The Blonde (3 page)

“There is no flat fee,” the driver said.

“What do you mean?”

“Only apply Center City. We are twelve block south. You must pay what’s on meter.”

“But South Philly is closer to the airport than Center City. Hence, it should be cheaper.”

“No flat fee.”

Kowalski considered asking the driver to take him to Dydak Brothers turf and then shoving him up against a wall and blasting his head off—that’d be a nice little cleanup job for the Polish boys. Bet you didn’t know you were messing with the South Philly Slayer, did ya pal? Too much to risk, though. Kowalski had to return to this city soon enough, and he didn’t need additional complications. The press was already writing stories about a psycho with a rifle hunting down gangsters. He had to finish this before he was caught and had to cash in too many favors.

“You know what? I’m not worried about the flat fee. Let’s go.”

Sheraton Hotel,
Rittenhouse Square East, Room 702

A
fter he finished power vomiting in the bathroom, Jack was finally willing to admit that okay, yeah, maybe it
was
poison.

At first, he didn’t want to believe it; had to be nerves. His mind playing tricks. Obsessing over his trip to Philadelphia.

And his morning appointment with Donovan Piatt.

Jack had done some checking up on Piatt. A local mag had voted him the city’s “most feared divorce attorney” and noted that he’d “hacked off more testicles than the Holy Roman Empire.” Nice. There was a little black-and-white photo on-line: The fifty-ish bastard had black beady eyes and a beard of burnished steel. Jack was going to have to face the real thing at 8:00
A.M
.

That was enough to make someone vomit, wasn’t it?

But his second attack was even more brutal than the first, and Jack started to realize that this wasn’t simple nerves. This was a full-on assault.

The third trip to the bowl was the worst yet.

Could he have any food left in his stomach? That greasy spinach and cheese airline stromboli had been the first thing to go. He wasn’t sure what was worse—the agony of vomiting or the fact that he recognized his in-flight meal in the toilet. The second time was mostly liquid. And now, the third … yes, now there were globs of tiny blood floating in the water. His stomach was tearing itself apart.

This was
fucked
.

Jack slapped cold water all over his face, then looked at his watch: 10:36
P.M.
He’d left the airport bar around 9:30. He’d vomited for the first time about forty minutes ago. If that girl was to be believed, the poison was working according to schedule.

And in ten hours, you’ll be dead
.

The smart thing would be to call the police. But even if he did, what would he say? A strange girl in an airport bar had given him poison, and then he’d said, “Hey, okay, thanks, catch you later”? Why hadn’t he called the police right then? Because she was too pretty to be taken seriously?

Come on now.
Think
.

Maybe tip off the police with a vague description—he was bad at height and weight, and come to think of it, he couldn’t even remember the girl’s eye color. Most he could say was that her chest was huge. Yeah, that would narrow it down.

Clearly, he needed to go back to the airport, find her himself. Make her tell him what she’d dropped in his boilermaker. Get help. Swear never to drink in an airport bar again.

Or maybe he needed to go to a hospital. Have his stomach— ugh—pumped. Let the professionals figure out what was wrong. Move on.

Unless the poison was already coursing through his veins. How long would it take for the doctors to pin it down? He could die in a plastic waiting room chair long before a nurse so much as stuck a thermometer in his mouth. Besides, he needed more than a cure. He needed to find this girl, figure out why she’d done this to him. Maybe she was doing this to other people, too.

Which is why you should call the police, Jack
.

Enough of this. Get in a cab, get back down to the airport, and find the girl. Now. Leave your bag here. Take your wallet and cell phone. Go.

Wait.

It was 10:38
P.M.
He was due for another vomiting session in five minutes.

How was he going to survive a cab ride? The trip from the airport to the Rittenhouse Square Sheraton took at least twenty minutes. What, was he going to have the driver pull over halfway to the airport?

Figure it out, then. Leave
now
. Before you lose your chance to find her.

And you never see your daughter again.

He was suddenly struck with the desire to stay in his room and call home. Hear her voice. But even though it was only a little after 9:30 back home, Callie would have already been in bed for an hour and a half.

No. He had to find the blonde.

Jack took the elevator down to the lobby and found a cab waiting outside the front doors. Philadelphia was dead this time of night. He’d heard the old joke about the city rolling up the sidewalks at night, and sadly, it was true. Granted, it was a Thursday, but this was the heart of the fifth-largest city in the United States. Shouldn’t there be more people out pissing their lives away in restaurants or bars?

“The airport, as fast as you can.”

“Time’s your flight?”

“I don’t have one. It’s just important that I get there….”

“Well, you are going to arrivals or departures?”

Which one?

Jack thought about it, then said, “Arrivals.” Because he had arrived, and could retrace his steps back to the airport bar that way.

“Terminal?

“Huh?”

“Which terminal? They’re serious about security. I can’t go wandering around the—”

“Which one is Continental?” That was the airline Jack had flown in on.

“That’d be C. Anybody tell you about the flat rate?”

Next the guy was going to tell Jack to buckle his seat belt, maybe even hop out of the car to make sure it clicked into the buckle correctly.

“I’m kind of in a hurry.”

Wordlessly, the driver took off up Eighteenth Street, passing Rittenhouse Square and Market Street, then JFK Boulevard, then a construction site. He had never visited Philadelphia before, but he’d studied a map of Center City. His hotel was three blocks from the Sofitel, where he was supposed to be meeting Donovan Piatt. He wondered if he was going to make it. Maybe he’d,
ha ha ha
, be dead.

If he
had
been poisoned.

Within a few minutes they were back on 1-95, headed south. Past the same row houses, shrouded in darkness, then two newish-looking sports arenas, then an industrial wasteland of refineries and—

Oh no. Not again.

“Excuse me. I need you to pull over.”

“I thought you were in a hurry.”

“
Please.
”

The desperation in his voice must have done it. Without another word, the driver pulled across two lanes and came to a gradual halt on the shoulder. Jack fumbled with the passenger door on the left—no chance to slide across to the other side—and barely kicked open the door before he started spewing.

There was a little more blood this time.

1-95 South,
Near the Girard Point Bridge

K
owalski was treated to the sight of a man hanging out of a Yellow Cab, heaving his guts out onto the blacktop of 1-95. Fucking drunk.

Couldn’t the guy’ve had the courtesy to pick the other door? You know, the one facing the scenic refineries of
southwest Philly? Now he was going to have that image in his mind all night long. I mean, c’mon. It’s a Thursday night, pal. Everybody’s working for the weekend.

Kowalski had been able to reserve a seat on a 1:00
A.M.
flight to Houston. With luck, he’d make it to the gate and through security checks in time. Get to Houston by 3:00
A.M.
Check for his envelope at the Shuttle Texas courtesy counter. Inside the envelope would be the address of the morgue. There wasn’t time to rent a car; he’d catch another cab. That was all he’d worked out so far. On the plane, he’d come up with three or four ways to slip inside the morgue, get what he needed, get out, and get to the drop-off point.

The head. They wanted Professor Manchette ‘s entire head.

Which, hey, whatever, not his problem. But it presented a set of logistical challenges. Like walking out of the morgue with a human head. Kowalski would need a gym bag and a hacksaw, at the very least.

The bag could be found at the airport. Scope a busy baggage-claim station—there were a bunch at George Bush Intercontinental—cherry-pick one from the steel conveyor. Someone raises a fuss? Apologize, claim to have one just like it. Then look for another one. Black, or navy blue. Two most common colors. Nobody thinks about buying distinctive luggage until they’re standing there by a baggage-claim queue, wishing they’d had the foresight to buy pink neon Samsonite.

Yeah, and that lasts until they leave baggage claim, and forget all about it. Nobody really wants to walk around toting a fucking Day-Glo bag.

Hacksaw? Morgue probably had a box full of ‘em. Plastic bags, too, to line the gym bag.

The best operations supplied their own tools.

Kowalski would be walking in with little more than his clothes and cell phone. The clothes could be easily ditched and burned.
And his cell phone was equipped with a nifty little self-destruct sequence—his father’s Social Security number, which meant that someday it would finally be put to good use—that could double as a getaway diversion. And what were the authorities going to do with a crazy naked man who was caught trying to saw the head off a dead college professor?

Not much.

By the time his fingerprints were entered into CODIS, his organization could already be working on paperwork for his immediate release. Some debriefing, maybe a reprimand, but nothing too busy. Then he could get back to Philadelphia. Resume his mission of personal vengeance by next Thursday at the latest.

And that was the
worst
-case scenario.

Government jobs. Absolutely the greatest.

Kowalski’s taxi pulled up to Terminal C. The fare was $42.30. So much for the flat rate. He removed his travel wallet from the inside of his suit jacket—this would be stuffed in a storage locker when he arrived in Houston. He peeled off two twenties and a five and told the driver to keep the change. Nothing too generous, nothing too miserly. No reason for the cabdriver to remember him.

He walked through the revolving doors to the Continental terminal, walked up to the E-ticket check-in. Slid in his credit card, which was under a name that matched the Texas driver’s license in his travel wallet.

Baggage?
the computer asked.

Kowalski punched 0.

Might be different on the way back. If he couldn’t make the drop-off, maybe he’d be carting Manchette’s head back to Philadelphia. Hang on to it for a few days. Show it the Liberty Bell.

Ha ha ho ho hewwwwww
.

Katie would have thought that was funny.

His ticket printed.

Halfway up the escalator to the Continental gate, Kowalski’s thigh started buzzing. He grabbed the phone, flipped it open.

“Yeah.”

Kowalski was given a phone number. He added six to every digit. Walked to a pay phone located down the hall from the gate. Dialed the new number, using the second of his prepaid cards. This was why he purchased them in threes.

“Don’t leave. We believe the subject is in Philadelphia.”

“The professor? Is it all of him, or was his head spotted rolling down the tarmac?”

His handler ignored him.

“A credit card believed to be carried by Kelly White was used at the airport lounge one hour ago.”

“I’m at the airport now.”

“This was an hour ago, but she still may be in the lounge. Please check.”

“Can you give me a description?”

“I sent a photo to your phone. She
has
changed her appearance since entering the country one week ago.”

“Nothing surgical?”

“No.”

“Then I’ll know her.”

Kowalski was already retrieving new mail. The subject line: “Happy Birthday!”

“Got it?”

“Yeah.” Kowalski looked at the image on the screen. “You know who she looks like? That actress … Ah hell, I just saw the movie. …”

“Reply to that number with a text message. ‘So glad you remembered,’ if you’ve located her. If not, ‘Better late than never.’”

Kowalski hung up the phone. This was good. If he didn’t have
to leave the city to take care of this new operation, he wouldn’t waste travel time getting back to his own project.

So where do pretty girls go when they’re wandering the airport at midnight?

I
’m just glad you didn’t get it all over the interior.”

Jack could only moan in reply.

The cab continued down 1-95, toward the airport, but he was in no condition to admire the view. The knot in his stomach was bad. Real bad. That last set of heaves apparently had awakened some primordial part of his brain—the one that monitored likelihood of death. This part triggered bodily reactions designed to forestall death: increased body temperature, a surge of adrenaline, the sweats. It was as if his body had finally gotten the memo:
Yes, it has come to our attention that we have been poisoned. Your body is now taking appropriate countermeasures to rid itself of poison. Best of luck, chaps, and now, once more, into the breach!

He wasn’t going to leave it to his body.

He was going to find the blonde and force her to give him the antidote.

“Most guys don’t have the courtesy. But if you don’t mind me saying, I don’t think I should be taking you to the airport. I think you need an emergency room.”