The Truth is Contagious (The Contagium Series Book 4) (16 page)

He nodded and sprung from his post. He opened
the door for us then scrambled past to fetch the veterinarian.

I didn’t even think about it; I took Argos
straight to the hospital ward. I used my foot to push open the
doors. Olivia was sitting at a desk at the entrance.

“Oh my God,” she said and stood, rushing
around to us. Her eyes flitted over Argos, wanting to help. She
hadn’t received any training for tending to animals, but that
didn’t stop her. “Put him on the bed.” She pointed to the first bed
before racing into the supply room. I had just laid Argos down when
she returned with bandages and alcohol.

Padraic, who was on duty, saw Olivia running
out of the medical supply room and ran out of his little office. He
must have been thinking a person was injured.

“Orissa,” he exclaimed. “Are you—” he cut off
when I stepped to the side. “What happened?” He flew to the bed and
put his hand on Argos.

“He went to the fence,” I rushed out. My
hands were still shaking as I held Argos down. “There was a zombie
and she bit him.”

“He’s infected?” Olivia asked, her voice high
and full of fear.

“No,” Padraic said. His blue eyes were
clouded with worry. “The virus doesn’t affect animals.”

Argos tried to get up. All three of us held
him down, soothing him at the same time. The hospital doors thrust
open and heavy, shuffling footfalls came from behind us.

“Let me have a look,” Jack said, his voice
scratchy. Olivia stepped back, letting the vet in. Argos whined and
put his head down. Tears pricked the corners of my eyes. I bit my
lip and forced them back. “Hold his head,” Jack told Padraic.
Padraic gently cupped Argos’s head in his hands, bringing his
muzzle away from his injured leg.

Argos yelped and jumped when Jack inspected
the bite. “Please tell me he was in a dog fight,” he said without
looking up.

“Zombie,” was all I managed to say. I took a
shaky breath. “Is he going to be all right?”

Jack put Argos’s leg back on the bed. “Yes.
He needs stitches. I’ve treated worse,” he told me with a small
smile. My stomach unclenched a tiny bit. “Keep him still. I have to
get my kit to sedate him.”

He went into the supply room, returning with
a black leather bag. Anxiety coursed through me and I watched him
draw something up in a needle and inject it into Argos. In a few
seconds, the dog relaxed.

“He’s not knocked out,” Jack told us. “So you
need to hold him.” The three of us nodded, arranging ourselves
around Argos so that we wouldn’t be in the way.

“Need better lighting?” Padraic asked.

Jack looked up at the distantly spaced
fluorescent before nodding. We wheeled the bed a few feet into the
hall so that it was directly under a rectangle of light.

I felt a little sick when Jack started
stitching the wound closed. The same thing had happened when I saw
the awful injury getting shot had caused Hayden. There was
something about seeing someone I cared about hurt that unsettled
me.

Olivia folded a comforter in half and laid it
on the floor. She piled another blanket onto that, making a
comfortable bed for Argos. Once Jack was done, we carefully moved
Argos to the blankets where he would be under observation for the
next several hours to monitor for dehydration. He would be given an
IV if necessary.

I tightly crossed my arms over my chest and
looked at Argos. Although he didn’t appear to be in any pain, I
felt awful.

“It’s not your fault,” Padraic said
softly.

I turned, unaware that he was behind me. I
sighed. “Yeah, it is.” I shook my head. “I should never have
brought him out.”

Padraic put his hand on my shoulder. “Riss,
I’m guessing you brought him out of the pen so he could play and
run.”

I nodded and clenched my jaw.

“You were being nice. I bet he misses the
days when he could run in a big open area.”

I blinked back tears when the memory of Argos
running around my grandparent’s farm flashed into my mind. The
emotion was only apparent on my face for a second. But Padraic
caught it. His blue eyes met mine in concern.

“Hey,” he said softly and put his hand on my
arm. “He’s gonna be just fine. Trust me. I’m a doctor,” he added
with a smile.

It wasn’t just Argos. It was this whole damn
thing, with everything going back to the day Zoe died and I let
Finicus run away. Had zombies gotten that stupid animal? Or did he
starve to death, not knowing how to fend for himself after years of
being Aunt Jenny’s spoiled house cat.

As hard as I tried, I couldn’t return
Padraic’s smile. He pulled me in for a hug. I had forgotten how
slender yet firm he was. I rested my head on his shoulder and put
my hands on his back.

“Orissa,” he said softly. “Don’t blame
yourself.”

I closed my eyes and tried to let go of all
the shit that had built up inside of me. I had been so concerned
with Hayden and his happiness that I hadn’t realized I was stressed
as well.

The hospital ward doors opened. I looked over
Padraic’s shoulder to see Hayden rushing in. He slowed, taking in
the sight of my arms around Padraic. Was that jealousy that flashed
across his handsome face?

“Are you all right?” he asked, the question
sounding forced. Padraic let me go, sliding his hands down my arms.
His eyes met mine and he gave me one more reassuring smile before
he let his hands fall to the side.

“I am,” I said and stepped over to Hayden.
“This isn’t my blood.” I waved my hands at the front of my shorts
and then motioned to Argos.

Hayden put his arms around me, shaking his
head. “I just heard you ran to the hospital ward covered in
blood…again. They didn’t say anything about a dog.” He crushed me
against him, and I couldn’t help but wonder if his enveloping
embrace was overdone for show.

“Who told you?” I asked, my lips brushing
against his neck.

“I don’t remember their names,” Hayden
confessed. “Some teenage girls.” He leaned back, looking into my
eyes. “I should have known they were being dramatic.” He smiled,
his hazel eyes brightening.

Being this close to Hayden, even in the
company of others, made my heart skip a beat. I wanted to tell him
he had nothing to be jealous of. There was no one for me but him.
Hayden flicked his eyes to Jack, who was busy pretending not to
notice our intimate greeting. Olivia, who was sitting on the floor
with Argos, already knew about our couple status.

“How did he get attacked?” Hayden asked and
took a step back, letting go of me. I subconsciously reached up and
pulled on the chain that his dog tags hung from.

“Zombie.”

“What?” Hayden was completely taken aback. He
must have assumed it was a dog fight.

“It was by the fence,” I said softly.

Hayden’s eyes narrowed in question.

“It freaking stood on a pile of dead zombies
and was clawing at the ground like it was going to tunnel its way
in here.” The words sent a chill down my spine. “Don’t worry, I
killed it.

I could feel his stress level go through the
roof. I took his hand, giving it a squeeze. For several seconds,
Hayden didn’t move. He just looked into my eyes and held onto my
hand. Then he blinked. His body tensed and his nostrils flared,
just like they do when he’s having a flashback from his days in the
war.

“Hayden,” I said and gave his hand a tug.

“You’re all right?” he asked again.

“Yes. Perfectly fine.”

His fingers moved over the new scratches on
my hand. He frowned and lifted it up, inspecting the torn skin. “So
fine.”

I yanked my hand back. “It’s no big
deal.”

“Have it looked at?” he asked.

Padraic, having heard, came over and took my
hand from Hayden. “It’s not deep,” he stated. “But this needs to be
cleaned.” He moved my hand closer to his face. “This is from
fingernail scratches, right?”

“Yes,” I sighed, knowing both he and Hayden
were going to make a bigger deal out of it than necessary. It
wasn’t like I hadn’t been scratched by zombies before.
Nevertheless, I didn’t object when Padraic scrubbed it with soap,
slathered ointment on, and then bandaged my hand.

“Where was the zombie?” Hayden asked.

I knelt down to pet Argos. “Inside the
moat.”

“I know that, I mean where along the
fence.”

“Oh.” I ran my hand over Argo’s muzzle. “By
the quarantine barn.” I stood. “Like literally parallel to it.” My
eyes met Hayden’s. “There are crazies in the barn.”

“You think it was trying to get to them?”

I nodded. “Why else would it be so determined
to get under the fence?”

“But the step stool made out of zombies…” he
trailed off shaking his head. “Zombies can’t do that. There’s just
no way.”

“Maybe it wasn’t a zombie when it fell in,”
Olivia said shyly.

I looked at her, a smile forming on my face.
“You’re brilliant.”

Her cheeks turned red and she looked
away.

“And it makes sense.” I said. “A crazy would
be able to pick up and move shit. It would be alive enough to think
of something like that. But it wasn’t able to get fresh meat, or
stomachs, or water, or whatever Dr. Cara said they need to keep
from turning into zombies.”

“So it stacked the bodies and then turned.”
Hayden ran a hand through his hair. “We got lucky.”

“Argos didn’t,” I mumbled.

Hayden looked away from me and at the dog.
“If he hadn’t discovered that zombie, we probably wouldn’t have
until it was too late.” He sat on the floor to pet Argos. “Kids go
outside, Riss. That could have ended horribly.”

I bit my lip and felt oddly emotional. Argos
opened his eyes, looking up at me. I scratched under his chin. “We
need to have people patrol the moats every day.” It had been done
only a few times a week. “And whatever is killed needs to be taken
out and burned. No more leaving it in there.”

Hayden nodded. “I can arrange for that to
happen.” He sighed. “It makes me nervous for our animals.”

A lump formed in my throat. Just when things
seemed to be going smoothly, giving us hope that we were going to
survive this, we hit a setback. Hayden put his hand on mine.

We would get through this. Somehow, someway,
we would make it work.

* * *

Padraic brought Argos into his room every
night. It was the normal routine for the dog, but with him being
injured and me feeling horribly guilty about it, I wanted him
upstairs with me.

I carried him up the stairs and through the
house. My arms were tired and sore by the time we reached my room.
I set him down on the bed, trying to get him to stay put. Jack had
told me there was no reason Argos couldn’t put weight on his leg;
it was a skin tear that hadn’t even gone into the muscle. Still, I
was babying the dog.

Around eight that night, Argos started pawing
at the door. I had just taken him out, so I knew that wasn’t what
he wanted. I shook his food bowl; he wasn’t hungry. He didn’t want
water and wouldn’t play fetch. He pawed at the door again.

“You want to go to your normal bed?” I asked
and opened the door. Argos walked out of the room, sniffing the
floor in the hall. “I’ll take you,” I told him and let him walk to
the stairs. I picked him up and carried him down.

The halls were dimmed, and many of the
residents were turning in for the night. Argos’s nails ticked as he
jogged along. Light spilled out from under the door of Hayden’s
office. I hesitated. He said he was going to go over Fuller’s notes
again. I didn’t want to bother him, but I couldn’t just pass him
up, could I?

I stopped and put my ear to the door.
“Hayden?” I softly called. A chair scooted on the tile.

“Riss?” he said.

“Yeah.”

After a second he opened the door.

“Late night?” I asked.

Hayden frowned and put his head in his hands.
“Again. Want to help?”

“Of course.” I smiled. “And by help do you
mean bend me over the desk and have your way with me again?”

Hayden only half smiled and tipped his head
back. I looked past him and saw Hannah sitting at the desk. Her
arms were folded on the surface, cradling her head. She had fallen
asleep. I stepped in, Argos following close behind, and closed the
door, turning the knob so as not to wake up Hannah. Argos
immediately started sniffing everything he could in the new
room.

Hayden was tense. His hair was rumbled and
black ink stained his fingertips.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

Hayden went back to the desk and sunk heavily
into the chair. With a sigh he leaned forward, putting his head in
his hands again. “I’ve been doing some math.”

“Math gives me a headache too.”

He shook his head and looked up. He hadn’t
shaved in a few days and purple circles hung under his eyes. “There
are a lot of people here, Riss.”

I perched on the edge of the desk. “And
that’s bad?”

“No, not at all. But it makes it hard to keep
everyone fed.”

“The gardens aren’t really gardens anymore.
They’re more like fields. And Ray said everything is growing as
well as we could hope, even in this drought.”

“She’s right.” Hayden picked up a pen and
turned it over between his fingers. “They are doing well, really
well.”

“But?”

“But plants only grow for so long. What are
we going to do in the winter? We can’t count on scavenging; it’s
not sure enough to have that be our only plan.”

It hit me like a punch to the stomach. I
remembered learning about some of the first settlers way back when
I was in middle school. As a kid growing up in a modern world, I
found it hard to believe that they spent the summer preparing for
winter. But it had to be done.

And though our world was technically still
modern, we were living just like those first settlers. Well, with
zombies.