After a long silence, Mr. Laughlin turned back to me. “I made some repairs in the House.” A muscle in his jaw tightened. “To one of the older wings. When things fall into disrepair around here…” He gave me a look. “People get hurt.”
I understood then that one of the older wings was code for Toby’s. I wasn’t sure what the groundskeeper meant by repairs until I made my way back into Hawthorne House and went to check.
Toby’s wing had been bricked up again.
CHAPTER 20
On the way from Toby’s wing to mine, I found myself glancing back over my shoulder every hundred feet. As I stepped into my hall, I heard Libby’s voice: “Did you know about this?”
“You’re going to have to be a bit more specific, darlin’.” That was Nash, obviously. I could see his silhouette in the doorway to my sister’s room.
“Your lawyer girlfriend. These papers. Did you know?”
I couldn’t see Libby at all, so I had no idea how she was looking at Nash or what kind of papers she was holding.
“Sweetheart, I wouldn’t let Alisa hear you refer to her as my anything.”
“Don’t call me sweetheart.”
This didn’t feel like a conversation I had any business overhearing, so I crept for the door to my room, opened it, and slipped inside. Closing the door behind me, I flipped on my light. A breeze caught my hair.
I turned to see that one of the massive windows on my far wall was open. I didn’t leave that window open. A breath caught in my throat, and I felt the drum of my heart in every inch of my body. I’d had nightmares like this before: First you notice one thing that’s off, and then—
Blood. The muscles in my throat tightened like a vise. There’s blood. Panic flooded my body like a shot of adrenaline straight to the heart. Get out. Get out get out get—
But I couldn’t move. All I could do was stare in horror at the white bedsheet lying under my open window, drenched in blood. Move. You have to move, Avery. Sitting on top of the white sheet, there was a heart.
Human?
And through the heart—a knife. My lungs felt like they were locked. My body didn’t listen no matter how many times I told it to run. There’s a knife. And a heart. And—
I let out a low gurgling sound. I still couldn’t run, but I managed to stumble backward.
I tried to scream, but no sound came out. I felt the way I had in the Black Wood, in the sights of someone who wanted me dead. I have to get out of here. I have to—
“Breathe, kid.” Nash was there suddenly. He placed a hand on each of my shoulders. He bent down, putting his face even with mine. “In and out. That’s a good girl.”
“My room,” I wheezed. “There’s a heart in my room. A knife—”
A dangerous expression flickered across Nash’s face. “Call Oren,” he told Libby, who had appeared beside us. When Nash turned back to me, his expression was gentle. “In and out,” he said again.
I sucked in a frantic breath and tried to look at my room, but the eldest Hawthorne brother sidestepped and blocked me from seeing a damn thing except for his face. He was suntanned and had a five o’clock shadow. He was wearing his trademark cowboy hat. His gaze was steady.
I breathed.
“I’ve seen what I need to see.” Oren directed those words to Nash. “It’s a cow heart, not human. Knife is a steak knife, same brand they keep in the kitchens here.”
My mind went to the List. Would-be stalkers. Threats.
“The linens are Hawthorne linens,” Oren continued.
“Inside job?” Nash asked, his jaw tightening. “One of the staff?”
“Likely,” Oren confirmed. He turned to me. “Upset anyone lately?”
I managed to get ahold of myself. “I might have upset the Laughlins.” I thought about Mrs. Laughlin calling me cruel. About her husband, warning me about people getting hurt.
“You think the Laughlins did this?” Libby asked, her eyes wide.
“Not a chance in the world.” Nash’s reply was firm. He glanced at Oren. “More likely, someone on the staff got wind that Mr. and Mrs. L are in a tizzy about something and took that to mean it’s gloves off.”
Oren digested that. “Can you get someone in here to clean this up?” he asked Nash.
Nash responded by making a call. “Mel? I need a favor.”
I recognized the maid who showed up a few minutes later. Mellie had a habit of looking at Nash like he hung the moon.
“Can you take care of this for me, darlin’?” Nash asked, gesturing toward the mess.
Mellie nodded, her dark brown eyes fixed on his. Alisa had told me once that Mellie was “one of Nash’s.” I had no idea how many of the household staff the oldest Hawthorne brother had saved—or how many of “my” people saw me as a villain who’d stolen Nash’s inheritance.
“I need you to talk to folks for me,” Nash told Mellie. “Make it clear: This ain’t open season. I don’t care who’s looking the other way or why. Hands off. You got me?”
Mellie laid a hand on Nash’s arm and nodded. “Of course.”
CHAPTER 21
There will be some changes to your security protocol on the estate until we get this figured out,” Oren told me after everyone else had left. “But before we talk about those, we need to talk about the Laughlins. More specifically, we need to talk about how you upset them.”
I grappled for a way to respond without giving too much away. “Jameson, Xander, and I were messing around in Toby’s wing.”
Oren folded his arms over his chest. “I know. I also know why.”
Oren had access to the security system—and one of his men had been in the Black Box that afternoon. What exactly did Eli overhear?
My head of security laid it out for me. “Tobias Hawthorne the Second. You think he’s alive.”
“I know he is.”
Oren was silent for a long moment. “Have I told you how I came to be in Mr. Hawthorne’s employ?”
I had no idea where that question had come from. “No.”
“I was career military, ages eighteen to thirty-two. I would have stayed in until I hit twenty years, but there was an incident.” The way Oren said the word incident sent ice down my spine. “Everyone in my unit was killed except me. By the time Mr. Hawthorne found me a year later, I was in bad shape.”
I couldn’t picture Oren out of control. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because,” Oren said, “I need you to understand that I owe Mr. Hawthorne my life. He gave me a purpose. He dragged me back into the light. And the last thing he asked of me was that I stay on to head your security team.” Oren let that sink in. “Whatever I have to do to keep you safe,” he continued, his voice low, “I will do it.”
“Do you think there’s a threat?” I asked him. “A real one? Are you worried about whoever left that heart?”
“I’m worried,” Oren replied, “about what you and the boys are doing. About the ghosts you’re digging up.”
“Toby’s alive,” I said fiercely. “I knew him. I think he’s—”