Konrath, Joe - Dirty Martini (12 page)

They aren’t showing his letters. They admitted that they did receive letters, but say they’re keeping them under wraps to rule out bogus confessions. They also neglected to mention anything about his demands. Which means they’re planning on paying him.

This is disappointing. He expected the city to stall for at least a few days, or to take a hard-line stance and refuse to deal with terrorists. That would have given him a chance to indulge in a few more surprises before the big bang.

Still, maybe he can fit one or two more in before crunch time.

He sets his TiVo to record, and then wanders over to his closet to pick a disguise. He decides on business formal. A Jack Victor suit, wool, three-button, vented, dark blue with dark gray pinstripes. A white shirt. A power tie. He slicks his hair back with mousse, applies a liberal dose of Lagerfeld, and then puts on the distraction—an eye patch.

A check in the mirror shows him to be roguish, mysterious. And all the witnesses will remember is a well-dressed man with an eye patch.

Along with the jet injector, he brings along a tiny contact lens case, containing a few drops of extract of Tanghin. The Chemist doesn’t know if he’ll get close enough to use either, but he’s got the entire day free to try. Should be fun.

He considers taking the bus because parking will be terrible downtown, but with all the stops the bus makes, it will take twice as long. So he risks it and takes a car, one that can’t be traced to him anyway.

The television told him the press conference was live at the 26th District police station, and that’s where he heads. Traffic isn’t too bad for lunchtime, and he manages to snag a parking meter spot from someone pulling out, only three blocks from the precinct house. Even luckier, the meter still has an hour left on it.

Fate apparently wants him to kill a cop today.

He decides to leave the jet injector in the car. Getting this close to the police, he doesn’t want to be caught with it on him. That leaves only the Tanghin, but that should be more than enough.

He walks briskly, hoping to get there before everyone has left. There are still news vans parked in front, so that’s a good sign. A hot dog vendor is set up on the corner. He approaches the forlorn figure and orders one with the works.

“Thanks, buddy. Business has been terrible.”

The Chemist takes a bite of the red hot, smothering his grin with pickle relish. He considers poisoning this man’s stand. It’s the perfect location for it, right outside the police station. Cops probably eat here all the time.

Maybe later, when he comes back.

There’s a bench on the sidewalk with a good view of the front of the station. He sits down and eats leaning forward, so nothing drips on his suit. Ten minutes pass, and he orders another dog, to the eternal gratitude of the vendor.

“Bless you, guy. I got two kids. Wish this city wasn’t so chickenshit.”

“You’re not worried?” asks the Chemist.

“Hell, no. My food is fresh. No one will get sick off my dogs, that’s for sure.”

“Didn’t you hear the latest?” The Chemist feels ripples of excitement, talking about this topic. “One man is doing all of this. They call him the Chemist.”

“And if I ever met this Chemist, I’d bust him in the ass.”

“What if he snuck up on you, poisoned your food while you were talking with another customer?”

“You got a sick mind, you know that?”

“I’ve been told.”

The Chemist returns to his bench. After twenty minutes, he begins to wonder if he had gotten there too late and missed the mark, but like magic she walks out of the building. Alone. It’s almost a hundred yards away, but he recognizes the hair, and the gray jacket she wore on TV.

He takes some extra napkins from the hot dog vendor. Then he trails the cop from the opposite side of the street, staying parallel to her.

She walks two blocks, turns onto Michigan Avenue, and enters a well-known grill pub, a chain place where kitschy things are stuck to the walls and the bartenders dress in sports jerseys. If it’s like the others of its ilk, the interior will be crowded, smoky, with low lighting. Which is perfect.

Traffic is against him, so he has to wait for the light to change before he can cross the street. When he walks into the restaurant, it’s exactly as he expected. The cheerful hostess tells him it will be a half-hour wait for a table. He declines, heading for the bar.

The bar is packed too, but he sees the cop standing between several men, trying to get the bartender’s attention.

He moves in closer, getting to within a few feet. Up close, she seems smaller, less substantial, than she appeared on television.

“Dirty martini, up,” she orders.

My, my, my. Our city’s finest, drinking while on the clock. Still, who can blame her? It’s been a tough morning.

A stool opens up, and she goes to it, and then does something that proves to the Chemist that fate is truly on his side: She takes off her gray jacket, places it over the stool, and asks the bartender where the ladies’ room is.

He points over his shoulder, and she heads in that direction. A moment later, the bartender sets down her drink by her stool.

The Chemist doesn’t hesitate. He opens the lens case, palms it in his right hand, and approaches the bar. With his left hand he reaches over, snagging some cocktail napkins from the bartender’s side of the bar, and with his right he dumps the toxin into the drink.

Now it’s a
really
dirty martini, he muses.

He shoves the napkins into his pocket, backs away from the bar, and finds a vantage point from several yards away. No one gives him a second glance.

A few minutes later she returns from the bathroom and sits atop her jacket. Grabbing the martini in one quick motion she brings it up to her lips—

—and drinks the whole thing.

He ticks off the seconds in his head.

One . . .

Two . . .

Three . . .

Four . . .

Five . . .

She touches her head.

Six . . .

Seven . . .

She wobbles slightly on the bar stool.

Eight . . .

Nine . . .

She rubs her eyes, then stands up.

Ten . . .

Eleven . . .

He cranes his neck up for a better look.

Twelve . . .

Thirteen . . .

She’s bent over now, a line of drool escaping her mouth. It’s followed by a flood of vomit.

Too late. Vomiting won’t help.

At fourteen seconds, she falls over.

People give her a wide berth. Several say the word
drunk
.

It takes almost thirty seconds for an employee to approach and kneel next to her.

“Call an ambulance!” he yells. “She’s not breathing!”

Of course she’s not breathing. She’s dead.

As the curious gather, he slips out the door, calm and casual. He has no doubt that several people are now frantically dialing 911. But according to statistics, a 911 response will take a minimum of ten minutes. Chances are it will take much longer. He knows this from experience. There is zero chance she’ll be revived.

The Chemist uses the napkins to wipe out the contact lens case, then deposits them into a garbage can. It’s a gloriously lovely day, and he takes off his blazer and uses one hand to carry it over his shoulder, Frank Sinatra style. Someone is bound to recognize the cop shortly. And when they do, it’s going to be a media frenzy. He wants to be home in time to see it, but TiVo is taking care of that for him, and it has been so long since he’s actually enjoyed a walk downtown.

In fact, it’s been a while since he’s actually enjoyed anything. A long while. Six years, three months, and thirteen days.

Revenge is a dish best served cold.

He considers heading to the lakefront, or walking through Grant Park. Then he remembers walking through the park with Tracey, and a foul mood overtakes him.

Who could have ever known that wonderful memories would someday prove painful?

He heads back to the car and climbs in, considering his next move. The satisfaction of watching the cop die is gone, replaced by a cold, dead feeling.

He wonders if this is why people become killers. That emptiness deep down that nothing—not drinking, not drugs, not therapy, not sex—can fill. Perhaps some people are born like that. Soulless. That’s how he feels most of the time.

Before, he was a normal guy. Decent friends. Decent job. A hardworking, tax-paying, red-blooded American who voted for the current mayor because he promised to be tougher on crime.

It seems like it was someone else’s life. But it wasn’t. It was his.

And now, there’s only cold.

He thinks about the hot dog stand, and that warms him a bit.

The Chemist snakes the jet injector tube up his sleeve and arms the spring. He’s wrestling to put on his blazer in the cramped front seat when he hears a car horn, right next to him.

Startled, he looks up.

A man in a rusty, older model Chevy stares at him, the rage on his face an indicator he’s been waiting there for a while.

The Chemist shrugs at him and shakes his head, indicating he isn’t moving.

The man honks again.

“I’m staying,” he says.

The man leans on the horn now, screaming, “Move your car!”

The Chemist ignores him, pockets the jet injector, and exits the vehicle. Some people just don’t take a hint. He’s actually doing this city a favor, reducing the population of idiots like—

“Hey, asshole! I’ve been waiting five fucking minutes for that space!”

The man has an unkempt beard and crazy eyes. In the passenger seat is an equally unkempt woman, obviously seething.

The Chemist shrugs. “This is my spot. Find another one.”

“We’re fucking late for court and we need that fucking space!”

No surprise there. The Chemist wondered what white-trash crime these two had committed. Set fire to their trailer to get the hundred dollars in insurance money? Or maybe sex with some sort of animal? His wife was so ugly, she’d qualify. He smiles at the thought.

And then the bearded guy is out of his car, walking right at him.

“You think this is funny, asshole?”

The Chemist is shocked. He’s heard about this happening, people being killed over parking spaces, but he can’t believe it’s happening to him.

He manages to say, “I’m not laughing at—”

And then the guy shoves him, hard. The Chemist almost loses his footing.

“Think you’re better than me, in that fancy suit and that faggy tie.”

The man goes to shove him again, and on reflex the Chemist brings up the jet injector. When the guy grabs his shirt, he pushes the orifice into his chubby neck and squeezes the trigger.

The lunatic raises up a fist to hit him, then his eyes bug out and he clutches his throat.

He falls, dead before he hits the street.

“Arnie!”

The Chemist looks at the woman, who is now out of the car and rushing at him.

“What have you done to Arnie! You killed him!”

Like a picture snapping into focus, the Chemist is instantly aware of his surroundings. People are watching him. On the sidewalks. From their cars. This has become a scene.

“That son of a bitch shot my husband!” she howls. “Someone help me!”

The only person close enough to ID him later is Arnie’s wife. He’s on her in four steps, jamming the injector into her throat, killing her in mid-scream.

Then he hurries back to his car. People are pointing now, and shouting. A few of them are running over.

Hands shaking, the Chemist fishes the car keys out of his front pocket. He starts the car and realizes, to his horror, that Arnie’s car is blocking him in.

There’s no time to do anything else. He slams the car into gear, steps on the accelerator, and crashes into the car parked ahead of him. Then he puts it into reverse and hits the gas again, causing another collision.

He now has an extra few feet of room around his vehicle, and he squeezes onto the street between Arnie’s Chevy and the car he’d just rear-ended. There isn’t quite enough space, and there’s a grind of metal on metal as he scrapes both sides of the Honda as he pulls away, hyperventilating, a crowd of people staring at him.

This is bad. Very bad. But he can fix it, if he moves fast. All they’ll remember is the suit and the eye patch—thank God he kept it on.

They’ll remember the car too. There’s a good chance someone even took down the license plate number.

But that’s okay. The car isn’t his. He can tie up this loose end, if he hurries.

The Plan doesn’t have to change. But now he feels an urgency he hasn’t felt before, and that excites him.

He expected this to be emotionally satisfying. But in his sweetest dreams, he had never expected this to actually be fun.