Lethal Experiment

Monica sneered. “How does it make you feel to know another man has taken over your life? A man who at this very moment is screwing your lover, spending your millions, and raising your little match girl.”

“How does it make me feel?” I repeated.

Like I’d been tied to a whipping post, I thought. But what I said was, “I feel like thanking God.”

“What?”

“No matter how much I love Kathleen and Addie, I can’t live like that. Dr. Crouch spent the past week helping me understand that, and what you’ve told me just makes it a lot easier to leave them behind. I’m glad they’ve found someone special to take my place.”

“Bullshit,” she said.

“I’ll miss the sex,” I said. “And Addie.”

“And the money?”

I laughed. “I’ve got as much as I need and I can always get more.”

“So your story is that you’re fine with all this,” Monica said.

“It’s true,” said Nadine, “though I wouldn’t have chosen you, or this time and place, to tell him about Kathleen.”

“Well I think he’s bluffng,” she said. “He won’t admit it, but I think I hurt him worse than he hurt me.”

“And I think you look sensational,” I said.

“What?”

“I like the whole package. You’ve got a kick-ass little body, and I bet you’re a wildcat in the sack.”

Her face smoldered like a live coal. “From what hellish pit have you summoned the gall to talk to me like that?”

“What do you expect me to say? I haven’t been laid in three years. Suddenly you waltz in here all worked up, wearing those ‘check-out-my-tight-ass’ pants!’”

“How dare you!”

I shrugged. “A kind word never broke a tooth.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Monica said, but stormed out before I had a chance to answer.

“Guess you’d better chase after her,” I said to Hugo. “She won’t like it when security pins her against the wall.”

He left, and Victor said, “It…was all…about you.”

“What was?”

“The…experi…ment.”

“The experiment,” I repeated.

“We…wanted…to see…how far…you’d…go.”

I thought about the seven loans Victor had Callie make to four couples and three individuals, loans that represented eleven lives and seven hundred thousand dollars—loans made and lives taken for nothing more than a bet between two midgets.

“You had me kill all those people just to see how long I’d do it? Why?”

“You…ever see…that…movie…Trading…Places?”