Джеймс Паттерсон - Target - Alex Cross

“I’m sorry to interrupt dinner, sir,” Franks said. “But my nav system committed suicide this morning, and my cell’s not picking up data for Google maps, and I can’t figure out where the heck I am on the real map.”

Franks held up a Rand McNally atlas of the Eastern Seaboard, climbed out of the truck cab, and said, “Could you help orient me, Officer?”

“Sergeant,” the trooper said, opening his door. “Sergeant Nick Moon.”

“I appreciate it, Sergeant Moon,” Franks said, opening the atlas to Virginia and putting it on the hood of the cruiser.

Moon climbed out. Muscular, athletic, he wore a bulletproof vest, had a large black Beretta pistol in his holster, and outweighed Franks by twenty pounds.

“Where y’all from?” Sergeant Moon said.

“Born in Arizona, but the past couple of years I’ve been jumping between Wyoming and South Dakota.”

“Oil fields?”

Franks smiled. “I do emergency welding work. You know, fix what needs fixing.”

“Good money in that?”

“Enough that I don’t work winters. I travel all over, taking a look around at things while I have the freedom.”

“Sounds like a nice life,” the trooper said. “Nothing tying you down.”

“Not for the next six weeks,” Franks said. He gestured at the map. “Can you help?”

“Sure,” Moon said, leaning toward the map and squinting.

Franks glanced around and saw no cars, then he smashed his right elbow up into the trooper’s voice box.

Moon reeled backward and sideways, gagging as he hit the open cruiser door and fell to the ground. Franks was almost disappointed the trooper was down already, but he jumped forward to finish the drama.

He kicked Moon’s right hand as he struggled for his service weapon. Franks’s steel-toed boot broke several fingers. Moon gasped and choked. Franks stooped, reached for the trooper’s pistol, and had almost slipped it free of the holster when a meaty fist smashed into the right side of his face.

Franks staggered and went to his knees. He saw dots, felt woozy, but not enough to dull instincts honed for years in the Arizona desert and the bigger sandpit.

Through sheer will, he threw himself forward, scrambling to get out of range of Moon’s left fist, and spun to his feet. Franks’s right eye was swelling shut, and he tasted blood on his lips, but the fog of the blow to his head was lifting.

The trooper was still on his back, reaching across his body for the gun. Franks took one fast step and with his steel-toed boot kicked Sergeant Moon on the top of his skull. He heard a crunch. The trooper’s body went rigid.

Franks kicked him again, this time in the temple, and then a third time, this one to Moon’s exposed neck. He felt vertebrae snap. The trooper sagged, dead.

For four long, heaving breaths, Franks felt that shaky adrenaline clarity he always got after a challenging kill, that hyper-confidence that empowered him when he realized he’d cheated death again. But there was no time to linger. No time to revel in it.

After wiping his prints off the sergeant’s pistol, he reholstered it, picked up the road atlas, and crossed to his truck.

Franks took one last look at the tableau of Sergeant Moon’s death scene, committed it to sweet memory, and drove off. He didn’t look back and did not whistle a single note.

I left my office shortly after darkness fell, my mind still returning to Nina Davis.

She was one of the most devastatingly beautiful women I’d ever met. She seemed to ooze sensuality from her pores and suggested forbidden adventure with every gesture. And she had predatory instincts. She stalked her sexual prey.

What was that about? She intimated she’d stalked Dr. Winters before, and successfully. But what else did she say? That there were rumors that he was into pain? Wouldn’t she have known that for certain?

As I climbed the stairs, smelling the aromas of Nana Mama’s latest triumph wafting through the door, I could not avoid the growing trepidation I felt. Nina Davis was making me nervous. I was the therapist. I was supposed to keep the inner lives of my clients at arm’s length, where they could be dispassionately observed.

But since Nina had left, close to four hours before, I’d been thinking about her, imagining her stalking me, imagining her bringing me right to the edge of a decision.

The guy has to make the final move in her little game. Isn’t that what she said?

I felt guilty for even considering that possibility. Not only was I a happily married guy, but my job demanded I keep my feelings out of her game.

But I was also a man, an alpha male if ever there was one, and Nina was so... how did she describe it? Free in her—

On the other side of the door, the sound of a cooking spoon banging against a pot startled me back to reality. I opened the kitchen door and sighed with relief at the familiar sight of Nana Mama at the stove, her back to me.

“That smells excellent,” I said.

“A lamb stew I whipped up,” she said.

“How long until dinner?”

She glanced at the clock. “Forty minutes?”

“I’m going to take a walk,” I said. “Clear my head.”

“Don’t get hit by a bus.”

I laughed and kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll try not to.”

I grabbed a jacket, cap, and gloves. I was putting them on when Bree came through the door looking like she’d taken a pummeling.

“Are you going for a walk?” she said. “I need one.”

After putting my arms around her and kissing her on the lips, I said, “I would love to go for a walk with you.”

That pleased Bree. She snuggled into my chest for a long hug before we went outside into the chill air and headed north toward Pennsylvania Avenue. As we walked, she told me about her frustration at her inability to make headway in the Betsy Walker murder case and about how Chief Michaels was calling her twice a day for updates.

“I don’t know what’s behind this pressure he’s putting on me.”

“Sounds like he’s up for a big job or he’s going to run for elected office.”

Bree thought about that. “So he needs a coup, and I’m the one who’s supposed to manufacture that?”

“I’m not saying I’m right. Just conjecture.”

She rubbed her temple, then stopped and fell into my arms.

“Hey,” I said, patting her back.

“I just need a hug, that’s all.”

“I love you,” I said. “And you can have as many hugs as you need.”

“Thank you, baby,” Bree whispered. “I love you too.”

Someone called out from behind us, “C’mon, get a room, why don’t you?”

We broke our embrace to see John Sampson hustling toward us. It had been a while since I’d seen my oldest friend and former partner at DC Metro.

“When’d you get back?” I asked, shaking his hand.

“Four hours ago,” he said.

“Good trip?” Bree asked.

“The best,” Sampson said. “I was ready to go back to work tomorrow completely refreshed, but I guess I had to start early.”

We both looked at him with puzzled expressions.

“I just got a call from a friend with the Virginia State Police,” Sampson said. “A mutual acquaintance of ours, Sergeant Nick Moon—”

“I know Moon,” Bree said.

“I do too,” I said. “He’s a guest instructor in mixed martial arts and submission techniques at Quantico.”

“That’s him,” Sampson said. “Good guy. And he’s dead.”

“What?” Bree said. “How? Line of duty?”

“He was in uniform,” Sampson said. “A couple of teenagers found him lying dead beside his cruiser, which was still running.”

“Shot?”

Sampson shook his head. “Looks like he’d been in a fight. Three of his right fingers were broken. His larynx was crushed. The knuckles of his left hand were split and bloody. The top of his skull was fractured from kicks, and his neck was broken.”