The Perfect Show (A Jessie Hunt Psychological Suspense Thriller—Book Thirty-Three)

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Jessie walked out of the main doors of Twin Towers and headed down the long walking path toward the street. The temperature had dropped precipitously after the sun set two hours ago, and she quickly zipped up her jacket, pulled the hood over her head, and texted Ryan.

Leaving Twin Towers now. Headed back to the car. See you in two minutes.

His response came quickly.

Got tired of sitting around. Went around the block to that burrito place. Got your favorite. Headed back now. If I’m not there when you get to the sidewalk, hang out by the officers in the squad car.

Okay. See you soon, she typed, then put her phone away before shoving her hands deep in her pockets to protect against the chill. As she approached the street, she looked around for the squad car with the officers that Parker had the dispatch sergeant assign to her. She didn’t immediately see them.

She became briefly concerned until she registered the cacophony of sirens coming from about six blocks away. Something was clearly going on, and if it was serious enough, they’d likely have been called away from some boring protection duty to help out. Jessie knew where she stood in the pecking order.

She reached the end of the pathway and turned left onto the sidewalk, walking along the chain link fence and looking for a free spot between cars where Ryan could pull in and pick her up when he returned. As a precaution, with the squad car gone, she reached down to undo the snap on her gun holster. Suddenly, she froze in place.

She was an idiot. She remembered turning the weapon in to the guard at the gun locker window when she went to see Haddonfield. Not only that, but her taser too. But when she left, she was so excited to finally be on a path to keeping her loved ones safe, that she had forgotten about retrieving them. And now that she thought about it, she recalled that the guard wasn’t there to remind her when she walked past him. He must have been on a break. Now, she had to go all the way back to retrieve it.

Jessie turned around. That’s when she saw him. Coming toward her on the sidewalk, about thirty yards away, was a hulking man in a hoodie. His head was down, focused on the ground. Even if he’d been looking up, it was much too dark to see his face. He was walking slowly but with a sense of purpose. He didn’t seem to have realized she’d turned his way.

As casually as she could, Jessie turned on her heel and headed back in the direction she’d just come from, away from him. She reminded herself not to jump to conclusions. It could just be some guy, any guy.

But something deep in her gut told her who it was. She forced herself to breathe as she continued walking, moving at a brisk pace but not breaking into a run. She considered pulling out her phone to call or text Ryan but feared that would reveal to the hoodie guy that she was aware of his presence.

Instead, she just kept walking. As she passed a pickup truck, she glanced in its sideview mirror. It was clear that the man behind her was closer now and moving fast. She guessed that he’d made up half the distance between them since she first turned around.

She picked up pace to get to the next car. As she glanced in its mirror, she saw something that made her blood run cold. The man, now less than ten paces behind her, was reaching for something in his pocket. In the dim glow of the streetlight, the thing flashed. It was a knife.

Jessie forced herself to think. She was alone. She had no weapon. And a man she was almost positive was Hank Costabile was coming up behind her with a knife. Maybe if she had the element of surprise, she could get in a quick kick or blow and make a run for it. But he was ready for her. He was stronger than her. He was armed. And he was almost on her.

She passed by a white van, hoping to get one last bit of help from its mirror when she heard the footsteps behind her break into a run. Without looking back, she did the same, passing by the hood of the van and then darting in front of it. Staying low but not stopping, she rushed around to the street and the passenger side of the van and peeked through the window. The man had stopped by the driver’s side door, lingering there.

It occurred to her that he didn’t know she was unarmed and was proceeding with caution in case she was waiting in front of the van, gun drawn, ready to fire. She took advantage of his uncertainty and made her way to the back of the van, quickly but quietly.

She was near the rear doors of the van when he stepped out into the street in front of the hood. Apparently, he’d gotten over his concern about being shot and checked, finding that she wasn’t there. Now, he had a clear path to her, and she was without a van to hide behind. The vehicle parked behind the van was a Subaru station wagon that offered nothing in the way of concealment.

The man rushed at her. She turned around and was about to bolt down the street when she changed her mind. She might be faster than the guy over a long distance, but he would catch her in a sprint. She had to change the dynamic.

So rather than run she took two huge steps and leapt up onto the hood of the Subaru. Then, without pausing, she scrambled up to the roof of the car and spun around. The man stopped in front of the hood of the car, apparently debating his next move.

Then, slowly, he pulled off his hoodie. Hank Costabile stood in front of her, a nasty smile on his face, a switchblade in his hand, flickering in the streetlight.

”Hi, Jessie,” he snarled. ”It”s been a minute.”

“Not long enough,” she shot back with far more arrogance than she felt.

“I’m guessing you don’t have your gun, or you’d have shot me by now,” he noted.

“There’s still time for you to turn around and go home,” she said. “You haven’t committed any crimes yet, at least not since you got out of prison.”

“But I’m about to,” he told her. “You didn’t really think I could just let things lie, did you? Or that I’d actually run off to Tijuana?”

“No,” she told him, hoping to delay the inevitable. “I figured you found some lookalike lackey to take your place.”

She unzipped her jacket and took it off. It wasn”t much, but it was the only thing at her disposal. Maybe she could whip it at him to keep him at bay, or even knock the knife out of his hand.

“You figured right,” he said as he clambered up onto the hood of the Subaru, denting it repeatedly. “There are lots of folks who want to help me, some of them in your own police station. They’re all tired of a mouthy bitch like you messing things up for the rest of us.”

“Such a gentleman,” she said. “I would have thought you’d have learned some manners in prison, but it looks like you’re just the same old human bowling ball.”

Jessie had made her decision. She couldn’t outrun this guy. And she couldn’t outfight him. But maybe she could outthink him. The very fact that Costabile was putting his freedom at risk to come after her was proof that he was fueled by rage more than brains. Maybe she could get him so angry that he made a mistake.

“Yeah, well, this human bowling ball is about to gut you like a fish.”

“I doubt it,” she said. “If you try to climb up here with me, you’ll probably fall through the roof, big boy.”

“Let’s find out,” he spat, moving forward on the hood.

She flicked the jacket at him like a whip, making him lose his balance slightly, but not enough to fall off the car. As he walked up the windshield, she retreated to the back of the roof. Maybe he really would be heavy enough to crash through the thing if he got up there with her. But she wasn’t holding her breath.

Jessie was running out of ideas, and the sound of a blaring car horn in the distance wasn’t helping her concentrate. Costabile was on the roof with her now and though he looked a little unsteady on his feet, he was in no danger of caving the thing in.

The honking behind them got louder and closer. Jessie stole a glance back. What she saw made her heart sing. Ryan was driving toward them—fast—and waving his arm at her wildly. She looked back at Costabile and realized that her husband and partner wouldn’t get there in time. There just wasn’t enough of it for him to pull over and get off a good shot before Costabile did his work.

“Looks like your time has come,” the former cop told her, a mad grimace on his face. He was now in lunging distance, gripping the knife tightly.

Jessie heard the honk again and pictured Ryan behind her, still waving wildly. And in a flash, she realized that hadn’t been waving wildly at all. He was swinging his arm backward, telling her to move in that direction. Now she understood. He was telling her to jump.

Without hesitation, she grabbed her jacket in both hands and flung it at Costabile’s face. As he swiped at it with the knife, she turned, jumped down to the trunk of the Subaru and leapt onto the hood of the Honda Civic right behind it. She landed hard on her knees but ignored the pain and spun around.

Costabile had won his battle with her jacket and was leaping down onto the Subaru’s trunk. But just as his feet landed, the hood of Ryan’s car slammed into the trunk. Costabile was going forward one moment and the next he was slingshot back into the air.

Jessie watched him fly thirty feet before slamming into the chain link fence next to the sidewalk along the perimeter of the Twin Towers. The fence caught him like a catcher’s mitt before he fell to the sidewalk.

Ryan leapt out of the driver’s seat and looked over at Jessie.

“Are you okay?” he said.

“I think so.”

“Stay there,” he instructed as he dashed between the cars and toward Costabile.

The man saw him coming and tried to get to his feet. Jessie was amazed that he could move at all. As he used the fence to pull himself up, Jessie noted that his right leg was bent the wrong way at the knee. Seemingly oblivious, he snatched up the knife, which was resting beside him on the sidewalk.

“I wanted her,” he grunted as Ryan came toward him, “But you’ll do just as well.”

When Ryan was close enough, Costabile swung wildly at him with the blade, but Ryan blocked it easily before slamming the man up against the fence with his left forearm, pinning his neck. With his right hand, he grabbed Costabile’s right hand, which still clutched the knife, and snapped it at the wrist.

Costabile yelped in pain as the knife dropped from his hand, which now dangled uselessly at his side. With the former sergeant still pinned against the fence, Ryan reared back and punched him in the face. Then he did it again. And again. And again.

Costabile’s body slumped but Ryan held him up with his free hand while he pummeled him relentless with his right. Eventually the sheer weight of the man was too much to keep upright, and he toppled to the ground, face-first.

Ryan knelt down and flipped him over. He put his palm on the top of Costabile’s head to keep him steady, then resumed punching him in the face. Jessie lost count of the blows as she watched her husband turn the man into a pulpy mess.

She realized that unless she did something, he was going to kill Costabile with his bare hands. Some dark part of her wanted him to keep going, wanted him to smash his fist through the back of the man’s skull. But she couldn’t let it happen, not because of anything particularly decent in her. She had to stop him because Ryan was a cop, not a killer, and he’d never be able to live with himself if he crossed that line.

“Ryan, stop!” she yelled.

But he didn’t. Jessie wasn’t even sure he had heard her over the sounds of his fist smashing against the crunching bones in Costabile’s face. She couldn’t see his eyes but imagined the frenzied rage in them as he shut everything else out. She was too far away to restrain him. By the time she got to them, Costabile would be a lifeless corpse.

“Ryan, you have to stop!” she screamed again, her voice piercing the darkness.

Her husband’s blood-drenched fist froze in mid-air.

“Stop,” she repeated. “It’s enough. Arrest him. Cuff him. But don’t kill him. That’s not who you are.”

Ryan turned and looked at her, his eyes filled with fury.

“How can we be sure that he won’t get out again?” he pleaded through gasps for air, “that he won’t come after you again?”

“He’s not ever getting out again,” she promised him. “And if he does, I’ll be the one to take him out.”

Ryan’s fist still hovered in the air for a few seconds before he finally relented. Without a word, he pulled out his handcuffs, rolled the barely conscious Costabile onto his stomach, and cuffed his hands behind his back. As he began reading the former police sergeant his rights, Jessie slumped back on the hood of the car.

She stared at Costabile, whose ruined mouth was covered in bloody saliva bubbles, making sure to lock the image in her brain. She felt no pity for him. It was only her love for Ryan—for his reputation and his future—that made her stop him.

But if she and Costabile ever met on a dark street again, she would pick up where Ryan left off. Only she wouldn’t stop. She wouldn’t even try to. She knew what she was capable of.

After all, Jessie Hunt was the daughter of a serial killer. She’d learned to harness the dark impulses he’d passed down to her into something productive, something that helped society. She’d turned her family’s taste for vengeance into a thirst for justice.

But if she let it, that lust for retribution could turn on a dime. It was in her blood. And it was always there, hibernating somewhere deep inside of her.

All she had to do was let it out.