"James Herbert - Domain" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert James)

Still, she'd met a few on her Park Lane beat who were real gentlemen, who treated her with respect
and a certain amount of gentleness. They were a bonus. These days she had learned to be less choosy.
Her best years, although they hadn't fulfilled the ambition, were what she termed the 'up-



and-down years'. It had worked for a celebrated but unrated actress acquaintance of hers, a woman
only famous for being famous, for being recognized because of the big wheelers she slept with. The
strategy had landed that particular lady with a millionaire husband, who had soon divorced her, making
the venture highly profitable. Countless pop stars and name photographers had added to her notoriety
and bank balance. The technique was simple, although it could prove expensive.

The hotel Jeanette had used (as had her 'actress' friend) was further along Park Lane, its flavour more
English than the Hilton. She had booked into the cheapest room possible (which wasn't cheap) and spent
most afternoons and evenings riding the elevators. Down the guest lift (from the top) through the huge
reception area or lounge, a short walk round the block to the service lifts, up to the top again, then back
down via the guest lift.
 She nearly always scored when just one man, or maybe two, occupied the elevator with her. A small,
shy smile from them, a word about the weather, an invitation to take tea, or a drink in the bar, perhaps
dinner, and that was it. She was home and dry. Of course it didn't take long for the hotel staff to cotton
on, but any such establishment, no matter how high-class, allowed a certain amount of licence in such
things. So long as there was no trouble, the hookers weren't obvious, no money went missing, the
management turned a blind (yet watchful) eye. Jeanette had never got the live one, though. Plenty of
almosts, but never the McCoy. Now it was just a little bit too late; her looks were not as fresh, the bait
not as succulent. Hence the Park Lane/Mayfair 'beat'. Assignments were often made by phone, but
nowadays it paid to pound the pavement. She could do without these sessions with



three or more participants, though; they were a little too exhausting.

She turned back to the window, pressing her forehead against the cool glass. The cries from those
below drifted up and her eyes began to moisten. Is this all it amounted to? Is this where it all led? Eight
floors up in a hotel bedroom, naked as the day I was born, sore from the abuse to every orifice in my
body by the three clients. Some climax, some joke.

Jeanette pushed herself off the window pane, stubbing out the cigarette on the glass. Maybe there was
something better waiting. Maybe there was nothing. Well, even that was better.

She tried to blink when the world became a white flash, but her retinas had already shrivelled to
nothing. And her body and the glass had fused into one as the building fell backwards.

As the heat wave spread out from the rising fireball, everything flammable and any lightweight material
burst into flame. The scorching heat tore through the streets, melting solids, incinerating people or
charring them to black crisps, killing every exposed living thing within a radius of three miles. Within
seconds, the blast wave, travelling at the speed of sound and accompanied by winds of up to two
hundred miles an hour, followed.

Buildings crumbled, the debris released as deadly missiles. Glass flowed with the winds in millions of