Prep For Doom Read online

  He never heard the shot.

  Learn more about TK Carter

  “Claire!” Her name was roared from outside the room in which she was standing. Rushing out, she came face to face with Logan.

  With hands folded across his chest, he looked her square in the eyes. He was pissed. “How long have you been here?” It wasn’t a question; he knew the answer.

  She pushed past him, not caring what else he had to say. “I don’t have time for this, Logan. I have fifteen patients and god only knows how many more on the way.”

  “Eighteen hours,” he spat back, following her to her next room. “How are you supposed to help anyone if you’re a zombie?”

  “What am I supposed to do, let these people suffer because I'm a little sleepy?” She swirled around to face him head-on. “I don’t know when you lost your compassion, but you might want to rethink your career choice.” But that was a lie. She knew exactly when he lost his desire to help others. It was when he joined that stupid conspiracy website. Not only was Logan Claire’s boss, he was also her ex. He called himself a prepper. To her, it was the dumbest idea imaginable. They were in the middle of one of the biggest cities in the world, packed in like sardines. She knew he could prep all he wanted, it wouldn’t do any good.

  Blocking her way into the next room, Logan demanded her undivided attention. “You can either go home willingly, or I will have you written up for insubordination. I need you healthy and alert and you are far from that right now.”

  Claire clenched her next patient’s file, furious that he would threaten her. “You have got to be kidding me.”

  “I don’t joke, Claire.”

  She looked at him with fire in her eyes. The Logan she had fallen in love with two years ago was gone. His once neatly combed and styled black hair was a curtain of matted curls that stuck to the sides of his face, evidence that he had failed to shower—again. He didn’t look like a doctor, he looked like a shut-in who was forced to deal with the rest of mankind, and his attitude reflected it.

  “What’s your choice?” He pushed her to answer.

  Shoving the file she held into his chest, she stepped close to him. With her lips pressed to his ear, she whispered, “Go to hell.” And the saddest part was she meant it. She felt betrayed by him in the strangest way. That prepping site took Logan from her and created a paranoid monster. She wanted her Logan back, wherever he was hiding.

  Without chancing another look back, Claire grabbed her bag from behind the nurses’ station and headed for the double doors that separated the ER from the outside world. Her anxiety that was nonexistent inside those protective walls returned the moment she breathed in the fresh air. The hospital was her safe place. In the outside world, she wasn’t a brilliant doctor who helped save lives; she was just Claire, a young woman who felt like she was stumbling through life with a blindfold on.

  The walk to the parking garage was always a time she used to reflect on her day. That day had started out like any other. It wasn’t quiet by any means, it was Manhattan after all, but by midday, they were swamped with unknown, flu-like cases. It was, by far, the worst flu outbreak she had ever seen. She knew where she was truly needed, and a few hours’ rest was all it would take to bring her back to life.

  With a sigh, she cranked up her Beetle and turned the radio to an earsplitting volume hoping that the noise would drown out her thoughts. Only, she couldn’t find what she needed. Channel after channel gave another report of what she already knew.

  ‘Worst flu outbreak in years,’ ‘Outbreak of the century,’ ‘Hospitals overrun by mysterious illness.’

  “That’s the way to keep the public calm!” she screamed into the emptiness of her car. She knew it was reports like those that caused people with a simple cold to flock into her ER and take up beds that were needed for the truly ill. For the first time in eighteen hours, Claire wanted nothing more than a hot shower and her warm bed.

  When she pulled into the congested traffic of lower Manhattan, she began to count the minutes until she could hop in the shower and wash the day away. At every block she was stopped at a red light, and every light seemed to take hours. Twenty minutes later, she was home, ready to get some sleep so she could get back to her patients.

  Claire shared her tiny apartment with her younger sister, Haylee, Haylee’s daughter, Emma, and occasionally, Logan. Though the nights that Logan stayed over were no more, and no one was happier about that than her sister. It had been them against the world since their parents died. Killed in a car accident when Claire was sixteen, their deaths forced Claire to grow up far too fast. Their deaths were the reason Claire chose to work in the emergency room.

  At sixteen, Claire made a promise to ensure that Haylee would be taken care of, and she had yet to break that promise. Foster home after foster home, Haylee was Claire’s only priority. Emma came along when Haylee was only eighteen, and she instantly became Claire’s heart.

  “Hey girl,” Haylee’s bright smile greeted her the minute she walked through the door. God, did she love that girl. “Asshole got the rest of his stuff and left you a note on the counter.”

  Okay, maybe not as much love as I thought.

  Exhausted, Claire let her bag drop to the floor with a thud. “What does it say?”

  “How am I supposed to know? I'm not a snoop.”

  Not a snoop. Claire repeated Haylee’s words to herself and then laughed, her eyes rolling so far back in her head that she feared they were stuck. “Really now?”

  “Fine,” Haylee huffed as she walked into the kitchen where she snatched the note from the counter and feigned reading. “It says here that we’re all going to die.”

  “Geeze.” Claire wanted to scream at the top of her lungs. Her once brilliant boyfriend had turned into a conspiracy nut. Scaring her sister and her niece with his crazy theories about mass deaths was one of the reasons she had to leave him. If he wasn’t screaming about Big Brother’s video surveillance or cell-phone tapping, he was spouting off about how the government was trying to poison the population.

  “I need a shower.” Claire sighed as she turned from the kitchen, leaving Logan’s note untouched.

  “Sounds like a good plan.” Haylee snickered as she shoved an Oreo in her mouth. “‘Cause you smell like vomit.”

  “Haylee!”

  “Just speaking the truth.”

  Ignoring her, Claire looked around for her bundle of energy, Emma. “Where’s my baby girl?” It wasn’t like her not to run into Claire’s arms the second she walked through the door. “In bed,” Haylee said around the cookie in her mouth. “She came home from school early with a mild fever and has been sleeping ever since.”

  Claire’s heart lodged itself in her throat. “Sick?” She turned for the hall and stared at Emma’s closed door. All the patients she saw that day flashed in rapid succession through her mind. Emma couldn’t be sick, she tried to reassure herself. Not like them, no.

  “It’s just a little fever,” Haylee said as she grabbed Claire’s shoulder. “There’s nothing to worry about.” But Claire wasn’t so sure. She knew bringing illnesses home with her was a hazard of the job; because of what she did for a living, she could cause her family to become sick.

  “After I scrub this yuck off me,” Claire looked her sister dead in the eyes, daring her to disagree. “I will be checking on her.” Haylee knew when it came to Emma, Claire didn’t play.

  Running into the bathroom, Claire turned the water to the highest temperature she could stand and soaped her body until her skin felt raw. If Emma wasn’t like the other patients she had seen that day, the last thing she wanted was to make her ill.

  Within five minutes, she was scrubbed red, wrapped in a towel, and headed to Emma. What hit her the moment she opened the door would be burned into her memory for the rest of her life.

  Emma, tiny little Emma, laid on her side, red from fever, soaked in sweat. Running to her side, Claire placed her hand on her head and cursed when the burn met her palm.<
br />
  “Haylee!” Claire shouted before turning to Emma to whisper, “Emma, sweetie.” Claire had seen it a dozen times that day: patients would come in with a mild fever only to quickly deteriorate.

  She felt Haylee come up behind her and stop. “What’s wrong?” Her casual tone grated Claire’s nerves. Claire couldn’t turn away from Emma, not even to address her sister. “We need to get her to the hospital, now.”

  “For what?” Haylee’s dismissive tone was like nails on a chalkboard as she continued, “It’s just a little fever. If we take her to that germ-infested place then she will get sick.”

  “Look at her,” Claire screamed as she pulled to her feet. “She has more than a little fever.”

  Haylee’s eyes grew wide with panic. “You don’t think it’s what everyone’s been talking about, do you?”

  Claire didn’t want to scare her, even as her own heart was breaking, but she knew the truth. Emma was sick, sicker than she had ever been, and she needed medical attention. “Get her in the car and I’ll be right down.”

  But when Claire finished dressing and made it back to Emma’s room to pack a bag, Haylee was standing over Emma, frozen and expressionless.

  “Haylee,” she spoke her sister’s name softly. “What are you doing?” Claire wanted to scream at her to move, but she had seen that face more times than she could count. Haylee was frozen with fear. Yes, Claire had seen that expression on every loved one’s face that knew death was near, but Emma was not going to die, she reassured herself, not on my watch.

  “The News,” Haylee’s voice cracked with emotion. “They said people were dying from this.”

  God, did she hate the news. “Some have, yes, but that doesn’t mean Emma even has it. We don’t even know what it is.”

  Emma didn’t have time for Claire to talk her mother off the ledge. Pushing Haylee out of the way, she wrapped Emma in her blanket and stood. “Are you going to stand there all night or come with us?”

  With Emma limp in Claire’s arms, her condition truly hit home. Within the few minutes it took her to get dressed, Emma’s fever had risen. She tried to tell herself that it wasn’t possible, but she knew better. All night, she had seen patient after patient deteriorate right before her eyes.

  Placing Emma in her car-seat, Claire turned to Haylee. “Sit in the back with her.” Even though Emma wasn’t conscious, Claire didn’t want her to be alone. She didn’t want her to ever be alone.

  Racing down the still-crowded streets of Manhattan, Claire did her best to keep her mind off the worst.

  Kids get sick. It’s normal. A little fluid and maybe some IV antibiotics and she’d be all better—laughing and running around like her usual self.

  “What do you think it is?” Haylee asked, stiff in the seat next to Emma.

  Claire’s fingers wrapped around the steering-wheel with white-knuckle force as she looked at Emma through her rearview. “We don’t know.” None of the tests she’d run that day came back conclusive. Whatever they were dealing with, it had never been seen before. Claire knew there was nothing that she could say that would ease Haylee’s worries, and she didn’t want to lie.

  In a perfect world, Claire could shut off her emotions and be the doctor. Emma wouldn’t be her niece, she would be a patient. Claire knew Emma needed that from her; she needed a doctor with a level head.

  Haylee and Emma were Claire’s life. They were all she had, and Claire would be damned if a little bug took either of them away from her.

  “How are you feeling?” It was a question that should have already been asked. It was a line that was ingrained into Claire’s vocabulary, utilized any time a family member brought a sick patient into her ER.

  “Fine.” But it was obvious Haylee was far from fine.

  Nodding at her, Claire tried her best to smile. “You don’t seem symptomatic.” Though she knew that didn’t mean much with whatever the illness was. A healthy individual could change in a matter of hours.

  Turning into the ER parking lot, Claire pointed to the side door that read, “Employees Only.” “Here,” she said as she handed Haylee her badge. “Go in through there and ask for Logan. He should be on the floor.”

  “What if he’s not?”

  “Then tell a nurse you're my sister.” Claire huffed out in frustration. “Just get her in there and I’ll meet you after I park.”

  “Okay.” With stiff movements, Haylee bent down and pulled Emma from her seat and headed for the door.

  Slamming on the gas, Claire peeled away from the staff entrance and slid her tiny car into the first parking spot she could find. Leaping from the car, she sprinted, with newfound energy, through the parking garage that she had left less than an hour ago.

  Bursting through the doors of the ER, Claire raced straight toward the triage desk. “Where’s Emma Calloway?” she all but screamed at Sloan, the only nurse in sight.

  “Are you back on shift?” Sloan asked with a tilted head.

  “No.” Claire tried her best to catch her breath. “My niece, where is she?”

  Sloan tossed her ebony black hair behind her shoulder, turned to her computer, and began to type out a series of commands. “Room 207.” She barely got the words out before Claire took off.

  The ER at New York Presbyterian was huge—a maze of corridors and rooms were laid out before her. It seemed like no matter how fast she ran, time was against her.

  “Claire!” A strong hand wrapped around her arm, stopping her in her tracks, “what are you doing back here?”

  “I don’t have time for your crazy.” Claire yanked her arm free of Logan’s grasp. “Emma’s sick.”

  “Shit.” Logan’s chest visually deflated. “You don’t think?”

  “Yes, I do.” She replied quickly as she turned away and continued her race down the hall.

  “We can’t help her. You know that,” Logan said, easily keeping pace with her.

  “Either you can help me,” Claire snarled at him as she continued her race to Emma, “or you can get the hell out of my way.”

  He stopped dead. “You shouldn’t have come back, Claire. You’d have known that if you read my note.”

  Grabbing the door to room 207, she turned to face him. “If you can’t keep your opinions to yourself, stay away from this room. The last thing Haylee needs is something else to worry about.”

  “What are her stats?” Claire asked the minute she pushed through the door and saw the familiar smiling face of Cindy, a brand new, fresh-out-of-college RN.

  “Temp is 104.1. BP is 136/98, respirations shallow at 6 BMP.”

  Haylee was at Claire’s side in a flash, needing her to decode all the medical jargon. “What does that mean?” she asked with tears swimming in her eyes.

  “That she’s sick,” Claire answered as vaguely as she could. “I'm going to insert a line, give her a fever reducer, and draw some blood,” Cindy quickly addressed Haylee, then looked to Claire for approval.

  “Stat rush on those labs,” Claire ordered, even though she knew exactly what they would say…nothing.

  “You got it, doc.”

  Cindy was a tiny thing at just five feet, but she was a fire-cracker that never stopped moving. If anyone needed something, she’d have it done and returned faster than anyone else on staff. Claire knew, if nothing else, they were lucky she was their nurse.

  It wasn’t until Cindy was gone that Haylee collapsed in the chair closest to Emma. “You have to save her,” she cried out to Claire. “She’s all I have.”

  Walking to her sister, Claire grabbed Haylee’s hand and made a promise no doctor should ever make, “I will do whatever it takes to save her.”

  Just then, a knock sounded on the door. “Claire?” Sloan popped her head inside. “Can I see you outside for a minute?”

  “Sure,” she answered her, then stood and looked to Haylee who had yet to take her eyes off sleeping Emma. “I’ll be back in a second, okay?” But Haylee didn’t say a word or move a muscle; Claire knew her sister was los
t.

  “What is it?” Claire asked the five foot seven beauty that was Sloan, after closing the door behind her.

  Claire watched as Sloan’s face fell. “Nine of your patients from today are gone.”

  “What do you mean gone?” It was a dumb question. Claire knew exactly what Sloan meant. They were dead. The patients that exhibited the same symptoms as Emma were dead.

  “They all bled out.” Sloan shook her head as if she was trying to dislodge a haunting memory. “You did everything you could.”

  Slumping against the cement wall, Claire’s face fell into her hands. “Did I?” she asked, knowing that she hadn’t done everything in her power to save them. How could she when she didn’t know what she was saving them from?

  “We can’t fight something if we have no idea what it is,” Sloan said softly.

  “How is this even possible?” Claire’s breath left her lungs in a rush. “How can no one know a damn thing?” Feeling defeated, Claire turned away from Sloan. “Thanks for letting me know.” But even to her, her voice sounded hollow.

  Claire walked back into the room where her angel rested, sat in a chair, and waited for the results that would either brighten her little world or crash it into eternal darkness. It was the waiting that was agonizing. To her, it seemed like hours passed before another knock came, but when it did, Cindy didn’t have to say a word. “No.” Claire shook her head in denial.

  “I'm so sorry,” Cindy whispered as she handed Claire the labs, which confirmed her worst fear, Unknown Pathogen. Rec’ Quarantine. “We’re going to have to isolate her.”

  Claire’s entire body began to shake with rage. “I’m not leaving her.” The mere thought outraged her. She refused to leave Emma alone, not when she was fighting for her life, not ever.

  “Claire?” Haylee spoke her name so softly she almost missed it. “I don’t feel so—” She was cut off by retching.

  “No.” Claire looked to Haylee as her head began to swim and her heart clenched in her chest. No.