerals,” I whispered.

“Avery?” Oren said beside me. “Everything okay?”

In Roman numerals, X was ten, V was five, and I was one.

“Ten.” I put my finger under the first X, then moved it to the rest of the letters, reading them as a single unit. “Eighteen.”

Remembering the mirror that had hidden the armory, I reached behind the portrait’s frame. I wasn’t sure what I was feeling for until I found it. A button. A release. I pushed it, and the portrait swung outward.