Fade to Midnight by Shannon McKenna

Author:Shannon McKenna [McKenna, Shannon]
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Published: 2010-06-01T04:00:00+00:00

"I cannot believe it! Aren't you hardened professionals? Decades of experience? I read your brochures, gentlemen! It's all bullshit!"

Ava's shrill voice was making Des's head ache. He rubbed his temples. Tom and his men were slumped in their chairs in the big luxury trailer outside Ava's lab that Des had procured for them, in varying stages of bloody disrepair. Richard's face was turning color, both eyes swollen shut, his mouth was distorted and torn, nostrils still caked with dried blood. Ken was hunched in his chair, curled around the ugly black hematoma in his scrotum, whining about a ruptured testicle. Tom's pant leg was cut off, his thick, hairy leg bandaged with blood-soaked gauze. In short, they were a whimpering, pathetic mess.

"Ava, please," Des soothed wearily. "Calm down."

"We handed them to you! On a silver platter! And you let them get away!" Ava's voice rose to a shriek. "Imbeciles! Incompetent dickheads!"

"You sent us out there with incomplete intel," Tom threw back. His face was beaded with sweat, pupils dilated from the pain meds. "We weren't aware that he had a high level of combat training--"

"He is a McCloud!" she hissed. "Did you not read the files? His background, his father, his brothers? Did we not tell you what Sean McCloud did to Dr. O? Did you not do the cognitive enhancement program? Can you think for yourself? Is the concept foreign to you?"

"You told me he was a brain-damaged amnesiac!" Tom snarled.

Ava snorted her disgust. "In the future, remind me. Thinking is a process that you and your people need to have outsourced."

Tom's eyes went very cold. "Shut up, you mouthy cunt."

Ava's eyes lit with battle fury. "To think I facilitated orgasms for these losers." Her voice was a thread of sugary poison. "If I had it to do again, I'd compel Keira to bite their shrinking little pink penises off."

"I'm done." Tom looked at Des. "Deal's off. I cannot cope with your venomous bitch of a girlfriend and a knife in my leg at the same time. And I want McCloud for myself. I want to take this"--he held up the dagger that had been embedded in his leg--"and fuck him with it."

"Not McCloud," Ava snarled. "He's mine."

"Wait, wait, wait. Just hold on," Des broke in. "Everybody just take a deep breath." He leaned over Ava, gripped her shoulders. "Shut up," he whispered. "Or we lose everything." Ava's breath hissed through bared teeth like a cornered animal, but he held her gaze. "Everything we always wanted," he coaxed. "You with me? You'll be good?"

Her eyes dropped. She gave him a sharp nod.

Des turned back to Tom. "Ava's sorry she was rude to you."

Tom snorted his disgust. "She can suck my dick."

Ava's smile dazzled. "Wouldn't risk that, if I were you, Tom."

"Stop it! Everyone!" Des snapped. "Throwing insults is inefficient. We need a new strategy for taking McCloud without injuring him."

"Drugs," Ava said. "Trank gun. I'll load it with something special."

"Or Tasers," Ken offered.

"That's what you should have used last night!" Ava snapped.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.