Chapter 8 - The twins test positive
Dr. Whitaker called at 5:40 the next morning.
I had slept nineteen minutes in a chair.
“Lawson.”
I stood.
“What?”
“Preliminary toxicology is concerning.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
Both children showed biomarkers consistent with exposure to the same class of industrial solvent identified in the old environmental report.
Not proof of where exposure occurred.
Important.
But no longer hypothetical.
Their medical teams began reviewing whether stored blood from earlier admissions showed the same markers.
It did.
Lower at first.
Higher later.
Pattern consistent with continued exposure.
Not dose reconstruction.
Not exact dates.
A trend.
I asked:
“Genevieve?”
The medical examiner had retained specimens because her death involved unresolved systemic illness.
Obtaining new testing required process.
Her estate representative.
Medical examiner authorization.
Legal requests.
It took days.
Meanwhile, the children stayed in the hospital.
Their treatment changed.
Remove suspected exposure.
Support organ function.
Treat complications.
No antidote miracle.
No mysterious herb Elena carried.
Medicine.
Monitoring.
Time.
Blythe improved first.
Her heart rhythm stabilized.
Jonah did not.
His liver injury remained severe.
Dr. Whitaker said:
“We need to prepare for the possibility he may need transplant evaluation if function continues declining.”
I walked into a bathroom.
Locked the door.
Put both hands on the sink.
Then I screamed once.
Not loudly enough for a movie.
A broken sound into a towel.
When I came out, Elena was sitting outside the twins’ room.
She had changed out of the maid uniform.
Jeans.
Borrowed sweatshirt.
“How is he?”
“Worse.”
She nodded.
No false reassurance.
I asked:
“Did Genevieve know this could kill them?”
Elena looked at me.
“She knew it could be dangerous.”
“Did she know she was dying from it?”
“No.”
That mattered.
Genevieve had suspected.
She had not solved her own death in advance.
I had spent one night turning her into a prophet because guilt wanted someone else to know what I should have known.
Elena corrected me.
“She was scared she might be wrong.”
“About the house?”
“About everything.”
“She wrote like she knew.”
“She wrote because she knew she might not get another chance.”
That was Genevieve.
May you like
Not certainty.
Preparation.
