THE DAMN ALARM was still blaring as Olivia’s eyes began to open. Where the hell was she? Her vision began to clear and she tried to take in her surroundings. She was no longer in the suit. But lying on a cot that was jostling around with a white blanket over her. What the hell happened to her clothes? It wasn’t the suit alarm. What was that sound?
“Ma’am . . . Ma’am can you hear me?” A man asked.
She squinted her eyes? Why couldn’t she see better? He seemed to be in a blue uniform. Why was that alarm still going off?
“My name is Eric. You are in an ambulance. Can you understand what I am saying?” the uniformed man was babbling.
“Dominic . . .” She managed to squeak out of her burning throat.
“Mr. Kain is in the other ambulance but don’t worry other than a few minor burns he’s fine. It’s just a precaution. The two of you doffed your suits before the decon procedure was complete,” Eric explained
“I don’t . . . understand.” Olivia struggled with each word. She felt like she had inhaled razor blades.
“Your suit ran out of oxygen and he literally carried you and your gear to the decon station. When you passed out he panicked and tried to rip you out of the suit. He couldn’t do it with his on so he shed his too. They were spraying you guys the whole time to help reduce the damage.” Eric reached over and adjusted her mask. “I need you to keep that oxygen on, okay. You inhaled some of the fumes and your throat is starting to show signs of a chemical burn.
Olivia was no doctor but she had been working in violent crimes long enough to know that could mean her airway swelling and shutting off.
“Is that why my throat burns so bad? Will they have to intubate me?” You have to get a hold of yourself. She could hear Grace scolding her as she had when they were kids. Calm down. Grace had always taken things in stride while Olivia tended to worry about everything. Grace was strong and brave . . . and dead. That carefree sense of adventure left her six feet under.
“Just lie back and try to relax. We are giving you oxygen through the mask and I can give you something to help the pain if you need it.” Eric sounded like a calm and collected librarian. His soothing baritone urged her to remain calm and breathe slowly.
Olivia conserved her voice and throat for the rest of the ride. Dominic had risked himself to save her. Of course he wouldn’t have had to if she hadn’t completely flaked out at the crime scene. She would never forgive herself if he was hurt. She kept thinking of the wild look in his eyes as he pleaded with her to stay. How was it possible to feel that connected to someone after just a few days? The thought scared the hell out of her.
They pulled into the emergency bay at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital and a medical team was waiting for her. Olivia was whisked into the trauma bay. The bright lights overhead seemed to blind her blurry eyes. She tried to talk but the razor blades in her throat had intensified. People were all around her but their voices were lost in a fog. The tall preppy doctor spoke to her with the same nonchalant baritone that the EMS driver had used until he looked in her throat. Then his whole demeanor changed.
His eyes widened and the little vein in his forehead began to stick up as he began shouting orders that didn’t make any sense. Nurses and various people in uniforms began filling the room. Olivia’s heart was pounding like a piston in a race car. The sweat that broke out over her kept making the little monitor slip off her finger. Oh sweet Jesus, I am going to die!
She could make out them telling her to calm down and breathe easy. Slim fucking chance. Another team in gray scrubs arrived with a machine that beeped like the Jetsons. What the fuck was that for? Her skin burned and itched intensely. They poked her like a pincushion and established new IVs.
The tall doctor barked an order at a dark-haired nurse who pulled out several vials and laid them out. He stood before a tray of equipment. Wait! Stop! She tried to scream. This was supposed to be just for precaution. She was fine! The dark-haired nurse started putting one vial after the other into her IV. Her skin no longer burned. Her throat felt smooth as glass and everyone in the room floated away.
“Miss Hastings . . .” She heard him say.
My name’s not Olivia Hastings.
DOMINIC TRIED TO jump out of the ambulance when they pulled up to the hospital. He had to find her.
“Sir!” the paramedic yelled. “You have to wait. We have to take you in. You still need to be treated for your burns.”
Two security guards were at his side in seconds as he tried to get through the doors. They set him down hard on a cart and the paramedics were at his side once more.
“I am fine goddamn it! I need to get to Olivia. I have to see her,” he yelled at everyone who tried to talk to him but no one would listen. They wheeled him into a room and a young doctor rushed in to examine him. She seemed to be in a hurry as all hell was breaking loose in a room across the way.
“My name is Doctor Windmiller, I’m going to check you out, okay?” The reddish brunette smiled at him with reassuring eyes. Her hands were very gentle and would have put him at ease if he just knew that Olivia was okay.
“I feel fine. Have you seen Olivia Hastings? She came in by ambulance too? We were working on a crime scene and were exposed to chemicals in a field,” he asked, desperation ripping through his voice. Goddamn it he couldn’t watch her die again. He couldn’t do it.
“I can’t talk about other patients,” she answered uneasily. She looked him over quickly and examined his ears and nose and throat then moved to his arms. “It looks like you didn’t inhale any of the chemical but your arms are another story. You have second degree chemical burns on a large percentage of both forearms. We are going to have to send you up to the burn unit to have this further evaluated.
“The hell you are. Listen, ma’am, I am sorry to be rude but I am not leaving this ER till I know that she is okay. Please. I don’t care if my arms fall off. If she doesn’t make it I don’t need them anyway.” He barked louder than he meant to.
Her eyes widened and she swallowed hard. “I . . . she’s . . .” The doctor stepped back and pointed at the room with all the commotion. People were moving in and out. A doctor was barking urgent orders and everyone was moving about quickly. He couldn’t see for the damned curtain. What the hell was going on in there?
“Olivia?” he questioned and Dr. Windmiller nodded hesitantly. Before she could say anything, he jumped up out of the bed and ripped the leads off. He stormed across the large walkway to the trauma room and ripped open the curtain. What he saw nearly killed him.
Olivia lay on the table hoses and tubes coming from everywhere. She looked dead. A woman in gray scrubs was handing intubation tools to a blond doctor who was doing his best to establish an ET tube in her throat. She must have inhaled some of the chemical. Goddamn it!
“Someone get him out of here!” the doctor yelled and went back to his attempt. The two orderlies returned with force and dragged him back to his room.
“Don’t worry,” the young doctor was saying. “Dr. Holt is amazing. He will take good care of her.” Her eyes sparkled when she mentioned his name.
“He better,” Dominic answered deadpan. All he could think of was the look on Olivia’s face when she was trying to tell him something in that stupid corn field. She kept pointing at something. A game of charades that he may never solve. Fuck! She had to be okay. He had bent over to collect the samples. That fucking spray. It killed all the larvae on contact. At that size they could have devoured the corpse in a week to fourteen days. The next thing he knew, Olivia was gone. He had finished with the current sample and then stood up and realized her suit alarm was going off. The sound was greatly muffled through his own suit and sounded far away. He turned and watched her going toward the decon tent.
When he saw her stumble his heart lurched. He dropped everything in his hands and took off running down the aisle of corn at full speed. As she fell she reached out and grasped at a corn stalk she must have gotten that shit all over her suit then. Time was running out. He hit her without slowing down and scooped her up tank and all and sprinted the last twenty yards. The fear in her eyes. Fuck, he had seen that before. Jesus. He couldn’t lose her again. He pleaded with her to stay calm. To stay with him. It took so long to find her. He couldn’t lose her, not now. They were being sprayed. If she could just hold on for a few more rinses they would be free.
Her eyes widened then closed and her body went limp in his arms. His heart shattered into a million pieces and he didn’t know what came over him. No one was helping and she was dying right in his arms. He started ripping her out of that damn suit. He got it open to get air in but couldn’t get it all the way off so he ripped his own off and finished cutting her loose. From the moment he broke his own seal until the spray of the hoses hit him he had held his breath. She had been unconscious and didn’t know any better.
Fuck what if he had killed her? The fact that this was all his fault was not lost on him. He wanted to hold her like it never happened. He wanted to rewind the clock and have her with him again. He couldn’t bear this again. A transport tech arrived with the two security guards who seemed to like him so much, to wheel him to the burn unit. He watched helplessly as they passed her room.
Would he ever get to see her again? The aching pit in his chest returned to consume any hope and life that had returned to his veins.