3 Great Thrillers

by Churton, Alex; Churton, Toby; Locke, John; Lustbader, Eric van; van Lustbader, Eric

  “Want to see the picture I drawed?” Addie asked.

  I looked at Kathleen. She nodded.

  “I’d like that,” I said.

  Before showing it to me, Addie wanted to say something. “All the camera pictures of me and Maddie got rooned in the fire, so I drawed a picture of Maddie so all my new friends could see what we looked like before we got burned up.”

  She handed me a crayon drawing of a girl’s face.

  “That’s Maddie,” she said. “Wasn’t she beautiful?”

  I couldn’t trust myself to speak so I just nodded.

  When we left the burn unit, Kathleen said, “I love them all, but Addie’s the one who got me praying.”

  “What happened to her?” I asked.

  Kathleen took a deep breath before speaking. “About two weeks ago, Addie’s house caught on fire. Her parents, Greg and Melanie, died in the fire while trying to save the girls’ lives.”

  “Addie was able to talk about it?”

  Kathleen nodded. “There was also the 911 call Melanie made.

  Apparently she got trapped downstairs. Greg made it to the girls’ room and put wet towels over their faces to keep them alive until the firefighters arrived.”

  “Smart guy to think about the towels,” I said.

  “Addie originally thought the wet towels flew into the room by themselves. When they explained her mom threw them, her face lit up. Until that moment, she thought her mom had run away.”

  We were both silent awhile.

  “There was a lot of love in that marriage,” I said.

  Kathleen said, “I haven’t experienced it personally, but I’ve always believed that during the course of a good marriage, especially when children are involved, husbands and wives often perform random acts of heroism that go largely unnoticed by the general public.”

  “And in a great marriage,” I said, “when one spouse goes down, the other takes up the slack.”

  Kathleen gave me a look that might have been curiosity, might have been affection.

  “You surprise me, Creed.”

  5

  “These little bombs weigh in at 490 calories,” Kathleen Gray said.

  I glanced at the paltry square.

  “That number seems high,” I said.

  “Trust me,” she said. “I used to work at the one in Charleston.”

  It was 7:45 pm and we were in Starbucks on Third and East Sixty-Sixth. Neither of us had much of an appetite, but Kathleen said she always treated herself to a raspberry scone after spending time at the burn center. She took a bite.

  “Yum,” she said. “Technically, it’s a raspberry apricot thumbprint scone.” She cocked her head and appraised me.

  “You sure you don’t want to try one?”

  I didn’t and told her so. “Plus there’s the other thing,” I said.

  “What other thing?”

  “The acronym for it is RATS,” I said.

  She studied me a moment, a faint smile playing about her lips. I saw them move ever-so-slightly as she performed the mental calculation.

  “You’re an odd duck,” she said. “You know that, right?”

  I sipped my coffee and made a note of the fact that I had now met three of Ken Chapman’s women, and two of them had commented on my strangeness on successive days. The third of Chapman’s women was my ex-wife, Janet, and her opinion of me was beyond repair.

  Someone pushed open the front door, and a rush of wind blew some rain in, lowering the temperature by ten degrees. Or so it seemed. Something behind us caught Kathleen’s eye and she giggled.

  “The barista was talking to someone and pointing at you,” she said. “I think it has something to do with the venti.”

  I frowned and shook my head in disgust. “Barista,” I said.

  Kathleen giggled harder. She scrunched her face into a pout.

  “You’re such a grump!” she said.

  “Well, it’s ridiculous,” I said.

  She broke into a bubbly laugh. I continued my rant.

  “These trendy restaurants, they’re all so pretentious! Just yesterday I saw a guy nearly die from eating some kind of exotic Japanese dish. And here,” I gestured toward the coffee-making apparatus, “you have to learn a whole new friggin’ language in order to justify spending four bucks for a cup of Joe.”

  She laughed harder. “Joe? Oh, my God, did you just say Joe? Tell me you just climbed out of a forties time machine.”

  I think she liked saying the word “Joe,” because she said it two more times while laughing uncontrollably.

  The other customers glanced at us, but I wasn’t finished yet.

  “Grande,” I said. “Solo. Venti. Doppio. What the hell is doppio, anyway—one of the seven dwarfs?”

  “No,” she squealed. “But Grumpy is!” Kathleen’s laughter had passed the point of no return. Her cheeks were puffy, and her eyes had become slits.

  I frowned again and recited the conversation for her. “All I said was, ‘I’ll have a coffee.’ ‘What size?’ she says. ‘A regular,’ I said. ‘We have grande, venti, solo, doppio, short, and tall,’ she says. ‘Four hundred ninety calories,’ you say. It’s a flippin’ two-inch square!”

  Kathleen gripped the sides of the table. “Stop it!” she said. “You’re going to make me pee!”

  When her last bubble of laughter died down, she told me it felt good to laugh after two hours with the kids. I understood what she meant. Bad as her life had been with Ken, she still managed to feel guilty that she had it so good by comparison.

  I said, “I hate to end the party, but I need to ask you a few questions about Ken Chapman.”

  She frowned. “Just when we were having such a good time.”

  “I know.”

  “I really hate to talk about it,” she said.

  “I know.”

  She looked at me and sighed. “Okay, Homeland. You put in your time. What would you like to know?”

  For the better part of an hour, we talked about her marriage to Ken Chapman. It was hard on her, and by the time she dropped me off at my hotel, I could see she was emotionally drained. I didn’t ask her to join me for a nightcap, and she didn’t offer to, though she asked if I wanted to get together the next day.

  “Tomorrow’s Valentine’s, you know,” she said.

  I told her I had to meet someone, which was true. In fact, I said, I had to pack my overnight bag and head back to the airport that very night—also true. She nodded in an absentminded way as though this were something she’d heard before, something she expected me to say.

  What I didn’t tell her: I had contracted to kill someone the next morning. What I did tell her: “I’m flying back tomorrow after my meeting to take you someplace special for dinner.” When I said that, her face lit up like a kid at Christmas and she gave me a big hug.

  Then I said, “I’ll call you at work tomorrow just before noon and we can work out the details.”

  An hour and change later, I was settling into my seat on the Citation. Ten minutes after that, I was sleeping soundly. But just before falling asleep, I thought Kathleen Gray had to be the nicest human being I’d ever met.

  6

  Monica Childers didn’t want to die.

  It was just past daybreak, Valentine’s Day, and we were north of Jacksonville, Florida, at the Amelia Island Plantation resort. Callie had positioned herself near the ninth tee box, where the main road intersected the cart path.

  Monica was no terrorist or threat to national security, but I had already agreed to kill her, so here we were. These freelance contracts meant money in my pocket. Although it’s noble to pretend my fulltime job is killing suspected terrorists for the government, they pay me with resources, not cash. Of course, the resources are supposed to be used exclusively for monitoring or tracking terrorists. But Darwin, my government facilitator, knows full well how I earn my living. He rarely complains because killing civilians during the down times keeps me focused and sharp. At least that’s what he believ
es.

  Darwin provides me with unparalleled clout. A simple call from him and doors get opened, legal procedures become irrelevant, and no turns magically to yes. While I’m very good with my own crime scenes, there’s always a random element to taking lives. On the rare occasions when something goes wrong, Darwin can be counted on to dispatch a crew to remove a body, clean a crime scene, or cover my tracks. He even controls a secret branch of the government that provides me and my crew with body doubles. Of course, the body doubles don’t know they’re working for us, but they remain safe until we need them. Darwin sees to that. He has a group of people who secretly protect them. I myself protected one of the body doubles the first year after leaving the CIA. I’ll probably do it again if I get bored in my retirement years. Listen to me: retirement years, what a laugh!

  About 70 percent of my income had been coming through Sal Bonadello, the crime boss. Most of the rest came from testing weapons for the army. But now Victor Wheelchair had entered my life with what he said would be a lifetime of contracts—contracts so simple to fulfill, a rookie could do them. My typical hit involved high-profile targets and often required days, sometimes weeks, of planning. By contrast, the types of hits Victor needed could be planned and executed in a matter of hours. I’d have to be careful not to over-think them.

  Victor said Monica had done nothing wrong and wanted to know if that was a problem for me. I said, “She’s obviously guilty of something or you wouldn’t want her dead. That’s good enough for me.”

  Something in my comment struck a chord that resonated with the metal-voiced weasel, and he asked me to “E … la … borate.” I explained, “We who kill people for a living avoid making personal judgments about our targets. In Monica’s case, I’m not her attorney. Not her judge. Not her jury. I’m not being paid to determine her innocence. I’m being paid to render justice. Whether it’s you, Sal, Homeland, or Captain Kangaroo, all I need to know is that someone, somewhere, has found Monica Childers guilty of something and sentenced her to death. My job is to carry out the execution.”

  Victor told me where to find Monica and how he wanted her to die. He said she ran at daybreak every morning and would do so even while on vacation at Amelia Island Plantation. So Callie waited for Monica by the ninth tee box, decked out in the latest dri-fit Nike athletic apparel. To complete the ensemble, she wore custom running shoes and a high-tech runner’s watch. When she heard Monica coming her way, she started running and timed her approach to hit the intersection a few seconds after Monica passed. The two ladies noticed each other and nodded. Callie rounded the corner, increased her speed, and fell into step with Monica.

  “Mind if I run with you?” Callie asked.

  Monica pressed her lips into a tight frown. “As you can see, I’m not very fast.”

  “Actually, you are!” Callie said. “I had to sprint like a boiled owl to catch you!”

  Monica wrinkled her nose. “Boiled owl? I hope no actual event occurred to inspire such an expression!”

  Callie giggled. “Oh my God, I hope so, too!”

  Monica smiled in spite of herself.

  “In any case,” Callie said, “this is a good pace for me. Plus, I hate running alone, especially when I don’t know the area.”

  That was all it took to form a runner’s bond: two very pretty, fashionable ladies who shared a passion for running. I imagined them jogging fluidly over the plantation road, the cadence of their stride adding a human counterpoint to the morning sounds of the island’s bird and insect population.

  Monica cast an envious glance at her running mate. “You have perfect legs!” she said.

  Callie, caught a bit off guard, responded, “What a nice thing to say!”

  Monica flashed a friendly smile and said, “You’re a model, right? I could grow to hate you!” After laughing, she added, “Are you staying at the plantation?”

  Callie said, “We—my husband and I—checked in late last night.”

  “You always run this early?”

  “Not really. But my in-laws are arriving soon and I want to get in a few miles before they do.” The way she drew out the word “in-laws” made Monica smile.

  “Oh God,” Monica said. “The in-laws.”

  “Exactly!” Callie said. “By the way, I’m Callie Carpenter.”

  “Hi, Callie. I’m Monica Childers.”

  They exited the resort and turned left onto A1A. Looking down the highway a bit, Monica said, “Let’s avoid the van. It shouldn’t be there.”

  Callie agreed.

  They were about to head the opposite way when Callie said, “Oh my God! That’s my in-laws!” She sighed. “Oh well, so much for my run!”

  Monica slowed. “Let’s try again tomorrow.”

  “Come with me!” Callie suddenly blurted out, her eyes twinkling. “I want to introduce you. It’ll just take a sec, and you’ll be speeding down the road again in no time!”

  As we planned, Callie ran ahead without giving Monica time to reply. Monica barely knew this girl and certainly wouldn’t want to stop her run to meet the in-laws. But she also wouldn’t want to appear rude, so we counted on her to follow Callie to the van.

  And she did.

  As the girls approached, I slid the side door of the van open and stepped out, smiling broadly. I’d dressed in what I considered to be coastal casual, a white, spread-collar dress shirt and tan linen slacks with matching Italian loafers. When I picked Callie up that morning, she had pointed at me and laughed a full minute. Even now, I saw her smirking at my choice of attire.

  While waiting to be introduced, Monica ran her fingers through her fashionably short black hair. Though I knew her to be forty-one, she looked years younger. She was in excellent shape, with deep, expressive eyes and a willowy frame that boasted a set of Park Avenue’s finest implants. I wouldn’t classify her as stunning, but she was certainly pretty, possibly even striking for her age. She would probably hate to hear a man add the words “for her age” when describing her looks, but things were what they were.

  Callie made the introductions, saying, “Donovan’s handsome, isn’t he! Check out that engaging smile and those penetrating, jade green eyes.”

  “Oh please,” I said, rolling my penetrating, jade green eyes.

  Monica smiled politely. As far as I was concerned, Callie could step back and let me take it from there, but she was on a roll. “And that outfit,” Callie said, winking at me, “very stylish.” Then she said, “Monica, what would you call that look?”

  Monica smiled. “Umm … continental?”

  “Coastal casual,” I said.

  Monica was itching to get back to her run, but she returned my smile. “Hello, Donovan,” she said, extending her hand.

  I took her hand in mine and made a slow, exaggerated bow as if intending to kiss it. Callie started to giggle, and Monica glanced at her and blushed. Monica seemed to want to say something, but I increased the pressure on her hand and suddenly everything in her world turned crazy. Monica gasped and tried to pull away, but I shifted my weight and clamped my other hand on her upper arm. Before her mind could process what was happening, I hurled her into the van with such force her body crashed into the far wall and rebounded to the floor.

  Wide-eyed, terror-struck, Monica scrambled for the door. But I was already in the van, blocking her escape. Stunned mute by the sudden explosion of violence, Monica tried to scream. My hand was already at her throat, and the pressure was so intense she couldn’t achieve more than a squeak.

  Monica’s eyes frantically searched for Callie. What was going on here, she must have wondered. Why wasn’t Callie helping her?

  I pushed Monica’s head against the exposed metal floorboard with my left hand and slid the van door shut with my right. She tried to wriggle out of my grasp, so I applied more pressure to hold her in place. I heard something crunch and guessed it was the cartilage in her ear. Cartilage or not, it seemed to take the fight out of her. Monica’s chest heaved, and her breath came in quick bur
sts, like a child gasping after a hard cry. She let out a low moan like a terrified animal caught in a trap: too frightened to scream, too disoriented to react.

  She must have heard the engine turn over, must have felt the van jerk into gear. Somewhere in the part of her brain that was still functioning, a puzzle piece fell into place. I know because I saw it register on Monica’s face: Callie was driving the van, and there would be no escape.

  Something worked its way up her throat and triggered her gag reflex. A mixture of drool, nose fluid, and blood collected at her chin and hung like a thick strand of rope. Victor would be proud to see how far Monica had fallen in such a short period of time. As if on cue, her tears began flowing freely. She whimpered in a little girl’s voice, “Please, please stop! You’re hurting me! You’re hurting me! Please! Let me go!”

  Callie scanned the highway and checked the rearview mirror before slowing the van. She made a sharp left onto the meager trail we’d cased earlier. As she worked the van into the thicket, scrubby pine boughs and overgrown bushes and vines parted before us and instantly closed behind us, effectively swallowing us up. Callie pushed us in about a hundred yards, then, with great effort, turned the van around, pointed it back toward the highway, and put it in park.

  “We’re good,” Callie said. She kept the engine running so the heater could work. Then she turned halfway around in the seat to watch.

  “Monica,” I said, “I’m going to let you sit up now if you promise not to scream.”

  She nodded as best she could, and I helped her get to a sitting position. She glared at Callie. Callie shrugged and mouthed, “Sorry,” then handed me some tissue to pass to her former friend. We watched Monica dab at her face until she’d got it as presentable as it was going to get under the circumstances. She tentatively touched some tissue to her ear. She winced and lowered her hand to inspect the blood. There wasn’t much on the tissue, but it was enough to cause some more tears to well up in her eyes. When she blinked, most of them got caught up in her eyelashes and only a few wound up tracing down her cheek. I’d been watching her all this time, waiting for her to catch her breath, maybe relax a bit. It seemed to be working. I think she was finding some hope to cling to. After all, why would we bother with tissue if we intended to kill her, right?