Kim Harrison - Dates From Hell

Rat chuckled and pushed it back with a single, thick-knuckled finger. “Yes way. Unless you want to move down to Arcane where you belong.”

Ivy almost growled. She hated her mother. She hated Piscary. No, she hated their control over her. Slowly she pulled the folder to her and opened it. “Oh my God,” she breathed as she looked at the picture, thinking it couldn’t get any worse. “A witch? They partnered me with a witch? Whose bright-ass idea was that ?”

Rat laughed, pulling Ivy’s eyes from her “partner’s” picture. Slumping back, she tried not to frown. Though it was clearly meant to be a punishment, this might not be a bad thing. A witch wouldn’t be after her blood, and the relief of not having to fight that would be enough to compensate for the extra work that having such a weak partner would engender. A witch? They were laughing at her. The entire tower was laughing at her.

“You said management doesn’t want her on her own. What’s wrong with her?” she asked and Rat took her shoulder in a thick hand and drew her reluctantly to her feet.

“Nothing,” he said, grinning. “She’s impulsive is all. It’s a match made in heaven, Ivy. You’ll be best friends before the week is out: going shopping, eating chocolate, catching chick-flicks after work. You’ll love it! Trust me.”

Ivy realized she was clenching her jaw, and she forced her teeth apart before she gave herself a headache. Her partner was a flake. She was partnered with a girly-girl flake who wanted to be a runner. This was going to be pure hell. Rat laughed, and seeing no other option, Ivy dragged the folder to her, tucked it under her arm, and headed for the door with Rat, leaving her old office and its comforting walls behind for an open office with pressboard walls and bad coffee.

It was only for a year. How bad could it be?

Born and raised in Tornado Alley, KIM HARRISONnow resides in more sultry climates. The bestselling author of Dead Witch Walking; The Good, the Bad, and the Undead; and Every Which Way But Dead, she rolls a very good game of dice, hangs out with a guy in leather, and is hard at work on the next novel of the Hollows.

For more information, go to www.kimharrison.net .

“A bunny.” The disgust John Heathcliffe pouredinto those two words made Claire Beckett roll her eyes as she rinsed out and refilled the water bottle from the rabbit cage. He wasn’t finished with his bitching, however, and continued, “I don’t know why we can’t—”

“You do know why, John,” Kyle Lockhart countered with what Claire considered the patience of a saint. He didn’t raise his head from the report he was reading, but added, “Because we have to follow safety procedures. We test it on animals to ensure that it’s safe before we let it anywhere near humans.”

Claire glanced toward John as she moved back to the rabbit cage, noting the irritation that flashed across his face. John, apparently, didn’t appreciate Kyle’s patience, but then she suspected there was little John appreciated about Kyle. Claire knew he resented Dr. Cohen putting Kyle in charge of the lab. John felt it should have been he. Both men were in the last stage of attaining their doctorates and it made their relationship somewhat competitive, at least on John’s part. Kyle didn’t seem to have the same issues, but then he was the one in charge.

“We’ve already tested it on a dozen mice and rats and now three bunnies,” John pointed out impatiently as Claire reset the water bottle in the rabbit cage.

“Yes,” Kyle agreed. This time he did glance up from the reports as he added pointedly, “And the first couple of those animals ended up a puddle of mush.”

John waved that away as unimportant. “Only the first few, and that was because we were giving them too much juice. We fixed that. We now know the amount needed per pound. We—”

“We are testing it on the rabbit, John,” Kyle said firmly. “And then we’ll test it on a bigger animal, like a—”

“Yes, yes,” the other man said impatiently. “We’ll test it on half a dozen bunnies, then half a dozen cats, and then another half a dozen dogs, and then monkeys, and then, and then, and then…I’ll be an old man before we test it on an actual human. If I’m still alive,” he said with disgust. “What use is it testing it on these animals anyway? They can’t tell us what it’s like. They don’t understand what we’ve done to them, and they can’t follow commands and try to change. They—”

“They can tell us if it’s safe by surviving the procedure,” Kyle countered shortly. “They can tell us what damage—if any—the procedure does to them physically by our following and testing them over the years.”

“Years,” John muttered. “Stupid, safe science.”

“Yeah,” Kyle said dryly as he closed the file and got to his feet. “Sucks huh?”

Claire bit her lip to keep from laughing and raised her eyebrows in question as Kyle turned his sky blue eyes her way.

“Claire, I need to go give Dr. Cohen the latest test results of our subjects. Would you mind getting Thumper out of his cage and strapping him into place while I’m gone? We’ll start when I get back.”

“Yes, Kyle.” Claire turned back to the cage as he headed out of the lab, but her eyes immediately found him in the rectangular mirror on the wall over the cage. Her gaze dropped over Kyle in his long white smock. He looked so sexy in the smock. She wouldn’t mind playing doctor/patient with him, she thought. Then her eyes moved to her own reflection, and she sighed as she took in the familiar features under the mop of red hair she had scraped back into a ponytail. She’d been told she was pretty more than a time or two in her life, and had a certain amount of confidence in her looks, but they didn’t seem to matter to Kyle. He treated her more like a buddy or kid sister than a woman.

“Yes, Kyle,” John mimicked nastily. “Thank you, Kyle. Bend me over the counter and—”

“You are such a jerk sometimes, John,” Claire interrupted as she reopened the rabbit cage. She managed to use bored tones despite her irritation and embarrassment. If the man knew he was getting to her, he’d be like a dog with a bone. She knew that from experience. John had become increasingly rude since she’d refused his invitation to dinner two months ago. He’d decided her refusal was because she “had the hots” for Kyle. Which was true, but Claire had no idea how he knew that.

“Come on, Thumper,” she cooed, scooping the white rabbit out of the cage. “There’s nothing to be scared of.”

“Right,” John agreed as he moved to the panel that controlled the destabilizer. “We’re just going to zap you with a molecular destabilizer that will turn you into a puddle of goo.”

Claire glared at his back as she closed the cage door, then turned her attention to Thumper. Petting the rabbit soothingly, she said, “Don’t listen to him. That hasn’t happened for a long time, not since we figured out we were using too much juice. You’ll be fine.”

Claire continued to whisper soothing nonsense to the rabbit as she carried him into the experiment chamber. It was a small room, built in the center of the wide back wall of the lab. The chamber was only ten feet square, its front and side walls made of protective glass to allow viewing. This was where the molecular destabilizer waited. It looked like nothing more interesting than an X-ray machine, but it wasn’t photons of electromagnetic interference that this machine shot out.