49. Play the Game

49

Play the Game

Dax

Monday, June 12 th

9:31 a.m.

I used to always say, "One day this," and, "One day that," but now I see that one day is now .

I'm not ready for this.

All the tubes and lines running out of Liam's arm. The constant beep of his monitor. The ashen color of his face. He looks nothing like he did before. And it scares the fucking shit out of me.

I continue to pace beside his seat and check the clock for the sixth or seventh time in ten minutes, counting down until Dr. Matthews makes an appearance.

"Sit. Down," Liam mutters out of the side of his mouth, his eyes still closed. "You're gonna ruin our plan."

"Where is he?" I lean against the counter, crossing my arms over my chest.

"I have no idea, but he's going to get suspicious if you keep patrolling the room like a caged lion."

"Shhh. Someone's coming."

Liam drops his head to the side, his breaths more exaggerated than they were a second ago, and I stifle a laugh, shaking my head at the absurdity of his idea.

The likelihood of us failing is more than I want to admit. If something happens because Liam volunteered to be an idiot—I force my thoughts in a different direction. I can't think of the what-ifs.

Brighton needs some time to get things figured out—I keep telling myself this—but it still feels wrong.

My phone vibrates from my back pocket, and I pull it free as the curtain rolls along the rail and a nurse steps into the area.

Brighton: He transferred because he saw the news broadcast. You'll have to come up with the details. Delete this text.

I re-read it. Twice. Then delete. My wheels turn, but my mind's blank.

The nurse steps past me, trying to engage me in a conversation I ignore as he injects something into Liam's port.

"I'm Phillip. If you have questions, you can ask for me. Lauren's still available if you need anything."

I stop watching when Liam flinches, my stomach churning with a nauseating twist. The two of them start a jilted conversation that I tune out as I try to think of some details and resume my pacing.

Phillip pulls open the curtain and taps Liam on the foot, ignoring when he winces. "Rest. I'll be back at the end of treatment. Do you want some ice?"

Liam nods and pinches his eyes closed as I turn to watch Phillip leave.

"Is he gone?" Liam whispers a second after the curtain closes.

"Yes, but I'm sure he heard you." I smack his shoulder.

"Get some rest," comes from the other side of the curtain as footsteps trail away. "I'll be back in a few."

Liam peeks at me through one eye, a grin spreading across his face as his phone chimes.

I pull it from under his hat on the counter.

Crissy: Hope you're feeling better. We still on for later?

My fingers race across the screen, pretending to type out a response. I peek at Liam from the corner of my eye and see the panic on his face before I toss it to him.

He catches it and drops his head back against the seat, closing his eyes.

"I wouldn't say anything to her. Geez, you need to give me more credit than that."

"You don't have the best track record." He types out something and presses send, stuffing his phone underneath his leg. "Crissy's going to swing by tonight."

"I'll make sure to be gone. Go back to pretending you're asleep." I grab the edge of the curtain and sneak a quick look around the oncology floor. Dr. Matthews exits the elevator as the doors slide open. He stops, places a hand over the elevator door so it doesn't close, and discusses something with Phillip before he points in our direction.

"Shit." I yank the curtain closed, turning on my heel. "I think he saw me."

Liam's eyes fly open. "What? He's coming?"

"Shh. Pretend you're sleeping or something."

My eyes dart around the room, searching for something to distract me from the fact that I got caught spying. Dr. Matthews clears his voice on the other side of the curtain and enters the room. Our eyes meet. I expect a smile or something, but his face remains stone-cold. His blank expression creates a new level of dread inside me.

"Dr. Matthews," I say, biting back concern, my voice coming out strained and shaky. The muscles in my jaw tighten, mirroring the tension that coils in my stomach.

"Call me Kline. Can I speak to you alone? Liam will be here for another thirty minutes." He nods his head toward the curtain, asking me to follow him. When I don't move, he tears his gaze from Liam and eyes me. The steady rise and fall of Liam's chest would make one think he's asleep. I have to say I'm impressed.

"I'm not comfortable leaving him." I cross my arms over my chest, a sense of protectiveness flooding through me.

He grasps the hem of the curtain, his restraint evident in his whitening knuckles. "Suit yourself. I was trying to make this easier for you." He tosses a file on the counter beside me. "Liam lucked out. The episode on Friday, the cough."

I tilt my head to the side, trying to make sense of what he means.

"The tumors are compressing his lungs," he pinches his eyes closed, scooting his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "He can't breathe right. That's why he passed out. It's looking like a fluid overload."

"I don't understand." Brighton said Kline would take things too far, but I never figured it would be right out of the gate.

"Dr. Fields wasn't following protocol. I went through his chart after you two left my office this morning. The lung tumors have been there for a while. Liam's a week or two behind where he should be. She's been irresponsible, and I don't know why Liam's best interest isn't at the forefront of her mind."

Liam goes stalk-still. It's obvious he's listening in, but I don't want to give him away.

"What do you mean they've been there? There's more?" I process what he's implying at a snail's pace, reminding myself that this is what she was talking about. There's no way this information is accurate.

"Unfortunately. I'm embarrassed by the care Liam has received. I apologize for the oversight and take full responsibility for this. Dr. Fields wasn't ready to take on another ES case, but she reassured me she could handle it. I shouldn't have allowed the risk."

He has to be lying. There's no way she would make that sort of mistake. The idea of the gravity of her not looking out for Liam's best interest crushes me. I chose her. We chose her. I know I'm not supposed to believe it, but my mind is telling me one thing while my heart is telling me something else. I hate to admit it, but he's convincing.

He places his hand on my shoulder. "I'm sure you've had a rough couple of weeks. You could use a break from this place. Let's go for a walk. He'll be here when you get back."

"I'm really not comfortable." My mind screams at me not to listen. To somehow make an excuse why I won't leave his side, but Kline isn't leaving me much room to argue.

"He's in excellent hands."

"Dax?" Liam pretends to rouse, blinking his eyes as he yawns and pushes the button on the arm of the chair to raise it so he's upright.

I hurry to his side and take his hand. He squeezes. I'm afraid we're trying too hard when I see the suspicion crease across Kline's face.

He steps around Liam's seat and grabs the rolling chair, sliding it to me.

"Fine, we'll do this your way," he says, waving at someone to enter the room. "We need to do a blood draw for genetic markers rather than an HLA test. I'm sure Dr. Fields mentioned it."

"I did the swab. Twice."

He frowns, flipping through Liam's chart. "Then you know what it's for?"

I nod.

"Did she also tell you the initial results were inconclusive?" he asks as he wipes away a bead of sweat trickling down his forehead. His eyes dart to my face and then to Liam's before he adds, "and that you're not a match?"

"I got an email saying it was . . ." There's no way I heard him right. My mind is playing tricks on me. "Not a match for what?"

"Your DNA."

Liam stiffens, his grip on my hand tightening. I slowly lower myself onto the chair as Kline takes the file from the counter and sets it in front of me on the reclined part of Liam's chair.

"What's this?" I scan through the pages, the words blurring as I stop at the last paragraph.

"That," Kline points to the labs at the bottom of the second page, "is a problem."

"Is this the HLA test?" I flip between the sheets of paper, my eyes scanning over the old results on our DNA.

Kline nods.

"But it was inconclusive."

"I thought it got misplaced or lost, but it wasn't." He leans against the counter across from us, irritation seeping out of him. "But both swabs are there with the same outcome."

"That's what she meant," I whisper to myself. My gaze flits to his before I stare at the file. I run a thumb across the yellow sticker label with a B and the blue sticker with the D .

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch that." Kline leans forward, his ear perked in my direction.

"Dr. Fields thought it would be in Liam's file."

"I don't know how this got overlooked. It's not our typical protocol. I'm not sure who made you your own chart."

"What does this mean?"

I pass Kline the file over Liam's lap, and he takes it. "You won't be able to help Liam."

"But I can't do anything else. This was it. Am I supposed to sit back and watch?" I pull my hat from my head and rake my hand through my hair.

"He's going to do fine after surgery. He has his own marrow."

"I don't know what to say." This is low, even for Kline. Brighton was right. He'll stoop to any level to have the upper hand. I give a sarcastic chuckle and shake my head. I'm not playing his games. This has to be wrong.

Kline looks at me with his brows knit together. "That's what the blood test is for. We need to confirm the results."

"That Liam's not my brother?

"Or that he is." The look I get implies there was no mistake. My heart races, a subtle tremor coursing through my body as the weight of his words hangs in the air.

I hang my head, worried about what I'll find on Liam's face if I look up.

There is something honest behind the insinuation, something that makes me question everything I thought I knew. The intensity of the moment is palpable, making it hard to breathe, as if all the air has been sucked out of the room.

"Do you have any aunts or uncles? Grandparents? Maybe they could donate." His gaze is piercing, as if he's trying to decipher every thought and emotion running through me.

"No, no one we want to have involved. Could we get an anonymous donation?" I stiffen, popping my neck from side to side. He's not going to get the best of me.

"That isn't best practice. We would only need it for standby. Liam can use his own right after surgery. He may not need it, but it doesn't hurt to . . ."

Liam groans, dropping his head back. "I can call Gran."

"No," I say, hoping he hears the finality in my decision. "I want another test. This has to be a mistake."

"I don't know what to tell you. The two HLA tests show there's no biological relation. Your DNA is not a match. There's a new girl who doesn't know her asshole from her elbow. She's screwed up a couple of other things." He shakes his head and continues rambling, but my attention stays fixed on this new information. Does Brighton know? Maybe this new girl is the one who's making errors and her suspicion of Kline is misplaced.

"This is just a blood draw in place of the swab," Kline continues, breaking me out of my thoughts as he directs someone in from behind the curtain.

"Will that make a difference?" Liam asks.

"It won't hurt."

A nurse with a plastic tote comes into the room, leaving the curtain skewed. She sets up her blood drawing station on the counter and pulls out a couple of tubes, a butterfly needle, and a long rubber tourniquet before greeting the room with a smile.

Liam starts up a conversation, but I'm too lost in my mind to catch anything the three of them say.

There's no way the two tests are both wrong. But if they are, this was all for nothing. We wanted to help Brighton catch Kline in the act, and all we've succeeded at is ruining my life.

I lean forward, setting my elbows on Liam's chair.

Results of this caliber were never on my radar, and I struggle to grasp the magnitude of what this means. I'm sure Kline gives patients bad news every day, but I doubt he's had to tell them that the only family member in their life is not a blood relative.

"Siblings don't always have matching DNA, right?" Liam asks as I stand from the chair, sending it sailing into the cabinet behind me.

"Correct, but they always share parts." Kline gives me an uncomfortable glare of disapproval. "Unfortunately, there is no genetic match. There isn't even a five percent chance of relation. According to these two tests, you're not brothers."

"Maybe the tests got mixed up," I say as I sidestep Liam's seat and snatch the file off the counter. "You mentioned a new girl?"

"I considered that—"

"But you're gonna tell me that didn't happen, right?"

"There is no error." Kline skims his tongue along his bottom teeth, nodding for the nurse to proceed.

She focuses her attention on Liam, taking a couple of vials of blood while I turn my attention to Kline.

"This will be our confirmation," he says.

My dislike for him evaporates. He's doing another test to make sure, even though he doesn't think it's a possibility.

The nurse talks to Liam in a hushed tone, distracting him from the blood draw, and places a cotton ball and tape over it before turning her attention to me. She goes about her work without interrupting Kline.

"Liam's going to finish out chemo. We'll let him rest a couple of days and get him back in here for surgery to remove the tumor from his hip. I want to start radiation a week or two after surgery. We want to shrink the size of the masses we found in his lungs."

"You're going to feel a small prick," the nurse says. I offer her my arm, and she smiles as she taps at the crook of my elbow in search of a vein.

"And what's after radiation?" I concentrate on the words coming from his mouth, disregarding the pinching feeling in my arm.

Liam's stayed silent for most of this, and I glance over to find him staring, a new level of worry and confusion on his face. Is it for me? The situation? Or that maybe Kline's not as bad as we were led to believe?

"We wait." Kline leans against the counter behind him, crossing his arms over his chest. "Do you have any questions?"

"I think you covered everything." I recoil, averting my gaze to the tubes as she takes them from the counter. First, she grabs the tube with the light purple top, then a yellow one. It takes longer to fill. I stare at the full tube she sets on the counter. That's a lot of blood. Heat rushes up my neck, and I close my eyes, trying not to think about my heart beating the blood from my body into the tubes.

I don't realize Phillip has come into the room until the nurse tears the tape, and I open my eyes. Phillip passes Liam a cup of ice before joining Kline at the counter. I don't get so much as a smile.

"You okay? Need some water?" She places a cotton ball in the crook of my arm. "You look a little pale. Hold this for a sec."

I obey, trying to get the cloudy sensation in my head to go away and watch Kline and Phillip discuss something I can't hear as they point at my chart.

The nurse tears off a section of tape and presses it over the cotton, smiles, and stuffs the blood-filled tubes into her caddy.

"We'll get these to the lab and get with you to schedule the harvesting. I'd give it a day or so," she says, patting the back of my hand. At least someone still thinks there's a possibility I can help Liam.

I nod, thoughts still fuzzy as they swim in my mind. The weight of the results pulls at my chest, making it difficult to breathe.

She pulls open the curtain, letting herself out as Kline and Phillip turn to face us, my file spread open.

"We're going to get this figured out. Phillip knows the girl I mentioned," Kline says, his head tucked in the chart as he continues to scribble notes.

Phillip confirms what Kline says before he taps Liam on the leg. "I'll be back in ten."

Kline hands him the file, and he tucks it under his arm before pulling the curtain back and exiting.

"He said she's been in and out of here a lot lately. There's a chance she messed something up, but we'll know in a few hours."

Would the Kline Brighton described go to these kinds of lengths? How would another test benefit him if he was lying about it in the first place? And what difference does it make to him if we're not brothers?

I only have the information she's given me. The few things I've seen on the news. And the things I tick off in my head.

They're named in the malpractice—together.

She wants to clear her name.

There's the list that doesn't seem like a coincidence.

The murders.

And she's trying to shift the blame to him.

I shake my head, feeling the weight of these thoughts and their possible outcome. There's no way she could be the one behind all of this. I have questions that need answered because I can't make all the pieces come together, no matter how many times I rearrange them.

Something's not right.

And that something has Brighton written all over it.