"Yvonne Navarro - Elektra" - читать интересную книгу автора (Navarro Yvonne)

Bob had twenty years of experience at this job, so he didn’t need to be told what to do. He reached
over the woman’s body and snatched a portable defibrillator off the wall at the same time Ray yanked
the sides of the top of their patient’s costume open as far as he could. Her black top was some sort of
shiny leather halter thing that looked like it would be more at home at a Halloween party, or maybe one
of those fetish raves, and it made the two electrodes he’d stuck onto the skin of her upper chest look
stark and out of place. There was more leather—full-length gloves and a strap, cut through and dangling
from around her neck. Finding a pulse had been difficult; they’d done it, but now that fleeting indicator of
life was gone. Under any other circumstances, the two medics would have fully appreciated the woman’s
lovely face and gorgeous body, but the blood soaking her midsection blew away any such thoughts.

There was a barely discernible background whine that the practiced ears of both men recognized, and
within seconds of turning it on, Ray yanked his hands away. As he pressed the paddles against her bared
skin, Bob yelled“Clear!” anyway, following his ingrained training protocol. He pressed the buttons on his
two paddles simultaneously, and the machine made an oddly low-keywhumping noise at the same instant
the young woman’s body arched and rose a good six inches off the sheet.

Nothing.
 “Again!” yelled Ray. He snatched the paddles from Bob and waved them in the air. “Comeon, lady!”
Bob jabbed a stiff finger at theCharge button on the side of the defibrillator; he had to aim at it twice
because of the swaying of the ambulance. Another high-pitched whine as the machine again built power,
and the instant the ready light came on, Ray again jammed the paddles against the bared skin of her
chest.“Clear!” the medic shouted, but once more his partner had already raised his hands.

The jolt made their patient’s body arch again, but the movement went almost unnoticed in the bouncing
of the ambulance. She fell back onto the blood-soaked sheet of the cart, and both of them bent over her,
searching for a pulse, a tick of her eyelid,anything. As Bob pressed his stethoscope against her breast,
one slender and strangely calloused hand slid over the side and banged lifelessly against the
rubber-coated floor.

The older paramedic sat back. “She’s gone,” he said. His shoulders slumped in defeat and he swiped at
his damp forehead with the back of his forearm. Ray scowled and looked like he wanted to try again,
then the paddles he was still gripping slowly lowered. After a moment, he exhaled and nodded, finally
slipping the paddles back onto their hooks. Now that the frantic moments were past, he could see that
the woman’s sightless eyes were open about a quarter of an inch; they were sort of a swamp brown
color with highlights of green, and still bright enough to look alive—God, but she had been beautiful. He
let a few more moments pass, then he reached out and gently pressed down on her eyelids to close them
for the last time.

1

JAPAN

THEREARE SOME WHO SAY THAT THE DESTINY OFeach and every person is preordained,
that there is little—or nothing at all—that the average person can do to change his or her fate. Save a
man from stepping in front of the bus that was meant to end his life, and that same man will slip in the
bathtub the next morning and split his skull. Philosophers throughout the centuries have likened it to the
grand old game of chess, where each move is planned far in advance based on the possibilities at hand.
A poor comparison, because it is one which makes the assumption that the focus of the challenge, the
players, actuallyknow which paths are available and what might happen when each road is chosen. But