Chapter Thirty-Seven Max

I step by to let Caro pass, then I close the door, do the lock. I turn to face her, glad I had the foresight to tell Francesco he could have the evening off. That, after my dinner service, I wouldn’t be needing him tonight.

“You figured it would be me?” Caro asks. “Really? That surprises me.”

My phone flashes on the table. I glance at it briefly, then turn it over.

“I told you to come if you needed me.”

“I don’t need you. And you know that well and good. All that suicide talk… what you probably told Rory. It’s ludicrous, Max.”

I sigh. “Why don’t you sit?”

“I don’t want to sit.” She crosses her arms over her chest, stands awkwardly in the middle of the room. I could crack a joke—Caro hates standing around awkwardly. Feels self-conscious, taking up space like that. It’s a trait we used to share until I started Hippoheal. Until I realized that the spotlight feels quite warm and nice. Suits me.

“Okay, well, I’m going to sit.” I lower myself down, but then I have a better thought. “How about a drink first?”

“We need to talk, Max. You can’t wriggle out of this conversation like you always do. Like you did yesterday, and again at the Colosseum.”

I walk over to the bar, give her my back. Pour, cubes, gulp. When I return, I say, “I’m not wriggling out of anything, Carolina.” I wink at her. I’m pretty sure I’m the only one who randomly calls her that.

“You only call me that when you’re trying to wriggle out of something.”

I arch an eyebrow. “Or into something.”

She doesn’t smile. Doesn’t sit either. “It’s the middle of the night. I didn’t come for jokes.”

“Okayyyy.” I place the glass on the table. “No jokes, and no…” I motion my head toward the bed.

“Jesus, Max.” She scowls. “No.”

“Okay. That’s a no. Anyway, you slept with Nate. If you were coming for that, it’s probably his door you’d be knocking on.”

“You’re mad. I knew you were mad, and that’s why I’ve let it go this long. I was trying to give you space. I was trying to—I don’t know—let you cool down. But I’m mad! I’m freaking out! And honestly, Max, Rory knows. I can’t do this anymore.”

I falter, almost lose my footing. “Rory knows what exactly?”

“She knows. She knows about Hippoheal.”

An avalanche loosens, starts tumbling toward me. Still I try to remain as outwardly calm as I can muster. “What exactly does Rory know?”

“Well, she thinks I’m embezzling from you. The author had a private investigator—got bank statements and stuff. Rory knows, Max. And the author does, too.”

The avalanche settles. Fresh crunchy snow in towering drifts, blocking the door, but we’re still alive on the inside. “Okay, so she doesn’t really know. She doesn’t know—”

“That your vaccine is a fraud?” Caro finally sits, crosses her snowy white legs. “She doesn’t know. Not yet.”

“Stop. Stop! You know—”

“I know what? That I’m not allowed to speak of it, not even when we’re just the two of us? That I’ve promised to never tell? Well, I’m done, Max.”

“Done? Done doing what?” Words are torching my tongue, making everything feel like fire.

“Done keeping your secrets. Done hiding it all. The vaccine isn’t working, and what’s more, it’s harming people.” She ticks off on her fingers, her panther ring glinting as she does. “Rashes covering their bodies, encephalitis, loss of vision.”

“Stop. Stop saying that!” I take a sip of my drink and squeeze my eyes shut, willing myself to calm down.

Except, didn’t I expect this? Didn’t I intuit that things were heading toward this?

“I can’t anymore.” When my eyes flit open, Caro is staring at me, dead in my eyes. Not like the rest of the day, when her eyes darted around, landing on anyone—anything—but me. “I’m sorry, Maxie. I love you so much. You know that. But I can’t keep this anymore.”

“I just need more time! With a little more time, the lab will get the formulation right. We’re so close to a cure. And then it’s going to save Papa! It’s for him, C. I need more time for him!”

“No.” She leans forward. “No, Max. No. You can’t use Ansel as your bargaining chip anymore. You know I love him. He’s like a father to me, too. But you’re not going to save him. You have to face it.”

“I am,” I say back evenly. “Just because you don’t believe. You think people didn’t believe Jonas Salk, too? Thought he was crazy. Anyone’s crazy until they succeed.”

“I…” She shakes her head, fumbles with words. Of course she does, because I’m right. And every time she goes down this road, she has to contend with her own guilt. That she herself is trying to snuff out Papa’s last chance.

“No, Max. You’ve been saying this for a year. Ever since… ever since I—”

“You were never supposed to even be in the lab. Spy on Katerina! Talk to the lab team behind her back. You’re in sales. You’re not a scientist, Caroline. You never have been.”

She frowns, but not a frown of upset. More in the neighborhood of pity—which pops something inside of me, makes my chest fizz.

“You didn’t even have clearance to go inside.”

“Well, I did go inside the lab, Max. We can’t change that now, can we? Anyway, let’s not erase history here. It didn’t start with me snooping. It started with me overhearing Operation Kazuka. You should have picked a better code name—you think I wouldn’t know what that meant? And it’s not like I went looking for the whistleblower in your data department. Manny came to me on his own accord, and honestly, Max, what? You thought you’d order them to fudge the data going to the FDA, and no one was going to spill?”

The fizzing in my chest is cratering. Turning volcanic. I grip the table. “They signed NDAs. All of them, fucking Manny, too. You think I spent so much time on research—so many years of my life—to come this close and then not save Papa? You think that’s what I’ve done?”

“You’re not going to save Ansel,” Caro says, standing, coming closer to me, her face wrenched in anger, more fiery than I’ve ever seen her. More fiery than I even knew she was capable of. “Max, wake up! You have to face it! Make things right. Enough already!”

“No. You’re wrong! I need more time. It’s so close to working.… It’s so—”

“It’s not! If you don’t fix things, admit what you’ve done, then—”

“Then what? You’re going to turn me in?”

“Yes,” she says simply. “Yes. I’ve given you a year already. People could die, Max! Die. D-I-E.”

“Who are you?” I ask her, shaking, unable to fathom that this horrible person is my sweet, even-keeled Caro. The girl I’ve loved for as long as I can remember. “Who even are you?”

Her head whips back to me. “Who are you? Literally, who are you? I don’t recognize you. Ansel would be ashamed, Max! He would be so ashamed of the path you’ve taken!”

“Shut up, shut up, shut up! Papa would not be ashamed. I’m trying to save him!”

“Well, you’re not saving him. And you’re hurting others. Face it. You have to face it!”

What she’s said echoes excruciatingly in my ears. It has been echoing, in fact, since she said it the first time.

Yesterday. And again today. At the Colosseum. But somehow, in a softer way. Now she’s abrasive, hurting my eardrums, pain in my heart. And another feeling building in my chest that’s not pain, or at least it’s not sadness. It’s anger. It’s fight.

“I know! You told me that already. That I’m another Elizabeth Holmes. That Hippoheal is going to be another Theranos if I—if you—don’t put a stop to it now.”

“And you erupted on me! Like it was my fault. I thought… for a moment I thought…” She shakes her head furiously—reminds me of a dog emerging from the lake, trying to rid itself of its sopping wet.

“What? What did you think?”

“Ow!”

I realize now that I’ve reached over for her wrist. That I’m twisting it. That I’m strong—not jacked like Nate, but strong and far bigger than Caro nonetheless.

“You’re hurting me, Max.”

I try to let go, but I find that I can’t.

“What did you think when we were standing on the edge of the Colosseum?” I ask her again.

“I thought…” She winces, still trying to detach her arm, but failing. “I thought… maybe… you were going to push me,” she whispers.

A scary silence grips the room.

“I was. I almost did. But then Rory showed up.”

She reaches down for her whistle, nearly gets it to her mouth.

But I’m one step ahead of her.

“I love you,” I whisper in her ear as I cover her mouth with my hand. She tries to scream, but I clamp it harder, using it to press her body back against mine. Then I release my other hand that’s been gripping her wrist and fumble on the table next to us where a knife rests on the fruit plate. The one I used earlier to cut a mango. Surprisingly sharp.

I grip the knife in my palm and recall the story in the author’s book. How Rory went with a knife to defend my honor from those bullies at school. My fourth-grade sister, with enough courage to wield a knife at boys a head taller than her. It bolstered me, that story. Made me remember I’m not that weakling anymore.

My heart is racing as I twist Caro closer to me.

“Fuck you, Caro!” I hear myself shouting, but I am powerless to stop it. To stop anything that comes after this point. “Why did you have to turn on me? I really did love you! That’s the craziest part. I thought it would be easier, when I found out you slept with Nate. But it’s not easier. I still fucking love you! But—it’s not enough. You see that now, don’t you, C? The fact that I love you is no longer enough.” I shake my head, because truly it does boggle the mind.

Boggles mine at least. How two things can be true at once: I love her deeply, and yet I very much want her dead.