“Don’t be.” Toby reached out to cup my face. “I see so much of your mother in you.”
That felt far too much like good-bye. From the moment Eve had arrived at the gates of Hawthorne House, I had been determined to get him back. And now—
“Will I…” The words stopped, like the question was gumming up my throat. “Can I see you?” I asked.
You have a daughter, I could hear myself saying.
I have two.
Blake didn’t give Toby the chance to reply. He shifted his attention to Eve. She basked in it, like he was the sun and she had the type of skin that didn’t burn. For the first time, instead of looking at her and seeing Emily, I saw something very different.
An intensity that was Toby’s. Blake’s.
“If I win this game…,” she said, steel and wonder in her tone.
“It’s yours,” Blake confirmed. “All of it. But before we begin…” Blake lifted a finger, and a member of his security team rushed over. “Could you fetch our other guest for Ms. Grambs?”
Grayson. I didn’t let myself fully believe that he was okay until I saw him, and then I let myself think about what I’d won—not just his freedom, but a promise that no one I cared about would find themselves a guest here again.
“Avery.” Grayson’s blue-gray eyes—his irises icy and light against the inky black of his pupils—locked on to mine. “I had a plan.”
“Reckless self-sacrifice?” I retorted. “Yeah, I got that.” I pulled him close and spoke directly into his ear. “I told you, Grayson, we’re family.”
I let go of him. The board was set up a final time. Eve was white. I was black. With tens of thousands of diamonds glittering between us, we faced off in a game of greatest stakes.
Based on Eve’s level of play against Toby, I hadn’t anticipated the challenge I soon found myself facing. It was like she’d watched my game against her father, internalized a dozen new strategies, and learned how I saw the board.
She’s playing to win. I was desperate to save Oren, and I had no idea how much of a crime I had committed by not reporting Sheffield Grayson’s death. But Eve? She was playing for the keys to the kingdom—for wealth and power beyond imagining.
For acceptance from someone she was desperate to be accepted by.
The rest of the room faded away until I couldn’t hear anything but the sounds of my own body and couldn’t see anything but the board. It took longer than I’d anticipated, but finally, I saw my opening.
I could have her in check in three moves, checkmate in five.
Just like that, I could walk away from here with Grayson, knowing that Vincent Blake had that many fewer ways of coming at me.
But he’ll still come.
The assaults on my financial interests, the paparazzi, playing games and boxing me in. He’ll just keep coming. That thought grew louder in my mind, pushing my focus from my match against Eve to the bigger picture.
For me, this wasn’t the ultimate game.
I could win, and I would still walk out of here no better off than when Tobias Hawthorne had died. It would still be hunting season. A man who Tobias Hawthorne had so feared that he had left a virtual stranger his fortune would still be gunning for me.
Even without violence, even with our physical safety guaranteed, Vincent Blake would still find a way of destroying anyone, everyone, and everything that stood in his way.
This win right now against Eve—it wouldn’t be enough.
I had to play the long game. I had to look past the board, play ten moves ahead, not five, think in three dimensions, not two. If I beat Eve, Vincent Blake would send me on my way, and he’d do so knowing that I was more than he’d given me credit for. He’d adjust his expectations in the future.
You’re young. Tobias Hawthorne’s voice rang in my mind. You’re female. You’re nobody—use that. If I gave Vincent Blake an excuse to continue underestimating me, he would.
I’d come here with a plan in mind. The tournament hadn’t been a part of that plan—but I could use it.
Playing chess wasn’t just about anticipating your opponent’s moves. It was about planting those moves in their mind—baiting them. After listening to the recording the old man had left for us, Xander had marveled at the fact that Tobias Hawthorne had foreseen exactly what we would all do after his death, but Hawthorne hadn’t just foreseen it.
He’d manipulated it. Manipulated us.
If I wanted to beat Blake, I had to do the same. So I didn’t take the opening Eve had given me. I didn’t beat her in five moves.
I let her beat me in ten.
I saw the exact moment when Eve realized that Vincent Blake’s empire was in her grasp—and the moment, right afterward, when Toby’s eyes flashed. Did he suspect I’d thrown the game?
Did my real opponent?
“Well done, Eve.” Blake offered her a small, self-satisfied smile, and Eve glowed, the smile on her face luminescent. Blake turned to me—and Grayson. “The two of you may leave.”
His men closed in on us, and I didn’t have to fake my panic. “Wait!” I said, sounding desperate—and feeling that desperation, because even though this had been a calculated risk, I had no way of knowing that I hadn’t miscalculated. “Give me another chance!”
“Have some dignity, child.” Blake stood and turned his back on me as his hunting dog returned to his side and dropped a dead duck at his feet. “No one likes a sore loser.”
“You could still have a favor,” I shouted as Blake’s security began to remove me from the premises. “One last game. Me against you.”
“I don’t need a favor from you, girl.”
That’s okay, I tried to tell myself. There’s another option. An option I’d come prepared for. An option I’d planned for. The gift of the chess set, the fact that I had Alisa waiting for me outside—I’d always known what my gambit was going to be.
What it was going to have to be.
“Not a favor, then,” I said, trying to hold on to the panic and the desperation so he wouldn’t see the deep sense of calm rising up inside me. “What about the rest of it?”
Grayson cut a sharp look in my direction. “Avery.”
Vincent Blake held up his hand, and his men all took a silent step back. “The rest of what, exactly?”
“The Hawthorne fortune.” I let the words come out in a rush. “My lawyer has been after me to sign these papers for weeks. Tobias Hawthorne didn’t tie my inheritance up in a trust. The fine people at McNamara, Ortega, and Jones are nervous about a teenager taking the reins, so Alisa drew up paperwork that would put everything in a trust until I turn thirty.”
“Avery.” Toby’s voice was low and full of warning. Part of me wanted to believe he was just helping me sell the in-over-my-head act, but he was probably offering a genuine word of caution.
I was risking too much.
“If you play me,” I told Blake, nodding toward the chessboard, “and you win, I’ll sign the papers and make you the trustee.”
Coming here, I’d been counting on Blake’s ego to make him think that he could beat me, but there had always been the chance that he would realize I’d suggested chess specifically because I stood a good chance at winning. But now?
He’d seen me play.