19. Date Night #2
I turned back to the task at hand. I grabbed a draw kit and slid onto the stool, forcing my breathing to steady.
The familiar snap of the tourniquet, the alcohol’s sharp scent, the tiny sting of the needle—these were things I understood.
Things I could control. I filled the tube with my blood, resisting the urge to glance at Julian to see how he reacted.
It felt like some twisted trust exercise for both of us.
Did I trust the man I shared a bed with to not devour me?
To live up to his word? To be stronger than his instincts?
The rustle of the coroner’s report told me Julian was playing the same game of trust. He seemed unbothered—or he was doing an excellent impression of it. Either way, it was a relief.
This was good. At least it took care of one worry: that my husband wouldn’t kill me accidentally—or on purpose.
I prepared the samples and placed them in the centrifuge.
The machine hummed to life, spinning the baseline tubes into neat layers of plasma and cells. Ten minutes. Just enough time to get everything else ready.
Assay plate first, I told myself. Controls, variables, no overthinking.
I set the plate on the bench and lined up the pipettes, my hands steadier now that I had a task.
When the centrifuge clicked to a stop, I pulled the tubes out and drew off the plasma, adding each sample to its well. Baseline. Post my blood. Fresh draw.
If this binds again . . . then it’s real.
Even though I hardly knew what “real” meant anymore.
I slid the plate into the reader and let it purr to life, its soft whirring almost soothing. Almost. Because I knew the results might change everything I thought I knew about myself.
Nervous, I walked over to see how Julian was faring while I waited for the reader to spit out a report.
I sat on the stool next to him. He immediately took my hand, like he thought I needed his.
The strangest part was how much comfort I took in it.
Stranger still that I didn’t want to throw myself at him.
“Any luck?” I asked, staring at my mother’s laptop as a dizzying amount of code scrolled across the screen.
He squeezed my hand. “Not with your mother’s files, but I looked up the name of the coroner listed on the report. A special medical examiner was called in because of the close relationship between your mother and Delia.”
“That’s correct. If I remember right, it was a Dr. David Sorenson who did the autopsy. Delia said he was well admired in the state, and she trusted him to be thorough and respectful.”
“Hmm.” Julian exhaled slowly, the sound thoughtful and unsettling. “Then why was he terminated right after? The official report says that he was dismissed following an internal review citing procedural irregularities.”
“What kind of procedural irregularities? Was it regarding my mother’s case?
” I tossed out, trying not to leap to conclusions.
The last thing I needed was another mystery to unravel—or another reason to think poorly of Delia, who had thought highly of this man.
I was still feeling icky about her visiting my father, even though I knew it was childish.
But this just added more fuel to the ick factor.
Julian’s brow pinched. He was feeling as conflicted about this as I was.
“It was a vague reason, with no specifics, which suggests the state wanted it quietly buried. It’s in their best interest not to open those types of doors.
Situations like these invite challenges to previous cases and civil liability.
What do you know about Delia?” he asked.
My insides squirmed, and not in the good way. “Why?”
“I simply find it interesting that she claimed to trust Dr. Sorenson, given the circumstances. And even you found it odd that she visited your father.”
“Julian, I don’t know if I can stand the thought of one more truth in my life being a lie.
” My voice cracked more than I wanted it to.
“I’ve known Delia my entire life. She and my mom met during their freshman year at Whitman.
Delia’s told me a hundred times how she owed my mom her life.
My mom even helped her get her first job as a forensic pathologist at the hospital here long before she was appointed county medical examiner. ”
In Georgia, that appointment wasn’t a small thing. You didn’t just hand someone the ME position unless they were vetted, credentialed, and trusted by the state. Delia had always been all three.
And I trusted her.
“And my mom,” I added, “dedicated so much of her life to helping find a cure for porphyria, all for Delia’s sake.
To give her a new lease on life. Delia even took part in the clinical trials.
What would Delia have to do with any of this?
She loved my mom like a sister, and she loved me like a niece.
And wouldn’t the state have implicated her too, if she did know anything?
” I had to grasp at all the straws I could. Delia couldn’t be involved in this.
I remembered the first time I saw Delia out in the light.
She’d looked up at the sky like heaven itself had appeared to her.
And the way her muscle weakness had reversed so quickly—it was a miracle.
I would never forget how happy my mom had been for her best friend.
How amazing it was to see Delia without the dark clothes and sunglasses she’d had to wear all the time, even indoors.
“I don’t know, darling,” Julian said softly, “but something isn’t adding up. We need to find out why Dr. Sorenson was terminated and what Delia knows about him. I don’t think any of this was coincidental.”
I was going to say he didn’t know that and it could be, but then . . . I happened to glance down at the coroner’s report, and Dr. Sorenson’s signature caught my eye. I knew that handwriting. I’d seen it on birthday cards over the years. It was Delia’s.
“Julian,” I said, deeply unsettled. “Um . . . I think I know why Dr. Sorenson was terminated.”
Julian blinked. “What? Why?”
I pointed at the report, my mouth dry. “The signature. That’s Delia’s handwriting.”
Julian picked up the paper and examined it. “Are you sure?”
“I think so. It’s the D in David. Delia always had this funny way of doing a little curlicue thing with her D s. Just like that.” The only conclusion I could come to was, “Delia did the autopsy report but covered it up. Why would she do that? Did she and my mother know something?”
Julian took my hand, trying to calm me while letting out the heaviest breaths. “I don’t know. I will have to do some digging into her past—and your mother’s.”
I let go of his hand and buried my face in my palms. “Julian,” I mumbled, “I don’t like this. Any of it. What’s next? My father isn’t who he says he is? He knew about all this too and lied?”
Julian gently pulled my hands away from my face. He wore a look of pity.
I didn’t want pity. I wanted him to tell me everything was going to be okay, that this was all just a nightmare I’d wake up from. But he didn’t lie to me. Instead, he cradled my face in his hands, the pads of his thumbs brushing my cheeks with a tenderness that made my throat tighten.
“I think I can confidently say your father was just as surprised as you were about me and my family’s existence.”
“How did my mom keep it from him? I knew their relationship had become more of a business one, but was their marriage so bad he had no idea what she was involved in?”
“We don’t know what she was involved in quite yet,” Julian said, trying to comfort me, though there was no comfort to be found in any of this.
And then the reader dinged, making me jump. My frayed nerves were already on edge. “I guess we’re about to get some answers.”
Julian and I both stood. We walked across the lab together, and this time I took his hand. He held mine tightly.
I stood in front of the reader, closed my eyes for a breath, and forced myself to look at what—deep down—I already knew.
The report flashed across the screen—numbers, curves, suppression values—and my stomach dropped.
My plasma wasn’t just interacting with Julian’s cells.
It was binding to them. Hard. Like it recognized something in his mutation and shut it down on contact.
How was that possible?
I needed to run more tests—protein isolation, mass spectrometry, a Western blot, fractionation—but there wouldn’t be time tonight.
“Darling, is everything all right?” Julian whispered in my ear.
I let out a light laugh. If I didn’t laugh, I was going to cry. “Well, the good news is that there’s a possibility I can cure you. The bad news is that I might very well be the cure.” If my connection to the plasma treatment put my life in danger, this made me feel like a dead woman walking.
Julian immediately wrapped me in his arms. “We will tell no one of this. No one.”
I buried my head in his taut chest. “What if someone already knows? What if the vampire who keeps threatening me does? Was this the secret he was talking about? But why come after me now? Why did he wait?”
Julian thought for a moment. “If I had to guess, I don’t believe he does know about your blood.
But he knows something, and he undoubtedly wants something.
Perhaps he believed you innocent in all of this until our marriage.
” He groaned, the sound low and raw. “Here I thought I was protecting you. Now I fear I’ve exposed you. Damn it.”
“I think it was inevitable. My mom’s porphyria cure and her knowledge about your world, whatever it may have been, made sure of it.”
“Erase the data and your findings. My humanity is not worth your life. I will remain as I am and protect you.”
As sweet as that was . . . “Julian, don’t you see? The only way I’ll ever truly be safe is to know the truth. All of it. And that means seeing this through. If I can discover a cure for you, we can use it on whoever is after me. Level the playing field, so to speak.”