02 Kiss of the Bees by J A Jance

Author:J A Jance [Jance, J A]
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Brian grabbed a gallon jug of bottled water out of the back of the Blazer and then started in the direction of the woman’s voice. “Watch out for the footprints,” she called to him. “You’re probably going to need them.”

Glancing down, Brian saw what she meant. Something heavy had been dragged by hand through the sandy dirt, leaving a deep track. A single set of footprints, heading back toward the charco, overlaid the track. As instructed, Brian Fellows detoured around both as he made his way into a grove of mesquite. Ten yards into the undergrowth he came to a small clearing where a woman in a gray-green uniform was bending over the figure of a man. He lay flat on his back, with his unprotected face fully exposed to the glaring sun. A cloud of flies buzzed overhead.

“What happened?” Brian asked.

The woman looked up at him, her face grim. “Somebody beat the crap out of this guy,” she said.

Brian handed over his jug of water. By then he was close enough to smell the unmistakable stench of evacuated bowels, of urine that reeked of secondhand wine.

“He’s still alive then?” Brian asked.

“So far, but only just barely. I’ve called for a med-evac helicopter, but I don’t think he’s going to make it. He can’t move. Either his back’s broken or he’s suffering from a concussion, I can’t tell which.”

The man lying on the ground, dark-haired and heavy-set, appeared to be around sixty years old. The large brass belt buckle imprinted with the traditional Tohono O’othham maze identified him as an Indian rather than Hispanic. One whole side of his face, clotted with blood, seemed to have been bashed in. His eyes were open, but the irises had rolled back out of sight. He was breathing, shallowly, but that was about all.

“Thanks for the water,” the woman said, opening the jug and pouring some of it onto a handkerchief. First she wrung out some of the water over the man’s parched lips and swollen tongue, then she laid the still-soaking cloth on the injured man’s forehead. That done, she sprinkled the rest of his body as well, dousing his bloodied clothing.

“I’m trying to lower his body temperature,” she explained. “I don’t know if it’s helping or not, but we’ve got to try.”

It was all Brian could do to kneel beside the injured man and look at him. His mother’s condition had taught him the real meaning behind the awful words “broken back.” He wasn’t at all sure that keeping the man alive would be doing him any favor. What Brian Fellows did feel, however, was both pity and an incredible sense of gratitude. If the man’s back was actually broken or if he had suffered permanent injury as a result of heatstroke, someone else—someone who wasn’t Brian—would have to care for him for the rest of his life, feeding him, bathing him, and attending to his most basic needs.

“What can I do to help?” he asked.

“Keep the damn flies and ants away,” the woman told him.

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