The Cumerian Unraveling Trilogy (Scars of Ambition, Vendetta Clause, Cycles of Power) Read online

“You heard what he said,” Arnold shrugged. “We’re at war now, and he agreed to it even if he wanted something different. And besides, if we’re able to knock him out, then all of the employees will be safe anyway.”

  “I won’t stand by while you punish him for trying to be a decent human being,” Jim said, finally realizing they did have common goals. Lowell Bracken masked his effort to reach out in threats and inflammatory talk.

  “I’m making the call!” Arnold jumped out of his chair and exited the conference room.

  There was no doubt what Arnold would do, and a shakeup at Bracken would benefit them tremendously, but now Jim had a decision to make, as well.

  Stalking down the corridor and to his office, Jim had so little time to think about what he would do. Was there another proposal that Bracken wanted to make to him alone? Could Bolt & Keize ever work with Bracken Energy? If he were caught sending messages to Lowell, he might get in trouble with his investors, as well, but because he was the mastermind behind the technology there was no way he could be forced out.

  Stony-faced, Jim burst into his office to find Andressa helping Toria pretend to walk, bending over so low that it looked like her breasts were going to fall out of her shirt.

  “I’m sorry, but I need you to leave,” he said, brushing by her on the way to his desk so quickly that he wasn’t sure if she responded. But she was gone soon enough, and that left him with a chance to focus.

  He had Lowell’s contact info right in front of him, and he brought up the messenger on his phone. Staring at the blinking bar awaiting the text, Jim wondered if there was another person out there who cared about anything beyond what goes in a wallet. If there wasn’t, this wasn’t a world he wanted to live in, and right now there seemed to be only one way to find out.

  “I think we might have common interests,” he wrote, and sent it before he could spare a second thought.

  CHAPTER 4

  When Tris picked up the phone and saw that her ex-husband was calling her, she stared at the name for a moment, her mind jumping to the worst imaginable possibilities. He never called her, not even when it was her birthday or when she was sick, so it must’ve meant that something terrible had happened to Sierra or Randall.

  “What happened?” she asked as soon as she’d accepted the call, starting to panic.

  “Who is it?” Taylor asked, standing a couple of feet away with a market cart. They stood in the middle of an outdoor shopping center lined with packed shelves full of home supplies. High overhead, bright lights under a thin tarp fought off the darkness.

  “It’s your father,” she said, covering the receiver, but in doing so she missed something Lowell had said. Her peculiar answer had gotten Taylor’s attention, and he came closer to listen.

  “Who was that?” Lowell asked.

  “Unless you’ve been busy with something I don’t know about, how many people could it be if I told them, ‘it’s your father?’ I’m with Taylor. Now what happened to Sierra and Randall?” she said, growing more agitated.

  “Something happened to Sierra and Randall?” Taylor gasped, concern marring his handsome young face.

  “No, nothing happened to anybody. What are you talking about? What are you doing with Taylor?” Lowell said, clearly frustrated.

  “Oh, that’s a relief.” Tris sighed. She put a hand over her heart. “You scared me half to death. I’m at the market with Taylor getting him ready for Lynxstra. Let’s see what we’ve got here: black bed sheets, candles, and body oil. Is this all you’ve found, Taylor? Go get some normal stuff. Yeah, he’s going to have a great educational experience at Lynxstra.”

  While she spoke, Taylor took the cart and headed down one of the aisles.

  “Who’s paying for all that stuff?” Lowell asked.

  “You are,” Tris answered, glad he couldn’t see the smile spreading across her lips when he grumbled in typical Lowell Bracken manner.

  “That’s just great, but the reason I’m calling is because I need to talk to you,” he said.

  “Oh?” Tris asked, pondering a whole new set of possibilities about the purpose of this call. Was he finally going to say something about how he regretted walking away from their marriage? No woman married a Bracken without knowing her life was subject to the tides of business, but it still hurt to think about how dissolving their marriage had somehow become the easy solution to a real but abstract problem.

  “You know I wouldn’t call if it weren’t important, but I need your help,” Lowell said.

  “Oh.” His reply came as no surprise to Tris. Of course he needed help, just like he had during the wire wars when suddenly everybody’s money had been swirling around in chaotic electronic space and he’d decided that he needed her to leave so he could be married to soulless Melody Hockley and get her family’s special banking protections.

  “Please listen to me for just a moment,” he begged. “I need to send someone to the Iron City to meet with Angela Lu and complete a deal for something called a transfer battery. It’s crucial this person not be directly connected to Bracken or have information they could steal or a phone they could compromise and track. I know it’s asking a lot, but can you do this for me?”

  Tris couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “The Iron City…‌in Plagrass? I’ve never even left the country. I don’t speak the language there, or know how to make a deal for something I don’t know anything about.”

  “Tris, I promise you it’ll be fine and you won’t need to worry about a thing. We’ll get you on a private jet with guards who will show you right to the Lus’ door. One of the guards will speak the language, and the word is that between Angela and her six sisters, at least one of them can speak every language on Iyne. Tell them what you want, agree on a reasonable amount, fill out a check I’ll have given you, and come home.”

  Tris clutched her forehead. It seemed like so much more than she could handle.

  “But what’s a reasonable amount? A million count? A billion?” Back when they were married, Lowell would occasionally talk about dividends, indexes, or compound interest, and she was never able to understand one word of it. She was just a simple girl from the Cumerian Horticultural Society who turned gardens into art.

  “I’m sure we’ll get taken for a ride on the deal. Just say the most you’re allowed to offer is one hundred million and then take whatever they say next that’s slightly over that,” he said.

  “One hundred million count? You guys must want this really badly.”

  “It’ll be worth it, but we need you to make it happen. Think of it as a vacation, and have the guys take you to a beach somewhere when you’re done. Or trek around for blooming Rangulas. Anything you want,” he said.

  Tris’s objections quietly collapsed, as Lowell must’ve known they would. She couldn’t say no to him, and never could. They’d first met at a fundraiser for the C.H.S. when he was the dashing up-and-comer. She’d assumed when he kept appearing at functions that it was only to burnish an image as an ecologically responsible energy tycoon, but it had really just been to get closer to her. After the divorce, people had assumed she’d left because she’d grown fed up with the Bracken Touch, as they called the pollution, killing off everyone’s flowers. To her shame, she’d gone along with the story more than once.

  Releasing an anxious sigh, Tris turned around and spotted Taylor returning to her. She loved him like her own child, even though he was the product of a perverted business deal. If this were what he and Sierra and Randall needed, she would do it.

  “There’s really no other way?” she asked.

  “Believe me,” he said, “this is the only move we’ve got on this.”

  “OK, fine. I’ll do it. When are they expecting me?”

  “They don’t know you’re coming,” he said. Tris grumbled.

  “Perfect. That’s wonderful. Well, there’s no way I could be ready for a few more cycles, at least. Is that fine?”

  “Absolutely,” he agreed. “I’ll sen
d you the details soon.”

  Tris ended the call and faced Taylor, who now had more items in the cart, none of which were remotely academic.

  “What was that about?” he asked.

  “Your father is sending me on a trip to Iron City,” she answered, looking into his dark Bracken eyes.

  “Sounds like fun,” he said. There was still so much he didn’t understand about his father and her relationship with him. Sometimes she didn’t think she understood it.

  “Does it? Not as much fun as these pheromone-scented bath salts,” she said, picking up a package from the cart. Taylor blushed. “Just make sure you find the right girl before you start playing with these things. A few minutes of pleasure can exact a heavy toll if she derails your life.”

  News that Tris was about to leave on an exotic trip right as her group prepared for their big charity fundraiser caused a furor of squabbling that would give chickens pause.

  “I don’t know exactly how long it’ll take,” Tris repeated as she and a few of the others tended to the nightbloomers on the society’s estate between Ristle, the city where Sierra was, and Toine, the capitol city to the east. Only one cycle remained until she had to leave.

  “But who’s going to design the arrangements for the event? Who’s going to order the seeds from the Illiams in the FarmFields down south? And who’s going to figure out which of the wretched, insufferable poor we’re going to give them to?” whined Geredine, a well-off loafer who had hardly been able to pick a weed since Tris’s announcement.

  “You make it sound like I’m the only one here who does anything,” Tris replied, ignoring her companion’s unsympathetic language. But she had been coming to that very conclusion; if it weren’t for their rich husbands, the helpless hens around her would be as hard up as the desperate poor they feigned to help.

  “Come now,” added Suzn from farther down the row. At least she had her hands in the ground. “It’s just because you’re so good at it. Why won’t you tell us the whole story about this meeting and why you’re going? Does your ex have something to do with it?”

  Subtle nods from the rest of the group made it clear they wanted to be told what they already assumed—that she’d fallen back in with the ground-raping caricature they mistook for her ex-husband. So what if he was involved?

  “I’m going for my children,” she said, stamping out that line of questioning as best she knew how. Their complete lack of support after she’d worked tirelessly for years was galling, and unkind thoughts sprung up that she’d long repressed. The only thing these useless women did for their wealth was spread their legs for men who ended up marrying them, essentially amounting to whoredom. Tris grew more anxious to leave by the second, and after she came back, she’d have to join a new group of more industrious women.

  “I just don’t understand. Can’t it wait? I’m loath to say it, but as far as I can tell, you want the fundraiser to fail,” Geredine said with uncommon candor.

  Tris had heard enough, and she tore off her gloves and dropped them onto the ground.

  “Where are you going now?” Suzn asked.

  “I didn’t ask for this, but it might be good for you. There are almost fifty women in the society. If you can’t organize the fundraiser, pull it off, and walk around the corner from your townhouses to hand over the sprouts to someone without little old me, then I think you should admit that you’re much more concerned with gossiping and having a good time with pretty flowers than helping anyone less fortunate. And besides, isn’t it a little shortsighted to hand over plants instead of food to someone who’s starving?”

  “Humph!” Suzn said, wearing her sour face.

  As Tris left, she regretted escalating the situation. For the most part they were decent people, and they were her friends even if they lacked the purpose and follow-through she had. But it would take some time to heal that wound, and her trip would afford her plenty of it.

  After driving home to her suburban apartment, part of a duplex she split with another woman whose husband had died, she turned on all the lights and set herself to filling the three large suitcases she’d bought at the market. It was hard to know exactly what she would need, so she brought clothes for every occasion and supplies for most everything. Only her phone was left behind, as planned. By the time she had managed to jam everything in and zip the suitcases up, she was exhausted and ready to sleep the rest of the cycle away.

  When she awoke and prepared to leave, she realized her problem. Two hands were not enough to easily manage three big suitcases. She couldn’t lift a single one of them and had no choice but to drag them one at a time out to her small, gas-powered car. The undercarriage nearly scraped the road due to the extra weight.

  To her surprise, Lowell was waiting for her at the airport outside of Ristle. It must’ve taken him a couple of hours by train from the Claws. Standing in one of his best suits next to a sleek, white jet waiting outside of a hangar, he almost managed to mask the fact that he’d nearly died of a heart attack recently.

  “You’re looking surprisingly well,” she said, dragging the first suitcase over.

  “Thanks,” he said, shrugging. “I had a meeting not long ago and it took a miracle, but I pulled it off. They weren’t looking when I basically fell into my chair. But anyway, let me get some help for you. These two guys and the pilot are going to be your liaisons.”

  Lowell waved a pair of guys over, both of them well-groomed and handsome enough to make Tris forget her age. The steps leading into the plane were just beside them, and some wind rustled through Lowell’s graying hair. This would be Tris’s first time on an airplane, and seeing the aircraft next to him made the situation so much more emotional than it should’ve been, or maybe it was the way he was looking at her.

  “And this is for you,” he said, removing a pouch from his inner jacket pocket. “It’s got everything you need for the deal with the Lus, as well as some of the local currency. See this plastic bill? It’s white now, but it turns red when you fill this end pocket with your blood, then it knows it belongs to you. If someone steals it from you, acid releases from the other end and destroys it. It’s about the only thing they have to keep order over there.”

  Tris cringed when she looked at all of the bills she’d have to fill with her own blood.

  “I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going!” she said, starting back. “I’m not joking. OK, maybe I am.”

  Lowell caught her arm.

  “Spend it all and have a great time. I can’t tell you how important this is to the family,” he said, growing somber and more direct.

  “It’s unfortunate I’m not still in the family, isn’t it?” she said, knowing this probably wasn’t the proper time to get into this. Lowell sighed and displayed a rueful smile. He blinked and his lips twitched, as if he were having trouble speaking.

  “I’ve had to sacrifice the best part of my life for this company, and that meant sacrificing you. You deserve so much better than what I could ever give you.”

  His dark brown eyes and his sheepish vulnerability reminded Tris so much of what it was like when they had been married. This kind of honesty had become rare for him, and she wasn’t about to let it go to waste.

  “Do you know why I never remarried? It’s because I never really considered our marriage to be over.”

  She leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek, his scent dredging up memories of humid summer nights and waking up next to him. Before he could say anything, she’d started up the steps onto the plane and took a step into the plush cabin. Out the small oval window, she could see in his eyes that he still loved her.

  Once the closing steps sealed her in, the pilot came out to greet her.

  “How do you do? I’m Tenny, and this is Jeano and Emry. You may not know me, but I certainly remember you. Been with Bracken nearly my whole life, at least since I got my wings. Not one accident,” he said, chuckling in a way that suggested he was in a state of good humor nearly all the time. “Let me show you arou
nd and then we can be on our way.”

  Tris’s seat wasn’t hard to find since there was only one row of them, and her luggage was strapped behind for easy access. She had her own table and footrest, and the carpet looked so soft she considered removing her shoes to enjoy it. A small refrigerator stocked with beverages was within arm’s reach, and dozens of magazines were tucked into a shelf. Once seated, buckled up, and pressed against the thick padding, she never wanted to get out.

  “It’s going to take us almost all cycle to get there, so you might relax for a while, have a glass of wine, and plan to fall asleep at some point,” Emry advised from a chair across the aisle.

  “Way ahead of you. I thought I’d be nervous, but this is so cushy I feel like I’m already flying,” she said.

  When the noise from the engine increased and the plane began to move, it jostled her from her peaceful state. Looking out the window, she caught sight of Lowell one last time. He stood near the hangar, one hand raised. She wondered if anything would change between them after she returned.

  The rattling increased in proportion to the speed until the plane left the runway and took off into the air. As it throttled upward Tris nearly sunk into the upholstery, but before long the pressure receded and she was staring out the window at the world below.

  “Not so bad, was it?” Emry asked.

  “I just hope it’s all so easy,” she replied.

  She whittled away the time on her flight by reading a book she’d brought, chatting with her amusing liaisons, and filling one of her plastic bills with blood before deciding she wouldn’t use any money at all on the trip. Through the window she watched the landscape bunch up and flatten as they passed the Cetaline Mountains and the Seasand Desert. The Still Sea was so calm it looked like a mirror, reflecting the clouds so perfectly she hardly knew where the surface was.

  She couldn’t have said when she fell asleep, but when she awoke she got the sense the plane was descending.

  “Are we there?” she groaned, still groggy.

  “A little over halfway. We’re about to refuel at a transportation hub named Pover and then finish up the last leg of our journey,” Emry said. There was something trustworthy about his green eyes and strong jaw. Perhaps Lowell had chosen him to come on purpose.