The Dispossession of Dylan Knox

By Scott Overton

While coordinating a tour event for her boss, the secretary general of the UN, Brooke Chappelle encounters her high school sweetheart Dylan Knox but Dylan doesn't remember her. In a public confrontation with the secretary general, Dylan nearly costs Brooke her job. Determined to unmask what she believes to be an impostor, Brooke spends a weekend with Dylan and witnesses some extreme personality changes. He claims there are actually three minds inhabiting his body, but his explanation is impossible for Brooke to believe.

Dylan works for a private space company on a project to beam solar energy from orbit and Brooke fears he might have sabotage in mind. As their relationship deepens, her own feelings start to betray her. She might be forced to report Dylan to her nation's security agencies—falling in love is the last thing she needs.

Especially when Dylan tells her that the very future of the world for the coming century may depend on the choices she makes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: No Walls Publishing
• Release date: Feb 2, 2022
• ISBN: 9781777430856

Book preview

THE

DISPOSSESSION OF DYLAN KNOX

SCOTT OVERTON

A picture containing text Description automatically generated

No Walls Publishing

SUDBURY, ONTARIO, CANADA

Copyright © 2022 by S.G. Overton

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, without prior written permission.

Scott Overton/No Walls Publishing

Sudbury, Ontario, Canada

www.scottoverton.ca

Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Book Layout © 2017 BookDesignTemplates.com

Photo of Author:  Shaun K. Overton

The Dispossession of Dylan Knox/ Scott Overton. -- 1st ed.

ISBN 978-1-7774308-4-9

To my parents, both by birth and by marriage.

Thanks for all the love and support,

and for never telling me I couldn’t do this.

Multiple personality disorder and possession are

not necessarily mutually incompatible disorders.

There's some evidence that you can have both.

―M. SCOTT PECK

PART ONE: 

California, the month of May

At first, Brooke suspected a trick. Within a day, she would wonder if her memory was starting to betray her. A week later, she would doubt her own sanity. And soon, she would come to question the sanity of the very universe itself.

Yet it all began so simply.

Good Lord! Dylan Knox! I can’t believe it.

Have we ... met before? His hand extended awkwardly in mid-air as her arms reached out for an embrace. She quickly drew them back to her side and tried to cover her discomfort with a laugh.

"Have we met? Dylan, it’s Brooke Chappelle ... from Larkmont High? I haven’t changed that much."

His face remained blank.

Time lurched: a crystal-perfect memory overlaid with a jarring facade of present day that refused to fit.

She stared at him. You really don’t remember? You went to Larkmont High School, right?

Yes.

We ... dated ... for quite a while.

Dylan looked disconcerted, and there was something furtive in his eyes—it wasn’t recognition.

I’m really sorry, but I honestly don’t remember you. It’s very nice to meet ... uh, to see you again, though. I ... hope our little factory has made an impression. He was trying to change the subject gracefully, and she went along.

Yes, absolutely. And the secretary-general is a big fan of space exploration—solar-power generation in particular. He’ll be thrilled to see all this. I hope you’ll be on hand next week because he’ll have lots of questions about your project.

That’s what I’m here for. The restraint in his smile made her blink hard and turn away. As a trace of his scent caught her nostrils, her mind flashed with a memory of lips against lips, a warm palm on her breast, fingers trailing under the back waistband of her McGuire denims.

God, he couldn’t possibly fail to see her shiver and the flush on her face. How could she end this?

Hatfield and Brown were approaching, conspicuous in blue security-uniform suits. UN Public Affairs liaison Patrice Grayson was with them. This tour of Draconis Space Ventures was Brooke’s first time leading an advance party for an event on the West Coast, and Patrice had graciously offered to assist.

Brooke performed introductions, adding, Dylan and I ... once knew each other.

Dylan gave a stiff nod and Brooke caught a questioning look from Patrice as they all shook hands. He remained scrupulously professional but carefully detached as he described a few more details about the Draconis operation that their previous guide had glossed over. When the tour finally concluded, Brooke felt both relief and disappointment.

She didn’t get the chance to explain to Patrice until hours later in the hotel bar over pre-dinner drinks.

He didn’t remember me at all, Brooke said softly. He wasn’t faking it.

Was he your first? Patrice asked.

"No. No! In fact, we never did have sex all the way. I was sure we would after the prom, but a friend of ours got so pissed we had to take him to the hospital. That kind of killed the mood. She laughed. But it was ... serious, you know? At least, to me. Except after the prom I guess life just got in the way. My parents took me to visit Mom’s family in New Orleans for the summer and Dylan’s English father helped get him into aerospace engineering at Cambridge. That was pretty much it. We emailed and Skyped for a while, but by the time work brought him back to the States years later, we’d completely lost touch."

Hard to keep a long-distance relationship going, even as an adult. Patrice nodded. With all the temptations of first year at university, it’s probably hopeless. I remember those days. She raised her apple martini and Brooke did the same with her gin fizz.

Life’s a bitch, she said, staring hard at the bubbles. In her mind was a page of calculus homework, the margins embroidered with scribbled variations of her name entwined with Dylan’s: Brooke Knox and Brooke Chappelle Knox.

A close-up of the sun Description automatically generated with low confidence

She’d been looking forward to the trip to California. Late May weather in New York had offered little more than cold drizzle with a strong wind up the Hudson that had forced her moto jacket back into her closet. Makeup was nearly pointless in the wet cold, and spray from passing traffic flattened her hair like grocery flyers in a puddle. West coast sunshine would be such a relief.

Was the promise of sunshine what had given the secretary-general of the United Nations the urge to visit California? Niels Van Valkenburg was a cold fish—she couldn’t picture him on a beach. Maybe it was all about California’s governor personally taking him on a Hollywood tour. She was glad that her boss, Raimunda Devlin, Van Valkenburg’s executive assistant, had chosen to look after those arrangements herself. Brooke would have enough on her hands to corral the media and keep things moving smoothly during the secretary-general’s later visit to Draconis, the rocket-manufacturing facility. She knew squat about rockets, but she’d done the research she’d thought the junket required. None of it had warned her that the Mission Manager of Draconis’s Solaria energy project was Dylan Knox.

She was glad that this had only been an advance trip in preparation for the SG’s actual in-person visit. Her encounter with Dylan would have been far more embarrassing if the Big Boss had been present to witness it.

Lying in bed with a serious Beefeater buzz, Brooke tried deliberately to relive moments with the Dylan of Larkmont High. She couldn’t—linear recall was completely elusive. Even an attempt to picture him in his favorite places—the soccer pitch, the swimming pool—failed miserably. A smell or a texture could summon memory images so vivid the real world paled in comparison, but sensory images weren’t available at will.

What did that say about memory, about consciousness, about time?

Was it true that time was an ever-present continuum—that the direction humans perceived, from past toward future, was only illusion?

Was there a world where Dylan Knox and Brooke Chappelle were still together, forever?

How much would she have to drink to get there?

A close-up of the sun Description automatically generated with low confidence

Brooke awakened the next morning with a mild hangover of gin and regrets. The advance assessment phase of her task was done, and today she would head back to New York.

But Dylan’s face was still in her mind. She’d once known that face better than her own, and sixteen years later he’d hardly changed at all: hair so blond it was almost silver, and a tiny pucker of scar to the right of his mouth like a permanent dimple. She’d kissed that scar more than a few times.

Her mind could never have forgotten those things—images of such intensity that her very brain cells had formed around them like pearls around grains of gold. How could they not be the same for Dylan?

She couldn’t be that forgettable, could she?

It was as if the adolescent Dylan she had known was utterly gone, replaced by an adult Dylan who was someone else entirely. What could produce such complete transformation? Some terrible trauma? A medical condition? She’d heard of extreme personality changes triggered by brain tumors and other injuries.

Or was it possible that he’d only been pretending not to know her? If so, the confusion and discomfort she’d read on his face had been the work of a consummate actor.

What conceivable reason could he have for such a deception? Had his feelings for her grown so bitter that he would try any ruse to prevent her re-entering his life? Or did he have some secret agenda that could be put at risk by someone from his past?

She snorted softly. That was the stuff of spy novels!

Yet, as her first coffee of the day seeped into her synapses tugging them alert, she played with the idea, more seriously:

What if he wasn’t the Dylan Knox she knew? What if his memories had deliberately been altered. Or….

What if the Dylan Knox at Draconis was an impostor?

They’d spoken for less than five minutes. Maybe any good actor could impersonate someone for that long. It happened in the movies.

No, that was ridiculous.

Wasn’t it?

Surely not even the most confident of impostors would try to fool a former lover.

There’d been just the slightest trace of a British softness to his r’s and o’s and a crispness to his t’s. Less than she remembered, though that was understandable after an extra decade in the US. On the other hand, an accent made a person easier to imitate—it drew attention away from other characteristics.

But he’d smelled the same, hadn’t he? Or was that a trick of the mind? As scents so potently triggered memories, could a memory trigger a scent?

What possible motive could there be to impersonate him?

She’d kept tabs on Dylan through other classmates long enough to know about his engineering degrees. A job at Draconis would make perfect sense. Could an imposter have replaced him sometime afterward? For what purpose? Draconis Space Ventures built spacecraft under government and private contracts, but she didn’t know if it did other government work that might involve secrets worth stealing.

God knew, world tensions were high. Global politics was rife with flashpoints—most often disputed territory containing oil reserves. There was talk of a critical top-level summit being negotiated to take place in China within the year. Brook hoped to be there—the secretary-general certainly would be.

Corporate espionage was a possibility. Or an effort by some foreign country to discredit private American space interests.

Soon she’d be imagining Dylan with a vodka martini in his hand—shaken, not stirred.

The Solaria mission to launch big solar collectors into space and beam energy back to Earth didn’t seem the stuff of international intrigue.

Unless it was a sinister plot to create the ultimate space weapon.

She giggled out loud at that one. Then the giggle turned into a fit of laughter that swept away the worst of her hurt long enough for her to pack and catch her flight back to New York.

A close-up of the sun Description automatically generated with low confidence

Perhaps it was the rain and soot that made her fears return. New York was a city of unflinching reality—it forced a person to confront truth.

The idea that an impostor would replace Dylan Knox for some kind of espionage was pure fancy, but the encounter with Brooke still might not have been coincidence.

She’d been there because of an upcoming visit by the secretary-general of the United Nations.

Maybe Dylan was, too.

That painted a whole different picture—one she could no longer ignore: an infiltrator at Draconis timed for the secretary-general’s tour. She’d have to report the possibility to Ron Hatfield in Security, but she wanted a lot more to go on before taking a step like that.

Jet lag had begun to hit as her cab wound its way through Queens and dropped her off in front of the modest brick house where her basement apartment awaited. It wasn’t fancy, but a couple of years of putting her stamp on it had made it feel like home, and the neighborhood was pretty quiet. After a quick trip to the Starbucks on the next block, she forced herself to unpack her bags then swapped her office pants for some grey leggings and slouched in her Ikea chair with her laptop.

Two hours of Google searching turned up a lot about Dylan Knox, none of it incriminating. The online trail left by her old flame was blandly innocent.

That didn’t mean a lot. Brooke knew that despite what most people thought, information on the internet didn’t all stay there forever. Servers were replaced and unimportant data left uncopied. URLs were abandoned and links broken. Trivial electronic traffic that ranged from weird sexts to pick up some milk and eggs messages flowed like silt in the Hudson River, but were filtered out within months, not worth long-term server space. Sometimes, specialized software could still find digital crumbs that fell by the wayside—people like her friend Ricardo trawled for that kind of thing out of boredom—but regular browsers and search engines were blind to them.

Dylan’s social media presence was almost non-existent: a few shares and retweets that were the stuff of millions of other users, but only the occasional personal item. The accounts of his friends offered more. A handful of old fraternity photos showed Dylan with a woman named Amanda during his last years at university—Brooke had known about that.

She hadn’t known about his fiancée, Rose Leforge, a pretty girl with a quintessential English complexion. Her throat tightened as she read.

The engagement announcement and Rose’s obituary were both online, along with some media reports about the boating accident that took her life two months before the wedding. The families had saved those to archives in the cloud.

It was after Rose’s death that Dylan had begun to look for work in the States; but if it was an attempt to escape the past, he hadn’t escaped in time to avoid the destruction of his parents’ marriage.

Brooke had fond memories of Dylan’s parents, Arthur Penfield Knox and Deirdre Patton Knox. In the eyes of an impressionable teenage girl, Arthur’s ties to the British diplomatic service had evoked an aura of sophistication, though his work was probably the kind of dull, bureaucratic stuff she now saw every day at the UN.

Dylan’s mother, Deirdre, had been a moderately successful actress and had the looks for it, with a presence that dominated any room and an artless grace that had made Brooke feel like an ox. Perhaps it was inevitable that such a woman would eventually yield to the relentless attentions of other men.

Or maybe Arthur had cheated first—both claimed to be the victim in the court transcripts of the divorce. Most hurtful was the fact that Arthur had facilitated his affair with the use of Dylan’s apartment and car. Dylan had denied any knowledge of that, but it was clear that his mother had never believed him. If that hadn’t been enough reason for him to leave the UK, the tabloid attention the divorce drama attracted had cost Dylan a high-profile job as the engineering spokesman for an aerospace firm.

He’d eventually landed at CruSys Corp., a small aerospace player in New Jersey, and alleviated his restlessness for a while by joining the staff of a tech blog, writing about engineering subjects. He wrote well—Brooke thought he might have made a career of it—but after three years in Jersey, he’d been lured to the west coast by Draconis.

None of this knowledge was helping Brooke to decide whether to mention Dylan to UN Security. By one o’clock in the morning, caffeine from her Starbucks run and several cups from the Keurig had left her with the jitters and she needed an antidote of mellow. Sipping a glass of merlot, she put her feet up again and closed her eyes to think.

One thing about Dylan’s social media activity was unquestionably odd. What little there was had come to a complete halt about eight months ago.

Maybe that was when he’d been promoted. Mission manager of a whole space project had to mean an awful lot of early mornings, late nights, and pizza-and-PowerPoint weekends.

She shut down the laptop and shuffled to bed without even brushing her teeth. Her last waking thought was a scanned newsprint photo of an engagement announcement.

Brooke was usually on autopilot during the walk along East 42nd Street from Grand Central Terminal to the river. It was a bit of pleasant exercise, unless heavy rain forced her to take the bus; but she could never prevent her mind from jumping to work ahead of her, anticipating all the tasks that awaited. Honking cabs didn’t penetrate her reverie any more than the trumpet of bus brakes, the rattle of store security blinds, or even the pounding thump from the passing car of a soon-to-be-deaf rap fan. Occasionally, an explosion of pigeons rising as one from an interrupted conclave, or raucous gulls chased by a cat from a feast of fallen chili dog would make her look up and notice the sky.

As she came alert to cross First Avenue, she heard a noise from the north even above the traffic: a large protest, she guessed, most likely in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza. People always gathered to protest near the UN when they wanted international attention, but it bothered her. It was as if they were rebuking the one organization that was most on their side. Practicality dictated that protestors play to the media cameras first, and then to the eyes of diplomats. UN headquarters reliably provided both.

On Monday mornings the staff of the secretary-general received their marching orders for the week at a ten o’clock briefing from the SG’s Executive Assistant Raimunda Devlin, once she’d finished her own one-on-one with the big boss. While Niels Van Valkenburg directed the entire organization in broad strokes, Devlin ran the SG’s office with military precision.

In a conservative navy suit and white blouse, Devlin addressed the troops straight-backed, as if at an invisible podium, her unblinking eyes first resting on one place, then darting to the next, and the next, her nose and chin held high, her crisp voice no louder than it needed to be. It was up to those gathered to hear her, not for her to make herself heard.

The upcoming trip to California was a big part of the agenda this Monday morning, and at Devlin’s nod Brooke gave a quick report on her advance team’s assessment of the Draconis assembly plant. Waiting until she could get a private meeting with Devlin and Ron Hatfield, she did not raise the subject of Dylan Knox.

A close-up of the sun Description automatically generated with low confidence

Devlin’s office was a shrine to efficiency—there was nothing welcoming about it, and even less so as Brooke faced two sets of blank faces and crossed arms.

You’re suggesting he might be an impostor because he didn’t remember you from high school? Hatfield’s voice was as flat as his abs.

We didn’t just have the same math class. We dated for over a year. Went to the prom together. Brooke looked at Devlin, sure that she would appreciate the significance. Apparently not.

Sixteen years ago, though. A lot of water over the dam. I’ve forgotten some of the guys I dated in high school. I wanted to. Sorry, Brooke, but what did you intend for us to do about this guy? Raimunda Devlin didn’t fiddle with pencils or paper—when she talked to someone, they had her full attention, and it could be disconcerting.

Brooke fought the urge to clear her throat. I just feel it’s better to be safe than sorry. I’m sure Ron can find out more about Dylan’s recent past than I’ve been able to. But, just in case, why don’t we quietly ask Draconis to keep Dylan out of the greeting party during the secretary’s visit?

Devlin was shaking her head before Brooke finished speaking.

"Not going to happen. Knox is the Mission Manager of the Solaria Project, right? So he’s the one the SG will most want to talk to. And should talk to, to show his support for solar power. You know that’s the main reason for the visit."

Sure, but the secretary could get the fifty-cent tour from the CEO—top executives love keeping the spotlight for themselves—and Dylan could be on hand to brief the media with the details but kept out of the main entourage.

Don’t think so, Brooke. Not because the two of you dropped your pants in high school. Devlin’s most practiced smile always confused condescension with warmth. "I’m sure Ron will check the guy out—if you do turn anything up, I want to know about it—but otherwise the tour goes ahead as planned. You ask me, there’ll be a whole lot more risk while the SG’s glad-handing on Hollywood Boulevard with a governor who’s in a mid-term slump." She and Hatfield exchanged a knowing nod that completely excluded Brooke, and the meeting was over.

Brooke called Hatfield a couple of times over the next few days. The tone of his voice ensured there wasn’t a third call. Dylan Knox not only had a clean record with every intelligence agency Hatfield had asked, but the guy’s father was a career diplomat, currently special assistant to the UK Minister of Labour. Brooke thanked Hatfield a little too effusively, trying to preserve her dignity, and resigned herself to searching the internet again. She’d learned nothing new by the time the UN entourage took flight for California.

A close-up of the sun Description automatically generated with low confidence

The assembly plant for Draconis Space Ventures was destined to be etched into her memory, with its five-story-high ceilings and rooms so large she swore she could see the curve of the horizon. She couldn’t begin to guess what such a vast chunk of prime Irvine real estate would be worth, and that wasn’t a question Draconis’ Manager of Guest Operations and Events was likely to answer.

A special catwalk about five meters above the factory floor had been decorated with printed greetings as well as UN and American flags. Below, knots of media people were dwarfed by enormous gleaming cylinders that lay behind them, covered with giant letters and patches of technical hieroglyphics. Rare open panels revealed masses of wires and tubing in all colors and thicknesses, while vehicles like oversized airport baggage-carts were parked in odd places, nearly overflowing with strange tools and hydraulic hoses. The air was metallic with hints of petroleum chemicals, but nothing too unpleasant. It was probably considered the perfume of progress.

Brooke was impressed in spite of herself.

All of the arrangements for the visit seemed to be in order, but a feeling of unease had possessed her ever since the SG had taken her aside the moment he arrived at the Draconis complex. And not because he called her by the wrong name—he never got her name right.

Brenda, he’d said in a voice too loud to be as confidential as he pretended, what’s this about an old boyfriend you’ve arranged for me to meet? Jockeying for a promotion, is he? Needs a little time in the spotlight?

Brooke’s jaw dropped. That’s not what I…

His upraised hand stopped her.

We all like to help our friends when we can, he continued. But I rather think we at the UN have a higher calling, don’t you?

He hadn’t given her a chance to reply, but with a self-satisfied smile he’d strode forward to meet the corporate welcoming party.

Who could have told him about Dylan? She couldn’t see how either Devlin or Hatfield would benefit from doing so. And the only other people who knew about the Brooke-Dylan relationship were her friend Patrice Grayson, and the other security guy, Brown.

Van Valkenburg had long been rumored to have informants among the staff, but had someone deliberately twisted the information to make Brooke look guilty of something underhanded, or had the SG simply heard what he wanted to hear? It wouldn’t be the first time.

She tried again to shake off the worry. She needed to get her head back in the game.

After some brief speeches from the catwalk, the secretary-general and the Draconis founder and CEO Dean Pershing descended to floor level where they were surrounded by microphones and cameras. The SG stepped toward Dylan Knox. Brooke realized she was holding her breath and tried to calm herself while Pershing introduced Dylan to the crowd. At Brooke’s arrival earlier in the afternoon Dylan’s face had shown no flicker of recognition even from the week before. Yet she’d foolishly blurted to the secretary-general that she and Dylan had gone to school together. Idiot!

I am most impressed with the Solaria Project, Mr. Knox.

Thank you very kindly, Your Excellency. Your interest in our work is very gratifying.

I confess that before today, I had thought microwave transmission of the solar energy gathered in space would be a more efficient method of transferring that energy to the surface, but your laser array may make a convert out of me.

Dylan gave an awkward nod. Most kind.

Although you must admit that there will be some who will feel concern to see a militaristic nation such as the United States in control of space-based devices producing a potent beam of energy.

Brooke gasped. Why would the secretary-general say something so inflammatory? Was he trying to gain points with the Russians or Chinese? Or was it some kind of oblique attempt to put Brooke back in her place? Dylan turned to his boss with a look of confusion.

Mr. Pershing and I have done our best to explain to Your Excellency that the laser will be no threat as a weapon. He forced a smile for the media. I’m sure this is your well-known sense of humor.

Explanations to me alone mean little, Mr. Knox. I would hope that your company—and your country—will be willing to host visitors from other nations to inspect your equipment and reassure themselves.

Even Pershing began to look agitated. Dylan crossed his arms over his chest.

The Solaria Project is not only peaceful by design, it’s the forerunner of a technology that will end dependence on fossil fuels, and do a whole lot more to bring peace to the world than the United Nations these days.

Excuse me?

The UN should be bringing the world together. It should be helping people to prepare for the worst effects of climate change and for the refugee crisis that lies ahead. Instead, it allows itself to be shackled by petty squabbles. And you personally act at the whim of whoever’s likely to back you for re-election. You should be ashamed of yourself!

The secretary-general stepped back as if he’d been slapped and a geyser of noise shot through the vast space as reporters hissed at cameramen, soundmen snapped at reporters, bystanders exclaimed shock into whatever ear was nearest, and Draconis staff tried to restore order. Later, in excruciating replays of the event, Brooke heard Dylan call the SG a puppet and complain that in nearly a century, because of weak-willed figureheads, the UN had moved no closer to being the world government that it needed to be.

As the secretary-general lamely protested the insults, Dean Pershing responded by physically pulling his mission manager away from the fray and stepping to the microphones himself. To his credit, he made a sincere and intelligent plea to those in the gathering to ignore the misunderstanding they’d witnessed and return their focus to the bright promise of the Solaria technology and the hope it represented for struggling people around the globe.

Of course, his plea did no good whatsoever.

Brooke could swear she saw drool on the chin of one of the news producers as he raced for his team’s remote truck outside.

While Raimunda Devlin and Ron Hatfield went into a hastily arranged conference-call with other UN executives, Brooke gathered the rest of their team and followed the stream of media representatives to the lobby, then the parking lot. She and her people tried their best to echo Dean Pershing’s sentiments and offered to provide any further information desired about the secretary-general’s sincere, deep support for clean energy. In between her breathless attempts at persuasion, she checked to see if any of her co-workers had brought Dramamine.

At least it wasn’t an assassination attempt. Only character assassination.

She should have pushed harder to convince the others that Dylan was trouble. Now the shit had hit the fan, and everybody was going to wear it, but especially her, since the SG was convinced that she’d deliberately arranged for Dylan’s presence for self-serving reasons. That little bit of misinformation now took on a whole new level of malevolence!

Niels Van Valkenburg portrayed himself as a paragon of virtue to the world, but on his own turf he was a petty tyrant who dismissed underlings on a weekly basis for the most trivial of failings. This confrontation would be a lead story in the California media over the weekend and would spread much farther unless an authentic international incident bumped it from the headlines. If Van Valkenburg stuck to form, Brooke would get a pink slip no matter what she said, and that thought was like a fist around her heart. Working for the UN had given her purpose in life—helping to bring stability and hope to millions whose lives were shattered by conflict. To be expelled from that calling would be unthinkable.

Until a week ago she would have been thrilled just to have the SG get her name right for once. Well, he was never likely to forget it again.

The ironic part was that she couldn’t even disagree with Dylan’s personal insults about Van Valkenburg. She would defend the UN to her last breath, but its current leader was weak and submissive to the powerful—almost a sycophant.

An hour later, the media had scampered back to their burrows, and the UN entourage was ready to depart. Brooke made no move toward the limousine holding her boss and the secretary, not needing the death stare from Devlin to warn her off. Clearly, word of Brooke’s guilt by association had spread to the security team too—they wouldn’t even make eye contact with her. She took a cab on her own,