Rapture

He put the gun to the side of Sean's head and eased the trigger. The .22 made a noise like one hand lightly slapping another. There wasn't much blood at all, just a neat round hole in Sean's temple. Again. Again. Three holes, forming a nice tight triangle. No shuddering. No spastic, jerking movements. Sean died neatly, and Jeff appreciated it.

He let the body slide to the ground, and he stood over it for a few moments. All the anger was gone, as if it had been scorched and vaporized out of every cell in his body. He felt as clean and light and free as the spirit of the wind. Then he began to sing very softly but happily. "Heaven, I'm in Heaven ... Heaven, I'm in Heaven ..." He didn't know any of the other words to the song, but they weren't necessary.

He unzipped the back hip pocket of his running pants and took out the plastic bag. He tucked the gun away and then sprinkled the mixture of flour and cocaine all over Sean's face, covering it with the fine white powder. That'll give them something to think about.... Jeff shoved the empty plastic bag back into his pocket and studied the scene until he was satisfied he'd left nothing, not even a footprint.

What hurt was that he wouldn't be able to see Georgianne on this trip. Not even a glimpse of her from a distance. He'd give anything to see her, if only for a minute, but it was out of the question. Later, he told himself, later there would be plenty of time.

"Heaven ... I'm in Heaven ..."

Jeff's luck held again, and he didn't encounter anyone as he left the Gorge. He jogged all the way back to the car. It seemed appropriate.

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PART III

OceanofPDF.com

Lateral

Movement

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CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Jeff checked out of the Brook Green Motel shortly after eight that morning and dropped the car off in Bridgeport within the hour. He returned the second car to the agency at La Guardia and then bought a seat on a noon flight to Los Angeles. By the end of the afternoon, local time, he was sitting on his balcony with a cigarette and an enormous glass of Scotch and ice. He was naked beneath the black robe wrapped loosely around his body. Only then, finally, did he allow himself the luxury of considering what had taken place at the Gorge.

He had to admit it was brilliant. He had treated the whole thing like a problem at work. You don't solve anything by talking about it off the top of your head. You let it simmer in the depths of your brain, and sooner or later the answer will come to the surface. It was, he reckoned, an essentially creative process. The world was full of people with stunted imaginations, poor souls who were incapable of something like this. He belonged to the select handful of individuals who had the courage, imagination, and sheer will to create their own destinies.

It had all come together so well! He felt like an architect who, seeing for the first time a construction he had designed, is overwhelmed by his own genius. The phony driver's license. The two cars. The cut cocaine, which undoubtedly would make the police think Sean had been involved in a deal that went wrong. And, best of all, the sudden inspiration that had come to Jeff only at the last moment: the tight triangle of bullet holes in Sean's skull. Didn't the Mafia go in for that sort of thing, symbolic, ritual executions? It couldn't be perfect, he knew, because nothing ever is; all the same, he thought it was pretty damn close to perfect.