Minutes to Burn (2001) Read Online Free Page A

would have bet the woman had wisps of facial hair. She recalled the street lady from that Tennessee Williams play with all the sex in it, the one who kept muttering, "flores para los muertos." Cameron cleared her throat softly and shifted in her chair. She would be seeing the woman up close soon enough.
    In hands curled like talons, the girl clutched a cheap leather purse in front of her, as if concerned that someone might snatch it right in the waiting room. She looked shaken, her cheeks a puffy red that suggested she'd been crying a short time ago.
    Smiling her sickening smile, the nurse pulled the door shut behind the girl, leaving her to face Justin and Cameron uncomfortably for a moment before she scurried from the waiting room. Cameron realized she was tense through her shoulders and neck.
    Justin caught her eye and smiled. Reaching over, he pulled the clasp of her necklace around to the back so that it wasn't visible. A calming ritual. The ring dangled out of view beneath her shirt, a small bump in the fabric.
    The thick wooden door to the right led back to the abortion suite. Cameron had always found it shocking that day surgery emptied into the same room where women waited for their postpartum checkups. It seemed wrong.
    She'd spent enough time in the waiting room to be able to predict which door the other women were going to be beckoned through for their appointments. The doors even looked different. The door to the "proper" OB/GYN suite was painted a cheerful yellow, a large smudge-free window taking up most of the top half. The door that led into the dilation and curettage rooms was dark, solid, ominous. It didn't even have a peephole.
    Younger girls in the waiting room, with dark half-moons under their eyes, were a shoo-in for the wooden door, especially when they were alone, or with only their mothers. When accompanied by both parents, they often headed through the happy yellow door, disappearing into the stream of light behind the window. Women who looked like teachers went through the yellow door, as did women with baby barf crusting on old sweatshirts proclaiming the names of cities and vacation spots. Women in smart navy blue business suits always went through the dark door. For these last women there were, to date, no exceptions. Navy blue was the color of death.
    Feeling Justin's thigh pressed against hers, Cameron leaned forward, elbows on her knees, and studied the individual strands of the orange carpet. The navy blue suit women always seemed calm and assured while they waited; Cameron felt neither.
    She suddenly felt her transmitter vibrate, a gentle tugging beneath the flesh of her deltoid. Turning her head, she spoke into her shoulder through her shirt, activating the unit.
    In '04, subcutaneous transmitters had replaced saber radios, which had headsets that allowed soldiers actually to listen through their jaws. The transmitters were better protected than the bone phones and impossible to lose. The soldiers' day-to-day movements powered the units, kicking a tumbler back and forth and recharging a minuscule battery--self-winding watch style.
    Cameron disliked using her transmitter in public; often it drew strange looks from people who thought she was talking to herself. It had been some time since she'd been paged.
    Justin glanced over, eyebrows raised, then whispered a command to activate his transmitter as well. A click sounded in the room, indicating that the transmitter had switched from silent mode to audio. "Kates," Justin said. "Public."
    Lieutenant John Mako had called in on the primary channel so that he could speak to them both at the same time. His disembodied voice issued through their transmitters. "Cam and Kates, Mako. I think I got you kids an assignment. You with Cam?"
    Justin rested his hand on Cameron's knee. "No, sir, a redhead about five seven with a vacant smile."
    "What do you mean, 'you kids'?" Cameron asked. "We're working together?"
    "Do I have a speech impediment of which I'm