Worlds Apart (11 page)

Tamping down on her dismay, Tina
donned a mask, lab coat, and gloves before entering. The
eight-month old baby lay still and quiet on the bed, his parents on
either side of him. Sharon had already started an IV.

Nodding to the parents, Tina
stepped up to the bed, taking in the flushed face and clammy, pale
skin. As she watched, a stream of diarrhea covered the pad Sharon
had placed underneath him. His mother gasped in dismay, grabbing
some wipes and a clean pad. While his parents cleaned him up, Tina
looked into his eyes, ran her hands over his skin, and palpated his
stomach. She read Sharon’s notes and added her own to the
chart.

“We'll keep him on fluids. This
illness seems to run its course in a week or so. Is he still
breastfeeding?” His mother nodded. “Good. I'd like you to continue
doing that, if he'll nurse at all. The breast milk is the best
thing for him. I'm also leaving orders to watch his fever. I don't
want it to get too high, but fever is part of the body's defense.
He can handle it if stays around a hundred one or so.”

She took in the pinched, anxious
faces of the parents, and found she had to reach deep for her
professional demeanor. “The danger with diarrhea is dehydration.
We're replacing his fluids with the IV, so it's just a matter of
getting the parasite out of his system. Your breast milk will
supply calories and antibodies that he needs. If he won't nurse,
pump some milk, and give it to him with an eyedropper. Its
antibodies and natural bacteria will help clean out his
gut.”

She changed the subject. “Neither
of you has gotten sick?”

They shook their heads. “No,” the
father said. “We think he picked this up at daycare.”

Tina couldn't repress the chill
those words gave her. This would spread like wildfire.

In the triage room, the television
was once again playing the public service announcement she and Will
had recorded with Mayor Ortega:
use bottled water or boil your
water before using, even for brushing teeth and for washing hands.
Do not eat from your gardens. If symptoms begin, keep hydrated.
Don't congregate.

The last part was hard, with so
many funerals to attend.

Back in the waiting room, Sharon
pointed her toward another child lying in her father's arms. “Put
her in with the Carmichael baby, Doc. We're out of
rooms.”

~~

“That parasite you sent us is
something new.” The voice on the speakerphone belonged to Dr.
Grayson of the CDC, his call coming well before the sun put in an
appearance the next morning. Tina continued to update charts as he
talked, her desk lost beneath piles of notes, printouts, two of her
stethoscopes, a new batch of thermometers, and somewhere—her cup of
coffee. She should have been at the clinic ten minutes
ago.

“Green Roads is officially
quarantined,” Dr. Grayson continued. “I've already talked to your
mayor. She's getting that started. I'm sending a team out to you,
headed by Dr. Karen Beauchamp. Her team will be investigating your
soil and water, but you'll be happy to know I'm also sending a team
of medical personnel to help with patient care. They should all be
arriving by this evening.”

Tina stopped typing and turned her
burning eyes toward the speaker. “Thank you, Doctor. That's the
best news I've heard in a week.”

“You still healthy?” he
asked.

“I'm fine. Now that people have
stopped eating the local food, and are treating their water, I
expect new cases to drop off. It might take a few more days to make
a difference, though. The incubation period seems to be about a
week.”

“Any more deaths in the last
twelve hours?”

“One.” Tina closed her eyes,
seeing Will's haunted eyes as he told her of the latest patient to
succumb—a three-year-old girl. She knew he was afraid for his own
young son. So was she.

“It'll slow down.” Dr. Grayson
sounded professionally reassuring, and Tina smiled at the
speaker.

“I know,” she said. “Thank you,
Dr. Grayson. Is there anything else?”

“No, I'll leave you to it. Keep me
in the loop until my teams get there.”

“Will do.” She tapped the off
button, took a deep breath, and began a search for her
coffee.

Chapter 12

Damien slipped into town around
noon a few days later, going in the back way and avoiding the road.
Since he’d already explored the town while in wolf form, he didn’t
have to waste time looking around now. Strolling past the houses
that butted up against the mountain, he came out onto Main Street,
and turned left toward the wood building on the corner.

His entry into the pub did not go
unnoticed. All movement and conversation came to a halt as everyone
stopped to stare at him. He paused just inside the door, noting
there were twelve people in the room, and that their interest in
him was not due to hostility.

They were astonished.

Damien took quick stock of his
form, afraid for a moment they could see the wolf inside him. But
that was laughable, and he shook off his concern, instead glancing
around with a raised eyebrow.

He did not fail to notice that the
pregnant woman was sitting at the bar. Perfect. He’d hoped she
would be here. He proffered a lazy smile to the crowd as he walked
to the counter. They continued to watch him and he let his
confusion show as he spoke to the bartender. “Is something
wrong?”

The bartender glanced toward the
woman. “Is this fellow one of the Atlanta docs?”

She shook her head, placing her
sandwich on the plate in front of her. She picked up her napkin and
wiped her hands as she approached Damien. He straightened as he
watched her, astonished at the aura that surrounded her. Not her
own aura, but from the child she carried. No wonder he had sensed
something strange while in wolf form.

She stopped three feet in front of
him, meeting his gaze with a stern authority that did not detract
from her beauty. He made no effort to hide his interest as he
nodded a greeting.

“Where did you come from?” she
asked. “How did you get into town?”

He shifted his backpack to call
her attention to it. “I came down off the mountain.” He glanced
around the room, but brought his gaze back to the woman. “Is there
some problem, ma’am?”

“You mean you just walked in? You
didn’t come down the road?” She turned to the bartender as mutters
rose behind her. “Shit.”

The bartender shrugged and the
woman turned back to Damien. “What’s your name?” she
asked.

“Damien. Damien Fontaine. I’ve
been hiking around the state for a while, and thought I’d stop in
for a shower and some supplies. I hope that’s all
right.”

“I’m afraid it’s not, Mr.
Fontaine. But there’s not anything we can do about it.” She
gestured around her. “This town is under quarantine. If you’d come
up the road, you would have been stopped several miles back. Now
that you’re here, you’ll have to stay for a while. I’m Dr. Cassidy.
Can you tell me where you’ve been in the last couple of weeks? Have
you been ill at all?”

Her eyes were a deep brown. Pretty
too, despite the tiredness he could see in them. Damien bowed his
head as he answered. “I’ve just been in the wilderness, ma’am.
Couldn’t tell you exactly where, as I usually avoid maps. Haven’t
been around any people, though. And I haven’t been sick, either.”
He looked her up and down, then smiled as he glanced into her eyes
again. “A little lonely, is all.”

She ignored his flirting and
tilted a head toward the bartender. “Eddie can give you a room.
I’ll let the CDC know you’re here. Please don’t try to leave town.
The good news is the illness is slowing down. We’ve isolated the
bug, but haven’t figured out where it came from, so cancel any
plans you have for the immediate future, and plan on playing lots
of pool or checkers.”

She indicated the tables as she
tossed her napkin on the counter, and turned toward the door,
already dismissing Damien.

The bartender stopped her rush.
“Uh, Doc?”

She paused, eyebrows
raised.

He pointed at her plate. “Finish
your sandwich, Doc. The clinic will still be there in five minutes.
You can’t run on adrenaline twenty-four seven.”

Damien watched with interest as
Dr. Cassidy sighed dramatically, marched to the counter, and swept
the sandwich off the plate. Making sure Eddie noticed, she stuffed
a good portion of it into her mouth as she stomped back to the door
and grabbed her coat from the rack, heading outside without
bothering to put it on. Her act brought a few titters from the
crowd, but Eddie seemed satisfied as he turned to
Damien.

“Eighty bucks a night, includes
breakfast.”

Damien loosened his pack, letting
it slide to the floor. He pulled out his wallet. “I’ll take one
night, but I wasn’t expecting to be stuck here. I don’t have the
funds for a long stay.”

Eddie shrugged. “Talk to the CDC
folks. They’ll set you up with FEMA or something.”

Damien handed him a hundred dollar
bill, waiting to see if the bartender would call it a fake. It
was
fake, but his source had assured him it would pass for
the real thing. Indeed, Eddie just held it up to the light then
motioned Damien over to a computer at the end of the
counter.

Damien made up an address and
phone number, hoping he wasn’t too far off from normal Flatland
practices. Eddie gave no indication he thought anything was
strange, but Damien was relieved when Eddie handed him a key and
his change.

He didn’t head for his room right
away. “So what’s got you all in this predicament?” he asked. “Do I
need to watch for purple splotches or pox or anything?”

“No.” The bartender stayed
serious. “Some kind of food poisoning, they think. Just all the
usual, lovely symptoms that go with that. I can guarantee the water
and food we're using now are safe, so if you end up with it, it’s
‘cause you’ve already been exposed. Hope like hell you haven’t
been. It's a bad one.”

His final words were punctuated by
a deep, tolling bell, reaching them from outside. Damien looked
around as all the tavern's customers began to push away from tables
or the bar, tossing money down. At his quizzical look, Eddie
explained. “Funeral. We've been averaging three a week. This is a
small town, mister. That's a lot of deaths.”

Damien nodded, picking up his
pack. He pointed to the stairs. “I'll get out of your
way.”

“Third door on your left,” Eddie
said.

~~

Once inside his room, Damien let
the pack drop to the floor as he lifted both arms above his head.
With a deep breath, he drew in the scents of fear and despair that
hovered over the town. His heart rate sped up as power peaked
inside him, making him gasp. He couldn't hold back the laughter
that welled up, but he made it a quiet laugh, not wanting to give
anyone a reason to think he was strange.

Those pixies had done their job
well. He'd make sure they were rewarded when he got back to
Kaarmanesh. In the meantime, he was here, with a town full of
victims, and a mystery so tantalizing he could taste it.

Who was Dr. Cassidy? And how had
it happened, that she carried a child of Kaarmanesh? Who had
fathered her baby? He thought back to the indicted portal and the
challenge left by the mysterious werewolf. It couldn't be him or
she'd be dead by now.

The keeper, perhaps? Or was
someone else making regular trips from Kaarmanesh?

Chapter 13

Tina rolled over and sat up in one
swift movement, awakening to stare into the darkness of her
bedroom.

“Shit. I never took the Plan-B
pill.”

She stared at the darkness a few
moments longer, then forced herself to lay back down. There was
nothing she could do about it now that couldn't be done in—she
glanced at the clock—two hours, when the alarm went off at six
o'clock.

Go back to sleep,
she
instructed herself. God knows, she needed the rest, but her mind
refused to settle. Her night with Clive Winslow had happened three
weeks ago, but she'd gone from that straight into the epidemic,
then the rock slide. She'd not had a moment to herself in all that
time. It was no wonder she'd forgotten.

Three weeks. Her period should
have started four days ago. Tina realized she was sitting up again.
She sighed and slipped from the covers. Sleep would not come back
tonight.

Ten minutes later, she flipped the
light switch at the back entrance to the clinic. Ten minutes after
that, she acknowledged what her eyes were showing her.

A plus sign. She was
pregnant.

God damn.
She put the
indicator on the counter and laughed. “What an idiot. What a
fucking idiot I am.”

Three thoughts wrestled for
prominence in her mind.

One was her lectures to the
teenage girls in town, to always use protection, and don't be
afraid to ask for the pills if they did forget. The second was that
she'd have to take a few days off to go to Portland and take care
of this.