“They were at an end. I didn’t kill the lady and all I get from you is cut-up newspaper. I’m the one who should be pissed.”
Jackson ticked the points off with his fingers. “You followed the woman back to New York. You, in fact, have been following her all over the city. You sent her a note. You met with her, and while I wasn’t privy to the conversation itself, from the looks of things the subject matter wasn’t pleasant.”
“How the hell do you know all that?”
“There isn’t much I don’t know, Mr. Romanello. There really isn’t.” Jackson put the glasses back on.
“Well, you can’t prove anything.”
Jackson laughed, a laugh that sent every hair on Romanello’s neck skyward and made him reach for his gun, a gun that was no longer there.
Jackson looked at the man’s amazed face and shook his head sadly. “Subways are so crowded this time of night. Pickpockets, I understand, can stalk honest people with impunity. There’s no telling what else you might find missing.”
“Well, like I said, you can’t prove it. And it’s not like you can just go to the cops. You hired me to kill someone. That doesn’t do a whole lot for your credibility.”
“I have no interest in going to the authorities. You disobeyed my instructions and in doing so jeopardized my plans. I came here to inform you that I was aware of this, to plainly show you that the rest of your money has been forfeited because of your improper actions, and that I have decided upon the appropriate punishment. A punishment that I fully intend to mete out now.”
Romanello drew himself up to his full six feet three inch height, towering over Jackson, and laughed heartily. “Well, if you came here to punish me, I hope you brought somebody else with you to do the punishing.”
“I prefer to handle these matters myself.”
“Well, then this is going to be your last job.” In a flash, Romanello’s hand went down to his ankle and he was erect again in a second, the jagged-edge blade in his right hand. He started forward and then stopped as he eyed the device in Jackson’s hand.
“The touted advantages of strength and superior size are so often overrated, wouldn’t you agree?” said Jackson. The twin darts shot out from the taser gun and hit Romanello dead center in the chest. Jackson continued to squeeze the trigger, sending 120,000 volts of electricity along the thin metal cords that were attached to the darts. Romanello went down as though poleaxed, and he lay there staring up as Jackson stood over him.
“I’ve held the trigger down for a full minute now, which will incapacitate you for at least fifteen minutes, more than ample for my purposes.”
Romanello watched helplessly as Jackson knelt down beside him and gingerly pulled the two darts free and packed the apparatus back in his pocket. He carefully opened Romanello’s shirt. “Quite hairy, Mr. Romanello. A medical examiner will never pick up on the extremely small holes in your chest.” The next item Jackson withdrew from his coat would have left Romanello numb if he hadn’t already been. With his tongue feeling as big as a knobby tree root, Romanello thought he had suffered a stroke. His limbs were useless to him; there was no physical sensation at all. He could still see clearly, however, and suddenly wished he had been blinded as well. He watched in horror as Jackson methodically checked the hypodermic needle he held in his hand.
“It’s mostly an innocuous saline solution, you know,” Jackson said as though he were addressing a science class. “I say mostly, because what’s lurking in here can be quite deadly under certain conditions.” He smiled down at Romanello and paused for a moment as he considered the import of his own words and then continued. “This solution contains prostaglandin, a substance produced naturally in the body. Normal levels are measured in micrograms. I’m about to give you a dose several thousand times that, measured in milligrams in fact. When this dose hits your heart it will cause the coronary arteries to severely constrict, triggering what doctors would technically term a myocardial infarction or coronary occlusion, also known as a heart attack of the most devastating kind. To tell you the truth, I’ve never combined the effects of electrification caused by the stun gun with this method of inflicting death. It might be interesting to observe the process.” Jackson was betraying no more emotion than if he were about to dissect a frog in biology class. “Since prostaglandin occurs naturally in the body, as I mentioned, it’s also naturally metabolized by the body, meaning there will be no suspiciously high traces left for a medical examiner to detect. I’m currently working on a poison to which I will attach an enzyme, encapsulated by a special coating. The protective cover is quickly broken down by the components in the bloodstream; however, the poison will have ample time to do its work before that occurs. Once the protective coating is gone the enzymes will instantly react with the poison compound and break it down, in effect destroying it. They use a similar process to clean up oil slicks. It’s absolutely untraceable. I was planning to use it on you tonight; however, the process is not yet perfected and I hate to rush things of that nature. Chemistry, after all, requires patience and precision. Hence, the fallback to the old reliable: prostaglandin.”
Jackson held the needle very close to Romanello’s neck, seeking the perfect entry site. “They will find you here, a young, strapping man felled in his prime by natural causes. Another statistic in the ongoing health debate.”
Romanello’s eyes almost exploded out of his head as he struggled with every ounce of will to break the grip of inertia the stun gun had caused. The veins stood out on his neck with the effort he was exerting and Jackson quietly thanked him for providing such a convenient place, right before the needle plunged into the jugular vein and its contents poured into his body. Jackson smiled and gently patted Romanello on the head as his pupils shot back and forth like a metronome.
From his bag, Jackson extracted a razor blade. “Now, a sharp-eyed medical examiner might pick up on the hypodermic’s entry site, so we will have to address that.” Using the razor, Jackson nicked Romanello’s skin at the precise place the needle had gone in. A drop of blood floated to the surface of the skin. Jackson replaced the razor in the bag and pulled out a Band-Aid. He pressed it across the fresh cut and sat back to study his handiwork, smiling as he did so.
“I’m sorry that it’s come to this, as your services might have been useful to me in the future.” Jackson picked up one of Romanello’s limp hands and made the sign of the cross over the stricken man’s chest. “I know that you were raised Roman Catholic, Mr. Romanello,” he said earnestly, “although you obviously have strayed from the teachings of the Church, but I’m afraid a priest to administer last rites is out of the question. I hardly think it matters where you’re going anyway, do you? Purgatory is such a silly notion after all.” He picked up Romanello’s knife and placed it back in the sheath strapped to his ankle.
Jackson was about to stand up when he noted the edge of the newspaper sticking out from the inside of Romanello’s jacket pocket. He nimbly plucked it out. As he read the article detailing the story of the two murders, drugs, LuAnn’s disappearance, and the police’s search for her, his features became grim. That explained a lot. Romanello was blackmailing her. Or attempting to. Had he discovered this piece of information a day earlier, Jackson’s solution would have been simple. He would’ve executed LuAnn Tyler on the spot. Now he could not do that and he hated that he had lost partial control of the situation. She had already been confirmed as the winning ticket holder. She was scheduled to appear to the world in less than twenty-four hours as the lottery’s newest winner. Yes, now her requests made more sense. He folded up the piece of paper and put it in his pocket. Like it or not, he was wedded to LuAnn Tyler, warts and all. It was a challenge, and, if nothing else, he loved a challenge. However, he would take control back. He would tell her exactly what she had to do, and if she didn’t follow his instructions precisely, then he would kill her after she won the lottery.