Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 124341 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 124341 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
At some point, they fell asleep, though it was hard to remember the difference between reality and slumber. She woke slowly, her body remembering the night before her mind brought it forth. She reached for him, but his side of the bed was empty. She leaned up to see a note on the bedside table, telling her in his blunt, all-caps writing that he’d gone for a walk. She placed it back down and then hugged her pillow, a dreamy smile tilting her lips, the beauty of the night still filling her with wonder.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“Do you have a minute to chat?” Mark asked as he came into the kitchen.
Autumn placed her almost-empty coffee cup down, looking up at the agent who, in only a few short days, had begun to become a trusted friend. His expression was troubled, and a tremble of trepidation made the hair on her neck rise. “Of course. Is everything okay?”
“I’d like to tell you and Sam about what I’ve found regarding—ah, here he comes now,” Mark said, nodding out the window behind Autumn.
She turned to see Sam walking across the yard from the path along the water, a hood pulled up over his head, shoulders hunched.
He came through the door a moment later, taking down his hood. Their eyes lingered, memories of the night before flowing between them, adding an invisible shimmer to the air. Her heart quickened, and she had the inane temptation to giggle, despite her worry about why Mark was calling a meeting with them. “Good morning,” she said instead. “Mark wants to tell us something.”
Sam looked at Mark. “Okay.”
“Let’s go into the living room,” he said, leading the way.
When they got there, Jak was already seated near the fireplace. Harper had told Autumn she was taking Eddie into town for some groceries, and Autumn had assumed Jak was going with them too, so the sight of him surprised and concerned her.
It was clear that Mark had wanted him there for a purpose.
The knowledge made her concern climb higher.
She and Sam sat down on the couch, and Mark took the other seat flanking the fireplace.
“I got the results back from the lab my task force works with that I overnighted your blood samples to,” he said, diving right in. “Neither of you were ever exposed to ADHM.”
It felt as if a bomb detonated between Autumn’s ribs. She looked over at Sam, who was staring at Mark, his expression stunned. “How is that… I mean, I suspected it about myself, but Sam…” She was at a loss for words. She reached out, taking Sam’s hand in hers. It was cold from his walk, and it sat limply in her own. “Sam was never exposed either? That must be a mistake because…” Her gaze flew over him. His knees, his ribs, his shoulders, temples. Oh God. Then why?
She looked back at Mark. Both his gaze and Jak’s were on Sam, both men watching him closely as though he might blow at any moment. Her fingers tightened on his.
“No,” Mark confirmed. “It’s not a mistake. Sam, are there any questions I might answer that will make this easier for you?”
“Say anything you want, Sam,” Jak encouraged. “We’re all here. To share this. Yell if you want to, flip a table. We’ll clean it up.”
Sam’s body had grown still. He sat silent and morose now, but his eyes…his eyes were shimmering with what looked like rage and confusion. Grief. “I was sick with something else then,” he said, still obviously trying to find a better explanation than the one he’d just been given, but Autumn heard the uncertainty in his voice. “That’s why I had the surgeries. The surgeries that made me…” His words cut off with a small, choked noise. Oh, Sam. Sam.
“No, Sam. You weren’t sick,” Mark said very gently. “You were never sick.”
“Why did they think I was?”
“They couldn’t have,” Mark said, and Autumn appreciated the directness. “They would have known you were not. We can do more testing to show—”
“No, never again,” Sam growled. “No more tests. No more.” His voice was a strangled yell, and a sob moved up Autumn’s throat. What did they do to you? Oh, Sam.
“Okay, Sam. No more,” Mark said, the same gentleness in his voice, the tone a father would use.
She didn’t blame Sam for his grief, his obvious pain and confusion. She herself had felt similarly when she’d read the words in her folder: suspected ADHM. But Autumn had also been cut free of her incorrect diagnosis—if that was all it was, a big, giant if—many, many years before. Sam’s had gone on and on and to a much more invasive extent.
“If neither of us were ever sick,” Autumn said, “then why?”
Mark sat back. “I located the nurse you were looking for. Salma Ibrahim.”
Autumn drew in a breath. “Salma?” Just the woman’s name on her lips was a soul balm at just the moment she needed one. “Where? How?”