John Lutz - In for the Kill

Did she suspect?

Have even an inkling?

He wondered about that as he watched the woman stride along the sidewalk, then shift her purse slightly on her hip as she turned and took the three concrete steps leading to the vestibule of her apartment building. She seemed tired this evening, as if something weighed on her, some of the bounce gone from her step.

No surprise there, he thought. Surely there's something in us that lets us know within minutes, at least seconds, when the world is about to end.

Up? Down? Stop? Go?

The elevator couldn't seem to make up its mind.

Janice Queen stood alone in its claustrophobic confines and felt her heart hammer. Not that this vertical indecision was anything new to her. There was only one elevator in her apartment building, and only one way to get to her unit if she didn't want to trudge up six flights of stairs, so it wasn't as if she had much choice. But she'd always had a fear of being confined in close places, elevators in particular. She could never escape the grim knowledge that if there were a serious malfunction-nothing that hadn't happened before to someone-beneath the thin floor under her feet was a black shaft that would lead to sudden and almost certain death.

At least two times a day, at least five days a week, she rode the elevator up or down the core of the old but recently refurbished apartment building.

Ah! Finally the elevator settled down, having more or less leveled itself at the sixth floor. When the door slid open, it revealed a step up of about four inches, enough to trip over if you didn't notice, and to provide a glimpse into the black abyss. A kind of warning.

Janice was living her life contentedly, going back and forth to her job at the bookshop, going out on the occasional date, or to hang out with friends at Bocco's down the block, or to pick up some takeout at the corner deli. Hers was a life like millions of others in the city.

The elevator could end it in an instant.

Ridiculous, she thought, as she stepped up onto the soft carpeting of the sixth-floor hall, nevertheless feeling uneasy while momentarily astride the abyss.

Her apartment door was only a few feet away from the elevator, which meant she could hear, even late at night, the device's cables strumming soft and somber chords just behind her walls, as well as a muffled thumping and bumping as it adjusted itself at each stop. Which meant she thought about the damned elevator too much, even dreamed about it, and had become reasonably convinced that death by elevator was her destiny.

She unlocked her way into her apartment and went inside. Dim. She flipped the light switch, and there she was in the full-length mirror that she paused in front of to check her appearance each time she came or went.

There was the rumpled, wearier version of the Janice she'd said good-bye to this morning on her way to work, not quite forty, still slim, with generous breasts, passable legs, and shoulder-length brown hair framing a face that was sweet rather than classically beautiful. Too much jaw, she thought. And those damned lines. They were only visible if the light was cruel or you looked closely enough. Fine lines like drool extended down from the corners of her lips. Crow's-feet threatened to appear at the corners of her dark eyes. Intimations of a lonely future. She still attracted men, but of course it was easier to attract than to keep them. Or, sometimes, to get rid of them.

The mirror was mounted on the door to a small closet. She looped her purse's leather strap over the doorknob, then removed the lightweight gray blazer she'd worn to work over her dark slacks and white blouse, and hung it in the closet between her heavier coat and a blue Windbreaker. She might drop the blazer off at the dry cleaner's tomorrow morning, wear the Windbreaker if it was cool enough outside and looked like rain. The bookshop's owner, Dee, was out of town, supposedly on business but actually seeing a married man with whom she was having a hot affair. Janice wasn't supposed to know about it, so she pretended right along with Dee. So there Dee was, getting her brains screwed scrambled while Janice, who now and then felt a spasm of jealousy, was dutifully opening the shop early every morning this week.

Not enough sleep for Janice, since she was addicted to late-night movies on television. Her lessening love of the moment, Graham, was also traveling, as he often did in his sales job, and wouldn't be back in town until tomorrow. They'd almost but not quite argued when she said good-bye to him at Bocco's. Janice knew their relationship was winding down and had decided to end it herself rather than wait for Graham. As she grew older, she more and more felt the need to exercise control in her life. Always before, she had waited. Not this time. Maybe the pain would be less severe.

She did know from experience that sooner or later another Graham would enter the bookshop, or use some timeworn pickup line at Bocco's.

As she closed the closet door, the intercom buzzed, startling her.

She went to it and pressed the button. "Yes?"

"Federal Parcel," said a male voice, made distant and metallic by the intercom. "For a Janice…Queeler?"

"Queen?" she asked.

"Queen. Sorry."

Janice pressed the button to buzz in the deliveryman.

A few seconds later the elevator cables began to thrum in the wall. He was on his way up with her package.

She opened the door and stepped out in the hall to meet him.

The elevator did its laborious dance, its door hissed open, and out he stepped, a medium-sized guy, dark hair, kind of handsome, wearing wrinkled khakis and a sweat-stained blue T-shirt, white joggers. He was carrying a long white box that looked like the kind used to deliver long-stemmed flowers, only made of heavier cardboard. He smiled, glancing down at the box to double-check the label.

"Janice Queen?"

"Yes." She saw no pocket in his shirt, no protruding pen or pencil. Other than the box, there was nothing in his hands, either.

Should have brought a pen from the desk. There's one in my purse, just inside the door.

No clipboard?

None of this struck her as wrong until a second too late.

As she reached forward to accept the package, he shoved her violently backward into the apartment. She bumped hard against the mirror, hoping it wouldn't break.

He was suddenly inside, the door closed behind him. Now he was reaching into a pocket with his free right hand, drawing out what looked like a partly wadded sock, a sap.

Is this happening? Is it real?

Somewhere in her stunned, panicked mind she decided to scream, and she'd inhaled to do so when the object from the man's pocket struck the side of her head.

She was on her hands and knees, sickened by the pain.

Someone else. This is happening to someone else. Please!

There was another starburst of pain, this time at the back of her skull.

The floor opened beneath her, and she was plunging down a dark shaft toward a deeper darkness.

Pearl Kasner trudged up the concrete steps from her subway stop and began the three-block walk to her apartment. She was short and buxom, curvaceous in a way her gray uniform couldn't conceal. A few men walking the other way fixed their stares on her breasts then quickly looked away, the way men do. As if the wife might be around somewhere watching.

She was tired and her feet were sore. There'd been a cash pickup at Fifth National, so she'd worked after hours. Helping the Brink's guys make sure the depositors' money was safe. Not that there was really much danger the place would be robbed.

But some danger. Enough. And enough pay.

Hard on the feet, though. Pearl spent a lot of time standing around. And being nice. That could be tiresome.