Queen of Quarantine (Brutal Boys of Everlake Prep #4) - Caroline Peckham Page 0,11

within my chest like a wild animal, caged and desperate, doomed and dying.

Above the bed was a whiteboard with various observations noted on it from vital stats to notes on blood extractions and the condition of the patient who had been kept here.

At the very bottom of the board were words that set my whole world alight with a desperate kind of agony as I stared up at them.

Patient deceased: 10:07am.

Resuscitation unsuccessful.

I stared at the clear declaration before me with my pulse spiking and the most debilitating fear rooting me in place for far too long. But my heart refused to accept the words that had been scrawled on that board. I just couldn’t.

"No," Blake snarled in refusal, echoing my own thoughts and turning from the room. He was taking much less care than he should have been as he raced along the corridor and started opening other doors, checking the rooms where other patients slept as he continued his hunt, clearly not accepting the facts as they’d been presented to us.

I stepped out of the empty room and stood waiting in the corridor for the other three Night Keepers to finish up their search, but I already knew what they would find.

“She’s not here and I don’t believe for one fucking second that she’s dead either,” I snarled, refusing to allow them to even consider panicking or giving into some useless form of grief.

“How can you be certain?” Blake demanded, his eyes wild with concern, a desperation in them that begged me to give him a definite confirmation which I couldn’t give.

“Because my father knows she’s too valuable to allow her to die so quickly. Besides, I’m not fool enough to believe something I haven’t seen with my own two eyes. She isn’t dead unless I see a body and if any of you even consider giving up on her then you’ll answer to me over it.”

None of them voiced any complaint to that. We were all equally determined not to believe in her death, so I forgot about the words which had been scrawled on that board and set my mind to continuing our search.

Our girl wasn't here. But I was certain she had been. She'd been here and she'd been in that room. We could hunt the rest of this place to be sure, but I knew we weren't going to find her here now. Of course, now we’d have to rob the place to cover up this break in just like the others.

She wasn't dead. She couldn't be. If she was, I was sure I'd know it. I'd have felt it as my heart was torn to shreds and my world imploded with the impossibility of it going on without her in it.

She wasn't dead.

But she was gone.

And we were going to get her back.

M y body was breaking. Everything hurt. It felt like there was a fissure rupturing open in my chest every time I took a breath. And when I did, it was with a wheezing rattle that made fear splinter through me. But for every way my body felt weak, my soul was galvanised, refusing to break.

I will not give up.

I was running out of time though. And I had to do something now if I was ever going to survive this. As much as I knew my boys would be hunting for me with the bloody ferocity of hell hounds, I was also starting to accept that Troy Memphis may have just hidden me too damn well for even his own son to find. And as I caught sight of a nurse approaching the glass door and tapping in a code to open it, I knew now was my shot. Possibly my last too. Because I didn’t know how much longer I could fight this virus. Its roots were too deep in my flesh, its hunger for my death all too keen.

I feigned sleep as the nurse approached, my meds tucked away under my mattress. I’d taken none today. Every time I took them now, I seemed to sleep longer, deeper. And that frightened me in a way I didn’t want to admit to. My dreams were so vivid, and the more time I spent with Dad and Jess in my unconscious state, the closer I actually felt to joining them. And as tempting as it would have been to slip away into their arms once more, it wasn’t time for me yet. I had a life I was desperate to live.

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