Patterson, James - Alex Cross 3 - Jack and Jill

He was weaving slightly as he stood in the foyer of the Johnson house. He waved the gun in small circles at me. He was wearing a strange sweatshirt with the printed message HAppy, HAPPY. JOY, JOY.

His short hair was dripping wet with perspiration. His glasses were slightly fogged around the edges. Behind the glasses, his eyes were glazed and shiny-wet. He looked the part of the Truth School killer. I doubted that anyone had ever liked Danny Boudreaux too much. I didn't.

His wiry body suddenly snapped rigidly to attention. “Welcome on board, Detective Cross, sir!”

“Hello, Danny,” I spoke to him in as low-key and nonthreatening a way as I could. “You called, and now I'm here.” I'm the one who is going to take your ass down.

He kept his distance. He was a jangle of raw nerves and incredible, pent-up anger. He was a puppet without a puppeteer.

There was no way to predict how this was going to go from here.

He was almost definitely suffering a withdrawal from his prescription drugs. Danny Boudreaux had the whole package of symptoms: aggression, depression, psychosis, hyperactivity, behavioral deterioration.

A thirteen-year-old, stone-cold killer. How do I get the gun away from him?

Christine Johnson was standing in the darkened living room behind him. She didn't move. She looked very distant in the background and small, in spite of her height. She looked frightened, sad, tired.

To her right was an exquisitely carved fireplace that looked as if it had been scavenged from some big-city brownstone. I hadn't seen much of the living room before. I studied it closely now. I was looking for some kind of weapon. Anything to help us.

George Johnson lay on the off-white marble floor in the foyer.

Christine or the boy had placed a red plaid blanket over the body The slain lawyer looked as if he'd lain down to take a nap.

“Christine, are you okay?” I called across the room. She started to speak, then stopped herself.

“She's fine, man. She's mighty fine pudding. She's all right,”

Boudreaux snapped at me. He slurred his words, so that they sounded like “cheese alriii.”

“She's a-okay, all right. I'm the one who's losing it here. This is about me.”

“I can understand how tired you are, Danny,” I said to him.

I suspected that he would be experiencing dizziness, impaired concentration, cottonmouth.

“Yeah. You got that right. What else do you have to say for yourself? Any more nuggets of wisdom about my delusional behavior?”

Wham! He suddenly kicked shut the front door behind us.

More impulsive behavior. I had definitely joined the party. He was still very careful to keep his distance -- he kept the semi-automatic always pointed at me.

“I can shoot this son of a bitch real well,” he said,just in case I'd missed the point before. It reinforced my notion of his extreme paranoia, his agitation and nervousness.

He was overly concerned about how I viewed him, how competent I judged him to be. He had me confused with his real father.

The policeman father who had deserted him and his mother.

I'd just learned about the connection on the ride over, but it made sense. It tracked perfectly, actually I reminded myself that this nervous, skinny, pathetic boy was a murderer. It wasn't hard for me to hate such a fiend. Still, there was also something tragically sad about the boy There was something so lonely and freakish about Daniel Boudreaux.

“I believe that you can shoot extremely well,” I told him quietly I knew it was what he wanted to hear.

I believe you.

I believe you are a stone-cold killer. I believe you are a young monster, and probably unredeemable.

How do I get your gun?

I believe I may have to kill you before you kill me or Christine Johnson.

I LOOKED at the words Happy, Happy. JOY, JOY. I knew exactly where the saying on his sweatshirt came from.

Nickelodeon. Childrenk TV. Damon and Jannie loved it. In a way, so did I. Nickelodeon was about families, and it probably infuriated Danny Boudreaux.

He grinned at me! He had such a fiendish, madhouse look.

Then he spoke quietly, as I just had. He expertly mimicked my concern for him. His instincts were sharp and cruel. It scared me again. It also made me want to rush him and punch his lights out.

“You don't have to whisper. Nobody's sleeping in here. Well, nobody except George the Doorman.”

He laughed, reveling in his crazy, creepy inappropriateness.

Here was the real psychopathic deal. Danny was a thrill killer in the flesh, even at thirteen.

“Are you all right?” I asked Christine again.

“No. Not really,” she whispered.

“Shut the hell up!” Boudreaux yelled at both of us. He pointed his gun at Christine, then back at me. “When I say something, I mean it.”

I realized I wasn't going to get the gun away from the boy. I had to try something else. He looked close to the breaking point, way too close.

I decided to make a move immediately.

I concentrated on the boy, trying to gauge his weaknesses. I watched him without seeming to watch.

I took a couple of slow, deliberate steps toward the living room window. An ancient African milking stool sat there. I glanced outside at the police lines staggered across the front lawn, keeping their distance. I could see riot shields and Plexiglas masks, battle dress uniforms, flak vests, guns everywhere. Jesus, what a scene. This mad boy had caused all this.

“Don't get any funny ideas,” he told me from across the room.

I already had afunny idea, Dannyboy. I already made my move.

It done! Can you figure it out? Are you as smart as you think you are, creep?

“Why not?” I asked him. He didn't answer me. He was going to kill us. What more could he do?

There was a real good reason for me to be near the window. I was going to position myself and Christine Johnson on opposite sides of the living room.

I'd done it. I had already made the move.

Boudreaux didn't seem to notice.

“What do you think of me now?” he snarled. “How do I stack up against those assholes Jack and Jill? How about against the great Gary Soneji? You can tell me the truth. Won't hurt my feelings. Because I don't have any feelings.”

“I'm going to tell you the truth,” I said to him, “since that's what you want to hear. I haven't been impressed by any killers and I'm not impressed by you, either. Not in that way.”

His mouth twisted and he snarled, “Yeah? Well, I'm not impressed by you, either, Dr. Hotshit Cross. Who's got the gun, though?”

Danny Boudreaux stared at me for a long, intense moment.

His eyes looked crossed behind the lenses of his glasses. The pupils were pinpointed. He looked as if he were going to shoot me right then. My heart was racing. I looked across the room at Christine Johnson.

“I have to kill you. You know that,” he said as if it made all the sense in the world. Suddenly, he was speaking in a bored voice. It was disconcerting as hell. “You and Christine have to go down.”

He glanced around at her. His eyes were dark holes. “Black bitch! Sneaky, manipulative bitch, too. You dissed me bad at that stupid school of yours. How dare you disrespect me!” he flared again.

“That's not true,” Christine Johnson said. She spoke right up. “I was trying to protect those kids out in the yard. It had nothing to do with you. I had no idea who you were. How could I?”

He stamped one black-booted foot hard. He was petulant, impatient, unforgiving. He was a mean little prick in every way, “Don't tell me what the hell I know! You can't tell what I'm thinking! You can't get inside my head! Nobody can.”

' “Why do you think you have to kill anybody else?” I asked Boudreaux.

He flared at me again. Pointed his gun. “Don't fucking try to shrink-wrap me! Don't you dare.”