Page 19 of Tango

Piper had inherited this setup from her father, Dr. Garret Phillips.

Garret had dedicated himself to finding a cure for Runker-Bailey Syndrome, an inherited condition that had killed all along Piper’s family line. And had, in fact, killed her father, too.

Funding was scarce for scientists who worked on rare diseases. Discoveries didn’t churn the dollars through pharmaceutical sales on the back end.

So Piper’s dad had, improbably, turned to Harcourt Alabaster.

Before Lionel Harcourt inherited the Alabaster dynasty, Garret had been his tutor from freshman year at university until Piper’s mom and dad got married at the end of their senior year.

Lionel and Garret had had a long personal history.

Once Garret approached Lionel with a charitable funding proposal, Alabaster generously set up a lab for Garret in the basement of their headquarters, where he worked daily until it was time to start small-animal trials.

Alabaster nixed the idea of mice and rats in the building.

They also nixed the idea of Garret producing the serum at an outside lab. After all, Alabaster had invested heavily in the formula’s development, and they wanted to safeguard the intellectual property as they did with all the formulas developed for Alabaster’s merchandise line.

Garret was fine with that.

They set up a second lab where the experiments took place.

That was where Piper spent the majority of her time. But she came here, passing through the storybook doors, at least twice a month.

Piper stepped out of the D.C. traffic clatter into the hush of the walnut-lined room, with its silk oriental rugs, and blinked as her eyes adjusted to the change in light.

As usual, the security guard sat at the ebony reception desk. The Alabaster guards were always young and fit, with a sturdy professionalism that smelled like they all had bathed in the military pool.

At first glance, Alabaster didn’t look like it had the security of Fort Knox. But the systems were significant, no corners cut.

After all, down in the basement, in the room adjacent to her chemistry lab, was the computer room with all of the secret formulas used to create the Alabaster skincare and cosmetics line.

Alabaster was a multi-billion-dollar business, and those formulas comprised their future earnings.

Piper’s dad had, as part of his agreement with Lionel, done some consulting on their products while he was alive.

Piper remembered how he’d bring home cosmetics samples to her mother. They’d have mommy-daughter playdays, plaster their faces with green goo, and dance around to the radio.

Those days were far back in Piper’s memories. Back even before she knew Chanti.

Piper’s mom was a flutter of a memory.

With her mom off in the far seas on her far-flung research, not seen in person for decades, Piper’s dad went full bore on working on his SSR1 formula. It wasn’t until he was approaching the end of his life that he told Piper he’d tried so hard to keep her from being essentially an orphan, and he felt he’d failed her.

Her dad never knew that Piper was showing signs of Runker-Bailey Syndrome. And she was grateful that he died thinking she was one of the lucky ones who had avoided the fate.

Piper opened her purse to dig out her badge as she stepped forward to stand under the light.

The guard jumped to his feet, his face flamed red. “Mrs. Harcourt,” he said tightly.

Piper turned to look behind her. With no one coming through the door, Piper’s gaze swept the room, landing back on the guard.

He cleared his throat. “Excuse me. Ma’am, do you have an appointment?”

“I’m Dr. Piper Phillips. I have a meeting with the executives at 3:30.”

The guard glanced down at the leather book lying open in front of him, on the intricately carved desk that looked like it belonged to a titan and not someone who checked identification.

Piper loved the elegance of the ledger and that he would sign her in with ink instead of a tap on the keyboard. She was so tired of face scans and the impersonal. Ink and leather felt luxurious.