I’d loosened up a bit after hearing him speak about the attempts on his life. Maybe it helped me understand, just a little bit, some of his personality quirks. Maybe it helped—inadvertently, subconsciously—for me to emphasize with him just a little bit more.
We’re never going to get to the point where I feel pity for Jeremy Stonehart. Not after the things he’s done to me. In my eyes, he will remain forever irredeemable.
But he doesn’t have to know that. He can suspect it—and I bet he does. But, I will never stonewall him so much that he thinks his cause lost.
What cause is that? I don’t know. There seem to be two conflicting, rivaling desires at play. The first is his reason for picking me, for stalking me, for abducting me and submitting me to all the horrors that entailed.
The second is his new pronouncement of affection for me. The “L” word. I haven’t had enough time or distance from him to process all the implications of that yet. It’s some heavy shit. I need to think long and hard about how I might use it to my advantage… when I get a break from Jeremy.
That break might come as soon as tonight, or as early as tomorrow. When we land in America, he will undoubtedly have business to attend to. Despite all the new freedoms I’ve attained over this trip, I don’t think he’ll want me leaving the house. So, starting tomorrow, it’ll be Lilly Ryder back in that glorious, enormous mansion… with nowhere to go and nothing to do.
Except think. And maybe talk to Rose. I have to find out what her relationship with Jeremy is. She said she’s known him for almost twenty years. How did they first meet? I know more about Jeremy now than I did when Rose told me that. Twenty years ago, he’d be twenty-three and still living in his father’s shadow. That was about the time he’d started Stonehart Industries and begun to build himself into the man I’ve experienced so intimately over the last six months.
But he wasn’t Stonehart at the start. He was still Jeremy… Jeremy something. He never did tell me his true last name. That means that Rose knows him from before. She’d seen him grow, mature, and conquer.
If I can talk to her--really talk to her–that might give me my first true insight into Jeremy’s past.
I glance at him past the pages of the book I’m reading. Most of the flight has been spent in productive silence—him working away on his laptop and tablet, me reading a book I found tucked into my bag, no doubt courtesy of Rose.
“What about Fey?” I ask.
“I assume you’ll want to continue communications with her. If you drop off again, it might raise suspicions.” He closes his laptop and looks hard at me. “And you must know we want to avoid that.”
“Okay,” I say. “I’m listening. Tell me what you have in mind.”
“You have to understand that I cannot grant you unfettered access to your friends,” Jeremy begins. He smiles in a way that could almost be seen as apologetic. “I do trust you, Lilly ... in most regards. And I will do my best to continue to demonstrate that trust, until we either reach the ultimate level that I desire or…” he pauses, and his sharp eyes glint at me, “…you do something to make me reconsider things.”
“I wouldn’t,” I begin.
“And yet you still might,” he finishes. “You recall I mentioned having gifted a cell phone to you?”
“Yes,” I say, my heart starting to beat faster in anticipation.
“What number do you think I punched in to Fey’s phone?”
“I assumed it was yours…” I say, hesitating.
“No.” Jeremy reaches into his jacket packet and pulls out a sleek, black rubberized case. It looks a little like a glasses holder, but much thinner, and much more refined. “I told her the truth. It was yours.”
He extends his hand to me. I reach for the case. As I take it, I realize that my whole arm is shaking.
“Open it,” he whispers. “Look inside.”
I glance up at him, and then turn my eyes down to the case. I trail one finger along the edge. It has that smooth, premium feel of new electronics.
I take a breath, steadying my nerves, and pop the clam shell open. Inside is a phone unlike any I’ve ever seen before.
For one, it’s all screen. The bezel around the edge is so subtle, so minute, that it might not even be there. I dip a nail under one side and lift it up.
It’s light. Surprisingly light, in fact. Most of the weight I felt when holding the case must have come from the case itself and not the phone. In my hand, the backing feels smooth and glossy. It’s black, every single side of it, so much so that it’s hard to see where the screen ends and the rest of the phone begins.
“Turn it on,” Jeremy suggests.
I brush my fingers around the side, looking for the power button. I find it and press down.
The screen immediately lights up. A silver ‘Stonehart Industries’ logo flashes as it boots. It looks exactly like the one I remember decorating the Stonehart Industries’ website when I looked it up, all those months ago, after first receiving Jeremy’s all.
“It’s a prototype,” Jeremy announces. “A proprietary design using some of Dextran’s best silicon and ZilTech’s new operating system. They tell me they can make it cheap enough, fast enough, and sexy enough to rival anything Apple or Google might come out with in the next three years. We’re launching the phone this March. What you have in your hands is the very first consumer model that’s been allowed out in the wild.
“Wow,” I say. “Jeremy, thank you.” I don’t want to get ahead of myself. But, already, I feel an excitement building. A phone signifies access to information. Access to the outside world. It’s my own piece of technology. It could grant me previously-undreamt-of liberation.
Eventually. I’m sure this one comes heavily modded to restrict all but the most basic functions.
“So?” he leans back. “Tell me what you think.”
“It’s really mine?” I begin. “I mean, I—”
“Of the design, Lilly. Do you think it has what it takes to compete with the best? To win over Apple fanatics? Show me that zest you demonstrated so well for understanding consumer desires in your time at Corfu Consulting.”
“Oh. Okay. Let me think. Um…”
I look the phone over. “It certainly has the sexiness you were talking about,” I say after a moment. I bring it closer to my eyes and examine the screen. “And the display is amazing. It’s like one of those infinity-edge pools. I feel like I’m holding something out of a futuristic thriller.”
Jeremy smiles. “Good. I’m glad you’re able to pick out its most distinctive features.”
“It’s also marvelously light,” I continue. I feel myself stepping back into the consultant role Jeremy—though I didn’t know it at the time—hired me for. “And the backing is so smooth, yet sturdy. Cool, like metal, but it can’t be, can it? That would be cost-prohibitive on a mass production scale… especially if you are to compete on price.”
“Right again,” Jeremy says. He leans forward, eager now. “I’m very proud of it, Lilly. It took years to align all the constituent owners of intellectual property under the Stonehart Industries umbrella. The backing is a new type of poly-carbon plastic. Never seen in a consumer good before. In fact, that phone—” he inclines his head to it, “—is the first time the material’s been seen outside a lab. You know how glossy black plastic always takes on fingerprints, and only looks good when it’s brand new?”
I nod.
“Look at the back.”
I flip the phone over. The entire backside is clean.
“Whoa,” I mutter, genuinely impressed. I pull two fingers across it, pressing hard to smudge the surface.
It comes away spotless.
“Even if the phone is a flop,” Jeremy says. “There are billions to be made in licensing that material. It’s a little secret that Dextran’s been working on for, Jesus, it must be a decade now, at least. That’s the real reason the takeover was so important. With Esteban at the helm, it would have taken another fifteen years before they
thought it ready to show to the world. By then, opportunities would have passed them by. Dextran needed a visionary, a true leader, and Stonehart Industries…” his eyes zero in on me, “…will give them that.”
“Still me?” I ask, uncertain.
“Still you,” he affirms. “No lies, Lilly. No deceit. I want you there… in time.
“The chips inside are all standard fare. Owning a silicon provider simply gives Stonehart Industries a manufacturing edge. We will be fully vertically integrated. As die sizes shrink, the specs can be upgraded. We’ll always compete with the upper echelon of phones.”
“What about the battery?” I ask. “A phone this light can’t last very long.”
“Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong.” Jeremy gives me a very smug, very triumphant look. “The battery is the killing blow. A single charge will have that puppy running for seventy-two hours straight—at full brightness, full data, 1080p video playback, whatever. That’s three days, Lilly, with the GPU and processor running at full rate. Compare that to the current iPhone, which is heralded as the best. Its battery would last less than six hours if both were doing the same thing.”
“That’s ludicrous,” I say. “I don’t believe you.”
“You should,” he says. “Because you’ve experienced the strength of that battery first hand.” He touches a spot just beneath the side of his jaw. “It’s what powered your collar.”
***
My throat tightens. For a moment, it becomes hard to breathe.
In that instant… when he said, “your collar”… he definitely shifted back to being Stonehart.
“I was your guinea pig,” I say softly. I thrust the phone back at him. “Take it. I don’t want it.”
He regards me. Unblinking. Unfazed.
“Don’t be foolish,” he says. “We’re not hiding from the past. Remember? Putting the battery in your collar provided the perfect testing environment. I can say that it was a spectacular success. If anything, you should be proud, my little Lilly-Flower. Now you know that your suffering was not for naught.”
Revulsion explodes within me. “You’re sick,” I hiss. I nearly chuck the phone at his head. Then I remember what happened the first—and last—time I threw something at him. “How can you talk of it so casually?”
“Because I don’t want you to forget what’s already happened,” he says. He sounds like he’s speaking from a place of deep thought. “I don’t want you to become a victim of our past.” He leans toward me, intense and focused like I’ve never seen. “I know that I’ve done some troubling things to you, Lilly. You were a victim once. You’re right. You were my prisoner.”
“But no longer. Things have changed, Lilly. A shift has occurred. You are still my most precious Lilly-Flower. And the last thing I want—the one thing I cannot bear to think about—is you carrying heavy emotional scars from what I’ve done.”
“I don’t expect you to forgive. I don’t want you to stick your head in the sand and pretend it never happened. That is why I bring it up, Lilly, from time to time. I need to gauge your reaction. I have to keep doing it, until I’m sure that you can look upon the past without being affected by it in the present.”
“That’s a tall order,” I scoff.
“But it can be done!” he emphasizes. A new fervor lights his eyes. “You are the only person I know strong enough to do it. If you don’t… if you continue carrying the emotional baggage… it will overwhelm you.”
“Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. Right now, I know, you think you’re close. They say time heals all wounds. But they’re wrong. The wounds of the type I’ve inflicted upon you will not heal. If left alone, and unchecked, they will begin to fester. Like a latent disease, they take root at the base of your soul and begin to consume your heart. But you don’t see it coming. You think you’re safe. You think that with sufficient time and distance you’ll slowly become immune. That’s where you’re wrong. “
“Because, left unchecked, those feelings will continue to grow. They will spread through your body like a malignant tumor, until, one day, they will rise up and destroy you. You’ll suffer a relapse. Your mental state will break. You’ll come across some trigger, some event or memory that opens the floodgates. From there, the cascade will never stop.”
“You sound very sure of yourself,” I say. I’m trying to stay indifferent, trying to remain unaffected by his pseudo psychoanalysis.
I’m to deny that it even has the tiniest shred of truth… even if I know it does.
The way his concerns line up with mine upsets me. So, instead of dwelling on it—instead of being a grown woman and focusing on the issue at hand—I decide to turn the tables on him. “Is that because it’s what you did to Paul?”
Jeremy--damn him--doesn’t even blink.
“No, Lilly,” he says. “It’s what was done to me.”
Chapter Six
“What do you mean?” I breathe.
“It’s why I am the way I am, Lilly,” he says. “It’s why, even when I knew I was falling in love, I continued to mistreat you. It’s no excuse.” He grimaces. “It’s just the fucked up remnant of my past.”
Is this the moment I’ve been waiting for? Is this the time that Jeremy might share some of his elusive history? It might be. But, something else steals my focus.
“Stop. Saying. That!” I exclaim. I squeeze my eyes tight and shake my head. “Don’t, Jeremy. Just—don’t! Don’t say it when you don’t mean it!”
He looks taken aback. “Saying what? That I am falling in love?”
“Yes, that!” I burst from my seat. “You can’t love me, Jeremy.” I stalk away from him, pacing the confines of the small cabin. “You can’t! You just can’t!”
“Why?” he challenges. I thank every God I’ve heard of that he hasn’t moved from his seat. I wouldn’t be able to take his nearness right now.
“Because, Jeremy. You’re not the type of man who loves. You keep yourself closeted. You’re closed off.” I bark a laugh. “I barely know a thing about you! I don’t even know your real last name!”
“You know the things that matter.”
“Then I know that you’re a sadistic, power-hungry freak!”
“Lilly…” His voice is cold and full of warning. “Don’t go there.”
“Fine,” I say. I spin around and walk back to him. “I have a new idea. You’re a businessman. Right? You pride yourself as such. You know how negotiations work. I’ll make you a deal. I’ll stop saying that about you… if you promise not to mention ‘love’ around me again.”
The corner of his mouth perks up in amusement. He’s calm and collected again. “I’m not sure you’re in a position to make such demands.”
“It’s not a demand,” I counter. “It’s a business proposal.”
“A ‘business proposal’.” He chuckles. “Is that what you consider what we have between us? Some sort of transaction?”
I glower at him. “You’re twisting my words,” I say. “That’s not what I said.”
“But it’s what you implied.” He sighs and stands up. I don’t back off.
He looks at me. His eyes move up and down my body. A shiver runs down my spine. He’s got that penetrating look in his stare again, the one that makes me feel like he can strip me bare and peer into the very depths of my soul.
Finally, he focuses on my face. I return his look, unflinching, uncompromising.
“You remember what I said once?” he asks softly. “The very first time we met in person? On the elevator ride up from the lobby of the Stonehart building, I told you that I wanted…” he steps into me, drawing my hair back to expose one ear, and finishes in a whisper, “…your mind.”
I fight the flush of arousal that his rustling voice never fails to evoke in me. My body is weak for him, as always. I know better than to expect anything different.
“So, it’s a deal?” I ask, trying to keep my voice steady.
“If that’s what it will take, Lilly…” He steps away.
“And if that’s what you truly want of me?” He lets the question hang in the air.
“I do,” I affirm.
“Then it’s a deal.”
He extends his hand toward me. I take it. His grip is strong and firm. I think that, even after all we’ve experienced together, this is the first time Jeremy has shaken my hand.
“Welcome to the business world, then, Miss Ryder,” he tells me formally. “I have a feeling you’re going to like it here.”
Chapter Seven
When we land countless hours later, I feel exhausted. After the handshake, Jeremy donned a professional mask.
There were no more discussions about feelings, relationships, or personal concerns. Jeremy was completely dispassionate as he told me the terms of use for my new cellphone, and for the continuation of contact with Fey.
The cell has been rigged so that anything I do on it is captured and transferred, in real time, to a virtual server that only Jeremy has access to. All my actions on it are recorded--from the briefest touch of the screen to the exact second I turn it off at night. It has no data, only regular network access, and of course the Wi-Fi is permanently disabled.
There are two numbers configured into the contact list. Only two. Neither can be deleted or removed. Others cannot be added, either—at least, not by me.
The first number is my own. It has an international area code that I don’t recognize. Jeremy said that it’s so that the phone can function globally. It’s programmed in such way that I don’t need to remember it, and I can give it out to others.
When I’ll get the opportunity to do that, I do not know.
The second number is what I have to use if I want to make a call. It routes to Jeremy’s cell. I must dial him, and then punch in the number I really want to call. It gives him the opportunity to either approve or reject the call. And, of course, record and listen in on anything I say.
The phone is hardwired not to dial any number but his. It’s not just a software implementation. It’s a hardware thing. It ensures, as Jeremy pointed out, my complete compliance with his wishes.
Uncovering You: The Complete Series (Mega Box Set) Page 50
