Bad Brains: A Psychological Thriller by Joe Prosit

Author:Joe Prosit [Prosit, Joe]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-07-31T23:00:00+00:00

The office was dark, and they kept it that way to keep from casting light under the door. There was a desk at the far end of the room and on it, a pair of computer monitors shined a pale light against the back wall. In the dim of the glow of the screensavers, the place looked more like a banker’s office than a doctor’s. Dark mahogany walls. A crystal bar set. Framed photos of couples. A gold lamp with a dark green shade. The desk, big and intricately carved like the president’s, faced the door and two rich brown leather chairs. Another odd locale in a series of odd locales they’d traveled through in the past hour. An all-inclusive beach resort. The Amazon jungle. A cold and deep subterranean world. A free clinic in the skeezy part of town. And now, an executive office on Wall Street.

Julie went around the desk. Ashton followed her.

A wiggle of the mouse brought both monitors to life. A lock screen asked for a PIN.

“Any guesses?” Julie asked.

“Well, this is definitely Petra’s office. See these pictures on the wall?” Ashton said. The back wall with all the framed pictures of couples stretching over decades was about all they could see in the light of the monitors. “It’s all the different versions of them going back through time. Petra and Sebastian. Sebastian and Petra. Natasha in a Victoria Secret’s catalog and Boris on steroids. Try six six six.”

“Nope,” Julie said, trying it and getting the “Incorrect PIN” message.

“These go back even further than the ones of Meh– of Mia and Kurt,” Ashton said.

Julie stopped in the middle of her second guess. Did he just say “of me and…” or “of Mia…”? She had no time to deal with that now. And “12345” wasn’t Petra’s PIN either. Maybe she was stupid enough to write it down somewhere. Julie tossed the mouse across the desk and went rifling through its drawers. There were hanging folders full of papers. Stock market analysis stuff. Printed out graphs with jagged lines cutting their way uphill. Annual board meeting reports. Blank tax forms from years past that were never filled out. So Ashton had been right about that. Whoever these people were, they were heavily invested in the stock market.

“What are we looking for, exactly?” Ashton said, still examining the photos.

“Fuck if I know. A slip of paper with her PIN written on it. A cell phone would be nice. Or maybe–” her fingers froze while flipping through papers in the hanging files. The material felt old and thick. “Ash, get over here.”

He came by her side, pushing the plump leather wheelie chair out of the way. “What is it?”

“I don’t know, but they look important,” Julie said and pulled out a stack of papers out of the drawer and plopped them on top of the keyboard where she could see them under the light of the monitors. They were as big as normal printer paper, but thick and decorated like dollar bills with elaborate green patterns bordering the edges and fonts like Irish tattoos.

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