Ghost River by Jon Coon (best non fiction books of all time TXT) 📕

leave for this boy?” Gabe asked. “That he’s the grandson of a brilliant engineer who sold his soul and built killer bridges?”

“There’s nothing wrong with my bridges,” Peterson barked before having another coughing spasm.

“That’s not the way it looks to us. Your bridge in Jacksonville collapsed three years ago. The Escambia Bay Bridge in the hurricane in eighty-eight, and now the Chattahoochee Bridge. It killed at least one McFarland man, not including the ones who died getting it built. And let’s not forget the ones you two killed covering up your scam. Good bridges don’t fall in because of a little rain.”

Peterson glared, his face transfigured with pain and hate.

Gabe shifted his focus. “Good to see you, Rogers. Richard Greenly, Wilson Corbitt, Charlie Evans, and Captain Brady send their regards. And you owe me a truck. You better plan to stay in Mexico, because if you ever set foot in the States again, you’ll be all mine.”

Rogers pulled the Glock and drew down on Gabe. Before Gabe could move, Carol, who was standing behind Gabe and Helen, shoved Gabe hard. As Gabe staggered to the side, Helen fell forward and took the two rounds Rogers intended for Gabe. She gasped and collapsed, face down.

Gabe recovered his balance and shoved a respiratory monitor into Rogers who fell back. Gabe kept coming and hit Rogers like a wrecking ball. The gun went flying, and Gabe hammered Rogers into the floor with a forearm across his throat. Carol grabbed the gun and pitched it to Gabe, who caught it one-handed and shoved the barrel under Rogers’s chin.

While Gabe held Rogers at gunpoint, Carol knelt beside Helen, and blood spurted from the two wounds in her chest. Zack dropped to his knees by his mother in disbelief, while Carol put her fingers in the bullet holes to stem the bleeding, getting soaked in the process. Zack stepped up, grabbed a towel and handed it to Carol who put it in place. The flow stopped, but Helen quit breathing. Carol spotted a resuscitator bag and shouted to Zack to bring it. She fitted it to Helen’s mouth and began to pump the bag. Nothing. She tried CPR.

“Zack, is there an AED? Look for a red case with a heart on it.”

Zack was back on his knees by his mother. He looked up, confused and in shock.

“Zack, move!” Gabe shouted. “Help her.”

Gabe was still holding Rogers, but he spotted the case Carol described in a glass front cabinet by the bed. “There,” he said, and pointed with his free hand.

Zack staggered to his knees and crawled to the cabinet, grabbed the case and handed it to Carol. She opened it, pulled open Helen’s blouse, and put on the adhesive patches. She hit the charge button and shouted, “Clear.” The first charge jarred Helen without result. She hit the charge button, waited and tried again. Still nothing. Carol went back to doing CPR. Moments passed. She checked for a carotid pulse and shook her head sadly.

Covered in Helen’s blood, with tears running down her face, she turned to Zack and said softly, “I’m sorry. She’s gone.”

Zack knelt beside his mother and sobbed. He looked up and pointed a finger at Gabe. “This is your fault. She didn’t deserve this.”

Gabe still had Rogers pinned and the Glock against his forehead. “No, she didn’t,” he answered. “I’m sorry.”

As Carol stood, Peterson coughed up more blood then choked. An alarm on his monitor went off and then flat lined. Carol jumped to the bed. “Oh no, you monster, my husband died because of you. You don’t quit breathing until I say so.”

She yelled at the old man and slammed him in the chest with both fists. She checked the monitors. Nothing. She gave two breaths and tried more compressions. When that didn’t work, she jumped on the bed, straddled Peterson, and used all of her strength to drive her compressions.

“Live, damn you!” She yelled. When there was no response, she left the bed just long enough to grab the AED from the floor beside Helen.

She wiped the blood-soaked pads on the bed sheets, slapped them on Peterson, and hit the charge button. “Come on,” she said as she waited for the unit to charge. When the green light came on, she called clear and hit him with the first shock.

No response. The cardiac monitor was still flatlined. She hit the charge button again, but this time nothing happened. The battery was dead. She climbed on the bed, straddled Peterson, and resumed chest compressions until she heard ribs crack.

Gabe cuffed Rogers to a supply cabinet and moved beside Carol with the resuscitation bag. He squeezed twice and asked, “More?”

“Yes, keep going.”

He continued to pump the bag, watching Peterson’s chest rise and fall with each cycle.

In desperation, she shouted, “Zack, look for vials of adrenaline or epinephrine and a syringe.” She continued chest compressions, feeling the strain in her shoulders and neck. Still no response.

Zack pulled open cabinet drawers, scattering its contents. “I found the adrenaline. How much do you want?”

“All of it,” she said. “He’s dead. We can’t make him worse.”

He filled a syringe and handed it to her. She pushed the air out and then slammed the long needle into the old man’s heart.

It worked. The cardiac monitor showed Peterson’s rhythm return. Within seconds his color began to change from ashen gray to pale pink.

Zack dropped back to his knees beside his mother and held her hand, choking back sobs. Carol remained by the bed monitoring Peterson while Gabe called an ambulance and the police.

Peterson slept most of the night in the ICU. By morning, wearing an oxygen cannula and telemetry, he was able to talk. Gabe turned on the recorder on his phone.

“Last chance,” Gabe began. “Talk now, or you take it all with you. Can’t imagine that’s going to play well on the other side.”

“Other side of what?” the old man snorted. His chest was bandaged, and talking was painful.

“Oh, you don’t have a soul? And