The Inheritance Games (The Inheritance Games #1)(90)

She is not well. I had to find a way out of here. I had to get away from her.

“Emily would have hated you for stealing their money. She would have hated the way they look at you.”

“So you decided to get rid of me,” I said, stalling for time. “For Emily.”

Rebecca stared at me. “No.”

“You knew about the tunnels, and somehow, you told Drake…”

“No,” Rebecca insisted. “Avery, I wouldn’t do that.”

“You said it yourself. Emily would have wanted me gone.”

“I’m not Emily.” The words were guttural.

“Then what were you apologizing for?” I asked.

Rebecca swallowed. “Mr. Hawthorne told me about the tunnels one summer when I was little. He showed me all the entrances, said I deserved something that was just mine. A secret. I come down here when I need to get away—sometimes when I’m visiting my grandparents, but since Emily died, things are pretty awful at home, so sometimes I enter from the outside.”

I waited. “And?”

“The night of the shooting, I saw someone else in the tunnels. I didn’t say anything, because Emily wouldn’t have wanted me to. I owed her, Avery. After what I did—I owed her.”

“Who did you see?” I asked. She didn’t answer. “Drake?”

Rebecca met my eyes. “He wasn’t alone.”

“Who else was there?” I waited. Nothing. “Rebecca, who else was in the tunnel with Drake?”

Who would Emily have wanted her to protect?

“One of the boys?” I asked, feeling like the ground was crumbling beneath me.

“No,” Rebecca said quietly. “Their mother.”





CHAPTER 86


Skye?” I tried to wrap my mind around that. She’d never seemed like a threat, the way Zara had. Passive-aggressive, sure, and petty. But violent?

We’re all friends here, aren’t we? I could hear her declaring. I make it a policy to befriend everyone who steals my birthright.

I could see her holding out a glass of champagne and telling me to drink.

“Skye was down here with Drake the night of the shooting,” I said, making myself confront the implications head-on. “She gave him access to the estate, probably even pointed him toward the Black Wood.”

Toward me.

“I should have told someone,” Rebecca said softly. “After the shooting, as soon as I realized what I’d seen—I should have spoken up.”

“Yes.” That word was razor sharp—and spoken by someone other than me. “You should have.” Overhead, Grayson stepped into view.

Rebecca turned to face him. “It was your mother, Gray. I couldn’t—”

“You could have told me,” Grayson said quietly. “I would have taken care of it, Bex.”

I doubted Grayson’s method of taking care of it would have involved turning his mother over to the police.

“Drake tried again,” I said, glaring daggers at Rebecca. “You know that, right? He tried to run us off the road. He could have killed me—and Alisa and Oren and Thea.”

Rebecca made a garbled sound the second I said Thea’s name.

“Rebecca,” Grayson said, his voice low.

“I know,” Rebecca said. “But Emily wouldn’t have wanted…”

“Emily’s gone.” Grayson’s tone wasn’t harsh, but his words took Rebecca’s breath away. “Bex.” He made her look at him. “Rebecca. I’ll take care of this. I promise you: Everything is going to be fine.”

“Everything is not fine,” I told Grayson.

“Go,” he murmured to Rebecca. She went, and we were alone.

Grayson lowered himself slowly into the hidden room. “Xander said you needed me.”

He’d come. Maybe that would have meant more if I hadn’t just had that conversation with Rebecca.

“Your mother tried to have me killed.”

“My mother,” Grayson said, “is a complicated woman. But she’s family.”

And he would choose family over me, every time.

“If I asked you to let me handle this,” he continued, “would you? I can guarantee that no more harm will come to you or yours.”

How exactly he could guarantee anything was unclear, but there was no doubt that he believed he could. The world bends to the will of Grayson Hawthorne. I thought about the day I’d met him, how sure he’d seemed of himself, how invincible.

“What if I play you for it?” Grayson asked when I didn’t reply. “You like a challenge. I know you do.” He stepped toward me. “Please, Avery. Give me a chance to make this right.”

There was no making this right—but all he’d asked for was a chance. I don’t owe him that. I don’t owe him anything. But—

Maybe it was the expression on his face. Or the knowledge that he’d already lost everything to me once. Maybe I just wanted him to see me and think about something other than October eighteenth.

“I’ll play you for it,” I said. “What’s the game?”

Grayson’s silver eyes held mine. “Think of a number,” he told me. “One to ten. If I guess it, you let me handle the situation with my mother my way. If I don’t…”