James Patterson - Now You See Her

In two strides, I was through the suite’s living room, my hand wrapped around the front doorknob, turning and pulling in one motion.

Then my arm almost came out of its socket as the door jerked to a stop only a quarter of the way open.

Hysterical, I tried the door two more times before I realized the slide lock was still engaged. Moaning and literally shaking with terror, I forced myself to methodically close the door, flip the lock free, and then try the knob again.

That did it. I ran out into the blindingly bright hallway and burst through the closest stairwell door to my left. My bare feet slapped painfully off the concrete as I half ran, half fell down the stairs.

As I made the next lower landing, I paused. Huffing and puffing, I tried to quell my rioting mind and figure out what to do next. Should I go into the hallway and knock on some doors? Go down to the lobby? That’s when the stairwell door above me blew open like it had been torn off its hinges.

Heavy footsteps began to hammer down the stairs as I turned and ripped open the lower floor’s door. Shedding towels, with my robe flying wide, I ran half-naked now down the new hallway. Every molecule of my being was focused on one thing: pumping my legs up and down as fast as they would go, moving away from the sound behind me.

As I turned the next corner, I spotted a red metal box on the wall. A loud clanging started immediately as I yanked the fire alarm on the run. Doors opened up and down the hallway. A groggy teenager’s eyes almost popped out of his head as he saw me streak past him at about thirty miles an hour.

I hit the next stairwell door and took this newest set of stairs two by two all the way to the ground floor. I crossed the empty lobby in nothing flat and headed for the hotel driveway. Standing in the drive’s turnaround, the night manager was on his cell phone and looking up at the building.

I thought about stopping and asking for his help, but even he would be no protection from Peter, I realized. I spotted a taxi stopped at the light on the corner and bolted for it.

The traffic light turned from red to green when I was still about twenty feet away.

I wasn’t going to make it, I thought as I ran barefoot, wheezing and covered in sweat, into the street. I winced, waiting for the feel of a bullet in my back, to fall sprawling on the asphalt. In my hysterical mind, it was already over. I could actually see Peter coming over and smiling his easy smile as he placed a gun to my forehead.

But instead, the cab suddenly stopped short and I jumped in. I broke a nail ripping open the handle of its rear door.

“In a rush, are we?” the young Asian wiseass of a driver said as I collapsed across the rear seat.

“Drive,” I gasped. “Drive, drive. Please just drive.”

I MADE THE TAXI DRIVER PROMISE to wait for me as I pounded on Charlie’s front door.

He finally opened it, wearing a pair of Texas A&M boxer shorts.

“What the hell?” Charlie said. “Nina?”

I smoothed my still wet hair as I stood in my bathrobe, staring at him. I hadn’t thought this far in advance. What could I say? How could I explain what had just happened?

He reached out and grabbed my elbow, sudden concern in his eyes.

“Nina, are you OK? Are you hurt?”

I was about to tell him that there was a fire at the hotel. Why not? What was another lie on top of nearly two decades’ worth?

I was more surprised than anyone about what happened next. Maybe it was the fact that I’d come unglued with shock and wasn’t thinking straight. Or that I’d been working so hard over the last week under such enormous stress.

I stepped over the threshold and crashed into Charlie like he was a tackling sled. I wrapped my arms around him like he was my last hope. Probably because he was.

He seemed baffled, to put it mildly. But that shocker wasn’t anything compared to what came out of my mouth a second later.

“My name isn’t Nina,” I said in his ear. “Oh, Charlie. You have to help me. Please.”

CHARLIE STARED AT ME, blown away, for a few moments before he brought me back into his office and sat me down. After he paid for the taxi, he put a half-full water glass of Johnnie Walker in my hand and one in his own, sat slowly himself, and let out a breath. After several more beats, he yelled, “What?!”

I stared at him for a few seconds, biting my lip. How could I do this? I thought. How could I open up after so many years, so many lies? I’d been keeping my secrets for too long. How could I reveal them now?

At first, I scrambled to think of a way to minimize the utter outrageousness of my insane life story. But after a minute, I realized how impossible that was.

Harris’s case file was sprawled out on Charlie’s desk. I stood and retrieved the sheet with the photographs of the suspected Jump Killer victims.

“Look, Charlie,” I said, tapping my high school yearbook picture twice. “This isn’t a young Renée Zellweger. It’s me. My name is Jeanine. Jeanine Fournier. I used to be married to Peter Fournier, the Key West chief of police.”

Then for the next half hour, as Charlie sat there blinking, I explained myself. Or at least tried to. When I got to the part about my faked abduction, he held up his hand.

“So you’re telling me that Fournier, the chief of police, is not only a bad cop, but, in fact, a psychopath?” Charlie said.

I nodded vigorously. “That’s why I faked my death. Peter’s first wife tried to leave him through regular channels. I didn’t feel like being stalked and gunned down.”

Then I told him the part about the Jump Killer and my new life and identity up in New York with Emma.

“When my firm volunteered me for the pro bono initiative, and I found out about Justin,” I explained, “I knew I had to come back down here to help. I knew Justin was innocent because the psycho who picked me up hitchhiking and tried to kill me the night I left was white.”

Charlie closed his eyes and began to rub them. He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again.

“Are you really a lawyer at least?” he finally spat out.

“I went to Fordham Law at night. I even passed the bar. My plan here was to get Justin off, but keep my life secret and safe and intact. But that’s out the window now. Peter was in my room tonight. He must have seen me at the bar when he was talking to you. I’d call the cops, but Peter is the cops. What am I going to do?”

Charlie lifted his drink and stared at it, thinking. Then he finally finished it.

“Well, from one lawyer to another, here’s my best advice, off the top of my head,” he said. “You need to get on a plane and get as far away from Fournier as possible until we can figure out a way to deal with him. You need to go back to New York.”

“GO BACK to New York?” I said. “What about Justin? I had contact with the real Jump Killer! That’s pertinent to Justin’s case, isn’t it? I’m probably the only person who’s ever seen the Jump Killer and lived. Don’t I need to testify?”

“It’s not that simple,” Charlie said. “In order to get a stay of execution with this little time left, you have to go through the Florida Office of Executive Clemency. We’re going to get only one shot at convincing the board to look at any new evidence. As it stands now, Justin’s fiancée recanting her damaging testimony is still the best possible scenario. She’s the only one who has vital exculpatory evidence that speaks directly to the case. The members on the board would be forced to consider it.”

“But—” I started.

Charlie silenced me with a palm. “Your, uh, new revelations, on the other hand, are essentially this: you came into contact with a white man who seemed to be the Jump Killer. It’s certainly thought-provoking, but there’s not enough legal red meat there. In fact, it might be seen as so fantastical that I wouldn’t be surprised if the governor dismissed it as a desperate stunt. Fabiana’s testimony is it, our only shot.”