Fate of Perfection (Finding Paradise Book 1) Read online

  Near her work pod, she caught several glances in her direction, followed by the sound of scurrying. Her lips thinned, an annoying trait that alerted others to when she was irritated. She didn’t like that they saw her wrath coming.

  “Mr. Arnet,” she said brusquely, coming to a stop in front of her idea board. Boot up. The pale blue pulsed to life.

  “Yes, miss.” The thin man stepped up next to her station.

  “It seems you haven’t kept tight enough control on these premises. Care to explain?”

  “Sorry, miss. We are only two days behind schedule.”

  “Behind schedule?” She faced him, schooling her face into a severe expression. And waited.

  He started to pick at his suit seam. “Yes, miss. Sorry. I’ll check in with—”

  “Don’t check in, Mr. Arnet, push. My department is known for being ahead of schedule. My physical presence should not be necessary to maintain this standard.”

  “Yes, miss. I apologize.”

  She faced her idea board again and accessed her files. As she opened her most recent update, a momentary flutter rippled her heart. She thought of the baby’s downy-soft hair and velvety skin. Holding the baby was like holding another piece of herself. The baby’s chest pressing against Millicent’s was . . . the most glorious feeling in the world. So natural. So . . . right.

  The memory of running her lips across the infant’s sleeping brow surfaced, causing a pang in Millicent’s heart. This wasn’t good. She knew it wasn’t. She shouldn’t miss that baby. It wasn’t hers. Her genetics aside, Millicent’s job was almost done. As soon as she stopped feeding, Millicent would go back to her life. Her empty, lonely life.

  Blowing out a breath, she tried to push the thoughts away. Then struggled to ignore the feelings of dread for the future. Of the pain she was sure to face. She tried to get back into the job.

  It turned into a long, long day. And when it was finally over, nearly time to go back to the nursery and feed, she put on her exercise attire and sought the buzz that endorphins gave her. Maybe running so hard she threw up would scramble her head in just the right way. It was worth a shot. She had to do something.

  On her running mat, she waited patiently for her implant to sync, then quickly built to warming-up speed. Before she could even break a sweat, she saw the large frame of one of the directors emerge from the clothing area. A moment later, she recognized the messy man-bun and the infallible swagger in his skin-tight sweat suit. He walked the length of the floor before stopping in front of her with his lips pulled into a smile. “Making up for lost time?”

  She rolled her eyes at his mocking tone. “Your pants are absurd. I can see the outline of your dick.”

  “Tempted?”

  “Hardly.”

  “I’ve missed our little chats. Everyone else here does as they’re told, when they’re told. Where’s the fun? Where’s the challenge?”

  “They are paid to. If you want a challenge, go make eyes at your crony, Mr. Hunt.”

  The smile dripped off Mr. Gunner’s face. “He has his duty. I have mine.”

  “Ah yes. The territorial pissing match. Or is it dick measuring?”

  He sauntered off, his shoulders swinging with his ridiculous swagger. “No need to measure. Mine’s always bigger.”

  “Ms. Foster is here?” Trent said as he smelled the familiar flowery fragrance. He glanced up in time to see a body pass. Beyond the glass door waited the stone face of Mr. Hunt, severe and perpetually in a bad mood.

  A giggle drew his attention away from the director of security management in time to see girl C raise her hands, wanting to be picked up by Mommy.

  “They are both getting too attached. It’s time to sever the tie.” Patricia, Trent’s new assistant, spoke quietly so as not to be overheard.

  Two other mothers were bouncing their children with dutiful faces, not overly engaged. The babies were only mildly invested, their attention wandering. One started to fuss as Trent watched. Of these three, only Ms. Foster was keeping the infant content with her milk supply. The other two women would soon join the two before them, who’d left after their milk had dried up from problems with feeding. Of those two, only one had cried as she walked away. Neither had had any lingering effects after returning to their duties and their regular lives. The babies, likewise, were happy with the lab staffers. All would be intelligent, if the preliminary tests held true, with a couple that were exceptional.

  But there was one child above them all. She was already showing brain patterns that shouldn’t have developed for months yet. Yesterday, she’d made a light flicker! Without an implant!

  “In addition to being four clicks above the infant Curve in two categories right now—four clicks!—she knows who her mother is, and her mother makes her happy,” Trent said. “No one else makes her smile like that. Mr. White is over the moon about the stats, so I’ve heard, and Ms. Hutchins wants things to continue progressing. Ms. Foster, right now, is helping that progression. We have until the infant turns two. We’ll indulge the child until she starts to display damaging levels of separation anxiety. Let’s keep our fingers crossed it won’t happen before our cutoff.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Trent had to stop himself from preening as he moved into the main room. He liked having an assistant. It meant he was moving up in the world. And if that baby kept showing promise, he’d move up right to the top; he could feel it.

  “Everything going okay?” He smiled down at Ms. Foster and girl C.

  “When will her eyes change?” Ms. Foster asked, scrunching her nose and making a face as she looked at the child. Girl C giggled merrily and reached for Ms. Foster’s nose.

  “Those are . . . probably the end result. They might change a little, but that is basically their final color.” Trent stooped for a rattle and handed it to a lab tech. The infant in the lab tech’s arms stopped crying long enough to grab the rattle. The item skittered across the floor a moment later. He had a terrible temper, that one.

  “This is the final color?” Ms. Foster’s voice had dropped into a suspicious tone.

  Confused at her reaction, he studied the child’s eyes for a moment. Black lashes curled up from light-blue eyes. He’d almost describe them as electric blue. Even this early in development, he could already see the hot spark of focus that would later blossom into intelligence. Just how intelligent, he couldn’t wait to find out.

  “No one’s eyes should be this color,” Ms. Foster said in an uncomfortable tone. “Did something go wrong with the breeding?”

  “Oh!” Trent laughed. “No, no. On the contrary, everything went right. Blue is a recessive gene. The sperm and the egg both carry an eye-color gene. You must have a blue gene in addition to your brown. In you, the brown—or dark hazel, in your case—took over as the dominant gene, hiding the blue.”

  “So why isn’t the blue hidden in GC?”

  “GC? Cute. Well, the father must have . . .” Trent checked his wrist screen. He now had the clearance to access most of the information he needed wirelessly. From anywhere! He’d come a long way in six short months. Everything was going as planned. “Yes, the father has two blue genes. So, being a natural birth, he offered a blue gene for the baby, and you appear to also have offered a blue gene. And there you go. Blue eyes.”

  “None of the other babies have blue eyes.”

  Why this was such a big deal, Trent had no idea. But Ms. Foster was one of the prettier people he’d ever seen—as a natural born, she had minute flaws, but they only made her more exotic and rare—so he smiled down at her despite his need to be on the way to Ms. Hutchins’s office. “A couple of the babies could have had blue eyes. But this is natural birthing! The selection is left entirely up to Mother Nature. I love it. It’s so exciting. There are literally endless results that could come of a single sperm meeting an egg. Endless! Not all good, I grant you, but when it works, it really works! And now look, your baby is one of a kind.”

  Ms. Foster’s face transform
ed into an expression that looked like she was going to be sick. “One of two, actually.” She clutched the baby to her chest and looked away.

  Trent knew that postnatal hormones had the ability to make women crazy, but . . . Well, this was just odd. He had no idea what was happening. Or what the problem was. So he just moved on. It was safer that way. Ms. Foster could be terrifying when she got her temper up and swung her weight around. He did not like matching wills with her. Mostly because he never won. He hoped that when he finally had to separate her from her baby, she’d go quietly.

  Millicent stepped out of the craft with lead feet. Her stomach flipped once, twice. She almost felt like she was going to throw up.

  The doors slid shut behind her and closed with a soft bump. She jumped, and then couldn’t help swinging an accusatory glare in Mr. Gunner’s direction. He stood as he had yesterday, against the wall, watching her make her entrance. He wasn’t her guard anymore, but still he made sure she got into the building.

  That was Mr. Hunt’s job, and Mr. Hunt trusted she wasn’t an idiot.

  Is that what Mr. Gunner was saying? That she was an idiot?

  Irrational anger boiled through her veins.

  Did he know, she wondered? Did he know that he’d stolen her thunder? Everyone said GC looked a little like her. But she didn’t. GC mimicked her, but that was it. It had taken realizing whom GC’s eyes had reminded her of to see it. GC looked like her birth father. Like Mr. Gunner.

  Dominant genes, my ass!

  As if hearing the accusation, the man of the hour glanced her way. He did a double take, probably wondering why she was staring a hole in his head. And he could just keep wondering, because even if she wanted to accuse him of hijacking her spotlight—which made no sense and she didn’t care—she wasn’t allowed to. It was forbidden to discuss the infants and their development outside the creation and growth department. She’d be segregated from her daughter immediately, and Millicent was not ready for that to happen. She wanted this to last forever, and since that wasn’t a possibility, for as long as possible.

  She straightened her gaze and walked toward her department with purposeful strides. Out of all the people in the world, she had been tied forever with him. Mr. Suave. Mr. Swagger.

  GC better not have any of that.

  “What is your problem, princess?”

  She swatted at his annoying presence, not bothering to look over when she hit his shoulder. “Don’t talk to me. They might find out. Let’s just keep this civil.”

  “Who might? What are you—”

  “Good morning, Ms. Foster,” the AI said pleasantly.

  Millicent hurried to her station, making sure Mr. Gunner wasn’t following. The only consolation was that he was extremely intelligent. And good at his job. The San Francisco office was now running like a fine machine as far as security went. They’d had no incidents in two months, or so the reports said. That hadn’t happened in a long time. So if GC inherited any of his abilities, so much the better.

  Something Mr. McAllister had said floated into her awareness—“There are literally endless results that could come of a single sperm meeting an egg.”

  What else would GC inherit from this man who fornicated with multiple women at one time and wandered around in exercise clothing that clearly defined his pecker?

  She sighed and wiped her hand over her face. She was almost afraid to watch her kid grow.

  That thought sank in. A tear came to her eye, a first in as long as she could remember outside the birthing room.

  They couldn’t take her child away. She had to come up with a way to stay in GC’s life.

  Chapter 8

  One Year Later

  “Message for you, miss.”

  Millicent slipped her foot into a boot. “Read it to me.”

  “Of course. It’s from Trent McAllister. He states, ‘Hello, Ms. Foster. I just wanted to let you know that Marie—we will be adopting your name suggestion—is doing great. She is really coming along, and I think we have a winner on our hands. As you know, we’ve asked for your visitations to continue well beyond that of the other mothers because little Marie looks forward to them. However, we are nearing our cutoff. We cannot make this any harder on Marie than it already will be. So, for that reason, at the end of this week, you will tell her you’re going on a trip, and we’ll give her a clean cut. I want to thank you for all your diligent work. We have entered your name into the breeding pool for the second time, and should it come up, I look forward to working with you again. Please let me know if you have any questions. All the best, Trent McAllister.’”

  Millicent’s hands shook where she held the zipper. Pain such as she’d never experienced tore at her heart. Without warning, her stomach gurgled and then erupted, spilling her breakfast onto the floor.

  Eyes dripping, she pulled her console closer and retrieved the message before flinging it onto a larger wall screen.

  “Can I help clean that up, miss?”

  Millicent ignored the voice, reading the text as her world came crashing down. As her heart ripped out. As her likely death presented itself. Because there was very little chance that she would succeed. But they were giving her no choice. She’d spent the last year reading up on every effort a natural parent had made to stay in their baby’s life. Appeals to the conglomerate, trespassing, trying to change jobs—everything had been tried. Every single thing. And often, the mother was either recycled or mind wiped. The conglomerate had made the line very clear—she was a product of their organization, and her brood was, too. They were all owned.

  It was time for her to take her child—and then her freedom.

  She hated that Mr. Gunner had been right. And that now she’d be forced to act on it.

  She was quiet on the way to her department, as usual. At the bay doors, she glanced at the empty spot along the wall where Mr. Gunner hadn’t stood for months. He didn’t need to make sure she made it in safely anymore. Her main task was done. Or so he thought. The ape.

  At her work pod, she paused. And then backed out. “Mr. Arnet.”

  A moment later, he was standing behind her. “Yes, miss.”

  “I will be in my office today. I need to concentrate. I want productivity to stay at the current rate. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, miss. Of course, miss.”

  She ignored the grateful look on his face. In her office, she resisted the urge to shut her door. People would already wonder why she’d suddenly decided to switch locations. She didn’t need them thinking something was up.

  To dispel their curiosity, she filled all but one wall with her pet project: the most complex systems in all the conglomerates. Some belonged to her nemesis, the staffer in Gregon who kept thwarting her attempts to crush Gregon’s newest firewall. The others were her own, which she constantly had to fortify against Gregon’s passive-aggressive attacks. The good news was, in addition to being a pastime that Millicent could sink into during the lonely evening hours, it had taught her some fantastic code sequences she hadn’t seen before. The bad news was, she had also taught some fantastic code sequences to the Gregon staffer, who was now using them against her.

  Today, though, none of that mattered. Maybe would never matter again.

  Now it was time for the first iffy part of her plan. The part where she basically sucked up to Mr. Gunner and said, “You were right about freedom. Please help me attain it.”

  She really hoped there had been a kernel of seriousness in his questioning all that time ago, and it wasn’t just her current desperation reading into it.

  Millicent bit her lip and stared at the screen.

  Possibly this was a terrible idea.

  After a deep breath, she started to execute the first part of her plan, which was made possible by Mr. Gunner himself.

  Shortly after Mr. Gunner had tricked her into going into the assisted living facility, she’d gone into the systems to analyze how he’d set up that security loop to hide his misdeeds on the craft—she ha
ted secrets. Then, a few months ago, she’d gone in to see if she could duplicate it, only to realize it was a sort of privacy reserved for Mr. Gunner’s department, accessible only to a director and higher. Of course, Millicent could take down the firewall with ease. And with enough time and effort, she could hack one of her own if she wanted, but she’d noticed that Mr. Gunner hadn’t used it again. Why hack another if she could take over this one? It was just waiting for a time she might need it.

  Like now, for example.

  She needed help in this endeavor, and even though Mr. Gunner had definitely been trying to distract her that one day with his talk of freedom and motherhood, he’d seemed so serious. So desirous to be a father. And the way he’d held Marie—he hadn’t even known the child was his, and he’d been fantastic with her. He’d had a connection; she knew it.

  This all certainly sounded like desperation . . .

  “He’ll want to help,” she mumbled to herself, feeling a surge of emotion at the enormity of what she was about to take on. “He will. He’ll do the right thing.”

  She had to believe that. Because without him, she had very little chance. And against him? Next to none—she could barely hold up her side of the insult slinging. The whole plan might unravel before she thought, Go.

  After a heavy sigh, she hacked into the security loop, added her own code, some traps, and a time-out. She buried a message like a time capsule that would display in his cleaning stall: “When I met you, one person had eyes of electric blue. But now there are two. Carpe diem.”

  She paused.

  She had to admit that there were a few possible hang-ups. First, would he figure out what she meant about the eyes? Second, would he have any clue what carpe diem meant? The phrase was a relic from over a thousand years ago. He was smart, but that didn’t mean he was properly educated . . .