Personal Demon

LUCAS: 19

PAIGE HAD JUST STARTED HER CALL when my cousin Javier, VP of technology, came to tell me the Nasts were getting impatient…and the St. Clouds had joined them. I checked my watch. I’d said thirty minutes, and it was going on thirty-five.

I caught enough to know Paige was asking Elena about the time she and other supernaturals had been kidnapped and studied by humans. While the Cabals had claimed no knowledge of the project, the Nasts had business ties with the financier-the late software tycoon Tyrone Winsloe-and none of the captives had been Cabal employees. Suspicious, but unrelated to the concern at hand which, from Paige’s conversation, seemed to involve another captive, a man named Armen Haig who’d died before the escape.

I longed to stay a few minutes longer, but Paige and the council didn’t need me and the Cabal did. A strange twist of priorities. An uncomfortable one.

I interrupted long enough to tell her where I was going, then followed Javier out, making the call to my mother on the way.

The meeting went exactly as I could have predicted. The Nasts and the St. Clouds offered their help in our time of grief. We only had to tell them what we needed. Of course, in telling them, we’d reveal our weaknesses, which is what they really wanted to know. It turned into a thirty-minute mutual reassurance session. Thank you so much for the kind offer, but we’re doing fine. No, really, we’re fine. No, I mean it, we’re fine. Thirty minutes with my cell phone vibrating nonstop, messages piling up.

“I’m sorry,” I said finally. “But I really do have to get back to the investigation. My father has put me in charge-”

“Of finding your brothers’ killers?” Thomas Nast, the CEO, snorted. “Does he want the parties responsible found?”

Sean murmured something to his grandfather, who waved him off, making a face. But he didn’t continue. Thomas had never been known for his tact, yet he was only saying what the others were thinking.

“Seems your father is putting you in charge of a lot,” Thomas’s son Josef said. “The Cabals are concerned about that. Investing so much power in someone who’d like nothing more than to see this institution collapse…” He tugged at his tie, clearing his throat. “It has us questioning your father’s state of mind, Lucas. He’s suffered a great trauma. There are provisions in the inter-Cabal manifest for this sort of thing, should a CEO be incapacitated and no one able to step into his place-”

“Nice try, Josef.”

My father’s voice came from the doorway. I stood to vacate his chair, but he waved me back down. When I hesitated, I could feel all eyes on me. I sat, but edged the chair to the side, giving him a place to stand at the head of the table.

Condolences filled the room. Any other time, my father would have received them graciously. He was better at this game than anyone. But today he cut them off in midsentence.

“As you can see, I’m not incapacitated. I have placed Lucas in charge of the investigation, using my staff and my resources. I expect when the situation is resolved, you will call an inquest into the proceedings, and I will fully cooperate. As for daily operations, those are also under Lucas for the time being, but all his decisions are being forwarded to me for final approval. Is that acceptable?”

He gave the final word a twist of sarcasm. The younger members shifted in their seats, casting glances at their superiors, who knew enough to remain stone faced.

“It seems you have the short-term situation under control,” Thomas said.

My father’s hand tightened on my shoulder.

“However,” Thomas continued, “it is the long-term one that concerns us more.”

“I’m burying two of my sons tomorrow-”

“And I buried one of mine four years ago. My heir. With nary a hiccup in the progress of daily operations.”

“Have you felt a hiccup, Thomas? Because if you have, I’d love to know about it.”

“We want to know your intentions, Benicio. As regards the naming of your true successor.”

“You show me yours, I’ll show you mine.” My father’s voice had slid into a faux breezy tone that for anyone who knew him served like a rattler’s warning. “Who have you named heir in Kristof’s place?”

“I have made my decision-”

“But won’t tell a soul, because the truth is, you haven’t made any decision.” My father circled the table, walking behind the men. “It should be Josef here, who stepped up to the plate after Kristof’s death and filled his shoes admirably…if incompletely. But you won’t make it official because you’re still holding out hope for young Sean, who shows every bit of his father’s promise but, well, there’s that touch of disillusionment settling over the boy. He’s not quite sure this is where he wants to be. Not quite sure he believes in the Cabal anymore.” My father clamped both hands on Thomas’s shoulders and leaned down to whisper, loud enough for us to overhear. “I know what that’s like.”

He straightened, hands still on the old man’s shoulders, fingers digging in.

“While I’ve enjoyed this chance to air our reciprocal concerns over succession, I have to wonder why the topic was broached at all. I’ve already named my heir. I did it years ago, as you well know.”

I fixed my gaze on my father’s chin, expression impassive.

“You can’t be serious,” Thomas said.

My father smiled. “I’ve always been serious. Lucas? I believe Paige was looking for you. She has something to share about the case.”

When I went to stand, my knees seemed unable to flex, and I had to clasp the edge of the table to push myself up. Stiff-legged, I followed my father from the room.

“I’m sorry,” he said as the door closed behind us.

“No need. It was a necessary maneuver. They will hound you for an answer until you give one and this will buy you the time you need to decide on an alternative course of action.”

Silence. I didn’t look at him. Couldn’t.

“Paige does want to see you,” he said after a minute. “But she’s in the lab right now. As we head down, I’d like us to make a few stops. Just walk the floors. Let people see us. Reassure them.”

I could scarcely afford the time, but I knew it was necessary. So I let him lead the way.

IT TOOK ALMOST an hour for us to complete the “rounds”…and that was with my father pressing forward as firmly but politely as possible. We finished in the cafeteria, where he insisted on buying lunch for me to take to Paige. That took another ten minutes, mostly dealing with more condolences, but he finally got through everyone and took me up the stairs to the executive dining room. It was empty. Not surprising. My father made it clear that he preferred the executives to dine with the employees, and few dared be caught doing otherwise.

“I really have to-” I began.

“Go. I know.” He stopped at the window overlooking the cafeteria. “How many people does this office employ, Lucas?”

“Two hundred and forty-five, at last quarterly report.”

“And the corporation? Excluding the sectors staffed by humans.”

“Approximately four hundred and fifty.”

“You know those figures without a second’s pause, don’t you?”

“I make it my business to know.”

A slow nod. “Four hundred and fifty oppressed souls in need of rescue.”

My jaw tightened. “Did you bring me up here to mock me, Father? Because I have-”

“-more important things to do.”

I forced myself to look at him. “I don’t see four hundred and fifty oppressed souls in need of rescue, but you know that. I see four hundred and fifty supernaturals employed by an organization that does not always have their best interests in mind.”

“Because human corporations do,” he murmured.

“Human corporations don’t hunt down and execute former employees. Or torture those accused of corporate espionage. Or threaten the families of those suspected of espionage. Or use blackmail as a recruiting tool. Or-”

He held up a hand. “Point taken.”

“Did I really need to make it?”

For a moment, he gazed out the window, watching his employees eat and talk.

“Of the Cabals, how do the Cortezes rank? In terms of ‘human rights abuses’?”

“I won’t answer that because you know the answer full well. To commend your standing is like praising a man who only beats his wife on Sundays.”

“If this Cabal collapsed, where do you think these people would go? They’re caged birds, Lucas. You don’t just open the door and set them free. That would be a cruelty beyond anything you accuse us of. If the Cortez Cabal disappears, they will fly to the nearest place of shelter, to another Cabal, a worse-”

“Don’t.” The tray’s edge dug into my thumb, and I realized I was still holding it-clutching it-and set it down. “This isn’t the time-”

“No, it isn’t. But it will soon be the time-”

“Carlos is alive-and probably innocent. Then there are my cousins…” I heard the desperation in my voice and cleared my throat. “There will be no need for you to make any determination for years to come.”

“No? If the last few days have proven anything, it’s that I don’t have that time. We are going to need to talk about this.”

I turned to him. “Please, Papá. Not now.”

“When, Lucas? Tell me when I have to do this to you? Shatter your dreams? Make you become someone you should never have to be? Tell you it’s your duty?” His voice caught. “When do I do this? Gain my heir and lose my son?”

“Not now. Please. I have-” My throat seized up and I had to force the words out. “I have to go.”