“And my father was your baseline,” I said.

“Your father was a coward who wanted to burn down twenty years of progress because he couldn’t live with the cost,” Caroline said.

She looked at me with a cold, analytical pity that made my skin crawl.

“You have his weakness, Natalie,” she said. “But you have my discipline.”

“I have my own discipline now,” I said.

“Do you?” Caroline asked.

She reached into her coat pocket.

My finger tightened on the trigger of my rifle.

“I wouldn’t,” I said.

She pulled her hand out slowly, holding a small, silver cylinder no larger than a pen.

It had a single red button on the top.

“Your father built the security override, yes,” Caroline said. “But he forgot who wrote the software for your neural-linguistic conditioning.”

She looked at me, a faint, humorless smile touching the corners of her mouth.

“Do you remember the winter of ninety-eight, Natalie?” she asked.

My chest tightened.

A sudden, sharp ache blossomed behind my left temple.

“Don’t,” I said, my voice shaking slightly.

“The black ice on the Potomac,” she continued, her voice dropping into a rhythmic, low cadence.