One to Go by Mike Pace Read Free Book Online Page B

midnight when they left the restaurant. They’d barely gotten out of the parking lot before Jess was bent over his lap, tugging at his zipper. He gently lifted her up.
    â€œToo distracting.” His attempt at a laugh was pathetic. “You don’t want to cause an accident, do you?”
Don’t you know, driving distractions kill?
“Let’s wait till we get to your place.”
    â€œMaybe I can’t wait that long.” She kissed him, plunging her tongue down his throat. His view completely blocked by her head, he heard a horn blaring.
    Bright headlights lit up the car’s interior. He was driving in the oncoming lane. Swerving hard right, he just missed a head-on with a huge sedan. Sweat beaded on his forehead.
    â€œSorry, but let’s just cool our jets here. We’ll be at your place soon, then we—”
    He saw her slowly rubbing her hips back and forth on the car seat. Jesus, was she going to masturbate right here in the car? Was this the way girls acted in Oklahoma?
    â€œI got a better idea,” she said. “Let’s go to the Lincoln Memorial. It’s faster.”
    â€œFaster?”
    â€œJust do it, silly, or—” She made a move to bend over his lap again.
    â€œOkay, okay.”
    Given the hour, it took little time to reach the memorial and find a parking space on Ohio Drive.
    Her skirt devoid of pockets, Jess carried her cell phone in her left hand, and took his hand in her right, then led him up the marble steps to the memorial.
    â€œExpecting a call?” asked Tom.
    She winked. “Photo op.”
    â€œIs the memorial open?”
    â€œTwenty-four hours,” responded Jess. “On-site rangers leave at 11:30. After that, it’s just routine patrol.”
    â€œAnd you know this how?”
    She responded with a grin.
    When they reached the memorial, she gently tugged him toward the Lincoln statue.
    â€œStand there, in front.” Tom complied, and while she fussed with her phone to take the picture, he looked up into the sixteenth president’s face. From the sharp angle, it was as if God himself was staring down at him with an expression of weary disapproval. He whispered, “I have no choice.”
    â€œWhat did you say?” asked Jess.
    â€œNothing.”
    â€œThen smile.”
    She took the photo. “Come on. Don’t know when the next patrol’s going to swing by.”
    Tom looked around. No doors, just four walls, each bearing Lincoln’s famous words. “Come where?”
    She led him behind the statue. From the front, Tom had assumed the statue was positioned flush against the wall, directly beneath the words:
In this temple, as in the hearts of the people for whom he saved the Union, the memory of Abraham Lincoln is enshrined forever
. But there was a gap between the wall and the back of Lincoln’s chair—more of a throne—consistent with the artist’s view of the memorial as a temple. A draped robe fell from Lincoln’s shoulders down the back of the chair.
    Jess pulled him into the tight space. They were hidden from everyone except somebody who might happen to walk around to the back of the statue.
    She reached up high and set her phone deep into the folds of Lincoln’s draped robe, then braced herself against the wall and lifted her skirt. No underwear.
    Like a woman possessed, she pulled at his belt and zipper. Tom was surprised his body responded to her ministrations. Pleasantly surprised, actually. She wrapped her legs around him, and for a short time he forgot about death and lost himself in the essence of life.

    By Thursday, he’d made no progress in finding a target. He’d early on come to an obvious decision—he would only target someone who deserved to die. A bad guy. He banished from his mind the natural follow-up questions: What if he couldn’t find a bad guy? Would he let Janie die? Would he roll the dice and pray one of the other