Grayson Hawthorne appears at Avery's school and informs her she has been named in his grandfather's will.

Avery and Libby fly to Dallas and arrive at Hawthorne House for the formal reading of Tobias's will.

The will is read aloud and Avery is named chief beneficiary of the entire Hawthorne estate, enraging the family.

Avery learns she must move into Hawthorne House and live there for one full year to claim her inheritance.

Drake leaks the news of Avery's inheritance to the press after learning about it from Libby.

Avery solves a puzzle involving roughly one hundred keys and crosses the threshold into Hawthorne House.

Jameson enters Avery's bedroom through a secret passageway and tells her she is Tobias's final riddle.

Xander reveals that Tobias was not born with a middle name and legally added Tattersall to his name 20 years ago.

Avery and Jameson find a book with a mismatched cover hiding a red acetate filter and a secret message about a hidden will.

Avery reads the Red Will at the law firm and discovers the four Hawthorne grandsons' middle names hidden within it.

Someone fires shots at Avery and Jameson while they search for clues among the trees in the Black Wood.

Alisa reveals legal loopholes in the will that mean Avery has a target on her head until she turns 21.

Drake is caught when his car tries to run Avery's vehicle off the road, and a matching rifle is found inside.

Avery rearranges the letters of her full name to spell a very risky gamble, unlocking the box holding five envelopes.

Nan shows Avery a photograph of Toby Hawthorne, and Avery recognizes him as Harry, her chess-playing friend from home.

When Avery Kylie Grambs is unexpectedly named the sole heir to a Texas billionaire's fortune, her life transforms overnight from poverty to peril. She moves into the Hawthorne mansion as the will requires, where a resentful family and a trail of cryptic clues await her. Working alongside the Hawthorne grandsons, Avery decodes hidden messages left by the deceased Tobias Hawthorne, each one pointing toward a deeper mystery. As she inches closer to the truth, attempts are made on her life, raising the stakes from a puzzle game to a fight for survival. The culprit is exposed and Avery survives, but the final revelation — that her old friend Harry is actually the presumed-dead Hawthorne heir Toby — reframes everything and launches the story toward its sequel.

The headline events of Avery's shocking inheritance and dangerous quest for answers.

Avery plays chess with a homeless man named Harry in the park, wins, and buys him breakfast.

Libby reveals that her on-again off-again boyfriend Drake is moving back in, prompting Avery to threaten to sleep in her car.

Avery finds Jameson drunk and shirtless balancing on a balcony railing before he jumps off it.

Avery opens her personal letter from Tobias Hawthorne and finds only the words: Dearest Avery, I'm sorry.

Grayson confronts Avery in her hotel room and accuses her of scheming her way into the Hawthorne fortune.

Nash notices Libby's black eye and quietly offers to track down whoever gave it to her.

Xander tours Avery through Hawthorne House and they stop before Tobias's portrait, which Avery does not recognize at all.

Thea warns Avery on her first day at Heights Country Day School that the last girl who spent time with the Hawthorne brothers died.

Avery and Jameson decode the incomplete adage Don't judge as a reference to Don't judge a book by its cover.

Avery enters the Hawthorne House bowling alley and a personalized welcome message flashes on the scoring monitor.

Zara negotiates with Avery to keep running the Hawthorne Foundation in exchange for teaching Avery how it operates.

Nash warns Avery that she is not a player in Tobias's game but merely the glass ballerina — or the knife.

Jameson takes Avery to the Hawthorne estate's private racetrack and drives her around it at high speed.

Avery is partnered with a girl in science lab at school and discovers she is Rebecca Laughlin, Emily's sister.

With Drake at the gates surrounded by paparazzi, Avery holds an impromptu press conference to redirect media attention away from him.

Before her world changed forever, Avery's life was defined by chess games in the park, after-school waitressing, and protecting her sister from a dangerous boyfriend. Once she arrives at Hawthorne House, she must navigate the estate's extravagance, earn grudging respect from its inhabitants, and decode Tobias's cryptic letters piece by piece alongside Jameson. At school, she encounters allies and enemies alike, while back at the mansion each new room and clue deepens the mystery. These secondary events reveal the texture of Avery's daily life inside the inheritance game, showing how she grows from a bewildered outsider into someone who can hold her own in the Hawthorne world.

The supporting moments that shaped Avery's journey from outsider to heiress.

Libby returns from Connecticut with a black eye, revealing Drake has become physically abusive toward her.

Jameson tells his brothers Avery solved the key puzzle faster than any of them ever had.

Libby reveals she overheard Zara and Constantine planning a DNA test to determine whether Avery is Tobias's illegitimate daughter.

Alisa reveals that Tobias's son Toby vanished in a house fire 20 years ago and that his remains were never found.

Grayson reveals his letter from Tobias is word-for-word identical to Jameson's, linking both brothers to the same puzzle.

After researching Avery's background and finding she has spent nothing on herself, Grayson tells her he may have misjudged her.

Jameson takes Avery to the bridge where Tobias proposed to Alice, and they pry up a loose board to find a carved symbol beneath it.

After Oren stitches Avery's wounds at Wayback Cottage, Avery initiates a kiss with Jameson in the bathroom.

Rebecca tells Avery that Emily dated both Jameson and Grayson at the same time and deliberately turned their rivalry into a game.

After Avery shares what Jameson told her about Emily's death, Grayson asks her coldly: Did he tell you that I killed her?

Xander reveals he fake-dated Thea to protect her secret relationship with Rebecca, which Emily discovered on the night she died.

Avery notices Tobias's self-portrait is signed in Roman numerals, inputs the code 1-0-1-8, and discovers the stained-glass riddle hidden behind it.

Rebecca reveals she saw Skye meeting Drake at the tunnels on the day Avery was shot, identifying Skye as the person behind the attacks.

Xander reveals that Tobias secretly tasked him with ensuring all four brothers played the inheritance game through to its conclusion.

The sugar packet inside Avery's envelope triggers a memory of meeting Tobias Hawthorne at her mother's diner when she was six years old.

Avery's time at Hawthorne House is marked by a series of revelations that transform both the mystery and the people involved in it. Early shocks — Drake's violence, the DNA test threat, and the news of a presumed-dead Hawthorne son — give way to deeper discoveries about Emily's death, the brothers' guilt, and the hidden architecture of Tobias's final game. Relationships shift as Grayson softens his hostility and Avery kisses Jameson after narrowly surviving a shooting. Secrets surface one after another: the real reason Emily died, Skye's betrayal, and Xander's hidden role as Tobias's agent. The pool culminates with a sugar packet unlocking a childhood memory that finally explains why Tobias chose Avery at all.

The key discoveries and emotional shifts that changed everything Avery thought she knew.