The Blood Between Us (15 page)

Running a hand through the mop of hair on my head, I made my way down the front stairwell. The first voice I heard belonged to Viktor, who was standing at the bottom of the steps with none other than Grace. She wore a simple black knee-length dress and heels. He was dressed in a gray three-piece suit, holding a glass of white wine. “Adrien. I’m so glad you could make it.”

My steps slowed as I descended, but I kept going until I was standing in front of him. I didn’t know why I was ashamed of the bruises. Maybe because I wasn’t that kind of guy. Maybe because I still didn’t understand the reasons behind my face getting creamed. Maybe because I’d lost, and I didn’t want Viktor to see me as a loser.

I forced a smile but knew it wasn’t very convincing. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“Better a late arrival than no arrival at all.” He put his arm around my shoulder and cast a sympathetic look at my wounded face. Then he held out his other arm for Grace and
led us toward the den. “Come. I want to speak to you two in private for a moment.”

As we moved down the hall, one of the servers held out a silver tray of glasses. I said, “What are they?”

“This side is nonalcoholic cranberry spritzers. This side’s got cosmopolitans. But you’re a little young for those.” He smiled and I smiled back.

“Indeed, I am,” I said as I took a spritzer in my hand. But the moment Viktor turned his back, I switched it out for a cosmo. Maybe I didn’t drink. But I didn’t fight, either.

As Viktor, Grace, and I stepped into the den, Julian gave my shirt a disapproving once-over and whispered to me, “Play nice.”

What was that supposed to mean? Grace was the one who started shit. All I ever wanted was to finish it.

Once the doors were closed, Viktor smiled warmly at us both. “It’s good to see you both, children.”

“Likewise, Uncle.” Grace sat on the chaise and folded her hands neatly in her lap. Her hair was curled into ringlets that lay over her right shoulder.

“And it’s nice to see you two getting along. Even if it is merely a lie perpetuated by Julian.” I shot a glance to Grace, who was already looking at me in wonder. Apparently we weren’t the great actors we thought we were. “Come, now. Do you really think I’m that stupid?”

Grace began to say, “We never—”

“It’s quite all right. If I can’t get you two to come together as a family, at least I can pretend for a short while that you won’t strangle each other in my parlor.” Viktor moved to his desk and opened the top drawer. From it, he removed a manila envelope that looked stuffed to the gills. “Now, as to why I wanted to speak with you . . .”

I didn’t speak, couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even move. The whole room felt like it was filling with a thick, hot gas. I knew this sensation. We were about to talk about death. Viktor’s death.

He said, “I didn’t want you to find this out after I’ve passed on. Julian knows, and he supports my decision. But I’ve decided that I want to tell you in person why I’m not leaving any of my estate to either of you.” Grace sat up some in her seat. I didn’t move. “Instead I’m leaving the entirety to the Wills Institute. All but a modest stipend for Julian.” It was unexpected, but it was also just money.

I counted two heartbeats before I let the words leave my mouth—words I already knew the answer to. “Does he . . . know that you’re dying, then?”

Grace’s eyes snapped to me in a warning—Julian had probably talked to her about it, too—but I simply shrugged in response. We were all dancing around the issue, and I was quickly tiring of it. The last semblance of family that we had
would soon be leaving us forever. I didn’t get why we were pretending that he was going to be alive in another year or two or ten. The sky was blue. Water was wet. And Viktor was dying. It was just the way of things.

“Yes. I suspect he’s known for some time, but this past week, I told him myself.” For a moment, a profound sadness filled his eyes. Then, as if gathering himself once again, he took on a businesslike tone. “Do you understand the importance of my decision to will my estate to Wills?”

Grace and I spoke at the same time—probably the only time we had ever agreed on anything, even if it was only a choice of words. “Of course.”

“I just didn’t want either of you to feel left out. I care deeply for both of you. But I think the money would do better to serve many children, rather than just two, and of course you have the trust from your parents.”

“Don’t worry about it, Viktor. I’m not.” I downed the last of my cosmo and set the glass on the desk.

As I stood, Viktor’s eyes shimmered. He said, “I cannot possibly express to you how much I will miss you both.”

Grace stood and rushed across the room, hugging him tightly. “Oh, Uncle . . .”

“The time for good-byes is fast approaching, children. I want nothing unsaid when it comes.” As he embraced my sister, he looked at me, his eyes now filled with visible tears.
“I love you. Both of you. I never had children of my own, but I always viewed you both as such. After I am gone, only the two of you and my beloved Julian will remain. Take care of one another. Please. All of you.”

It was too much—the idea of losing Viktor. I’d known for over eight days now, but it hadn’t seemed real until this very moment. Viktor was dying. And soon all I’d have left to call family would be Grace. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.

I walked out of the room and snagged another cosmo, then found a quiet corner of the house to hide in until it was announced that dinner was being served. I counted roughly twenty people gathering around the table—by the looks of it, power players, maybe a few academics, and me. An older gentleman to my left swallowed a bite of something creamy and green before meeting my eyes. “I knew your father well, Mr. Dane. Tell me. Do you plan to follow in his career footsteps? He was a brilliant chemist, and a marvelous teacher.”

My face was feeling warm. It was a pleasant warmth, and one that made it easier to make small talk. I blamed the booze. With a shrug, I said, “I might follow him into chemistry, but not teaching. To be honest, I haven’t given it that much thought just yet.”

The man dabbed at the corners of his mouth with his cloth napkin, then returned the napkin to his lap. He looked
somewhat perplexed by my response. “It is your senior year, isn’t it?”

The rest of the table had turned their attention to our conversation. I took a sip of water and set it down, gathering my thoughts. “Yes. It is my senior year. But anyone who thinks that an eighteen-year-old is capable of choosing their forever path in life is kidding themselves. I’ll figure it out. I just need time. And patience.”

“Adrien has a brilliant mind. He just needs the right people behind him to encourage him and show him how to apply himself. I expect wonderful things from him, given time.” From the opposite end of the table, Viktor raised his glass to me in a toasting gesture and smiled. “And patience.”

A woman in peach chiffon addressed my sister then. “What about you, Grace? Do you find yourself requiring more time to find your chosen path in life?”

Grace, as usual, had all the right answers. “I plan to work in pharmaceuticals. In fact, I’m confidently planning to apply to all the Ivy Leagues when the time comes.”

“Of course you are,” I muttered under my breath, earning a look of warning from Julian.

Looking down the table to my godfather, I silently thought to him,
Why am I here?

But Viktor and I had been having conversations with
our eyes for years, and the way he was looking at me now, I imagined his response was something like,
Because sometimes a brief, pleasant dinner conversation can open a door years later that you weren’t even aware existed. Now, if I could trouble you to be your charming self for the remainder of the evening?

His smile came slowly but surely—the way it always did when he was certain he knew what he was talking about. When it appeared, I found myself letting go of my urge to leave the table. Viktor had always had that effect on me. He was soothing, calming. When he smiled at me, it felt like being wrapped up in a blanket after coming in from the cold.

I was going to miss him.

I spent the rest of the dinner nibbling on small bites and engaging in small talk to make him happy. I even promised a man who owned a few biomedical companies around the country that I would look him up after I finished school (whenever I finished school).

It helped to pretend that Grace wasn’t sitting across from me, judging me with her effortless ability to talk to strangers. It helped more that I’d managed to sneak another cosmo when nobody was paying attention. After dessert and coffee, Viktor and Julian gave their good-byes and escorted guests to the door. Grace and I were the only two left at the table, but neither of us spoke. My phone buzzed in my pocket, and when I retrieved it, I saw that my mysterious informant
had just texted me. They said,
Grace has evidence of what really happened to your parents. Find it!

I glanced toward the door long enough to see something that made my heart skip a beat. Julian was texting someone. Another message popped up on my phone.
Might I suggest you check her room?

I sat there dumbfounded. Could Julian be the person who’d been tormenting me with these text messages? Why?

Grace raised a well-manicured brow in my general direction. “Are you staying here tonight or going back to the dorms?”

The room tilted slightly, so I said, “Staying.”

“Good. I’d hate for you to die in some horrible car accident after sneaking so much to drink.” She smiled in that sweet, sadistic way of hers before walking around the table to leave the room.

As she passed behind my chair, I emptied my glass and said, “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

She paused, but only briefly.

“Oh, brother . . .” She bent down, whispering in my ear. I could feel her breath brush the tiny hairs on my neck, my skin turning to gooseflesh, as if reacting to the poison of her words. “I’d revel in it.”

I had no idea why some people were vile and others were not. Maybe they really were that way when they were born.
After all, we’d had the same parents—it was hard to say Grace was a product of bad nurturing. Still, maybe experience made them that way. We might have lived inside the same house, but Grace and I had led very different lives. It was hard to think of a control group to even test a hypothesis. I’d met people like Grace of all genders, races, and orientations. Nothing seemed to tie them together but the bitterness that fueled their words . . . and my exhaustion over having met them.

“You’re a kind person, Grace.” I raised my empty glass in her direction. The room was feeling warmer than I remembered, and a lot less stable. Were the walls really spinning or was it just my perception? “Mom and Dad would be proud.”

I wasn’t sure where he’d come from or when, but Julian was standing over me, his jaw set, his eyes full of disapproval. I set my glass on the table and said, “It’s just a cranberry spritzer.”

“Please. Lying is so unbecoming of you.” He took my glass, despite the fact that it was empty. Then he bent closer to my ear and hissed, “Seems like you’ve had enough. More than enough, considering you’re only eighteen. What were you thinking? That no one would notice?”

That wasn’t it at all. I wasn’t even sure what it was, why I’d drunk, especially so much. I’d thought I could come back here, to the place where I’d grown up, and not completely
lose myself. I was wrong.

I stood. I wanted my actions to be strong and smooth, but I staggered a little as I pushed my chair back from the table. “Julian, you’re not my father.”

I looked him in the eye, hardly caring in that moment whether it
had
been Julian texting me about Grace and the evidence she supposedly had about the fire that killed our parents. As I moved past him and up the stairs, I said, “He’s dead.”

Any process in which the nucleus of an atom is changed in some fashion

That night I didn’t sleep so much as move in and out of consciousness on a wave of nausea. Once I’d sobered up, I drove Maggie back to the dorms in the wee hours of morning and took a hot shower. My head felt like it was floating somewhere above my body, and my everything hurt. It had been stupid to drink. Alcohol was a poison, and consuming it would serve to get a person nowhere fast. It wasn’t logical to poison yourself, and it had been proven in my case to lead to negative outcomes. But then . . . I hadn’t been feeling very logical lately.

Caroline was waiting for me beside the soccer field at
9:00 a.m., as promised. We went over our notes in silence, recording our method and double-checking that we had the right amounts of potassium and water. Finally, she handed me a pair of goggles and said, “You look like hell. Did your weekend get worse after the last time I saw you?”

I took off my sunglasses, squinting at the light of the sun, and hung them from my left jeans pocket. “Dinner party on Saturday, hangover on Sunday.”

She frowned, her pink lips sinking in concern. “I’m worried about you.”

“Don’t worry about me. Worry about this garbage can. Are we all set?” I glanced over at Coach Taryn, who had put the lacrosse team to work running laps and now eyed us warily. I wasn’t worried about the garbage can blowing up so dramatically that it might hurt the players all the way over there, but I didn’t want a screaming coach on my back this early in the morning.

“Thirty grams of potassium. Sealed trash can. Goggles on. Let’s do this.” She signaled our supervisor with a nod and shouted, “Coach Taryn?”

He gave us a thumbs-up.

Caroline clutched the string that was dangling the potassium over the water inside the trash can. I opened the scissors and placed them around the string. “One . . . two . . . three!”

I cut the string, and we both held our breath as the potassium dropped into the water. For a moment nothing happened. Then an explosion of steam blew the lid off the trash can. The chemical reaction reached up into the sky, forming a mini mushroom cloud of sorts. Impressive on a visual level. The trash can, however, stood unharmed. I sighed. Caroline groaned. “That sucked! It didn’t even dent the can. It just blew the lid off. How are we going to blow up a bathtub?”

Our calculations were off. Way off. It should have been far more fantastic than it actually was. I was off my game, clearly. “We need more potassium. A lot more potassium.”

Caroline rolled her eyes at my obvious assessment of the situation. “Ya think?”

“Well, recalculations are part of the process. Every failure is a success that we learn from.” I didn’t even feel like I was there, in that field, going through the motions of a scientific experiment. My mind felt like it was somewhere else entirely, though I couldn’t pinpoint where exactly. Maybe California.

Caroline met my gaze. “What did you learn from your hangover?”

“That vodka is something to be avoided in the future.” My stomach flip-flopped in response. It didn’t want to talk about vodka. It just wanted to go back to my room and lie
down for a while. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Do you want to go out sometime? Like for a ride or something? Maybe pizza?”

She picked up the now-dented lid of our trash can. “Absolutely. But no one ever asks me.”

I paused, taking a moment to figure out whether or not she was joking. The look in her eyes said that she really had no idea that I’d done just that. “I’m asking you.”

“Oh.” At first she looked surprised. Then she shook her head. “No. Sorry.”

As she walked toward our failed experiment, I followed, shaking my head. Was I really that bad? I thought of the look in her eye on Friday night, when she’d invited me to meet her this morning. It hadn’t seemed like it was just for the science experiment. “What is it with you? You don’t like me or something?”

She shrugged. “I told you. I’m just not interested in you in that way.”

“It’s not a date. It’s just a ride with a friend. And
maybe
pizza.” I put on my most charming smile. At least, as charming as I could be when I felt like my head was full of sharp shards of rock. “If you’re lucky.”

But I wasn’t just asking her out as a friend, and I knew it. A little voice at the back of my mind questioned whether
me asking Caroline out had anything at all to do with Josh kissing me the day before. I swore to myself that the two had nothing to do with each other, but honestly? What I did know was how it had felt to kiss Josh. What I didn’t know was what it might feel like to kiss Caroline.

She looked me over for a moment, as if debating just how terrible an evening with me might be. It didn’t exactly inspire confidence in my fragile ego. Finally, she hoisted up the trash can and said, “Okay. But we’re just friends.”

“Fine.” There was something way too formal about the whole thing. I’d hung out with friends plenty of times before. Why was she making this awkward? Or was that just her deal? Maybe she was just an awkward person. The evidence was certainly pointing in that direction. “Tonight? Say eight o’clock?”

“Fine.”

We cleaned up our experiment and yelled our thanks to Coach Taryn for his supervision. Afterward, I headed back to my room, where my pillow was calling my name. I was certain from what little experience I had that sleep was the only thing that was going to ease my throbbing head.

As I moved into the dorm, silence enveloped me. This evening would be different. Commuter students would return from their weekends at home, and with them would come the hustle and bustle and noise of dormitory living.
But for now, it was still early, and the halls were blissfully silent. I was looking forward to a nice nap.

I trudged up the main stairs of the dormitory, anxious to reach my room. My footfalls echoed as I climbed toward the top floor. I did my best to tread lightly. Not because I was afraid of disturbing anyone, but because I wanted to see if I could step softly enough that the sound wouldn’t reverberate off the stone walls around me. I was in a battle with the laws of physics. It was stupid, but people do a lot of stupid things when no one is looking.

I finally reached the top floor and hung a left toward the tower stairs. The tile floor of the hall coupled with the addition of wooden doors caused me to change my strategy slightly. Then a loud slam from the end of the hall thundered through my aching head, causing me to lose this particular battle.

The echo of voices had replaced the echo of my steps. The sound grew louder as the speakers came closer. There were two voices. Both rang at a higher timbre, definitely female. What’s more, I recognized one of them as Penelope’s, and the other voice belonged to Grace.

“I got it. I should have had it four years ago, but I’ve got it now.” Grace’s words piqued my interest. What was it that she had? But I was in no mood to ask her. The way I was feeling at the moment, I thought it best if she didn’t even see
me. The last thing I wanted right now was to get into another argument with her. I ducked back into the doorway of the janitor’s closet, staying out of sight as they made their way to the stairs.

“I’m so excited for you. I’m already sick of seeing Adrien’s face and he’s only been here a week.” I could hear them as they started to descend the stairs.

Their voices were fading as they rounded the landing one floor beneath me. “Listen, I have to go pick something up. I’ll meet you in the dining hall in fifteen minutes, okay?”

So much for my nap. Headache or no headache, this was my chance to find out exactly where Grace had been going and what she’d been up to. And this time, I knew where Penelope would be, so there was no chance that she could get in my way.

I made my way down the stairs and out into the morning air just in time to see Grace and Penelope part ways. I tried to act casual as I walked across the campus grounds, but I had to be quick or I would lose her.

It didn’t take long for me to figure out where she was headed. I’d seen Grace take this path a hundred times. She was headed for the library. Of course, as I’d learned on Friday night, it probably wasn’t the books she’d been visiting at all. It was probably the radio station on the third floor.

But then it occurred to me I’d caught her slipping out the back door of the library before. Once, I’d even seen her do so when I’d been visiting Josh myself, so there was no way she’d been in the radio station.

Deciding to test the hypothesis that was taking shape in my mind, I waited for her to head into the library, then rounded the building to the back and hid in the shadows behind the recycling bin. Sure enough, before long the back door to the library opened, spilling light out into the nearly enclosed parking lot. Grace exited the building and turned toward me. Her stride was confident and direct, as if she’d walked this route so often it was a routine. I ducked down, peering between the Dumpster and the wall. Grace stood at a locked door I’d assumed led to a maintenance room. She paused and looked around before retrieving a key from her pocket. Opening the padlock, Grace yanked on the door and went inside.

I moved around the Dumpster toward the door. Whatever she was doing in there, I knew that it couldn’t be good for me. I had to find out what it was. I reached for the door handle. If I could just get it open a crack, I might be able to get some idea of what she was up to.

As my hand began to close around the handle, I felt it turn from the inside. Grace was coming out. A crack of yellow light spilled outside, and I had microseconds before I
was caught. In a moment of panic, I reached out with my leg and kicked the door as hard as I could. It slammed closed. I picked up a glass bottle from beside the recycling bin and ran for the front of the library. The door started to open again. I threw the bottle behind me, and it shattered into pieces when it struck the block building. I could hear Grace yelling from inside the mystery room.

“Real mature, jerk!” She hadn’t seen me. Well, she had seen someone, but I didn’t think she knew it was me.

I didn’t stop running until I got back to my room. I grabbed my messenger bag and some supplies, then headed right back out. My earlier headache was gone. I couldn’t even think about sleeping anymore. It had taken me this long to find out where Grace had been going all this time. I wasn’t about to waste any more time wondering what she was doing.

The only variable in my plan was where my sister was now. It would put a serious damper on my investigation if she were to walk in on me going through her secret lair. But as much as I liked to eliminate variables, that was a risk I was willing to take.

I made my way out of the dorm and back to the library. I took a couple of paper clips out of my bag. I bent the end of one and inserted it into the padlock. After ten minutes of twisting and swearing, I remembered that I had no idea how to pick a lock. I’d seen it done on TV and read about it in
several novels, but it turned out that TV and novels were not necessarily accurate representations of real life. I decided to take a much more scientific approach. If I couldn’t pick the lock, I’d just break the damn thing instead.

Reaching back into my trusty bag of tricks, I grabbed my can of compressed air. It was a simple-enough tool. I’d purchased this particular can right here at the campus bookstore. Sure, it was great for cleaning the dust and debris from one’s computer and keyboard, but who knew that it was so helpful when breaking and entering?

I slid the red straw into the padlock that I had seen my sister open less than a half hour earlier and pressed the button. The trapped carbon dioxide gas inside hissed as it escaped its cylindrical prison. The lock grew white with frost as it chilled from the inside out. I picked up a large rock and slammed it against the lock. It shattered like glass, and I opened the door. Videos on YouTube had shown me several examples of it working, but I stood there in shock for a moment. I wasn’t actually sure how much the canned air helped, but the rock definitely did wonders.

I flipped the light switch and waited for my eyes to adjust to the low yellow light. What lay before me sent a chill up my spine while simultaneously sending flames up the side of my face. I was in a lab. A chemistry lab. Grace’s lab.

There were glass bottles full of chemicals lining metal
shelves on the walls. Various acids and solutions were neatly labeled and placed so that those in danger of reacting were as far away from one another as possible. There were jars of raw elements as well. Sodium, potassium, cesium. Several of them could be quite volatile if not properly handled. Beakers and test tubes lined a drying rack near the sink. A Bunsen burner was attached to a large green cylinder with a hose.

I made my way down the three steps and onto the floor of my sister’s laboratory. Her experimental notes were sitting out on the table. I picked up the top sheet of paper and my heart sank. I instantly recognized what she was doing. These were my father’s formulas, in my father’s handwriting. This was my father’s life’s work. The formulas he’d been developing to create temporary night vision for a variety of purposes with nothing more than some brilliantly concocted eye drops.

On the table next to his notes was an experiment log book that she’d obviously been working on for some time. It looked almost ready to be turned into a paper for presentation. I leaned back against the table. The mysterious texter had been right all along. Grace was going to take credit for my father’s work.

I started gathering Grace’s and our parents’ notes together. I was taking them. I was taking it all. I’d be damned
if she was going to take credit for Dad’s biggest dream and all of his and our mom’s hard work. I picked up the last notebook from the table and added it to my pile, swearing under my breath as I did. This was my father’s notebook. The one I had picked up from the burnt remains of our home the day our parents died. This must have been what Grace and Penelope had been grabbing from my room earlier.

I set down the stack and flipped open the notebook. Loose pages came fluttering out, falling to the floor at my feet. I picked them up and started to read the words written on them. I didn’t recognize these words. I had read my father’s journal—at least what I had of it—countless times over the last four years, but I didn’t recognize these pages. I turned to the section that had been ripped out—and held one of the loose pages up to the tear. These were the missing pages from my father’s journal, reunited with their home at last.