TEMPTED BY HER BOSS (7 page)

Donovan hurried over and tapped him on the shoulder. ‘I think you’re waiting for us.’

The guy cut his call. ‘Donovan Reid, from the DPA?’

He nodded. ‘Can you give us an update and take us straight to the hospital? Is it still two patients?’

The guy shook his head. He was unusually pale for a Florida local. Or maybe he was just feeling the lateness of the hour, like the rest of them. He gave a wave to couple of police officers near the doors.

‘Two? You’re joking? We’re going to need a police escort. Latest count is thirty-five.’

He started walking towards the doors, not waiting for them to follow.

Donovan’s strides lengthened. ‘What do you mean, thirty-five? Where did they come from?’

The guy sighed as he pulled open the door of the police car. ‘It seems that a kindergarten trip was at the state park caves five days ago.’ His gaze swept around the team. ‘I hope one of you guys is a paediatrician.’

Donovan felt his heart sink like a stone. Grace’s face was a picture. It looked like her first assignment was going to be a baptism of fire.

CHAPTER FOUR

T
HE
HOSPITAL
WAS
pure and utter chaos. People wandered everywhere, staff looked bewildered and hospital security seemed to have no idea what they were supposed to be doing.

Last time Grace had seen anything like this had been a nightmare shift in the ER as a resident during a major incident when there had been a pile-up on the nearby highway.

Three ambulances were in the bay outside, currently unloading patients. Hysterical parents were talking on mobile phones and one kid seemed in danger of wandering outside.

Grace grabbed the little hand in hers, thought about it for two seconds then lifted the toddler into her arms. The child looked around two and a half and wasn’t in the least bit worried about being in the arms of a perfect stranger.

Donovan had moved into full team-leader mode. The chaos didn’t seem to worry him at all—in fact, he might even be thriving on it.

‘John, I want you to find who is in charge of finding our primary source and co-ordinate with them. We need environmental controls in place to stop the spread of disease.’ John nodded as if this were an everyday request and disappeared into the melee of people. ‘David, set up communications with our labs and find out who is charge of the lab facilities here. I need you to start doing some provisional testing to move things along.’ He spun round and caught sight of Grace, who had perched the toddler on the reception desk. ‘Grace, what are you doing?’

‘It seems like I’m looking after a lost child.’

He wrinkled his nose and shook his head. ‘Hold on.’ He walked over to the desk and grabbed the Tannoy system. ‘Anyone lost a little boy, around two years old? Brown hair, red T-shirt.’ His voice boomed around the waiting room and crowded ER. Heads turned from every direction. Donovan’s wasn’t a voice to ignore.

There was a shriek from the corner, where a woman was waiting with another child in her arms. ‘Mason!’ she yelled, as she pushed her way through the crowd with one arm outstretched and the other clamped around the other child. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t even notice he’d vanished.’ She promptly burst into tears as Grace handed the little boy over.

‘Don’t worry, he’s fine and it’s bedlam in here.’ She squinted at the other child, who was older but whimpering and lethargic in his mother’s arms, with a distinct tinge of yellow to his skin.

She glanced at Donovan but didn’t wait for his response and bent down, ‘Are you waiting for someone to see your son?

The woman nodded. ‘We’ve been waiting for three hours.’

Grace did the sums in her head. It was after midnight. This woman had been here since nine p.m. with a sick kid. Not good.

She smiled. ‘Okay, I’m going to show you to a cubicle then have a look at your son. Does he attend kindergarten? Was he on the trip the other day?’

Donovan seemed to be talking to three people at once, but he gave her a little nod and pointed her in the direction of an empty cubicle. Grace didn’t need to take instruction from him; she knew exactly what she should be doing. The staff around here obviously couldn’t cope with the influx of patients and would need the assistance of the DPA staff. She might not be a paediatrician but she was an experienced doctor and could do a basic assessment on a kid.

She dragged her suitcase behind her and dumped it in a corner. She could retrieve it later. Right now, she had a job to do.

The assessment took minutes. She charted the little boy’s obs, took some bloods, set up an IV line and ordered some further tests.

By the time she joined Donovan a few minutes later he’d managed to acquire himself a clipboard, which he handed to her.

‘Everything okay?’

She nodded. ‘I’m pretty sure he’s going to be another case. He’s five and was on the cave trip with the kindergarten class and is clinically dehydrated and showing signs of jaundice.’

She looked around. ‘Is there somewhere we can admit him?’

Donovan held up his hands. ‘Right now, that’s the million-dollar question. I’ve just spoken to the hospital director. He looks as if he’s ready to have a heart attack. They are reorganising some patient areas to try and give us two ward areas for patients who are affected.’

‘Do you have a number?’

The lines in his forehead seemed to have deepened in the last few minutes. ‘Yeah, around thirty-seven. Thirty-eight if we count your latest. I’ve contacted the DPA for another team with some specialist paediatric staff. It’ll be around twelve hours before they can get here, though.’

Grace understood. Until the rest of the team arrived, they were it. ‘I’ll manage,’ she said swiftly. ‘I can do a basic assessment and prescribe drugs and put in IVs for kids.’

Donovan was looking at her with those blue eyes. He should look tired because it was late. But he didn’t. Instead, he looked invigorated. She’d heard that about him. About how he thrived on his job. Thrived on the pressure of it all.

She had to admit to feeling a little buzz herself on this first field assignment. But was the buzz from the job or from being around Donovan? The man was infectious. She liked the way that energy radiated from him. She liked the way his brain never seemed to stop thinking about the next task. Did he even have an off switch?

She looked at the list of names he’d given her. ‘What do you want me to do with these?’

His voice was serious. ‘I realise this is your first assignment, but I really need you to hit the ground running. You don’t need to work up backgrounds or histories on any of the patients—John will be doing that. I need to check they’ve had all the bloodwork they should have, make sure the samples get sent to David at the lab, and keep an overall note on the condition of the patients. We need to keep on top of things here. The situation could become very volatile. Paediatric patients can deteriorate very quickly—we’ve already lost one older patient—and I’m assuming most people don’t know that. If they did, we’d have a whole host of hysterical parents to deal with.’

His eyes swept around the room. ‘This hospital only has sixty beds. It’s usually only used for basic surgeries and medical complaints. Up until today there were only five paediatric beds. Anything major usually gets transferred to Panama City. If we have any kids that need ITU facilities, we’ll need to transfer them.’

Grace nodded. She understood how serious the situation was, and how easily it could get out of control. For the next twelve hours Donovan needed a team he could rely on. It didn’t matter that her stomach was currently churning. It didn’t matter that she’d doubted for a few seconds if she could actually get the IV into the five-year-old’s tiny vein. One look at that mother’s face had given her all the determination she needed.

It was strange. Around twenty minutes ago all she’d wanted to do was drag her case somewhere, find her pyjamas and lie down for half an hour. She’d hit that point—the one that usually hit medics in the early hours, when it seemed as if everyone in the world was sleeping but them and they would kill for a bed. But the adrenaline surge had hit since then. Things were looking up. Maybe if she could grab some food she would get her second wind.

She took the clipboard and swallowed hard. So many names, so much information to gather. She gave him her best smile. ‘This will be fine, Donovan. I’ll give you a shout if I run into any problems.’

He gave her a tight-lipped smile. Maybe not. Looked like she’d better deal with any problems herself. She pressed the clipboard to her chest. ‘See you soon.’ She kept the smile plastered on her face as she walked down the corridor. She could almost feel his eyes drilling a hole into her back.

She could do this. She could. Sleep was for amateurs.

* * *

He was watching her again. Watching the swing of her hips in that red dress. Darn it. He needed to tell her to change into a pair of scrubs. That way most of her curves would be hidden beneath the pale green material and he could concentrate on the things he needed to.

The Marburg Virus outbreak was much worse than first expected. One fatality already and a whole host of possibilities with a class of kindergarten kids all exposed. He’d already reported to Callum Ferguson, who was organising another team to come and assist. In the meantime, he had to try and get a handle on how to treat these patients and stop the spread of the virus. This place was a logistical nightmare. The lab facilities were basic. The staff were already run off their feet. Judging by the number of people in the ER they were going to run out of beds soon. The hospital facilities were fair, but there were no specialist facilities for any of the kids if their conditions deteriorated quickly.

Above all, he needed to communicate with the staff who were here. And he needed to do it quickly to make sure everyone was working from the same page.

John appeared at his side. ‘We need to have a briefing for staff. Can you collect all the available staff on duty and we’ll give them an overview of what we’re dealing with and how they can contain the risk and stay safe?’

John moved quickly. He was used to this, and he was a professional. Donovan could rely on him.

In around ten minutes the staff were gathered in one of the large nearby treatment rooms. There were around twenty of them—some nurses, some care assistants, two onsite doctors, admin staff and the hospital director. Most of them looked anxious and at least one woman was heavily pregnant.

Donovan stood in the doorway. ‘Hi, folks. Thanks for stopping for a few moments. I’m Donovan Reid, a team leader at the Disease Prevention Agency. David Coles is working in your lab, John here will be doing case histories and Grace Barclay, one of our doctors, will be reviewing the patients and looking at symptom control.

‘Most of you already know that we suspect we’re dealing with the Marburg virus. We’ve had two confirmed laboratory cases and we’re waiting for the results of others. Marburg virus can also be called Marburg haemorrhagic fever. We treat it the same way we treat other viral haemorrhagic fevers. Most patients are infected at source.’ He glanced over at John. ‘We’re still establishing where that it is, but at the moment we suspect it’s some bat caves in the local state park. Previous sources of infection for this virus have been African fruit bats.’ All eyes in the room were watching him. He wanted to make this brief but comprehensible.

‘The incubation period is between three and ten days, followed by a sudden onset of symptoms. These can include a rash over the trunk, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, chest pain and abdominal pain. More severe symptoms include jaundice, delirium, haemorrhaging, inflammation of the pancreas and liver failure.’ He ran his hands through his hair. It didn’t matter that there were over twenty people crammed into this room. Right now you could have heard a pin drop. Everyone was hanging on his every word.

‘There is no magic cure for the virus. We don’t have a vaccine against it. We can only treat the symptoms. Maintain fluid balances, give oxygen therapy, replace lost blood and clotting factors and treat any complications.’ He looked around the staff. ‘For everyone here, barrier nursing techniques have to be used in all cases. Any staff member exposed to body fluids is at risk. Protective gowns, gloves and masks have to be worn at all times. Take care with the disposal of needles, equipment and patient excretions.

‘Patients who are worst affected should be placed in isolation if possible.’ He held up his hands. ‘I realise facilities here aren’t ideal. But the people with the worst symptoms should be nursed in side rooms if possible. Parents have to be warned about the spread of disease. They have to be gowned, gloved and masked if they want to stay with their kids.’

The questions flew at him from all corners of the room.

‘What if we’ve already been exposed?’

‘How many people die from Marburg’s?’

‘Is this the only outbreak?’

‘How long do the lab tests take?’

Donovan was calm, cool and collected. He answered everyone as best he could. The death rate could be terrifying. But he didn’t want people running scared. There had already been a death here. Jessie Tanner hadn’t been old. But the death of a sixty-seven-year-old was a lot less terrifying than the death of a kindergarten-aged kid. He had to try and keep things in perspective.

He kept everything brief and to the point. After around fifteen minutes most of the staff had returned to their stations.

Lucy Kirk, the head nurse, appeared at his side. ‘I’ve got a couple of kids that need to be reviewed. Their symptoms are getting worse and they’re not responding to their IV fluids. They can’t stop vomiting and the fluids are coming out quicker than they’re going in.’ Her face was flushed and her hair had escaped from the elastic band at the nape of her neck.

Donovan looked up. ‘Can’t you ask Grace? She’s supposed to be reviewing the patients.’ He felt a little surge of annoyance. He’d just been asked to take part in a press conference for the local TV and radio stations. He’d done many of these in the past but knew he was supposed to run things by the communications department of the DPA first. Trouble was, he hadn’t worked out what he was going to say yet—let alone put pen to paper.

Lucy shook her head. ‘Grace is caught up with a kid with breathing difficulties. We’ve got six adults and thirty-four children as patients now. Grace hasn’t stopped for a second. We’ve already nicknamed her Superwoman. But she’s only one person. Our regular doctor is spending most of his time trying to move the rest of our patients to other facilities.’

Donovan nodded quickly, running his hand through his hair. ‘Okay, thank you. I’ll be with you in two minutes.’

Lucy disappeared back to the ER while Donovan scribbled some quick notes for the press conference. He was being unreasonable. He couldn’t really expect Grace, on her first assignment, to look after more than forty patients. Trouble was, things frequently worked out like that on DPA fieldwork trips.

He gowned, gloved and masked. It only took him a few minutes to review the kids and agree with Lucy’s assessments. He wrote up some orders but, after looking around him, decided just to administer the anti-emetic IV shots to the kids himself. It didn’t take long and he quickly disposed of his equipment and clothes.