Lewis Perdue - Perfect killer

When he crested the top of the bridge northwest of Tchula, he knew he had the right spot. Snoop Dogg was singing about niggas who run but they couldn't hide.

When Cedric slowed to a stop at the top of the bridge, he pulled on a latex glove, reached under the seat for the TEC-9, Not a headlight in sight. He opened the window and let in a stiff, cool wind smelling of approaching rain, maybe hail and a tornado. He tossed the gun over the railing, then drove on into Tchula and back up 49, where he stopped short of the 82 overpass to adjust his seat and lower the suspension. He got out, squinting against the wind as he walked around the Monte Carlo with a flashlight. Satisfied no damage had been done by the gravel, he opened the trunk and grabbed the shoe box his Clarks had come in. He opened the lid and smiled at the stack of hundred-dollar bills rubber-banded together in the trunk. Half a stack, actually. The bitch had cut ten g's worth of C-notes, an even hundred of them, right in half. Federal-fucking-Expressed them to him in a box that arrived at his crib a week to the day after he'd made bail over the drive-by on West Gibbs Street. Wrapped around the money had been a printout of the article about his arrest printed off the Greenwood Commonwealth's Web site.

Cedric smiled now and enjoyed the glow in his belly. He was a true gangsta, famous enough that some woman he had never seen had sent him money to kill for her. She'd called his cell exactly one time to make sure he had the money and understood what to do and when. She told him he'd get the other half of the stack of bills when the two Oreo bitch shysters were in the ground. He'd peeled the cap off one of the bitches so he figured he'd get half the bills tonight and the other half when he took care of the unfinished business. He nodded as he reached under the spare tire and pulled out the Glock.

Back behind the wheel, he looked at the Rolex on his wrist.

"Time to get yo swerve on, Dr. Glock," he said to himself as he went down his checklist: Roly-O, Clarks, bling-bling, and the iced Crissy in back for the bitch. He'd never seen her, but her voice on the phone call gave him some serious bone and he wanted skully from the bitch.

"My dick be stuck up in yo' windpipe," he said. "I be stickin' it up in yo' pie too, bitch."

He merged onto east 82. Just outside of town, he spotted the turnoff they'd agreed on. Cedric pulled to a stop on the road shoulder, waited until there were no headlights from either direction, then made the turn. A hundred yards down, he stopped the Monte Carlo, killed the ignition and stereo, grabbed the Glock, and waited.

Lightning snapped around him and reminded him of the Jakes' helicopter lights. He hoped the bitch would show up before the fucking rain turned the road into fucking gumbo. Cedric thought about pumping the bitch. She was a white bitch, no doubt from her voice, and she sounded snotty and highfalutin. She needed to be fucked within an inch of her life, and he'd be the man to do it. He rubbed at the growing stiffness in his crotch.

Cedric went limp a second later when the cold steel of a gun muzzle pressed behind his left ear.

"Don't move." The woman's voice carried an edge that made him want to wet his pants. Bitch. Cedric struggled to control his bladder.

"You disappointed me. Jasmine Thompson doesn't have a scratch on her and the other one could live."

Lightning flashed again; thunder came almost immediately.

Warm urine spread across his lap. He'd get the bitch for this.

"You had promise," the woman said. "I could have used you for a long time, paid you big money" She paused. "But no."

He opened his mouth to plead for another chance, then an intense, bright pain filled his head like the flash-bang grenades the cops used. In an instant he knew it was more than mere lightning and thunder.

The thug known as Dr. Glock managed a single last thought and a single last word: "Mama."

Giant balls of rain the size of marbles filled the night as the man-boy who called himself Dr. Glock slumped across the seat. Jael St. Clair emptied the magazine into his head, then made her way to the Monte Carlo's trunk, grabbed Cedric's half of the hundreddollar bills, and got back in her SUV.

Her cell phone trilled as she turned on the ignition, flicked the wipers on high, and put the SUV in gear. She grabbed the phone and saw it was General Braxton.

"Sir."

"We have a change of plans," Braxton said without preamble. "Stone's beyond redemption. It would be best if you eliminated him and the lawyer immediately."

"Sir!" A long pause crackled softly in the earpiece.

"Sergeant?"

Jael felt her heart catch. The General rarely used her rank.

"This is a mission of vital importance. Until now, your rules of engagement required you to operate via stealth, through other people, and in a manner that minimized the danger to yourself or the chances of being detected."

"Sir," she acknowledged, knowing what was coming.

"Those rules have changed. Use whatever means are necessary to make sure Brad Stone and Jasmine Thompson do not live to enjoy another sunset. Regardless of the risk, regardless of costs."

"Sir."

"Thank you. Go with God." The General ended the connection.

Jael hit the "end" button on her phone. It wasn't the first time the General had given her a suicide mission she had lived to talk about.

By the time Jasmine and I reached my hotel, the night had filled up with rain, thunder, and lightning. An opaque downpour splashed like milk beyond the headlights. The radio announced that tornadoes had hit near Black Bayou. "Try next to the stairwell." I pointed.

Lightning continued its wicked barrage, followed closely by deep, rolling thunder that stirred memories of night combat. Then came hail the size of cottonseeds, drumming a high-pitched fusillade on the roof as Jasmine backed the Mercedes into a parking space and turned out the headlights.

"Okay, keep the engine on and your eyes open," I said. "I'll be quick." You're sure you don't need help?"

"Positive."

Jasmine's face glowed beautiful and strong in the instrument panel's soft light. "If the police show up, pull out nice and slow like you were just leaving anyway." "But-"

"No sense both of us getting nailed."

With Lashonna's Ruger in one hand, I started to open the door, then froze as a white Ford Excursion drove into the lot, then continued on to the back corner and parked near the white fiber-optic contractor vans. Moments later the lights flickered off. We waited. Jasmine held her own Ruger in her lap.*****

From an inside pocket of her big handbag, Jael St. Clair retrieved a thin, papersealed packet the size of a large commemorative postage stamp the General's company kept sending her since the head wound in Afghanistan. She peeled off the protective plastic-lined paper wrapper, pulled out a patch resembling a Band-Aid, removed the strips covering the adhesive, and pressed it on the bare skin below her left collarbone.

Then she pressed the electric release for the SUV's rear door and climbed across the backseat into a cargo area half-filled with luggage. Her heart rate steadied and slowed as the warm surge of confidence radiated from the patch, focused her thoughts, and sharpened her senses. Jael located the duffel she had requested with the car. Fumbling in the dark, her practiced hands soon found the familiar shape of a night-vision monocular. Jael smiled when she pulled it out, held it close to her face, and in the dim illumination from the parking lot lights recognized the Night Quest PVS-14. One of the best thirdgeneration devices, weather resistant and highly versatile.

She turned on the Night Quest, held it up to her right eye, and adjusted the gain to accommodate the lights from the parking lot and those illuminating the walkways.