Blood Orchid
by Jenna Ryan
Copyright © 2017 by Jenna Ryan. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
Chapter One
The huge stone manor looked haunted, Kate Marshall mused, particularly at night under a hazy quarter moon. Sitting alone on a rise of land with a dense patch of equally haunted forest fanning out from its storied walls, it could have been plucked from a dark fairy tale. Or a horror film, she supposed. For now, it stood as an eerie life-and-death testament to the hospital it had become a century and a half after its birth.
Many wings had been added over the years, and the interior had been brought completely up to code. It was a state-of-the-art eighty-five-bed private facility, and yet for all that, on the surface at least, it remained a relic from a bygone era.
People from all over the Bay Area came to St. Mark’s in order to go on living. Sometimes they died, but mostly they hoped they wouldn’t. That was the ideal, at any rate. Unless they worked there, as Kate had for the past three years. Unless the ideal was shattered by grim reality.
“Don’t do this,” she murmured into the thickening fog. “It doesn’t help.”
Rocking her head from side to side, she regarded the murky outline of the old house one last time and then pushed off from the back of her car.
She did this occasionally after a bad shift: pulled over on the steep road that wound down to the bay, climbed out and stared at what was. Thought back to what had been. Questioned what might have been.
Damn it. Thoughts and conjectures didn’t help either. As a child, the manor had given her chills. Apparently, she reflected, it still could.
Filmy fingers of fog drifted through her line of vision. Only a few streetlights burned on the road, making it the perfect spot for anyone requiring a moment of solitude to stop. Unless, of course, a bad driver happened to be squealing down the hill at twice the legal limit.
She spotted the headlights first, weaving wildly from side to side. Okay, that was a bad sign. Drunk at the wheel, she assumed, and she pulled the keys to her Prius from her coat pocket.
“Do not be deceived by what is unreal, Kate Marshall. Fear only what is.” A woman’s voice, whisper-thin yet strangely clear, came from behind her. Startled, Kate whirled to face the shadows.
A tiny female figure stood on the slippery outer edge of the road. She wore a dark coat and a veil that covered her head and face. Her hands were folded one over the other. Kate spied a tattoo on the back of her left hand that might have been a flower.
She started to speak, but the woman cut her off with an urgent, “Move now!”
Kate snapped her head around as the weaving car shot out of the fog. The headlights were blinding, but even through her momentary shock, she knew the vehicle was coming straight for her.
She jumped back instinctively, as fast and as far as she could. Unfortunately, the shoulder was rough and her heel caught in a crack. As the headlights bore down, she stumbled and fell.
The car, a behemoth from her current perspective, screeched to a halt less than six inches from her feet. It sat there, as if panting, for several seconds. Then the driver slammed into Reverse and peeled away to brake on the opposite shoulder.
Well, hell. She closed her eyes briefly while her heart hammered and her body trembled. What was going on out here? Who’d be crazy enough to fly down a San Francisco hill in the fog at night with no—
Wait, the woman! But when Kate scrambled to her knees, no one stood on the edge of the road.
“Okay, going crazy,” she said aloud. “Seeing people. Hearing voices.” With her fingers pressed hard to her temples, she looked again. And still no one stood there.
The growl of a powerful engine brought her back. She swung her gaze to the vehicle and felt annoyance war with fear.
Climbing to her feet, she brushed dirt and pebbles from her trench coat. Whatever had just happened, she didn’t need it after tonight’s double shift from hell.
The Cadillac on the shoulder seemed to float in a sea of gauzy white. The weird effect sustained until the driver’s door burst open and a woman wearing a blood-red coat and stiletto boots clattered out.
Her heels clicked unevenly on the damp pavement.
Definitely drunk, Kate reflected, and unfortunately recognizable. Taking a last uncertain look behind her, she braced for the face-to-face she’d known would come at some point but had actively hoped to postpone until tomorrow.
Illuminated by high beams and swirling mist, the approaching woman’s sharp features shifted from drunken sorrow to glittering fury. Fingers curled, she all but lunged at Kate. “You let my son die, you incompetent bitch! You killed him!”
Kate didn’t defend herself. Wrong time and place. Instead, she offered the standard physician’s apology. “I’m so sorry, Ms. Perradine—”
“Sorry?” Anna Perradine’s shrill voice echoed through the night. “You’re sorry? You don’t know what the word means, Dr. Marshall.” Wobbling closer, she snarled, “But I promise you, you will.”
As a fully licensed trauma surgeon, Kate was accustomed to dealing with emotional outbursts. Shock and disbelief were the usual first reactions to the death of a loved one, and anger certainly wasn’t uncommon. But she couldn’t recall ever encountering the kind of poisonous rage that was now being directed at her by this woman—who had already directed some at her over the phone. Maybe it was time for straighter talk.
“Ms. Perradine,” she said again. “Your son lost a great deal of blood at the scene. He took three bullets to the chest. We did everything possible to stabilize him, but truthfully, he was gone before he reached the hospital. The paramedics—”
The woman made a dangerous sound. “Paramedics aren’t doctors, Doctor. I wouldn’t expect them to save the life of anyone in Frankie’s condition. It was your job to do that, and you failed. Miserably.”
“Anna.” A man materialized out of the fog to touch the woman’s arm. “Don’t you think—”
“I don’t have to think!” She took two staggering steps, swatting his hand as she might a pesky mosquito. “I know. And what I know is this. You were a fill-in surgeon, Dr. Marshall. A third-rate replacement for the bastard who should have operated on my son. I’ve spoken to the chief of surgery. Dr. Nolan was scheduled to be on duty tonight.”
“Yes, he was. But he had—”
“Shut up,” Anna shouted. “My son’s dead, and it’s Jason Nolan’s fault just as surely as it is yours. You’re both murderers!”
When guilt pricked, Kate pushed it away. She’d done nothing wrong. This was merely a woman who’d suffered a tragic loss lashing out. “Dr. Nolan is an excellent surgeon,” she said. “But I promise you, there’s nothing he or anyone could have done to save Frankie.”
The woman struck Kate with a single stinging blow across her cheek.
Teeth set, Kate balled her fingers. “And still there’s nothing anyone could have done. Nothing at all.”
This time, Anna’s companion grasped both of her arms. The restraint didn’t prevent her from scalding Kate with a look. “You’ll pay for this, do you hear me?”
Kate had a feeling half of San Francisco could hear her.
“You killed my son—you and the son of a bitch who should have performed the surgery. Did last night’s storm keep you awake, Dr. Marshall? It kept me awake. Thunder that violent comes with lightning, millions of volts of untamed electricity. A single strike can cause instant death, just like that.” She snapped—or attempted to snap—scarlet-tipped fingers in Kate’s face. “That’s how it’s going to be for you and Nolan. Death.” Again, her fingers didn’t quite snap. “Just like that.”
Kate said nothing. She simply absorbed the woman’s virulent stare.
Snatching free, Anna shrugged the shoulder of her jacket into place and jerked her chin up. “If you don’t recognize my family’s name, I suggest you look it up on Google, Doctor. You and your brilliant counterpart have made yourselves one hell of a powerful enemy tonight. Powerful and deadly.”
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