“You read the reports of the man who has kept me as his lab rat for twenty-two years, who subjected me to countless tests all in the name of science, and you wonder why he may feel that I am dangerous?”

“If I unlock this door, Alexander, and you attempt to harm me or to escape, my men will put you down. Understood?”

“Why would I want to harm or escape from my own father?” Alexander said, again through his empty smile.

“I need time to get the key.”

“I have one,” Alexander said, holding a brass key up to the windowpane. “Straus keeps his key somewhere and gave me this one in case of emergency.”

Alexander bent down slowly and slid the key under the small gap of the door. The key sat inches from Ken O’Connell’s feet. He reached down, picked up the key, turned, and nodded to his armed assistant who was dutifully at his post.

“I am trusting you, Alexander and hope that you trust me as well.”

“You will not be disappointed… Dad.”

As Ken lifted his hand holding the key closer to the lock, Alexander moved a few steps away from the door.

“In case you change your mind and choose to close the door, my increased distance should afford you more time to do so,” Alexander whispered.

Ken slid the key into the lock, turned it quickly and heard the bolt slide into its home. Ken O’Connell was not a man who approached anything from a place of fear, but as he pushed the door open, he felt his legs grow weak.

“I will sit if that makes you more comfortable, dad.”

“No need,” Ken said, stepping into the room. “I think we understand each other just fine.”

Ken could easily remember how willing a partner Alexander agreed to be. How quickly he was to offer suggestions and make corrections when the information that Ken had regarding Straus was incorrect. He recalled how quickly Alexander learned how to use and to understand the Smartphone that he gave him. And how patient Alexander was when he told him the plan needed to be executed only when the timing was perfect.

When Alexander acted without thinking and killed two of the doctors whom Ken was relying on for a fair amount of his payment for silence, Ken worried about his partner. His rage was more powerful than Ken had expected. And when Straus never showed for their scheduled meeting, Ken began to realize that choosing Alexander to be a part of the plan was a critical mistake.

He had, at first, wondered if Alexander could have become an addition to his family. He was, after all, his son, and as his son, Alexander was entitled to a life well beyond the reach of most. Even when he first saw the photographs of Alexander and read the reports his team had delivered, Ken still wondered.

It was when he first saw him, through the thick glass of hallway window, that he knew. Alexander would never become part of his family or any other family for that matter. He was too different.  Too unique.  Ken needed to maintain his position in the business community and the expected media frenzy over a human being living without a heart would cause unwanted exposure.

He had a gift, it was an ability to ignore emotions. Pushing them down deep to the place his father used to call “the garbage pit of your soul.”

He took Alexander to a “safe house” he had rented in Manhattan where Alexander agreed to focus his time on learning the fine art of applying make-up and learning how to “control his temper.”

When Ken learned that Rinaldo and Zudak had been murdered, he instructed his men to “eliminate Alexander and to hide the body in the ocean.” He needed to find Straus and Mix and salvage what was left of his plan.  When he killed Curtis and Adams, Alexander and his rage cost Ken millions of dollars. The thought of Alexander getting to Straus before he had a chance to apply the intelligently crafted threat of extortion he had in mind, was a possibility that Ken could not accept.

“Worst case scenario,” he said to his hired assistants, “is that we eliminate everyone who knows anything, and we walk away with lessons learned.”

“And best case?” he was asked.

“We squeeze Straus, Mix, and Lucietta for three million and walk away richer with lessons learned.”

The next day, when Ken learned that Lucietta was murdered in his office, he sent a resource over to make sure Alexander was still in the apartment.

“No sign of Alexander,” the report came back. “He must have taken care of Lucietta and is probably looking for Straus right now.”

Ken still had Mix and Straus to count on to prevent his plan from being a total disaster, but when Derek Cole reported that Mix had left the resort and that Mix didn’t look like he was going to last much longer, everything was down to finding Straus.

That’s when the entire plan fell apart. What angered Ken the most as he sat, tied to the cold metal chair in the rat-infested warehouse, is that he never saw it coming to this. He never fully trusted Alexander, but never thought he would actually resort to this.

The fire that Alexander lit before telling Ken how much he appreciated his assistance and that he “so wished that things had been different and that they would’ve had memories together of picnics in the park and playing catch in the road” was beginning to spread. As designed.

The rags were damp with an oil and gas mixture that was designed to slowly ignite but, without doubt, burn completely. One by one, Alexander placed them in a long, straight line that ended against a heaping pile of discarded pallets stacked in the corner of the abandoned warehouse. Ken’s screams of anger and of pleading were largely wasted on Alexander. He went about the business of arranging the rags and pallets to ensure that the wick of rags would ignite into a raging fire.

“Alexander,” Ken said as Alexander had finished arranging the rags, “I have resources that are instructed to find me if I don’t check in every hour. I haven’t spoken to them in over three hours, meaning that they will be here any second. And when they arrive, I will have to beg them to spare your life.”

“Daddy,” Alexander said softly. “Your only resource left in this world was assumed dead on arrival twenty-two years ago.”

With that, Alexander lit the long stretch of rags, which accepted the offered match and slowly turned to low flame. “This fire will certainly capture the attention of the local fire department, but I am afraid to tell you that the department is a volunteer one. Their response will be tardy. And, given the assumption that there is nothing worth risking a life over in this warehouse, they will risk nothing. What I am telling you, dear daddy, is that no one will know you are in this warehouse, screaming and pleading for your life until you can no longer scream or plead.

“Your imagined plan of vengeance was, in fact, nothing more than a way to line your pockets. Mine, however, has nothing to do with revenue. Didn’t you wonder why I suggested that your name and your other son’s name should be included on our ‘lists?’ You assumed having your family listed as targeted victims would provide you cover. I included your names not as a clue but as a thorough list. You were so quick to agree to add your own family’s names to the list of targets, yet you never questioned why I wanted to add them.”