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  Even so, that doesn’t erase the fact that she’s a thief. I lost millions because she stole our design and gave it to Weissman. And the fact that she is downright dangerous. She tried to blame the leak on Ryland. As if Ryland would ever do something like that to me. I’m sure she saw the opportunity to create even more chaos by splitting us up and pounced on it. It’s a Weissman move all the way.

  Ryland seemed to be even more enraged than I was when I came clean about her. He stood so abruptly, his chair slammed against the wall behind him. “That bitch!” he’d shouted, face red as a lobster. “Who the hell does she think she is? And that bastard, Weissman. I could kill him for this.”

  I almost forgot my own pain watching him go off like that. He then went on to trash talk Sam for at least another thirty minutes, ranting and raving about how she wasn’t even that strong as an engineer. That bothered me then and it bothers me now, though I kept my mouth shut. I’ve always been the type to go overboard, to get a little too intense, but him? He’s always so laid back he’s in danger of bedsores. All the time I’ve known him, he’s always been the one to pull me back, level me out, and when necessary, remind me I was acting like a jackass.

  So what’s with the sudden change of heart? Why so vicious about Sam?

  He can’t possible feel as betrayed as I do. Maybe because he put his ass on the line for her, fought for me to hire her, to keep her on even when she pissed me off. He’s done nothing but praise her since the moment she walked through the doors. Why else would he turn on her so quickly? That’s got to be it.

  Unless…

  I shake my head, running my hands through my hair and scrubbing them over my scalp in a confused daze.

  No. There’s no way.

  He’s my buddy.

  I’ve known him since school days. He wouldn’t betray me like that. Why would he? What reason could there be? We’ve never been anything but best friends from the day we met. There’s never even been a hint of rivalry between us. I’ve treated him practically as a partner in the company, with a salary to match. When we were first starting up and money was tight, I took the pay cut and let him take home the bigger salary. His eleven percent of company shares mean he stands to make millions from this technology. There is no reason on earth for him to want this company to fail. It’s his hard work too.

  Even so…

  Something niggles at the back of my brain. Why didn’t he at least try to defend her even a little? It’s not as though I had literal proof that she was the one and only mole in the company. He never once tried to get me to stand back and take another look, when he almost never misses an opportunity to suggest just that. No, instead, he derided her work. He all but erased the progress she made. And it was her progress, entirely. Her notes tell me so. She’s not a stupid girl, she’s not a poor engineer, but he was suspiciously quick to categorize her as such.

  Why?

  I drop my head in my hands. Fuck, fuck, fuck. She’s still in my head. Making me doubt Ryland, screwing with my sense of loyalty and justice.

  “Daddy?”

  I lift my head and look at Maddie. “Hmm?”

  “Are you all right?” she asks worriedly.

  “Yes, I’m just tired.

  “I’m pretty tired. Can we go home now?”

  At least, she trusts me enough now to admit when she’s tired, instead of crawling into a corner and falling asleep on her own. She knows it’s no crime to be sleepy, that I won’t be angry with her.

  I nod, suddenly very tired myself. “Okay, honey. We’ll get going in just a minute. Let me check my email once more, and we’ll head out.”

  She nods, and I turn my attention back to the computer.

  One particular name in the list of senders stands out, and I have to grit my teeth against the gasp of surprise. She has balls…I’ll give her that. I’m surprised she contacted me tonight, but I can’t pretend I’m not eager to see what she has to say. I open Sam’s email and begin to read.

  I’m sure you don’t want to hear from me—tonight of all nights. You must be working hard to get everything in place for tomorrow. I thought I would be there with you. It was my baby too.

  But it’s okay. I understand your reaction, now that I’ve had time to think it over.

  First and foremost, I should’ve been honest with you from the beginning. I should’ve told you Vince Weissman is my father.

  “What?” I blurt out, reading the line again, my jaw hanging open.

  “Huh?” Maddie asks.

  “Nothing, darling.”

  My father and I have never had a relationship, and he’s certainly never showed an interest in my work. I never thought he would have any sort of effect on my life, so I figured it wasn’t worth mentioning. Besides, would you have hired me if you knew who he was? I doubt it. I took my mother’s maiden name when I turned sixteen, determined to strike out on my own without the family name hanging over my head. I didn’t want any preferential treatment. You understand. Of all people, I feel like you would.

  And I do. If what she’s saying is true, I now understand why she seemed to relate to my daughter’s pitiful childhood up to this point. I can’t imagine having a father like him, the slime.

  When he asked me to lunch that day, I was sure there had to be some ulterior motive behind it. We’re not the daddy buying lunch for his darling daughter types. Sure enough, when he kept peppering me with questions about Excalibur—specifically how it was coming along, whether we were ready for the demo—I knew something was up. I’d heard rumors of him stealing the plans for the other drone, and I carried those rumors in my heart up until that lunch date. When I confronted him, he claimed you were the one who stole the plans from him.

  “That bastard,” I mutter, then glance at my daughter.

  She shakes her head, waving a finger back and forth in admonishment. “That’s a bad word, Daddy.”

  “Sorry,” I whisper and go back to the email.

  I know his version of the story can’t possibly be true, or else how is it possible that both companies are having the same problems with cooling? It was a bit too much of a coincidence for me. His engineers, if they really were working on the technology for months prior to your development of the drone, would have worked out such bugs before now. But I knew they hadn’t, because he kept alluding to the problem, and trying in a roundabout way to see whether I’d come up with a solution.

  I knew then that only two people could’ve leaked the plans to him. It couldn’t be you, since that would mean sabotaging your own company. It had to be Ryland. He’s the only one working as close to the project as I am, and he would have easy access to all my files.

  You don’t want to believe me. I get that. I do. I didn’t want to believe it at first, either. After all, he’s been my mentor. He insisted I work for your company. I know now that his advocacy was calculated. Not so great for my ego, to put it mildly, but I’ll get over it.

  There’s one way for you to be sure that I’m telling the truth, however, and it also happens to be the way we can put an end to this madness. I only hope it works out the way I planned it.

  I gave Ryland the wrong information on the changes we made to the body of the drone, specifically, the alterations to the fan vent. If he did indeed, give that information to my father, their version of the drone should still overheat.

  Rest assured, the correct calculations are still in the files containing my notes and the plans. I can’t imagine Ryland changing them to reflect what I told him, since that would mean having the correct information on record. He would want the wrong measurements to be used, so your drone would crash and Arcane’s would fly.

  I have to think this through. Is she truly onto something? What she’s saying makes sense, in that Ryland would want Arcane to have the correct numbers while leaving us with something which could sink the entire project.

  Adrenaline races through my veins. I want her to be right. God, how I want her to be right, but being right would mean that Ryland is a
traitor. All these years, I kept a viper close to my heart. If she is right, it means we would win out over Arcane. And it would mean that Sam was telling the truth all along.

  I’m sorry for the way this worked out, Lincoln. I wish you nothing but luck tomorrow. Goodbye.

  I close the email and flop backwards into my chair. Hope bubbles up like an underground spring. If she’s telling the truth and there is no reason for her to write this email tonight, then there’s still a chance for success. For tomorrow to be a success, tonight is crucial. I need evidence and I’m going to find it.

  I shoot Maddie an apologetic look. “Sorry, kiddo. It’s going to be a slightly longer night than I’d anticipated. Tell you what, I’ll dig your Princess bed out and build it up for you. Then we can curl up together, and I’ll read you a bedtime story before you go to sleep?”

  “My Princess bed?”

  I grin at her. “Yup.”

  “Yay, Daddy.”

  Lincoln

  If there wasn’t so much nervous energy pumping through my veins, combined with caffeine, I might be dragging my feet. At seven this morning, I carried my sleeping daughter into her bed. I then waited for her nanny to come through the door before going back to the office.

  I know I look like death warmed over, a sleepless night is hardly the ideal situation before a day as important as this one, but if I pull this off, then I’m set for life.

  I have to crush this.

  It will go well. It has to.

  So why is my stomach in such a tight knot?

  I watch people filing into the room. They’re from all walks of life, really—investors, enthusiasts, tech writers. The conference draws thousands of people from around the world every year. There’s always plenty of excitement when it comes to getting the first look at a new piece of technology.

  It’s a theater in the round, with multiple levels of seating arranged in a circle around the room. As the minutes tick by, the buzz grows.

  I’m still not completely sure Sam is telling the truth and won’t be until Weissman’s people demonstrate, but a little faith never hurt anybody. Especially after what I found out last night. Access logs and security tapes having been flawlessly doctored. Lou would never have noticed, and I might have missed it too, but I know my lab inside out. I know the vents open at only certain times and they seemed to be opening at the wrong times.

  Some of these doctored tapes dated before Sam even started working for me.

  I still don’t know why Ryland would do it, though. This is what sticks in my craw as I stand behind the curtain separating those of us preparing for demonstrations from the hundreds of spectators filling the seats. Why would he go behind my back this way? What did I ever do to him? And he sat there, just as surprised and offended as anybody, when we found out Weissman had stolen our design.

  No. My design.

  Ryland, my best friend. My buddy. It has to be him. Only he knew enough about the design to take it to someone else. He maneuvered Sam’s hiring in the company. She was the perfect decoy, wasn’t she? They could blame it all on her.

  Which reminds me.

  I peer through the opening in the curtains, scanning the room for any sign of Weissman. He’ll be out there, naturally, since his corporation is performing a demo. He’ll want to witness his triumph over his biggest competitor in person. Not just the success of his drone, but the destruction of mine.

  He might be in for quite a surprise.

  Ryland approaches, grinning from ear to ear.

  I stare at him. Still not wanting to believe how wrong I’ve been. His smile is so real, so full of pride I could actually believe he’s my friend. I’ve seen that grin so many times. Before a game, before an important presentation, when he stood as my best man. If it weren’t for Sam, I wouldn’t have the slightest clue of what might be behind that grin. Those friendly eyes.

  “Ready for this?” he asks, his voice full of excitement.

  Is it excitement at the thought of seeing me fail? It has to be. Does he secretly hate me that much? It might not even be personal, really. Maybe he’s just collecting a hefty payday from Weissman, of a bigger share of Weissman’s company, once mine has been destroyed. Who knows? I want so much to ask him about the tapes. I want to ask what I did to leave him so vulnerable to bribery, if that’s what this is all about, but I don’t. I turn away from him. I actually can’t look at him.

  “As ready as I’ll ever be,” I murmur, looking out over the audience again.

  “You’re nervous?”

  “Yeah.” I don’t turn to face him. He might be able to read me if I look him in the eye. Let him think I’m having a bad case of nerves and leave it at that.

  “Don’t worry. Your drone will kill it.” He slaps my back.

  My first instinct is to turn around and sock him in the jaw. But I don’t. Soon, he will be nothing to me. What is important is my company. My eyes catch movement.

  There he is. The smug son of a bitch, moving toward his seat in the front row. Very good, Vince, very good. All the better to watch me destroy you.

  I wish Sam were here. Damn it, why was I so quick to judge her? I pushed her away out of hurt and rage. Even though I called her a whore—something I still haven’t forgiven myself for—she reached out to me and clued me in on the trick she played on Ryland. She didn’t have to do that. She could’ve left me to my own devices. She could’ve hung me out to dry.

  “Looks like we’re up before Arcane,” Ryland whispers, standing close to me.

  I force myself not to move away. I turn to look at him, my face composed. He is going to get such a shock. “Good, because I don’t feel like waiting for them to get through their presentation before I get through ours.” And it’ll look better for me to present first, too. They’ll be the ones who look like thieves—which is what they are.

  “Wait. What?” It’s a sharp question, surprised. Dismayed, even.

  “Yeah, I’m running the demonstration, myself.”

  He frowns suspiciously. “But I’ve been rehearsing it for days.”

  “I’m sure you have, but nobody knows more about my drone than I do. It’s my baby and has been from the beginning. I’m presenting.” I glance at him from the corner of my eye, almost daring him to defy me on this. I wouldn’t want to tip my hand too early, but he’s pushing me to the breaking point.

  He sees this, too, knows me well enough to know when I’ve had just about enough. He nods. “All right. Go for it. Good luck.”

  I wish I believed he really wants me to do well. It’s a soul-destroying feeling when the person you loved like brother for as far back as you can remember—turns out to be your enemy.

  The host of the presentation is stepping out onto the stage now, to the applause of the audience. They’re ready to be wowed—well, I have a feeling they’ll get what they came for.

  “First up today is Guardian Technologies, presenting their design for a long-range drone.”

  More applause.

  The knot in my stomach is as tight as it’s ever been. Maybe tighter.

  I carry the drone out to the stage, smiling. Nobody has touched it today except for me. I won’t take any chances. This is it. Everything we’ve worked toward, everything we’ve dreamed of. The entire future of my company and everyone who works in it.

  Yeah. No pressure.

  I place the drone on the table and get an image of Sam in my head. She should be here with me. If this presentation goes successfully, it’s because of her. Not me. She saved us. I owe her big time.

  I scan the room, searching the crowd. They’re an eager, captive audience. And the most eager member isn’t Weissman, either.

  It’s his daughter.

  There she is, up top, standing with her back to the wall. Directly across from where I’m standing now. Arms folded, eyes boring holes into me. When I look into them, she lifts her chin in that defiant way of hers. Daring me to make a scene, to call her out. To even give an indication that I know her.

  I
wish I could tell her I believe her, but not until I see what Arcane does. But I believe her when she says she didn’t want to hurt me. I believe she didn’t use me the way I accused her of doing.

  There’s only one way to find out if she’s telling the truth about the rest of it.

  My smile widens. “Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.”

  Lincoln

  So, thanks to this breakthrough technology, our Excalibur GTX3 will be able to travel up to twenty times further than current models of even the highest-priced devices.” I use the controls to raise the height at which the prototype hovers over the room. “It is also able to maintain altitude with up to ten pounds attached, without affecting the distance it can travel.”

  I scan the front row, pointedly meeting Weissman’s gaze before looking to the person seated beside him. “Would you do me the honor of assisting me in this demonstration?”

  The woman smiles, smoothing down her pencil skirt before standing. I wave her over to me, still with the controls in my hand, and point to the gallon of milk on the floor. I’ve been flying the drone for over ten minutes now with fifteen minutes being the longest a presentation can run. The prototype seems to be doing just fine. You did it, Sam. You did it. I don’t dare raise my eyes up in her direction, but I hope she feels the pride I do.

  “Could you please confirm that this carton is full and not empty?” I ask, flashing her my most winning smile.

  She bends, lifting the carton, and nods. “It’s full of milk,” she confirms with a laugh.

  A general rumble of laughter spreads over the room.

  “Now, would you be so kind as to hook it onto the bottom of the Excalibur GTX3?” While she’s doing this, I turn to the audience. “A gallon weighs approximately eight-point-three-five pounds. Short of our ten-pound limit, but you get the idea.”

  More good-natured laughter.