“Of course I did, more than anyone. I was trying to keep you safe.”
“By keeping us in the dark? We could’ve helped you.” Evie’s tone carries a hint of reproach.
“I know.” I glance at Gretchen’s memorial. “She did. Gretchen had the formula for the poison, and I was hoping she’d be able to leverage it in our favor as soon as you got to Atlanta. I was… I guess I was stupidly optimistic about your chances. I thought the military would be able to protect you, that you’dmake it. I thought sending it with her was the best way for it to get into the right hands, but I didn’t foresee …”
“Right.” Evie nods, her fingers tangled together in her lap. “Gretchen. There’s no way you could have.”
“Everything was a clusterfuck. Everything.” Wyatt plops down on one of the lab stools, his standard issue green pants riding up almost to his knees.
“It’s okay if you’re mad.”
“Mad?” He smiles, the warmth of it reaching his eyes. “I’m happy as hell you’re here.”
“Same.” Evie drapes an arm across my shoulders.
It hits me almost as hard as the memorials. Having my friends back, knowing they’re here for me no matter what. Why does it all have to hurt?
“I guess we should get to work.” I clear the knot from my throat and roll up my sleeve. “Evie, get as many vials as you can without killing me.”
“I got you.” She heads for the metal cabinets along a side wall.
“Time to cook.” Wyatt drums his fingers on the table in time with the music.
“Wyatt, I can give you a list of what we need to create the poison—do we have an array of signalosomes? I need that and hemophiliac factors to start. We’ll also need a full workup of my blood again—I’m assuming the Saints couldn’t recover the data or samples from the convoy?”
“No. Only got a few things for the lab. Anything that was glass, gone. Electronics were smashed or looted by the time they got there.”
“So we’re back to square one. Okay, I think I should focus on the poison while you and Evie focus on the vaccine. We also need to consider economies of scale. Do we have someone we can talk to about that?”
Wyatt grins, the music on his record player swelling. “We’re back, baby.”
I return his smile, hope blooming again despite the barren soil of my heart. “We’re back.”
13
Icheck for Valen’s hum every so often. It’s there. I reassure myself that he’s all right, that whatever Gregor did to him, he survived it. But it’s not enough. I still worry, the anxiety of it like a constant thorn in my side.
“Drink more. I took a lot of blood.” Evie hands me a pouch, some sort of smoothie mix inside. “It’s gross, but it’s ridiculously effective at hydrating you.” She sits beside me, both of us waiting on the centrifuge to finish.
“Pretty bad.” I wince as I swallow down a big pull of it. “Why is it sweet but in an awful way?”
“Just to punish you, I guess.” She picks at her nails for a second, the cuticles already raw. “Hey, so, girl talk time while Wyatt’s getting lunch. Valen. Is that… What is that really? You and him. Like, is it serious or just a way to work off the tension?”
I almost choke on the disgusting hydration sludge.
“Define the relationship. You’ve been sort of vague about it so far.” She props her elbow on the desktop and leans her head on her hand. “Spill.”
God, how do I explain Valen? I can’t even understand it myself, not really.
“We’re together.” It sounds so banal.
“Right, but how tight are we talking?”
I sigh and prop my head on my hand to match her. “It’s so complicated. In DC, he was like a double agent, and he made me so fucking insane. Not giving me good samples, never telling me what was really going on, being an all-around asshole, right?”
“Right.”
“But then when we were alone sometimes, he was different. He was sort of, I don’t know, sad and intense and obsessed with me.”
