Taking Flight (A Devereux Novel) (5 page)

Derek applauded as the game of
Roego
drew to a stunning conclusion. Even Jeff, the game’s creator, shook his head in
delight. “Wow, Rachel, I’m honestly flabbergasted. I never would have thought
of using your horse like that.
Absolutely brilliant.
This is going to change my thinking about the optimal strategy.”

Rachel beamed. “Thanks,
Jeff. I had the idea last week, but didn’t have the opportunity to put it into
use. It turned out even better than I’d expected!”

The players shared a drink,
as was customary, and then rehashed the more interesting parts of the game.
Derek listened for a moment, but when he turned to engage Sara in conversation
he realized she wasn’t back from the bathroom yet.

I wonder if she’s gotten lost. The house doesn’t always make it easy on
people.

He found her in the library,
engrossed in a book on the opposite corner of the room from his desk. He
couldn’t remember if he had left anything important out on the cherry wood
desk, but he doubted it.

“Ah,” he said. “Why did I
get the impression you were a big reader?”

She flashed that engaging
smile at him, her white teeth glimmering in the soft light of the library. It
had no external walls in order to protect the older and more valuable books
from the damaging ultraviolet rays in sunlight. “Well, I guess I’m not the
typical airhead that makes their home in this city, so maybe that had something
to do with it.”

“Well said.” He ducked his
head to read the cover of the book she had taken off the shelf. “Oh, you’re a
fan of Nietzsche? Now that
is
surprising. I had you pegged as more of a romance or thriller reader.”

She looked at the book in
her hands as though it was the first time she was seeing it. “Ah, yes, you had
gotten me right the first time. I grabbed this to see if I was missing out on
anything.”

He grinned. It would be too
enjoyable poking fun at her if she got flustered so easily. “And? What’s your
verdict?”

The book snapped shut, and
she put it back in its home nestled amongst its friends. “Not for me. How did
the game go? Is it still on?”

“Oh, no, it wrapped up in
spectacular fashion. A masterful victory by Rachel—I’m sure they’ll be
discussing the ramifications all night and what this means to the game
balancing. Jeff is intent bringing it to market in the next few months, you
see. I’ll be financing the launch, since I believe in the product.”

“Really? That’s generous of
you. Something of a venture capitalist, are you?” She leaned against the
bookshelf and stood on one foot, crossing the other over onto its toe. It was a
cute stance.

“Something like that,” he
said. “How about you? I know nothing about you other than you are not a fan of
Nietzsche. Are you an up and coming actress? Model?” She cocked her head to the
side, a small smile tugging playfully at the corners of her lips. “No, you
don’t seem like the type. Maybe… agent?”

“Afraid you’re barking up
the wrong tree,” Sara said. “I’m a journalist, in town to investigate the
chronic homeless problem Los Angeles.”

“Journalist, eh?” Derek felt
his shoulders lift just a little. It was a rule among his brothers—they
allowed nothing to compromise the secrecy of their past. They had all the
cooperation they needed from the company and the government, but that didn’t
prevent them from letting things slip themselves. “And you’re in town to look
into the homeless problem? That’s quite the topic. I’m interested to hear your
take on things. How do you like the job?”

“I love it!” Sara’s face lit
up. “Being an investigative journalist was everything I wanted to be when I was
younger. I fought so hard for it and finally saw success a few years ago. I
even won an award for an article I had written on the plight of the poorest
class of Americans.”

“Congratulations.” Derek let
himself relax a little more. It was unlikely a journalist of such high
caliber
was here to dig up dirt on him. The tabloids
constantly sent enterprising young women after him, but Sara wasn’t the type.
“That’s fascinating, and obviously connected with the homeless here in the
city. What have you worked on in the past couple of years?”

He hadn’t expected the
response he got from the question. Sara staggered backward a little as though
he had struck her.

“Whoa! I’m sorry, are you
okay?” He reached out to her, but held back at the last moment in case it made
things worse.

She pushed herself upright
with what appeared to be tremendous effort. Her eyes remained cast to the side
and filled with a sorrow that touched Derek deeply. It was more
heart-wrenching
than anything he had ever witnessed in
person. Real emotion was rare to find in this city of fake smiles and plastic
faces.

“No, I’m sorry. It’s been a
long time, I shouldn’t react like this anymore.” She grimaced and took a deep
breath. “To be honest, I haven’t written a damn thing in the past two years. I…
was engaged. And I loved him very much, but then he died.” She tried to say
more, but her voice choked up and tears came to her eyes. She waved at her face
in frustration. “Ah, damn! I shouldn’t be telling you this. We just met.”

Derek closed the final
distance between them and put his arm around her. She put her forehead on his
shoulder and he held her for a moment while her body shook. “It’s okay, Sara.
You had a big loss in your past
,
I get
that
. I had my own a couple years ago when my father died. I doubt it
was as harsh as yours, but I’m not over it, either.”

She looked up at him, her
eyes wide and open. “Your father died? What about your mom? She must have been
devastated.”

He shook his head. “No, she
passed away long ago, when my little brother was born. My father threw himself
into work and we rarely saw him after that. Until he committed suicide two
years ago, and then it was too late.”

They stood in silence for a
little while, arms wrapped around each other, supporting and comforting. Sara
murmured from where her head had nestled into his shoulder. “What did your
father do?”

Derek laughed. “Well, he was
a programmer, originally. Beyond that, we never knew. He never talked about his
work with us, and like I said he barely spent time with us. It was just us four
brothers growing up, raising each other, trying to get away with whatever we
could under the watchful eyes of our nannies. Evan was our surrogate—he’s
only two years older than I am, but he always seemed so much more mature than
the rest of us.”

“Wow, that is so different
from everything I know,” Sara said. “I had two sisters, and my parents are
still alive, back in Chicago.
Although I haven’t seen much of
them since the accident.
Haven’t seen much of anyone, actually.”

The hurt and pain was still
easy to hear in her voice. But there was also a hint of self-reproach, as
though she was upset for distancing herself from everyone she cared about.

“That must be very difficult
to deal with,” Derek murmured. “At least I had my brothers to draw on, and I
didn’t know my father as well as most do.”

Sara drew in a deep, shaking
breath, and let it go as though forcing painful memories to leave her body.
“I’ve decided it’s time to move on.
As much as I can, anyway.
I can’t spend the rest of my life wallowing in self-pity.”

Derek admired the strength
it would take to shake off something like what Sara had been through. He tried
to think of anything in his life he loved so much that he couldn’t do anything
for years after it was gone.
Maybe if all
my brothers died at once.
His thoughts flashed to Evan’s visit and the
warnings he’d given Derek.
What are the
odds of that happening? Evan is just a little jumpy.

“I’m sorry, I’ve gotten your
shirt all wet,” Sara said, lifting her face from his should and looking up at
him. “My eyes do this leaking thing sometimes when I’m sad.”

He laughed. “A leak implies
they’re broken, but there’s nothing wrong with your eyes. They’re gorgeous.”

Her mouth was inches away.
He couldn’t resist any longer.

Their lips met in a soft
kiss. Sara’s lips were warm, welcoming, and a little salty from the tears that
had fallen on the pink skin.

Before it could go any
further, Derek pulled back just out of reach. Sara made a small, frustrated
sound in the back of her throat, and he smiled.

“You’re distraught, and I’m
dwelling on deep thoughts I’ve been putting aside. It wouldn’t be right to take
anything more from you. Yet.”

She drew back herself and
opened her eyes. Her face held such a plaintive expression that he couldn’t
help but chuckle, especially when she asked, “Are you sure?”

“I think so.” He loosened
his arms and stood back. “I enjoyed that, and it helped to talk about this.
Maybe we can do more of both another day.”

She smiled back at him. “I
would like that.”

“Shall we go
rejoin
the party?” He held out his hand to her.

“Let’s.”

“Argh!” Sara threw her banana peel against the
wall—it hit and fell to the ground with a faint
plop.

The rest of the party had
gone well—she had made friends and ingratiated herself with Derek’s crew.
Her decision to use her real name and profession, while potentially putting
Derek on guard against any deep questioning, turned out to be a great choice
when a couple of his friends had recognized her and co-opted her to talk about
several of her articles for much of the night.

It had been gratifying, but
also lessened the time she could talk with Derek or interview his friends. She
had ended the night with only two useful pieces of information: that his father
had died, and presumably left him and his brothers the owners of the Onyx
Company.

That alone was much more
than she’d begun with, but the information had been useless so far. As far as
the world at large appeared to be concerned, the company didn’t exist. And that
spawned a whole new series of good questions, but not a lot of good answers.

“How the hell can a company
post a profit of four
billion
dollars
in a quarter and not even legally exist?” she muttered. “There’s no record of
them anywhere!”

It made no sense. A company
that large must employ thousands upon thousands of people. Even the most strict
and binding non-disclosure agreement in the world couldn’t compel that many
people to remain silent about such a big secret.

Sara had redrawn the
company’s logo from the letter in Derek’s library from memory, and she wasn’t
able to find anything that way, either. She was running it through image search
software to see if that had any results, but she didn’t have high hopes. It was
so difficult for computers to recognize shapes and pictures that it was a huge
shot in the dark.

To her surprise, when she
got back from picking up Chinese food, the search had returned a news article.
“Military accident injures Gulf War veteran.”

An
accident at a military testing ground in Arizona was hushed by the base and no
explanation given
. We have obtained a picture of the debris that landed in Mrs.
Kenwick’s
backyard. Mrs.
Kenwick
lives just beside the base, and she says the explosion she heard yesterday was
unlike anything she had ever heard before.

“It was just a really loud
bang, like the start of a war over there,” she said. “The glass in the house
shook and dust rained down from the ceiling. It was like we were having an
earthquake.”

As you can see, the debris
is just a piece of metal with illegible writing on it. The base did confirm
that there was an injury in the accident and that the injured was Gulf War
veteran Chad Hunter. Hunter was rushed to the hospital, and we have been told
that doctors were forced to amputate one of his arms. He has survived and is in
critical condition for the time being.

Military.
That did not increase Sara’s odds of discovering any deep truths
related to the case. It was one realm she steadfastly refused to delve into
when choosing her investigations. Not because there wasn’t valuable information
the public should know about, but because it was a brutal climate filled with
money, politics, and power struggles—less in the forces themselves than
the military-industrial complex that depended on it.

Either way, it was a piece
of advice Michael had suggested and she took to heart. His advice was like gold
to her, and it had never led her astray.

It was time to call Ron and
try to weasel her way out of this entire sordid adventure. She would regret not
pursuing Derek further, but she was under no illusion that she wasn’t just the
new
flavor
of the week to him. When a man could have
countless numbers of actresses and supermodels, even several at the same time,
a woman like her stood no chance of capturing his attention long-term.

It’s not like I’m ready for romance. I mean, the other night felt good.
Really good.
But I can’t betray Michael’s memory like
that.
He
had been everything to her, and two years was not enough to repair the hole in
her heart where he still lingered.

Ron got straight to the
point. “Tell me you’ve solved it.”

“Jesus, Ron, it’s been a
week. Relax. A proper investigation takes months or even years—you know
that. I know you came from the tabloid world, but you’ve been around the block
a few times.”

“I don’t have time for
years, Flight. I was brought in to produce
immediate
results. You know the definite of ‘immediate?’ It’s not months from now, I’ll
tell you that much.” He sounded even more stressed than usual. Sara wondered
how much he had riding on her investigation of Derek. It could very well be the
crown jewel of his strategy to turn the paper’s fortunes around. A deep,
immersive story about America’s
favorite
brothers and
how their rise to wealth and fame had been orchestrated… she could see how that
would sell copies.

“Look, Ron, I’ve got bad
news. This will get solved slowly, or not at all. There just isn’t enough to go
on here. Derek is a fortress, and the only leads I’ve been able to get have
gone cold before they even started.” She tried to put as much sincerity into
her voice as she could.

“Are you trying to tell me
that there’s no story there?”

She hesitated. She hated
lying, and the truth was the story might be even bigger than Ron dreamed.
Four rich brothers, a dead father, a shadowy corporation with no
record of its existence?
It indicated a huge cover-up, and there was
no way the government wasn’t a part of it
. There were too
many holes in the public record when it came to the Devereux’s and their
company.

“I don’t know, Ron. Maybe
it’s just a stunt. You know, some reality show trying to dupe the world to set
up a huge unveiling. Or maybe it’s entirely mundane. I’m just telling you,
there’s no way I could get anything to you with any kind of speed. Let me work
on something else. There’s a great research topic here, the sheer number of
homeless and what is being done about it. I could stay and do a great piece on
that, get it to you within a few weeks, ready for publication.”

The only response was the
loud chewing of gum. She held her cell phone away from her ear, her nose
wrinkled with disgust.

“Ron? You get that?”

“Look, Flight. I don’t like
you. You aren’t my style of reporter. I’m not saying you’re
garbage—you’ve got an award, or whatever. But I need you to get me the
real story behind Derek Devereux, and I need you to do it quickly. The bottom
line is you’ll get me that story by the end of the month, or else you’re
fired.”

“Whoa, Ron, that’s not
possible!”

A blank tone met her words.
The bastard had hung up on her.