Final Crossing: A Novel of Suspense Read Online Free Page A

hole, she’ll see no one.
    The footsteps inside stop. A few seconds pass. Rudiger thinks he might have to force himself in. Then she unlocks the door and opens it.
    Stupid.
    Rudiger swings into view, smashing his fist into the bridge of her nose before she can even think to react. She falls backwards and lands hard on the floor. Carpet keeps her skull from cracking.
    Rudiger shuts and locks the door as he listens to her wheezing and gurgling on the floor. He hums louder, losing himself in the rhythms of a song he can’t place. When he turns to her, she is groaning and grabbing her face. He pulls her hands from her face and drags her by the arms out of view from the front door.
    He drops her arms and they thud on the hallway floor. Rudiger knows she is done. She can’t move. Can’t scream. Helpless. He quickly searches the small house. No one else home.
    When he returns she stretches her face into terrified protest. Probably was hoping I was looking for money , he thinks. Or jewelry. But I came for her and her alone. Now she knows it.
    He straddles her body and squats down over her torso. His legs pin her arms to her sides. She opens and closes her eyes, as if eventually she’d open them and he’d be gone.
    “Pullee...pullee...” Her words are garbled, but Rudiger knows she is saying please . He’s an interpreter, after all.
    She begins to cry, stopping only to choke on the blood draining into her throat.
    For a second, he sees something in her eyes, a flash that pulls him back into a void. He sees the whore, standing over him, laughing as the Preacherman starts slicing up the side of his face, telling him he’s a dirty fucking boy. A sinning boy. So bad a sinner that he better hope Jesus gives him forgiveness when the Rapture comes. And that whore bitch woman just laughed as the blood poured down his face.
    The vision fades.
    The woman closes her eyes. Rudiger begins.

5
    WASHINGTON D.C. APRIL 6
    “YOU ’RE BACK.” Veronica’s gaze swept over Jonas, noting the soft cast on his wrist. “Not too much worse for the wear. Didn’t get your pretty face too bruised up.”
    Which wasn’t true. He still had a large welt on his forehead. Jonas dropped his briefcase on his desk, looking at the clutter. He’d only been gone for three days, but three days is all it takes in politics to lose your footing permanently.
    He turned to his assistant, whom he only ever called V. Tall, athletic. Feminine to the point Jonas assumed that, at any time, only expensive lingerie separated her couture from her naked skin. She was achingly beautiful and inexplicably single, and Jonas had often been tempted to ask her out before his senses got the better of him. It was bad enough his personal life was always fucked-up. He didn’t want to do the same with his professional one.
    “You didn’t come to visit me in the hospital,” he said.
    “I did. You just weren’t conscious.” She brushed past him and dropped a stack of papers on his desk without explaining what they were. “It was the only time I’ve seen you vulnerable.”
    A dull ache resumed in the back of his head. “Then you haven’t been around me enough.”
    “I’m glad you’re okay.”
    “Thanks, V. Me, too. What did I miss in the last couple of days?”
    She shrugged. “Just the normal life-and-death decisions that are made here every day.”
    “Anything actually interesting?”
    “No. Not really.” She paused. “Except Michael Calloway. You heard about that?”
    “Who hasn’t? It’s the only thing on the news.” Jonas thumbed through the stack of papers she’d given him. None of it could wait, but all of it would. “I’m catching a flight later to go to the funeral. The Senator asked me to.”
    “Need anything from me?” she asked. “You mean like a date to a funeral?”
    “I have just the outfit.”
    “I’m sure you do. But I don’t think the point of the funeral is to have all eyes on you.” Jonas flipped through the first few pages of a brief