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Dr. Charish sat back and regarded me with something that almost—almost—looked like respect. “My goodness. Marcus said you were clever. Perhaps I was wrong about why he wanted a relationship with you.”
Right then I silently vowed that at some point I would slug this bitch in the face, hard.
She spread her hands. “Anyway, yes, I approached Pietro and told him what I knew, convinced him that I wanted to continue Dr. Quinn’s research. I could see the greater potential even if he could not.” Her smile was chock-full of self-satisfaction. “Then I bided my time, waiting for the breakthrough that would make my plan possible.”
“Sofia’s artificial brains,” I said.
“Did you know Pietro paid for her entire education?” Dr. Charish asked. “Sofia had an interest in medicine, but he convinced her to go into neurobiology. Supported her the whole way, while making sure she specialized in fields that would benefit him.”
Okay, that was more than a little manipulative, but I already knew that about Pietro. “And you hired her to make sure you could keep an eye on her and what she was doing.”
“Of course,” she said. “And with Pietro’s blessing as well, since it kept her close.” She chuckled. “That made things much easier all around, since it can be unwise to cross that man.”
“I can’t wait to see what Pietro’s going to do to you,” I said.
She lifted an eyebrow at me. “Do to me? For what?”
“For crossing him,” I said. “He told me he’d never allow any of the zombies under his protection to be harmed in any sort of research.”
“Angel, I didn’t cross him.” She leaned in close and smirked. “He simply made an exception in your case.”
She chuckled at the stunned look on my face. “Can you blame him?” she asked with a tilt of her head. “He’s been grooming Marcus for bigger and better things for a long time now, and it didn’t take much persuasion on my part to convince him that the last thing he wanted was to see Marcus hooked up with barely literate trash.”
I felt as if a fist had closed around my chest. She stood and raked her gaze over me. “Let’s get you cleaned up and fed, shall we?” she said with a bright smile. “We need you at your best!”
With that she left the room, leaving me to stew in my hate and fear.
Chapter 26
Food was brought in for Philip and me, once again on plastic cafeteria trays. Cheeseburgers and fries this time, and, of course, a side of brains.
The amount of brains they were giving me was generous—which either meant they didn’t know how much I needed, or they expected me to burn them off. Considering how much Dr. Charish clearly knew about zombies, I had a bad feeling it was the second reason.
Philip twitched then went still again, eyes remaining closed. I had a feeling he was awake and was trying to get his bearings without giving himself away. And he’d have probably pulled it off if I hadn’t been paying close attention—also known as “bored out of my mind.”
“Hey, Philip,” I said. “There’s no one else in here or the observation room, but I’m sure they’re still monitoring us.”
He opened his eyes and looked at me. I allowed myself a moment of self-congratulation that I was right about him being wide-awake. He sat up, eyes flicking around the room, taking in the blood that covered the floor and us.
“There’s some food for you,” I said with a nod toward the second tray. “Brains too, which you’ll want to eat, I’m sure.”
A flicker of disgust passed over his face, and I almost laughed. “Yeah, I know,” I said. “But your instincts will take over quickly enough.”
“He shot me,” he said in a low voice. Frowning, he pulled his shirt up, but even through the dried and congealed blood it was obvious he was unwounded. He ran his hand over his chest. “That’s amazing.”
“Yeah, it’s fucking miraculous…as long as you’re tanked up.”
“Tanked up?” He gave me a puzzled look.
“Well fed on brains,” I explained.
“Ah. Well that shouldn’t be a problem,” he said.
I lifted an eyebrow. “Uh, right. Well, here’s the deal. The more you exert yourself, the more brains you’ll need. So your days of weight training and ten mile runs are over.”
His brows drew together as he opened his mouth to argue, but I cut him off. “You still don’t get it, do you?” I said. “You don’t need to do all that training anymore. The zombie part of you takes care of being strong and fast, and all it wants in return is brains.”
He considered that for a moment. “But if I had sufficient brains, I could train to improve, right?”
