hey you guys!
thanks for reading! I'm happy to see how many views this has :)
thanks to VG for reviewing! i wish i could reply to you but I can't reply to guest accounts, so I'll answer your question here: yes, it will be 2 POVed...sort of. I'll be putting in a lot of Xander perspectives, given what happens to him in this chapter.
Sorry this chapter has no cute traumatic flashbacks :(
but it does have a large hedge and a window escape and sleepy gray so I think that makes up for it :)
I hope y'all love this chapter! please review it would make my day!
thanks you guys!
peace out!
The next two weeks, Grayson barely slept, despite his concussion. He was too preoccupied with worry to do anything but lay awake in bed, staring at the canopy several feet above and getting up every hour on the hour to see if the mysterious figures had returned.
So far, they hadn't, and Grayson was ready to collapse with exhaustion. But he couldn't stop watching—he was supposed to protect his family. And what happened if the dark figures did reappear? What would he do? Grayson couldn't very well go out on the lawn and yell at them.
Well, theoretically, he could, but he doubted it would do any good. If they were armed, he'd probably get shot, and if they weren't, he'd most likely be laughed at. Most people did not wear monogrammed silk pajamas.
Grayson pulled the curtains back again, resting his forehead against the glass. His burning eyes scanned the dark lawn again, but of course, there was nothing.
He sighed, drawing the curtains and collapsing into bed. He had to try to sleep, or he wouldn't be able to do anything tomorrow.
The blankets' soft embrace enfolded Grayson, and as he curled into the fetal position, he fell asleep almost immediately. He was a deep sleeper, a fact which sometimes worked against Grayson, as it was very difficult to wake him up. He slipped into that sleep now, finally allowing his mind to relax.
His last conscious thought was that there seemed to be a strange, sweet, fruity smell in the air, but he fell asleep so quickly that there was no identifying it.
Quite unfortunately, Grayson didn't hear the gunshots.
A frantic knock came on the door as golden daylight streamed into the room, illuminating the soft gray blankets, the sheer gray curtains, the plush gray carpet. Xander and Jameson jokingly called the bedroom "fifty shades of Grayson."
Grayson pulled the covers over his head with a groan as the knocking continued. "Go away, Xan."
"It ain't Xan," came Nash's familiar drawl. "Come on out, Gray."
"Give me a moment," Grayson sighed, dragging himself out of bed. He quickly pulled on khakis and a short-sleeved dress shirt, smoothed down his hair, and brushed his teeth, quickly checking his reflection in the mirror. The bump on his forehead had gone down, the swelling disappearing, and all that was left of the cuts was a thin pink line running across Grayson's cheekbone. The dark circles were still there, but there was nothing to be done about them, so Grayson pulled the door open to find Nash and Jameson standing in the hall—well, Jamie was standing. Nash was in a wheelchair, looking slightly disgruntled.
"Didja know your Southern accent comes out when you're tired?" Nash asked nonchalantly, and Gray's cheeks flushed. He'd been taught—by the old man, of course—to repress the accent, as it didn't seem fitting for a young aristocrat. But it was still there, buried beneath the layers of formality.
"Why are you out here?" Gray asked. "I believe you are supposed to be in the medical wing."
"I'm fine," Nash insisted. "Jamie helped me sneak out. We've gotta talk, Gray."
Gray arched an eyebrow, inquiring what was so important that Nash had seen fit to leave the medical wing with a punctured lung—although it had healed considerably in the last two weeks. "Go on."
Nash nodded. "Xan's missing. His door was locked and he wasn't comin' out, so me and Jamie picked the lock. Window was shattered and there was a bullet on the floor."
"And the blankets were all over the place," Jamie added. "It looks like he struggled."
Gray raked a hand through his hair, ruining the already haphazard arrangement. "Do you think he was kidnapped?"
Nash shrugged, his gaze filled with worry. "Seems like the only plausible theory. You should come check it out, Gray—you're great at reading a crime scene."
"Let's go," Gray agreed, and the three of them set out toward Xander's room, Jameson pushing Nash's wheelchair.
Grayson's heart pounded in his chest as they walked. What had happened to Xan? If he'd been kidnapped, who had done it? Was it related to the mysterious figures on the lawn?
And how had they gotten inside?
When they got there, the door of Xander's room was ajar, and Grayson pushed it open.
Weak sunlight, partially obscured by clouds, filtered through the broken window, glittering on the shards of glass lying on the floor. Xan's blankets were scattered everywhere, a pillow lying against the wall where it had probably been thrown. A rip in the pillowcase had stuffing spilling out of it, and Grayson wondered if Xan had legitimately tried to defend himself with bedding.
"Here's the bullet," Jameson observed, reaching down to pick up the small capsule.
"Don't touch it," Gray said sharply, and Jamie froze. "Why?"
"When the police come to investigate, I don't want your fingerprints on it," Gray replied, taking a handkerchief from Xan's dresser and giving it to Jameson. "Use this."
Jamie carefully picked up the bullet with the handkerchief and turned it over under the sunlight, examining every inch of it. "There's blood on it!"
Nash and Gray looked up immediately, hovering around Jamie so they could examine the bullet.
"You think it went right through?" Nash whispered, his voice hoarse.
"No," Gray replied, his finger hovering above the rust-colored line. "There's only blood on one side. That points to it having grazed him."
"But how do we know they didn't just shoot him again?" Jamie asked, his voice shaking.
"We don't," Gray told him. "Unless either of you heard gunshots last night?"
Both Nash and Jamie shook their heads.
"We should talk to security," Jamie suggested. "They must have heard something."
Gray's temples had started to ache again, and he sighed, placing a hand to his forehead. The concussion had healed by now, but he was still plagued with headaches every few hours.
Jamie grabbed the handles of Nash's wheelchair, and the boys set off through the quiet hall toward the security wing.
As they walked, Grayson couldn't help but explore his expansive mind palace, searching for answers. Who would have had a motive to kidnap Xander? Was it the same individual who had destroyed the jet? How had they gotten onto the grounds of Hawthorne House? Could there possibly be a secret passageway that the Hawthornes didn't know about?
Should he tell Nash and Jameson that he didn't think the jet crash was an accident?
Should he bring Avery, who had enough on her plate, into this?
Should he flee to the kitchen and devour whatever pastries he could find?
Grayson shook his head, deciding on the best solutions. It was probably a good idea to tell his brothers about the jet crash—if the perpetrator was the same individual who had kidnapped Xander, it was important that they knew. Avery would find out that Xander was gone eventually, if she didn't already know. And pastries wouldn't help matters, only increase the need for vigorous exercise, which Grayson had neither the time nor the physical capabilities to do at the moment.
The doors to the security wing swung open, and the brothers were immediately greeted with several harried security personnel, most of them on the phone with what sounded like the authorities. Nash tried to ask if the guards had seen anything last night, but they all appeared too busy to talk.
Oren waved the boys away. "Sirs, I'll have to ask you to leave. We're relaying sensitive information to the police, and it doesn't concern you."
"We are Xander's brothers," Grayson said, somewhat haughtily. "I believe it does concern us."
"I'm afraid it's a legal matter," Oren informed them. "This case will be top-secret—"
Grayson arched an eyebrow.
Oren sighed. "As top-secret as it can be, what with this being a Hawthorne matter and all. Unless any of you have information to offer the police, you must stay out of this. We don't need more of you involved in a serious crime."
"What do you already know?" Jameson asked.
"We know what Xander saw outside recently, and that whoever kidnapped him is most likely the perpetrator that caused the explosion of the private jet."
Nash's mouth dropped open. "You don't think it was an accident?"
"How could it have been?" Oren asked, voicing Grayson's earlier thoughts. "Both engines exploded—at the same time, no less. I find it hard to pass off as simple engine failure."
The head of security sighed heavily. "It appears as though someone is trying to target you, boys. I wouldn't leave Hawthorne House if I were you—although it appears that even here is not safe."
"Is there anything else?" Grayson prodded.
Oren shook his head firmly. "I can't divulge any more information, Mr. Hawthorne."
"So you do have more information."
His face hardened. "If you would go away, sirs, it would make my day."
Grayson tried not to pout. It was something Xander would have done, as well as being immature.
"But Xan—" Nash said hotly, and Oren held up a hand. "Go."
Nash huffed indignantly, and they left the security wing, traipsing into the hall—where they nearly ran Avery over.
She let out a tiny shriek and jumped back, and Jameson immediately let go of Nash's wheelchair, putting his hands on Avery's shoulders. "Sorry, Heiress—didn't mean to scare you."
Avery laughed, recovering quickly. "You didn't."
Her expression quickly changed, a veil of guarded sadness sinking over her face. "I'm guessing you guys saw?"
Jameson nodded, his features uncharacteristically morose. "Yeah. And the security team won't tell us anything."
"Well, it's not like we can't do anything about that," Avery replied. "You guys are Hawthornes."
"That, unfortunately, doesn't change the fact that the security team is determined to dismiss us," Grayson told her. "We could search for more clues ourselves, obviously, but we'd have to do it before the police arrive. They'll most likely rope off the scene."
"Then we've gotta go over there!" Jameson exclaimed, and he grabbed the handles of Nash's wheelchair again, speeding off toward Xander's room. Grayson set off after them with a sigh, closely followed by Avery.
"Gray," Avery said softly. "How are you doing?"
He couldn't help but run a hand through his hair again, further tousling it. "I'm alright, Avery. I apologize—we haven't spoken for a while."
She shrugged. "It's okay. There's been a lot going on—you know, the jet crash, this kidnapping, and…"
Avery's hand went to her abdomen, which looked as flat as ever, but Grayson knew a tiny heart pulsed beneath the skin. He felt a pang of guilt for not speaking to Avery about it earlier.
"How have you been?" Grayson asked. "What with—the baby?"
She actually smiled a little. "Not that bad, to be honest. I've thrown up a couple times, but that's been the worst of it. My obstetrician said I'm due in April, so we've got time to think of a name."
"Do you have a gender preference?"
Avery shrugged again. "I'm not sure yet. Boys seem to be a Hawthorne tradition, but I don't know if I want to keep that or break it. Either way, I'm excited."
Grayson cracked a smile. "I'm sure you'll be an excellent mother."
She laughed. "I hope so. Jamie's really worried about being a dad, and he's drinking a lot right now, so I've got to make up for him."
Avery nudged Grayson's arm with her shoulder. "How mad would you be if we called you Uncle Gray?"
Why couldn't he keep from smiling? "Well, I feel like some sort of title is in order, but I suppose Uncle Gray will work."
They had arrived at Xander's room, where Nash and Jameson had already begun searching for any clues they might have missed the first time. Grayson took it upon himself to search the bed, looking for any ransom notes or more bullets.
He did find one of the latter buried between the remaining pillows—so the kidnapper had shot at Xan more than once. But this bullet showed no sign of blood, so it had most likely missed.
Had the next one hit its target? Grayson wished there was a way to know, but unless the Hawthornes could build a time machine—which wasn't too far from the realm of possibility, actually—there wasn't.
If only Grayson had woken up, then maybe this wouldn't have happened. He could have done something, anything to prevent this.
Grayson froze, a sudden realization occurring to him.
Why hadn't he woken up?
Yes, he was a deep sleeper, but Grayson doubted that even he could sleep through gunshots. And Nash and Jamie were much lighter sleepers—if they hadn't heard any shots, then they hadn't awakened at all during the night. Why not? Why wouldn't such a loud noise wake everyone in Hawthorne House up?
It was then that Grayson remembered the sweet smell from last night. He hadn't thought anything of it, but he'd fallen asleep remarkably fast, almost as soon as he'd detected the scent.
Grayson climbed off Xan's bed and announced, "I've located a second bullet. That points to at least two shots, but this one has no blood on it. Clearly, it missed."
"Then the first one wasn't a warning or anything," Jameson concluded. "They actually intended to shoot Xan—or he just made them mad, and they fired again. But it seems like it'd be hard to dodge a bullet, so maybe they didn't mean to hit him."
"Why didn't any of us hear them, though?" Avery asked. "A gunshot goes off at about a hundred and forty decibels. That would've woken any of us up, even Gray."
"You don't think—" Nash started, then froze.
Grayson realized, suddenly, that he could hear footsteps. Quiet, yes, but getting steadily louder, and there were several of them, by the sound of it.
And to make matters worse, sirens were wailing in the background.
"The police," Grayson hissed.
"Everyone out the window!" Jameson whisper-shouted. "Now!"
"How're we gonna get a wheelchair out the window?" Nash asked.
"Fold it up—fast," Avery decided, and Grayson nodded.
"Heiress, you go first," Jameson instructed. "Hurry, we've got maybe twenty seconds!"
"We're two stories up, Hawthorne!"
"There's a hedge! Just go!"
Grayson helped Nash fold up the wheelchair, trying not to pinch his fingers. Nash appeared steady enough, so Grayson hoped he could function without the wheelchair—the doctors at Hawthorne House were rather strict about healing processes, but Nash seemed okay.
The footsteps were getting louder, and all Grayson and Nash could do was stand there as first Avery, then Jameson climbed out the window. When Jamie had disappeared from view, Grayson hissed, "Nash, you go first!"
"Gray—"
"Seriously, Nash! Jump!"
Nash shoved his wheelchair out the window and squeezed through while Grayson listened to the footsteps, which were rapidly drawing nearer. He could make out every word the voices were saying now.
Nash's hands were still on the windowsill as he prepared to drop, but Grayson couldn't wait any longer—three more seconds and the police would discover him at the scene of the crime. And if the officers saw him, they'd catch all four of them.
He had no choice.
Grayson lunged for the window, accidentally kicking Nash in the head as he dropped. He heard his older brother's muffled, indignant yelp, which was quickly stifled as Grayson plunged into the dense branches of the hedge.
He failed to keep back a tiny squeak of pain—how embarrassing—as the tiny, sharp twigs raked across his face and arms, leaving behind a plethora of stinging scratches. The branches caught at Grayson's dress shirt, yanking it up so that the skin of his abdomen was also open to attack. He didn't dare pull it back down, though—the police could potentially hear anything.
Through the half-darkness, Grayson could see Nash, Jameson, and Avery, all keeping as still as possible. None of them appeared to be in very comfortable positions—Nash's elbow was jabbing into Grayson's side, Jameson was almost upside down, and Grayson could only imagine the havoc the branches were wreaking on Avery's hair.
Grayson realized suddenly that he wasn't even touching the ground—the hedge was about ten feet high, and the branches kept him suspended just under the top of it. This was going to be a doozy to get out of when the police left.
He lost track of time, not even daring to pull out his phone. But the voices went quiet eventually, and the door of Xander's room shut with a click.
"I think it's safe to come out," Jameson whispered. "They're gone."
Grayson winced as he tried to move—a particularly sharp branch was digging into his stomach, and as he inched away from it, several more attacked the skin of his back. With a hiss of pain, he fought his way down, trying to ignore the vicious twigs clawing at him from all sides.
Finally, after a good two minutes of struggling, Grayson managed to liberate himself, falling onto the grass with a muffled thud. Straightening up, he turned to help Avery through, and she couldn't stifle a laugh when she saw him.
"This is probably the messiest I've ever seen you," Avery observed, smiling.
Grayson dragged his hands down his face. "I'm sure I look like roadkill. The old man would've had my head if he saw me like this."
Jameson and Nash stumbled out of the hedge, looking disheveled and annoyed. All four of them were covered with scratches, with twigs and leaves tangled in their hair. Grayson sighed—there would surely be questioning as to why they looked like they'd been through a wood chipper.
"Okay," Nash started. "So before the police came in, y'all were talkin' about why we didn't wake up last night. Did anybody else notice that weird smell?"
"I was going to bring that up," Grayson replied. "I suspect that it was some kind of sleeping gas—something intended to put us all to sleep so that the perpetrator could kidnap Xan in peace."
"That's probably why security didn't hear anything," Avery concluded. "There's no way they tried to stop the kidnapper—they could have taken someone down in a heartbeat. That means they were most likely drugged as well."
"But why didn't the kidnapper just drug Xan too?" Jameson asked. "It would've been easier than shooting at him."
"I'm not sure," Avery admitted. "It does seem a little bit random. Why take out everyone in the house except who you're trying to kidnap?"
Grayson fingered the torn hem of his dress shirt. "We could check the security cameras. They record audio—if the kidnappers weren't cautious enough, we could potentially overhear their plans."
He wiped away a smear of blood on his cheekbone, the product of one of his deeper scratches. "Although it might be optimal to clean ourselves up first—no sense in raising suspicion."
Nash nodded in agreement as rain started to fall. "Y'all look like you went head-to-head with a bear and lost."
Jameson laughed. "Yeah, let's get inside. We can meet in the entrance hall in half an hour."
The four of them limped back to Hawthorne House, and Grayson tried to ignore the twinges of pain in his ankle, still braced after the jet crash. The joint ached from the haphazard escape, but that and a few abrasions were a small price to pay for not being discovered at the scene of a crime.
Grayson returned to his bathroom mirror for what seemed the thousandth time, examining his disheveled reflection with a sigh. Scratches crisscrossed his face and arms, the deepest being the one on his cheek. Grayson could even feel the stinging pain on the skin of his midsection and back, undoubtedly a side effect of his shirt riding up.
He ran a washcloth under the faucet and squirted soap onto it, dabbing at the tiny cuts. Grayson gritted his teeth as the damp cloth touched a deeper scratch on his elbow, trying not to let out any sounds of pain. He hardly ever mentioned it, but he couldn't stand the sight of blood, and he'd never liked cleaning out his own wounds. When Grayson was younger, Nash had done that—he vividly remembered being six, sitting on the front steps and crying as his older brother tried futilely to calm him down, trying to clean the dirt out of the deep scrapes on Grayson's knees.
Once the blood had been cleaned off, he didn't look like nearly as much of a wreck. Grayson turned his attention to his hair, pulling the various pieces of foliage out of the tangled blond mess and disposing of them in the trash can.
Grayson raked a comb through his hair, ensuring that it was as neat as possible. It was getting long—the soft blond strands fell over his forehead and the tops of his ears if he didn't gel it excessively.
He ran a finger over the scratch over his cheek and let out a soft hiss. That was deep enough to merit a bandage, unfortunately. Grayson pulled a roll of gauze and a small pair of scissors from the bathroom drawer and quickly snipped two small pieces off, taping them over the cut in an X.
Grayson's stormy gaze scanned his battered face again, deeming it acceptable for now—although the scratches would stand out in all their bright red glory the next day. Concealer might be in order tomorrow, he decided.
Finally, Grayson took off his mostly shredded dress shirt and pulled another one on, this time long-sleeved. Short sleeves made him feel exposed.
One last look in the mirror, and he was ready. He closed the door of his room behind him as he left, going downstairs to meet the others in the entrance hall.
Only Jamie was there so far, a Band-Aid placed over the bridge of his nose. He hardly looked like he'd cleaned himself up at all, presumably excited to get back on the trail of Xan's kidnapper.
"How are you holding up?" Gray asked, glancing up at his little brother. Jamie had passed him in height a while ago, but he'd only made it to five foot eleven, so it wasn't as embarrassing. Still, Grayson hated being five foot eight.
"Fine, I guess," Jamie replied, raking a hand through his mess of dark hair. "Just really stressed, you know? There's a lot going on right now."
Gray nodded. "Indeed so. But please, for everyone's sake, try not to drown yourself in whiskey."
Jamie laughed. "Easier said than done, Gray."
He couldn't help but crack a smile. Despite the various misfortunes that had befallen the Hawthornes lately, everything seemed quite hilarious for no reason at all. Maybe it was the aftereffects of the concussion.
Avery and Nash arrived within seconds of each other, looking much less worse for wear, and all four of them sat down on the marble staircase, trying to decide what to do next.
"First things first," Nash said, "we've gotta figure out who kidnapped Xan. And we've gotta figure out how they did it—like how'd they get into our house? And why'd they knock us all out, but not Xan?"
"We should go to the control room," Jameson suggested. "We can get into the security camera feeds there—I'm pretty sure it's almost the guard's lunch break. I mean, I don't think it's illegal to hack into our own security, but he might not let us see if we just asked."
Grayson pulled his phone from his back pocket, glancing at the clock. "It's almost twelve-thirty. We'll be able to get in soon."
They waited across the hall from the control room until the door opened and the security guard walked out. Jameson led the way into the room, and Avery locked the door behind them as Grayson sat down at the keyboard, rolling up his sleeves.
"How're we gonna get into the computer?" Nash asked, leaning on the table. "You got the password, Gray?"
"No," Grayson replied, feeling around the rim of the desk for a secret compartment. "But it won't be hard to find."
His fingers hit a seam, and he pulled open the compartment, revealing a scrap of paper and a bottle of wine. Apparently, the security guards enjoyed drinking while on duty, which didn't seem like a very good idea.
Grayson removed the paper, squinting at the tiny writing at the password—a meaningless string of numbers. He typed it into the bar on the computer, and they all watched as the security feeds opened up.
"Go to last night," Avery instructed, and Grayson clicked on the View Past Feeds option. He scrolled through the timestamps until he reached midnight—close to when he'd fallen asleep.
"Turn it up," Jameson whispered. "We've gotta hear the audio, too."
Grayson turned it up. It took some skipping around, but eventually, the cameras picked up on two dark figures and an unfamiliar male voice.
"Control room first…okay, go ahead."
A soft thump came a minute or so later, and Grayson realized it was probably the security guard who'd been watching the cameras in the control room. If it had been sleeping gas, it had worked before the guard had time to do anything.
Jameson had stiffened next to him, but Grayson thought nothing of it, too focused on the camera feeds. He watched as dark silhouettes moved through the near-pitch-black halls, so silently and swiftly that they might not even have needed to knock out the security guard to go unnoticed.
The dark figures stopped repeatedly, limiting their pauses to one or two minutes. Grayson mentally kept track of where they stopped—all the bedrooms, the security sleeping quarters, the library. They never went into the rooms, simply paused outside the door.
"What do you mean, we're out?"
The second voice was female, a low, husky alto. Based on the feeds, there were at least two perpetrators, and they were standing outside Grayson's room.
"It's not pumping anymore," replied the male voice.
"You used too much on this kid, you idiot! Now we'll have to take the hostage by force."
"Everyone else in the house is out cold," the first voice protested. "It won't be hard. Let's just get it over with."
"Fine. Get rid of the pump and let's go."
Something was stuffed into what sounded like a trash can—a pump, apparently. So it had been sleeping gas.
The footsteps faded away, and Grayson's stomach clenched as the figures reappeared in the upper right camera—the one outside Xan's room.
A shaft of golden light streamed into the hallway, and Avery sucked in a breath as a startled yelp sounded on the camera and a gunshot echoed through the control room.
"There's one," Nash breathed, his voice shaking.
The sound of glass shattering sliced through the silence, and then a yell emanated from the security camera. "Stay still, kid! I don't want to have to shoot you!"
A loud thump, and then another gunshot.
A high-pitched, shrill scream split the darkness, and all four of them gasped.
"Quit struggling—"
Thunk.
Grayson winced. That sounded like they'd knocked Xan out—forcibly, not with sleeping gas.
"There we go." It was the female voice again. "You're lucky everyone was asleep, or you'd have brought them all running in here with machine guns. Honestly, can't you abduct a kid quietly?"
"It's not my fault he started screaming!"
The last sounds were that of something being dragged across the floor, then hurried footsteps, then a door shutting softly.
Then silence.
Everyone was quiet for several seconds, staring at the black screens of the cameras.
Nash broke the unnatural stillness. "Well, they didn't shoot him. There were only two gunshots."
"And only two bullets," Jameson added, sounding like he was trying to keep his voice from trembling. "So one of them grazed him—probably the one where he screamed—and one of them missed. It sounded like it hit the window, but it must've hit one of the metal parts or something, because all the glass was inside. If it'd gone through, the glass would've fallen into the hedge, so the bullet must've ricocheted."
"They did knock Xan out, though," Grayson interjected. "I don't think he was shot, but that doesn't mean he isn't injured. If we could hear the blow on CCTV footage, it was a hard hit."
"We have to figure out how they got inside," Avery said determinedly. "I doubt they came in through the front door."
Grayson shook his head. "Of course not. No, it must have been through some entrance that security cameras don't have footage of. Which is strange, because to my knowledge, all entrances to Hawthorne House are heavily monitored."
"It's gotta be a secret passage," Nash decided. "But I thought we knew about all of those."
"If Xan saw them on the lawn, then the passage is probably outside," Jameson concluded. "Let's go back out and see if we can find anything."
Grayson checked his phone again—they'd been in the control room for almost half an hour. "The guard's lunch break will be over soon. We should probably leave before we are discovered."
He closed the secret compartment and logged out of the computer, and they left the control room, opting to leave the House through a more inconspicuous exit than the front door—security might get concerned.
As they walked, Grayson couldn't help but berate himself. He'd been so focused on finding out how the kidnapping had taken place that he'd barely even thought about Xander—the poor kid was probably suffering, especially if the kidnappers had knocked him unconscious with that severe of a blow.
You're supposed to protect him, Grayson scolded himself. Not sit around trying to figure out how he got kidnapped. You have to find him.
He, Jameson, Nash, and Avery stepped onto Hawthorne House's sprawling grounds, and Grayson, wrapped up in his self-deprecating thoughts, realized too late that the sirens were wailing again.
He'd barely touched the grass when a voice said, "Hands up, Mr. Hawthorne. You're under arrest."