Absolute Instinct jc-11 Read online

  “To save our asses, yes. Said he will take the brunt of any disciplinary actions Fischer might want to take, including his dismissal.”

  “Geez, we can't let Eriq take this on himself this way. Did you tell him I was thinking of taking that position with Virginia state? Did you?” She grabbed her phone up and pressed speed dial for Santiva in Quantico.

  Richard stopped her, pressing the phone's off button. “Calm down. There's something else.”

  “What?”

  “Eriq won a 155 million dollar infusion of funds to be used for the Behavioral Science Unit and the FBI M.E. programs to be administered at your discretion, Jess. You're on the board that decides just how this money will be used.”

  She stared at Richard, disbelieving. “I–I don't know what to say.”

  “Jessica Coran? Without words? Mute? The world's turned upside down.”

  “I'll take that as a compliment, I think.”

  “Does this mean you'll stay with the FBI, Jess?”

  “No… no amount of money is worth going through this again. Look down there at that lost soul, Richard.”

  Sharpe looked again at the battered, torn body of the dead young man still in his early twenties. “The kid lived such an unrelentingly brutal emotional nightmare, constantly under assault by his own mother.”

  Then he saw movement.

  At least he thought he saw movement.

  It appeared imperceptible, but yes, Giles Gahran Matisak began to slowly squirm.

  “God blind me for a fool, Jess, he's alive!”

  “What?” She stared down to the body splayed swastikalike and bleeding all over Dr. Stroud's bones, which were apparently the only thing in the exhibit not simulated but the actual diablo spinata transported here from the Mojave.

  Now Jessica, too, saw the pinned Devil's child squirm in pain. “Someone ought to put the wretched thing out of its misery,” she muttered, her gun pointed.

  Richard put a hand over hers, taking the gun from her, saying, “No, Jess. It would only add to your nightmares. Leave it in God's hands.”

  “He's suffered enough.”

  “It is rather like watching a rabid animal, isn't it?”asked Laughlin.

  “You're right, Richard. I won't do it. I won't do it.” She holstered her weapon.

  Laughlin said, “If we can save him, you could study him, as you did with Matisak before him.”

  “What good came of it? Studying this kind of evil does not make it go away, and neither does burying it. It just keeps coming back, and I'm walking away on two good legs from it now for the final curtain.”

  Richard draped his arm about her and placed her head on his chest. “Whatever you decide, I'm behind you one hundred percent, Jess.”

  “With you at my side, Richard, I want to enjoy life more.”

  “As do I, of course.”

  “I want us both to escape this madness that surrounds us. We've paid our dues many times over, you in London, me here.”

  “Time for a little peace and paradise, you mean?”

  “We'll never find it on the path we're on, not as FBI agents without a semblance of normalcy in our lives.”

  “All right then, it's settled! But we must make a pact. Neither of us shall ever be lured back in once we've stepped out of it.

  “Done!” She hugged him to her. “Thank God I have you.”

  “Perhaps I'll find time now to write that book I've carried about in my head all these years.”

  “By all means, Richard, do it,” she said.

  “I love you, Jess. I've loved you all my life.”

  “But you haven't known me all your life.”

  “Doesn't matter. I've loved you-”

  “-all my life!” They said it in unison.

  Richard kissed her passionately while the milling confusion of humanity's floating opera here in the museum continued to file past Giles Gahran Matisak's now-still body. Giles lay still now, beyond caring about the amateur photos being shot or where they might wind up. For a moment, Jessica watched men in tuxedos and women in sequined evening gowns all rubbernecking for a better view of the monster who suddenly let out a final death rattle and was gone.

  “Horace Keene and his team can take care of this untidy mess,” Sharpe firmly said, guiding her along the promenade farther and farther from the horror below. Jessica, nestled in the crook of Richard Sharpe’s embrace, allowed him his way toward the far stairwell and exit. She consciously fought the urge to pull from him and go back to take control of the crime scene. But no, she would not do that, not this time. Fuck them one and all, the FBI, Portland authorities, all her critics who felt she had, over the years, developed a heavy-handedness that put others off, and those who felt she had nothing but a cold sociopathic mind herself to be able to function in this man's world.

  She liked the feel of her feet moving her body out of this lifestyle here and now. She could do this, easily, with enthusiasm simply turn and walk away. Mentally, she had also turned a corner deep within, one camouflaged all these years by ultimately meaningless cliches about duty and honor and integrity and loyalty to something she had no reason to turn her entire life over to, and to a profession that only rewarded in order to take away later, a profession that constantly asked, What have you done for me lately?

  Inside her head, she felt a great sense of freedom rush in to replace all the mendacity that thrived on the system like parasites, fat cutworms, slugs, leeches and lampreys. The freedom she felt allowed her to walk off without a care and to not once look back, but to think only of her future at the ranch with Richard and their animals. To think herself and her sanity and good health and as small a thing as her smile might actually be more important than the next autopsy, than doing an autopsy on the son of Mad Matthew Matisak. Something any competent autopsiest could do.

  “Yeah, Horace Keene can take care of this mess,” she said, stopping Richard in his tracks. She hugged him close. “I want to live now, really live.”

  “Cancun's got great airfares right now, and it's been a while since we've gone diving.”

  “No… maybe later in the year, but now it's home. We do have a wedding to plan.”

  FB2 document info

  Document ID: fbd-61fb87-760a-6a4b-dd90-7d3a-11b0-c63b4a

  Document version: 1

  Document creation date: 29.10.2012

  Created using: calibre 0.9.3, Fiction Book Designer, FictionBook Editor Release 2.6.6 software

  Document authors :

  Robert W Walker

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