She now had an hour before it was quitting time and the first results of Blaise’s father’s blood tests were ready. Harley looked at the printouts, ready to spot anything that would suggest what the illness was or if something else was going on.
The first thing that brought her up short wasn’t what she’d been prepared to find. It was an irregularity in the blood itself. Harley switched to the second test she’d run and found the same finding. Not used to seeing that result, and not knowing what it stood for, she had to look it up.
What it turned out to be had her shaking her head. The irregularity was cougar hemoglobin, which was impossible. But the third test’s printout showed the same thing. If she hadn’t taken the blood herself, she would have thought someone had mixed big-cat blood with the human one.
As she scanned the rest of the page, she put the irregularity aside. What the results showed was definitely more concerning. Blaise had been right. His cousin had set out to harm Blaise’s father. There were not one but two strong poisons in his system. How he’d survived for so long was a miracle. A normal person would have died shortly after it was introduced. In the back of her mind, Harley had to wonder if it had to do with the cougar blood. She quickly pushed that thought away. She’d talk to Blaise about it after his dad was fixed up. Even though the poisons were deadly, there were medications that counteracted them, and quickly.
Harley couldn’t get her hands on the antidotes yet, but she knew a doctor who could give her what she needed. He wouldn’t ask questions. He was a research doctor whom Harley had worked for right out of school. He would trust she would need the medication without having to know the reason why. All it would take would be for her to talk to him and he’d call in the prescription to a drugstore for her to pick up.
She made her call, having the result she wanted. The only thing he asked was for her to keep him informed if all didn’t work out as she’d planned. Harley had quickly promised she would, then gave him the address to the drugstore not too far from the lab, not wanting to use the one right next door.
Harley left work and headed for the drugstore. There she was able to pick up the prescription, along with a small package of syringes, without having to wait. Her doctor friend had made sure the pharmacy filled it as a rush prescription.
During the drive to Blaise’s place, Harley found herself flicking her gaze to the blood test result printouts, which sat on the passenger seat with the white pharmacy bag. She now couldn’t get the thought of cougar hemoglobin being mixed with Blaise’s father’s blood out of her head. There was no way it could have been added later. She’d taken the sample herself, and no one had touched the vials but her. It didn’t make sense.
She turned onto the long lane that led to Blaise’s house. Once she arrived, Harley parked in front of the four-car garage. She gathered up the things from the passenger seat and got out. She knocked on the front door once she reached it.
Blaise answered. He smiled before he pulled her inside and into his arms. He kissed her hungrily, showing how much he’d missed her, before he released her. It took a second for Harley to gather her wits about her once again.
“You have the results?” Blaise asked as he glanced down at what she carried.
“Yes. I think you should get everyone up to your parents’ room so I can tell you all at the same time.”
He met her gaze with a short nod. “All right.
Wait right here. I’ll get them.”
Blaise walked to the living room. Once he disappeared from sight, Harley heard him tell his family she’d arrived and that she wanted to talk to them all upstairs with his father. They were a silent group as they stepped out into the foyer.
Taylor took the lead up the stairs with Aspen as his mother, then Harley and Blaise, followed.
Inside the master bedroom, they stood around the bed. Blaise’s dad pushed himself up higher on his pillows once his gaze landed on Harley.
“I take it you have the results,” he said to her.
Harley nodded. She held up the printouts.
“It’s not good.”
“You found out what illness he has?” Blaise’s mother quickly asked.
“It’s not that. And it’s not an illness.” Harley looked at Blaise. “You were right. Caleb is doing your father harm. He has to have known it.” She turned her gaze on her boyfriend’s dad. “I found two strong poisons in your blood. I don’t know how you’re still alive. The amounts would have killed anyone else.”
“Poison,” he replied. “It wasn’t medicine Caleb was injecting me with.”
“No. He was administering the poison that way. That’s the only thing I could come up with. I understand you’ve been sick for over half a year.
He probably managed to somehow get the first doses of poison into you through your food or something you drink. Then once you became sick enough that you needed more care, that’s when he started with the shots.”
Blaise’s father glanced at his wife with a grim expression. “It wasn’t through my food. It was through something I drank. Caleb gave me a bottle of ten-year-old scotch to show his appreciation for all I’d done to help him become a doctor. He hadn’t given me anything before. He knows I’m the only person in the house who likes scotch. It has to be that. Now that I think about it, I started to become ill shortly after I had a few drinks of it.”
Harley nodded. “The poison is the type that doesn’t leave a person’s system. It just built up with each drink you had until you thought you were really sick.”
“Is there something we can do to counteract the poison?” Blaise’s mom asked.
Harley held up the white pharmacy bag she carried. “I have it right here. I know a doctor who was able to write me a prescription for it. He’s a good friend of mine and didn’t ask any questions.
He knows I wouldn’t do anything stupid with it. I have to give you two shots. One dose of each should be enough, but if you don’t improve in a couple of days, he told me to give you another.”
Blaise’s father held out his arm. “Do it. I’m sure one dose will be enough.”
She dumped the medicine and syringes onto the bed and prepared the first injection with the amount her doctor friend prescribed. Once she administered it, she readied the second.
Harley had just stuck the needle into Blaise’s father’s shoulder when she heard, “What’s going on here? What’s she giving to my patient? I came back to check on him since I couldn’t give him his medication and this is what I find?”
She quickly pushed the plunger home, emptying the syringe. Harley barely managed to take out the needle before she was roughly pushed aside. This was obviously Caleb.
“She was undoing what you did,” Blaise said.
Anger clouded Caleb’s face. “What do you mean by that exactly?” he demanded.
“Harley is a medical lab technician. We allowed her to run some blood tests on my father’s blood. She found the poison you’ve been giving to him. We know what you’ve been doing.”
It all happened so suddenly Harley had no chance of getting away. Caleb grabbed her around the throat and spun her so her back was against his front. He growled like a big cat, his fingers tightening until she could barely breathe. She reached up and tried to tear his hand away, but he was stronger than she.
“If not for this meddling bitch none of you would have known,” Caleb said in a voice laced with another growl. “I never would have thought you’d have allowed a human to do any kind of test on him. Who would have known our glorious leader of our family group would have taken the risk of letting one learn the secret of what we are.