Autumn Rising Read Online Free PDF

help herself, even in h er position. She scoffed, “What? There’s no such thing!”
    “Don’t be ridiculous. Look around you—” She barked one short, sharp laugh. “Oh wait, you can’t. Anyway, you’re currently in our headquarters which is situated in a bunker deep underground miles from anywhere.”
    “Okay, so that’s who you are and where I am, now tell me what you plan to do with me.”
    “Nothing for the moment. I have scientists working on creating a copy of your blood. We took a sample while you were unconscious, but I’m sure we’ll be needing many more before the copy is perfected.”
    “You realize the thing that got me in this whole mess in the first place is the fact I’m one of the best in the business. Dumas brought me in to work on the project for a reason. Numerous people before me couldn’t figure out what created shifters, so what makes you think you’ll be able to do so now?”
    “Because previously we didn’t have your blood. We were trying to create something from an unknown quality.”
    Autumn tried to see a way out of her situation. An idea occurred to her, and she snatched upon the opportunity. “So let me help,” she said quickly. “I’m more use to you in a lab than lying here helpless on a table. My skills in genetic splicing are some of the best around. You must realize that or I would never have been brought in on the project.”
    “Really? Do you still think that’s the only reason Dumas brought you on board?”
    She struggled with her bonds. “I can’t talk to you like this! At least let me sit up so we can talk like rational adults, and professional women at that!”
    The woman, Vivian, continued to pace around the table, her sharp heels clacking on the floor in a slow, deliberate rhythm, like water dripping from a tap. “We’ve known about shifters for years, and have tried to contain them, though picking them out from regular humans has proven to be somewhat tricky. Of course, back then we immediately eliminated any we found out about. Only years later did we consider the possibility that shifters might actually be able to do something to help this country rather than destroy it.”
    “ Shifters never did anything to harm us! They lived peacefully until you started to stir things up!”
    “ May I remind you that you were part of the team doing the stirring, Doctor Anderson?”
    “I didn’t know what I was getting involved with.”
    “Yes, you did. Perhaps not all the details, but you knew it was something different, something abnormal. You didn’t give a thought to the people behind the samples, you only cared about the samples and what they might mean.”
    “That’s not true.” H er voice came out as a whisper, and even she was forced to doubt her sincerity. It was true. She had been caught up in the chase, in the puzzle to find the answer. She remembered how desperately she’d wanted to see where the samples she was working on had come from. She’d not given any thought to the people whose samples she was studying, who they were, what lives they lived, what people they had who loved them, if they had any at all. All she’d wanted was to see them, as experiments, as freaks for her to study. She’d been just as bad as everyone else involved, even if she’d not fully known the truth.
    She yanked her arms again. “Come on. Let me up!”
    Vivian folded her arms across her narrow chest and exhaled through her nose. Her lips twisted as she seemed to consider Autumn’s pleas. “If I release the straps, you will behave yourself, is that understood? I have men standing outside the door who have been instructed to render you unconscious again at the first sign of trouble.”
    Her heart lifted in hope. “I won’t cause any trouble, I promise.”
    “Okay, fine. I guess I’ll have to trust you to behave yourself at some point.”
    The older woman moved to stand above Autumn’s head. Her fingers fiddled with something on the strap across her forehead,