CHAPTER 27 LYRA
LYRA
Don’t be afraid, Lyra Catalina. She will come for you.
Hours after Lyra had recovered the memory, it still lingered.
She and Grayson had headed back to the airstrip the moment they’d obtained the file on Lyra’s kidnapping from Alisa’s man.
The entire flight back to Texas, Lyra had barely said a word.
They’d been to her home. Now they were headed for Grayson’s, because at Hawthorne House there was yet another file, one that Tobias Hawthorne had assembled on a dead man he’d referred to as Thomas, Thomas.
Grayson had told Lyra once that everything in that file was a lie, but given the dead billionaire’s proclivity for puzzles, there was at least a chance that those lies were actually a code.
The man who’d kidnapped Lyra had been sure that Alice Hawthorne would come after her. Why?
As their private jet began its descent, Lyra stared at the sketch in her lap, the only useful thing in the sheriff’s file.
It wasn’t a police sketch, just the work of an artistic teacher at Lyra’s preschool.
After fifteen years, the security footage from Lyra’s abduction had been either lost or deleted, but this sketch had survived, and the man in it—he looked like Lyra.
So very much like her.
“The resemblance is quite strong.” Grayson had given Lyra time to process, time to broach the subject herself, but he seemed to have decided against leaving her to her thoughts any longer.
“No wonder they thought he was my father.” Lyra had never seen anyone who looked as much like her as this man did. Even in black-and-white, the resemblance was remarkable, there in the shape of their eyes, their full mouths, the way high cheekbones were softened by slightly rounded cheeks.
“It’s possible the drawing isn’t fully accurate,” Grayson commented. “If the teacher encoded the two of you as looking alike, that could have affected her memory of your abductor’s face.”
It could have, but did it? Because looking at that drawing, Lyra could hear the voice from her dreams. This man’s face was familiar to her in every way the photographs of Tomás had not been. Every part of Lyra that had chanted not him, not him, not him before was screaming HIM now.
This was the man who’d taken her, and he’d had her eyes—and so much more.
“My mom knew next to nothing about Tomás.” Lyra forced herself to be logical, to think through the situation instead of feeling it. “They weren’t together all that long. I don’t think she knew much of anything about his family at all.”
Grayson effortlessly followed Lyra’s train of thought. “Perhaps your father had a brother.”
Genetics were funny. Traits could skip a generation—or ten. A niece could end up looking more like her uncle than her father.
“Whoever this man is,” Lyra told Grayson, “we need to identify him and find out what his connection was to Alice—and why he was so sure she’d come for me.”
Within minutes of their plane touching down, the jet door was open. Through it, Lyra could see a black SUV pulling onto the private runway.
“That will be Alisa,” Grayson told Lyra. “She made it clear to me when I asked for the plane that she would be escorting us to Hawthorne House herself.”
Alisa Ortega wasn’t the one driving the SUV. Grayson’s brother Nash was. The eldest of the four Hawthorne brothers pulled onto the road with one hand on the wheel. He only had to glance at his mirror for half a second to make an appraisal of Grayson’s appearance.
“You haven’t gotten any real sleep to speak of.” Nash didn’t say a word about Grayson’s flannel shirt—or the stubble.
Grayson, for his part, seemed intent on pretending he was wearing a suit. “And I’m supposed to believe that you have?”
“Got almost five hours last night through sheer force of will,” Nash replied. “Libby couldn’t sleep without me beside her. Pregnancy makes it hard enough, but with Avery gone—”
Grayson cut Nash off. “We’re getting her back.”
“Damn right we are,” Nash said, his Texas accent far more pronounced than any of his brothers’.
“Jameson may have found something in Europe,” Alisa reported. “Multiple somethings, actually, that seem to be shaping up as one of your grandfather’s games.”
Lyra knew from Grayson that Tobias Hawthorne had been a man who loved puzzles and riddles and making other people dance to his song.
“And for whom was this game intended?” Grayson queried.
“Alice,” Nash replied. “Apparently, it was the old man’s version of a love letter. He knew things and wanted our grandmother to know just how much he’d pieced together. Jamie’s working on figuring it all out.”
Beside Lyra, Grayson breathed. In and out. “How is he?” Grayson asked. His voice came out steady, but Lyra knew the question hurt.
“How are you?” Nash replied, like that was an answer. None of them was okay.
“Jameson,” Alisa admitted, “is hanging by a thread. Xander’s with him, should that thread snap.”
“He blames me,” Grayson said quietly. It was the first time he’d said that out loud. Lyra reached for his hand. Grayson let her.
“Jamie needs someone to blame right now,” Nash replied. “You ask me, he needs his ass kicked, too, but I’ve been advised against it.”
“Not by me,” Alisa clarified. “My position on the kicking of Jameson’s ass is neutral, but Libby’s insisting we need to give him space, to have faith in him the way Avery would.”
Lyra had never met Libby Hawthorne, but she’d picked up on the fact that the rest of them were very protective of Nash’s wife, who seemed to stick close to home.
In terms of the mysteries Lyra and Grayson were trying to solve, going to Hawthorne House was a logical next step, but for the first time, Lyra processed the fact that she was headed somewhere very few people were ever allowed to go.
The Hawthorne family and the Hawthorne heiress were infamously insular, as private as they could be, given their fame.
“Shouldn’t you be with Lib right now?” Grayson asked Nash.
“Oren’s with her,” Nash replied. “So is Zara. So is Max—Xander called her. It’s an all-cupcakes-on-deck situation, freeing me up to assess whether or not you are in need of an ass kicking.”
Grayson had barely slept. He’d barely eaten. He wasn’t okay, and he didn’t even try to argue that he was. “Thea and Rebecca?” he asked instead. Lyra didn’t recognize the names.
“College is keeping them busy,” Alisa replied. “They don’t know Avery’s gone, and we’re going to do our best to keep it that way. We also convinced the Laughlins to take an impromptu trip. Zara and Nan were not so obliging, but only the former has forced us to deal her in.”
Grayson took a moment to process all of that. “And Odette Morales?” he said.
“Still looking,” Alisa reported. “Have you two had a chance to go through the file from the sheriff’s department?”
In response to that question, Lyra passed the sketch of her kidnapper up to the front seat. “This is the man who took me. He knew a lot about this group.”
“This guy a threat?” Nash asked, his voice the kind of casual that strongly suggested he would be just as casual about taking care of any and all threats.
“He’s dead,” Lyra replied. She could smell the acrid, metal scent of blood just saying the words. “But if we can figure out who he was, that might tell us something.”
About him. About me. About my connection to Alice—or hers to me.
“I’m on it,” Alisa said. “Between my connections and Oren’s, we’ll see what we can do about identifying your kidnapper, Lyra. In the meantime, Grayson, we need to discuss your sisters.”
“And why would we need to that?” Grayson said, narrowing his eyes.
“Do you recall how old your sisters are?” Alisa inquired.
“Eighteen.”
“Legally, adults.”
Grayson’s pale eyes narrowed farther. “I do not like the sound of this. Where are they?”
“Calla Thorp’s hometown.” Alisa didn’t bother sugarcoating that.
“I hired Knox Landry to keep an eye on Gigi. What the man lacks in manners, he makes up in a brutal tendency to trust no one, impressive fighting skills, and a fondness for money. I’m paying him well, and even if I wasn’t, Gigi has wormed her way into his heart somehow.
Knox will protect her. As for Savannah, our British friend appears to be sticking very close to her. I’m tracking all of them.”
“Rohan,” Grayson said testily, “is not anyone’s friend.”
“He ain’t gonna let a damn thing happen to Savannah,” Nash drawled. “He gave her the game.”
“I do not care about the Grandest Game.” Grayson’s voice was far too calm. “What are they doing in the Watcher’s hometown? What are they up to—my sisters, Rohan, the brutal and impressive Mr. Landry?”
“The whole lot of them went after Brady Daniels,” Nash reported. “Seems the gentleman was hiding out in the bayou.”
“I don’t like this.” Grayson’s displeasure was palpable. “I’m assuming you gave my sisters new phones, Alisa, and that’s how you’re tracking them. Send me their numbers. Now.”
Alisa obliged. “Done,” she told Grayson. “But before you make those calls, you’ll want to smile.”
Smile? Lyra blinked as Alisa rolled down the windows—Lyra’s and Grayson’s both—just as the SUV rolled to a stop in front of an elaborate wrought iron gate. Immediately, a trio of photographers with very expensive cameras closed in.
Smile, Lyra realized, for the paparazzi.