Page 47 of Twisted
“You have a family doctor?”
“You do too,” he reminds me.“Dr.Patel.He’s been taking care of the humans in this house for the last, well, forever.”
“Is he a vampire doctor?”
“No, he’s human.He’s just been our family doc since I was a kid.”
“Oh.”I pull the towel from my hair and am very aware of the fact that my tank top is thin and I’m cold.Devon’s eyes dart to my nipples, as if he’s unable to help himself.
“What are you doing here?”I ask.
“I brought you this,” he tells me and taps the top of a laptop.“You need it?”
“Yeah.I do.”Tossing the towel over the back of a chair, I hurry over and pick up the laptop and the USB drive.
“What’s this about?”Devon asks.
“Supposedly, it’s files from the Order.”Letting out a breath, I go to the bed.“I’m kinda scared to look at them.”
“Want me to look with you?”
I turn, looking at him for a good moment.“Yeah,” I say honestly.“That would be nice.”I pull a pink blanket from the foot of the bed and drape it around my shoulders.Devon and I both sit on the bed, and I open the computer.It’s brand new, and I skip over setting it up so I can get right to the file.Holding my breath, I plug in the USB and close my eyes.
“Want me to do the honors?”Devon asks.
“Please,” I say with a heavy sigh.“Maybe I shouldn’t look.”
“Even I want to know what this is about,” he says and playfully elbows me.“You won’t be able to get any sleep if you don’t look.”
“You’re right.”I nod and he slides the computer closer to him.I clench my jaw as I watch him open the drive.There are several folders, and he clicks on one.“Holy shit,” he mumbles when a long list of documents pop up.Every file is labeled with my name and then a date, and the first one goes back to the seventeenth of March from when I was only seven years old.
“Click on that one,” I tell him, hands trembling just a bit.There’s still a chance this isn’t real.There’s a chance the Order just turned their head and ignored the fact I’m a witch and didn’t keep extensive records on me without my knowledge.
“Is that you?”Devon asks as a picture loads.It’s the first page of this document.
“Yeah.”A chill runs through my spine and I shake my head.“I remember this place.”Leaning in, I look at the photo closer.It feels like this day happened forever ago, yet I still remember it pretty well.I had caught a stomach bug from Larissa and she was much sicker than me.I threw up twice throughout the night then had a small dry-heaves session but was better within a day.
And for some reason, Vivian insisted I go see a doctor.The actual visit itself wasn’t memorable, but the way Larissa treated me was.She had been lying on the bathroom floor, with it coming out both ends, for nearly forty-eight hours at that point.The girl must have been fucking miserable.
“I’m no doctor,” Devon starts as he scans the first few lines in the medical report.“But you don’t normally get this kind of extensive testing done when you have a stomach bug for less than twenty-four hours.”
“No,” I agree.“I don’t remember getting an EKG.”I close my eyes and think back.“Or even bloodwork.”
“You were only nine, so you might not remember everything.”
“True, but getting an EKG and a scan with contrast isn’t easy to forget,” I add, pointing to more test results on the screen.“And I was always told to only go to the doctor in case of an emergency.Like I literally had to be dying and no quack of an Order doctor was around to help.I can count the number of times I’ve seen a doctor on one hand.Literally.”
“Then how did they—oh, shit.”
“What?”I ask, looking from the computer screen to Devon.
“Midazolam.”
“What is that?”
“Twilight anesthesia.”He turns and looks at me, brows furrowing.“It causes amnesia.”
A chill runs down my spine and I shake my head.“No,” I say, but I can’t deny what I’m seeing.I flip through page after page and it’s the same thing: I was given the same drug and then had blood taken at least once a year.
