“Yep.” He tilts his phone so I can see the exchange. “I told you he booked the red-eye on purpose.”
Theo
I’ll be in the tenth-floor conference room waiting for you.
Leon
We just landed. We’ll head to the hotel and drop our bags.
Theo
No. Come here directly. We have another problem I need sorted out before Monday.
Leon
Okay.
“Only you, Theo,” I mutter, shaking my head. I start toward the ticket machines, my feet feeling like lead weights, but when I realize Leon hasn’t moved an inch, I turn back. He’s still standing there, illuminated by the glow of his screen. “Coming?”
“In a minute. I’m looking up what food places are open first. The boss can wait five minutes.” He glances up with a grin. “How about Pip’s Pantry? There’s one in Terminal 2 that does hot breakfast boxes. Should I grab a family meal? No clue how long we’ll be stuck there today.”
“Would that be for you—or to share?”
“Share,” he says, the corners of his eyes crinkling with amusement.
“You never know. You could be like Theo demolishing an Alpine Tower—nothing but debris in his wake,” I mutter. “Just checking.”
Actually, speaking of Theo... odds are that if he’s been at the office since dawn, instinct tells me he’ll be deep into hangry territory by the time we reach him.
“Actually, make it two family meals,” I say, nudging Leon’s shoulder. “Just in casesomebodyforgot that humans require actual fuel to function. And maybe grab some chocolate cookies while you’re at it. Chocolate is the only thing that might stand a chance against the Dark Side today.”
The drivefrom Heathrow to South Bank takes just under an hour. By the time the hired car pulls up in front of Excelsior Parks’ headquarters, the sky has shifted from pale-gray to a soft, rain-washed blue that matches some of the paintings of London hanging inside the National Gallery.
The company’s headquarters are situated along the Thames. It’s a sleek, ultra-modern building made of glass and steel that gleams against a backdrop of older stone buildings. Across the river, Tower Bridge rises in the distance. It’s regal and familiar, the same bridge I’d stared at in Theo’s photo. Goose bumps ripple up my arm. Let’s hope Theo is in a forgiving mood.
Inside, the building is eerily quiet. Only a bleary-eyed security guard is stationed at the front desk to check our IDs and print visitor badges. The elevator hums as we ride up to the tenth floor.
When the doors open, motion sensors flick on the lights, illuminating the corridor in a warm glow. The charcoal walls are lined with framed blueprints and renderings of Excelsior’s most famous coasters.
“Empty offices give me the creeps,” Leon mutters, shifting the grease-stained Pip’s bag to his other hand. “It’s like the beginning of a horror movie. If we see a set of twins in the hallway, I’m out.”
He’s not wrong. The stillness is unnerving.
At the center of the floor, a glass-walled conference room glows with a stark, lonely light. I spot movement first, then the frantic, high-pitched squeak of a marker against a whiteboard—followed immediately by a low, jagged curse that vibrates through the glass.
I take in Theo. He looks like he’s been hit by a category-five hurricane. His usually crisp button-down is wrinkled and untucked, the top buttons undone. There’s a faint grease smudge on one cuff and a dark mark on the knee of his trousers. A scruffy beard shadows his jaw, and his hair is a mess of uneven curls, sticking out at odd angles.
He paces as he mutters to himself, one hand gripping a marker, the other raking through his hair. The whiteboardbehind him is covered in equations and scrawled notes—sensor drift,sampling lag,variance tolerance.
Leon leans close and whispers, “Food usually tames caged animals. Think it’ll work on him?”
“Worth a try,” I whisper back. “If we’re lucky, it’ll buy us enough time before he turns feral. Not sure if that’s better than twins.”
“Oh, it definitely is.”
We share a soft laugh.
“Honey, we’re home,” Leon calls out, his voice echoing off the glass walls as he lifts the takeaway bag like an offering. “And we’ve got lunch.”
