Page 106 of Captured Immune

“I thought you guys werebest friends?” I sneer. “Wouldn’t he have told you if he had told me?”

“Actually, as soon as Jodi left him, Victor broke things off with your mother. She was devastated. None of us could understand it. One day, he was completely in love with her. The next, he didn’t want anything to do with her. It was like if he couldn’t have JodiandSuzie, he didn’t want either of them at all. Around that time, he also stopped speaking to us. No matter how many times we’ve reached out over the years, we never heard back. Years of friendship right down the drain.”

Nowthat’sthe coldhearted Victor I know. Selfishly, it makes me feel slightly better that I wasn’t the only one he pushed away. But why my mother? If he was as in love with her as these pictures depict, what changed?

The room goes silent as I gather my thoughts. I feel sick, and disoriented, and confused, andfuck...my ribs are killing me.

As if reading my mind, Tao stands and points toward a padded medical chair in the corner. “You came here for some healing, right? Let’s do duh lady first.”

“Actually,” I say, snapping out of my bewildered state, “you won’t be able to heal her. She’s immune to Zordi powers. You can use Healing Products on her though.”

Tao glances at Li with a look that says,What’s duh boy talking about?

Li responds with ahell if I knowshrug.

I don’t blame them. It’s as strange for me to say that someone’s immune to Zordi powers as it is for them to hear it.

“What do you mean, she isimmune?” Tao asks.

“See for yourself.”

Tao gestures toward my T-shirt wrapped around Arella’s arm. “Can I heal foh you?”

Arella nods. Tao kneels by her chair, then carefully peels the bloody fabric off her skin. She winces a little.

“Just sit still.” Tao closes his eyes, then hovers his hand over Arella’s knife wound. A moment later, when nothing happens, his mouth pops open. “How?”

I’ll never get tired of seeing the shock on people’s faces when Arella amazes them with her—what can only be described as—magic. “Told ya.”

“Let me try,” Li says, perking up. “Tell me a lie.”

“Um, I hate bacon,” Arella says, and it makes me smile. This woman loves bacon. Whenever she eats it, she moans like I’m eating her out.

“Hmm,” Li says. “My inner alarm didn’t go off. I can’t see through your body either.” Li aims her gaze at me. “I can see through Trey’s body though.” She turns back to Arella. “Tell me another lie.”

Arella thinks for a moment. Then her eyes flick up to me. “I’m not in love with Trey.”

It takes my shattered heart a second to realize she means the opposite. I haven’t forgotten that each time I’ve confessed my love to her, she’s never said it back. I didn’t tell her I love her with hopes that she’d return the words, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’thopingshe’d say it back. In a way, she just admitted that she loves me. It’s not the same as actually hearing her sayI love you, but it’s close enough.

“Hmm,” Li says. “Try another one. Something obvious, like one plus one is five.”

“Um,” Arella says, “the grass outside is blue.”

Li gasps with a hand to her chest. “Wow. She really is immune.”

While Li grabs the healing products for Arella, Tao asks me to climb into the medical chair. I don’t hesitate to obey. With a few cranks of a lever, the back of the chair reclines, and suddenly, I’m staring into a blinding chicken lamp clamped above me.

“The ceiling lights down here are kinda dim, huh?” I say.

Tao scoffs as he examines my face. “Landlord said to install good lights down here, it be over three thousand dollah and I am responsible for pay. I said no thank you, went to duh store, and got three lamps for less den thirty bucks. Do same job, but cheaper.”

“Didn’t Li say you guys get royalties from Healing Products?”

“Yes. One percent.”

I do the quick math in my head. “That’s still six figures a year.”

Tao wiggles a finger at me.Tsk. Tsk.“Having money does not mean you should spend it on three-thousand-dollah lights when thirty-dollah ones do duh same job.”

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