Mastermind: A Theo Cray and Jessica Blackwood Thriller Page 27
“And Theo?”
Heywood sits back down. “Theo? Lifeline has suggested some interesting psychoactives that I want to try on him. I’m curious to see if I can make him a more malleable personality. And if they’re safe enough, maybe we try them on you. But as you deduced, Lifeline is nowhere near as far along as they think. Thankfully, I have all the time in the world to work out the kinks.”
I shake my head. “Wow.”
“You still don’t believe me?”
“I do,” I reply. “I just mean, wow. I knew I’d be right. I just didn’t realize by how much. Theo owes me dinner. He said I’d never get you to monologue like a cartoon villain, but I kept telling him that’s exactly what you are. Who talks like this outside of a B-movie villain?”
He shakes his head sadly. “You still don’t—”
“Understand my situation? Are you sure it’s me who doesn’t understand? Do you really think that Gerald Voigt, a man who I’ve stood in the line of fire for, would abandon me? That the three of us would be dumb enough to plot a search for your server, knowing that Kieren had our phones tapped? And by the way, did you see her today? Have you seen her since you told her to detain us? Or have you only heard her voice on the phone?”
His face twitches, then fits itself into a smile. “Again with the mind games.”
“You know it. Let’s play one more game: we both get up and walk to our respective doors and see who gets to leave and who has to stay.”
Heywood’s eyes narrow. He glances over his shoulder at the door, then forces another smile.
I stand, leaving my handcuffs on the counter. His eyes widen at the sight of them. He’s trying to make sense of what’s happening, wondering if this is a bluff.
I walk to my door, then stop and turn around. “This is killing you, isn’t it? You’re wondering if this perfect little prison you helped Kieren conceive might actually be your own.”
He keeps that smirk on his face as he tries to retain his composure.
I turn around, face my door, and grab the handle.
And step through.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
AFTERMATH
Kelsi the silver robot girl pushed her bicycle along the pedestrian median of the Brooklyn Bridge toward Manhattan. The setting sun made the sky glow a thousand shades of amber and the skyline look almost normal.
Tourists had returned to New York City, and her friends said the money in Times Square was good. Kelsi was looking forward to making the rest of the money she needed to take the advanced modern dance class she’d been waiting for.
This had been the roughest year of her life, not to mention the Void fucking with everyone’s lives. But she regretted none of it. Sure, eating cereal twice a day when money was tight and having to listen to her roommates bang at all hours of the night was irritating. But this was what being young was about.
As she moved her bicycle around a teenager selling sodas out of a cooler he’d dragged all the way to the middle of the bridge, she caught a glimpse of a couple standing next to each other as they leaned on the railing watching the sunset.
The fading sunlight caught the woman’s eyes, making them look like green fire as her dark hair blew in the breeze. The man was watching the woman out of the corner of his eye.
He looked like an actor they’d hire to play the smoking-hot professor on some television show.
The edges of their hands were touching and their bodies were close, but Kelsi couldn’t tell if they were lovers or best friends.
The thought made her smile. She let them be, then pushed her bike toward the city and what lay ahead.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Andrew Mayne is the Wall Street Journal and Amazon Charts bestselling author of The Girl Beneath the Sea and Black Coral in his Underwater Investigation Unit series; The Naturalist, Looking Glass, Murder Theory, and Dark Pattern in his Naturalist series; Angel Killer, “Fire in the Sky,” Name of the Devil, and the Edgar Award–nominated Black Fall in his Jessica Blackwood series; and the Station Breaker novels. The star of Discovery Channel’s Shark Week special “Andrew Mayne: Ghost Diver” and A&E’s Don’t Trust Andrew Mayne, he is also a magician who started his first world tour as an illusionist when he was a teenager and went on to work behind the scenes for Penn & Teller, David Blaine, and David Copperfield. Ranked as the fifth-bestselling independent author of the year by Amazon UK, he currently works with OpenAI on applied artificial intelligence. For more on him and his work, visit www.andrewmayne.com.