by Sosie Frost
“For the family.”
“Absolutely not.”
He asked the impossible, and yet his eyebrows rose, as if he realized the obscenity of the plan. Still he chose to ignore every modern convention of rationality and decency.
And for what?
The family?
No.
This wasn’t for the Bennetts. And it wasn’t for the company.
This was vengeance. Pure sadism. He planned an end to a bitter feud that began before I was born and was bound to continue after I died.
“We won’t do this.”
My father said nothing. He stared, and I struggled to endure the uncompromising commands. I braced for the worst, but I hadn’t anticipated his brutality. I was twenty-nine years old, and he yet surprised me.
Horrified me.
“Nicholas, you are my eldest son. You are my heir, my legacy to this world.” He spoke softly, intentionally forcing me to hold my breath just to listen. “But understand, I have two other sons.”
“Perhaps they’d prefer to do this crime,” I said.
“Doubtful.”
“Then you realize this is a mistake.”
“Nicholas, you will control the company and this family alone, as it has been set for generations.”
“I understand.”
“I have no real need for two additional sons.”
The implication struck like a blade to the throat. I didn’t doubt his threat. A Bennett lost his naivety at a young age. My father had no cause to lie.
“You would harm your own flesh and blood?” I asked.
“You would deny your family the ultimate wealth, security, and vengeance?”
My father stood, a lurking devil.
“I love this family,” I said.
“Then protect it.”
“From you?”
“From any danger. The decision rests with you, Nicholas. Convince your brothers to capture and breed Sarah Atwood, or...” His pat to my shoulder suddenly gripped, pinching hard against a nerve he favored to bring me to my knees as a child. I didn’t wince. “You will be responsible for what happens to this family.”
He sipped the rest of his wine and left me to the silence of the study.
What choice did I have?
I would always put my family first.
4
Sarah
I fell asleep at the lab.
My first time at the facility in weeks, and I wasted it collapsed on the black laminate table, trapped between a microscope, a couple test tubes, and Lady Gaga blaring on my laptop.
I checked for drool and groped for my phone.
Midnight.
What a productive four hours.
I stretched. The perpetual ache in my shoulders wouldn’t ease if I didn’t get some sleep in a bed. Last night I curled up in the university library, but I hadn’t studied a word for my midterms. Instead, I blinked through as much of the new agreement Anthony’s office worked up to announce the trust. It granted me executive power to operate the company in lieu of whatever imaginary baby I concocted, but it wouldn’t help me pass Ecology.
At least Atwood Industries was safe from Darius Bennett. That made the exhaustion, misery, and complications worth it. Nothing was going to tarnish my father’s legacy—certainly not any empire the Bennetts shaded with their vulgarity.
I blinked at the laptop. The measurements were supposed to upload directly into the program.
“Damn.”
I alt-tabbed through the open applications. Facebook. iTunes. An Amazon product confirmation for a case of K-Cups I didn’t remember ordering but made sense. My head throbbed with a horrible caffeine withdrawal. I spaced out, but I swore I opened the correct spreadsheet.
My Biosystems Design coursework stared at me.
Great.
I was such a mess I wasn’t even doing the right work in the right lab.
Frustrating.
I closed out the program. My back ached, my laptop overheated, and I was pretty sure I forgot to eat lunch and dinner.
Something had to give.
And I had a bad feeling about what it’d be.
The state-of-the-art lab belonged to Atwood Industries—and Dad promised my own office once I earned my PhD.
It wouldn’t happen now.
No matter how much work I had done in the lab, no matter how much I researched and developed, I had a bigger responsibility. When it came time to publish, patent, and sell, the credentials were more important than the private, basement lab.
Dad forbade me from working on anything for Atwood Industries at school, and I understood. Less risk for the campus to claim experiments at the university belonged to them. But peer reviews and testing and all the hassle that came from developing a commercial product—especially anything genetically modified—turned into a nightmare and a half.
What started as something fun and exciting became an exercise in litigation, patent wars, and corporate level secrecy. Dad insisted nothing about my research leaked beyond the family. Josiah was supportive. Mike called me a nerd. It didn’t matter as long as Dad was proud of me.
“If Mike and Jos get the company when they grow up…” It was the first time ten year old me had thought about it, and my nose scrunched up in confusion. “What do I get?”
Dad parsed through his papers. “Your brothers were made for the company, Sprout. I needed sons.”
“Then what was I made for?”
“I wasn’t expecting a little girl. It’s only proper for the company to go to my boys.” Dad winked and pushed my textbook toward me. “But you like science, and that helps me.”
“It does?”
“Sure, Sprout. Daddy has all kinds of people helping to make the corn better before we plant it. You’ll work in the labs and do research.”
“But I want to be a baker.”
“Nonsense. It’ll make Daddy happy to have you working hard for the company. Don’t let me down, Sarah. You’re the future of the Atwoods.”
Some future.
I rubbed my face. I hadn’t drooled on my research journal. Good. The scrawling gibberish? Not so much.
Half of my notes didn’t pertain to the research I knew would revolutionize Atwood seed and product. Most of the notebook now filled with scribbled leads on what my brothers worked on and where they had tucked or spent so many millions of dollars. Anthony warned we’d be hit with an audit from the Board if we didn’t get it sorted out soon.
Just the thought of an audit gave me a headache—especially after losing most of my credits last semester because of the funerals.
My email blipped. Anthony, torturing me after hours again.
S—Bennett hired a private investigator to research into Josmik Holdings. I’ll find out more, but be careful with information on open networks. –Anthony
“Good luck.” I closed the laptop. “He’ll need it.”
Like I had any information about Josiah and Michael’s joint venture. Whatever money they took, spent, or invested was gone. Anthony and I had no success figuring it out.
But Darius shouldn’t have even known about Josmik Holdings.
The shiver tingled over me.
Why would he investigate my brothers’ lost investments?
He wanted something they had. Something he failed to obtain before Dad died.
And that something was worth murdering for.
A crash echoed from upstairs. I checked the time.
Midnight?
A door slammed from the ground floor offices. Who in their right mind was working so late?
I zipped my bag, listening over the clicking pumps working hard to maintain a vacuum for the projects stashed in the corner. The lab existed in a state of pure noise. Chemistry wasn’t all mixing compounds and dissolving solutions. I spent more time waiting for the machines to finish their tests than doing fun experiments. Erlenmeyer flasks were a lot more exciting when I wasn’t washing them.
I listened.
Nothing else echoed.
I hadn’t studied in the lab in a few weeks, but usually no one darted into the offices upstairs in the middle of the night.
All the more reason to head home. It was way past the time I was comfortable being out alone, especially when the last warnings Dad gave was about my security as I had grown into such a beautiful woman.
I wasn’t about to think of those implications. Another bump shattered the stillness.
This time it didn’t come from upstairs.
This time, the slice of a boot crashed on the stairs just outside my lab.
The few techs and chemists who used the lab didn’t wear steel tipped boots. They also didn’t lurk in the hallways. And they certainly didn’t take the steps agonizingly slow, clopping a heavy-footed echo in the bare basement halls as though hiding.
My chest tightened—the worst moment for that to happen. I edged away from the door with a wheeze. The light switch waited under my hand, but drenching the lab in darkness would be just as suspicious as me bursting out of the room in a dead sprint.
Instead, I searched my purse for the phone. Mike and Josiah always carried guns. I regretted never taking up their offer to learn to shoot. A small canister of mace jingled on my key ring. I had no idea if it even worked anymore, but I tossed the cap away. If it was empty, maybe my aching lungs wouldn’t swallow enough mace to hurt me?
Or maybe it’d cause a full-on attack.
Only one way to find out.
Glassware stacked around me, but my only real weapon was a lab stool. The acids and strong bases locked up tight in the storage room. The windows didn’t open completely, and we converted our second cubby into a larger eye-wash station and emergency shower. No hiding in there.
The footsteps snapped against the cement hall.
My pulse fluttered.
I was trapped.
Thud.
Quiet.
Thud.
I counted my breaths. Far too few to be effective. I heaved the nearest stool over my head.
The door kicked open. I screamed and slammed the stool against a man dressed completely in black leather. He grabbed the chair before it crashed against his ski-mask. He jerked me off-balance.
I spun from his grasp, but my laptop clattered to the ground. The book bag followed.
He lunged. My soil ecology books swung into his jaw.
I thought I was quick, but my attacker was bigger, stronger, and far more aggressive. His hands laced over my waist and lifted me from the ground. I screamed, throwing fists and kicks against anything soft and squishy.
Except nothing about the mugger was soft.
“Let me go!”
Something connected. Hard. My toes felt like they broke, but the attacker slumped. I kicked again, missing the fleshy bits I had already pummeled. I nailed his knee with a swift, deliberate aim.
He dropped me, but I picked myself up faster than the asshole clawing who needed the wall to stand on his injured leg.
The mace didn’t mist so much as it jetted, but the shot of liquid capsicum dosed him with aggravation.
Run.
The pepper spray showered the lab, and the spiced air tore razor-bladed pain in my throat and lungs. I coughed and abandoned my bags.
He didn’t follow. I sprinted up the basement steps, collapsing at the top in a wheeze that scared me more than the attack.
I groped for my inhaler in my pocket.
“Fu—”
I didn’t have the strength to swear. The inhaler tucked in my freaking purse which was probably long gone with the mugger. Damn. I didn’t carry that much money on me. The idiot attacker would make off with forty dollars, a student ID, and my emergency medication. Hell, the biology textbooks that clattered against his face were the most expensive thing in the lab.
I burst outside and bolted to my car. The clicking locks echoed. A symphony in my fear. My fingers trembled as I pushed the ignition, but the rumble reassured me. Like my father’s casual whistle as he kicked my butt in tennis or my brothers’ fist-fights at the base of the stairs.
Comforting. Normal.
I managed to breathe. Kinda. I’d just drive home. Find my medication. Calm down, call the police.
Recover my damn lab journal and laptop before the thief made off with something more important, more valuable, and absolutely crucial to the survival of my family.
Christ, before the mugger ruined something that had the opportunity to revolutionize agriculture and significantly raise yields in dry, arid climates. Not the most riveting way to save the world, but it’d be enough to put food in a lot of people’s bellies and conserve a hell of a lot more water.
My chest ached. I had to get home.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.
I peeled out of the parking lot and sped down the deserted main street.
Twin headlights blinded me from my rearview mirror.
A car?
No. I swore again, wasting more air on useless fear.
Motorcycles.
Goddamn it.
I lived in Cherrywood Valley long enough to realize the Atwoods weren’t the only powerful force dominating the markets. I avoided the bikers as Dad instructed.
But these guys weren’t the local Anathema thugs.
The bikes roared beside me, and I reflexively jammed the breaks as one cut in front of the car. The rider dressed in solid black, and a shaded helmet covered his face. He swung toward me, and I drifted away, slowing enough to drop a gear. I made it too easy for them to chase me.
My vision darkened as the cough squeezed my chest and head.
Not good.
I accelerated, but the bikes kept up—speeding, edging close, and risking their own lives to drift ever closer to my car.
What did they want? To kill me? To steal the car?
Hurting me would do nothing. They couldn’t even kidnap me, not when I was the only one able to release the ransom money.
Oh, God.
Ransom.
It made sense. All the instability, all of Darius’s damn speeches. It was a chance for a criminal to make a move against me—especially if they thought Darius would seize control of the money and company.
I was the easier target.
God, that pissed me off.
Dad didn’t raise me to be a victim. I hid weakness beneath the Atwood name, and I utilized my gifts to forge a stronger image. A better image. Sarah Atwood—gifted student, charming philanthropist...
Lost and struggling daughter trying her damnedest to do what she could to keep her mother from slicing her wrists and the company from dissolving to our family’s greatest enemy.
I jerked the wheel toward the asshole biker treading too close to my side. I scared him off, but not before the clatter echoed inside the car.
The bang terrified me.
They punctured my tires!
I lurched the wheel again. Wasn’t a great idea. The busted tire shredded over the rim.
The car fought and thudded. I waited until the last possible moment before shoving my foot flat against the break and riding through the dangerous shudder that skidded the remaining good tires.
I twisted the wheel and accelerated. My turn from the main drag surprised them. The bikers screeched to a halt and spun to chase, but I had a quarter of a mile on them.
Even with my lungs cramping and shoulders tightening, I found my way through the city in the darkness. The bikers hung back. They weren’t Anathema, and that gave me some hope. I sped past the opera house and industrial district, heading south instead of taking the bridge across the river. The town limits blurred by. A couple aching breaths delivered me a mile outside the city.
The pain in my lungs didn’t ease until the first of our thigh-high corn sprouted in the distance. The night hid most of our property, but I didn’t care. I was close to home.
In my breathless fog, I realized my mistake.
Damn it. I led the bikers right to my house.
The crushing sob didn’t emerge from
my chest. I swallowed another harsh breath. I couldn’t turn around. Stopping so suddenly in the rattling car would allow my stalkers to dive from the bikes and get too close.
The car rumbled. Something charred and filled the interior with acrid fumes.
I couldn’t make it to the next town over on three wheels. Home seemed to be the best option, and I prayed I’d get there with enough of a head start to find Dad’s old hunting rifle. Maybe Mom knew how to shoot.
Maybe Darius would be there?
Fuck.
I slammed my hand on the wheel.
Jesus Christ. Crawling to Darius Bennett for help? How much oxygen had I lost?
A flash preceded the second blowout. The back tire popped in a horrible burst of sparks and an explosive thud that stole complete control of the car. I spun out, fish-tailed, and bumbled over the road. The speedometer read a number somewhere between idiotic and absolute disaster.
The car skidded off the shoulder. The wooden fence didn’t stop me. In the darkness—in my blinding, aching, oxygen-deprived fear—I slammed on the accelerator instead. My wheels tore into the acres of corn, and the stalks thudded and cracked and beat against my windshield.
Screaming did nothing. The car careened into the dirt, sinking deep into our fields and rutting through the crops. My headlight shattered on the fence and what remained dulled with mud and shredded leaves.
The frayed tires bounced against the mud before imbedding in the irrigation equipment. The car juked, tossing hard to the right. I shielded my face as it flipped, crashing and shattering every window.
The engine still hummed.
But the car stopped.
I fell against broken glass. The airbag hadn’t deployed, my only salvation. The dust would have killed me…unless the men chasing me did it first.
My vision blurred. The coughing did nothing to clear my lungs. Twice I attempted to turn the car off, missing the ignition and pressing furiously against the radio. Lady Gaga roared against the nightmare. I didn’t have the energy or clarity to shut it off.
I was close to home.
I thought.
Maybe?
Get out of the car.