The second I stepped across the threshold, Doolittle placed me into a chair. He drew my blood and examined the bite site on my foot and the bigger one on my shoulder, which had acquired a plum-purple swelling. Barabas recounted the scene, while Julie and Ascanio hovered in the background, quiet like two mice.

“Pit vipers?” Doolittle asked, checking my eyes.

“Appears so. At least the one I caught was. Not a rattlesnake, though.” Barabas shrugged. “Three-inch fangs.”

“Nauseous?” Doolittle asked me.

“Yes.” I was still sweating, too. The sweat drenched my face and my back, clammy and cold, and my heart was beating too fast. The bite on my arm hadn’t sealed itself either. That was a bad sign. Lyc-V closed most wounds in minutes.

Someone pounded on the office door. Barabas moved to the door, slid aside the metal shutter covering the narrow spy window, and looked through it.

“It’s your lover man.”

“Barabas, open the damn door,” Raphael snarled.

Barabas slid the shutter closed. “Do you want me to let him in?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

Barabas slid the shutter open. “She’s thinking about it.”

“Andrea,” Raphael called. “Let me in.”

“The last time I saw you two together, you were so happy,” Barabas said. “Just out of curiosity, Raphael, how the hell did you manage to fuck that up?”

Raphael’s voice gained that dangerous, I’m-about-to-go-nuts quality. “Remind me, how are things with you and Ethan?”

“None of your business,” Barabas said.

“Let me in and I won’t rip your head off.”

“You won’t rip my head off anyway,” Barabas said. “We’re friends.”

“Let him in,” I said. If we didn’t let him in, he wouldn’t go away. He would just stand by the door and him and Barabas would yell obscenities at each other. My head hurt enough as it was.

Barabas swung the door open, and Raphael marched in. He saw me and turned pale.

“Don’t agitate her,” Doolittle warned.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Raphael pulled up a chair and sat next to me.

Doolittle shined a light into my eyes, listened to my heartbeat, and thrust a glass of some murky liquid into my hand. “Drink this.”

I took a tiny sip. It tasted like someone had mixed kerosene with turpentine. “This is awful.”

Doolittle peered at me through his glasses. “Now, young lady, you will drain that glass. If I can drop everything and rush over here, at the very least you can repay me for my kindness by taking your medicine.”

I gulped the drink. It burned my throat and I coughed. “Doc, you’re trying to kill me…”

“Drink a bit more,” Raphael said.

I pointed at him. “You heard what the medic said. Don’t agitate me.”

I bravely took another swallow of the nasty stuff, trying to force it down and keep it there.