The Brothers Hawthorne (The Inheritance Games, #4)(116)

“No.” Grayson’s eyes hardened. “I think this is about Acacia.”

“He wants to control her?” Nash said. There was nothing that got under Nash’s skin like a man mistreating a woman.

“He’s boxing her in,” Grayson replied, a dark undertone in his voice. “Turning up the heat. I overheard him telling her that he was there for her, she just had to let him be there for her. I heard him reminding her that her parents were gone, that her husband was gone, that she had no one. And wouldn’t you know it, when the FBI came to the house, he was nowhere to be seen, because she couldn’t afford a lawyer, and his only offer was to come as a friend.”

Grayson stopped there, but Jameson knew instinctively that his brother wasn’t done. He was still thinking, still piecing together the big picture.

All they had to do was let him.

“Trowbridge told Savannah about the accusations against her father,” Grayson stated with blade-like precision. “And about her mother’s emptied trust. Plus, right before Gigi and I fought, she said that Savannah and their mother had an argument about the girls’ trusts. They wanted to use them to help pay for a lawyer, but Savannah said the trust terms wouldn’t allow that unless…”

“Unless Trowbridge signed off on it?” Nash drawled.

“Maybe,” Jameson replied. “But Grayson thinks there might be more to it than that. Don’t you, Gray?”

“I think,” Grayson said, his voice low, “that if my private investigator hasn’t managed to get a copy of the trust paperwork by now, he’s fired.”





CHAPTER 93





JAMESON


They went from SUV to private jet and by the time they had, Grayson had gotten ahold of that paperwork. He set his tablet down with an audible click for the rest of them to see. Avery beat Jameson, Xander, and Nash to picking it up.

“The money is under the control of the trustee until the beneficiary is thirty years old…” Avery’s eyes widened, and she looked up from what she’d just read. “Or married.”

Grayson’s expression was grim. “Savannah is seventeen, eighteen in seven months. She has a boyfriend, and that boyfriend is Kent Trowbridge’s son.”

Jameson didn’t know these people as anything other than names in a story, but he thought about what Grayson had already said. The elder Trowbridge was boxing Acacia Grayson in, draining her finances, using the FBI to rattle her, ensuring that her only options were him… or his son.

“I take it we do not like this boyfriend?” Xander queried.

Grayson’s expression became, in a word, murderous. “He touches her when she doesn’t want to be touched. I saw the father do the same thing to Acacia—a hand on her shoulder, inching toward her neck.” There were slabs of granite softer than Grayson’s jaw at that moment. “The son is whiny,” he told them. “The father is dangerous.”

“So we take him out.” Nash took off his second-favorite cowboy hat.

Jameson smiled. Kent Trowbridge didn’t know what he’d gotten himself into. No one stood a chance against any two of the Hawthorne brothers, let alone all four. “What do we have to work with, Gray?”

Grayson’s reply was immediate. “Illegal activity to hold over his head if we can find proof that he’s the one who emptied Acacia’s trust.” Grayson’s smile was measured and slow. “There’s a safe in his home office. I didn’t have time to crack it the last time I was there, but this may call for a return trip.”

Jameson leaned forward, ready to play. “What else?”

Grayson leaned back. “I have all of his passwords. Guy kept them taped to the inside of his desk.”

Unfortunate for him, Jameson thought. And very fortunate for us.

Across the aisle of the plane, Nash looked from Xander to Avery. “You two thinking what I’m thinking?”

Xander grinned. “This should be fun.”





CHAPTER 94





GRAYSON


Every problem had solutions, plural. Complex problems were fluid, dynamic. But as it turned out, Kent Trowbridge wasn’t all that complex, and Grayson was certain that he wouldn’t be a problem for long.

Two days. That was how long it took for Grayson and his brothers to get what they needed, which gave Grayson plenty of time to consider the where and when of this confrontation.

Racquetball wasn’t one of Grayson’s sports of choice, but the racquetball court that Trowbridge had reserved for his weekly game against a family friend suited Grayson’s purposes nicely—particularly given that the friend in question was a federal judge.

The same judge who’d signed the FBI warrant.

The clear glass wall separating the hall from court number seven allowed Grayson the perfect view of his quarry. Even better, it allowed his quarry to eventually realize that he was being watched.

Grayson had dressed for the occasion: expensive suit, expensive shoes, a black-and-gold Rolex on his wrist. He didn’t look like he belonged in an athletic facility. There was an advantage to making sure your opponent felt underdressed.

The judge noticed him first. Grayson didn’t bat an eye. He just kept watching the two of them, the way a man on the floor of the stock exchange might watch the boards.