Peril (17 page)

Just a few steps shy of her recliner, she stopped. “Morgan? Morgan Adams?”

Somehow she nodded. She was afraid her words would not come forth when her mind tasked her vocal cords with uttering them.

She held out her hand. “I'm Lilly Reeves. It's nice to meet you.”

Morgan brought her free right hand up and Lilly clasped both her hands around it. She took a seat in the nearby wooden rocker, perching herself on the edge, her eyes searched every inch of Morgan's face.

In her chest, Morgan's heart buzzed like it had suddenly sprouted hummingbird's wings. Ever since her mother's confession, thoughts of this sister had consumed her mind. She even dreamed of her last night . . . of what she might look like. Would she like Morgan? Just tolerate her?

Could Lilly love her like she imagined a sister would?

Morgan eased her hand from Lilly's. The touch of her hands, the swollen sadness in her eyes, the pensive smile on her face pulled tears down Morgan's face.

Lilly reached to her and quickly wiped them away. “You're so beautiful. You have the prettiest eyes I've ever seen.”

Morgan laughed, the tension easing from her chest. “Me? Have you been without a mirror?”

Lilly smiled in return and eased herself back into the rocker. “I'm afraid I have a confession to make. Once I learned your name from your mother and that you were getting dialysis, I searched medical records to see if you might be a patient here.”

Morgan understood the implication. “I won't tell anyone of your little HIPAA violation.”

“Trust me, I'm fine with the repercussions considering I did find you. This wasn't very nice of me sneaking up on you like this, but I figured you'd be trapped and couldn't run away.”

Morgan sighed. “I wondered if this moment would happen.”

Lilly leaned forward. “I want to know everything about you and your life.” She reached over and fingered Morgan's wedding ring. “And about the man you married.”

“How did you find out about me?” Morgan asked. “Your father?”

Sadness scrawled over Lilly's face. “No, certainly not. Thomas Reeves is not a man who's known for being forthright and honest. That's for sure.”

Morgan pulled her lip between her teeth. Perhaps her mother had been right to protect her from having a relationship with such a man. After all, this woman, her sister, could barely hide her contempt.

Lilly shivered, her body shedding bad thoughts like a dog shaking off sewer water. “Your mother paid me a visit.”

If she'd ever doubted her mother's love for her, this was the moment those thoughts died. Clearly, Sally had risked everything to approach Lilly. Considering what little Morgan knew of Thomas Reeves, Lilly didn't seem to be swooning over the father she herself hadn't grown up with. Morgan reconsidered her mother's position. Still, uncertainty tainted her willingness to forgive. Did she have to hide the truth? Wouldn't there have been some point to disclose who her real father was, even if there was a hint of a question? Wasn't knowing the truth always better?

In her awed silence, Lilly filled the void. “Your mother . . . she loves you very much.”

Fresh tears welled in Morgan's eyes. “I know.”

“Sally didn't explain much about how you ended up here. It's unusual for a woman your age to need a kidney transplant. I'm a doctor . . . don't know if you knew that. So, of course, I'm going to ask you all those inappropriate questions that should never be asked until at least the second visit.”

What was it about Lilly Reeves that seemed so familiar? “I feel like I know you . . . like I've seen you somewhere before.”

“I work here at Blue Ridge, in the emergency room. Used to be at Sage. Maybe you were a patient there at one time.”

“Never.”

Lilly smoothed her lips together. Her perfectly applied lipstick not crossing the boundary of her lips despite the motion. “I guess if I'm asking you to tell me the intimate details of your life, I can at least begin with one of my own.” She folded her hands tightly against her stomach. “Only fair, right? Me being your older sister and all.”

Those words,
older sister
, so foreign yet so full of meaning and possibility.

“My life was splashed across the news a few years back. The Drake Maguire case?”

Morgan nodded slowly as she pulled the story from her mind.

The serial rapist.

“I was one of his victims.”

There was a brief silence between them and then Lilly reached out and clasped a hand over Morgan's.

“Now, what's this business all about?” She motioned to the medical equipment.

Morgan's throat swelled with thoughts of Teagan, how her illness would be worth every moment if her daughter were still alive. “I got sick when I was pregnant. HELLP syndrome. I developed kidney failure and there was no reversing it.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Did my mother tell you about my daughter? Teagan—” Morgan choked over her name, the tide of emotion suffocating her like she'd been shoved underwater, her blame the hand that held her under.

Lilly's eyes glistened. “Yes.”

What had caused Morgan to immediately march down that path? Was it to test Lilly's resolve? Shove her away from a relationship because Morgan didn't plan on staying on planet earth that long?

Lilly held her hand tighter. “I know what you're doing. I've done it myself.”

Morgan turned her eyes away. Lilly's hand over hers was too much, like a fire lit into the darkness that swallowed her soul. Her skin burned under Lilly's touch.

“I had a friend . . . a good friend . . . I tried to drive away because I thought I could handle my whole mess of a life better on my own. The man who attacked me murdered her.” A sigh escaped her lips. “We can't hold ourselves responsible for others' actions. I felt for a long time I should have saved Dana's life.” A tear rolled down her cheek. More echoed from Morgan's eyes. “I know as mothers we hold ourselves up on this pedestal of belief that we can prevent all the bad things from happening to our loved ones. It's just not true.”

Lilly pulled a tissue from her pocket and dabbed Morgan's cheeks. One glance, then Morgan couldn't pull her gaze away. Lilly's face mirrored the prison of her own life. “At some point, we have to give it up and know that the reason for such things may never be known to us.”

“I can't do it . . . get to that place of forgiveness.”

“Forgiveness can be a hard road. Personally, the closer I am to God, the easier it's become. How about you? Do you have faith?”

Morgan rubbed the heel of her hand against the pain in her chest. “I did once—now I don't think I could ever have it again.”

Chapter 19

Late Morning, Friday, August 10

T
HOMAS
R
EEVES READ OVER
the pathology report for the third time before he slapped it back down onto the table. Tyler's assessment of the situation was correct. The cells in the neuro graft were growing at an uncontrolled pace.

Early in Reeves's medical career, at medical school to be exact, he'd been surprised to learn what cancer really was. For most of his life, it had been the boogeyman in the closet. Both of his parents had died from the disease when he was fairly young. His mother from breast cancer and his father from a brain tumor.

And here he'd given a fit young man the disease he had once sworn to cure.

That pathology class had been a real eye-opener. All cancer was, in the end, was a cell that had lost control of itself. The reproductive mechanisms ran amok, dividing rapidly into a mass of nonfunctioning cells, crushing out the viable ones, preventing them from doing their work. At times, their havoc spread to distant areas of the body:
metastasis
. When that occurred, they grew wildly in other places and pushed those normal cells from completing their bodily duties.

One cell, the building block of every organ, gone awry.

Cells unhinged. Drunk with the power of a life without limitations.

And somehow it spoke to him on another level. What would that kind of life be like? One without boundaries? One without consequences?

Neural grafts were a new field. Previous physicians had attempted to use transplanted neural grafts in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's patients to see if it could cure those disease processes. Well, it had succeeded in abating some patient symptoms, but on a very small scale.

After his success in treating PTSD, the brain continued to be an ultimate fascination for him. How could he actually improve the organ,
tinker with the biological supercomputer? He'd read autobiographies of people with picture-perfect memories. More than just photographic, they could remember things with such detail that it could supersede physical maps, plans, and tactical details.

Super soldiers.

Creating these men would garner military interest, he figured. Then he could live a life without limits. Military applications set everyone free. Once the power of a nuclear bomb was realized on the poor souls in Japan, everyone else feared one detonating on his territory and stayed in line.

Now, the perfect spy. The perfect soldier. Able to gather data without recording equipment. Memorize battle plans at the drop of a hat. And he could make that happen. He was sure of it.

At first, the government had shied away from the idea of actual brain surgery, but when he relayed the practical military applications, they were eager to get on board. Under the cover of another company, of course. No direct link between Reeves and the military for the media to sniff out.

But something now was horribly wrong with his life-limitless experiment. And if he didn't figure it out soon, his plush life of endless possibilities was going to evaporate before his eyes. He would likely end up with something worse. Revocation of his medical license was a definite possibility. Time in jail? He never wanted to see the inside of a cell again.

He glanced at the report and then out the window.

He'd
given
someone cancer.

The problem had to be the cells' genetic basis and not his doctoring of them. Young, immature cells were known to behave this way. It had happened in other studies. So, were more mature cells the answer? As much as he hated to admit it, adult cells did behave better, knew their limitations.

Was that the problem with a limitless life? There was ultimate destruction at the end? His mother, before her death, had talked about the Ten Commandants as the constraints that give you freedom because they keep you out of trouble.

He shook his head to dislodge the image of her wasting body from his mind. What did she know anyway?

But perhaps this is what those immature neural cells needed—a way to
have limits put on their infantile behavior. Could mixing in some adult cells help?

But what adult would readily give up his brain cells, particularly if it meant he or she could die.

What's the way around that little problem, Thomas?

Chapter 20

Early Afternoon, Friday, August 10

L
ILLY
R
EEVES KNOCKED
on her father's door.

She gathered the striking young man sitting at the nurses' station reviewing charts was Tyler Adams. From Morgan's description, it fit the man to a T. Brown hair with streaks of dark blond. Polarizing blue eyes. There was definitely something brewing behind them as he quickly leafed through the several notebooks stacked beside him.

Beneath her touch, the door opened, and the coolness of Reeves's inner sanctum drew her feet forward. He stepped back, a moment of shock and hidden amusement halting his pace before he beckoned her forward and closed the door behind her.

“Quite a surprise to have you visit me today. Are you going to sit or just stand and continue to look like you're going to claw my throat out?”

Lilly eased into the chair, crossed her legs, and settled her hands onto her lap. “You say you want to have a relationship, right? Did you plan on ever telling me about her?”

He brushed invisible particles from the desk blotter. “One, I've only known for a day. And two, what would the point of that have been?”

She tapped at her cheek as her eyes narrowed. “You don't think I'd be interested in knowing I have a sister?”

His eyebrows rose. “You want to meet her?”

“I already have.” Lilly leaned forward. “She needs us. And you turn her mother away?”

“That surprises me.”

“What?”

“That you'd want to have a relationship with her.”

“Why?”

“Because the only part that relates her to you is my genetics.”

“Maybe that's why . . . to see if there are any redeeming parts in your DNA.”