Page 48 of The Unraveling

As Victor’s heavy, bare arm drapes over me in a hug, I exhale another sigh deep from my lungs against him. Despite the push and pull of my cancer and his treatment, my eyes sting with happiness knowing every moment of pain has been worth it.

I will get to be with Victor forever. We will have infinite years to say I love you.

So I let the soft words rest on my tongue as a strange, sudden warmth floods my veins. Blissful tears gather on my lashes as I float so feathery soft like a dream. One slips down my cheek and between my lips, a coppery taste on my tongue that my cottony mind dismisses.

My heart slows with another deep exhale, my thoughts losing focus with each moment of fleeting clarity.

Slower and slower . . . I know with each fading beat that I’ll be okay. That whatever poison afflicted Victor and me must be finally leaving my system.

As my heart shudders once like it’s ready to still, I exhale a shallow sigh of relief.

Chapter 18

Thirty Years Earlier

I heave the cab door shut and shakily draw in a breath of cool spring air as I stare down the sidewalk leading up to an old Victorian-style house. A crescent moon is pinned high above it. The deep red paneling has me smiling, and the sharp, black peaks of the roof and decorative trim are enticing enough to help overcome a bit of my exhaustion and tug me forward.

Scrutinizing the rich green lawn, I smile at the clover popping up in thick patches. The fresh, damp soil in the flowerbeds lining the sidewalk is free of weeds, and I wonder what will be planted.

I drag my feet up the front porch, step after wooden step, a breath falling out of me when I reach the top.

The front door opens as I continue forward; my foot falters—my heart skipping—at the sight of the man before me. He offers me a perfect smile, his hand reaching out as he steps onto the porch to welcome me.

“You must be Isla Davis,” he says. His charming accent—some elegant English—makes me grin, a warmth twisting inside me.

I swallow and take his hand, the cold of his flesh jolting my heart. I’d have gripped the sides of my lacy, ankle-length crimson skirt and offered an anachronistic curtsy as I always feel compelled to do when wearing it, but my balance is so unreliable I’d have tipped straight onto my face.

“Yes, the quickly dying girl,” I confirm, which earns me a bright chuckle.

Gently, he slips from my grip and tucks a loose strand of wavy brown hair behind his ear. “I’m Dr. Victor Todd.”

“You have a beautiful home,” I say as we step into the foyer. On the right side of the hall that runs like a vein down the center of the house, there’s a staircase intricately carved from mahogany. My imagination fills with the images of long, lacy skirts sliding up each step. “Clearly historic. Victorian?”

“Thank you. It’s Queen Anne Revival architecture.” He smirks as he shuts the door with a soft click. “In fact, I’m the original owner.”

I snicker, and my heart flutters at the base of my throat and makes me cough. “Oh, so you’d know whether or not it’s haunted.”

Dr. Todd winks. “There are no ghosts here. Trust me, I would hear them.”

I quirk a brow in a playful challenge. “So nobody has died here?”

He sucks his teeth and tucks his hand into the pocket of his brown corduroy pants. “All who have died here passed peacefully. I believe you need the opposite for haunts.”

I purse my lips and pause for a breath before saying, “So this . . . unorthodox treatment can kill, you admit?”

“Yes,” he says simply. “But the rates are no worse than other treatments. Better than most, actually.”

I swallow. “My oncologist said chemotherapy would kill me. More painfully than just letting the cancer eat away at me for the next few weeks.”

“Well, there will be no eating you away here,” he teases.

I sigh and chase after humor before the worst of my emotions can banish it as I follow him to the room directly to our left. “So, there are no ghosts to scare my socks off here, but what about haunts spooky enough to scare my leukemia away?”

He pauses, steps faltering and head tilting back ever so slightly for his stunned laugh. His delighted eyes level with mine, grin wide as he says, “Well, Isla, that will be entirely up to your perception.”

Pursing my lips, we continue toward the desk at the center of the study. I sit in a leather chair as directed. He sits across from me in his own, a brown file with my name on it next to the elbow he props on the wooden top.

I heave out a breath. Tears sting my eyes, and I force them back with a hard blink before disguising them with a yawn.