AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The one with the sunglasses on all the time—he’d walked right up to her once and bumped her. She was a real hoot. Never knew what was going on around her either.
She had a really pretty face, though. Maybe someday, she’d grow into her freakishly thin, gawky tall body. Her older sisters all had. The kid had been talking math with an equally tall gawky professor who had been looking down at her like she was a goddess or something.
Guy had to be snowed by the way the girl had smiled at him. She did have a beautiful smile, too. Vaughn had thought that before. But he had never been into teenagers like that.
Gregory wanted her watched. She was one of the precious daughters he’d created for his darling Denita, after all.
Vaughn hadn’t fully understood it all before. Gregory had made him read a book on damned eugenics and why they were so important for the future of the human race and all. It had clarified things a bit.
He wasn’t certain he believed Gregory when he said intelligence came fully from the mother, though. That didn’t make a whole lot of sense to him at all. Not considering how Vaughn thought DNA worked. But Gregory was wanting to prove that. Scientifically.
By creating those golden children of his. Lots of them. So he could study them. Compare.
Darling Denita had been a genius, Gregory was using only her kids to prove his superbabies theory. Gregory had combined his expertise in IVF with his sociological study in a way Vaughn had to admit was cool. He just didn’t think he would have had the patience to engineer such an experiment over thirty something years. The oldest girl from that experiment was like thirty-two or -three now. And those twin doctors were like thirty-six or -seven or so. There were some in between, too, he thought. A lot of them.
Vaughn didn’t know where all of them were, though.
Gregory made sure Vaughn had all the money he needed for whatever he wanted. Just for watching these golden spawn.
There was nothing wrong with that. Earning that money by ensuring nothing happened to darling Denita’s daughters before Gregory could use them wasn’t such a hard job at all. Not when he got to watch that sexy-ass redhead sometimes.
That girl in the sunglasses, though, she definitely had the best smile. It made a guy feel dizzy when she smiled like that, actually.
He couldn’t seem to stop watching her.
Vaughn had never felt that way about a woman before.
43
Pen was chattering.Sydney had to smile as the younger girl just kept going on and on about the seriously hot professor she’d taken a psychology class from that morning. He apparently had the broadest shoulders of a man she was not related to Pen had ever seen.
Pen had a thing for tall, broad-shouldered, hot guys with brains. Finding guys that she wasn’t too much smarter than was one of Pen’sthings.
As smart as Pen was, she was still very insecure about it. Probably from having to hide what she was as a kid in the foster care system. Until Zoey had rescued her when she’d been eleven or so. After Pen had run away and been missing for two weeks.
It had taken the social worker two weeks to inform Pen’s only known relative that an eleven-year-old girl was missing.Two weeks.
Zoey had found her two days later.
It had left its scars.
Just like losing her mother when Sydney was eleven had left its own marks. And everything that had happened since. Sometimes Sydney feared they were all just a bunch of patchwork quilts now.
Syd looked toward the rear of the Value Elementary School parking lot. Where the guards were. Luc always had a guard or two on Pen—at a distance, but still visible.
Houghton was even more extreme. Her guard’s car was right next to Pen’s. Sometimes he drove the car she was in, but not often. Sydney wantedsomefreedom, after all.
It was like having a constantly watching shadow following every move she made. Yes, he was a dark, sexy, beyond-gorgeous shadow, but he watched every move she made. Unless she was behind the thick stone walls of Houghton’s mansion just over the Barrattville line.
Because the nightmares were out there and could turn real at any time.
“I think you should audit the next lecture,” Pen continued. “You’re older than I am. You should check him out—then ask if he has a younger brother for me. So what do you say? Help me out?”
“I think I’ll pass. I’m too busy to worry about men right now. Even hot, smart ones.” She looked for the little girl they were there to get. She was a miniature version of Pen, minus the blue hair. Maybe. She’d dyed it before.
Nikkie Jean had used washable hair dye on Keller’s hair, though. Keller shouldn’t be that hard to spot.
Sydney studied the kids as they poured out of the little elementary school that was just too cute for words.
