It isn’t just Reverend Carl and his pack of Pure fanatics. They have to put limits on choice for other reasons, for pragmatic reasons. The way things are, the way women are, no one would want a girl. No sane parent would want to choose a wrist-counter color for a three-month-old. I wouldn’t.

In three days, I’ll know if I’ll have to.

Chapter Forty

FORTY

By the time I arrive at work Lorenzo and Lin are in the lab, heads together, arguing over protein extractions and whether we need to add a primate to the menagerie of lab animals.

“We don’t,” I say. “What we need to do is check out the second MRI room.”

There’s no reason to check the MRI equipment; Lin has already done that. But I’ve been around the machines enough, and heard one subject after another complain about the banging, even with ear protection. Lying in an MRI tube is like snuggling up next to the amp while Eddie Van Halen wails out a guitar solo. In other words, almost painful.

When we’re all in the room, I fire up the machine. The force of some sixty thousand times the earth’s natural magnetic field shakes my bones. I tell them above 125 decibels of ear-splitting noise about my mother and about the envelope I found in Patrick’s office last night.

“Three teams?” Lin shouts. “Are you sure?”

“Positive,” I yell back. My voice is barely audible, but Lin gets it. “Anyway, we’re done. I have all the numbers at home and I want to set up the first trial on Mrs. Ray for Tuesday. Monday, if we can manage it. It means we’ll have to work through the weekend, dose up a few mice. I mean, Lin can dose up the mice.”

“I knew you were finished,” Lorenzo says, and hugs me, which feels wonderful and awful at the same time. “I saw it in your eyes that day at Georgetown.”

Right. I wonder what else he sees in my eyes. “Lin, I need a minute alone here.”

She raises an eyebrow but says nothing. In a moment, Lorenzo and I have the MRI room to ourselves.

“I have some news. Not very good news,” I say over the banging. I don’t know when, or why, I decided to tell him.

Lorenzo’s face goes as white as the walls. He punches the casing of the machine beside us, and the banging shudders, then steadies again. A flood of Italian cursing fills the room. “What is it, Gianna? What do you have?”

“No. I’m not sick. I’m fine. Well, I’m not fine, but—”