by Addison Fox
“And so it bothers you.”
Just like her observations on their plane ride from London, he realized that she saw things.
And her vision was a bit too sharp for comfort.
The denial was rising on his lips before he risked a quick glance at her, diverting his attention from the traffic. And the clear understanding and gentle support in her warm smile was his undoing. “Yes it does.”
“They care about you. I’m sure they’d like you to be a part of things.”
“And I care about them. It’s not about caring. It’s just different. I’m different.” Again, he broke off, emotional landmines detonating under his feet. “It’s always been there but it started after my parents died.”
Liam wove through heavy traffic, pleased the other cars kept his gaze on the road and off the ready sympathy he knew would be in her eyes. He hated talking about his parents. It was bad enough they were gone, but then that immediate wellspring of pity and sadness that inevitably crept into the conversation...he hated it.
“Kensington mentioned how they died last night when we were in the library and she told me about the history of the house. My grandfather’s mentioned them several times as well through the years. He had quite the soft spot for your mother.”
The image she painted eased the tight knot of his stomach. The image he’d always carried of his mother—her wide-eyed beauty and broad smile—filled his mind’s eye. “She was larger than life and had a personality that drew people to her, effortlessly.”
“Each of you has that.”
He thought of each of his siblings in kind. Kensington and Rowan certainly had that gift and even Campbell, when he turned on the charm. He’d always saw himself as far more aloof.
Distanced.
He kept people out and always had, well before losing his parents. Their deaths had only exacerbated the trait.
“The girls do and Campbell as well. I’m the curmudgeonly older brother who gives orders.”
“You do look like you have a digestive disorder from time to time.”
A hard bark of laughter escaped before he could hold it back and he turned toward her, surprised to see an impish smile dimpling her cheeks. “Careful, there. I might think you weren’t still mad at me for last night.”
“I’m not mad at you. I was. And then I was really mad at your sister, especially since she’s gorgeous,” Isabella waved a hand. “But I’m over it.”
“What do her looks have to do with it?”
“She’s perfect.”
He avoided a snort—just barely—at the evidence Isabella spoke of his stubborn, bullheaded sister. “Perfect isn’t a moniker I toss around lightly and certainly not in reference to any of my family.”
“Well, take it from me, she’s intimidating.”
“Kenzi?”
“Yes! Who else?” She sighed, her irritation evident that he wasn’t keeping up. “But she complimented my hair so I feel better about her.”
Liam tried to keep pace with the odd notes of the conversation and stopped. His sisters had a special sort of conversational shorthand and it was obvious Isabella was in on the joke.
“Look. My only point is, I’m not like them. I don’t know how to be effortless with others. Or smooth instead of blunt and pointed. I don’t do well with others. Or with commitments.”
His statement hovered there, roiling between them as the traffic opened up and he sped up the West Side Highway. And underneath the syllables, he heard the excuses.
Don’t get too attached.
I can’t be the man you need me to be.
I’m not the one for you.
And he knew Isabella had heard them, too.
* * *
Commitment.
That lone word—concept, really—was the story of her life. Commitment to the job. To goals. To a scientific idea. That she had in spades.
Commitment to others?
Not so much.
Funny, how hearing the words drip with such certainty from Liam Steele’s perfectly-formed lips had made it all clear.
At some point in his life he’d chosen to run from commitment and he had no intention of turning back.
With a hard shove on the passenger door, Isabella ignored the tension that skittered up her spine and stepped from the car. She’d be damned if she’d continue to live in fear.
* * *
Summoning up a smile through sheer force of will, she met him on the sidewalk. Her lab was at the edge of university property—loosely affiliated but privately funded—and Liam had already parked in the spot reserved for her, despite the fact she took the subway everywhere.
Useless privileges.
The thought rose up quickly and sprouted seeds. She was proud of her work. Proud of her mind and the research system she’d worked in for more than a decade and a half. None of that changed some of the silly excesses that wrapped around that life.
The need to prove your work to others. To showcase what you were doing and brag to the world how far you’d come in achieving your goals.
That’s what put you in this position, a quiet voice taunted her. That need to show off her achievements in a way that others would notice, too.
“What’s that look for?” Liam waited while she ran a keycard over a scanner, then pulled the door wide for her once it snicked open.
“I was thinking about my parking spot.”
“As in ‘it gets a lot of shade during the day?’ Or because others try to park there?”
“More about how useless it is.” When he only kept that understanding gaze locked on her, she shrugged and pressed forward. “It’s silly, I suppose, to even give it a thought. But the whole concept of the spot seems trivial. I don’t own a car and never have, yet there’s a spot that sits there with my name on it. A useless privilege someone decided was important.”
“We humans are a funny lot. We often place importance in strange places.”
“I used to think it was a practice in the scientific community, but I’m sure other professions are no different.” They walked down a long corridor toward a bank of elevators. Her lab was on the third floor and she buzzed them into the elevator for the quick climb.
His grin flashed—distracting and devastating in the extreme. “Even though I may complain about them, why do you think I like working with my siblings?”
“No fights for parking spots.”
“Absolutely not. We fight about more important things like who’s going to get the evening’s takeout order or who gets to pick the day’s radio station.”
She laughed in spite of herself as they stepped off the elevator. Even with the picture Liam painted she couldn’t quite see a roomful of adult Steele children fighting over the radio station.
“This is quite a facility.”
Her smile hovered as a surprisingly warm memory filled her mind’s eye. “You should have seen where we used to be. The building next door is still connected through the basement. My lab was off that basement-level corridor. We called it the dungeon.”
“Sounds warm and inviting.”
“I wouldn’t go straight to inviting, but it did have a certain charm.”
“So why’s this place so empty? For a place this big we really haven’t seen anyone.”
“Only about fifty people work here and it’s still early.”
“That’s all? This is a huge facility.”
She marveled at how fast his mind moved, always observing. Always cataloguing. “It’s my understanding there’s been a move to change that, but the facility was completed as Daniel died and I’ve heard it’s been wrapped up in a lot of red tape. Until that’s worked through, they haven’t let in tenants.”
“How many were on your research team?” Liam asked as she pushed open one last door.
>
“When Daniel was alive there were five of us who assisted him. After his death, the team disbanded over time. I have three colleagues now and about five graduate assistants that rotate based on their school load.”
“Streamlined team. Why’d the others leave?”
“I think some might have been hurt I was the recipient of Daniel’s generosity. Or others had new opportunities they wanted to pursue. I don’t know and I’m ashamed now to say I didn’t try to find the answers.” She fought back the sigh at the further evidence of what others must see in her actions.
Cold disinterest.
She flipped on a bank of lights. “Nothing was the same after we lost him.”
“Was his death sudden?”
“Maybe a better way to explain it was not unexpected. He was ill for a long time. I never expected the end to come as abruptly as it did, but—” She trailed off, memories of her mentor warming her.
How many months it had taken her to walk into her lab and not expect to see him? Or to think she’d take a quick jaunt into his office after a long day and discuss her research, only to remember he wasn’t there.
Daniel always had time for her. Always wanted to know what she was working on and pressed her with questions she hadn’t yet thought of on her own.
“He sounds like a special person.”
“He was.”
“A saint, almost.”
The comment was so odd—so out of place—she stopped at one of the long lab tables. “What’s with all the questions about Daniel?”
“It was an observation.”
“No, it wasn’t.” She abstractly felt the cool metal of the lab table underneath her fingertips and willed herself to calm down. She and Liam had already had one fight over a misbegotten series of questions.
She refused to make the same mistake twice.
“Daniel Stephenson was a special man. He was my mentor and my boss and I thought the world of him. But he was still a person. Moody and mercurial like anyone else. He also suffered from his illness and had many bad days where he was a challenge to be around. He wasn’t a saint. No one is.”
“All right.”
“So why all the questions?”
“I ran an idea by Jack this morning and I can’t quite shake it off.”
Was that embarrassment that flitted through his gaze? When she added up the distinct shifting on the balls of his feet, the observation had more merit. “And?”
“I need you to keep an open mind.”
“I’m a scientist. That’s part of my job description.” She meant the comment as a joke, but his discomfort only grew more pronounced. “What’s the matter?”
“What if Daniel isn’t really dead?”
She searched his face, convinced she couldn’t have heard him correctly. But no matter how hard she stared, those clear blue eyes remained somber and oh-so-serious.
“No way.”
“Think about it.”
Think about it?
Think about an idea that packed a comparable punch to going over Niagara Falls in a barrel? She was gobsmacked. And more than a little surprised an admitted cynic would even have landed on something so fantastical.
“You cannot be serious. It’s absurd. Not to mention weird and impossible. We had a funeral. There was a will. And the money. All of this,” she flung a hand to her surroundings. “It’s all because he died.”
“Money can buy a lot of things and can keep a lot of people quiet.”
“But he was sick. I saw his blood work many times over. His illness was degenerative and it had attacked all of his major muscle groups.” Her gaze alighted on a row of computers and an idea hit. There was no need to continue discussing this—the answer was in the data. “Come here. I’ll show you.”
He followed her toward a row of computers that ran along one of the countertops and waited as she keyed in her credentials, then a series of search queries. Their database was large, the reams of data the research generated requiring several servers and another round of backup at an off-site location.
“What are we looking at?”
“My work is catalogued across cellular research, tissue samples, blood work. We also have loads of data tied to the computer models that processes all of it. Every result is logged into the database with a variety of tags. Come look at this.”
She tapped several keys before pulling up Daniel’s information. With a few more clicks, she dug into the file she recalled so vividly. “I put the majority of his data in myself. We often used Daniel’s blood work for many of the tests we ran.”
“Why? He didn’t have a mental disorder.”
“No, but his disease is parked on a very specific piece of DNA code. It’s pure, as it were, and fairly easy to find.”
“Which means you can manipulate it. Like we discussed with the virus.”
“Yes, we could have, but we never did that with Daniel’s cells.” She hesitated, the pain of losing him before they could have helped him a very real reminder of how many people could truly be helped by her work. “He didn’t live long enough.”
But what if they’d figured out several pieces sooner? What if his body could have held out longer? What if they’d only gotten promising results sooner?
What if, what if, what if?
A useless exercise that could make you crazy if you allowed it to.
Liam pointed to the computer screen. “What does this mean here?”
His question pulled her back from endless questions that had no answers. “Those are his various labs.”
He tapped the screen. “There. That one’s dated a week ago.”
“It can’t be. This file is specific to Daniel only. His research. His blood work. His DNA.”
“Then why are there several files with date stamps going back years?”
She saw where Liam pointed and clicked on the most recent file. The serial code unique to Daniel came up first—assigned to him their first week on the project—followed by sequences of DNA code, all date and time stamped by the computer.
It was part of their standard research protocol and she couldn’t have changed it if she’d tried.
With trembling fingers, she clicked the mouse once more to look more closely at the strand of DNA that had always defined his illness. The gene markers that had sequenced his disease were gone.
And in its place was a perfectly clean strand of DNA.
Chapter 12
Liam caught Isabella as she backed away from the computer, shaking her head. “It’s not possible. It... No... Just no.”
He knew the details were a shock—hell, he couldn’t believe it and he’d already been toying with the idea all morning—but he needed to keep her calm and able to interpret the data that winked back from the computer screen.
“Explain it to me. Tell me what you’re looking at.” He dragged one of the lab seats from a nearby table to the counter and guiding her, settled her on top. “Walk me through it.”
Fingers trembling, she moved the mouse once more. “I’ll show you his older labs. Ones I ran before he...died.”
Liam heard the strange emphasis she placed on the word “died” but said nothing. They’d know soon enough what they were dealing with.
For several long minutes, she walked him through the details, pointing out several markers of Daniel’s illness and explaining how the DNA coding worked. Although Liam didn’t have his brother’s skills for computer code, he had a head for patterns and at its core, many components of her work were an exercise in recognizing them.
“See these spots.” Isabella pointed at three different points of the screen, then back to the notepad she’d dragged from a nearby drawer. “They all indicate abnormalities.”
“But they’re gone on the most recent tests.�
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“Yes.”
“When did they vanish? Let’s trace it back.”
The work took a while, the large files taking time to load and then search through. Liam settled into the moment, curious to see the side of Isabella that emerged as she worked.
While he’d seen several aspects of her personality, from the concerned friend to the nervous houseguest to the fierce warrior, the competent professional was a new one.
And oh, how she shone.
Her proficient fingers flew over the keyboard as she navigated through the various programs, jotting down notes and identifying each stage of what appeared to be Daniel Stephenson’s healing from a terminal illness.
Her long dark hair curled down her back and she continued pushing the heavy mass behind her ear as she worked her way methodically through the data. The traces of embarrassment that seemed to tinge other aspects of her life were nowhere in evidence as she trod the familiar paths of her work.
He fought the urge to run his hand through those lush strands—that fierce concentration was the only excuse he had for the fanciful thought that came next. “You love what you do.”
She twisted her head at the words, her fingers stilling over the keyboard as her gaze met his. “What?”
“Your work. You love it.”
“I do.” A light crinkle worked its way between her bright, expressive eyes. “Why do you ask?”
“As you’ve more than accurately assessed, it’s easy to suspect your motives. My family and I have been rather suspicious of you.”
“Suspicions that—”
He interrupted her, the twin demands to explain and apologize pushing him on. “That all vanishes watching you. You love what you do and it shows.”
Her dark, enigmatic gaze searched his face, as if judging the sincerity in his words. Whatever she looked for, he could only assume she found because her voice was quiet when she finally spoke. “I want to find the answers.”
Liam had always believed himself immune to the emotions that came so easy to others. Love. Understanding. Compassion.
He wasn’t heartless—or tried damn hard not to believe himself capable of it—but he knew he didn’t view the world as giving. Or kind. Or indulgent of those filled with gentler dispositions.