Ultimate Thriller Box Set - Crouch Blake - Страница 25

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“Nice,” Andy said. “Where did you learn to break like that?”

“I played the pro circuit for a while.”

Sun lined up the one ball and flashed Andy a grin.

Andy said, “You're kidding, right?”

She banked the one into a corner pocket, leaving herself position on the two.

“Most people think pool is a man's game. It's not. Football—running, throwing, hitting each other. That's a man's game.”

Sun put away the two ball, setting up an easy shot on the 3. She leaned over a bit farther than necessary, enjoying his eyes on her body.

“Pool,” Sun continued, “pool is all about angles and finesse and thinking ahead. Carefully plotting actions and executing them with precision.”

The three went in with a whisper, and the five was all lined up.

“Visualizing what you want, and getting it.”

She pocketed the five and also put down the seven, crippled along the side pocket.

“It's like seduction,” Sun said. “Something that a woman can do much better than a man.”

“Is this a date?” Andy asked. “This is a date, right? I mean, not a going out kind of date, because we're not out, but we've got this man-woman thing going on here, right?”

Sun smiled at him. “Why put labels on it? We’re just two consenting adults, enjoying a two thousand dollar game of pool.”

“We should really play foosball. Now that's my game. I did that as a living, for a while. Hustling foosball.”

“Good money?” Sun asked, eyeing the 6.

“Yeah. I used to bring in four, five bucks a night.”

“Sounds like a fun way to spend your childhood.”

“Childhood? I did it until I turned thirty.”

Sun laughed, missing her shot.

“Okay, stand back,” Andy said. “Now you'll see why they call me Fast Andy.”

Andy took careful aim at the 6 ball, and with an easy, steady stroke, missed it completely and scratched the cue into the corner pocket.

“Because you lose so fast?” Sun asked.

Andy’s eyes twinkled with challenge. “I'd be winning if you weren't wearing that tight blouse.”

“So if I took the blouse off, you'd be more focused?”

I’m actually flirting, Sun thought. It felt nice. Really nice.

She eyed the table. Andy was leaning against the rail, in the way of her shot.

“You wanna move, so I can win my two thousand dollars?”

“Not really, no.”

Sun walked over to him and put her arms around his waist, still holding her cue.

“I knew this was a date,” Andy said. “Right? Am I right?”

Sun placed the cue ball on the table and drew her stick back, shooting behind him. In one fluid movement she banked off the six and sunk the nine, winning the game.

“Nice shot,” Andy looked down at her, putting his hands on her shoulders.

“Thanks.” She let go of the cue, but her arms remained around his waist. Their eyes locked. “I take cash and personal checks.”

“I want to be honest with you. I only have four dollars to my name.”

Andy’s lips parted slightly. She could feel his heart through his ribs, and it seemed to beat a little louder. Though he had the barest hint of stubble on his face, Sun could smell aftershave. She moved her hand up his sides, feeling the muscles in his back, thinking that she hadn’t touched a man like that in so long.

Sun stared at him, wondering if her pupils were as wide as his. She waited for him to move in for the kiss, unsure what she would do if he tried.

Neither of them moved.

The moment lingered, then passed. Sun dropped her hands and turned away.

“So foosball is your game?” she said, trying to sound upbeat.

“I’m supernatural at foosball. I’m ranked third in the world.”

“Double or nothing?”

“You’re on.”

Sun beat him in four minutes.

“There’s got to be something you can win at,” she said after the final goal.

“Football,” Andy said. “That was my game. All the running and the hitting. It's not a real sport unless you wear mouth protection. Would you like to see where I got kicked in the head with cleats?”

“How about Asteroids,” Sun said. “I stink at Asteroids.”

Andy stunk worse. Sun played her last ship with her eyes closed, and still annihilated his score.

“What are we up to?” Andy asked. “Eight grand?”

“There’s got to be something you can win at.” Sun looked around the rec room, trying to find something she wasn’t good at.

“How about arm wrestling?”

Sun declined. Andy looked strong, but if she beat him at arm wrestling she didn’t think his ego would ever recover.

“How about Scrabble in Portuguese?” Andy suggested.

“Board games are in Purple 10.”

As they walked out of the rec room, Sun noticed Andy’s limp.

“Did you pull a muscle?”

“Blister.” Andy made a face. “From not wearing socks.”

“Let me see it.”

“It’s ugly.”

“I’m a big girl.”

Andy kicked off his shoe and peeled down his sock. It was ugly, covering much of his heel, red and inflamed.

“We need to dress that. Come on.”

Sun took Andy’s hand and led him into Yellow 6, the medical supply room. She sat him on the padded examination table and removed his shoe and sock.

“Don’t you need to muzzle me first?” Andy asked.

Sun grinned. “Have you had your shots?”

“I’m not sure. Let me check my tags.”

Sun opened the closet and found some gauze, tape, hydrogen peroxide, and burn ointment on the well-stocked shelves.

“Are you sure you’re qualified to do this?” Andy asked.

“I think I can manage.”

“Remember, this is a blister. Not a neutering.”

“I’ll try to keep that in mind.”

She dabbed peroxide on some gauze and cleaned the inflamed skin.

“So why did you become a vet?” Andy asked. “No desire to practice on people at all?”

Sun tried to think of something flippant, but nothing came to mind.

“Not that I’m knocking vets,” Andy said quickly. “But it seems like you’d make a great MD.”

She squirted on some ointment, but her good mood deflated like a leaky tire. The memories came back. Memories she’d been trying for years to suppress.

“Sun? You okay?”

Could she tell him? Would that scare him away?

“Sun?”

“I... I used to be a doctor,” she said. “A human doctor.”

Sun taped on the bandage and waited for a response. None came. The silence stretched.

“If you want to talk about it,” Andy said finally, “I want to know.”

He reached down and took her hand. She gripped it, tight, and sat on the table next to him. The words, unspoken for so long, began to tumble out of her.

“I did my internship at Johns Hopkins, began my residency there. I was on the tail end of a twenty hour shift; there was an apartment fire and we'd been working without break for eight hours. A women came in with abdominal pain to the right iliac fossa. Her tongue was coated, she had foetor oris, high temp, vomiting; text book appendicitis. Hers was ready to rupture. We prepped her for a laparotomy, emptied her stomach with a naso-gastric, and I scrubbed for surgery.”

Sun could remember how tired she was, and how determined that she wouldn't let fatigue get in the way of her job. The woman was Caucasian and overweight, but in a way she reminded Sun of her own mother. Even though her pain was severe she'd been stoic.

“I'd done a dozen appendectomies. It was a simple operation. I made a gridiron incision through McBurney's point, divided the mesoappendix, used a pursestring suture in the caecum. Then I closed her up and she was discharged a few days later.”

Sun swallowed, held Andy’s hand even tighter.

“She bounced back the next week. Temperature of 105. Peritonitis. Her peritoneal cavity was filled with pus and fecal matter.” Sun took a deep breath. “My pursestring suture had opened. I hadn't tied it off.  Her lower intestine emptied out into her abdominal cavity.”

Sun turned away from Andy, stared at a spot on the wall.

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