CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Castor
Dominion’s headquarters sat in the middle of the city, one tower curling up to the sky like a helix.
We stood at the street’s edge, the glass-front lobby dark and vacant aside from one security guard.
There were others throughout the building, one per floor, but if we did this right, they’d barely notice us – not until everything came to light tomorrow.
This was it.
Nova squeezed my hand. ‘We got this. Your plan is flawless.’
I nodded. The B&E for our little midnight field trip was the easy part.
It was less breaking and more entering. I’d talk up Jerry and he’d buzz us straight to the penthouse floor – the only way to access the rooftop for our guise.
It was Grandfather’s floor, all seven thousand five hundred square feet of luxury space.
He knew I was planning to watch the fireworks, so any alert he received for his private office being accessed would be ignored.
From there, we’d grab his keycard and take over his lab.
In a few hours, the Fox legacy would be dead, Nova cured. There was no hesitation in my bones. My family had broken my trust, my love, my hope for them to change. In response, I’d cut them out of my life and burn down everything they built.
I didn’t want anything else more.
Nova pulled her hat lower over her eyes.
Leo’s clothes swallowed her, the sleeves extra-long to cover the node cuff at her wrist. She’d taken out her box braids, and her fluffed curls haloed her face.
The last part of her disguise was a pair of colored contacts with fake oculsight rings.
I preferred her brown eyes to the icy-blue stare regarding me now.
Either way, Nova was still the most beautiful soul I’d ever met, and a baggy hoodie and sweats would never hide that from me.
But hopefully, the new look would hide her identity from Jerry.
I swung open the lobby doors and stepped inside. Lights flickered on, the Lucille B. Anarcha exhibit fully illuminated, her portrait towering over us. Just beyond it were four turnstile entries, waiting for an employee biosig to open their plexiglass gates.
‘Mr Fox!’ The security guard at the front counter stepped from behind his desk, fixing his uniform, the brass buttons on his shirt gleaming. My eye caught the taser at his hip, the radio pinned to his shoulder. He wouldn’t need either.
‘Hey, Jerry. Grandfather knows I’m here. I promised my friend a view of tonight’s fireworks. Thought I’d take advantage of the roof for a more intimate moment.’
If I could count on Jerry for anything, it was being a hopeless romantic. Every time I came to visit Grandfather, Jerry asked if I’d found the one yet. Last week, I’d told him to keep his fingers crossed for me.
‘Mr Fox called ahead. It’s against policy, but who am I to stand in the way of young love?’ He winked. ‘I’ll buzz you through and unlock the C-suite elevators.’
‘Thanks, Jer.’
Nova smiled awkwardly, letting her hair cover her face.
I pressed my thumb to the biosig pad and we passed through the entry gate, the low glass panels sweeping closed behind us.
I held my breath as the elevator doors opened, the penthouse key already lit.
Nova stepped in first, positioning herself just beneath the elevator’s hidden camera near the buttons.
Jerry hadn’t had a chance to look closely at Nova’s face in the lobby, and we didn’t want to give him the chance.
Her picture from Yvonne’s interview still cycled the news, but in those photos, she wore a fitted outfit, sleek braids, her eyes my favorite shade of mahogany brown – nothing like the girl standing beside me now.
‘You made that look so easy,’ she said.
‘Just wait for this next part.’
The elevator doors opened and Nova let out a gasp.
We’d used Grandfather’s private entrance, which let us out in the middle of his floor.
Glass light fixtures hung from the ceiling, twinkling like stars in the Milky Way.
Abstract art inspired by the solar flare lined the walls, and at the far end was a glass room – Grandfather’s private lab – now pitch black.
She walked through the sitting area’s plush sofas and ottomans in awe.
I walked over to Grandfather’s cherrywood desk and pressed my thumb to the biosig panel set beneath the middle drawer. A hidden compartment opened, revealing the last thing we needed – Grandfather’s keycard.
‘How –’ Nova stopped, trying and failing not to smile.
I held up my thumb and wiggled it, the thin biosig sleeve in place. ‘Younger me prepared well for this moment.’
‘Younger you was a menace. And you still are.’
I paused, an empty smile on my face. I’m about to destroy my family.
My adrenaline clashed with my heart, but Grandfather gave me no choice.
This was by his design. He couldn’t teach me to be respectful and mindful of other people’s experiences and obstacles, then expect me to stay quiet when they needed me to speak.
I shook out my hands and bounced on my toes. ‘Sorry, just need a minute.’
‘Hey.’ Nova brushed her fingers along my stubbled jaw, her touch sending shivers through me. ‘You good?’
I kissed her forehead, lingering a few seconds. My minute was up. I nodded toward the pitch-black labs across the floor. ‘Here we go.’
When I came here with Gemma last week, I’d almost lost hope.
I’d managed to get her to walk me through every lab floor related to the Freedom System and couldn’t find the right one.
It wasn’t until the end, when she needed to stop by Grandfather’s private floor to drop off a report, that I immediately recognized the glass chamber floor.
This was it.
Nova stood beside me in front of the dark lab, not yet moving.
‘Hey. Your cure is beyond this door.’
‘I know. It feels surreal.’
We wouldn’t be here without Nova. I wouldn’t have known about Grandfather’s secrets, what my family did to me for their gain.
I owed so much to her. Together, we would be my family’s much-deserved downfall.
I didn’t know what my future held without them, but I needed it to breathe.
I drew in a shallow breath, letting the realization wash over me.
That conversation with Grandfather today would be the last one for a while where either of us smiled.
A new chapter of my life would start, beginning with Nova cured.
She would walk out of here without any pain, one way or another.
I pressed Grandfather’s keycard to the lock, followed by the lifted biosig. Nova and I turned the handle together.
White lights flickered to life. Blank monitors lined one wall, a console in the middle. There were two dark chambers, and I recognized the one on the left from the photograph with the glass floor. It would trap the disease, break it down and kill it.
‘You were in a room like this? Inside a soundproof glass box.’ It was more a statement than a question.
I knew Nova had screamed like that woman had, the photos of the test subjects in Grandfather’s files still ingrained in my mind.
Anger flared inside me. She shouldn’t have had to go through that.
I hated thinking of my family as sick in the mind.
I wouldn’t have believed it if we hadn’t found the files.
But it was in black and white, and we were standing here.
The lab prototype for the cure was real.
Nova nodded. ‘Only without the glass floor. This chamber looks newer. I’m guessing less than three years old, lining up with Dr Anand’s research and your grandfather’s testing.’
I set up my phone’s camera, ready to capture everything.
‘You’re shaking again, Cas.’ Nova lightly touched my arm. ‘You’re absolutely sure about this?’
I was more than sure. I’d walked around full of anger this past week, hiding it behind my Fox smile.
It was time to put that emotion into action.
I am the person my family created. They did this to themselves.
‘It’s adrenaline. Not nerves. I’m ready.
How about you? You’ll be the face of another Dominion news cycle. ’
‘And so will you.’
‘Worth it.’
She tipped up on her toes, bringing her forehead to mine. I held her as tightly as I could, letting her presence soothe every crack in my heart. There was no turning back for us.
Eyes forward.
‘What if it doesn’t work?’ she said softly. ‘And your pain flows back?’
‘Then it’s mine to keep.’ And I meant it.
It was the only one of my family’s sins I would gladly carry.