and left.
I regarded Kate a moment. Despite the day's events, she looked as fresh and alert as if it were 9:00 A.M. instead of 9:00 P.M. I myself felt my ass dragging. I'm about ten years older than Ms. Mayfield, and I haven't fully recovered from my near-death experience, so that might explain the difference in our energy levels. But it didn't explain why her clothes and hair were so neat and why she smelled good. I felt, and probably looked, crumpled, and I needed a shower about now.
Nash looked dapper and awake, but that's the way mannequins always looked. Also, he hadn't done anything physical today. Certainly he hadn't had a wild ride around the airport or climbed through an aircraft full of corpses.
But back to Kate. She had her legs crossed, and I noticed for the first time what good legs they were. Actually, I may have noticed this about a month ago in the first nanosecond after meeting her, but I'm trying to modify my NYPD piggishness. I have not hit on one single-or married-female in the ATTF. I was actually getting a reputation as a man who was either devoted to duty, or was devoted to some off-scene girlfriend, or was gay, or who had a low libido, or who perhaps had been hit below the belt by one of those bullets.
In any case, a whole new world was opening up to me now. Women in the office talked to me about their boyfriends and husbands, asked me if I liked their new hairstyles, and generally treated me in a gender-neutral manner. The girls haven't yet asked me to go shopping with them or shared recipes with me, but maybe I'll be invited to a baby shower. The old John Corey is dead, buried under a ton of politically correct memos from Washington. John Corey, NYPD Homicide, is history. Special Contract Agent John Corey, ATTF, has emerged. I feel clean, baptized in Potomac holy water, reborn and accepted into the ranks of the pure angelic hosts with whom I work.
But back to Kate. Her skirt had ridden above her knees, and I was treated to this incredible left thigh. I realized she was looking at me, and I tore my eyes away from her legs and looked at her face. Her lips were fuller than I'd thought, pouty and expressive. Those ice-blue eyes were looking deep into my soul.
Kate said to me, 'You do look like you need coffee.'
I cleared my throat and my mind and replied, 'I actually need a drink.'
She said, 'I'll buy you one later.'
I glanced at my watch and said, 'I'm usually in bed by ten.'
She smiled, but didn't reply. My heart was pounding.
Meanwhile, Nash was being Nash, totally unconnected, as inscrutable as a Tibetan monk on quaaludes. It occurred to me again that maybe the guy was not aloof. Maybe he was stupid. Maybe he had the IQ of a toaster oven, but he was bright enough not to let on.
Mr. Roberts returned with a tray on which was a carafe and four coffee mugs. He set this down on the table without comment and didn't even offer to pour. I took the carafe and poured three mugs of hot coffee. Kate, Ted, and I each took a mug and sipped.
We all stood and went to the windows, each of us lost in our own thoughts as we stared out into the city.
I looked east, out toward Long Island. There was a nice cottage out there, about ninety miles and a world away from here, and in the cottage was Beth Penrose, sitting in front of a fire, sipping tea or maybe brandy. It wasn't a good idea to dwell on those kinds of things, but I remembered what my ex-wife once said to me, 'A man like you, John, does only what he wants to do. You want to be a cop, so don't complain about the job. When you're ready, you'll give it up. But you're not ready.'
Indeed not. But at times like this, the idiot students at John Jay were looking good.
I glanced at Kate and saw she was looking at me. I smiled. She smiled. We both turned back to our views.
For most of my professional life, I had done work that was considered important. Everyone in this room knew that special feeling. But it took its toll on the mind and on the spirit, and sometimes, as in my case, on the body.
Yet, something kept pushing me on. My ex had concluded, 'You'll never die of boredom, John, but you will die on this job. Half of you is dead already.'
Not true. Simply not true. What was true was that I was addicted to the adrenaline rush.
Also, I actually felt good about protecting society. That's not something you'd say in the squad room, but it was a fact and a factor.
Maybe after this case was over, I'd think about all this. Maybe it was time to put down the gun and the shield and get out of harm's way, time to make my exit.
CHAPTER 20
Asad Khalil continued on through a residential neighborhood. The Mercury Marquis was big, bigger than anything he'd ever driven, but it handled well enough.
Khalil did not go to the toll highway called the New Jersey Turnpike. He had no intention of going through any toll booths. As he had requested in Tripoli, the rented automobile had a global positioning system, which he'd used in Europe. This one was called a Satellite Navigator, and it was slightly different from the ones he was used to, but it had the entire U.S. roadway system in its database, and as he drove slowly through the streets, he accessed the directions to Highway 1.
Within a few minutes he was on the highway heading south. This was a busy road, he noticed, with many commercial establishments on either side.
He noticed that some automobiles coming toward him had their headlights on, so he put on his headlights.
After a mile or so, he dropped Jabbar's keys out the window, then removed Jabbar's cash from his wallet, counting eighty-seven dollars. He went through Jabbar's wallet as he drove, ripping up what could be ripped and dropping small pieces out the window. The credit cards and plasticized driving license presented a problem, but Khalil managed to bend and break them all, and let them fall out the window. The wallet now contained nothing except a color photograph of the Jabbar family-Gamal Jabbar, a wife, two sons, a daughter, and an elderly woman. Khalil regarded the photograph as he drove. He had been able to retrieve a few photographs from the ruins of his home in Al Azziziyah, including a few photographs of his father in uniform. These images were precious to him, and there would be no further photographs of the family of Khalil.
Asad Khalil tore the Jabbar family photograph in four pieces and let it fly out the window, followed by the wallet, then the plastic bottle, and finally the shell casing. All the evidence was now strewn over many miles of the highway and would attract no attention.
Khalil reached over, opened the glove box, and pulled out a stack of papers-rental forms, maps, some advertisements and other papers that had little purpose. The Americans, he saw, like the Europeans, loved useless papers.
He glanced through the rental agreement and confirmed that the name on the agreement matched his passport.
He turned his attention back to the road. There were many bad drivers on the road here. He saw very young people driving, and very old people driving, and many women were driving. No one seemed to drive well. They drove better in Europe, except for Italy. The drivers in Tripoli were like Italian drivers. Khalil realized he could drive badly here and not be noticed.
He looked at his gas gauge and saw that it read FULL.
A police car came into view in his side mirror and stayed behind him for a while. Khalil maintained his speed and did not change lanes. He resisted glancing too often in the side-view or rearview mirrors. That would make the policeman suspicious. Khalil put on his bifocal glasses.
After a full five minutes, the police car pulled into the outside lane and came alongside of him. Khalil noticed that the policeman didn't even give him a glance. Soon, the police car was ahead of him.
Khalil settled back and paid attention to the traffic. They had told him in Tripoli that there would be much traffic on a Saturday night, many people visited or went to restaurants or movie theaters or shopping malls. This was not too different from Europe, except for the shopping malls.
