The Vines by Shelley Nolden (ebook and pdf reader .TXT) 📕

She shook her head. “That’s not it.”

“Then why?” he asked, squinting to distinguish her face from the sunlight behind her.

Her sky-blue eyes looked heartbreakingly soulful. Finn felt the urge to embrace her, despite all the reasons he knew he shouldn’t. He looked down at the river of brittle vines that ran past him. Soon they would be supple again. The seasons would repeat. If Kristian lived, he would find a way to torment her despite their father’s edict. Cora would pass the next years the same way she had the last hundred.

He pictured the scars that traversed her body and remembered what she’d said about her interior being even uglier. Although incomparably prettier than Frankenstein, she, too, had been transformed by scientists who’d believed they could play God. It made perfect sense that she’d revolted against the family that had viewed her as their creation—and property. So why was she helping them now?

He leaned forward and lifted her chin, so she had no choice but to look at him. “You owe me an answer.”

Her eyelids fluttered, their long lashes shining with tears.

Rollie called for them to hurry, but Finn didn’t stir.

Neither did Cora.

At last, she met his gaze. “I love him.”

He must have misheard, yet her words had been crystal clear. “How could you possibly?”

Already turning away from him, she plucked a package from among a scattering of antiseptic wipes. “Needles!”

“Bring them here!” Rollie commanded.

“Where do you want me?” she asked, rushing to his side.

“On the gurney.” Rollie connected a needle to each end of the tubing. “So the blood can flow down to Kristian. Finn, help her.”

Stunned, she stood stock still, staring at the surface she’d been bound to minutes earlier.

Finn’s stomach lurched. They couldn’t ask her to lie back down on that, so he scrambled to his feet and righted the examining table. After testing its sturdiness, he extended his hand to her.

“Hurry, we’re losing him!” his father yelled, breaking Cora’s trance.

She looked at Finn, and he could see her fear.

“I won’t let anything happen to you; I promise.” He squeezed her hand.

Exhaling slowly, she sat down on the rusted metal which creaked and wobbled beneath her trembling frame. He lifted her legs onto the footrest and grabbed the needle now connected to the tubing.

She shrank away from it. “I don’t know if I can.”

“Do you want me to?” Finn asked, though he doubted he could properly insert it into her vein.

“I’ll do it!” Rollie shouted.

“That’s not what I meant,” she said, her teeth chattering.

“Would you rather be asleep?” Rollie stood up. “As God is my witness, I swear no harm will come to you. Though you may need a breathing tube.”

Slowly, she sat up. “Okay, but first, I need to say good-bye, in case . . .”

Rollie backed away and signaled Finn to do the same.

Cora bent over Kristian’s still form, whispered into his ear, and kissed his forehead.

Suddenly comprehending that the two had a history together, he wondered what had happened between them that made her so forgiving now.

With renewed poise, Cora climbed back onto the table. “Don’t worry: I’ve got something.”

Rollie nodded and took the needle from Finn.

From her pocket, she removed the vial of chloroform, which she must have recovered while searching for the needles and tubing.

With an uncharacteristically peaceful expression, she gazed into the palm of her other hand. Finn strained to see the object, but her fingers had closed around it.

She looked from Kristian to Finn, then laid down. After a whispered prayer, she removed the plug from the chamber, closed her eyes, and held it to her nose.

Silently, Finn reminded her of his promise.

Moments later, her hand slipped from its resting spot atop her abdomen, and her fingers uncurled, revealing an empty palm.

Rollie inserted the needle, connecting Cora and Kristian.

Though unconscious, she seemed to be smiling.

Six days later

March 27

black sedan careened through the stale yellow light.

Finn grabbed Lily’s coat sleeve and yanked her back into the pool of lamplight on the corner of the sidewalk.

“Ouch!” she said, surprised.

The surge of adrenaline had reminded him of the times he’d almost lost her, and he shivered in the misty rain. He longed to pull her to him. Instead, he didn’t even offer the now obvious explanation.

Throughout their commute from the Bronx hotel where they’d spent the past six days in quarantine, she’d been seemingly oblivious to the bustle of evening rush hour. And quiet, worrisomely so. During their second stint in isolation, the few times Lily had answered his calls she’d only been willing to discuss Kristian’s health.

According to Rollie, who’d run their diagnostics while caring for Kristian in the Tuberculosis Pavilion, Kristian had tested positive for Ebola, Rift Valley fever, and Spanish influenza—all three of Cora’s diseases without vaccines. To prevent the physical side effects of stress from hindering Kristian’s healing, Rollie had been keeping him in a medically induced coma while watching for symptoms to emerge.

Although Lily’s aloofness since leaving North Brother was justified, it had exacerbated Finn’s own agitation. He’d taken for granted how open she’d always been with him. In comparison to his family’s secrets and evasiveness, Lily’s honesty and chatter had provided a welcome contrast. It was just one of the many reasons he loved—and needed—her.

Now he’d likely lose her, right as his family was falling apart.

Finn followed Lily across Madison Avenue, the mist glistening in the headlights of the waiting cars.

In a few minutes, they would enter his parents’ warm, bright, deadly quiet apartment. Finn couldn’t do that with this wall between them.

“Come here a sec,” he said, abruptly moving under an awning to escape the biting wind.

Glancing in the direction of his parents’ apartment, Lily frowned, and Finn surmised that she was debating between two equally unpleasant alternatives: continuing there without him or having the conversation she’d been avoiding.

“Can we please talk?”

From her rigid jaw and posture, he knew her standoffishness would be hard to crack.

During the past six nights, his hotel bed had felt