Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 98561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 394(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 394(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
The village’s generator had exploded, throwing out burning fuel and deadly metal fragments. Several people had burns and lacerations but the most seriously hurt were a man and woman who’d been right next to the generator when it blew up. The man’s leg had been sliced open in several places and I suspected he might lose it. The woman was bleeding internally and had already lost a lot of blood. Marcos and I examined her in one of the huts while Dr. Guzman worked on the man. “She needs exploratory surgery,” I murmured to Marcos. “We need to find where she’s bleeding from so we can stop it. Can we get her to a hospital?”
“No time.” He nodded at the sky. “This rain will turn the roads to mud. It’ll take three, four hours just to get her back to our field hospital and we’re not equipped for surgery. Maybe six hours to get her to somewhere that is.”
I gripped the edge of the table, the anger and frustration building. When I got home, I was going to start donating to the charity myself. Marcos and Guzman were doing their best, but they could do so much more with more money. This woman was going to bleed to death, when any decent ER could save her…
My jaw tightened. No. I wasn’t going to let that happen. “We’ll do it here,” I told Marcos.
He blinked at me in amazement, then nodded. And as the rain hammered on the roof, we put on surgical masks and gowns and went to work.
It was a slow, painstaking process. Her belly had been peppered with razor-sharp fragments of metal and they each had to be carefully extracted until we found the one that had hit an artery. If I went too fast and pushed one quarter-inch deeper, I could cause more bleeding. But the portable blood pressure monitor we’d hooked the woman up to kept beeping in warning: she didn’t have long left.
That’s when the lights went out. I couldn’t see a thing and I had both hands right inside the woman’s body.
“What’s going on?” I asked Marcos, trying to keep my voice level.
“The lights were running on the backup generator. It must have run out of fuel.” I heard his clothing rustling as he dug something out of a pocket. Then a flashlight lit up the room. “Here.”
He held the flashlight over the patient and I carried on as best I could, teasing apart layers of tissue and plucking out the shrapnel until—
“I see it!” I told him. “Clamp! Quick!”
I felt a clamp press into my gloved hand. I reached in and clamped the artery. Both of us looked at the blood pressure monitor. The numbers fell and fell…and stabilized. I closed my eyes in relief.
It took another hour to repair the artery and close her up. I knew my work was amateurish by surgeon standards, but it would buy her enough time to get her to a hospital. We staggered outside, exhausted. The rain had stopped and Dr. Guzman joined us. He’d managed to stabilize his patient, too, even managing to save the leg. “Let’s get them in the car,” said Dr. Guzman. “We can drive them to the hospital in Quito. We should be there by morning.”
Marcos yawned and stretched his back. “I know a good place for breakfast,” he said, and looked at me questioningly.
I hesitated. He was cute and nice and…wholesome. I liked him, but…
But when he looked at me, I didn’t get that lift in my chest, that feeling like I was floating right off the ground. I didn’t feel that scalding, wicked heat rippling down my body.
You’re never going to see Gabriel again. It’s over.
“Yes,” I told Marcos. His face lit up.
We got both patients loaded into the back of the Landcruiser. I ran back inside the hut to get the last bag of gear and was just turning back to the door when there was a scream from outside.
I hurried to the doorway…and froze. Two pickups had pulled up in front of the Landcruiser and a group of men were pointing guns at Marcos and Guzman.
I ducked quickly back inside, then peeked through the window.
Guzman and Marcos were explaining in Spanish that they were doctors and needed to get to the hospital. Guzman had his hands up, calm and patient. Marcos was agitated and impatient. Neither approach seemed to be working. The leader of the gunmen seemed to be talking into a radio, listening to orders. He walked past a set of headlights and I got my first good look at him: he was in military-style camouflage pants and his hair was cropped short, but he was wearing a red tank top and a black and white bandana that covered the lower half of his face.
Cartel. Oh God…