The Blonde by Duane Swierczynski Read Free Book Online Page A

see. Because he was a guy.
    Men were visual creatures, endlessly fascinated by the randombody parts of women they didn’t even find particularly attractive. In his case, even a woman who had poisoned him. He couldn’t
not
look.
    “Hey.”
    Jack caught a fleeting glimpse: Kelly’s pale white skin, with a perfectly trimmed triangle of red hair, shaved close. Definitely not a natural blonde. Then it was gone, hidden by the pink stripes of a pair of bikini briefs.
    “I’m sorry. Thought you were done.”
    “Right.” Kelly smirked. “Though I suppose I owe you at least a look, don’t I? After all I’ve put you through?”
    “You don’t owe me anything.”
    “I owe you an explanation. But are you ready to hear it?”

12:18  a.m.
    Edison Avenue
     
    E xplain it to me best you can.”
    Kowalski was on his cell. He’d convinced Ed’s wife— Claudia, her name was—to return to her bedroom for a moment while he called for backup. He, of course, was doing no such thing, and Claudia would know within a minute something hinky was going on. The clock, as always, was ticking.
    Welcome to my life.
    Then he’d headed back to the bathroom. Christ. The Dydak Brothers would have come in their pants, all this blood. This was at least a six- or seven-hour detail.
    Next, he’d hit the phone. Called his handler on the last number he’d memorized. Asked her what to do.
    “Explain it to me best you can,” she’d said.
    Kowalski stepped inside the bathroom, closed the door—he didn’t want Claudia hearing this stuff—and quickly described theinjuries. It was all from the neck up. No visible gunshot wounds or lacerations. All of the blood seemed to have spurted out through the eyes, nose, ears, and mouth. Like the man’s brain were a blood orange and some invisible force had reached in and squeezed tight in one spasmodic jerk.
    “Hold, please.”
    Claudia started sobbing again. He could hear her through the wall. Damn it, this wasn’t going to last long. Hopefully, the brain boys up in CI-6 were moving fast. Telling his handler how to respond. What to do next.
    “We’re going to need the subject’s head,” his handler said. “Seal it and await pickup instructions. I’ll call you on this phone.”
    That’s what Kowalski thought. Fuck. With the wife next door, this was going to be complicated. Then another thought occurred to him. One subject, kissing another, the new subject dead within an hour. Bioweapon? Supervirus? Ebola?
    “Should I quarantine the house? The subject’s wife is here.”
    I’m here
,
    “No need. But do not let any of the subject’s blood to come in contact with any open wounds or scrapes or mucous membranes. Treat it like AIDS. Clear? We also need you to clean the house.”
    Kowalski didn’t need clarification on that one. “Clean” didn’t mean Windex and rags.
    Claudia was still crying.
    Now this joker in the bathroom might or might not have gotten what he deserved. It’s never good karma to kiss a strange woman in an airport when you’ve got a wife at home. But the wife was innocent, as far as he knew.
    Claudia, grieving like anyone would.
    Anyone normal.
    Push it away, Kowalski. Look for tools at hand; obsess over this shit later. It’s what you’re good at, remember? Push
everything
away.
    He opened the medicine cabinet. He found what he needed inthree seconds. His eyes checked the label. Yeah, it was the kind he needed. The kind that wouldn’t snap halfway through. Claudia came back to see what was taking so long, why there weren’t a thousand flashing lights and sirens outside her house because her husband, Christ in heaven, her husband’s brain had exploded inside his skull, and the entire fucking world should be racing to the scene to help, to figure out what went wrong. That’s what Kowal-ski would expect her to be thinking anyway.
    “What are you doing in there?”
    He grabbed the plastic box of dental floss, flicked the top open.
    The best operations supplied their own