by Baker, LJ
Contents
Title Page
© LJ Baker
Dedication
Books by LJ Baker
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
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Epilogue
Newsflash
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Hold Me
Life After the Outbreak, Book 3
L J Baker
© LJ Baker
All right reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
http://www.lj-baker.com/
Cover by Red Pen Kisses
www.redpenkisses.com
ISBN-13: 978-1497526242
ISBN-10: 1497526248
Be a Unicorn.
Find the magic in the world and follow your dreams. Don't ever let anyone make you
feel like you can't be magical.
Books by LJ Baker
Save Me (Life After the Outbreak, book 1)
Find Me (Life After the Outbreak, book 2)
Hold Me (Life After the Outbreak, book 3)
Remember Me (A Life After the Outbreak Extra) Coming Soon!
CHAPTER ONE
Dan and I looked at each other, both at a total loss. Will's eyes were frozen to the cut on his arm. It was a few inches long and not deep enough to need any real medical attention, the kind of thing we'd normally just shrug off. If it wasn't for Will's reaction, I might not have even paid attention to it at all.
Panic registered on Will's face and his hands trembled at his sides.
"Maybe... uh... he could have..." My brain cycled through the possibilities of what else could have happened— anything but what we were all thinking. My thoughts raced faster than I could keep up with and I stuttered over my words.
Dan put his hand on my shoulder to calm me. "Let's just take this one step at a time. No sense spinning into a panic before we know for sure what happened."
"How are we supposed to know what happened?" My voice cracked as I tried to keep from losing it completely.
"Will, do you know how you got cut?" Dan asked.
Will stood silent, still staring at his arm, panic etched on his face.
If Will was afraid, there was no way I was going to be able to pull it together. My heart was pounding so hard against my chest that I couldn't breathe. Except that I was breathing, way too fast in fact. I could feel my lungs moving in and out, but it felt like I wasn't taking in any oxygen. The world spun around me. I could hear Dan talking, but he was suddenly so far away.
Everything started going fuzzy. I blinked a few times and then I was in Dan's arms on the ground and he was calling my name. "Andi? Hey... are you okay?"
I looked around, confused for a moment, until I saw Will. He was on his knees on the ground next to me with tears welled up in his eyes. At first, I thought something happened to me. He looked at me with the same broken expression he wore the day he found me after I was kidnapped. But as the fuzziness faded, I remembered what was going on.
"I'm so sorry, Andi." He leaned down and rested his head against my stomach.
I put my hand on his head and closed my eyes.
This can't be happening. It has to be a nightmare.
"I really think we need to get inside before the rest of that horde makes its way in this direction." Dan patted Will on the shoulder and once Will lifted his head from my stomach, he pulled me to my feet. Or foot, because I still couldn't put pressure on my sprained ankle.
Will snapped back to reality and led the way into the basement while Dan carried me down the stairs. As soon as we were safely inside, Dan deposited me onto the couch and propped my swollen foot up on some pillows.
The whole scene was surreal, as if I was sitting outside myself watching the scene play out before me. The color drained from Dan's face as he leaned against the side of the sofa with his hands held up over his mouth and nose in prayer position. No one was speaking, yet inside my head jumbled thoughts screamed out.
Will sat on the coffee table next to my foot and gently peeled off my sock. It was excruciating, but it had to be done. It seemed almost comical that he was focusing on my injury when his life was hanging in the balance.
He frowned at the sight of my swollen ankle. "Oh hell, that looks awful. I really wish we had some ice."
"We probably do. Mom had some of those ice packs that get cold from some chemical reaction or something like that."
Will started to stand to go get one but I pulled him back down. "Let Dan get it. Are we really going to focus on my sprained ankle right now?"
"Andi, it looks bad."
"Screw the ankle, Will. What about your arm?" I yelled, on the verge of complete hysteria.
His eyes dropped and he took a deep breath.
Dan left and returned with the ice pack in a flash, then draped it over the swollen mess at the end of my leg.
"Will!" I grabbed his chin and pulled his face to look at me.
"I'm sorry. I know. I got scratched. I felt him rip the jacket, but I didn't think it went through." His voice lowered to almost a whisper. "I was wrong."
My heart beat frantically against my chest and my hands trembled. "You're sure? It was from the flesh eater and not something else? You're one hundred percent positive?"
"I'm positive," Will said, and looked away, but didn't pull his chin from my tight grip.
I looked around the room in panic. There had to be something to fix it. Something we could do. I wasn't willing to just accept his words and everything they meant.
"We could…" Jack's words sprang into my head and I remembered my one-legged old friend at the military base. "We could cut it off. Like Jack said about his—"
"Andi, it's been too long. Jack said it had to be right away. It won't work." Will rubbed his hand over his arm and inched back as if he was protecting the arm from being hacked off.
Dan slumped into the chair next to the couch and scrubbed his hands over his face. "That was what… twenty…thirty minutes ago? How are you feeling? Any fever yet?"
I leaned forward and felt his forehead. "Holy hell, you're burning up. Dammit, get him some ibuprofen."
Dan jumped up to get the pills and returned with a handful of caplets and a bottle of water.
Before he had a chance to take the pills from Dan, Will clamped his hand over his mouth and dashed to the bathroom. Dan and I both looked at each other.
"That usual?"
My heart sank and I shook my head. "Not that I've seen. From the fever, maybe?"
"Don't know."
"What the hell are we going to do?" I drew in a deep breath and tried to reign back my panic. I managed to push it down right below the surface, but it threatened to emerge at any second.
"We could take him to the military base. I know they didn't fix Ros
e, but that doesn't mean they can't do anything." Dan stood and paced across the small space.
"No." I had no idea what to do, but I knew that wasn't it. "They... I just... can't."
Dan nodded. "Yeah, I get that. I just don't have any other ideas." He sat down on the coffee table and took my hand. "You know we don't have many options here, right?"
I bit the inside of my cheek until I drew blood to keep from crying and nodded my head. He was right. There weren't a lot of options. Will was infected. He was going to die. It was only a matter of what happened in between. I choked back bile that came up with that thought and winced as it burned its way down my throat.
Will emerged from the bathroom pale and a little wobbly, then sat down on the couch without saying a word.
"You okay?" Dan asked with genuine concern, all previous anger gone.
"Yeah," he answered, then turned to me. "Andi, can I talk to Dan alone for a minute?"
I wasn't expecting that, but I nodded. Will was probably about to give Dan some speech about taking care of me after he was dead or some crap like that. Not that Dan needed any lecture. He wasn't going to just leave me.
Despite my protests, Dan carried me down the hall, deposited me into an old office chair with wheels and pushed me into the storage-medical room in the back. It was down a long hall from the living room, past the bedrooms, so it was the farthest I could be to give them some privacy.
Dan dug through the medical supply cabinet, pulled out an ace bandage and tossed it to me.
"This should help the sprain. You okay?"
I nodded and he disappeared to talk to Will.
Okay.
I wasn't even sure what that word meant anymore.
I wrapped the bandage around my swollen foot and ankle. The compression helped and I downed a few ibuprofen for added measure. There were a couple pairs of old crutches in the corner from various injuries over the years. I rolled the chair over to them and picked out one that had my height on it. After making the proper adjustments, I was upright again. It took a few minutes to adjust to walking on one leg, but it was a hell of a lot better than being carried around like a child.
I paced back and forth on the crutches, getting the hang of it and wondered what the guys were talking about. I even considered sneaking out to the hallway to listen in, but that wasn't exactly possible on crutches without being heard.
Maybe he was wrong. Maybe the scratch wasn't from the flesh eater. We were all so absorbed in fighting off the horde that it would be understandable to get injured and not even realize what caused it.
I shook my head and took a few deep breaths. No, that had to be it. He wasn't scratched at all, it just got it caught on a tree branch or something. Or maybe he nicked it with an arrow pulling it out of his pack. That made a lot more sense.
My heart slowed a bit as my brain cycled through possibilities and tried to pinpoint exactly when it might have happened.
Dan softly knocked on the door and poked his head in. "He's asking for you."
"What did he say?"
"Uh, he said, can you tell Andi I wanna see her."
"No idiot, what did he want to talk about with you?"
Dan smiled and put his hand on my shoulder. "That was between me and him. Now he wants to see you, so why don't you go spend time with him while you can."
Spend time with him while I can.
It sounded so final. So hopeless.
Anger bubbled up inside me and I pushed Dan's hand off. "Thanks." I wanted to punch him in the throat or knock him down, maybe smack him with a crutch. Anything but have him standing there looking at me with that pity in his eyes. It wasn't his fault, but that didn't matter. I was going to take it out on him anyway.
"Don't be angry with me, love. He asked me not to say anything." He tried to grab my arm before I could get out the door, but I slipped away before he could stop me.
Will was curled up on the couch covered in one of my grandmother's quilts, shivering. I squeezed in next to him and he wrapped his arms around me, holding me close. Heat radiated off his feverish body and his teeth chattered so violently I thought they would crack from the force.
"Maybe you need more ibuprofen?"
"I took six."
Shit.
"They probably just need time to work."
"You know it won't make a difference." He stroked his hand over my hair and kissed my temple. "I have what, a day... two days?"
My heart jumped hard in my chest. A day or two wasn't enough. I needed more time.
"Probably more. If you were only scratched, not bitten, you have more time. I've seen people hang on for nearly five days from a scratch. It just depends on how strong you are. You just have to be strong." I was talking too fast and the panic was clear in my voice.
"Maybe, it wasn't even a scratch. I was thinking, and you know, you could have just nicked it with an arrow or something. I know you think you know how it happened, but you could be wrong. There was a lot of chaos, and it would have been easy to get confused on what happened. Maybe you just have an infection from the arrow and that's what's causing the fever. You could have tetanus. We have some antibiotics. They could help." I grabbed the crutches and tried to jump up to find some medication, but Will pulled me back.
"Andi, take a breath. I don't have tetanus. I know you don't want me to leave you. Hell, that's the last thing in this world I want, but we have to accept it. It's going to happen either way."
No!
"I don't care what you say. I'm not going to accept that." I pulled away, grabbed the crutches and headed for the supply room.
Since Mom was a nurse, she managed to take home all sorts of medical supplies and drugs once the outbreak hit. We had meds for just about every condition, not that I had any clue what most of them were for.
Dammit, what was it Mom told me about this shit?
I remembered something about broad spectrum antibiotics being good for a lot of things, but I had no idea which ones were considered broad spectrum. I scanned the bottles and pulled out a few. Ampicillin was what Mom gave Mrs. King, the old woman who lived in the basement with us, when she first got sick after the outbreak. We had no idea what was wrong with her, so she probably treated her for something broad.
I also noticed some ciprofloxacin, which I was pretty sure was the drug people were hording after that anthrax scare. Hell, if it could cure anthrax, maybe it might help Will.
I grabbed the bottles and a syringe, stuck them into my pockets, and hurried back to Will. He was still shivering, but was sitting up with his head back and eyes closed.
"Will?" I whispered, not quite sure if he was asleep or just resting his eyes.
He patted the couch next to him without moving his head or eyes. I took the seat, laid the bottles in his lap and set about preparing the syringe. Good thing Janet sent me to the infirmary to work as punishment after my fight with Donna.
He opened one eye and peered down to see what I was doing. "What's all this?"
"Antibiotics."
"Andi, I don't have tetanus."
"Even if you don't, you don't know they won't help."
"Ok, babe." Will sighed and slipped out of the blanket to give me access to his arm.
His shivering was calming down and he didn't feel quite as hot as earlier. Maybe the ibuprofen was helping the fever after all.
I gave him the injections and covered him up just as Dan came back into the room. He eyed the bottles and looked up at me with sad eyes.
"You need some help?" He had that same look of pity and I knew I must look like a crazy person, but I didn't care.
"No. We're fine."
We were so not fine.
"Okay." Dan looked at the bottles again. "You hungry? I can make something if you want?"
"No thanks." Food was the last thing I wanted.
I looked to Will, in case he was hungry but he just shook his head.
"All right. Well I'm going to get some sleep then. Call me if you need me."
> I nodded and he disappeared into the back.
"Come here." Will held out his arms and I climbed onto his lap.
Before long, the pain would kick in and just touching him would hurt. For the time being, I was going to take advantage of the feel of him. As much as I wanted to believe there was all some big mistake and he would be all right, I knew I was only kidding myself.
I snuggled my face against his shoulder and took a good long breath of him. Tears welled up in my eyes and I fought them back. There would be plenty of time for tears. I had to be brave for him and make the most of our time. My breath hitched and I choked back the lump in my throat. I was fighting a losing battle.
"Hey now, no crying. We still have a little time left." His voice was soft and weak.
Weak was not something I associated with Will. He was always strong, always there when I needed him. He was the one thing in our screwed up world that made sense. And I was losing him.
CHAPTER TWO
"How are you feeling?" I pushed the hair off his forehead and pressed my lips to the warm skin. He was cooler than before and the shivering stopped.
"Better." He gave me a weak smile and ran his hand over the side of my face.
He was lying, but I welcomed the smile. Will's smiles were one of the things I loved most about him.
"Wouldn't you be more comfortable in bed?"
"Are you trying to get me in bed so you can take advantage of me in my weakened state?"
"Yes, Will. That's exactly it. There's something about high fevers and pale skin that turns me on."
He tried to laugh but it came out as a cough. His body shuddered as he gasped to take in whatever oxygen his lungs would allow. Watching him suffer was tearing me up inside. I would have given anything to take away what happened to him. My heart thumped hard against my chest and ached with every beat. His pain was mine and watching him suffer hurt like nothing I'd ever experienced before.