CHAPTER 42

That True North was “ski in/ski out” meant we had direct access to the slopes. All you had to do was step out the back door, pop on your skis, and go.

“There’s an easy trail here,” Grayson told me after he’d showed me the basics. “If we take it long enough, we’ll hit the busier ski areas on the mountain.”

I glanced back at Oren and one of his men—not Eli. This man was older. Oren had called him the team’s arctic specialist. Because every Texas billionaire needed an arctic specialist on their security team.

I wobbled on my skis. Grayson reached out to steady me. For a moment, we stood there, his body bracing mine. Then, slowly, he stepped back and took my hands, pulling me forward on the very slight incline near the house, skiing backward as he did.

“Show me your stop,” he said. Always issuing orders. But I didn’t complain. I turned my toes inward and managed to stop without falling… barely.

“Good.” Grayson Hawthorne actually smiled—and then he caught himself smiling, like it was forbidden for his lips to do that in my vicinity.

“You don’t have to do this,” I told him, lowering my voice to avoid being overheard. “You don’t have to teach me anything. We can tell Alisa I chickened out. I’m not here to ski.”

Grayson gave me a look—a know-it-all, never-wrong, do-not-question-me kind of look. “No one is going to believe you chickened out of anything,” he said.

From the way he’d phrased that, you would have thought I was fearless.

It took me all of five minutes to lose a ski. The trail was still relatively private. Other than my bodyguards, it was like Grayson and I were alone on the mountain. He zipped to retrieve my ski with the ease of someone who’d been skiing from the time he could walk. Returning to my side, he dropped the ski in the snow, then took my elbows in his hands.

This afternoon was the most he’d touched me—ever.

Refusing to let that mean anything, I popped the ski back on and repeated what I’d told him earlier. “You don’t have to do this.”

He let go of my arms. “You were right.” That had to be a first: Grayson Hawthorne admitting someone else was right about anything. “You said that I’ve been avoiding you, and I have. I promised I’d teach you what you need to know to live this life.”

“Like skiing?” I could see myself in the reflection of his ski goggles, but I couldn’t see his eyes.

“Like skiing,” Grayson said. “To start.”

We made it to the bottom, and Grayson taught me how to get on a ski lift. Oren went on the lift in front of us; the other guard on the one behind.

That left me alone with Grayson: two bodies, one lift, our feet dangling as we ascended the mountain. I caught myself sneaking glimpses at him. He’d pulled his goggles down, so I could make out all the lines of his face now. I could see his eyes.

After a few seconds, I decided I wasn’t about to spend the entire ride in silence. “I heard your conversation with Sheffield,” I told Grayson quietly. “Most of it, anyway.”

Down below, I could see skiers making their way down the mountain. I looked at them instead of Grayson.

“I’m starting to understand why my grandfather disinherited his children.” Grayson didn’t sound quite like himself—the same way Jameson hadn’t. The difference was, the night before had made Jameson more reserved, and it seemed to have had the opposite effect on his brother. “If Toby set that fire, if my grandfather had to cover it up, and then Skye—” He cut off abruptly.

“Skye what?” I said. We passed over a patch of snow-kissed trees.

“She sought Sheffield Grayson out, Avery. The man blamed our family for his nephew’s death. He slept with her out of spite. God knows why Skye did it, but I was the result.”

I looked at him in a way that forced him to look back at me. “You don’t get to feel guilty about that,” I said, my voice steady. “Pissed?” I continued. “Sure. But not guilty.”

“The old man disinherited the entire family around the time I was conceived.” Grayson steeled himself against that truth even as he said it. “Was Toby really the straw that broke the camel’s back—or was I?”

This was Grayson Hawthorne, showing weakness. You don’t always have to bear the weight of the world—or your family—on your shoulders. I didn’t say that.

“The old man loved you,” I said instead. I wasn’t sure about much when it came to billionaire Tobias Hawthorne, but I was sure of that. “You and your brothers.”

“We were his chance to do something right.” Grayson’s voice was taut. “And look how disappointed he was in the end—in Jameson, in me.”

“That’s not true,” I said, aching for him. For them.

Grayson swallowed. “Do you remember the knife Jameson had up on the roof?” The question caught me by surprise.

“The one with the hidden compartment?”

Grayson inclined his head. I couldn’t see the muscles in his shoulders or neck, but I could picture them beneath his ski jacket, tensing. “There was one puzzle sequence my grandfather constructed years ago. The knife was part of it.”

For reasons I couldn’t even pinpoint, the muscles in my own throat tightened. “And the glass ballerina?” I asked.

Grayson looked at me like I’d just said something very unexpected. Like I was unexpected. “Yes. To win the game, we had to shatter the ballerina. Jameson, Xander, and I got the next part wrong. We fell for the misdirection. Nash didn’t. He knew the answer was the shards.” There was something in the way he was looking at me. Something I didn’t even have a word for. “My grandfather told us that as you amass the kind of power and money he had—things get broken. People. I used to think that he was talking about his children.”

“The tree is poison,” I quoted softly. “Don’t you see? It poisoned S and Z and me.”

“Exactly.” Grayson shook his head, and when he spoke again, the words came out rough. “But I’m starting to believe we missed the point. I’ve been thinking about the things—and people—that we have broken. All of us. Toby and the victims of that fire. Jameson and me and…”

He couldn’t say it, so I said it for him. “Emily. It’s not the same, Grayson. You didn’t kill her.”

“This family breaks things.” Grayson’s tone never wavered. “My grandfather knew that, and he brought you here anyway. He put you on the board.”

Grayson wanted me safe, and I wasn’t. Having inherited the Hawthorne fortune, I might never be safe again.

“I’m not the glass ballerina,” I said firmly. “I’m not going to shatter.”

“I know you won’t.” Grayson’s voice was almost hoarse “So I’m not going to avoid you anymore, Avery. I’m not going to keep telling you to stop doing the things that I know you can’t and won’t stop doing. I know what Toby is to you—what he means to you.” Grayson’s breath was heavy. “I know, better than anyone, why you can’t stop.”

Grayson had met his father. He’d looked him in the eyes and discovered what he meant to the man. And, yeah, the answer to that question was nothing—but he knew why I couldn’t just leave the mystery of Toby alone.

“So you’re in this?” I asked Grayson, my heart skipping a beat.

“Yes.” He said the word like a vow. It hung in the air between us, and then he swallowed. “As your friend.”

Friend. The word had edges. This was Grayson pulling back, keeping me at arm’s length. Pretending that he got to make the rules.

It would have stung if I’d let it, but I didn’t. “Friends,” I repeated, fixing my gaze on the end of the lift, which was quickly approaching.

“Slide forward in your seat,” Grayson told me. All business. “Tilt the tips of your skis up. Lean forward, and go.”

The chair gave me a little push, and I zoomed forward, fighting to keep my balance. I didn’t need Grayson Hawthorne to do this. Through sheer force of will, I kept my skis underneath me and managed to stop.

See? I don’t need you to hold me up. I turned back toward my friend Grayson, a smile spreading across my face, fully prepared to gloat—and that was when I saw the paparazzi.