Dark circles underlined his eyes. Between that and his morning scruff, he looked just this side of homeless. A hot shower and close shave made him feel like himself again. He smiled at his reflection in the mirror, but the expression melted from his face as he considered the agenda for the day. Safely locked behind his office door were towers of Cid’s file folders stretched to the ceiling.
Maybe he needed time off, but that seemed ridiculous. He’d barely been there a quarter. How could he justify a vacation this early? A break would be a sign of weakness in front of those who already thought him underqualified. He would reward himself with some time away if the investigation into the Special Projects division panned out, but for now, he needed to focus.
“You up yet, kid?” he said into the intercom in the kitchen.
“Almost!” Serah said.
As the coffee brewed, he crafted a precise Windsor knot. His dad’s tie clip would finish the look.
“Bacon or sausage?” he prompted, igniting the flame on the stove.
“Whatever you’d like,” she called back. “Do you know where my shoes are?”
He reached for the bacon. “Hall bathroom,” he said.
“Roger.”
The com line crackled.
His hand hesitated as he dropped meat into the pan. Over the sizzling, he heard heavy boots on the ground, shouts in the distance, and ricochets against stone walls. The sounds rushed away as quickly as they came, and he had recovered by the time Serah scrambled into the kitchen with a backpack that weighed twice as much as she did.
He took a moment to scoop bacon and eggs out onto two plates and poured himself a mug.
“It’s going to be a late night. Mrs. Lynd will be by to babysit, okay?” he said, sitting down beside her at the table.
“Yeah, that’s fine. Can we order pizza tomorrow?” she asked. “I want a movie night!”
“Sure,” he said. “Pepperoni?”
“Mushrooms on half,” she said, nibbling at her breakfast. “For Quinn.”
His brow lifted. “Since when is she coming over?”
“Since right now. You should ask her today.”
Collins pinched the bridge of his nose. He already had plans to work with Quinn several nights this week. It wasn’t that he didn’t like spending time with her. The opposite was true—he liked it too much. More time spent with the girl he couldn’t have would only give him ideas he shouldn’t act on.
“Why don’t we leave Lehi out of this one and make it just you and me?”
“You know what? Forget it!” Serah said. “Forget about pizza! Forget about movies! Can you just take me to school?”
“Hey,” he said, “don’t be mad. Talk to me.”
But she was done. She stomped out into the hallway, grabbed her books, and slammed the door behind her. He blinked at the room. What the hell happened to his sweet little sister? She was only nine, but that was a tantrum fit for a teenager.
A bit of silver glinted under the edge of the coffee table. Serah’s bracelet. He studied the clasp and noticed the bent link. She must have snagged it on something. Collins slipped the bracelet into the pocket of his jacket, which was hanging by the door. He’d take it to the jewelers to get it repaired.
He moved about the apartment, gathering his briefcase and jogging down the hall to retrieve his tie clip. The argument over Lehi wouldn’t stop pestering his thoughts. When he’d first met Quinn, she’d pulled at him like a magnet. He had teased her and competed with her. She’d sharpened her wit by fighting back at every turn. Without realizing it, the teasing had shifted into flirting. It wasn’t until he’d seen Quinn with Serah that he realized how much he liked her.
But that was also the same time that his whole life turned into a complete shit show. Things were complicated, and he’d had so much on his shoulders. The only way he knew to deal with it all was to keep up the pretense that everything was just a game. Keep teasing, keep pushing. Then in one moment of weakness, while in college, he’d actually asked her out, to finally see if there could be something there, but she’d laughed it off like one of his usual jokes. He’d let her believe it had been.
Since then he’d decided Quinn was right. The two of them would be a total joke. He was so damaged at this point there wasn’t even the slimmest chance he could be decent boyfriend material. Especially not to Quinn. She deserved a whole lot more than what he had left to give.
Collins knew Serah viewed Quinn as an older sister, and he was glad Quinn was willing to play that role. Serah wanted the three of them together, like a real family, but it wasn’t in the cards.
* * *
The car ride was tense. Serah slammed the door when she got out and threw a mean look at him over her shoulder.
Perfect start to a horrible day. Collins sighed as he stepped out of the elevator.
“Do you want me to get someone up here to clear a path for you?” Edith said as she handed him a mug of coffee.
“Nah, I’m young and spry. I can manage,” he said.
“Be careful in there,” she said. “If there’s a cave-in, we might lose you.”
That phrase made him pause, recalling the mineshaft in his dream, but he pushed it aside. He wouldn’t allow himself to entertain this craziness any longer. Arcadian Fortress was betraying him after all the loyalty he’d given it. He would not let it impact his career or his home life.
The towers of file folders were just as imposing today as they’d been two days ago. He’d spent yesterday running errands and then sitting here glaring at the stacks—but he couldn’t put it off any longer. His suspicions that Cid’s lackeys had created a maze proved to be correct. Each turn to get to his desk was thwarted by a wall of folders. He was a blended mixture of pissed off and amused by the time he made it to his computer. He hoped one day he had the opportunity to be as petty as Cid Harvey.
With something this immense, he had no clue where to start or how to organize them. He began by reading the labels on each box.
He had to respect Cid for one thing: The man had clearly sent him everything. He searched around aimlessly for a while, hoping for a lucky break, but it would take some work to separate the important from the useless. When he’d asked for the files, he’d been sure he would have an answer by the end of the week. At this rate, he’d be lucky to have sifted through half of it by the end of the decade.
Everything seemed unrelated. There were technical reports filed with accounting receipts and department schedules. There were huge sheets of paper printed with blueprints and complex schematics. There were purchase orders for large pieces of equipment shipped from Alaska piled atop ownership deeds to pieces of land in remote parts of the West—New Mexico, Nevada, Texas. Why did they have a presence out there?
He spent the day pacing up and down the paperwork corridors, trying to arrange things chronologically, at least, to give him a foothold in the data dump of history.
The technical reports were the most revealing about what kinds of special projects the division worked on. He spent a painstaking amount of time researching the technical lingo in one report, trying to understand what he was reading. There were pages of engineer-speak about technical troubleshooting; he’d thought it might be an important clue, only to conclude it led nowhere.