Perfect killer

CHAPTER 48

The low rumble of a large truck cut through the maelstrom as I tried the card again without success. Down below, a large white truck with the cable contractor's name on the side came barreling in, pulling a trailer with a giant coil of fiber-optic cable. It lurched to a stop near the rest of the white vehicles.

Jael rubbed at her eyes, stunned by the flash of lightning. She took a breath, and set the M21 down.

Jael covered the M21 and crawled into the front seat, quickly running down her options as her vision cleared. From her expansive saddlebag purse, she pulled out the HK4 in its leather clip holster, chambered a round, then clipped the HK4 to her belt. She reached back into the bag and pulled out a loop of high-C piano wire with two lengths of broom handle on each end and a small collar where the wire crossed to make its loop. It was her own invention. She tucked it into her back pocket.

Male voices from the truck filtered through the open tailgate window; one of them had spotted it and was coming over to be a Good Samaritan. Jael turned the ignition key to its accessory position, rolled down the front passenger-side window. Then, to avoid opening the door and activating the interior lights, she slid out the window and into the storm.*****

I tried the room access card again and again with no luck. Then lightning and thunder came simultaneously, and this time when the flash faded, there was no light from my room and the air-conditioning had stopped altogether. Time pressed tight around me, so I abandoned stealth and battered the door open with my shoulder, setting off the laptop's alarms. I fumbled the locking cables off the computes, snatched the laptop's power supply out of the wall, jammed it in my duffel, and zipped it up. Then, with all the alarms shrieking, I shoved the laptop into its case and sprinted from the room. It had taken just seconds.

Jael crouched in the deep shadows by her SUV's rear wheel and saw the Good Samaritan running toward her, shoulders hunched against the rain.

"Hell if I know," the Good Samaritan called out to the driver. "Call him on his cell. He was supposed to tell us where he wanted the rig."

As the Good Samaritan pushed the tailgate window shut, Jael slipped through the cloak of darkness and rain. She slipped the piano-wire loop over his head and jerked it closed around his neck. The garrote's little ratcheting collar prevented the loop from opening.

Jael stepped back quickly to avoid the man's thrashing and flailing. Seconds later, the lack of blood to the man's brain carried him off into unconsciousness. His head made a ripe-cantaloupe sound as it thudded off the SUV's rear bumper.

In the next instant, she heard a car door slam and the revving of a car engine. Pulling the HK4 from the holster, Jael thumbed off the safety and raced toward the noise. The Mercedes pulled out of the parking space. Joel stopped, crouched into her two-handed shooting stance, and sighted in on the Mercedes as a shout sounded behind her.

"Hey! What's holding you up?"

Jael turned as the truck driver got out. She shot him twice in the head. When she turned around, the Mercedes had reached Highway 82 and turned left into a slow line of westbound traffic. Jael St. Clair sprinted toward Highway 82 with Braxton's orders to get Stone and the lawyer ringing in her ears.