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Contemplating this, I turned away and prepared more test tubes, even though the experiment would have to wait anyway.

“Why did you ask me to come here?” I looked at Julie, who had appeared silently beside me. “The next internship session isn't until next week, and...”

“Why on earth are there traces of Salma in your blood?” I blurted out in frustration and turned completely toward her, only to realize once again that she was more than a head shorter than me.

She bit her lower lip.

A pleasant tingling sensation traveled through my upper body and further down.

God, could she stop that?

“I don't know what business it is of yours.”

She looked up at me, her gaze steady.

Was she serious? All foreign substances in her blood were affecting the research results.

“It is my business, because I need your uncontaminated blood.”

I tried to hold her gaze, but she looked away.

“Who gave it to you?”

Her gaze found its way back to mine.

“I take it to control my powers.”

She did what? She took it on her own without losing her memories?

“To control your emotions...” I concluded, because the way her powers manifested themselves was nothing more than the result of strong emotions.

She had to be a very emotional Quatura if she had such control problems, but I doubted it, because she was excellent at hiding all her emotions. Well… probably because of the Salma...

Inevitably, my gaze slid down to her stomach.

“You realize you could harm your child with that?”

If it were my child, I wouldn't even let someone like me near her body to take blood samples regularly.

“Without the Salma, I wouldn't be able to protect this child,” Julie pressed out, and I looked up again.

And suddenly I wondered what exactly she was protecting this child from.

More questions bombarded me and I ended up back where I had started.

“I don't understand,” I thought aloud. “How can it be that you don't forget anything?”

Julie held my gaze, but I could tell it was difficult for her because she started playing with the sleeve of her lab coat.

I made her nervous. And I liked that.

“I did forget,” she began. “Again and again.” Her words sounded cold, different than usual. As if they came from a completely different Julie. “But if you take too much of it, your body gets used to it.”

So, she had taken it often. Not just on the day I had taken her blood. She apparently took it regularly...

Fascinating. And yet concerning.

Why did it sound like she wasn't just using it to control her powers? Why did it sound like there was much more to it than that?