Replica

“To keep up the charade that I’m helping Nate, even though I’m really stabbing him in the back. I need to give him some dollars.”

“I … see.” Esmeralda picked up the seating chart, as if she couldn’t stand for her hands to be idle for a moment.

Nadia found herself practically holding her breath, hoping her mother would ask her questions. Hoping she would show some interest, or even concern. She had to know Nadia was going through hell right now and could use her mother’s comfort. But Esmeralda Lake had never been much for nurturing.

“You’ll want to talk to Gerri tonight,” she said, leaving all the questions unasked. “She uses the black market more heavily than your father and I do, so she’ll likely have more dollars available.” There was a definite hint of disapproval in her mother’s voice, and Nadia felt a moment of smug satisfaction that for once it was directed at her perfect sister instead of her.

The satisfaction faded almost as soon as it had appeared. If Nadia failed to appease Mosely, it was Gerri and her children who would suffer the most for it, and she was ashamed of herself and her petty jealousy.

“All right,” she agreed. “I’ll ask Gerri.”

There was another awkward moment of silence, as Esmeralda seemed to be at a loss for words. Then she turned her attention to the seating chart again.

* * *

Gerri lived in another one of the three buildings of the Lake Towers, so it was relatively simple for her and Nadia to slip out of the party during the cocktails-and-mingling portion of the evening before dinner was served. If their mother hadn’t approved the plan in advance, she would have been furious with her daughters for shirking their duties as hostesses—though technically Gerri was a guest. As it was, she gave them both a pointed look when she saw them heading for the door, a look that told them in no uncertain terms that they’d better hurry back. Gerri acknowledged her with a nod.

Gerri’s apartment was silent and dark, though somewhere in the children’s wing Rory and Corinne were probably still awake in the care of their nanny. Gerri led Nadia to her home office, where she opened a wall safe and withdrew a couple banded stacks of dollars. There were plenty more inside the safe.

“Will this be enough?” Gerri asked as she stuffed the dollars into a manila envelope.

“I honestly don’t know,” Nadia admitted. Unlike their mother, Gerri had actually wanted to know what the dollars were for, and Nadia had told her the whole story—except for the threat Mosely had made against her children. Gerri had the right to know, but Nadia didn’t have the heart to tell her. There wasn’t anything Gerri could do about it, and Nadia wasn’t going to take chances with the kids’ lives, so there was no purpose to making her worry. Nadia felt guilty for keeping the secret anyway.

Gerri tapped the edge of her desk with her nails, making an annoying little clicking sound as she studied the contents of the safe and frowned.

“It’s hard to know,” she murmured. “If he were using the dollars for the black market, I’d have some inkling, but for this specific purpose…” She shook her head and handed the envelope to Nadia. “It would have been helpful if you could have asked him how much money he needed.”

Nadia had been too angry with him at the time to even think about it. Besides, it wouldn’t break her heart if she gave the dollars to Nate and it ended up not being enough for his needs. As long as she could tell Mosely it was an honest mistake, anything she did to delay Nate’s search could only be helpful.

“It will have to do,” Nadia said firmly. “I’ll tell him this was all that was in Dad’s safe.” At least Nate was putting in an appearance at the party later tonight. He’d declined the dinner invitation—as he did whenever he could possibly get away with it—but because he needed to get the money from her, he had promised to make a cameo appearance to lend the party a little extra cachet.

Gerri reached out and clasped Nadia’s hand, giving it a squeeze. “You’re doing the right thing, you know. No matter how bad it makes you feel.”

“Betraying the man I’m going to marry, helping Dirk Mosely arrest an innocent man, and maybe even causing a bunch of innocent people to be tortured…” She shook her head. “It might be the only thing I can do under the circumstances, but it’s not the right thing.”

Gerri sighed. “Nadia, protecting yourself and your family is always the right thing to do. You have to choose your battles, and choosing to battle Mosely is insane.”

“Now, maybe,” Nadia said as anger burned in her core. No one should have the kind of power Mosely wielded and abused, not even when they were investigating murder and treason. “But he’s not invincible. Someday, he’ll make a mistake.”

“I wouldn’t mind seeing him take a very long tumble, I must admit.”

If she knew he’d threatened her kids, would she be quite so willing to put up with him now? Anger spurred Nadia, almost hard enough to make her tell Gerri the whole truth, but she managed to contain it. Telling her wouldn’t change anything.

“Maybe you and I can help make that happen,” Nadia suggested as she took another look at the envelope full of dollars her sister had given her. Dollars Gerri had because of her extensive dealings with the black market, where she routinely bought tech for personal use that was of higher quality than that manufactured by Paxco.

“What do you have in mind?” Gerri asked with a hint of suspicion in her voice, as if she was prepared not to like whatever Nadia suggested.

“When he hit me, Mosely gloated that he could get away with it because no one would believe me if I told. But what if I’d been wearing a recorder of some sort at the time?”

Gerri shook her head. “Even if you could prove he hit you, it wouldn’t be enough. If we go after him, we have to go after him with something that will kill him. Wounding him would be a very, very bad idea.”

Nadia nodded her agreement. “I know. And like you said, we might not be able to do anything about him right now. But what if sometime in the future, he finds himself standing on less firm ground? Even the most powerful people in the world can have their moments. It’s not like no one’s ever had bad things to say about Mosely before.”

“True,” Gerri said slowly, no doubt cataloging in her mind the times Mosely’s behavior had been called into question.

“What if the next time he’s on the defensive about something, we produce recordings of him threatening me? Or worse. Lots of people would give him a pass right now because he’s investigating a case of treason and it’s all so new and fresh. But what about a couple of years down the line?”

“I don’t know, hon,” Gerri said doubtfully. “It would take an awful lot to take him down, and I’m not sure it’s worth the risk. If he should find out you were recording him…”

“How would he ever find out?” Nadia imagined there was a hard glint in her eyes. “He thinks I’m just a frightened little girl who’ll do whatever he tells me to.”

“Maybe so, but still—”

“I want to make him pay. You don’t know what it’s been like, being forced to give in to his demands like this.” Nadia suppressed a shiver and reminded herself for what felt like the thousandth time that no good could come from telling Gerri about the threat to her children. “Maybe if I’m at least trying to get him back, it will make this all more bearable.”

Gerri still looked unconvinced, a line of worry creasing her brow. She wasn’t given to bouts of uncertainty as Nadia was, and Nadia felt briefly bad for putting her in what must have been an awkward position. That didn’t stop her from trying to bolster her own argument.

“Do you think…?” She paused to carefully consider her words before speaking. “Maybe I’m letting him get to me too much, letting my imagination run away with me. But I feel like there’s a chance Mosely could make me mysteriously disappear before this is all over. He knows I’ll never forgive him for the things he’s done, and he also knows I’m destined to be the Chairman Spouse someday. He might find it more convenient if he could stop that from happening.”

For one of the few times in her life, Gerri was speechless, staring at her little sister in horror.

“But if I’m recording him, maybe even transmitting the recordings to a remote location, I might have a little leverage to stop that from happening.” Nadia shivered again. “Or at least make him pay for it after the fact. You would know where the recordings are being stored, and if anything ever happened to me…”

Gerri pulled her into a rib-crushing hug. “Nothing’s going to happen to you,” she said fiercely.

“But—”