THE MAVERICK DOCTOR AND MISS PRIM/ABOUT THAT NIGHT... (6 page)

The sense of relief that rushed over her body was instant. She’d been scared. Scared that she’d missed something—that she’d overlooked something important. Something her sister would never have done.

It was the first time today she actually felt as if she might be doing a good job.

She took the file from his hand. “I guess we don’t know everything, then,” she murmured.

He gave her a lazy smile and raised one eyebrow at her. “Really? You mean the DPA hasn’t managed to find its way into every corner of the universe to see if there are any deadly diseases left?”

Her eyes were scanning the sheets in front of her. She shrugged. “It makes sense. The Keatings said that it was the first time the locals had come into contact with outsiders.”

“First contact. Sounds much sexier than it should.”

She raised her eyebrows at him. “Sounds like a whole can of worms.”

The resident lowered her head and busied herself in the corner of the room. In some ways Callie wanted to do that too.

She wanted to take herself out of the range of Sawyer’s impenetrable stare. It was making her hair stand on end and sending weird tingles down her spine.

She felt like a high-school teenager on prom night, not an experienced doctor in the midst of an emergency situation.

She picked up one of the vials on the countertop. “I guess I should lead by example.”

He was at her side in an instant. “What do you mean?”

“If I’m going to recommend first-line vaccination, I guess I should go first.”

“Are you sure about this?”

Callie almost laughed out loud. Was he joking? “Of course I’m not sure. But I’ve got to base this on the evidence that I’ve got, no matter how imperfect it is. If this is smallpox, I’ve a duty of care to protect others and contain the virus. You, me, the parents—anyone else assessed as ‘at risk’ should be vaccinated.”

She picked up the diluent and delivered it swiftly into the container holding the dried vaccine. Her hands rolled the vial between her palms, watching the liquid oscillate back and forth.

“I think you should wait. I think we should have a definite diagnosis before we start vaccinating.”

She nodded. In an ideal world that made sense. But this wasn’t an ideal world. It was a completely imperfect situation. If she hesitated, she put people at risk.

This was her decision. The buck stopped with her.

“There are risks attached to any vaccine but this vaccine was widely used and we’ve got a lot of data on the issues raised. I’ve reviewed our medical notes. There’s nothing in my history, your history or the parents’ that would prevent vaccination. The only issue is Alison—and she’s already told me she’s decided against it.”

There was an expression on his face she couldn’t fathom. Something flickering behind his eyes, as if the thoughts in his head were about to combust.

This man was almost unreadable.

Was he relieved or mad? Did he want Alison to have the vaccine and put her baby at risk? Or did he want her to take her chances without?

Obviously, she knew the outcome—but that didn’t help here.

Had Sawyer’s wife been in similar circumstances and avoided a vaccine because she had been pregnant? Or had she taken a vaccine—that was untried and untested on pregnant women—with devastating consequences?

It was almost as if he’d gone on autopilot. He washed his hands, lifted a syringe and needle and tipped up the vial, plunging the needle inside and extracting the vaccine. “If this is what you want, let’s do it.”

She was stunned. She’d thought he was going to refuse—going to argue with her some more and storm off. This was the last thing she’d expected.

“Are you going to get vaccinated?”

He nodded almost imperceptibly. “Of course.”

She tilted her head and raised her eyebrows at him, the question obvious.

“I’m working on the assumption you’re going to say that only vaccinated personnel can work with the kids. These kids are mine. They’re
my
patients. I won’t let you keep me out. And if a vaccine is what it takes...” he shrugged “...so be it.”

The words were stuck in her throat now.

The thing that seemed to pass her by. The people thing.

The thing she really wanted to concentrate on, but her public health role wouldn’t let her. She’d learned over the years just to lock it away in a corner of her mind.

But it was the thing that was on the forefront of
his
mind. And it was affecting his reactions. If only she could have the same freedom.

He was prepared to take a vaccine with known side-effects in order to keep looking after these children.

And no matter how hard she tried not to, she had to admire him for it.

There was only one thing she could do.

She turned her arm towards him. “Let’s do it.” Her voice sounded confident, the way she wanted to appear to the outside world. Her insides were currently mush.

His finger ran down the outside of her upper arm. Totally unexpected. The lightest of touches. She heard his intake of breath before he went back to standard technique and pinched her skin.

It was over in the blink of an eye. She never even felt the bifurcated needle penetrate her skin. It wasn’t like a traditional shot and she felt the needle prick her skin a number of times in a few seconds before it was quickly removed and disposed of.

“You know this won’t be pretty, don’t you?”

She nodded, automatically reaching up and rubbing her arm. “I know what to expect. A red and itchy bump in a few days...” she rolled her eyes “...a delightful pus-filled blister in another week and then a scab.”

She washed her hands at the sink as he drew up another dose of vaccine and handed it to her, pulling his scrub sleeve up above his shoulder. She could feel herself hesitate, taking in his defined deltoid and biceps muscles. Did Sawyer work out? He didn’t seem the type.

“Something wrong?”

“What? No.” She could feel the color flooding into her cheeks. How embarrassing. He hadn’t given her arm a second glance.

Concentrate. Focus. He was smirking at her again, almost as if he could see exactly what she was thinking.

She scowled, pinched his arm and injected him, delivering the vaccine in an instant. It was as quick as she could get this over and done with, so she could turn her back to dispose of the syringe.

“Ouch.” He was rubbing his arm in mock horror. “It’s all in the technique, you know.”

“Yeah, yeah.” She started washing her hands again. “You’re not supposed to rub your arm, you know.”

He shrugged. “Everyone does. It’s an automatic response. Being a doctor doesn’t make me any different.” His arm was still exposed, and this time, instead of focusing on the muscle, her eyes focused on the skin.

It was full of little pock marks and lumps and bumps. The obvious flat scar from a BCG vaccination. He followed her eyes and gave her a grin. “A lifetime’s work. Chicken pox as a child, then a whole career’s worth of DPA vaccinations.”

She pulled up her other sleeve. “Snap.”

His finger touched her skin again and she felt herself suck in her breath as it ran over her BCG scar. He was standing just a little too close for comfort but seemed completely unaffected.

He turned and smiled at her. “At least you don’t have chicken pox scars.” Maybe it was the lazy way he said it or the way his smile seemed kind of sexy.

“Oh, I do. Just can’t show them in public.” She couldn’t help it. The words were out before she had time to think about them. She was flirting. She was
flirting
with him. What was wrong with her?

That was the kind of response that her sister might have given. The kind of response that had men eating out of the palm of her hand and following Isabel’s butt with their eyes as she walked down the hallway.

But this was so
not
a Callie response.

What was she thinking of?

It wasn’t that she was some shy, retiring virgin. She’d been on plenty of dates and had a number of relationships over the years. But she wasn’t the type of girl who walked into a bar and flirted with a man. She was the kind of girl who met a man in a class or in a library, and went for a few quiet drinks before there was any touching, any kissing.

She wasn’t used to being unnerved by a man. To find herself flustered and blushing around him. It made her cringe.

But Sawyer seemed immune. Maybe women flirted with him all the time? He just gave her a little wink and crossed the room. Now he was in midconversation with the second-year resident, explaining where some of the supplies were kept and how to access them.

He obviously didn’t feel heat rising up the back of his neck to make him feel uncomfortable.

She took a deep breath and moved. Out to the madness of the corridor, where the incessant sound of phones ringing must be driving everyone mad.

She picked up the nearest one as she passed. The voice made her stop in her tracks.

“Callie? Is that you?”

Evan Hunter. It must be killing him to be stuck at Headquarters instead of being in the thick of things.

“Well?” His abrupt tone was hardly welcoming.

It was beginning to annoy her. Every phone call she’d had from this man had started with him snapping at her and shouting orders. Wasn’t he supposed to be supporting her?

He knew she’d been flung in at the deep end.

“Hold on.” She set down the phone, ignoring the expletives she could hear him yelling as she walked over to the whiteboard on the wall. The DPA team was well trained. Every piece of relevant information and the most up-to-date data was right in front of her. She didn’t need to run around the department asking a barrage of questions.

She watched as a member of staff rubbed one number off the board and replaced it with another. The potential ‘at risk’ group was now at five. Not bad at all.

A list of queries had appeared around the containment facility. She would need to get onto them straight away.

The only glaring piece of information that was missing was around the plane. There was the number of passengers, with the number of contact details obtained. Three hundred passengers—with contact details for only seventy-six.

This was taking up too much of her team’s time. They needed to deal with the issues around the containment facility. It was time to delegate.

She could feel her arm tremble slightly as she picked up the phone again. Isabel would have been fit for Evan Hunter. She would have chewed him up and spat him out. It was time to embrace some of her sister’s personality traits.

“Evan?”

“What on earth were you doing? When I call I expect—”

She cut him off straight away. “What have I been doing? What have
I
been doing? I’ve just been getting my smallpox vaccination and I’ve just inoculated another member of staff. I’ve been assessing our most up-to-date information to determine whether or not this is a terrorist attack.” She glanced at the clock. “Information I wasn’t due to present to you for another eight minutes. And, incidentally, my professional opinion is that it’s not.

“I’ve also been trying to keep the staff and patients here calm and informed about what’s going on. I’m trying to find out how Callum is but no one will tell me anything. I’m having problems with the containment facility. We can’t make all the contacts for the plane passengers.” She was starting to count things off on her fingers.

“We’re just about to vaccinate those exposed—but we have a pregnant nurse to consider. Oh, and Sawyer is driving me crazy.” She took a deep breath. “So, how’s your day going, Evan?” She couldn’t help it. The more she spoke, the more she felt swamped, the more she felt angry that Callum wasn’t at her side. The more she realized that Evan Hunter, boss or not, should be doing more to help her, not adding to the problems.

The silence at the end of the phone was deafening. Her heart rate quickened. Had she just got herself sacked?

No. How could he? Not when she was in the middle of all this.

She heard him clear his throat. “Point made.”

She was shocked. “What?”

“Point made, Callie. What do you need?”

For a second she couldn’t speak.
What did she need?
Apart from getting out of here?

“I need you to take over the plane contacts. We’ve got three hundred passengers and only contact details for seventy-six. I also need you to take over the viable threat assessment for these people as our details are sketchy. I’ll get one of the contact tracers and epidemiologists to conference-call you.” Isabel used to quote the English expression
“In for a penny, in for a pound”
before she took a risk. Somehow, it seemed apt.

“Fine. I can do that. Anything else?”

She felt like a girl in a fancy department store on a fifty percent sale day. But nothing else screamed out at her. “Can you magic me up some pediatric ICU facilities?”

“That might be a little tricky.”

“Didn’t think so. Never mind. I’ll let you know if I need anything else. When can I expect to hear from the lab?”

“That’s what I wanted to tell you.”

Oops. She almost felt bad for being snarky with him.

“The samples have been received and are being processed. It’s only been a couple of hours. In another ten we should be able to tell you which virus type it is. That will give us something to work with.”

She nodded as she scribbled notes. “That’s great.”

“And, Callie?”

“Yes?” This was it. This was where he blasted her for the way she’d just spoken to him.

“Leave Sawyer to me. I’m going to try and find out where he’s been and what he’s been doing these last few years. Let him know who’s in charge. Only use him if you have to. He’s not part of the DPA anymore.”

She could feel the steel in his words and instantly regretted her outburst that Sawyer was driving her crazy. “He’s actually been quite helpful. He’s just a little...” she struggled to think of the word “...inconsistent. One minute he’s helping, the next he looks as if he could jump out the nearest window.” She looked over at the window next to her. The sun was splitting the sky outside. She almost felt like jumping out the window herself and heading for the nearest beach. Chicago had good beaches, didn’t it?