Chapter 1 - THE CHAIR AT THE HEAD OF THE TABLE
The first person to laugh was Victor Crane.
It was not a loud laugh. Men like Victor did not need volume. He had spent twenty years learning how to make contempt sound professional.
“Sir,” he said, standing just outside the glass boardroom, “this floor is restricted.”
The old janitor kept wiping a faint coffee ring from the marble beside the conference-room door.
His name tag said ELIAS.
His gray hair was thin, his shoulders slightly rounded, and his navy maintenance uniform was a size too big. At seventy-six, he looked like the kind of man people apologized to when they bumped into him and forgot five seconds later.
Victor did not apologize.
“You were told to finish before eight,” he continued. “The leadership meeting begins in three minutes. Take the cart and leave.”
Inside the boardroom, twelve executives were arranging tablets, water bottles, and carefully neutral expressions around a table long enough to land a small plane on. At the far end stood one high-backed chair.
Empty.
The old man glanced at it.
Victor stepped between him and the glass.
“Did you hear me?”
“I heard you.”
“Then move.”
A young woman near the printer looked up.
Maya Reed had been at Novaris Systems for nine weeks, which in Victor Crane’s world meant she was barely more permanent than the coffee filters. She was twenty-two, an engineering intern from UMass Lowell, and she had already learned three rules about the executive floor.
Never be late.
Never contradict a vice president.
And never make Victor Crane feel small.
She broke the third rule anyway.
“He’s almost done,” Maya said. “It’ll take thirty seconds.”
Victor slowly turned toward her.
The entire hallway seemed to tighten.
“What did you say?”
Maya swallowed. “I said he’s almost done.”
Victor smiled.
It was worse than if he had shouted.
“Remind me of your name.”
“Maya Reed.”
“Intern?”
“Yes.”
“Then here’s your first real lesson, Maya. People who don’t understand hierarchy don’t last here.”
The old janitor stopped wiping.
Maya’s face reddened, but she held Victor’s gaze.
“He didn’t do anything wrong.”
Victor took one step closer.
“Pack your desk after the meeting.”
Maya blinked. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“Victor,” someone inside the boardroom called, uncomfortable now. “We’re waiting.”
Victor never looked away from Maya.
“You’re finished.”
The old man placed the rag on top of his cart.
“No,” he said.
Victor looked at him.
Elias reached inside the uniform shirt and pulled out a black phone so thin and expensive it looked absurd against the faded fabric.
He tapped one number.
The call connected immediately.
“Serena,” he said. “I’m on forty-two.”
Pause.
“No, don’t come up yet.”
His eyes remained on the empty chair beyond the glass.
“I only have one question.”
Another pause.
Then the old man asked, very quietly,
“Why is my chair empty?”
Inside the boardroom, Graham Voss, chief executive officer of Novaris Systems, went completely still.
So did the chief financial officer.
So did three board members who had been talking among themselves.
One of them dropped a pen.
Victor gave a short, irritated laugh.
“What is this?”
No one answered him.
Graham rose from his seat.
He was fifty-four, silver at the temples, immaculate in a charcoal suit. The financial press called him the architect of Novaris’s modern era.
At that moment he looked like a man staring at a ghost.
He walked to the glass door and opened it himself.
“Mr. Ward?”
Victor’s smile vanished.
Maya looked from Graham to the janitor.
The old man removed his cap.
The room went silent.
Elias Ward.
Founder of Novaris Systems.
Chairman emeritus.
Largest voting shareholder.
The man whose black-and-white photograph hung in the lobby thirty-eight floors below.
A photograph taken twenty-five years, thirty pounds, and one lifetime of grief ago.
Elias stepped past Victor.
“Good morning, Graham.”
Graham’s mouth opened, but nothing came out.
Elias entered the boardroom and stopped beside the empty chair.
Then he looked back at Maya.
“You,” he said.
Maya’s heart dropped.
“Yes, sir?”
“Don’t pack anything.”
Victor went pale.
Elias pulled out the chair and sat down.
“Now,” he said, looking around the table, “somebody explain why I had to wear a janitor’s uniform for eighteen days to learn what kind of company you’ve turned mine into.”
No one moved.
Then Elias placed a thick yellow envelope on the table.
Across the front, written in red ink, were two words:
PROJECT HELIX.
Graham’s face changed.
And Maya saw it.
May you like
Fear.
