Power Play — Chapter 55

We last read Chapter 54, in which Beth has her scheduled meeting with Xavier Wheldon, the CEO of StarPrime. After some smalltalk, a cocky Wheldon springs his trap. He asks Beth if she likes trophies, before he shows her a photo of Sapphire Angel’s costume hanging in the trophy case at his lodge, the Pegasus Club. Wheldon reveals that he knows Beth’s secret, and confronts her with one of the Raven Tristan’s photos, showing Beth chained to Sapphire Angel’s car, in full costume. He tells her she needs to pull the plug on her story, and convince the OCO to approve StarPrime’s purchase of the nuclear plant, or he will go public with her secret. Wheldon also gifts Beth a sequined dress, and commands her to attend the gala at the Pegasus Club the next evening so he can keep an eye on her.

This is the second story, so if you want to start from the very beginning, you can jump over to book 1, and begin with the Prologue of Sapphire Angel, Superheroine. Or to start at the beginning of book 2 (this story), click over to the Prologue of Power Play.

Thanks for reading!

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Beth Harper stared straight ahead, oblivious to the landscape rolling past as she drove to Stanley Devor's house. She thought of her debates with Stanley, just months earlier, about whether she even needed to keep her identity secret. She was the mighty Sapphire Angel, after all. Her arguments seemed foolish now. Both she and those close to her were in danger, and her secret was being used against her.

As she pulled into Stanley's driveway, the garage door opened, like it was beckoning her to enter and confess her failures. She paused a moment before turning off her car and plodding into the house. When she reached Stanley's office, he was waiting in his chair. He looked up at her, his eyes curious. She had only told him it was an emergency, and they needed to speak.

"You look like someone just kicked your dog," he observed. "If you had a dog."

Beth looked down. "Yeah, it's pretty bad," she said in a quiet voice.

"What is it?"

"Xavier Wheldon knows I'm Sapphire Angel. It was him, not the Red Scorpion gang."

She watched Stanley as those words sunk in. His eyes showed no confusion or surprise, only kindness and empathy.

"Tell me what happened," he said in a soothing voice.

Beth took a long breath as she sank into the chair across from his desk. "This morning was my meeting with him. Almost from the get-go, he started blabbing about trophies, and how wonderful they are. I wondered where he was going with it, and then he brought down the hammer. He showed me a photo of Sapphire Angel's costume, on full display in the middle of his trophy case."

"The costume missing from your closet," Stanley said, matter-of-factly.

Beth nodded. "Then he showed me a photo on his tablet of me chained to the hood of my car, in costume. I looked..." She couldn't finish the thought.

"And I'm guessing he didn't just do this for kicks?"

"No. Yes. Well, yes and no. He was enjoying himself, no doubt. I'm sure he was thinking it was quite the feather in his cap, being the one to put Sapphire Angel in her place. But you're right, that's not why he did it. He told me to pull the plug on my story. Tell the OCO there is nothing there. He said I needed to persuade them, no matter what, that we're at a dead end. Or else."

Stanley nodded but said nothing.

"You don't seem surprised by this," Beth said.

"I'm not. That's because just minutes ago we learned who your mystery woman is, Beth."

"What?" Beth blurted, her head jerking up. "Who? How?"

"You can thank Ethan. When he hasn't been looking after you, he's been pouring over a ton of surveillance footage that I've fed to him. We hoped maybe, if we could track down the woman, we would have an outside chance of recovering the evidence she has about you being Sapphire Angel. But I guess it's too late to put that genie back in the bottle."

"It is now," Beth said with a frown. "I thought you said she disabled all the cameras?"

"She disabled all the cameras around the garage and in the woods, but not the ones down the road from the lane, that let you know when it's safe to pull out without being seen. And she didn't find the network drive where the footage gets recorded, either. She was smart enough, though, not to get filmed stopping at the entrance to the lane."

"So how did Ethan do it, then?" Beth asked.

"He took down the license plate info for all the cars driving past the lane, which was a huge job. I doubt he's even slept. He logged all the cars that drove past in the ten hours leading up to when he found you."

"That had to be a lot of cars."

"It was," Stanley replied, "but he narrowed it down by eliminating the ones that only passed by once during that window of time. He figured the camera would have caught her coming and going. We're guessing that she drove by, and parked somewhere out of sight down the road."

"But even that had to be too many cars to research."

"It was a good number, but not as many as you'd think. We took all those license plates and indexed them with PennDOT vehicle registration records. We eliminated all the male owners from the list, which I guess was a little risky because our mystery woman might have driven someone else's car. We also eliminated older women, and women that were very tall or very short, since you at least had a very vague idea as to her size. That got it down to a manageable number. Then it was good old-fashioned detective work."

"But you found her," Beth said.

"Yes. It was pretty easy at that point. My profiling software matches people with their last known employer. One name on the list was someone who works for StarPrime. It jumped right out at us."

"Of course she works for Wheldon," Beth muttered, shaking her head in disgust. "I feel like such an idiot for thinking she was with the Red Scorpions. She played me. In more ways than one."

"Her name is Raven Tristan. She's a computer hacker, among other skills, and Wheldon uses her to get information on adversaries to use as leverage."

"She sure did that successfully," Beth said with a frown. "How did you learn what she does? That can't be in her official job description."

Stanley smiled. "She's not the only one with the ability to learn about others."

"I guess it doesn't really matter," Beth said with a sigh. "We know who she is, and now we know why she did it. But my secret is out, and Wheldon has me under his thumb. I appreciate what you and Ethan did to track this woman down, but there's nothing I can do. She knows everything she needs to know. I can't put you and Ethan at risk by crossing Wheldon."

Stanley looked at her but said nothing.

"You know what's ironic?" Beth asked. "I've run into dead end after dead end trying to find things out about Wheldon and this sale, and yet she has no problem finding out my biggest secret. I give up."

"Beth, giving up isn't in your DNA. I've told you before that you were destined for great things since you were born. I wasn't kidding. You were born to be Sapphire Angel. You're more than the costume and necklace. It's what is inside you. Yes, Wheldon may know all about you. But it's not always what you know that is important. It's what you do. And we're going to do something."

Beth looked up blankly, before shaking her head. "That's not an option. If I do anything, Wheldon will make sure the world knows I'm Sapphire Angel. And he has made sure he'll know if I try anything, by insisting I go to his lodge for his big party tomorrow night. He'll spill my secret if I don't show up. Then I spend the rest of my life with a big bull's-eye on my back. And so does anyone around me."

"If you go, who's to say he still doesn't do it?" Stanley asked. "Perhaps that's why he wants you there. He might be planning a great reveal of your secret to all his guests."

Beth tilted her head back, groaned, and rubbed her temples. "What am I going to do?"

"If you're up for it, I think for starters you need to check out the woman who captured you. Maybe even confront her."

"What will that accomplish? And what if Wheldon finds out? It could be game over at that point."

"Wheldon won't move against you yet. He needs leverage against you, to make sure you go to bat for his deal. I don't think he'd give up that leverage by revealing your secret before the deal is sealed. Think of it as calling his bluff, and that's even assuming he finds out. I think it's worth the risk. Maybe this woman knows something about him, since she deals in information. Perhaps a piece of that information can help us get some leverage of our own."

Beth chewed her lip for a few moments. Her initial reaction was to laugh at the suggestion, but she didn't. Perhaps Stanley was right about her inner makeup, because despite all she'd been through, she saw a kernel of hope in his idea, as far fetched as it seemed. And in that kernel of hope, a spark of determination started to grow within her.

She looked up at Stanley, resolve in her eyes. "I'll give it a shot. I can't let Wheldon get away with this. But I need to get started right now. Wheldon is expecting me to convince the OCO by tomorrow morning to green light this deal."

"Are you sure you're ready? You could use a few more days to get back to full strength."

"I'm ready. This woman only got the best of me because she took me by surprise. Even at half strength, she won't be a threat if she doesn't know I'm coming. I need to pay her a visit, right now."

"It's a good thing that I have her address."

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"Perhaps it isn't as dire as it seems," Stanley said, speaking into the phone.

"What?" Ethan exclaimed on the other end of the call. "How could it be any worse? Beth's secret identity is out there now, and we don't know how they'll use it!"

"Let's calm down, okay?"

Stanley paused, letting Ethan gather himself.

"I'm sorry, Stanley. I worry about her. This whole situation is a nightmare."

"I know you worry about her, Ethan. But I mean what I say. It might not be as insurmountable an obstacle as we think. Sapphire Angel has many amazing powers, but of all her powers, the strange force that protects her identity might be the most powerful of all."

"That's debatable, but isn't it kind of moot now?" Ethan asked. "This woman already learned Sapphire Angel's identity."

"That's true," Stanley said. "But do you remember what you said after Beth revealed her identity to you?"

Ethan snorted.

"How could I forget? I told her I felt clueless for not recognizing her. She's my best friend, and I had seen her up close as Sapphire Angel. And I still didn't recognize her. I felt like an idiot."

"You're not the only one who didn't recognize her, Ethan. Nobody has. Conner Bennett has spent hours with Beth, and he's had a few face-to-face meetings with Sapphire Angel. He hasn't made the connection, either."

Ethan let out a frustrated sigh.

"I'm not sure I understand your point, Stanley. Like I said, this woman already knows her secret."

"What else did you say to Beth after she revealed her secret to you?"

Stanley waited as Ethan thought back to that stunning day.

"She transformed right in front of me and confessed her secret. I still barely recognized her, and admitted that if she told me she wasn't Beth, I'd believe her, even though I knew otherwise and had seen it with my own eyes."

"Exactly."

Ethan let out another frustrated sigh.

"Exactly what, Stanley? Can't you just tell me what your point is?"

"My point is that this isn't like one of John's comic books, where the hero runs around without a mask, and only a change of hairstyles makes him unrecognizable. This is real life. Not a comic book. It takes much more than a change of hairstyles. There are powerful forces at play with her necklace. Forces that might be able to turn this around. Just like you admitted to her — that she could still change your mind — it might only take a nudge in the other direction for someone's perceptions to change. Or maybe a hard push."

"That's not entirely crazy, I guess," Ethan mumbled.

"No, it's not. We just have to hope Beth finds something with this woman to help her make that nudge."

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This is the second story, so if you want to start from the very beginning, you can jump over to book 1, and begin with the Prologue of Sapphire Angel, Superheroine. Or to start at the beginning of book 2 (this story), click over to the Prologue of Power Play.

Thanks for reading!

I appreciate any comments or email.