Grace Perne is a hard-working young woman with a lot of responsibility on her shoulders. Brought up by her father, a doctor, after the tragic death of her mother, she is determined to do good in the world.
Alexei Ivanov is determined to escape the...
اوووه! هذه الصورة لا تتبع إرشادات المحتوى الخاصة بنا. لمتابعة النشر، يرجى إزالتها أو تحميل صورة أخرى.
Alexei | Grace
"Please."
IT WAS A SATURDAY NIGHT in London, and my coworker was practically begging down the phone. I could hear the exhaustion saturating her voice—I felt it too, having only finished a twelve-hour shift at nine-thirty p.m.
"I know it's a lot to ask," she continued, "but if we didn't absolutely need you I wouldn't have called."
I stared down at the unappetising ready-meal I'd just pulled out of the microwave. "I've been on overtime every night this week," I sighed.
"Grace, I know it's not fair to ask you to do this." There was a hushed static sound followed by muffled voices as Lena directed somebody to the radiology department. "Maybe we could have managed if it was just the flu, but...there's been an incident."
Even as she spoke I was throwing the microwave meal in the bin, pulling on my dirty white trainers and grabbing my car keys. "What sort of incident?" I inquired, placing the phone between my ear and shoulder as I pulled my hair back into a sloppy ponytail.
This year's bout of flu had been especially nasty, and our jabs turned out to be up to ninety percent ineffective. For weeks now hospitals across England had been inundated with the sick, their symptoms ranging from fever to serious respiratory issues. I couldn't remember the last time I'd had a proper night's sleep—or eaten a proper meal, for that matter.
"There's been an explosion in Camden," Lena explained. I could picture her pinching the bridge of her nose to stifle a yawn. "We don't know the details, but a lot of the victims are being brought to us. There's police everywhere, taking names and statements, trying to catalogue witnesses..."
"Jesus."
"Yeah. Like we're not already run off our feet trying to get these people better," she scoffed.
The news should have shocked me, filled me with concern, but it barely even registered. I was way too tired to feel anything other than a faint worry that tonight, no matter what we did, it might not be enough.
"Gracie," I heard my father calling from the living room of my tiny apartment.
Zipping up my jacket, I leaned my head around the corner to see that he was alright. I felt bad leaving him on his own so much, but I equally didn't have a choice, and he knew that. Since his accident, he hadn't been able to work - it was up to me to bring the money in now.
"Yeah, dad?" I gave him a weary smile but I could see already that he was concerned.
