The Last Empress by Christopher Ride

Author:Christopher Ride [Christopher Ride]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781864714500
Publisher: Penguin Random House Australia

STEPPING INTO THE elevator, Wilson pressed the twelfth-floor button and waited for the doors to close. He didn't look at his reflection in the mirrored walls because he didn't want to see the disgruntled expression he knew would be staring back at him. In the background, Beethoven's Fifth was playing ominously from the speakers mounted into the ceiling. The music only compounded the dread he felt as the elevator glided upwards into the rarefied air of the Executive Level.

Jasper had summoned Wilson to discuss the Mercury Project. The future chairman and CEO of Enterprise Corporation had always been openly opposed to the Mission of Ezra. It seemed his patience and his appetite for risk had been fully exhausted after the completion of the Mission of Isaiah. No sooner had Wilson returned from the past did the details of the second mission surface. In the beginning it had tested everyone's stamina; even Wilson's desire to be involved was limited. The mental scars of his mission were more debilitating than any of his physical injuries, and it took time, even for him, to become motivated to step anywhere near a second project.

That realisation alone should have quelled Wilson's frustration with Jasper, and yet Wilson held a grudge anyway. Jasper was a man who ruled using fear as a motivator. If he didn't get his way he most often became threatening, drawing on his birthright as the future successor of Enterprise Corporation to drive his own objectives. Wilson resented that sort of power and saw it as his role to push back because so many others were afraid to do so. And yet Wilson's desire to provide honest resistance had developed into open disdain for the incoming CEO. All Wilson knew was that he didn't like Jasper very much: he didn't have to, he didn't want to, and in his opinion he didn't need to. It didn't matter to him that Jasper was one of the most powerful men in the world. As far as Wilson was concerned, if Jasper threw him out of the company, that was fine with him.

The elevator doors opened and, as expected, a stunning brunette was waiting just outside to guide him to the inner sanctum. In her early twenties, she was very tall with broad shoulders and tanned skin. Her rich brown hair was cut in a sharp bob, and her cheeks were seemingly chiselled from granite. Wilson expected nothing less; the Executive Level was renowned as the epicentre of the most beautiful women in the Americas. Money and power drew these Amazon beauties to the twelfth floor as certainly as bees were drawn to an open flower.

'Mr Dowling, welcome back to the Executive Level,' the beauty announced. 'My name is Minerva Hathaway.' She was all business, no smile or welcoming body language.

'It's fantastic to be back,' Wilson replied, deadpan. He looked out at the expansive marble floor and huge, circular, peaked glass ceiling. The morning sun was streaming inside and the brightness was startling at first.

'You

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