James Patterson - Now You See Her

I couldn’t take my eyes off the butt of his gun on his Sam Browne belt. In a moment, he would turn and see me, I thought. In a moment, he would stand and draw and fire his gun into my face. People or no people, the fact that almost two decades had passed meant nothing. Killing was what Peter did.

I was suddenly extremely aware of my heartbeat. I could feel the systole and diastole of my heart clenching and releasing as I waited for Peter to catch me out of the corner of his eye.

But after one second and then two, miraculously he didn’t turn. After a third moment, my paralysis lessened, and I was suddenly able to move. I mustered up the last iota of my will to live. I backpedaled, turned, and squeezed into a place along the crowded bar.

“So you’re still trying to pull some tricks up in Boca,” Peter said to Charlie at my back, as I eavesdropped. “I mean, you seem like a decent lush, Baylor. Why represent a piece of garbage like Harris? Controversial client like that is bound to stir up people’s emotions. I’d hate to see you become a victim of a violent crime.”

“Is that a threat?” Charlie said.

“Just some friendly advice,” Peter said. “Your own personal public service announcement from Key West’s chief of police.”

“Don’t you have any drunks to beat up?” Charlie said.

“Fresh out,” Peter said. “But if you’re free, we could head outside.”

“Be happy to,” Charlie said. “You keep the badge, I get the gun.”

“You’re real funny, Counselor, but what’s not funny is that you’re trying to protect the man who killed my wife from his just reward.”

I swallowed. Peter was referring to me, I realized.

“It doesn’t matter,” Peter said. “No matter what you do, Friday night, your precious client is walking into that chamber, and they’re going to carry him out in a bag.”

“We’ll see about that, won’t we?” Charlie said calmly.

“Yes, we certainly will,” Peter said.

I heard Peter stand. Would he come to the bar and order a drink? Was he behind me? Before I could muster up the courage to turn around, I felt a hand at my back.

“There you are,” Charlie said.

I couldn’t have been more relieved.

“Who was that cop?” I managed to spit out.

“Chief of Police Peter Fournier. Must have heard it through the grapevine that we were looking at Tara Foster’s file.”

I blinked down at the floor, trying to absorb that.

“Some people say he’s dirty, but whenever any complaints arise, he always ends up smelling like a rose. You have to see him, with his perfect Barbie doll wife and two perfect little Stepford kids, like he’s Mr. All-American Dad. Then he comes in here just now with that high-wattage Tom Cruise smile of his and threatens me. Sick puppy.”

Peter had a wife and kids now?! I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. I’d be sure to go over it when my heart started beating again.

“You want another beer?” Charlie said.

“Yes,” I said. “And a shot of whiskey.”

“There you go, Nina. Get into that Key West vibe. I didn’t know you had it in you,” Charlie said with a wink. “But then I call us a taxi. We need to rest up for tomorrow. We have only another three days. I have a feeling this one is going to be a race to the finish line, don’t you?”

I IMMEDIATELY HIT THE SHOWER when I got back to my hotel room. With my hands flat against the glass tile wall, I stood directly under the spray in the suite’s spa-like bathroom for almost an hour, my eyes closed as the hot needles pinged off my face and skin.

I was hoping the heat and the rush of the water might clear my mind, deliver some much-needed calm, but as the minutes passed, I knew it was fruitless.

I couldn’t stop thinking about how dangerously close I’d come to Peter, but after a while, I realized there actually were some positives. One, Peter was back in Key West, away from Emma. Two, if Peter didn’t ask Charlie about me that meant Peter didn’t seem to know that I wasn’t in New York. And three, he didn’t know that I was helping Charlie.

But I had to keep things that way. Going out for dinner and drinks on Duval Street was about as reckless a move as I could have made. All Peter had to do was turn, give the slightest of glances over his shoulder, and he would have seen me again.

Freeing Justin was my priority, but I had to be smarter. I also needed to wrap this up as soon as possible. Every moment I stayed down here, I was playing with my life.

Finally, reluctantly, I squeaked off the faucet and squeezed out my hair. After I dried and wrapped myself in a couple of fresh towels, I pulled on the fluffy bathrobe that was hanging on the inside of the bathroom door. I went into the bedroom and set the alarm clock for five so I could get up early to do my hair.

I was going to call Emma back in New York, but then I realized how late it was and decided to just text my daughter good-night instead. Too exhausted to get into my pj’s, I sat for a moment on the side of the bed.

Beyond the open doorway of the bedroom, the living room curtains were wafting gently in the breeze from the rooftop patio slider. Between them a slight sliver of the moon glowed over the still silver plain of the water.

Could Charlie see it, too? I wondered. I couldn’t deny how I was starting to feel about him. He was funny, intelligent, not hard to look at, though the breakfast beers would have to go.

I turned off the light and lay back on the pillows, already half asleep, when I had a much less romantic thought. Without turning, I glanced over at the billowing living room curtains, furling now in the dark like a full sail.

But how could the curtains be blowing in the breeze? I thought.

When I’d locked my balcony door before my shower?

FOR THE NEXT two solid minutes, I lay there in the dark, my heart rapping like a set of brass knuckles at the inside of my chest, silence sizzling in my ears.

But there has to be a good reason was the thought that scrolled through my unraveling mind like a continuous news crawl.

Then my molars clicked together involuntarily as a faint scraping sound came from just beyond the open bedroom door.

Something in my chest started to flutter when I heard it again. It came from the left, as if someone standing in the suite’s kitchen had shifted his weight.

Not just any someone either, I suddenly thought.

I guess Peter hadn’t missed seeing me at the bar after all.

I knew I couldn’t just stay there, that I needed to get up, hide, run, do something. But I didn’t move. I couldn’t. Animal fear pressed down on my chest like a lead blanket, making me weak, pinning me to the bed.

After a long, careful, silent breath, I lifted my hand as if to prove to myself that I could, in fact, move.

Good, I thought stupidly.

Now I needed to do the same thing with my feet.

I reached out as I slowly sat up, my right hand brushing along the top of the bedside radio alarm clock. I was standing, my eyes glued to the dark doorway, when I had an idea. I bent down slowly, unplugged the heavy clock, and brought it with me to the side of the open bedroom door.

As I arrived, a dark figure moved smoothly and silently through the bedroom doorway.

At first, I didn’t believe it.

This isn’t happening , I thought, suddenly frozen and senseless again. How could this be happening? I’m dreaming this.

Then a switch tripped somewhere in the primordial part of my brain, and I snapped out of my daze and swung the clunky alarm clock by its cord two-handed as hard as I could.

There was an unexpectedly loud shattering sound followed by a heavy thump as the figure immediately went down. I’d swung high and assumed I’d hit Peter in the head, but I didn’t stick around to find out. I dropped what was left of the clock and ran in a blind panic out of the bedroom.