Page 90 of The Hawthorne Legacy
My thoughts were elsewhere. We knew now that Jackson Currie would talk to me. He wouldn’t talk to Grayson. He hadn’t talked to Tobias Hawthorne’s investigators. He was paranoid and pretty much a shut-in. He didn’t trust phones.
But he would talk to me—in person.
“I’ll call you back,” I told Grayson, and then I placed another phone call—to Alisa. “I’m allowed to spend three nights per month away from Hawthorne House. So far, I’ve only spent one.”
CHAPTER 74
Alisa didn’t like the idea of my visiting Hawthorne Island. Oren liked it even less. But there was no stopping me now.
“Fine.” Oren gave me a look. “I will arrange security for you.” His eyes narrowed. “And only you.”
Beside me, Xander jumped to his feet. “I object!”
“Overruled.” Oren’s reply was immediate. “We will be flying into a high-threat situation. I want at least an eight-person security team on the ground. We can’t afford a single distraction. Avery is the package—the only package—or I will duct-tape all three of you to chairs and call it a day.”
All three of us. My eyes found their way to Jameson’s. I waited for him to argue with Oren. Jameson Winchester Hawthorne had never sat out a race in his life. He wasn’t capable of it. So why wasn’t he attempting to negotiate with Oren now?
Jameson noticed something about the way I was looking at him. “What?”
“You’re not going to complain about this?” I stared at him.
“Why would I, Heiress?”
Because you play to win. Because Grayson’s already there. Because this was our game—yours and mine—before it was anyone else’s. I tried to stop myself there. Because your brother kissed me. Because when you and I kiss, you feel it, the same way I do.
I wasn’t about to say a single word of that out loud. “Fine.” I kept my eyes on Jameson’s a moment longer, then turned to Oren. “I’ll go alone.”
It took a little under four hours to fly from Texas to the Oregon coast. Including travel time to and from the airport on each side, that was closer to five. I was standing on Jackson Currie’s doorstep—such as it was—by dusk.
“Are you ready?” Grayson asked beside me, his voice low.
I nodded.
“Your men will have to stay back,” Grayson told Oren. “They can set up a perimeter, but I’d bet a very large amount of money that Currie will not open the door if Avery shows up with her own army.”
Oren nodded to his men and made some kind of hand signal, and they spread out. If this went as planned, my mother’s family would never even know I was here. But if they figured it out, small-time criminals didn’t hold a candle to the power of the Hawthornes.
My power, now. I tried to really believe that as I reached forward and knocked on Jackson Currie’s door. My first knock was hesitant, but then I banged with my fist.
“I’m here!” I said. “For real this time.” No response. “My name’s Avery. I’m Hannah’s daughter.” If I had come all this way and he still wouldn’t open the door, I didn’t know what I would do. “Toby wrote my mother postcards.” I kept yelling. “He said that if she ever needed anything, she should come here. I know you saved Toby’s life after the fire. I know my mom helped you. I know that they were in love. I don’t know if her family found out, or what happened exactly—”
The door opened. “That family always finds out,” Jackson Currie grunted. Over the phone, I hadn’t realized just how big he was. He had to have been at least six foot six, and he was built like one of Oren’s men.
“Is that why my mom changed her name?” I asked him. “Is that why she ran?”
The fisherman stared at me for a moment, his expression hard as rocks. “You don’t look much like Hannah,” he grunted. For one terrifying moment, I thought he might slam the door in my face. “Except for the eyes.”
With that, he let the door swing the rest of the way inward, and Oren, Grayson, and I followed him inside.
“Just the girl,” Jackson Currie growled without ever turning around.
I knew Oren was going to argue. “Please,” I told him. “Oren, please.”
“I’ll stay in the doorway.” Oren’s voice was like steel. “She stays in my sight at all times. You don’t come closer than three feet to her.”
I expected Jackson Currie to balk at all of that, but instead he nodded. “I like him,” he told me, then he issued another order. “The boy stays outside, too.”
The boy. As in Grayson. He didn’t like stepping back from me, but he did it. I turned for just a moment to watch him go.
