Fade To Midnight Read Free Page B

was at the Haven with us, remember? Glasses, braces. Woof, woof. The cognitive enhancement program bombed out bigtime on her, as I recall. She never got into Club O. Just didn’t have what it took.”
    Ava nodded. She remembered the tongue-tied Edie. One of the privileged ones, like Des himself. Rich kids who did the soft core version of Dr. O’s dirty mind games, because Mommy and Daddy wanted better grades. Ava hated the pampered little cunt for that.
    â€œWho inherits if Ronnie dies?” Her voice hardened.
    â€œAv. Please,” Des grumbled. “We can’t kill everyone in sight.”
    â€œWho?” she persisted.
    He shrugged. “The Foundation, I guess. I know that Edie’s out of the will, because I overheard Dad and Charles talking about her. He’d cut off her personal funds. He was arranging to disinherit her. That was a few years ago.”
    â€œWhat did she do? Drugs? Partying? Fucking the wrong men?”
    Des shook his head. “No, she’s just weird. She embarrasses him. Charles can’t stand that. She had, ah, problems. You know…” He twirled his index finger in a circle at his temple. “Doesn’t surprise me, since she’s one of Dr. O’s duds. Most of them cracked up years ago.”
    Ava tapped her lip. “Dr. O wanted to do an interface with Edie Parrish so bad, he was practically pissing himself,” she said. “She had the perfect test results for it, but she was Charles Parrish’s little baby girl. He had to keep her in bubblewrap. Stick with the standard cognitive enhancement program. It drove him crazy.”
    She left the rest of the thought silent. How she, Ava, had borne the brunt of Dr. O’s frustration. He’d taken it out on her. She had good reason to hate that mealy-mouthed little Parrish princess bitch.
    Des looked baffled. “What was it that he liked about her? What can you see from test results and MRI’s?”
    Ava’s smile was bitter. Des was such an ignorant dickhead sometimes. “They were exactly like mine,” she said softly.
    Des’s face was still blank. “Meaning?”
    Ava sighed. “I was his best interface, Dessie. Besides Kev McCloud, of course. We were the only ones that didn’t die of brain bleed. Some lasted a few days, but only McCloud and I were genuinely reusable. That’s why I survived. That’s why I wasn’t flushed down the john with the rest of them.” She brushed her hair back with a swipe of her hand, preening. “And being pretty helped, too.”
    Des looked vaguely uncomfortable. “Um. I see. I’m, ah, sorry.”
    The insincere, pat words grated on her. “No, you’re not. You don’t give a shit, and we both prefer it that way,” she said crisply. “Kev McCloud was the cornerstone of Dr. O’s research. X-Cog wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for McCloud. So Dr. O was always looking for test results similar to his, and mine. And Edie Parrish had them. That’s all.”
    Des let out a dubious grunt. “Kev McCloud managed to escape and practically fuck the whole project. Looks like that perfect interface had some pretty big fucking holes in it. And his twin, Sean, forced Dr. O to slit his own throat, remember? That should give you pause, Av.”
    Pause, hah. It had given her sleepless nights for years. Wondering frantically how Sean McCloud had managed it. When she could not.
    How? How the fuck had he done that? All those years of being Dr. O’s slave-crowned dollbaby. Used like a puppet, all the while dreaming of hammers crushing, knives gouging, axe blades hacking. Gouts of black arterial blood. Her hands began to shake, just thinking about it.
    She locked the feelings down automatically, so that she could function. “The McClouds are freaks. Edie will be different. She’s female, artistic, creative. Shy, introverted personality. Probably emotionally crushed by her