Page 100 of Surrendering Hope (The Hope Legacy)

“You pull out 90’s ballads when you’re sad, rock music when you’re mad, and any decade of divas when you’re happy.”

“I’m diverse.”

“Got it,” Duncan says. “The guard stops checking on floor twelve. Get off at that floor. He will go right and make a circuit. You follow, but stop and hide in the first meeting room until he’s got back into the lift.”

“Then what?” I ask.

“Then it’s time to hope your cardio paid off.”

“We’re climbing over sixty floors of stairs, aren’t we?” I ask.

Duncan laughs whilst Zee snorts. “Bet you wish you’d gone with my ‘Mission Impossible’ styled plan now?” I mutter as we lay on the roof of the elevator waiting to make the twelfth floor.

“Are you sure about this?” Zee whispers out of the blue.

I frown. “About what?”

“Killing Archan.”

I blink the sting of tears away as I stare at the endless tunnel of darkness. “We cannot depend on one plan. When we complete a mission we try plan A, but always have a plan B and C.”

“True, but have you thought of any different plans?”

“I’m all ears if you have an idea.”

“Well, is there no one else who can carry out plan B?”

He’s trying to save me from heartache, but there are too many moving parts which revolve around me for anyone else to adapt from plan to another.

“Ty is expecting me, he won’t fall for anyone else. He’s suspicious, but narcissistic enough to believe that my place is at his side, therefore that is where I will end up.”

“He’s overconfident.”

“But he underestimates me. He thinks I’m too weak to try anything lethal.”

“Eleventh floor,” Duncan warns.

We both sit up, alert. Zee leans across and cups my cheek. “I can sense your sadness, Natia, like a lead weight in your heart. You are the strongest person I know. He considers humans to be selfish creatures, which many of us are, but you are the curveball, a rare diamond amongst a billion rocks. He underestimates you, so when he thinks he has you where he wants you, bam, hit him where it hurts, turn the tables, and make him suffer.”

I nod as the lift moves again. Zee pulls back and grips the handle of the emergency exit. “Ready?” he whispers.

“Yes.” The elevator dings a preppy sound as the still whistling guard exits. Zee peels the top open, I pop my head through, glance around and drop through the hatch to the ground, my footsteps silent as I exit and swing right. Zee’s a few steps behind me as we pass a long glass wall before reaching the first door. I push the handle, it doesn’t move.

“Duncan, it’s locked,” I mumble.

“Okay, give me thirty seconds.”

My heart beats a steady yet increasing rhythm as time ticks by and the probability of discovery increases. The guard’s whistling creeps closer.

The door beeps as the lock clicks to green. I shove it open and pull Zee inside. The lights blink on, declaring movement to anyone passing. “Duncan, the lights,” Zee mutters, pulling me further into the room. We pass a long table surrounded by twenty chairs, Zee pulls me into a mini library and down the furthest stack. The lights blink off, shrouding us in darkness. The door beeps, the whistling has stopped, replaced by the shuffle of the guard’s steps. This time the lights don’t respond. The guard is going to know there is something wrong, a minute ago the lights came on, now they won’t come at all.

“Sir, I have an anomaly in meeting room one, twelfth floor.”

Zee pushes me into a corner, the shadows falling over us. The guard steps forward, the lights above him flickering on as Duncan adjusts his interference.

“The lights came on, then they wouldn’t come on, now they come on.”

“Who do you think he’s calling?”I ask Zee.

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