Rorie snorted in delight.

“We will,” agreed Declan, before pausing to take this in. “Wait, pictures for your what?”

“And we will take lots of notes, right, Declan?”

I spoke at the same time as Beau: “I don’t actually have a—it’s something that—never mind, it was a joke.”

Rorie slid from the bed, grinning at the success of her mockery of me. “I’m gonna repack.”

“Beau, why don’t you help her?” I suggested. Beau, still shouldering his overloaded duffel, obediently trotted after his sister.

I’d been rolling my scarf—a delicate, almost transparent square of fine blue cotton—but now I set it down, one edge still loose.

“What’s happening at work, Dec?”

His back straightened, belying the casual note in his voice. “We’re close.”

“The antiviral?” Declan’s lab was currently assembling the final data needed in order to request a CTA—a Clinical Trial Application—for a medication he’d spent the last few years developing. The drug was a small fragment of an antibody, called a nanobody. While not as expensive to develop and produce as monoclonal antibodies, nanobodies were still costly, meaning Declan’s small outfit continually faced serious funding challenges.

“Yeah. A lot of data to sort still, but yeah. If all goes well, human trials soon.”

“And you’re up for taking the kids out of town anyway? Ah, Dec.”

He raised his shoulders in a philosophical shrug, but I caught the faintest flicker of disappointment in his eyes before a deliberate kindness replaced it. “And miss a chance for a weekend with my favorite young ones? Besides, it might not work and then I’ll have something to distract me when I get the news. Cushion the blow, yeah?”

I felt a fake smile cross my face. “Of course.”

We were both lying; nothing could cushion that kind of disappointment. He’d poured everything he had into this, the longest of long shots: years of obsessive, slavish work; his reputation; all his personal financial resources. If Declan’s lab could produce a successful antiviral drug—one that could cure a specific viral illness, the way antibiotics could cure a bacterial illness—the medical implications would be massive. Operating on the theory that nanobodies not only could neutralize an acute infection but could potentially be used to induce a more active long-lasting immunity, the discovery would be a world-changing event if it worked and could be administered in a cost-effective way.

But if he failed, he’d risked everything: his funding and maybe even his facilities and staff. He’d have to start over.