CHAPTER FOURTEEN

“ D r. Phillips,” Xander Tomassi said in greeting, as the video call connected to his head scientist. Douglas Phillips had worked for him since the beginning of Project Callan and was highly trusted.

Xander was in a safe house in Baltimore. The property was surrounded by at least a dozen private military contractors. Not that he could see most of them.

They were protecting him from vampires. Not that he’d told them that little bit of information. It would only put unnecessary fear into them, so he’d given some bullshit story about upset investors. The management of the security firm seemed uninterested, but Xander knew better. They would have done groundwork on him. It didn’t matter. No one would find out anything about the actual work he was doing.

Even them.

They were aware they were being tracked and watched by powerful enemies and were doing their job, so Xander was feeling as safe as he could for now. He’d been told it was too risky to head back to Seattle right now, so they’d brought him to the Baltimore safe house.

Xander and a small team had been forced to stay in a very average four-star hotel with terrible service before the safe house had been made available.

It had been torture.

Well, aside from that one night when the receptionist swung by with a complimentary bottle of champagne after he’d expressed what a great job she’d been doing. Smart girl had read between the lines and lifted her skirt.

The security team had kept him alive so far, and that was more than he could say for Diego Lombardo. The Italian president had been a large investor in this project; in fact, it was through him Xander had initially met Stefano Russo and learned about the existence of vampires.

He’d despised him immediately—the guy was a narcissistic asshole.

Unsurprisingly, the narcissism had been Russo’s undoing.

Revealing himself to Diego in the hopes of forming an alliance to overtake the vampire king, Vincent Moretti, Stefano had dug himself, and his race, into a hole he’d never seen coming. Diego and Xander, on the other hand, had seen enormous dollar signs. It had taken them a while to hatch their plans, but a year later, the project was almost ready to go into execution mode.

Initially, they’d known very little about vampires, but it had been easy to get information from Stefano. The guy loved to show off. He thought vampires were superior to humans and was happy to prove it. So, they’d played the dumb humans while he’d played right into their hands. Even to the point where they included him in some of their plans, where he could be of value. Stefano was blinded by the need to overthrow this Moretti king of his and become all-powerful.

The latter Xander could understand.

Xander had more power than most people realized. The pharmaceutical industry was rife with corruption, and there was little anyone could do about it. All the most powerful leaders and people in the world relied on their financial backing for, well, fucking everything.

Those with the money pulled the strings.

They were the true king-makers.

It didn’t take much to follow the money to expose them, but people didn’t want to know. Companies like BioZen relied on the masses to continue feeling they were powerless to do anything.

Thank God.

Because if they worked it out, the entire power structure of the world would crumble like a house of cards.

It had always been this way.

Xander shook his head and shivered. Imagine if no one bought into the lies anymore?

It could happen. People were starting to become more aware. It was causing a problem, but he had a solution.

Nearly.

As for Stefano Russo, Xander had been told by Diego that the Moretti royal army had captured him and his brothers. He didn’t know enough about the legal system in their race, but he would be surprised if they were still breathing.

Now Xander was on their damn radar.

Until recently, the Moretti family hadn’t known anything about him, but they’d discovered and destroyed the Italian laboratory where BioZen were experimenting on a fresh batch of new vampires. Inside had been a bunch of data which had stupidly included his name.

Fuck it.

His team had messed up. There should have been nothing to trace back to him or BioZen. It was why they were on the US army base to start with. The government was an investor and customer.

Not that it was common knowledge across government circles. Obviously, vampires were still hidden from the world despite his attempts otherwise, so he’d had to go along with it.

The Secretary of Homeland Security, Joe Nutler, had explained his involvement with them was highly classified and his small, handpicked team didn’t officially exist. Which went some way in explaining why the bust order at the lab in Italy had come directly by the order of President James Calder himself. POTUS didn’t know about the BioZen contract.

One day soon he would, and the president would be pinning a medal on Xander’s lapel. At thirty-five, he was already very successful, and one of the most senior executives at BioZen. They were hugely impressed with what he brought to the organization, but only two of the directors knew what he was working on. In fact, there were only thirty people in the organization who knew about the project, and they were all under the tightest legal contracts. Basically, they couldn’t breathe without permission.

Each employee had been scrutinized and undergone intense background checks, as had their close friends and family.

“Mr. Tomassi,” Douglas replied, pushing his glasses up his nose. With his white coat, gray hair, and BioZen security badge clipped to his pocket, he looked every bit the mad scientist. “Welcome back, sir.”

He allowed Douglas to believe he was back in Seattle.

“Thank you,” Xander replied. “I’d like to progress to the next phase in the project, so let’s jump straight into your update, so I understand how things are tracking there.”

“Everything is on track here. The new team members start mid-week,” Douglas said. “Then we can swiftly move the program into the execution phase when you give approval.”

Perfect.

“Excellent,” Xander replied. All the months of planning and experimentation on test vampires were about to begin paying off. Their end product would be a series of injections, which they were now ready to test on real humans. If their experiments worked, and it looked like they would, the treatments would make a human body, along with all its senses, much stronger. Around fifty times stronger than the average human being.

What they hadn’t been able to replicate from their vampire test subjects was their skill in telepathy. While they believed it was strictly cognitive, they had been unable to truly find the source of its ability. It seemed... and he hated even thinking these words... supernatural.

So Xander was looking for the right neuroscientist to work with them. And by right he meant someone willing to park their scruples and contribute to the next advancement in humanity.

Super humans.

“Will we see you in the lab this week?” Douglas asked.

Xander didn’t want to scare Dr Phillips with all the details of the risks involved with what they were doing. As far as his team knew, they had US government backing, and it was a secure, top-secret program.

Which it was.

Fortunately, they had the best security and technology money could buy. And they had a lot of money. In theory, no one could get in.

Especially not vampires.

Their teams had done their research and ensured it was as vampire-proof as one could get. Their systems scrambled regularly, sending anyone hacking down a bunch of rabbit holes. They’d also used tungsten to reinforce certain areas around the lab if they did get into the buildings. The steel was the strongest in the world and was able to resist vampire strength.

“Not right now. I’ll video where necessary. For now, my priority is setting up the new labs where we can mass produce these enhancers and test a greater number of subjects.”

Xander shifted in his chair and adjusted the screen.

“Have you secured a location yet? I’d like to express my interest in leading the next phase. Sandy could take over here in Seattle if you agreed. She’s doing a great job,” Douglas said.

Xander nodded and tapped his pen to his lips.

Douglas had proved to be an excellent head scientist on this project. He was professional and didn’t let ethics get in the way of science and progress. He was the right man for the job.

Plus, he trusted him, and that was a rare trait these days. Especially with his paranoia.

“I should be signing something later today, but it looks like we’ll have a location in L.A.,” Xander said. “If you can convince your family to move out there, the job is yours.”

Douglas let a small smile hit his lips. “Thank you, sir. I’m sure my wife and teenagers will be more than happy with the warmer lifestyle.”

He nodded.

“Good,” Xander said. “Let Sandy know she’ll be stepping into your shoes shortly. I’ll get HR to arrange the paperwork.”

They ended the call, and Xander began scrolling through his emails. There were a lot of them. The remaining shareholders were uneasy after the news of Diego’s murder.

Because it had been a fucking murder despite those vampires making it look like a suicide.

While the country grieved his death, the vice president stepped into his shoes, and Xander was left the job of appeasing his investors.

And honestly, he really wasn’t great with people.

Diego had been the man for that.

Now he needed to find a new investor to get this lab and the product manufactured. BioZen had only been willing to fund a certain percentage of it.

But who?