Clade

Clade Read Online Free PDF

Book: Clade Read Online Free PDF
Author: Mark Budz
Tags: Fiction, General, Science-Fiction, High Tech
The ugly gang scarring on Anthea’s thighs hasn’t started to pucker yet. In another few years, she’ll need skin grafts to get rid of the dreamlike squiggles carved into her, hallucinatory glyphs that scare the crap out of him but are also a turn-on.
    “That’s terrible,” Anthea says when he’s done.
    “I don’t know what to do,” he confesses. “She won’t listen to me. I’m at a total loss.”
    “It’s up to her. She’s old enough to decide what she wants. Doesn’t need you telling her what to do. If she wants advice, or help, she’ll ask for it.”
    Maybe. Maybe not. Anthea doesn’t know his mother like he does.
    They chill for a while. Her skin is soft, the stroking meditative. Rigo can feel the beer going to work on her, unknotting muscles. The moment drags on, comfortable. Eternal. With Anthea, it’s always this way. From the very beginning they clicked, were attracted to each other like subatomic particles. He trusts her, feels like they can talk about anything, no matter how intimate. There are no secrets between them. She’s not like some of the back-stabbing
cabronas
he’s gone out with who lie, say one thing and then do another. With Anthea he won’t get hurt, knows exactly where he stands.
    When the subversION segment ends another one starts up, perversION. Anthea sets her empty beer on the floor and turns to him. Her eyes are bright, as if they’ve soaked up all the light from the screen. She leans forward, hair spilling down in front of her eyes, and pecks him on the nose.
    “Is that all I get?” he says.
    She nibbles on his left ear, teasing nips, and then pulls back, leaving the lobe to cool in the air.
    “There’s another one,
mami
,” he says, turning the other ear.
    She straightens, touches a thoughtful finger to her heartthrob lower lip—full and ripe without lipstick or collagen.
    Rigo puts his hands on her hips, pulls her close. Feels her hands slide across his pectorals, down to his ribs. Tickling.
    He yelps in surprise, twists sideways. Clamps his arms to his sides, trapping her fingers, and then fumbles for one of her armpits. Hits home. She giggles, tries to squirm away, and spills off of the sofa. They tumble to the floor, roll on the carpet until they’re gasping for air, sweaty with laughter. He ends up on top, ass pressing into her stomach as he pins her arms to her sides.
    “Wanna jig?” she says.
    “I think I might be up for that.” Rigo eases off her.
    “Not in the bedroom.” She tugs him to the sofa with one hand. “I don’t want to wake Josué.”
    “No problem,” Rigo says.
    Anthea slips off her skimpy shorts. Rigo helps her with the blouse, sliding it over her upraised arms.
    Onscreen, two people kiss as she undresses him. To Rigo, it’s like seeing himself in a mirror that reflects a different place or time . . . a different self.
    “Take it slow,” she says, straddling his legs, settling her hips onto his lap.
    Her nipples are raspberry plump. He presses one between his lips, feels it swell against the tip of his tongue. His fingernails rattle along the xylophone of her rib cage, grip the skeletal wings of her shoulder blades. They raise a little, spreading wide to carry him aloft. All he has to do is hang on and he’ll be lifted up, all the way to heaven.

THREE
    Next morning, Rigo still feels a little out of sorts from his encounter with the dying woman. He can’t seem to shake her bad air. It’s like trying to get rid of a stubborn hangover. He offlines Varda—he can do without the grief—and pods to work early before either Anthea or Josué are awake, hoping that the daily routine will restore some semblance of balance. For the most part it works. By the time he arrives at Noogenics, he’s broken through the surface tension of his funk into the breezy air of normalcy. He’s back on track.
    For once, there’s no overnight fog clinging to the horseshoe crab curve of the Monterey Bay coast, and eager fingers of sunlight slip over the
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