"Steven Gould - Jumper 02 - Reflex" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gould Stephen Jay)

She tore off the clothes she was wearing and took a quick shower. She ran the water hot,
hoping it would thaw the frozen place in her chest, a knot of suppressed grief, fear, and anger. I'll let
it out soon. When I don't have to function.

She put on therapist clothes, comfortable but slightly formal, a combination she'd found gave her
the right mixture of accessibility and authority with her clients. Jeans, a nice blouse, a silk jacket, and
flats. She put her palm against the window. It was cold enough that she started to grab her overcoat,
but, at the last minute, she pulled on Davy's worn leather jacket, a bit large on her, but comforting, his
smell mixed pleasantly with the leather.

There was a bulge in the inside pocket and she checked it. It was an envelope with fifty
twenty-dollar bills. One thousand dollars. They were new twenties, oversized Andrew Jacksons, so it
wasn't his older stash, the used bills he'd stolen ten years before, from the Chemical Bank of New
York.

She shook her head. Spy money. A small portion of a payment from one of his "errands" for
Brian Cox. Non-lethal, zero-exposure transportationтАФan agent inserted into Beijing, a remote
electronic radio monitor left in Serbia, a dissident pulled out of Baghdad. More rarely, hostages
rescued, but he kept those to a minimum, for her sake. He'd done a few jobs a monthтАФmore recently
during the mess in pre-occupation Iraq. The original plan had been to pay back the million he'd stolen
while still a teen, but he'd kept on going, even after it had been returned with interest. He hadn't
returned it to the bank, though. He'd donated the money anonymously to dozens of shelters and drug
treatment centers across the country.

He still donated heavily, now, but there was also a closet back in the cliff house with over three
million dollars in it.

"What else am I going to do?" he'd said. "Garden?"

She put the money back in the jacket. She might need it to find him.

Her office was only a quarter-mile away, a five-minute walk, but she tried to visualize it, tried to
will herself there.

It didn't work.

Dammit. Did I imagine the whole thing? Was I at the condo the whole time?
 The climbing rope with ring, bolt, and concrete was still in the corner of the living room, where
she'd piled them.

She walked to the office, kicking through drifts of fallen leaves, unable to enjoy the colors of the
changing trees. She wanted to find him, to do something. But she had no idea where he was, where to
look. Davy would come to her, when he could.

She didn't know if she was strong enough.

Waiting is the hardest role.