James Patterson - Kill Me If You Can

She held the thumb latch on the inner door and waited for the buzzer. Through the glass, she could see the door to apartment 1 open. A man stepped out — blond buzz cut, baby blue eyes, wearing faded jeans and a gray muscle shirt that left no room for the imagination.

He smiled and opened the front door.

“Can I help you, ma’am?”

A gentleman, Marta decided. And from what she knew of American accents, his was not from New York. He was from one of the southern states. Alabama, or maybe Mississippi.

“I’m looking for Matthew Bannon,” she said.

“He’s not here,” the southern gentleman said. “But surely you must have figured that out when he didn’t answer the second time you rang. Now, are you gonna keep ringing all the bells till you find someone dumb enough to let you in? Because we don’t rent to stupid people. So, take a hike, Blondie.”

Marta’s Bottega Veneta bag was hanging from her shoulder. She pressed it to her side with her upper arm until she could feel the Glock against her ribs.

Her face remained icy calm. “I’m one of his teachers at Parsons,” she said. “Can you tell me where to find him? I have his final paper. I wanted to give him his grade.”

The man from apartment 1 relaxed a little. “Oh, so you’re an art teacher.”

Marta gave him her most seductive smile. She had been on the cover of German Vogue four times. This guy would be easy. “Yes,” she said. “I’m Professor Mueller.”

“So, then, Professor,” he said, still filling the doorway, “how do you feel the Dadaist movement affected the growth of postmodernism in twentieth-century America?”

“Fuck you,” Marta snapped.

“Yeah,” he said, “that’s pretty much how I feel about Dada. But I’m a big fan of those dogs playing poker. Now, get out of here.”

Marta hated quick hits. This one wasn’t researched, wasn’t planned, but the Russians were in a hurry to find Bannon. If she was going to be waiting for him in his apartment when he got home, she’d have to kill the asshole blocking the door.

She ran through the scenario in her head. T urn toward the outer door, take the gun from my bag, spin around, shoot him between the eyes, drag his body inside, clean up, go up to the fifth floor, and wait for Bannon. The guy in the muscle shirt would be collateral damage. Tough luck, pal. You asked for it.

She turned to the front door, one hand on the clasp of her black bag. And then she saw him.

The first guy, the one with the shaved head, who looked like he was in a hurry to go someplace, hadn’t gone anywhere. He was standing outside sucking on a cigarette.

She removed her hand from the leather bag. Killing one person was manageable. Killing two was messy. Too messy for Marta.

She opened the front door, and the black guy with the cigarette grunted a polite but detached New York hello. The white guy followed her out of the building and stood at the top of the front steps.

“Happy trails, Professor,” he said.

She walked down the steps and onto Perry Street.

She’d be back. To kill Matthew Bannon and the redneck bastard from apartment 1.

GETTING THROUGH AIRPORT security at JFK turned out to be a snap. For me. I breezed through with my multimillion-dollar carry-on.

Katherine, on the other hand, got caught red-handed, carrying a five-ounce tube of toothpaste into a three-ounce world.

She was stopped by a TSA screener — a chunky Hispanic woman wearing a government-issue white shirt, black pants, blue latex gloves, a gold badge, and a name tag that said MORALES.

“I’m going to have to confiscate this,” the screener said, pointing at the toothpaste.

“I know the three-ounce rule,” Katherine said. “And yes, this is a five-ounce tube. But it’s more than half empty. There’s maybe only two ounces left.”

“I appreciate that, Miss,” Morales said, “but you really don’t know the rule. All liquids, gels, and aerosols must be in three-ounce or smaller containers. Larger containers that are half-full or toothpaste tubes that are rolled up are not allowed on the aircraft.”

“You’re joking,” Katherine said.

“Miss, we do not joke here.”

“For God’s sake,” Katherine said, “what do you think I’m going to do with half a tube of toothpaste? Blo—?”

I clamped my hand on Katherine’s mouth before she could say the four words that would land us both in jail— blow up the plane.

Katherine pulled away. “Matt, what the hell are you doing?” she barked as two more security screeners stepped in and flanked us on both sides.

“I’ll tell you what he’s doing, Miss,” Morales said. “He’s saving your ass. Now, unless you want to miss your flight to Paris, you’d be smart to toss that toothpaste in that bin and be on your merry way.”

I squeezed Katherine’s arm gently. “Please,” I said. “I promise I’ll buy you toothpaste in Paris.”

“This is Tom’s of Maine,” she said. “They won’t have it in Paris.”

“I’ll buy you French toothpaste. They make the best in the world.”

“This one is called Tom’s Wicked Fresh and it’s all natural and it keeps my breath fresh for hours. It’s the only one I use.”

I leaned close to her and whispered in her ear. “You may find this hard to believe, but we are about five seconds from being arrested, strip-searched, and thrown in jail for the night. I’ve never asked you to do anything for me on blind faith, but I’m asking you now. Please, please, please, give the nice lady your toothpaste, don’t utter another word, and I promise you that tomorrow morning we will be checking into our hotel, racing up to our room, peeling off our clothes, snuggling under the sheets, and I will kiss you over and over and over, even if your breath smells like a Paris sewer. Please?”

She tossed the toothpaste in the bin.

“Have a nice flight,” Morales said.

“Thank you,” I said, bowing my head. “Thank you.”

Morales smiled. She knew what I was thanking her for.

I only wished I could have told her that she might have saved the world from Tom’s toothpaste but she missed the guy who was leaving the country with a bag full of diamonds he stole from a dead Russian.

“Let’s find a bar,” I said as I propelled Katherine as far from security as I could. “I need a drink.”

We found a little place close to our gate that served burgers and beer. I had one of each. Katherine didn’t want either, so she decided to backtrack to the Starbucks we had seen as we walked through the terminal.

I sat at a small table, munching my burger, which was not hot, sipping my beer, which was not cold, and staring at the LCD flat-screen TV over the bar. It was tuned to a local news station. The sound was muted, and I was too far away to read the closed captioning.

I was just starting to unwind from the toothpaste incident when I gagged so badly I almost puked my burger and beer all over the table. I wasn’t choking on the mediocre airport cuisine. What made me want to throw up was what I saw on the television screen.

Me.

Me at Grand Central, holding a black medical bag with a bank of lockers behind me.

“Holy shit,” I said.

“Holy shit, what?” Katherine said, sitting down at the table with a grande cappuccino and a blueberry muffin.

She sat facing away from the television.

“Holy shit, I need another beer,” I said, jumping up and heading for the bar. I got there just in time to read the tail end of the closed captioning: …wanted for robbery. They flashed a phone number.

And then they cut to a commercial.