Pathogen Read online

  Table of Contents

  Synopsis

  Praise for Trigger

  By the Author

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  About the Author

  Books Available From Bold Strokes Books

  Synopsis

  When a deadly virus surfaces in the small, wealthy town of Hidden Valley, British Columbia, Dr. Kate Morrison and Sergeant Andy Wyles work together to uncover the source of the outbreak. As the two women navigate their new relationship, Kate and Andy are also forced to navigate a highly political and increasingly panicked community. Still bearing the scars of her recent abduction, Kate is driven to discover how this virus attacks her critically ill patients while Andy investigates suspicions of bioterrorism. As the death count rises, Kate struggles with a crushing sense of helplessness, the pressure to keep the residents of Hidden Valley alive, and Andy’s growing concern that maybe Kate hasn’t yet dealt with her troubled past.

  A Dr. Kate Morrison Investigation

  Praise for Trigger

  “Trigger by first-time author Jessica L. Webb is an action-packed adventure. Webb has a great writing style, and her storytelling is outstanding.”—Romantic Reader

  “[A] brilliantly tense and thrilling story that unraveled bit by bit, drawing the reader even further in.”—Inked Rainbow Reads

  Pathogen

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  eBooks from Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  http://www.boldstrokesbooks.com

  eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  Please respect the rights of the author and do not file share.

  Pathogen

  © 2016 By Jessica L. Webb. All Rights Reserved.

  ISBN 13: 978-1-62639-832-0

  This Electronic Book is published by

  Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 249

  Valley Falls, New York 12185

  First Edition: December 2016

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Credits

  Editor: Jerry L. Wheeler

  Production Design: Stacia Seaman

  Cover Design By Melody Pond

  By the Author

  Trigger

  Pathogen

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to thank the entire Bold Strokes Books team, who made my secret, quiet dream of becoming a published author come true. So many people had a hand in bringing this book to life, and I am so incredibly grateful for your time, energy, and dedication.

  Special thanks to my editor, Jerry Wheeler. We make a good team, narrowed eyes and all.

  For my wife, Jen. You have always believed I am brave.

  Chapter One

  Kate was furious.

  She stood at the nurse’s station in her Vancouver East Emergency Room, hands wrapped around a takeout cup of coffee. It was lukewarm. Cold, really. But she tried to let it calm her, to let her anger dissipate into the familiar noise and movement of the morning rush. She was vaguely aware of the four med students who had been shadowing her for the past week as they whispered quietly to each other. It was the perfect opportunity to walk them through the trauma they’d just seen. Time to teach them about the crucial skills of team communication and have them identify the critical components of airway-breathing-circulation in the sixteen-year-old stabbing victim they’d just watched Kate work on for the last hour. But Kate was too angry still to do any of that, not after having to weather the insults and accusations from a trauma surgeon with a superiority complex. So she stood with her coffee, looking down at the e-Chart of the kid they’d just lost, trying to pull herself together.

  “Don’t you see patients of your own anymore, Morrison? Or do you just turn up at traumas to show us how it’s done?” Craig dropped his e-Chart carelessly on the desk, rubbing the heels of his palms into his eyes. He was at the end of a double shift, and it showed.

  “Funny,” Kate said shortly. Craig was her closest friend and ally at Van East. Apparently, Kate didn’t have the patience for anyone today.

  Craig looked at Kate through bloodshot eyes. “Don’t let him get to you. Davidson’s an asshole, and you know it. He couldn’t have saved that kid if he’d been standing in the ambulance bay with his scalpel in hand.”

  Kate grunted noncommittally, though she did feel a bit better hearing it from someone else. The med students shuffled uneasily behind them, and Kate tried to pull her day back into focus. She turned to them, their faces eager, unsure, and possibly bored.

  “Each of you find a case. I want a complete history and treatment options, no input from each other or the residents. And don’t get in the way of the nurses. Find me in an hour.”

  They scurried away, and Kate felt a pang of guilt. Usually she looked forward to medical students. They forced people to think about what they were doing and why. And they often provided comic relief for those who had been here too long. Kate wasn’t sure if it was this cohort or whether she was generally feeling impatient, but somehow these med students made her feel old. Old and tired.

  “Is it me or are the med students getting younger?” Craig’s voice was plaintive.

  This time Kate cracked a smile. “I was just thinking the same thing. It’s possible, Dr. Nielson, that we are getting old.”

  “God, I feel it today,” he groaned.

  A nurse stopped Craig to follow up with a patient, and Kate took the last few moments to look out through the window. When she had left her apartment just a few hours ago, it had been a gentle, warm morning with just the subtlest hint summer was behind them and a wet, cool season was slowly making its way over the mountains.

  Just then a familiar, uniformed figure came in through the revolving doors. Kate’s heart gave a quick kick at the sight of Andy in her RCMP uniform, a windbreaker over the light grey shirt and soft body armour vest. Out of habit, Andy scanned the room as she walked in and Kate smiled as Andy’s clear grey eyes came to rest on her. Andy stopped, one finger hooked into her belt, holding a coffee in one hand, her shoulders back, her almost six-foot frame looking every inch the RCMP sergeant she was. Andy gave a slow smile, and even across the room, to Kate it felt like a private moment, as if that look could only ever be for her.

  They’d been back from Seattle four months. They’d returned from their too-brief stay in the Montana mountains, love-drenched and happy, to a frenzy of media attention. It had been overwhelming, more so given they were trying to navigate the beginning of their relationship. All Kate wanted to do was turn around and hide out with Andy in the small cabin they’d shared for three days. Things settled down, and now life had almost returned to normal. Except the part where Andy walked casually into her ER, and Kate still reacted like a schoolkid with a crush.

  Andy walked up to the nurse’s station, and Kate put down her cold coffee, accepting the scalding one from Andy in return.

  “Hi,” Kate said quietly. “You’re lucky you caught me.” />
  “Lucky, yes,” Andy said. Her smile was brilliant, beautiful.

  Kate sought out the details of Andy’s face she knew so well now. The soft lines at the corner of her eyes when she smiled, her blond hair pulled back off her face, even her straight posture which would relax the moment Kate’s hand drew a line down her spine.

  “I thought you’d be home sleeping by now,” Kate said, taking in the circles just visible under Andy’s eyes. Kate knew Andy had worked an overnight. She should be at her apartment already, sleeping.

  “Something came up,” Andy told her with a small, knowing smile. It had become an all-encompassing catch phrase for both of them. It could mean anything: a trauma, a distraught family, a deadline, a new lead, one more patient, one more phone call. Often it simply meant they’d lost track of time and had gone over their shift. Until now, neither of them had someone waiting for them who could compete with their work.

  “And I take it that something isn’t resolved, since you’re here in uniform,” Kate said, digging.

  “Finns caught me just as I was heading off shift. He’s handed me an out-of-district case, apparently at the superintendent’s request.”

  “Which means what?” Kate asked. She transferred the cup to her other hand, relieving the intense heat against her palm.

  Craig interrupted before Andy could answer. “Sergeant Wyles, how’s life?”

  Andy tipped her hat solemnly at Craig. “Dr. Nielson. I can’t complain.”

  “You’re in the wrong place for not complaining,” Craig said, half serious. He brightened quickly. “Hey, you guys should come by for dinner this weekend. Anya’s been asking for weeks.”

  Kate answered for them both. “We’re heading up to Andy’s parents place next weekend for her brother’s fortieth birthday.”

  “Is this the first time you’re meeting the family?” Craig asked, looking interested.

  “Yep,” Kate said.

  “Are you nervous?”

  “I’ve never gone home to meet my girlfriend’s family before. What if I do it wrong?” Kate answered Craig’s questions but kept her eyes on Andy. She simply smiled reassuringly.

  Craig picked up his e-Chart, shaking his head. “I’m pretty sure all the same rules apply, Morrison. I’ll tell Anya we’ll aim for end of September.” With a quickly sketched farewell, Craig left to see patients.

  Kate took their moment of silence to sip her hot coffee. It was absolute heaven. “So, you were telling me about an out-of-district case?” she asked Andy.

  “Right. I’ll be heading up north for an overnight to check out a situation in Hidden Valley. They’ve got someone up there, but Finns wants me to check in. I’m sure the local detachment is going to love that,” Andy said with a wry smile.

  “When are you back?” Kate said, trying not to let her disappointment show. Her work hours had ruined their fair share of plans, too.

  “I’m supposed to be done by noon, so I should be back in the city around four tomorrow.”

  “Sure, and my shift should be done at seven,” Kate muttered under her breath, making Andy laugh. “So this is suck-up coffee, then,” Kate said, indicating the cup in her hand.

  “Something like that.” Andy lowered her voice before she spoke again. “I also thought maybe you had a hard night.” Kate could see Andy scanning her eyes, gauging her reaction. Kate knew she didn’t need to bother. She could never keep anything from Andy.

  Kate shrugged in response.

  “I thought so.”

  “Practicing mind reading, are you?” Kate said, trying to lighten the mood.

  “No, I stopped by your place earlier. I was hoping to catch you before you left.”

  Kate’s heart skipped at the thought, and she pictured Andy using the key she had given her to come into the apartment. She imagined the surprise of seeing Andy as she was getting ready for work, imagined kissing her in the kitchen…

  Kate shook her head, the knot of curls bouncing against the back of her neck. She still struggled with how strong her feelings were for Andy. How she had to temper them in public. She’d never felt like this, not about anybody, not once.

  “Why does that make you think I had a hard night?” she asked, focusing on Andy’s words.

  “There was a pot of tea by the sink and the bed was made. You only drink tea when you can’t sleep, and you only make the bed in the morning when you wake up before the alarm,” Andy said.

  Kate didn’t say anything as she looked out over the ER. One of her med students wrote furiously in a chart as the patient, clearly enjoying the captive audience, gave what looked like his entire life story. Kate considered going to rescue him, then changed her mind.

  “Nightmares?” Andy asked softly, bringing her back.

  Kate gave her a tight, humourless smile. Andy sighed, looking down at Kate’s left arm. Kate controlled the urge to touch the perfectly healed but still pink scar that encircled her arm just below her elbow. She knew it would only make the grim look on Andy’s face that much worse.

  “I’m fine.”

  Which was entirely true. Most of the time, she never thought about those few terrifying hours when a deranged man had tried to remove the skin of her arms and hands. She didn’t have panic attacks or flashbacks, and she didn’t spend any time thinking about what had almost happened. But sometimes while she slept, Angler showed up in her dreams. He never did anything, just stood back with a smirk on his face and watched her. His inaction was somehow more frightening than anything he could say or do in her dreams.

  “I’m fine,” she said more firmly, until Andy tore her eyes away from the scar on Kate’s arm. Kate knew that scar haunted Andy, but she couldn’t figure out how to make that stop.

  One of Kate’s med students sidled up to the nurse’s station, eyes on her chart. She started to speak to Kate, then seemed to realize she’d walked into a private conversation. The woman blushed, squeaked, and shuffled down the hallway, obviously waiting until Kate was done.

  “I guess my five minutes are up,” Andy said, shifting the belt around her hips. “What time are you off tomorrow?”

  “Same as today, seven.”

  “See you at your place then?” Andy said. They spent most of their time together at Kate’s small, one-bedroom Mount Pleasant apartment. Having Andy there already felt familiar.

  “Yes.”

  They had a silent, charged moment as they looked at each other. Kate felt Andy give the smallest of sighs, a gesture she was sure Andy had not meant for her to catch. Kate stretched up suddenly and touched her lips to Andy’s with the lightest, most fleeting touch.

  “See you tomorrow,” Kate said, listening to the rapid, erratic pounding of the blood in her veins. They had not been together long enough for a kiss, even a brief, public kiss to be anything but a promise for more the next time they were alone together.

  Andy backed away, eyes dancing. “See you tomorrow.”

  *

  Kate ran her bare feet over the smooth surface of her hardwood floors, finding the knots and grooves with her toes. She was sitting on the oversized beige couch in her living room wearing the scrubs she’d had to change into at the hospital after a catheterization gone awry. She was trying to focus on the report in front of her. Her supervisor, Dr. Angstrom, had caught her just before her shift ended to tell her the trauma surgeon from the day before had registered a complaint against the ER. Kate, already exhausted after another long shift of trying to see and treat her walk-in patients, direct traumas as they screamed into the ER, and keep an eye on her med students, had not handled his criticism and condescension well. She’d defended herself, Angstrom hadn’t listened, Kate had pushed, and Angstrom had stuck her on a committee to prove he was managing his team. And to top it all off, he’d reminded her that the medical student profiles and resident schedules were already two days late, and he expected them by the next morning. Defeated, Kate had said nothing more.

  Pushing thoughts of her supervisor away, Kate looked at her pho
ne. It was seven thirty and still no new messages. Andy had texted her earlier, saying she’d be late. It was to be expected, really, in this long day that had no end. Focus, Kate demanded of herself. She wanted to be done by the time Andy arrived. Kate’s stomach flipped at the thought. Focus.

  She was rearranging the residents’ schedules when she heard the key in the lock and Andy walked in, still in uniform, and dropped her bag by the front door. With her grey eyes on Kate and a slight smile on her face, Andy pulled off her windbreaker and hung it on the hook by the door. Sitting perfectly still on the couch, Kate watched as Andy pulled off her soft body armour vest, the Velcro sounding loud in the silence, and hung it with her jacket. Still, neither of them said anything, though Kate was suddenly very aware of the blood pounding through her body as Andy pulled at the belt around her waist, the sly grin still playing about her lips. Once Andy had hung her belt on the hook, she put her hands in her pockets, her dark pants with the distinctive yellow stripes down the sides hanging low on her hips.

  “Hi,” Andy said, leaning against the doorway. Her eyes hadn’t left Kate’s from the moment she’d walked in the door. Kate remembered to breathe.

  “Twenty minutes,” Kate said finally. “I need twenty minutes to finish this report for Angstrom.”

  “Sure.”

  Kate watched Andy unclip the holstered revolver from her belt hanging by the door. She knew Andy would put it on the bedside table in the bedroom, as she always did. What Kate didn’t know was whether or not Andy had always done this, or whether it was because of what happened the morning Angler had broken into their hotel room and taken Kate away. Kate couldn’t bring herself to ask.