I thrust McGregor’s journal onto my lap. “Honestly, I don’t remember any boyfriend, okay?” I lift the journal and reread the page. How do I know it’s safe to give McGregor his research if I can’t understand it? It may as well be written in another language.
“She told me last night his name was Silas.”
I want to scream. “It doesn’tfuckingmatter.” The pounding in my head intensifies. Why can’t he get it through his thick skull that this version of Ella doesn’t matter? That this part of her life’s already been lived? Doesn’t he want his powers back? Doesn’t he want to return to the future?
He does, doesn’t he?Or does he want to stay here… with her? I suck on my vape and roll my shoulders. I don’t care.
I don’t.
And the second Parker’s powers are restored, he won’t be my problem anymore.Focus on the book. One step at a time.
I shake my head. “Stay out of her life, Parker. We’re only here to get your powers back, and then we’re gone. Now can you leave me in peace for five minutes to read this fucking book?”
“But it doesn’t add up.”
I clutch my hands to my head. “Then lucky it’s not your job to count, so leave it.”
“Fine,” Parker says. He worries his bottom lip and edges forward. “There’s something else I need to talk to you about. I tried before we went to McGregor’s—”
“Parker,” I yell. “I swear if you don’t fuck off in the next two seconds, I’ll send you home and go on vacation.”
Parker scowls and exits the room, finally leaving me alone to read. I spend another five minutes inhaling deeply on my vape before the words have any impact. I pore over McGregor’s book, searching for hints he or Matthews were going to betray us, but the combination of his messy handwriting and the extensive scientific jargon leaves me understanding very little. I have no choice but to hand McGregor his journal. He’s our last hope. Besides, Parker and McGregor were close at Neurovida. “Like a father,” Parker said.
But if Parker and McGregor were so close, why did McGregor develop a chemical weapon against him?
21Mariella
Nothing is wrong with me.The thought bounces around my head the next morning as I return to Parker and Rose’s apartment with two cups of soup and supplies to bandage Parker’s wound. My heart jitters at the thought of seeing him again. It hasn’t resumed its normal pace since I woke this morning with a light chest and my head full of whimsical ideas about what my life could be like at Neurovida.With him.
When no one answers my knock, I awkwardly let myself in and cross the tiny living room, a trail of absconded soup dripping in my wake. Rose is sitting up in bed, scowling at the blood-stained journal open in her lap. Escaped strands of hair frame her narrow face, the dark circles beneath her eyes more prominent than ever. She inhales on her vape, blowing apple-scented vapor toward the empty, unmade bed on the other side of the room.
“How are you feeling?” I ask from the doorway.
“Sore,” she says without glancing up. A silent moment passes between us before she spits out, “Thanks for your help last night.”
“You’re welcome.” I step into the room and place one of the soup cups on her nightstand. “I figured it might’ve been a while since you ate.”
Rose draws on her vape with glazed eyes, as if her mind’s somewhere else entirely.
I place the bandages and Parker’s soup on the desk separating the beds, sit on the swivel chair, and twiddle the charm on my necklace. My muscles tighten as we sit in silence, words building in the back of my throat. “I brought bandages for Parker,” I say, moments before he saunters shirtless through the doorway, navy chinos slung low on his hips.
“Is my shirt in here?” he asks, head bowed to button his pants. He pauses when he sees me, a grin creeping across his face. “Morning.”
Heat floods my cheeks as I take him in, momentarily lost for words. I spare one second for the wound on his upper abdomen, which looks less severe now the dried blood’s washed away. Then my gaze wanders over his bronze skin, glowing in the morning sun.
Mouth dry, I trace the veins decorating the prominent muscles of his forearms, the swell of his deltoids, and the muscular hollow below his pecs. I look lower, down each perfectly ribbed abdominal muscle, to the deep grooves in his lower abdomen forming a V that disappears beneath his pants. Anna calls themsex linesbut, until this moment, I’ve never entertained the thought.
Rose hasn’t looked up, her nose still stuck in the leather-bound book. Has she become desensitized to the sight of Parker half-naked before her?How?
“I brought bandages,” I mumble, and he steps closer, stealing my breath as he towers over me. He leans down, remnant beads of water glistening on his skin.
“Thanks,” he says. He grabs a clean shirt from the bed beside me and turns to Rose. “Anything good in there?”
I bite my lip, dissecting the defined muscles in his upper back and the strong ridges of his shoulder blades. I want to trace the long, muscular indent that runs over his spine, down to—
The blood drains from my face. Parker has a tattoo on his skin, partially concealed by his pants. It looks like the sketch of the strange clock I found in my mother’s journal.
“Your tattoo,” I whisper.
