CHAPTER 59

IT ISN’T MURDER. Like my dad said, killing a rabid dog is actually mercy.

Which is why, when I pulled into the vacant lot and saw Alex parked in the distance, sitting behind the wheel of a Prius, I floored the gas and headed straight for her.

I had no idea what Alex had been expecting. Maybe a gunfight. Maybe a fistfight. And maybe she could have beaten me in both.

But in a demolition derby, a two-and-a-half-ton Ford Bronco truck beat a compact Toyota hybrid any day of the week.

By the time I got close enough to see Alex’s expression-pure shock that I wasn’t going to stop-she hit the accelerator. But it was too little, too late. The Bronco crashed into her front end with a satisfying, metal-crunching clang, the four-wheel-drive climbing up onto the hood of the tiny car, a heavy steel-belted radial smashing through her front windshield.

I jammed it into reverse, my tires found purchase on the gravel-covered asphalt, and I rocketed backward off the Prius, bouncing high in my seat from the shocks.

Alex was buried under an airbag, the front end of her car smashed to half its height. I backed up until I was a good fifty yards away, then punched it and rammed her again.

The Prius lurched sideways, its tires shrieking, the big truck pushing until it reached a divot in the cracked pavement and rolled up onto its side, and then over the top, rocking upside-down like a big metal turtle.

I backed up again, but after a few feet something begin to whine under the floorboard. I tried to pop it into gear, and the truck jerked, then was still. I’d killed the transmission.

No biggie. I was just getting started.

I tugged on the door handle. It didn’t budge. So I stuck my Beretta in my teeth and climbed out the missing windshield onto the hood of the Bronco. I slid off the bumper and onto my feet, then went after her.

When I got within twenty feet of the Prius I fired three shots, bursting all three airbags. Keeping the Beretta aimed, I pressed on the airbag fabric, deflating it, ready to fire at the first thing underneath.

But there was nothing there. The car was empty.

I spun around just as I saw the blur. The kick connected solidly with my hand, my gun taking flight and arcing through the air, clattering to the concrete a few dozen feet away.

I pivoted, brought my own leg around, aiming at Alex’s chest. She turned into it, absorbing the kick on her shoulder. Then she shoved me away, backpedaled, and assumed a tae kwon do stance, legs apart and fists raised.

I got in the same stance.

“I’m going to rip your fucking head off,” Alex snarled at me.

“Bring it, bitch.”

Alex advanced, feinting with her left, hooking with her right. I ducked my head down, her knuckles grazing off my skull, and then I brought my knee up, driving it into her ribs.

She recovered quickly, spinning to my left, whacking me in the neck with the back of her hand. I staggered from the blow, and she followed up with a scissors kick, her body taking to the air.

Her foot met my jaw, hard enough to bring the stars out. I spun with it, and kept spinning until I hit the ground, slapping both palms against the tarmac to cushion my fall.

Alex was on me quick as a snake, punting one of my kidneys up into my lungs. I screamed, but managed to pin her leg on the second kick, shifting with it, flipping her onto her face.

I kept hold of her ankle, rolling her up, getting on top of her.

Then I grabbed her bleach-blond hair and introduced her face to the pavement. Once. Twice, three times, and then she tangled her hand in my hair and yanked me off.

We both rolled to our feet. Alex spat out blood and teeth. Her face was the picture of rage, the scar tissue stretched so taut it was pure white. She lunged, but anger had replaced form and I easily sidestepped the move, giving her a one-two punch to the nose.

She wiped a sleeve across her face, mopping off blood.

“You’re all alone, Jack. No one is here to save you this time.”

I thought of every major case I’d ever been on. Each time, someone had come to the rescue. Herb. Harry. Phin. None of them were here now to watch my back.

Alex was right. This time I was totally alone.

But this time I didn’t need any help.

I moved in, kicked at her instep, dropping her to one knee, then hammered a right cross home, jerking her head back. Alex brought up her fists, swung and missed. I followed the right with a left, rocking her sideways, then another right, and another left. It was like hitting a heavy bag, except heavy bags don’t whimper.

She fell onto both knees, not even fighting back, keeping her head covered up.

I grabbed her arms and my knee met her nose. If it hadn’t been broken before, now it was.

Alex slumped onto her ass. She wasn’t getting up again.

“Lucky,” Alex said, blood dribbling down her face from eight different places. “You got lucky.”

“Wrong. I’m better than you. And I just kicked your ass.”

I scanned the empty lot, found my Beretta only a few yards away. I strode over to it and scooped it up. Then I returned to Alex, sticking the gun in her face, pointing it at her eye socket so she could look up the barrel.

Alex tried to smile, all red gums and broken teeth.

“You’re not going to kill me.”

“Yes. I am. And I don’t want your last thought to be a hopeful one, so stop trying to convince yourself of that. In five seconds, I’m pulling this trigger.”

“You can’t do it.”

“You’ll find out in four more seconds.”

Alex’s half grin faltered. “You’re a cop.”

“Not anymore.”

And there it was. The sneering, mocking face that had haunted my dreams for so long became something pitiful, pathetic, filled with fear.

“Jack. Don’t do this.”

“This is for Latham, and Alan, and Coursey, and the dozens of others you’ve slaughtered. But mostly, it’s for me.”

“Jack, please-”

“When you get to hell, say hi to Charles.”

Alex cried out, “Jack-no!”

The bullet took off the back of her head. She flopped onto her side, blood spraying the broken concrete. I put two more into her skull, kicked her over, and fired three more into her dead heart.

Dad was right. It was like killing a rabid dog.

I checked her pulse, found none.

But just to make absolutely sure, I waited ten minutes before calling the police.

CHAPTER 60

I WAS SWEEPING UP my wreck of a house-something I’d put off during my three-week bout of drinking and depression-when a car pulled into the driveway.

“How’s the nose?” I asked when I opened the door.

“I’ve got an extra nostril.” Harry’s voice was nasally, for obvious reasons. He had a big white ban dage across his face, with some sort of nose brace, and his black eyes made him look like a raccoon.

“Nice,” I said.

“Doc said it came off pretty clean, so it should look more or less normal when it heals. Thanks for giving it to the EMT. And thanks, you know, for coming to my rescue and saving my ass.”

“My plea sure, Harry.”

Harry looked down at his feet, then scratched himself in a bad place.

“So I was thinking. Alex is dead, right?”

“Yeah.”

I’d found Alex’s gun in the wrecked Prius and given it back to her, so it looked less like an assassination and more like self-defense, but otherwise told the authorities everything that happened. There would be a hearing, but I’d learned from on high that no charges would be filed. Stopping a serial killer’s multi-state crime spree and recovering over eighty thousand dollars in stolen money counted for a lot, and supposedly no one was anxious to prosecute me.

The only weak link was Officer Scott Hajek. After leaving the cemetery I’d visited the Crime Lab with the phone Harry had found, asking Hajek to get Alex’s number off the SIM card. He agreed, and promised he’d keep quiet about helping me, as long as I promised to go out with him sometime.