Susan Smith - The Timer Game

‘It doesn’t really matter, does it? If he dies?’

She’d said it so quickly, matter-of-factly, Grace wasn’t certain she’d heard correctly. ‘It does to his parents,’ Grace said. ‘It does to me.’

In the end, the parents prevailed, signing off on the surgery. The boy died three days later. A week afterward, a human heart became available that would have worked, and Grace had never forgiven Lee for killing him.

The research side of the Center had always been Warren’s particular interest, and Grace had a growing suspicion that Warren was willing to sacrifice patients on the hospital side to be used as guinea pigs for research that was still experimental.

Or she could just be jealous that Lee was Warren’s favorite now, and had been for some time. Part of her still missed him.

A sterile tray the size Grace used for making cookies glowed in purple light as Warren pushed open the door to the lab. ‘Don’t turn on the light. She’s got cartilage cells that are light sensitive.’

A green light cast a glow over the counters. It was a narrow, windowless room and Grace felt slightly claustrophobic. Out of the gloom, Lee Bentley emerged, her hair gleaming.

‘Well, well. We meet again.’

Her hair had grown long since Grace had last seen her, and she wore it in a thick braid that shone the color of wheat and made her cheekbones look high. She had the talent for smiling with her teeth and never having the smile ease up her face. Her eyes were pale green, humorless and cold. Somewhere in Lee’s genetic code, marauders clambered in fur boots over a dung hill, swinging mastodon thigh bones and shattering the skulls of slumbering children. She was taller than Grace and just as slender and could have easily modeled. Whips and chains, probably.

‘Still killing chimps?’

‘Please,’ Warren said.

‘She’s a lab tech,’ Lee said. ‘She couldn’t find the jugular if she Googled it.’

‘Biologist,’ Grace said. ‘They call us forensic biologists.’

‘Both of you.’ Warren held up his hands in a classic gesture of peace. ‘Lee, I’m sorry.’

He was siding with her. How could he side with her?

‘I want Grace to see this.’ His voice held a pleading note.

Lee narrowed her eyes, debating something with herself, and then whirled and went down an aisle. She walked past what appeared to be an ear floating in gelatin and stopped before a large metal container the size of a Crock-Pot, connected by a snarl of tubes to the wall. It was a bioreactor, for growing things. A monitor attached to the tubes beeped in a steady pulse, and Grace saw at the far end of the counter a printer spitting out a stream of data.

The human ear meant Lee was focusing now on an entirely different direction in her research, and it made Grace queasy. ‘What am I looking at?’ she said irritably.

Lee slid her hand over the outside of the bioreactor, caressing it. ‘First, a few thoughts. There are almost three hundred kids – just in America – waiting at any given time for a heart. Often a heart that never comes.’

‘And the neck bone’s connected to the chin bone. I know the stats, I know how many die waiting. Can you leave the theatrics for your Nobel prize speech and cut to the chase?’

Lee lifted her chin and looked at Warren. ‘She’s impossible.’

Grace thought she saw him nod in agreement and she snapped, ‘Good. I’m gone.’

Warren clamped a hand gently on her shoulder and she bit off her sarcasm when she saw the pain and tenderness in his face.

‘Grace. Please. I need your help.’ His voice was low and urgent. He was turned away from Lee so the researcher couldn’t hear their conversation, and Grace felt again the connection with this aging man. ‘I need you to see this.’

She nodded and he took a breath, relieved. Grace moved primly down the aisle and stood next to Lee, noting that her perfume held a mix of citrus and musk, and something fainter.

Perhaps gunpowder. ‘What’s in there?’ Grace said.

Lee lifted the lid. Inside the vat floated a human heart.

It was the size of a tiny fist. It swayed gently in a thick, viscous liquid. It was an odd tan color and floated in a soupy nutrient sea the red color of Jell-O. Grace felt a wave of nausea. The last time she had seen a human heart was in Guatemala. She closed her eyes and steadied herself against the counter.

‘Grace? Are you okay?’ Warren said, alarmed.

‘I need to leave. Go into the hall.’

She patted her way blindly past them toward the door and burst through it into the hall, taking gulps of air and leaning against the wall. Her legs felt unsteady. She wiped her lip and swallowed hard, a faintly metallic acid taste in her throat. She heard the lab door close.

Warren joined her in the hall. ‘What can I do?’ he asked quietly.

She shook her head, took another gulp of air, opened her eyes. ‘Sorry. Just took me by surprise.’ The pale print on the hall wallpaper slowly stopped moving.

‘You want to sit?’

She shook her head and took a steadying breath. ‘I haven’t heard anything about that. A human heart. Extraordinary.’ Her legs had stopped trembling and she risked straightening up.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.