"Put me down." To her surprise, he did.
Tori's eyes widened perceptibly and she knew then what she had to do. It was no longer his decision. Yet she realized how imperative it was for him to believe in her submission, and so she became suddenly composed and docile, every inch the complaisant wife. Before this day was over, she'd be in that death-riddled city, administering to the sick. Yet she wasn't afraid for herself or her child. She could not get the disease. Her child, as long as it was in her womb, was protected by her own immune system.
The day, however, would be a lengthy one. She was impatient to start out, yet at the same time she knew she had to be meticulously organized and very secretive.
Perhaps she could make her excuses now and make a polite exit without generating his suspicious nature. That notion was at the forefront of her mind as well as the knowledge there was an immediate necessity for haste.
She made herself realize Nessa was no longer her ally. She listed in her mind all the medicines, food, and first aide supplies she would need; the different serums she'd have to bring. Lost in thought, she hardly noticed when Aisling entered the room. The prophet, she mused. Cameron and the old woman spoke in low whispers, their words only for each other.
Tori smiled for the first time.
The two were completely absorbed in their conversation.
Tori slipped from the room, making her way to her chambers above and began packing. Her confidence grew. Yet even then the floor began to spin and her stomach threatened to rebel.
She remained calm. Yet when she turned to leave, Aisling was in the doorway. The look on the old woman's face held a wealth of information for anyone who chose to read it. Tori felt Aisling would shutter her features if she decided to, but instead the seer let her disapproval clearly stay in her eyes.
"I could tell you much about Cameron Savage. I could tell you he loves you, but you wouldn't believe. I know some of what lies in store for the two of you. I know..." She broke off, shaking her head. "I also know you plan on leaving. No," she held up her hands, "I won't interfere."
Fascinated, Tori waited. Then, "What else can you tell me?"
"Nothing. Your destiny is in the hands of the gods. There is a deadly presence waiting to enwrap you, to snare you. It is up to you to fight the menace. I can do nothing except warn you to take heed."
"That is it?"
She shook her head. "I see death. Men fighting one another. I see guns and trenches and missiles."
"It can't be," she murmured. "Cameron warned me, he--"
"A great war, a war where many will die and brothers will fight brothers, fathers their own children. It happened once like that a very long time ago." Aisling was trembling and the lines on her face seemed to deepen even as she spoke. To Tori it looked as if she aged right before her eyes.
"A war between families?"
Aisling shook her head again. She touched her heart then lowered her lashes as if in pain. "No, it will be much more than that, much more.... You must tell him of his child."
Then she left, and Tori wondered at Aisling's words and how she knew about the child. But she had no time to dwell on them. There was still much to prepare and despite her wish to hurry, she knew patience would work much better in its place. Despite her very real desire to go to the people that needed her, just as she always had, she was quaking with worry and dread. It was Savage's stubbornness, she told herself, his unfailing pride, his need to protect. He had no right to keep her here.
In the evening just after the meal, when her husband entrenched himself in the lab, she knew her restraint had served her purpose well. It was imperative that she reach Roseland before he would miss her.
Once she was there, he would not be able to make her leave if a quarantine was in place. In all truth, she could tell Savage she hadn't been able to sit idly by and do nothing when people were dying. She had taken every precaution, packed everything including several sterilization packets.
When she entered the hangar and she met no resistance, she knew all her precautions had worked. With the fastest glider secured, she flew away completely unheeded.
A few hours later and with the stench of death surrounding her, she flew straight into the disease-infested city. The streets were empty. When she set the glider down on top of the hospital, she was greeted with a strange silence. She stepped out. Hot winds picked up the debris scattered on the landing pad, and the sun glared down. Far off in the distance she watched a thin trail of smoke spiral upward. Then she heard the squeak of the funeral carts lumbering along one side street, discreetly picking up the dead.
She forced back the nausea and the dizziness whirling within, and she pushed back the feelings of doom that threatened to topple her strength of will.
The door leading to the stairs and the hospital opened. Jonathan stepped out. Astonished, she raced to him, hurling herself into his arms even as tears streaked her face.
"Tori, what will Cameron say? It's too dangerous for you to be here. This is foolishness."
"I had to come and well you know it. It's no more dangerous or foolhardy for me than it is for you. I've brought supplies for the surgery as well as the new serums. Where can we set up?"
"You can't," Jonathan said. "You know very well that if we even try to use the new surgery, it could just as easily result in more deaths. You've not had time to test it."
"Do you think those people suffering out there would care? Why don't you let them choose? Tell them what their chances are without the operation. Tell them it may kill them or create untold complication. Tell them. But let them choose. Let them know if they get stronger, this procedure will help them survive other epidemics, other plagues. Tell them, Jonathan, or I will."
Tori stood her ground. Jonathan shook his head then walked to the high wall over looking the City. He watched for a long time then sighed. "All right." Tori nodded seriously. "Good," she said, striding toward the stairway.
Jonathan followed. She pushed open the doors then began the long descent to the floor below where she would set up her lab. When they reached the second floor rooms, the number of patients didn't surprise her. They were stacked on top of each other. She shuddered then swayed.
Jonathan touched her shoulder. "If it helps, I understand what you're feeling."
She looked at him, surprised by the empathy. "Helpless, alone--these poor people. Abandoned by their loved ones because of fear, they don't deserve this. No one does."
"Let's get going."
"Right." A great sigh shook her.
"We must conquer this. We've so much to prove," she whispered, terrified. Could they win against a foe that could not even be seen, an enemy that was ready and seemingly undefeatable?
Tori's hands clung to the heart monitor in front of her, her mind filling with its first hint of doubt.
"We'll not be alone. We'll have the serums, both old and new. And Cameron will stand beside us, as well as The Phantom. I am sure of it."
There was determination in Jonathan's voice when he spoke of the battle to come and he was so sure of her husband. Tori straightened, encouraged by his resolve, but wary of Jonathan's mention of The Phantom. She had thought that Jonathan knew of her husband's duel identity.
"The Phantom is a mercenary, seeking only monetary gain."
Jonathan grinned. "Think so?"
"I experienced him first hand, or can you forget so soon?" She busied herself with unpacking then assembling the supplies. "I don't want to talk about this. Cameron will be here and I would rather be prepared than not. He didn't give his permission for this excursion and I would be surprised if he arrives in a very good frame of mind. And...while we have time we must figure out a way to convince him his surgical expertise is at a premium these days."
"So, he doesn't see things the same way we do."
"Of course not. Until he gets a written go-ahead from the board of physicians, he won't touch a single patient."
"Then you've perfected the treatment."
"Yes." Tori shook her head, "but I've yet to perfect my husband," she murmured, returning to her work.
"I thought the good doctor was already perfect. There are many who believe he is."
"Then they are fools."
"Cameron and The Phantom are the same," Jonathan said softly then paused as if waiting for her reaction.
"What?" Tori looked up innocently. "You've just figured that out?"
Jonathan inhaled sharply. "How long have you known?"
"The first time he showed himself to me without his mask," she replied tersely. "I'm not a stupid woman," she murmured to herself. But even as she focused her attention on one of the sick patients, the short-wave radio crackled with static.
"Dr. Savage is requesting to land. Should I give him permission?"
Her heart thundered! He had come.
She closed her eyes and tried to stop her hand from trembling. She remembered his power and his ruthlessness. He would be furious with her but then it seemed as if he was always in that state of mind.
He was an incredible surgeon, she reminded herself. This city needed him.
But he had raced after her--not for the well-being of the patients, but to bring her back. The keepers of the city might well feel that none of them could leave, that they would have to stay and see this epidemic to its end.
And that was what she had wanted.
Savage might not be immune...
She was surprised by the insecurity and fear that swept through her. She didn't want him to die. Barbarian or not, he had mixed blood in his veins and she didn't know if he was susceptible to this. She was afraid for him, wanted to send him back, denying him access to the City. Because... Because she loved him, more than she ever imagined she could.
Even as she moved to the next patient, she was pondering the situation. Jonathan stepped in front of her. "Victoria," he said quietly, "you have to stop him. You must know he has never had the signe virus. He is one of only a few outsiders who have never contracted the disease. Tori, this strain is deadly. He won't care, and he won't ask if you've been exposed. He'll assume if you did have the disease, you would have died. Your secret has been carefully kept unless you've told him."
He shook his head then, "You tried to tell him?"
"I can make him understand," she shot back fiercely.
"Hell, Tori! If he didn't believe you the first time..."
"I have to send him back!" Eyes beseeching, Tori stared at her cousin.
"You really think you can?"
"I must.
Cameron
Cameron went crazy, searching the telemonitors for communication that might lead him to Tori. When he entered all the information he had on hand and still did not come up with enough facts to set her at any one city, he began to swear at himself, calling himself every name imaginable.
Very few knew he was The Phantom, and even fewer knew he did indeed have mixed blood. Jonathan knew most of his secrets, past and present. He'd never had the tests that Tori claimed would reveal his genetic makeup, never been so desperate he needed confirmation of his immunity. If he risked his life within the city, doctoring the sick, it would not be the first time, nor he thought would it be the last. But this time it was Tori who had him sweating.
"Little rebel," he whispered fiercely. Then he was furious with himself for not realizing sooner where she would head. Roseland, he sighed, the latest city of death. If his emotions had not been entangled, he would have arrived at the city a few minutes ahead of her.
But his emotions had him tied up in knots.
He slowed the glider, easing back on the throttle as he looked over the landing pad and the position of Tori's glider. After hovering for several seconds, he let his vehicle float downward until it landed on the top of the hospital building.
Two men dressed in white uniforms stepped from the door. "I'm looking for Jonathan Reese and Victoria Savage," he called out. The men looked grim and strangely determined. He knew his wife was here. Cameron leapt from the glider and walked closer to the orderlies. A sixth sense caused the hair on the nape of his neck to stand on edge, warning him all was not as it seemed. What was going on here? Jonathan, if not his wife, should have come to welcome him.
Proceed with caution, he reminded himself. His wife was not above trickery or deceit to get her way. She had proved that time and again. And she must know by now he had come, must realize he would not allow her to place herself in danger.
He wanted to find her and make sure she was safe.
There should be no need to involve these men who were approaching him. If she refused to see him, he would resort to whatever measures were necessary.
He stepped forward, hand extended in greeting.
Women and children were dying within this building, he thought suddenly. The howling winds circling the city carried with them the pain and misery of the sick. A soft keening whispered through the sultry afternoon. If he closed his eyes, he could see the sick stretched out, row upon row in the wards, eyes haunted, mouths drawn tight.
"I'm looking for Victoria--" he began again, speaking out. But before he could finish the sentence one of the orderlies nodded.
"This way."
Astonished at their curtness, he followed. Through the door then down a long set of steps, they walked into a long tunnel. White doors lined both side of the tunnel, yet they didn't stop until they came to the very end and could go no further. A door swung open. Before he could turn and ask the question that suddenly came to mind, the orderlies pushed him into the room, the sound of the door closing and locking. Too late he realized where he was.
Cursing, he felt the repercussion of his folly bear down against his chest. Furious, he raced to the door. Knowing even before he put the full force of his weight on the handle it was useless. The longer he stood in front of the door, the angrier he became. He could still think. He could still rationalize what had just happened, but he didn't want to.
With an air of indifference he didn't feel, he stepped back then slowly surveyed the room. The walls were all painted a pale blue and there was no furniture. Only one small telemonitor sitting in the far corner of the room gave any indication that he wasn't going to be left to fend for himself. Facing the screen, he said, "I told you I'm looking for Victoria Savage." He strove for calm.
Horizontal lines ran across the monitor as it began to hum and blink. A bright abstract sun appeared and a soft melody played a quiet tune. "I'm in a damn psycho ward."
"Serenity--peace--harmony," a soft female voice whispered.
None of this made sense, yet at the same time it was incredibly logical. He'd just never thought to give Tori that much credit. She didn't waste time this way. She confronted her opposition, battling, fighting. It was not like her to hide behind this type of treachery.
No, Jonathan had a hand in this, not that he hid behind treachery either. It was just that his approach was always more subtle, more unpredictable.
"Let me out, Victoria! Now!" he roared.
The monitor changed and now a little brook rushed helter-skelter through mountain valley. In the background, snow-topped mountains rose majestically.
"Equilibrium--tranquility--stillness." The female voice was softer and it was sexy as hell, but there was only one voice he wanted to hear. His hands clenched into tight fists, eyebrows narrowed at the screen.
"Victoria..." he gritted out.
Then the screen changed again.
Tori.
Now that she was there, in front of him, he didn't know what to say. She was wearing white, her hair pulled back into a tight knot at the base of her neck, and he knew she was tending patients. A facemask dangled in front of her. Nothing she wore would protect her.
And yet...
He knew she didn't need protection from the virus. From the moment she defied him to come to this disease-ridden city, he knew she had told him the truth about her immunity. Trust, he told himself, but that was a very fragile word.
She might feel he was tr
ying to take away her independence, her freedom. He didn't intend to, but she had come to mean so much to him the thought of losing her left him desolate.
"Dr. Savage," she murmured huskily, her face expressionless. "You cannot stay here. Jonathan and I have agreed on this. You have two choices..." She paused. "Will you be reasonable?"
Cameron held his hands tightly behind his back. He was torn between the sweet knowledge she was healthy and in good hands with Jonathan--and the strongest urge to sweep her into his arms, bodily carrying her from the premises. As The Phantom, he'd have the encouragement of everyone in the facility, except Jonathan. But he had not come as The Phantom.
He could pray she would remain well. This time she had the upper hand and he couldn't help but feel stirred by her courage and daring.
Rebel Heart Page 38
