Total pages in book: 173
Estimated words: 169266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 846(@200wpm)___ 677(@250wpm)___ 564(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 169266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 846(@200wpm)___ 677(@250wpm)___ 564(@300wpm)
“Haven’t seen her yet,” I say. Julia Van Veen is the Chief Technology Officer of Global Dynamix, credited as the one who ‘created’ Vanguard (despite what he thinks of it). Double PhDs from MIT and Stanford in neuroscience and computer science and a former DARPA researcher, Dr. Van Veen was brought on to Global Dynamix two decades ago and helped shape the company under the guidance of the founder, Elron Masters. Masters is nearing a hundred years old and has an honorary role as Chairman Emeritus, but his stain on society has left a mark that’s impossible to scrub off. It was his foray into self-flying airplanes, AI, and cryptocurrency, plus his support of autocracy, that helped usher in the Dark Decade and the fall of the American empire, the consequences of which the world is still feeling today.
But even with Masters tucked away, his protégé Conrad Marsh, a smarmy, fifty-four year old former start-up whiz kid, still carries the mark. While Marsh, Van Veen, and the rest of Global Dynamix have spent the past few years trying to placate the harm Masters did and the role the company took in the US as the government fell and corporations rose in power, no one worth their salt trusts them.
Especially not the British government.
Especially not when they possess a living, breathing weapon.
Which is exactly why I need to infiltrate Vanguard and his inner circle and find out what’s really going on. And if it turns out the so-called superhero is as dangerous as a weapon of mass destruction, then I’ll need to take him out and somehow survive the process.
Sounds easy, right?
“I see her,” Bayo says in my ear. “Walking around the pool, talking to one of the ambassadors. She’s heading your way.”
I slowly turn my head to see a tall blonde woman in an off-white satin suit. Before I can look away, her gaze stops on mine and focuses.
“She’s seen me,” I mumble behind my hand as I smooth back my hair.
“Mia Baxter?” Van Veen says as she approaches me.
Fuck, she knows me.
“Keep your head this time,” Bayo says. “Remember, you need this. I’m going to mute myself now in case she has similar tech to Vanguard.”
“Yes?” I say to her, keeping Bayo’s words in my head. Van Veen is a different animal than Vanguard, that much I can already tell. The way she walks has a lethal grace, not unlike some of my fellow agents. Van Veen’s, though, doesn’t come from knowing how to kill a man with a twist of her hands, but from knowing she’s probably the smartest person in the room, no matter the room. To be fair, she might also know how to easily kill a man. Her upbringing in the Netherlands is rather hazy.
What we do know is that she’s been with Global Dynamix for over twenty years, rising through the ranks with the kind of quiet efficiency that suggests she’s buried more than a few bodies along the way—metaphorically speaking, of course.
“I’m Dr. Julia Van Veen,” she says in a crisp, posh accent that’s not quite Dutch, not quite British or American either.
“Mia Baxter,” I say as I take her outstretched hand, her grip firm and dry, holding on just a beat longer than necessary. Her eyes—a pale grey that borders on colorless—sweep over me with clinical precision. I feel like a specimen being cataloged, though I’m immediately doing the same to her.
She’s handsome rather than pretty, with the kind of sharp, aristocratic bone structure that photographs beautifully and ages even better—cheekbones that could cut glass, a long, elegant nose, lips that seem perpetually poised on the edge of a dry remark. Her glossy blonde hair is cut shorter in the front, longer at the back. I know she’s in her mid-sixties, though she wears it with pride rather than as a burden. There’s an intelligence in her face that’s almost aggressive, the look of a woman who has never suffered fools and doesn’t intend to start now.
It’s a warning to stay on guard. I straighten my shoulders an inch, and her nostrils flare delicately. She notices everything, doesn’t she?
“I saw your conversation with Vanguard,” she says, releasing my hand. “Fascinating approach. My lip-reading skills are rusty these days, but I had the feeling you insulted him.”
Yes. Definitely notices everything.
“I’m sure he’d agree with that assessment,” I say coolly.
“You’re right about that.” A smile touches her lips but doesn’t reach her eyes. “He’s not used to being challenged. It unsettles him more than he’d like to admit.”
Which means he should be challenged, I think.
“I meant no offense,” I say carefully. “I just believe in direct conversation.”
“So do I.” Van Veen tilts her head, studying me the way a cat might study a mouse it hasn’t yet decided to kill. “Mia Baxter. Vantage Magazine. Graduated King’s College with a double degree in Journalism and International Relations. Impressive work, your piece about the reconstruction efforts in Eastern Europe. Less impressive work on that exposé about the Belgian finance minister—though I suspect the retraction wasn’t your fault.”