Patterson, James - Alex Cross 3 - Jack and Jill

I opened every single cassette, row by row, every box. I thought it was important, especially with someone as orderly as Sara. If Sampson had been around, I wouldn't have heard the end of it. He would have called me crazier than Jack or Jill.

I opened a cassette box for Hitchcock's Notorious. I didn't remember ever seeing the film myself, but one of Hitchcock's favorite male leads, Cary Grant, was featured on the box cover.

I found an unmarked cassette inside the box. It didn't look like a movie. Curious, I popped the cassette into the VCR. It was the fourth or fifth unmarked cassette that I had viewed so far.

The film wasn't Notorious.

I found myself looking at footage of the murder of Senator Daniel Fitzpatrick.

This was apparently the uncut version, which ran considerably longer than the film that had been sent to CNN.

The extra footage was even more disturbing and graphic than what had been viewed on the TV news network. The fear in Senator Fitzpatrick's voice was terrible to hear. He begged the killers for his life, then he began to cry, to sob loudly That part had been carefully edited from the CNN tape. It was too strong. It was brutal beyond belief. It put Jack and Jill in the worst possible light.

They were merciless killers. No pity, no passion, no humanity I jabbed at the PAUSE button. Jackpot! The next shot in the film had started tight on Senator Fitzpatrick, then pulled out to a wide angle, maybe wider than intended.

The tape showed Jack as he fired the second shot.

The killer wasn't Kevin Hawkins!

I suddenly wondered if Jill had left the tape here for someone to find. Had she suspected that she might be betrayed? Was this Jill's payback? I thought that maybe it was: Jill had fucked Jack, straight from hell.

I studied the frozen frame revealing the real Jack. He had short, sandy-blond hair. He was a handsome-looking man in his late thirties. There was no emotion on his face as he pulled the trigger.

“Jack,” I whispered. “We've finally found you, Jack.”

THE FBI, Secret Service, and Washington police cooperated and worked closely together on a massive and important manhunt.

They all badly wanted a piece of this one. It was the ultimate homicide case: a president had been murdered. The real killer was still out there. Jack was still alive; at least, I hoped that he was.

And he was!

Early on the morning of December 20, I watched Jack through a pair of binoculars. I couldn't take my eyes off the killer and mastermind.

I wanted to take him down. I wanted him for myself. We had to wait, though. This was Jay Grayer's plan. It was his day, his show, his plan of action.

Jack was just walking out of a three-story Colonial house. He went to a bright red Ford Bronco that sat in a circular driveway.

By then, we knew who he was, where he lived, nearly everything about him. Now we understood a lot more about Jack and Jill.

Our eyes had been opened very, very wide.

“There's Jack. There's our boy,” Jay Grayer said to me.

“Doesn't look like a killer, does he?” I said. “But he got the job done. He did it. He's the executioner of all those people, including Jill.”

Jack was herding along a small boy and a girl. Very cute kids. I knew that their names were Alix and Artie. Also coming along for the ride were the two family dogs: Shepherd and Wise Man, a ten-year-old black retriever and a frisky young collie.

Jack's kids.

Jack's dogs.

Jacks nice house in suburbia.

Jack and Jill came to The Hill... to kill the President. And then Jack murdered his partner and lover, Jill. He executed Sara Rosen in cold blood Jack thought he got away with the murders, clear and free. Jack had an almost great plan. But now we had Jack in our sights. I was watching Jack. We all were.

He looked like the perfect suburban Washington dad in just about every way. He had on a navy hooded parka that was unzipped in spite of the cold weather. The open jacket exposed a blue plaid flannel shirt and stonewashed dungarees. He wore floppy, tannish brown Topsiders, gray woolen socks.

His hair was cut short, military-style. His hair was dark brown now. He was a ruggedly handsome man. Thirty-nine years old.

The President's assassin. The stone-cold killer of several political enemies.

A conspirator.

A world-class traitor.

A real heartless bastard, too.

He is just about the perfect American killer, I thought as I watched him in command of his obedient troop of children and pets. He was a near-perfect assassin. He was a daddy, a husband, clean-cut as could be. He looked absolutely beyond suspicion.

He even had alibis, though none of them would hold up because of the film footage of his shooting Senator Fitzpatrick. A Jackal for our age, for our country, for our naive and very dangerous way of life.

I wondered if he had watched the President's burial ceremony on TV, or maybe even attended it, as I had.

"He's such a devil-may-care fucker, isn't he?Jay Grayer said.

He was sitting beside me in the front seat of the unmarked car. I hadn't heard Jay Grayer curse much before today. He wanted to take down Jack real bad, real hard.

That's what we were going to do. This was going to be a famous morning for all of us.

It was all about to go down.

“Get ready to follow Jack,” Grayer spoke into a handheld mike in our car. "You lose him, anybody, and you can just keep going.

In whatever direction you're headed."

“We won't lose him. I don't think he'll even run,” I said.

“He's a homebody, our Jack. He's a daddy. He has roots in the community.”

What a strange country we lived in. So many murderers. So many monsters. So many decent people for them to prey on.

“I think you're probably right, Alex. Spot on. I don't get it yet, I don't fully understand him, but I think you're right. We've got him nailed. Only what exactly do we have here? What makes Jack run? Why did he do it?”

“Money,” I told him a theory I had about Jack. “Look for the money. It cuts through and simplifies all the other stuff. A little politics, a little cause, and a lot of money. Ideology and financial gain. Hard to beat in this venal day and age.”

“You think so?”

“I think so. Yes. I'd bet a lot on it. He has some strongly held beliefs, and one of them is that he and his family deserve to live well. So, yes, I think money is a part of this. I think he's probably acquainted with some people with a lot of money and power, but not as much power as they would like to have.”

The Bronco took off and we followed it at a comfortable distance. Jack was a careful driver of his valuable cargo. He must have been impressive to his kids, maybe even to the dogs, undoubtedly to his neighbors.

Jack the Jackal. I wondered if that was another of Sara Rosen's word games.

I wondered what Jill's very last thought was when her lover betrayed her in New York. Had she expected it? Had she known he would betray her? Was that why she left the cassette in her apartment?

Jay wanted to talk, maybe he needed to keep his mind busy right now. “He's taking them to the day school down yonder. His life is back to normal now. Nothing happened to change that. He just planned the murder and helped execute a president. That's all. No biggie. Life goes on.”

“From what I can gather in his military records, he was a first-class soldier. He left the Army as a full colonel. Honorable discharge. Participated in Desert Storm,” I said to Jay.

“Jack a war hero. I'm impressed as hell. I'm so goddamn impressed with this guy that I can't begin to tell you. Maybe I'll tell him.”

Jack was a war hero, officially.

Jack was a patriot, unofficially.

As we rode along, I remembered the inscription on the Tomb of the Unknown at Arlington National Cemetery. Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God. Somehow, I thought that was how Jack probably thought about himself.