“My job is to treat everyone like a threat,” Oren replied. “Right now, what I need is for you to promise that you’ll stay put and do nothing.” My gaze went to the research spread across the desk. “My team and I will find out everything we can as quickly as we can, Avery. Toby might be the target here, but he also might not be.”
I frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Give us twenty-four hours, and I’ll let you know.”
Twenty-four hours? I was just supposed to sit here, doing nothing, for twenty-four hours? I hung up the phone.
“Does Oren think Eve is a threat?” Max asked in a dramatic stage-whisper.
Xander made a face. “Note to self: Cancel the welcome festivities.”
I thought about Oren telling me to let him handle it, then about Eve swearing that all she wanted was to find Toby. “No,” I told Xander. “Don’t cancel anything. I want to get a feel for Eve.” I needed to know if we could trust her because if we could, maybe she knew something I didn’t. “Got any particular festivities in mind?” I asked.
Xander pressed his hands together. “I believe that our best option for assessing the truth of the mysterious Eve’s character is… Chutes and Ladders.”
CHAPTER 10
The Hawthorne version of Chutes and Ladders wasn’t a board game.
Xander promised he would explain further once I got Eve to agree to play.
Focused on that task, I made my way to the Versailles wing. At the top of the east staircase, I found Grayson standing statue-still outside the wing, dressed in a silver three-piece suit, his blond hair wet from the pool.
A poolside cocktail party. The memory hit me and wouldn’t let go.
Grayson is expertly deflecting every financial inquiry that comes my way. I glance toward the pool. There’s a toddler balanced precariously on the edge. She leans forward, topples over, goes under, and doesn’t come up.
Before I can move or even yell, Grayson is running.
In one liquid motion, he dives into the pool, fully clothed.
“Where’s Jameson?” Grayson’s question drew me back to the present.
“Probably somewhere he’s not supposed to be,” I answered honestly, “making very bad decisions and throwing caution to the wind.”
I didn’t ask Grayson what he was doing outside the Versailles wing.
“I see that Oren put a man on Eve.” Grayson almost managed to sound like he was commenting on the weather, but a comment never felt like just a comment coming from him.
“It’s Oren’s job to make sure I stay safe.” I didn’t point out that under other circumstances, Grayson would have considered that his job, too.
Est unus ex nobis. Nos defendat eius.
“Oren shouldn’t be worried about me.” Eve stepped into the hall. Her hair was dry and fell in gentle waves. “Your security team should be focusing everything on Toby.” Eve let her vibrant green eyes go from me to Grayson, and I wondered if she recognized the effect she had on him.
“What do I have to do to convince you that I am not a threat?”
She was looking at Grayson, but I was the one who answered the question. “How about a game?”
“Hawthorne Chutes and Ladders,” Xander boomed, standing in front of a pile of pillows, rope ladders, grappling hooks, suction cups, and nylon rope.
“The rules are fairly simple.” The list of complicated things that Xander Hawthorne considered to be “fairly simple” was lengthy. “Hawthorne House has three chutes—entrances to the passageways that involve, let’s say, a drop,” Xander continued.