Jack & Jill (Alex Cross 3)

We followed him between the tight rows of barely moving traffic. Blaring car horns provided chaotic background noise for the foot chase along Ninth Street.

Chop-It-Off-Chucky burst forward. He’d gotten his second wind.

Suddenly, he veered right and into a gleaming, glass-and-steel office building. The building looked silver blue.

Madness, pure and simple.

I had my detective’s shield already out as we entered the office building several strides behind Chucky. “Spanish guy, red beard. Which way?” I yelled at the dazed and confused-looking security guard standing around in the plush, paneled lobby.

He pointed to the middle car at a metal-on-metal elevator bank. The car had already left the ground floor. I watched the floor indicator: three—four—rising fast. Sampson and I jumped into the open door of the car nearest the front entrance.

I hit ROOFTOP with the palm of my hand. That was my best guess.

“Roadrunner said Perez was a porter at Famous Pizza,” I told Sampson. “There was a Famous on the ground floor here.”

“Think Chucky’s a creature of habit? Likes roofs? Has his favorites all picked out?”

“I think he had a couple of escape routes figured out, just in case. And, yeah, I think he’s a creature of habit.”

“He’s most definitely a creature.”

The elevator bell rang, and Sam

pson and I scrambled out, guns first. We could see the Capitol in the distance. Also the Statue of Freedom. Pretty sight under other circumstances. Weird, now. Kind of sad.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Shanelle Green. I kept seeing her brutalized face. What had he hit her with? How many times? Why? I wanted to catch this bastard so bad, it hurt. Hurt my body; hurt my head even worse.

We moved away from the building, and I finally spotted Chucky outlined against the skyline. My heart sank.

Chucky did have an escape route in mind. He had thought about this before. Somebody coming to get him. He sure was acting guilty. He had to be our killer.

“Fuck you, peachfuzz!” he screeched, taunting us again.

Then he took off on a long, running start. He had a powerful stride—a long stride.

“No,” I moaned. “No, no, no.”

I knew what he was going to do.

Perez was going to jump from building to building.

“Stop, you son of a bitch,” Sampson shouted, “or I will shoot!”

But he didn’t stop. We watched him take a flying leap.

We ran to the edge of the roof, both of us screaming at the top of our lungs. There was a second office building catty-corner to our roof. The top of that building was a floor below where Sampson and I now stood.

Chop-It-Off-Chucky was airborne between the buildings, the glass-and-steel caverns.

“Jesus!” I gasped as I peered straight down over the side. The gap between the buildings was at least twenty feet wide, maybe more.

“Fall, you bastard. Hit a wall,” Sampson yelled at the flying figure. “Go down, Chucky!”

He’s done this before. He’s practiced his escape, I thought as I watched. No wonder he’s never been caught. How many years on the loose? How many kids molested or murdered?

We had our guns out, but neither of us fired. We had no proof that he was the killer. He had only run from us, had never pointed a weapon. Now, this insane leap from one office building to another.

Chucky looked suspended in motion sixteen floors up. A long, long way down.