So Anna fell, probably tripped, and just for a moment, she flew. For that split second, Celia would swear she saw her daughter suspended in air, weightless as no person ever could be, sailing in defiance of gravity, and her heart lodged in her throat, not because her daughter had tripped, but because this was it, the thing that would change their lives, the power she’d been searching for and hoping she wouldn’t find.
But no, Anna hadn’t really flown. Her momentum had simply carried her down the rest of the stairs and onto the sidewalk below, and Celia’s perception of time had slowed during that fraction of a second. Postcrash, the kid had screamed like a banshee, bystanders came running and gave Celia that look that people always gave the mothers of screaming children, the this-must-be-your-fault look, until it became clear that it was just an accident, one of those things that happen to little kids. By that time Bethy was screaming because Anna was screaming, and Celia managed to ignore them both long enough to call the car and rush to the hospital.
&nbs
p; Broken arm. Anna had stuck her hand out, cracking the bone on impact, and that was another power Celia could check off the list—Anna didn’t have her grandfather’s invulnerability to injury. But for the first time, Celia wished both her children had that superpower, suddenly envying her own grandmother for never having to worry about the young Warren West breaking himself in a fall.
Anna was very proud of the purple cast she had to wear for the next five weeks. Celia decided that maybe she wouldn’t worry so much about whether the kids had powers. They would fall, they would fly, they would run as fast as they could, they’d have good days and bad.
When the girls hit puberty, the watching started again, but the anomalies Anna displayed had more to do with being a teenager than being superhuman. And after all was said and done, the power she ended up with had no external manifestation. It was undetectable.
Celia couldn’t win this game.
* * *
After just a couple of days of being sequestered on her “trip,” Celia returned to her office Monday morning and swore she found a layer of dust on her desk, and her computer was cold. Everything she’d worked for, everything she’d done to keep West Corp alive and growing after her father’s death was slipping away.
This was an exaggeration. But her strength had become precious. She felt that the least shock would destroy her, and her life’s work seemed fragile. She’d look away, and it would vanish.
She had an hour or so to review the information for the case before heading to court. The evidence Anna had been able to dig up was … interesting. Blurry pictures of check stubs and invoices that on their own didn’t mean anything, but when lined up revealed a financial smokescreen. It proved McClosky and Patterson was a front, but Celia’d already suspected that. The data also offered a new name, the next step on the trail: Delta Exploratory Investments was a holding company, one she’d actually heard of, and one whose line of ownership was much easier to track because it wasn’t just a front. She dug into her own notes, the thick file folder full of research about the other companies making bids on the city development project, and there it was: Delta Exploratory was the company through which Delta Ventures, Danton Majors’s company, had made its own bid. This gave her a straight line between the lawsuit and Majors. Her lawyers had built a powerful case for their defense. They weren’t just hopeful, they were smug.
Maybe Anna really had been paying attention all those afternoons she’d spent in Celia’s office, just hanging out. She’d brought them exactly what they needed. God, she wanted to hug the kid right now.
A phone call to Mark confirmed that a patrol had spotted two of the young new supers out and about a couple of nights ago—descriptions matched Anna and the stranger, the jumper whom none of them could identify. Him, and not Teddy? And how the hell did Anna know this guy? It made her question her assessment that he must have been a stranger. It made her worry about Anna more, not less.
If she trusted Anna this far, she had to trust her daughter’s instincts about this as well. But it wasn’t easy.
Out in the kitchen, the girls had finished breakfast and were gathering their things to head to school. The usual, perfectly normal weekday morning chaos of the house. Celia paused, just to listen—Suzanne clearing away juice and cereal, the girls arguing back and forth about who put whose uniform sweater where, and where their books were. Bethy was already at the elevator. Anna was moving more slowly, lingering by the kitchen table, rearranging books in her bag. The school uniform made her look younger, and Celia had to remind herself that she was almost an adult. Almost full grown.
“Hi,” Celia said. Then just stood, watching.
Anna looked at her sidelong. “Hey, Mom.”
Whew, deep breath, stay calm. “If you have time after school today—do you think we could have a talk?”
Her daughter froze, just for a moment. And what must she be thinking? She seemed to shake herself back to the moment. “Yeah, I can do that.”
“Good,” Celia said. Her relief was physical, the tension of weeks draining away. “Looking forward to it.”
Anna flashed a nervous smile. “That hearing about the lawsuit’s today, right? How do you think it’s going to go?”
“I think it’s going to be just fine. I expect the whole suit to get thrown out. We got some last-minute information that really pushed our case over the top.” Thank you. After school today, she’d be able to just say thanks.
“Good. That’s good,” Anna said, totally straightforward. She’d learned her poker face from her father, after all. “Well, good luck with it all.”
“Thanks. I’ll be glad when it’s over.”
“Don’t forget,” Anna said, “you promised a vacation when you’re done with all this lawsuit stuff. I’m holding you to it.”
“I haven’t forgotten.”
“Anna, we’re going to be late!” Bethy shouted from the next room.
“I’ll see you this afternoon,” Anna said, waving as she peeled into the foyer to the elevators.
Anna was going to be just fine. Maybe Celia wasn’t a terrible mother after all.
“Vacation,” Suzanne said, wandering in from the kitchen. “I like the sound of that.”