CHAPTER 14 GRAYSON
GRAYSON
A s Grayson descended the darkened staircase, listening for the sound of Lyra’s footfalls ahead of him, Jameson’s warning echoed through his mind.
Lyra Kane is a threat, whether you see it or not.
Grayson took the lead at the bottom of the stairs, trying to shift his focus to the present: the metal chamber, the theater, door after door, the feel of Lyra walking in his wake.
Be sure that she’s worth it, Gray. Make damn sure that she’s not Eve.
Grayson came to a stop at the threshold of the mosaic ballroom. In its center, there was now a single piece of furniture: a king-sized bed. Black frame. Black pillows. Black sheets. Grayson’s mask and tuxedo from the masquerade ball had been laid out across those sheets.
“ This is your room?” Lyra asked.
“For the duration of the Grandest Game.” Grayson crossed the dark, glittering ballroom and knelt at the foot of the onyx bed.
He set first his key, then the champagne flute and golden dart, on the floor, then withdrew a longsword from beneath the bed, placing it beside the other objects.
“At the start of a game,” he told Lyra, “it helps to lay out all of the pieces of the puzzle that you’ve been given.
” Grayson produced the glass dice he’d found zipped into the pocket of his jacket when he’d put on his outfit for phase two.
He added them to the other objects and studied the entire collection.
“Your turn,” Grayson told Lyra.
With effortless grace, she sank to the floor, laying out her own objects, and then she flipped over her wrist. Grayson’s gaze landed on the pin she’d affixed to her sleeve.
He stopped her from removing it. “The pin isn’t a part of the game. We gave them to the top ten players last year, too.”
Once a player, always a player , Avery had said then. From the moment she’d conceived of the Grandest Game, Avery had wanted the players to feel like they were a part of something, like having played the game meant something, even if you didn’t win.
Grayson and his brothers had given Avery a pin once, too.
“I’ll take your word for it.” Lyra picked up Grayson’s room key and her own, comparing the two, rotating them in her fingers. Grayson saw what she saw: The same words were engraved—front and back—on both keys.
EVERY STORY HAS ITS BEGINNING… TAKE ONLY YOUR OWN KEY.
“An echo,” Grayson told Lyra. “The wording is nearly identical to that on the table upstairs.”
Lyra tilted her head slightly to one side and then she went for the opera glasses that hung over her hipbone. Lifting them to her face, she examined the words on the keys anew.
“Anything?” Grayson asked.
“No.” Lyra lowered the opera glasses and slid them back through her belt loop, and Grayson’s thoughts went to their original owner.
Odette Morales. The old woman knew something—more than she’d told them—and Grayson had spent much of his childhood being taught how and where to apply pressure to get results. But for now…
“Your instincts were good.” Grayson nodded toward the opera glasses on Lyra’s hip. “Those will give us an advantage at some point in all of this.”
“All of this.” Lyra’s amber eyes gleamed with something like anticipation—or determination or both. “Clue to clue to clue.”
“A true Hawthorne game,” Grayson replied. “Nearly every puzzle sequence my grandfather ever designed started with a collection of objects just like this.” Grayson paused, his gaze lingering on the objects, one by one. “Keys were a favorite of the old man’s.”
Keys—and knives. Rings. Glass. Grayson thought for the first time in years about a specific object in a specific game: a glass ballerina.
“Did your grandmother play the same kind of games?” Lyra asked.
Alice. “I wouldn’t know,” Grayson said. That was the truth, but it was also dissembling as a matter of precaution. Jameson had been very clear that any talk of Alice was a liability.
“My dreams are starting to feel like one of your grandfather’s games,” Lyra said beside him.
“Like my father laid an array of objects and riddles out before me, right before he died. Omega. A Hawthorne did this. A calla lily. A necklace with three pieces of candy.” Lyra’s eyes found his like flames cutting through night. “ Three , Grayson.”
There are always three. Grayson let that thought come.
“With a Hawthorne game, how do you know what any of it means?” Lyra pressed.
Grayson felt the pull to delve into this mystery with her, but he had given Jameson until the end of the game, and his word was his bond.
“The only way to ever really know what any element of a Hawthorne game means,” Grayson said, reaching for his champagne flute and redirecting Lyra’s attention, “is to play.” He lifted the crystal to his lips, taking a taste.
“Pomegranate—and a hint of elderflower liqueur.”
Lyra mirrored his action, taking a sip out of her own flute.
Grayson did his best not to dwell on the shape of her lips. “The drink. The glass. The dart.” He paused, just a fraction of a second, holding her gaze. “The numbers from the dominoes and the dice. The sword. The key.”
Grayson saw the exact moment that he had her—here, now, focused on the game, safe . And still, he knew that this victory was temporary.
Lyra Catalina Kane was not the type to back down—from anything—for long.