To Hatred Turned by Ken Englade Read Free Book Online Page B

twisted around her throat, and a bloodstained pillow partially covered her head, which dangled over the edge of the bed. On the orange carpet beneath her was a puddle of blood and vomit.
    As Duggan stared, momentarily not sure what to do, the woman, trying to draw air into her struggling lungs, emitted a low-pitched, rattling gasp. It was the same blood-curdling sound that Duggan and Moore had heard as they started down the hallway.
    Shaking off their astonishment, they leaped into action. Frantically, Duggan grabbed the woman’s free wrist, searching for a pulse.
    “Anything?” Moore asked hopefully as he struggled to loosen the ligature around her throat.
    “Steady and fairly strong,” Duggan replied, surprised.
    Pushing aside the pillow, Duggan gaped at the sight. The woman’s head rested in a large blood stain and her hair was matted into a slick helmet. Gently probing her head, Duggan found two small wounds, one in the rear and one over the temple. He immediately and correctly identified them as bullet entry holes.
    “She’s been shot,” he informed Moore.
    “And strangled too,” Moore added, grunting as he struggled to unwrap the cord that encircled her neck. The paramedic was puzzled, however, when her breathing did not immediately become less labored once he removed the binding.
    “What’s wrong?” asked Duggan.
    Moore looked closely and saw for the first time a yellow object hanging from the corner of the woman’s mouth.
    “There’s something else,” he said, groping for the object.
    Prying open her jaws, he found a sizable wad of yellow facial tissue jammed inside. When he tried to remove the tissue, it tore in his fingers. Part of the wad came out, but much of it remained lodged in the woman’s throat.
    “I need my forceps,” he said, reaching for the tool.
    Working feverishly, he gripped the tissue and worked it free.
    “There,” he mumbled in relief. Immediately, the woman’s breathing improved.
    While Moore was trying to extricate the tissue, Duggan moved to cut the ropes and free the woman’s limbs, being careful not to sever the knots, aware that they could be an important piece of evidence in a criminal investigation.
    As he worked, a shiny object caught his eye. Lying on the pillow under the woman’s head was a casing from a small-caliber shell. He left it where it was for the police to retrieve.
    Moore, encouraged by the change for the better that the removal of the tissue had on the woman’s breathing, inserted an IV in her arm and started a drip to replenish lost fluid.
    Once that was done, the paramedics knew they had gone as far as they could in the house. Their job then was to get her to a hospital as quickly as possible.
    Working as a smoothly functioning team, they loaded her onto a gurney that Moore had fetched from the ambulance and wheeled it back up the hallway, across the living room, and out the front door. The boy followed them, looking lost.
    As they were loading her into the ambulance, a patrol car from the Richardson Police Department screeched to a halt in the driveway and Officer Jonathan May rushed up. Operating on the assumption that their services would be needed as well, it was routine for the police in Richardson to answer all fire department calls. When Officer May steered toward 804 Loganwood, he had no more idea of the conditions he would find there than had Duggan and Moore. However, he took one look at the scene and knew he had a problem.
    “What happened?” he breathlessly asked Duggan.
    “Woman’s been shot,” the paramedic replied tersely.
    At that point, May made a command decision. “I’ll ride with you,” he told Duggan, scrambling into the ambulance.
    “What about the kid?” Duggan asked.
    “Here comes someone else,” May said as another patrol car arrived. “He’ll take care of the kid,” May said, scrambling into the back of the ambulance. “Let’s go.”
    The vehicle was tearing through Richardson’s quiet streets, its siren