Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 127712 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127712 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
I took the drug. We both did. In fact, we did it like every weekend that first month I was there for my own one-year sentence. Then we got caught.
This memory makes me smile.
I was kicked out of Mercer’s lab and he was put on some kind of probation that really only lasted about a week. But my punishment was more serious because, again, I’m no Mercer.
After my year was up, they kicked me out.
This part actually makes me laugh.
“I’m afraid you’re just not cut out for the Institute,” my father said. “Here, have a yacht.”
But Mercer had been there for two years at that point. And he had pull. So the powers that be gave in to him.
I could stay, but I had to live with him. I could stay, but I had to work with him. There would be no lab for me. In other words, there would be no money.
Who needs money when you live on a private island with your genius, rich, best friend?
Not me.
So that’s how it started.
I was in charge of recruits back then. And the easiest place to do experiments like this was through the prison system. So that’s where I spent most of my time.
In fact, that’s where I met Olsen.
Of the thirty guilty men the warden offered up, ten are an automatic no because they are in for violent crimes, so they don’t even make it to the little room at the prison where I have been given permission to do interviews.
Five more ask for the guard before I’m done with my opening statement.
Another eight try to negotiate on their sentences as payment and six more ask for what they consider to be large sums of money.
I don’t think I can get the first group off, but I promise to do my best to get them an appeal and a top-notch attorney. The ones who think money is always the answer get what they asked for. All of them came up with predictable numbers. Ten grand. Thirty grand. One even went as high as a hundred grand.
Money is not the answer. But if it makes them happy to get it, then it makes me happy to give it. I didn’t even try to talk them down.
This is my seventeenth time rounding up ‘volunteers’ for the project. And I’m tired of it.
So the last guy today is already on my last nerve when he sits down. “I’ve been thinking,” he says.
“I’m sure you have. Let me guess. You feel that you deserve more compensation.”
“Uhhh…” He smiles at me. “OK. I guess, if you want to put it that way, sure. Compensation.”
And this is when I realize he’s handsome. Not the way I’m handsome, or the way Mercer is handsome, but the way a prisoner can be handsome under the right circumstances. He’s wearing an orange jumpsuit. His file says he’s in for grand theft auto. It also says this is his third time in and he’s only twenty-three. He’s handsome in a way that is dangerous and cocky. Like he knows a secret that the rest of us uptight assholes will never understand. Which is intriguing to me, because I’m literally part of a small group of people who know a secret that, before this moment, he would never even have a chance of hearing rumors about, let alone be invited into.
I close his file and fold my hands on the metal table that he is handcuffed to. “All right. You’ve piqued my curiosity. What would you call it, if not compensation?”
“Well, technically, it will be compensation. But I was thinking more along the lines of revenge.”
“I’m sorry?” I lean forward a little.
“Revenge. You know. When someone fucks you over and you get busted, and they escape and go free. And then you spend the next six months behind bars, getting used to the idea that you are now doing serious time, so you plot intricate revenge schemes to stay sane. And then some well-dressed asshole shows up with an insane offer, and you decide you will do this, but only if he makes your wild schemes come true.”
“Are you asking me to kill someone?”
He looks up at the cameras and shakes his head while closing his eyes. Like I’m the dumbest motherfucker on the planet.
“Don’t worry. The cameras are off. What we’re doing, it’s illegal.” I look down at his file to find his name. “It’s illegal, Olsen. The warden here is dirty, the guards are all taking bribes, and I’m trying to circumvent the FDA by using prisoners as guinea pigs in a neurological experiment. If you really are asking me to kill someone, don’t waste my time playing games. Just give me the details.”
He laughs out loud. “You kill people?”
“Do I look like I kill people? No, I don’t fucking kill people. But if you need someone dead to say yes to this offer, I can make that happen. So. Do you need someone dead?”