“Oops, sorry, I was–”
The person, clammy and pale, reared back before then sneeze all over him.
He stood frozen, his lips pulled into a tight grimace as he stared down at the droplets on his phone.
“Sorry,” the person murmured before skirt around him and continuing down the hall.
Alex remained stuck in his spot for a moment before he finally came back to his senses. He wiped the phone off against his shirt, shaking his head before he shoved it into his pocket and reached for the hand sanitizer dispenser on the wall near the door.
He growled in frustration as he found it empty. With a curse under his breath, he hurried through the door and past the patients waiting to be seen, cringing at every cough.
Relief washed over him when he finally took in a deep breath of cool mountain air after stepping outside.
With a shake of his head, he crossed to their rental and pulled open the back door, finding it unlocked. “Thank you, Sebastian.”
He rummaged around in his bag, grabbing a cord and thehand sanitizer. He squeezed a generous amount of the cool gel into his palm before he rubbed his hands vigorously, coating every inch of his skin.
“There we go,” he said, shoving the small bottle into his pocket and closing the car door.
He made his way back to the security office, grabbing his laptop off of Ava and plopping into his seat again. With a plug located, he ran the cord to his laptop and settled in to dig up some information about the patients.
Ava rubbed his shoulders as his fingers hammered against the keys.
“I’m in,” he murmured as the camera on the monitors across the room bloomed to life on his computer screen.
“Awesome, now the patient records,” she said as she leaned closer to him.
“On it,” he answered. “Hey, how long is Doc going to be here? We can do all this from the motel.”
“He’s doing a round with Dr. Meade. I don’t know how long they’ll be.”
“Well, maybe Shadow can hang here with him and me, and you can abscond to the motel where there will be less germs.”
“Which motel you at?” the guard asked.
“Pelican Inn,” Ava answered. “Outskirts of town.”
“Oh, yeah…hate to tell you, dude, but there may not be less germs there.”
Alex’s lips parted as he winced at the words. “Ugh, seriously?”
“Sorry, nicest place we have here is the Falls B&B over on Second Street.”
Alex opened another window, quickly finding the B&B’s number before he dug his phone from his pocket. “That’s perfect, Av–Reb–Becky. We could walk there right now.”
“Ahh, sorry, buddy, no can do. The owner’s in the hospitalwith this crazy flu, so you’re out of luck on that. They’re closed.”
“What?” Alex let his head drop back between his shoulders. “You’re kidding me. So, we’re stuck in Germlock Falls at the Germ-ican Inn.”
“Use your hand sanitizer, babe,” Ava said with a rub of his shoulders.
“I’m going to have to bathe in it.” He shook his head, dismissing the page for the prospective accommodations and returning to gaining access to the patient charts.
He cracked the system to access them, bypassing any of the credentials needed to see specific charts.
“Okay, I’ve access to all the charts. Is there some sort of code I can use to find the people with this flu.”
“Good question,” Ava said. “I’ll ask Doc. Be right back.”
