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  "I'm not a baby, damn it. Get your hands off me!" If I'd had the energy I might have hit him I was so angry at the way he was treating me. He threw his hands up in the air though, do I let it go with a glare.

  I grabbed onto the cabinets beside his bed to help me stay standing. I managed to get to the end of the cabinets before my little stubborn streak got slaughtered by the dizziness taking over my head. "Brodie," I called out in a panic.

  His hands were on my waist instantly. "I'm right here."

  I shut my eyes tight. "Make the room stop spinning."

  He wrapped his arms around my arms and held me tight until the dizziness passed, and I relaxed. "Better?"

  I forced my body to turn around in his arms, so I could cuddle into him. I'd been stupid when I yelled at him. He'd done nothing but try to help me. "Sorry. I don't know why I got so angry."

  "You're sick, sweetheart. I get it, and I'll step back when you push me away, but I'll never leave you. Now can I put you back in bed? It's starting to hit Sammy, and I need to make sure Grams doesn't need my help."

  I nodded, feeling even guiltier because he was being so understanding. He carried me back to bed, and I was afraid I was being a burden. "My dad can take care of me. Your grandma has her hands full."

  He took my hand in his and brushed my hair away from my face. "You're still really sick, Risa. We just barely got your fever down into the 102s, and I can't help anyone if all I'm doing is worrying about what might be going on with you."

  "But when you get sick, how is your grandma gonna handle that?"

  He stood up. "Lara's on her way over. It'll be fine, just get some rest. I have to go back downstairs."

  I nodded and closed my eyes when he stepped away from me, but he came back a second later and kissed my forehead. The last thought to float through my mind before I fell asleep again was about Brodie. For someone who wasn't the boyfriend type, he made a really good boyfriend.

  Easier to Believe the Bad Stuff

  When Grams shook me awake and took my temperature, she looked exhausted. It was still dark out, and my throat felt permanently swollen.

  "101.4," she declared with a smile. "I'm very pleased with this."

  "How's Sammy?" I croaked.

  "He'll be fine. I poured fluids down him all night, so his body was better prepared for the fever. He only ever got as high as 102."

  I nodded, but 102 sounded high to me. "How high did mine get?" She never actually told me what my temperature was.

  She looked at me gravely, her grayish-brown eyes boring into me. "You were at 104.5 when you passed out. You stayed right around 104 for several hours." She shook her head. "I wasn't sure I could get the fever down, honey. I don't know what scared me more, the fever or the desperation in my grandson's eyes. That's an incredible pressure I don't want to experience again. When did you start feeling sick?"

  I tried to think back through the day. "My dad said I felt warm before I left with Brodie at lunchtime, but I didn't feel sick. I had a sore throat, but I didn't start feeling cold and achy until we left the mall."

  She nodded. "Makes sense. Brodie's been running a low fever all night, but he says he feels fine—well, aside from you scaring the piss out of him." She stared at me as if I held the answers of the universe. "How did you get him to change so dramatically?"

  I bit my bottom lip, not knowing what to say. I didn't have a magic pill or anything, no secret weapon. I thought back to my first encounter with him at Love These Buns. "I was—kind of mean to him."

  She laughed long and loud, and I really liked her. I was comfortable around her even though I'd just met her. Maybe it was because I could see so much of her in Brodie, maybe it was the kindness in her eyes or the way she obviously loved Brodie—I didn't know, but she felt like family to me.

  Brodie walked in and flopped down on the bed next to me, throwing his arm across my waist. "What did you do to Grams?" His voice sounded incredibly nasally like he was congested.

  I raised my hands. "I just told her I was mean to you."

  He glared at me teasingly and turned to Grams. "You should see her when she's trying to hide something. She's a sarcastic little thing." He cleared his throat then did it again then coughed a few times.

  Grams was still smiling when she went into the bathroom and turned on the water. She came back a moment later and shoved the thermometer at Brodie. "Well," she said, raising her eyebrows. "For once your pigheaded stubbornness has paid off." The thermometer beeped, and she looked down at it quizzically. "It doesn't make any sense. Your temperature is dropping back to normal, you've been sneezing all night, and your cough is loosening up. It's like they've got the virus from Hell and you've got a common cold. This vaccine is really pissing me off. Why would they release something so erratic?"

  "Maybe we were the guinea pigs," Brodie suggested.

  "Well I am not okay with my grandbaby being someone's guinea pig. I have half a mind to go to the media with this, but I'm afraid they'll put you three in the quarantine facility and cut me off from you."

  I shook my head rapidly, and Brodie sat up next to me, taking my hand in his. "She won't let that happen, baby."

  Her voice was angry and tough, and it gave me such a solid glimpse of the woman she had to be to have raised a handful like Brodie. She was impressive. "You're damn right I won't. No one's touchin' my boys." She put her hand on my shoulder. "And you better believe I'm not letting anything happen to you."

  I was happy that she wanted to look out for me, but I felt a little shy and fearful over the power she seemed to think I had with Brodie. I didn't know why he was attached to me. I had such little experience with guys. I was at a loss as to why he put up with all my issues.

  "Brodie!" Lara's loud and very angry yell made me flinch.

  He got up quickly. "I'll be back, sunshine. Sammy's been a belligerent ass."

  He rushed out of the room, and Grams picked up the cup I'd been drinking from all night and looked inside. "Looks like you need a refill."

  Yuck. I didn't want lemon-lime anything again for as long as I lived.

  She must have seen the disgust on my face because she laughed at me. "You're doing better, so we can try some orange juice, tea, soda, I'm gonna say no to the beer and Tequila, and milk isn't gonna be the best idea right now. But I also have fruit punch and cherry flavored sports drinks if either of those sounds appealing."

  "Fruit punch please, and Mrs—" I wasn't sure what her name was.

  "No, no. You're family now, you can call Grams."

  I'd never really known my grandparents, and I was pretty sure they weren't as awesome as Brodie's grandma. I wanted to tell her how great I thought she was, but it felt a little weird. "Thank you for taking care of me, Grams."

  "My pleasure, sweetie." She glanced at the door before turning all-knowing eyes on me. "And thank you for loving my grandson."

  My eyes stung as so much air hit the surface of my exposed eyeballs. The smile fell completely from my face. How did she know that? Oh God, would she tell Brodie?

  She shook her head and smiled kindly. "It was a good guess is all. And that's between you and him entirely. I was just being a nosey old woman. Forgive me for that and for this small interference—my daughter, his momma, threw words around easily. She was affectionate when she wanted something and a damn good actress. When Brodie was young, she hurt him deeply and repeatedly. That last time—his freshman year—well, I—" She clamped her lips together and shook her head. "He should probably be the one to tell you about that. Just be patient with him. She inadvertently taught him to keep his guard up and trust no one. Sammy and Lara and now you are the only ones to ever really get through that wall."

  Thinking about Bill and Mom, it made sense why we were drawn together, why he'd been able to help me so much. "I can understand that."

  "He said that about you—that you understood him." She picked up the cup again. "I'll send him up with fruit punch."

  I sat there thinking about it all—the
way he took care of me, the fuzzy argument that led to him declaring himself my boyfriend, the way it felt to be in his arms. How could I not love him? He was seriously flawed—arrogant, way too flirtatious with anyone of the opposite sex, stubborn, uncooperative when it came to anything he wasn't completely interested in doing, and I wasn't so confident that I'd gotten past all his walls. But I still loved him. I just wasn't ready to tell him all that.

  He came up a few minutes later with a couple cups of fruit punch and turned on the TV. I cuddled next to him, and he flipped to the local news. "I just wanna see if anything has leaked to the press about the vaccine."

  I hadn't been paying much attention to the news aside from special reports or commercial teasers in between shows I was watching. I felt a little out-of-the-loop as it started, but when the first three segments were about the rash of murders and hate crimes committed by drugged-up psychos, I admitted to myself that I didn't like the news because it was a little scary. I didn't even know about this new substance people had been using, but the effects were gruesome and more often than not, ended in mutilation and even consumption of their victim's body. Gross. My stomach turned at the thought, and I was happy I hadn't eaten since lunch.

  The news segments about violent crimes seemed to go on and on—I had no idea Albuquerque was so unsafe compared to Los Gatos. I got up to use the restroom and Brodie stayed within arms reach in case I needed him. When I'd gotten back to the end of the bed all by myself, I felt a little triumphant.

  Grams' head poked in. "Hey, kids. I brought some soup for both of you."

  The smell hit my nose, and I turned and ran for the toilet, throwing up the contents of my stomach. On the bright side, that only included fruit punch and water. On the dark side, it didn't seem to matter that I had nothing in my stomach since I continued to dry heave over and over.

  A cold washcloth hit my forehead, and I fell back against Brodie's legs. My hands were shaking too much to even lift them, and tears were falling down my cheeks. Brodie slid to the ground behind me and pressed my head back against his shoulder, holding me up.

  Grams' voice above us surprised me. "Damn it, there's no time for your stubbornness, Brodie. That fever's gonna come right back up again if we can't keep fluids in her. Sips—she has to take sips. Now!"

  My brain knew I had to drink, but my stomach was so not happy about it. I took a sip and rinsed my mouth out with it then took another and forced myself to swallow. My throat was back to hurting as bad as it had earlier. I took three more sips before it came back up again.

  "Stay with her," Grams said urgently. "I need an IV. I'll be back as soon as I can. Try to keep getting water in her."

  I tried to drink a few more sips of water, but when that came back up, I refused to try again. I think Brodie begged me, but everything was really fuzzy, and I kept falling asleep.

  When I woke up again, I was on Brodie's bed with an IV in my arm. My whole body felt heavy, and my head was so congested that decapitation was looking like a good option. It was light out and Brodie was sitting up beside me, his fingers tangled in my hair. His eyes were closed, and his breathing was even. It took a lot of effort, but I managed to shift over and put my head on his thigh. I closed my eyes and fell back to sleep.

  "I think she's made it through the worst." Grams' whispers reached me in my barely awake state. "Her temperature is still high, but all three of them are retaining a low-grade fever. She isn't showing signs of dehydration anymore, and the vomiting has stopped. The boys are fine. I'm worried an upper respiratory infection will develop in Sammy, but he's strong enough to fight that off. Either Brodie's resistance is the strongest or he had a light dose of the vaccine. He hardly showed symptoms other than the common cold."

  Dad's voice pulled me a little further from sleep, and I distinguished Brodie's fingers running through my hair again.

  "I still don't understand. A vaccine is supposed to keep them from the infection, not give it to them."

  "Actually a vaccine typically contains a small, weakened portion of the bacteria or virus. Its purpose is to introduce the immune system to the germ, so that it can build up a healthy defense to have ready when the full-strength germ hits. It produces a fairly uniform reaction that's been studied in controlled environments. I don't think they did that in this case. My experiences with the other teens brought in the ER and with these three tell me it's erratic and unreliable at best. To be blunt, it nearly killed Risa, and I'm betting we aren't being given follow-up information on our other patients because it's likely wiped out several more. I don't like what's going on here, Scott."

  I held my hand up to Brodie, and he threaded his fingers through mine, making me realize the IV was gone. Slowly, I peeled my eyes open, but the light in the room assaulted me, so I closed them again.

  Brodie still sounded congested. "You think—"

  "Shh," Grams scolded.

  "She's awake," Brodie informed her. "But you think the Red Cross is behind this?"

  "This blood drive was done by the CDC. Scott brought the release over that he was asked to sign." I could practically hear the glare in her voice.

  "Get off my back about the damn blood drive. It's fucking done, get over it!"

  It took an extreme amount of energy, but I pushed myself up and turned my shocked face on him. How could he talk to her like that? She'd just taken care of all of us. His eyes were so hard and angry, but as he stared at me, they softened, and I watched the guilt creep in. I let myself fall back against him.

  "I'm sorry, Grams. I—I don't know why I got so mad. I'm sorry."

  "Do you talk to your grandmother like that often?" Dad's hard-ass authoritative voice made me roll my eyes. I was about to tell him to back off, but Grams beat me to it.

  "No, Scott, he doesn't. He ignores me really well, but he never snaps at me. Neither does Sammy, for that matter, and he's yelled at me twice in the last eight hours. Brodie and Sammy have been at each other's throats a few times, too. I lost count of how many times Lara had to put that boy in his place. Has Risa snapped at you, Brodie?"

  He ran his fingers through my hair again. "It wasn't a big deal, Grams. She's a lot sicker than the rest of us."

  "That's not what I asked," she said tiredly.

  "Yeah, once," he admitted.

  I looked up at them. "Irritability was a listed side effect," I managed to point out slowly.

  Grams nodded at me. "We've been reading about that for hours, honey." She turned to Dad. "I think we should start looking at symptoms of the actual infection instead of just the vaccine. I'm just gonna check them out again then I'll meet you back at the table."

  Hours? Did she mean Dad had been there for hours? It was the middle of the day, and was it—it was a Monday. "Dad?" He stopped walking to the door and turned to me. "It's a Monday."

  He laughed a little. "Very good, honey. It is Monday," he said patronizingly.

  "I mean—you work on Mondays. Why aren't you—"

  "Risa." Brodie's tone was soft as he leaned close to me. "I called your dad last night when you couldn't hold down water. He's been here ever since."

  My emotions bounced around from shock to confusion to happiness. Work had always been more important like when he had to work instead of coming to see me at Mom's—no, wait, she kept him from me. Well, when he had to work instead of taking me to get my brace off—he'd been at the police station. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to make reality replace years of what I thought I knew. "You didn't go to work?"

  He walked back over to me and sat on the edge of the bed. "You're the most important thing in this world to me, Risa. I know you're still working on believing that—and that's okay. I'll keep reminding you." He kissed my forehead and stood back up. "I've got research to do. Get some more rest."

  I watched him leave the room and thought about it all as Grams took my blood pressure and my temperature then moved on to Brodie. I managed to sit up and move my feet to the floor, feeling more stable than I had in twenty-four hours, but
then the sneezing started. After my fifth sneeze, I was ready to collapse back in bed if I hadn't had to pee so badly. When the sneezes finally stopped, Grams was done with Brodie. He climbed off the bed and stood in front of me with his arms held out to me. Slowly, testing my strength, I pulled myself up using his arms.

  Grams patted Brodie on the back. "Don't let her overdo it." Then she left the room.

  In the bathroom, I couldn't resist brushing my teeth. When I'd made it through that, I decided to try for a shower. Brodie was adamantly against it, but I refused to listen. I was exhausted when I came out, but it felt so much better being clean that it was worth it. He'd changed the sheets while I was in the shower, and we climbed back into bed together.

  "I keep thinking about you and your dad," he said gently. "You know he really loves you, right?"

  I sighed, trying to sort it all out in my head again. I'd heard it all, and I really wanted to believe him, but it was so hard to battle so many years of bad experiences with him. "Why is it easier to believe the bad stuff?"

  "Because we've been told it too often. It doesn't make it true, but it is easier to believe. Do you trust me, sunshine?"

  I loved him—everything about him—well except for his man-whore ways. Still, it was hard to flat-out admit to him, so I simply nodded.

  "Then trust me—I know he loves you."

  I stared at him for several minutes, debating where I wanted to push this conversation. "And if I said the same thing to you?"

  "I'd believe you. But I know that's different because I know Grams loves me. She wouldn't put up with me if she didn't."

  "No." I forced myself to maintain eye contact with him. Be strong, don't back away, I told myself. "That's not what I meant. But—do you trust me?"

  "Of course I trust you."

  "Like you trust Sammy and Lara and Grams?"

  He smiled indulgently. "Well they have a few years on you, so—"

  "Brodie?" I didn't want his evasiveness. I wanted an honest answer like I'd given him.

  He searched my eyes and ran the back of his fingers across my cheek. "Yes. I trust you."