If you could test your son for a gene that predicts violence, would you do it?
Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from Jayne Cowie’s One of the Boys, which is out July 11th!
Antonia and Bea are sisters, and doting mothers to their sons. But that is where their similarities end.
Antonia had her son tested to make sure he didn’t possess the “violent” M gene.
Bea refuses to let her son take the test. His life should not be determined by a positive or negative result.
These women will go to any length to protect their sons.
But one of them is hiding a monster.
And there will be fatal consequences for everybody….
When Jack’s M test result came through, she didn’t share it online. She rang Owen and told him straightaway. “I knew it would be negative,” he said. He sounded pleased. It made her feel better.
“Yes,” Antonia told him. “Me too.”
“I can’t say it’s not a relief to have it confirmed, though,” he said. “Have you told Bea?”
“Not yet,” she said. “Do you think I should?”
“Yes,” he said. “If she knows that Jack is negative, it might help persuade her to have Simon tested, too.” There was the sound of someone else talking in the background. “I have to go. I love you.”
“I love you, too,” Antonia told him. Then she sent Bea a text, inviting her over for lunch, but Bea said she couldn’t make it because she was working. She made excuses the next day and the day after that, too, and Antonia cried again, this time with frustration. In the end, she texted Bea back to tell her that Jack had tested negative for the M gene and left it at that. She was recovering from major surgery, after all. She didn’t need Bea’s drama on top. That Friday, she got a taxi to the hospital and introduced Jack to Owen’s colleagues. She watched carefully as Owen showed Jack off, as people admired his tiny features and dusting of soft hair. He really was a beautiful baby. “Owen tells me you got a negative M test,” one of them said, another doctor called Paul. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” Antonia said.
“It’s going to be a big deal in a few years. I don’t think people have really grasped that yet. They still seem to think that if they make enough noise online, they can make it go away. But it isn’t going anywhere. It’s the future, it really is. Identifying M-positive boys means we can help them. Now that we know that male violence has an underlying genetic cause, that it’s a medical problem, we can treat it.”
Jack started to whimper at that point, and Paul smiled sympathetically and moved away. She knew that he had a little boy of his own, a bit older than Jack, but someone pressed tea and homemade carrot cake on her and she soon forgot to ask about him. Owen let her use his office so she could feed Jack in private, and she went home tired but relieved that it had all gone so well.
Not that Jack was easy most of the time. Antonia understood why, and she didn’t resent him for it. He had come into the world too soon, and that made everything difficult for him. The days blurred into weeks. All of a sudden, Jack was three months old. Antonia felt like she’d aged thirty years in that time, and yet it seemed to have passed in the blink of an eye. That was when she realized that she hadn’t seen her sister since Jack was born. They’d exchanged text messages, but there hadn’t been any real contact. It felt . . . it felt almost as if Bea was avoiding her, and that wouldn’t do.
She had a haircut and a manicure, swelling with pride as the women at the salon cooed over Jack, and then she picked up an assortment of cookies and fruit and a bunch of flowers and set off for Bea’s house. There was no point phoning ahead. It would only give Bea the chance to make
some excuse. When she got to Bea’s street, she parked as close to the house as she could. Then she picked up the gifts and Jack, who was still asleep in his car seat, and knocked on the door.
“Be home,” she muttered as she waited, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “Please be home.”
She was in luck.
The door opened, and there was Bea, hair pulled back, wearing ancient jeans and a T-shirt
several sizes too big, with a blood-soaked tissue held against her nose. She blinked when she saw Antonia, and then she sighed.
“What happened?” Antonia asked, horrified.
Bea looked away. “I suppose you want to come in.” She stood back, making room for Antonia to get past. Inside, the house was cool and smelled faintly of lemon floor cleaner. The television was on, showing some noisy kids’ TV show.
“Do you want tea?” Bea called over her shoulder as she headed back into the kitchen. Antonia followed her, gripping the handle of Jack’s car seat tightly. Every muscle seemed to have gone stiff.
“No, I don’t want tea,” she said as soon as they reached the kitchen and Bea had nowhere else to run. “I want you to tell me what happened to your face!”
“A toddler with a very hard head happened,” Bea said dryly.
Antonia put the bag of fruit and cookies on the table but didn’t put Jack down. She felt the sudden need to be able to make a quick exit. “Simon did it?”
“Yes, Simon,” Bea said, as if that had been a stupid question.
“On purpose?”
As if he had heard her, Simon appeared in the doorway.
The sound caught Antonia’s attention. She turned to look at him and blinked in surprise. “He’s crawling?”
“That is what they do at this age.”
Simon grinned up at her, revealing several little white teeth.
His hair, white-blond, curled around his ears. He looked like a grubby-faced cherub. Perhaps he was.
But her sister’s face told another story.
Excerpted from One of the Boys by Jayne Cowie Copyright © 2023 by Jayne Cowie. Excerpted by permission of Berkley. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
