While she waits, she distracts herself with an email from Elliot, who wants more funding to study the sea cucumbers. Over the past few weeks Holly has done plenty of bedtime reading on sea cucumbers, thanks to detailed and frequent reports from Elliot. She’s learned that not only do the creatures vomit up their intestines when threatened (Elliot used the more technical term expel), they’re able to regrow entire parts of their bodies as well. Elliot believes that the proteins that cause the elasticity and regeneration could be used in a new line of skin care aimed at what he tactfully calls the “mature population.” His initial findings look extremely promising.
Could this be the breakthrough she needs for her own research? Holly shoots a quick reply, saying she’ll approve the funding but wants to be part of the test group. It will give her access to the product, and possibly the raw materials, without arousing suspicion. She couches it as a joke. “I’m a reluctant member of the target audience, after all,” she writes.
But Elliot’s response is a quick and unequivocal refusal: “Sorry. Including you could be seen as biased by outsiders at best—at worst, it might raise questions of data manipulation.”
She reads his answer and frowns. She respects Elliot’s ethics, she really does, but this isn’t the NIH. She debates on whether to insist, but decides to let it go. She’ll gain access some other way.
She spends the next hour brooding over the lab results on the last synthetic sample of Eden’s blood. It’s like a Rubik’s Cube—she gets one aspect of the sample to work, and the others fall apart. If she could just discover how the protein ages Eden, she might be able to figure out how to stop it and wake her up—and find the key to a synthesized version for Jack. She pores over her notes, looking for the solution. But she’s too close to the data, has been working on it for too long. Whatever the answer is, she’s not seeing it. Frustrated, she puts it away and heads downstairs to say goodbye to Jack.
“What’s on for your afternoon?” she asks.
“I dunno. I may try to go for a run when I finish,” he says, drumming his pencil on the library table. “And at some point I need to talk with my geometry teacher to go over this crap.”
“All right,” Holly says. “Let me know how it goes, okay? And if you run, take it easy.”
“Whatever,” he mutters, shifting restlessly away from her.
She lets the comment go. Keeping him on this short of a leash is tough on both of them, but it’s the best she can do right now. If she’s honest, it’s all she can do, at least until she figures out how to replicate the proteins in Eden’s blood. Or finds Eden.
And when she does—she tries hard not to think otherwise—what then? What if Eden is awake? For years, Holly has longed to hold Eden, to hear her voice and see her smile. But there’s a very real possibility hugging won’t be what Eden has in mind. Not after serving as a human science experiment for so many years. Even though at least half of the science was done for her benefit.
And what about Jack? Eden was always a generous child, and she loved her brother. But a niggling voice in the back of Holly’s brain worries Eden may feel differently about being a human pincushion now that she’s awake. One step at a time, Holly tells herself.
First they have to find her.
* * *
Christopher Cooke’s office is located at the far end of a quiet, leafy street. It’s a comfortable brick cottage with a grassy yard and a few fat rosebushes climbing a trellis in the front. Like Christopher himself, the house isn’t what Holly expected. She drives past twice before she’s certain she has the correct address.
When she parks and gets out, she sees a side door with an Office sign discreetly lettered in green and gold. She makes her way along the path to the side door and rings the bell.
He must have been waiting for her because he opens the door almost immediately. He’s dressed in a pressed white shirt and dark-wash jeans, and his long black hair is damp, as if he’s stepped out of the shower. He’s not handsome, not exactly—the scars on his face and the world-weariness with which he carries himself take care of that—but there’s a magnetism to him that’s impossible to ignore. He reminds her of a sleek panther she saw once at the zoo. It’s hard to look away.
“Come in,” he says, standing back to let her pass. She’s careful not to stare at his right hand, but when he leads her to the office she can’t help but sneak a glance. He turns around in time to catch her.
“Ah,” he says, with that amused grin she finds so infuriating. He holds his arm up, rotating it from side to side. He’s wearing a prosthetic today, one that ends in an articulated hand. He extends, then curls the fingers, waggling them at her. “No hook today. I tend to save that for first impressions and occasional practical jokes.”
He’s standing in front of a large window, and with the sun behind him, Holly can see through the thin fabric of his shirt. The artificial arm, a sleek metallic black, joins his own at the elbow. In the soft afternoon light, it’s oddly beautiful.
“How does it work?” Holly asks, fascinated.
“Osseointegration,” he says. “A fancy way of saying that it’s grafted onto my nerves and bones.” He rolls back his sleeve to show her the implant site. She’s conscious of how closely he’s watching her, but if he’s hoping for a reaction, he won’t get it from Holly. She has too many of her own scars.
“Does it hurt?”
He shakes his head. “Not much. Not anymore. My arm gets tired sometimes, after a long day. But not often.”
He rolls the sleeve down, then stretches out his hand to her, palm upright. She hesitates, then meets it with her own. The artificial hand is cool, not humanlike at all, yet touching it is uncomfortably intimate, as if he’s showing her the truest part of himself. It’s so quiet she can hear her own breathing, and maybe his too. His gaze is steady, but she struggles to meet his eyes. She wonders if he can detect the pressure of her skin against his hand, and the thought makes her breath come more quickly.
Ridiculous.
She steps back and breaks their contact.
“The best titanium and plastic you can buy,” he says, dropping the hand to his side. If he’s noticed her agitation, he doesn’t show it. “It even comes with a silicon sleeve that makes it more realistic. Lets me blend in better at fancy parties and whatnot. But I don’t get invited to many of those, and I’ve never been a fan of artifice, so I go with the black.”
Holly can’t tell if that’s an insult or not. It sounds like one, and she leaps at the chance to take offense and put that moment of connection behind her.
“Since that hefty retainer I paid came from the profits of artifice, I’d think you’d be more of a fan,” she says.
He shrugs. “No disrespect meant. There’s no way to hide this, so why try?” he says, waving the hand at her again. “On the other hand, when the robot revolution comes, I’ll be on the winning side. Do you see what I did there?”
Holly tries not to smile, but it’s such an awful joke she can’t help herself. “Do you have something for me?”
He sighs theatrically. “To business, then. Please, take a seat.” He gestures at a desk and chair across the room. She walks toward it and he follows, and she tries not to be conscious of his eyes on her back. She focuses on his office to distract herself. It’s different from what she’d expected. White, filled with light and a few simple pieces of furniture, it’s understated in a style not that different from her own. There’s no clutter, only a single plant on a side table by the window.
She sits in the chair, and he settles himself behind the desk. A laptop is on its center, and Cooke opens it. He types for a moment, then swivels its screen toward her, and Holly braces herself for what she’ll see.
Except she’s looking at a blank screen. A single white page with nothing on it. She looks at him inquiringly.
“This is what I’ve found so far,” he says.
“Is this some sort of a joke?” She takes a deep breath, trying to calm the anger that flares through her. Her children have no time for this.
“Not at all,” he says. He pushes the computer out of the way and leans forward. “At least not on my end.”
“Excuse me?”
“Holly—may I call you Holly?”
“I prefer Dr. Darling,” she says coolly.