by Bella Street
Addison slapped the couch cushions. “Then that confirms it! She was from the past!”
“How do you figure that?”
Lani looked triumphant. “I told you! She was the one who brought up the Zannytu movie in the first place. Said there was no harm in watching it 'for old time's sake.' But when we watched it together, it was like the first time she'd seen it!”
“Okay, this is gonna blow your mind.” Addison paused for effect. “I once found a pair of leg warmers in the back of her closet.”
“All this time,” Lani said, sagging against the chair. “How could we have been so blind?”
“Leg warmers?” Gareth said, still lost.
Addison stood. “Verity came from 1980.”
“What? Why?” Why did he think he could handle time-travel calculations when he couldn't even follow a conversation?
“Well, we know Seffy is the hub.” Lani tapped her lip with the pencil. “So why did Verity come from 1980 to our time to get Seffy back here?”
“Yeah,” Addison said, “What's Seffy got that's so important to 1980?”
***
Seffy took a step back as Fenn sagged to one side and passed out. As she lowered the gun, her trigger finger felt like it had an itch that didn't get scratched.
He's faking it. He's trying to gain my sympathy. But he won't get it. She wiped her tears away with the sleeve of her shirt. In fact, he should die here, right at the point of admitting he was a failure.
She pulled in a deep breath. Was it really possible Fenn was her father? Or were all the pictures and documents just a stalker's collection? Her gaze went to the wall. She saw Fenn smiling, holding a baby wrapped in a pink blanket, Fiona at his side.
God, Fiona is my mother? She went very still as that horrendous factoid soaked in. I should turn the gun on myself right now and just be done with it.
The family friendly photos ended at the little girl in the polka dot dress. After that, the documents seem to uphold evidence of a search of some kind. The photos at the very end showed she'd been found—snapshots of her life in WeHo over the course of a year or so.
But it was all circumstantial. What was real was the man lying at her feet. It didn't matter if he was her father, or some crackpot with a wild theory. What she did know was that he had something to offer.
Seffy went for the phone and made a call, Fenn's lasts words burning a hole in her heart and soul.
There is a way.
Chapter Nineteen
Seffy refrained from telling Olga to hurry up.
Fenn lay against piles of pillows in his bed, looking like he'd already passed on to the Other Side.
Except his chest rose and fell with alarming irregularity.
The nurse bustled around the room, setting up an I.V. pole and rolling table that must've been stored in the closet.
She pulled a small cooler from her bag and opened it, revealing at least a dozen pint bags of blood and presumably blood components, if the yellow bags were any indication.
Next she began to hook up the tubing and place a series of syringes on the metal table.
“Shouldn't there be other medical personnel here?” Seffy said, feigning interest. All she cared about was Fenn getting well enough to calculate and coordinate and push the right buttons.
“For once the freak gets it,” Fiona said, looking decidedly ill herself.
Seffy shot her a dark look. Ah, Mommie Dearest. The happy little family is now all together.
“Tell me again why you can't do this in a medical facility with actual doctors?”
Fiona's words surprised her. So she really didn't know the truth about the nurse? And how had Fenn kept such a secret from his girlfriend when Fiona was obviously adept at compound conspiracies?
“I think it's obvious this is not a strictly normal procedure,” Olga said. “However, Fenn wishes it.”
Seffy glanced at the nurse. And you work for Fenn. You always have. Why did that fact still surprise her? Who was this eccentric yet weak compound leader who held Olga's loyalty?
Were she and the nurse related? Finding out Olga was her Meemaw would really be icing on the crazy cake.
“Seffy, grab that chair and come sit next to the bed.”
Seffy went for the chair with stiff movements. On top of everything, she might be sending a man to his death in the next few moments.
And yet, despite see-sawing emotions, she felt disconnected from the proceedings. Maybe she was just numb from one too many revelations.
Fenn is my father.
Fiona is my...God, I cannot finish that thought.
And I have a creepy alter-ego ghost haunting the halls of a psychiatric ward.
She remembered longing for a polka dot dress when she was little. Looks like I got at least one thing I wanted back then. Apparently getting um, parents, had been pushing the envelope.
“Get a move on,” Fiona snapped.
Seffy set the chair down, unable to keep the contempt from her face. “You know what, Fiona? I don't feel like doing the whole Red Cross thing today.” Without turning her head, she said, “Sorry, Olga, looks like we'll have to reschedule for another time.”
Fiona jumped up and shoved her toward the chair. “You'll do this now!”
Seffy loomed over the smaller woman, hands balled at her sides. “Bring it.”
Covering her stomach with splayed hands, Fiona took a step back, her dark eyes filled with fear and loathing.
“Ladies,” Olga said, exasperation in her tone. “This is a delicate medical procedure and Fenn does not have time for this.”
Fenn moaned softly as if in agreement. Veins stood out in his throat as he turned his head on the pillow.
Fiona glared at Seffy, her face flushed.
“So which is it?” Seffy flicked her bored gaze toward the figure on the bed. “Death or life?”
Fiona wrenched herself away and went to the end of the bed, looking like a wicked fairy who didn't get her way.
Almost disappointed she didn't get to beat the crap out of Fenn's girlfriend, Seffy pulled the chair next to the bed.
Suddenly Fenn grabbed her hand and pulled her close. She leaned toward him, frowning. What now?
He moved his mouth toward her ear. “She doesn't know,” he said in a low whisper. “She can't know.”
“What's he saying?” Fiona demanded.
Seffy avoided eye contact with the woman. “He's delirious.”
“Get away from him!”
“Oh, so you want me to leave? No problem.”
“Seffy, sit down.”
Olga dragged more machines from the closet and hooked electrodes to Fenn's body. Fiona curled up on the edge of the bed, sniffling, misery and surliness marring her face.
Finally the moment came when Olga started Fenn's I.V.
Seffy had to look away as the nurse threaded the thick needle. Despite bleeding all over most people she knew at the compound, she was still a bit squeamish.
When the nurse took her hand, Seffy could feel it shaking slightly. Would Olga be implicated with murder if this went badly? Fiona would no doubt press charges and sue for good measure. Might even get the older woman deported back to Mother Russia.
She was fun that way.
“This might pinch a little.”
Seffy winced and held her breath. People with needles were abject liars.
“I apologize for the rushed crudity of the procedure, but last minute testing was imperative.”
Her blood slowly seeped into an empty bag hanging from the arm rest. Seffy looked away. “Why couldn't you just use stored blood?”
“The components of your blood have, shall we say, a shelf life. For Fenn, I need a fresh dose.”
“What about for Trent?” she asked, dreading the answer.
“I was able to use a 'killed' version of your blood. The virus responded to that version as well as the live version, and of course I didn't want to take a chance using a live version if I didn't have to.”
&nbs
p; “Oh,” she said, renewed agony twisting her heart like a wrung-out rag. “But why did he have a heart attack?”
“I believe it was due to the virus and the steroids, not your blood.”
“And yet, you demand 'live' blood for Fenn,” Fiona said in a low voice.
“His cancer is a much tougher foe than any virus. We've already had this discussion.”
Fiona fell silent, her expression not softening not a whit.
Olga began a vitals check on Fenn's limp form, frowning while scribbling notes on her charts.
Seffy stared at her, trying to reconcile the image of the kindly nurse with the scary bloody doctor lady who worked on Fenn with some inner will that probably bordered on madness.
Aside from Fenn's harsh respiration, the heart monitor became the only sound in the room.
Seffy hated the heart monitor. It wasn't that long ago she'd heard it sounding off wildly before going silent altogether.
She glanced up at Olga's tense expression and wondered if anything was going wrong.
And why wouldn't it go wrong? I'm poison! She's pumping hot, live poison into another person and expecting something other than death.
If Fenn survived, would his body become covered in bruises like hers? Like Trent's had at the end?
She bit her lip to stem the tide of grief that lay just beyond the margin of self-control. Maybe Fenn would die. Maybe she would die—her blood had to be killing her from the inside out if it was as potent as Olga implied. Then all her troubles would be over.
Will they bury me behind the compound next to Trent?
The plastic tube carrying her toxins blurred. Seffy turned her head and stared hard at the opposite wall, determined Fiona not see a single tear.
Bottom line, Fenn needed to live, so he could follow through with his latest carrot on a stick.
His words reverberated once again in her mind.
There is a way.
There had to be a way.
The heart monitor suddenly began a lone note. Olga looked up from her notes, alarmed.
Fiona jumped up and approached her. “What does that mean?”
The nurse twisted around to the nightstand where several instruments and syringes lay ready. As she reached for a syringe, Fiona grabbed at the tubing and ripped it out of the back of Seffy's hand.
Pain sliced at Seffy's flesh. She stared at the gaping wound in her hand and looked up at Fiona in a daze. What the hell?
“You killed him!”
Seffy watched her blood ooze from the plastic tube now lying on the floor, leeching into the carpeting. “Most likely,” she said hollowly.
Even if the blood did save him, someone would emerge from the dark and gun him down anyway. It was all so pointless.
Next to her, Olga worked over Fenn's body to the sound of a flat-lining monitor. What did the nurse really think was going to happen? That he'd sit up and request a sugar cookie and paper cup of orange juice? That he'd run the compound with some modicum of leadership?
But he has to send me back.
He has to.
It had taken chest compressions and adrenaline to get Trent's heart going again—until a couple of bullets made it stop forever.
The carpet fibers continued to suck greedily at the leaking tube. Deep red paled as her blood spread outward from the initial drip. Red to pink. Pink to white. Who has white carpeting anyway? You can never keep it clean.
“Seffy, I'm going to need your help.”
She looked up with dull eyes.
“I need to get him on a hard surface to begin compressions. The bed's too soft.”
“HELP US!” Fiona screamed as she pushed ineffectually at Fenn's body.
Seffy stood and assisted Olga in lowering Fenn's boneless form to the floor, right on top of the growing blood stain. The nurse began CPR as Fiona looked on in horror.
Seffy regarded Fiona's bloodless lips and bleak eyes. Is that how I looked?
Next she turned her attention to Olga's grimly determined expression as she heaved over Fenn's body.
“Don't you dare leave me, Fenn!” Fiona cried. “I can't raise a child alone. Please!”
After what Fenn had put his body through, Seffy could only imagine the freakish outcome of any offspring.
She hoped for its sake Fiona went heavy with the organic vegetables and multi-vitamins.
Her vision dimmed.
Oh my God. She stared at Fiona in shock. Her gaze dropped the woman's midsection.
Is it me?
It must be.
And Fenn doesn't want Fiona to know.
Her brain went on a brown-out. It was just too much. She sagged against the wall, feeling like a discarded doll.
After a lifetime or so, the heart monitor picked up a pulse. Then another. Olga eased back, her face lined with sweat and strain.
Fenn coughed a few times and his eyes fluttered open. Fiona broke down weeping, her face in her hands.
Seffy got to her feet with an effort. She took one last look at the scene—the blood spattered bedspread, the prone body on the floor, the grieving woman—and turned to leave.
“Seffy,” Olga said, her voice rough with exhaustion. “I could still use your assistance.”
She shook her head. “No, I'm done here.”
***
Fenn blinked as his surroundings slowly came into focus. The first thing he noticed was Fiona asleep in a chair next to his bed. She looked as exhausted as he felt. Shadows hollowed the contours beneath her eyes and cheekbones.
His eyes flicked to movement on his right. Olga bent over him, her brow furrowed. He became aware of a pressure on his chest. She was listening to his lungs with a stethoscope.
She showed no signs of realizing he was awake. Maybe that was because his eyelids felt weighted with soul-deep fatigue.
I suppose this means I'm not dead.
And yet he'd seen the beckoning bright light—knew his chances had evaporated due to the sickness in his bones. It was his quest that had killed him.
And the object of his desire had brought him back.
Life is in the blood.
But like life, the opportunity was fleeting. He knew he had one last chance to make the most of it. One last chance to make things right.
“So how long have I got?” His voice came out roughened with the rigors of death.
Olga's eyes appeared over the edge of her half-moon glasses. “That was rather a close call.”
Fenn attempted a half-hearted smile. “What happened? Did I just drop dead?”
“More like a lapsing. You became weak, then slowly went under.”
“Sounds like a description for my existence.”
Olga's stiff smile faded almost as soon as it had begun. “Like I said, it was too close.”
He forced his eyes to remain open. “How much time have I got?”
She sighed. “I haven't run all the tests yet, but I think the sooner you resolve your issues, the better.”
Fenn concentrated on pulling air into his lungs and releasing it. Even his heart only seemed to beat through the force of his will.
“Fiona's right. I can't leave her behind.” He looked up at the nurse. “The baby...what would be the effects of leukemia and a recent heroine addiction?”
“Frankly, I'm shocked you were able to father a child at all. Infertility is the primary side-effect of cancer and addiction.” She cleared her throat then lowered her voice. “You're sure the child is yours? During the aeration experiment, several compound residents ended up...impregnated by the wrong persons.”
He glanced at his girlfriend. She was many things but unfaithful was not one of them. “Fiona was locked in her room for most of that period,” he said. “But regardless, the child is mine.”
Olga took released a breath. “Fenn, I need to remind you again to take care of the matters at hand. Of all the tests I've done with Seffy's blood and a variety of pathogens, there's never actually been a cure.”
He'd suspected as much. But
it still came as a heavy disappointment. “But there is a second chance?”
“Yes.” She fiddled with the stethoscope. “And you're not the only one running out of time.”
Fenn passed a weary hand over his face, not unaware of the irony of the statement.
Because, technically speaking, he had all the time in the world.
***
Seffy sat in her room, on the edge of the bed, head in her hand.
Talk about the hangover of a lifetime. That's what it was like—the fog, the pain, the queasy stomach.
Queasy to the point that Olga had performed a pregnancy test.
But the only baby is me...
In someone else's womb.
God, how could she get a handle on this? How could she come to terms with the impossible?
Fenn had mentioned the earthquakes had started when Fiona got pregnant. So does that mean I'm responsible for that, too? Is there any mess that isn't my fault?
She thought briefly of the Glock she'd hidden in her room along with the gun Trent gave her. That was one way to 'fix' things.
But as soon as the idea presented itself, she rejected it once again. Trent wouldn't want her to take that way out. And let's face it, I don't have the guts to splatter them on the wall anyway.
Maybe some therapeutic Thorazine would help in a pinch.
A knock on the door brought her head up.
Gareth peeked in. “Is this an okay time?”
Best ever. Schooling her expression, Seffy nodded. “Sure.”
He entered the room and lowered himself onto the chair. “So...how are you feeling?”
Numb?
Shell-shocked?
Nigh suicidal?
“Okay.”
He cleared his throat. “A lot has been going on around here and I thought you might like an update.”
It was on the tip of her tongue to challenge him on the whole 'a lot' descriptor.
Pretty sure I cornered the market on that. “Oh? Like what?”
“Well, you're never going to believe this but Lani thinks Verity is behind the whole thing.”
Seffy stiffened at the name, then stifled a bark of laughter. “Verity?”