Edge of Danger by Cherry Adair Page A

Listen to me. Nobody can know that I have a photographic memory. Swear to me.”
     
      “I do. But you are scaring the crap outta me, Eden.”
     
      “That makes two of us,” she told him grimly, wishing the eerie feeling of being watched would go away. She was spooked enough as it was without being paranoid as well. “From now on I don’t even want it discussed. Not even between the two of us, do you understand?” She waited for his emphatic nod.
     
      “It wouldn’t have taken the killer long to realize that Dr. Kirchner wasn’t the one who made Rex. You know that, Eden. You must know that.”
     
      Eden frowned fiercely. Bless his heart, she’d adored Theo, but Marshall was right. Theo had become vague and forgetful by the time he’d slid into his early eighties. At one time he’d been a brilliant mathematician and scientist. A pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence. Proving to his peers—and teaching her—that truly autonomous robotic behavior was feasible long before anyone else thought it was much more than an idea on the drawing board.
     
      His first AI project, many years ago, had put his expertise and skill above everyone else in the field. Five years later, he’d groomed a seventeen-year-old student straight out of MIT to follow in his footsteps. But for years, it had been Eden, his former student, who’d made startling findings in the artificial intelligence field.
     
      Her brilliant mind, coupled with a photographic memory and—as Theo used to put it—the retentive skills of a pachyderm, had allowed Eden to catapult artificial intelligence to an entirely new level.
     
      She’d allowed her mentor to accept all the accolades and credits. He deserved them.
     
      But now he was dead.
     
      She straightened her shoulders. “I can’t know anything,” she told Marshall. More to calm herself down than to pacify him.
     
      “Let’s get out o—” She spun around to look at the door as the buzzer sounded, alerting them that someone had entered.
     
      The inner door swung open. “Jason?”
     
      “Good morning,” he said, his handsome face showing concern as he strode toward her, hands outstretched. “I called your apartment to see if you’d like to join me for breakfast, and was told you’d left for work. I couldn’t believe it.”
     
      She gave him a blank look. “Who could tell you that? I live alone. And why couldn’t you believe it? I work here.”
     
      “Of course you do. But I told you to ease back into your routine slowly. You’ve been traumatized. And the answer to that is that I have my security people there watching your place. Dr. Kirchner was brutally murdered thirteen days ago,” he reminded her unnecessarily. “I’m not taking any chances with you.”
     
      He looked genuinely concerned, and Eden was touched. “But I’m here. Behind a locked door with your whole security detail posted inside and outside the building. No one can get to me, Jason, thanks to you.”
     
      “I still wish you’d take me up on that cruise I offered you. Take a few months off. Regain your equilibrium. Let the authorities put Theo’s killer behind bars.”
     
      “That would be a pretty long cruise,” Eden said mildly. Jason might be offering her time off, but they both knew the only place he wanted her right now was here in the lab. Jason was good at saying what he believed the person he was talking to wanted to hear. But Eden never mistook the subtext. He was all about the bottom line.
     
      “You know what I mean. I care about you deeply, Eden. I’d hate for anything to happen to you.”
     
      That made two of them, Eden thought rather bemused as Jason pulled her into his arms. She wondered if he even noticed Marshall sitting ten feet away. Probably not.
     
      As kisses went, Jason’s were pretty good. But even a full lip lock with Jason Verdine didn’t come close, not even marginally, to the sensations evoked by a dream man who