The turn of events downstairs had caught me off guard. First, when Jonas looked at me but didn’t really see me after I’d crawled out from underneath that table. And then again when I’d seen the disaster waiting to happen and instead of letting the young man taste even a small amount of the same pain he’d inflicted on others, I’d been more concerned with reaching him in time to keep him from getting hurt.
While the nails in my shoulder hadn’t felt great, I’d lucked out that Jonas had dragged me upstairs to his personal space because it saved me from having to break in later to plant one of the listening devices I had with me. The second he’d stepped into the bathroom, I’d made quick work of placing the bug underneath the edge of the counter in the kitchenette and then covered the move by pretending to explore his apartment. And then I saw the painting…the one I’d seen him working on for hours the day before. I knew shit about art but I’d known the second I saw it why he’d spent so much time on it. Because he wasn’t just painting some abstract image that made only sense to him. No, he was putting himself into every stroke of the brush, into every carefully selected color. Pain, hope, grief…I saw it all. And as he’d returned to the room, all I’d wanted to do was enfold him in my arms and ask him who he was and why he needed to use a paintbrush to tell the world what he was feeling.
And then I’d gotten pissed…royally pissed. Because no sob story gave him the right to hurt those who needed to be protected the most. He’d had a choice – even if the worst had happened to him, he could have ended the cycle instead of continuing it.
“Mace?”
I jerked myself from my thoughts and saw that Jonas had actually stepped closer to me and his hand was resting on my arm. I casually pulled free of him as I tried to remember what he’d asked me. The fog of confusion finally cleared and I remembered him mentioning the hourly rate he was offering.
“That’s fine,” I said quickly.
“Great,” he said with a smile. “How about I show you what I have in mind?”
I nodded and followed him from the apartment back to the first floor. I’d already gotten a pretty good look when I first entered through the unlocked front door. The main part of the space had been constructed of mostly brick walls and there were several interior walls that broke up the openness of the space. Since I’d already known Jonas was an artist, I’d assumed he was likely planning to use that part of the space as his gallery to showcase his work. I wasn’t as sure what his plans were for the room we’d been in when the nearmiss had happened. The wood that had fallen was only a fraction of the debris that cluttered the area and I knew most of the work would need to happen in that room. A couple of the walls were exposed and many of the ceiling tiles were loose or gone all together and the linoleum floor was torn and dirty.
“So this is where the classes will be, so I want to get this cleaned up, close off the walls and put down some new flooring. The table would actually be a great place for me to put the paints so the kids can pick what they need…”
My ears caught on the word ‘kids’ and my whole body stiffened and a sour taste flooded my mouth.
“Kids?” I asked as casually as I could.
Jonas chuckled and shook his head. “Sorry, I’m getting ahead of myself. Yeah, I’m starting up an after school art program for some of the needier kids in the city whose schools had to get rid of their art programs because of budget cuts.”
Jonas motioned around the room. “This will be the studio where they can work on different projects and up front will be the gallery where I can hang their stuff so they can show off their work to the community.”
My ears were ringing so loudly that I barely heard the rest of what he said because after weeks of indecision, the young man in front of me had just sealed his own fate.
By the timeI got back to the shitty apartment across the street, my trigger finger was itching and I felt a calm settle in my bones that I hadn’t felt even once in the past three weeks as I’d watched Jonas through my scope. The sensation was familiar and comforting and washed away the temporary warmth that the young artist’s touch had caused.
I snatched my rifle from the closet in the dark bedroom that had only a twin mattress in the middle of it and then strode towards the bathroom. The weight of the gun sent me to a whole other level as I pushed open the bathroom door. By the time I crouched on thefloor and balanced the rifle on the window sill, my breathing had already slowed dramatically and my body had readied itself for the escape it would need to make before Jonas’s body even hit the floor. It was unlikely the sound of the rifle would even be heard over the din of the traffic below but I wasn’t going to take any chances.
I flipped open the scope and felt a rush of pleasure go through me at the sight of Jonas standing with his back to the window. He was near his painting but not looking at it. His phone was to his ear and I debated whether or not to take the shot while he was talking. If he stepped even a little to the left or right, he’d be out of my line of sight and I’d have to bide my time until I had another chance. I wanted this done now, damn it. I’d have to risk it.
As I rested my finger on the trigger and began the process of settling myself, my phone rang and I bit back a curse. Sweat began to form on my brow as the delay caused a shard of doubt to permeate my brain. I needed to get a grip and stop waffling back and forth on Jonas’s innocence. I’d had the proof in my hands for three weeks – the arrest record, the medical records and statements of the three victims, the picture of the fourth victim whose body had yet to be found. And now the fucker had admitted that he was going to bring his prey directly to him under the guise of doing a good thing for those in need. Fuck, he’d even picked his targets perfectly – the most vulnerable kids who wouldn’t have anyone watching out for them. A guy with Jonas’s background would be able to spot the neediest, weakest kid in the bunch and do whatever he wanted to him.
My phone stopped ringing but then started up again within seconds.
“Fuck!” I shouted and snatched it up. “What?” I snarled at Mav, even though my anger had nothing to do with him and everything to do with me because my hesitation had let my gut take over again and the calmness that had settled over me earlier was gone.
“Listen,” was all Mav said and then there was a click and I heard Jonas’s voice come on the phone and I realized Mav had tapped into the bug I’d planted and was picking up the conversation Jonas was having with the other person on the phone.
“I don’t know, Case. He seems nice but there was something about the way he looked at me…it reminded me of...”
Jonas’s voice dropped off as he listened to whoever was speaking. I cursed the fact that I couldn’t hear the other person talking.
“I know that in my mind, but I still feel like he’s out there.”Another pause and then Jonas said,“No, I need to do this and I need to do it myself. You get that, right?”
The combination of fear and determination in Jonas’s voice had me looking through the scope. At some point, he’d turned around and was watching the traffic on the street below. A smile graced his lips as he said,“His name is Mace.”His voice dropped as he coyly said,“Yes, he is.”
Fuck, why the hell hadn’t I thought to have Mav clone his phone so I could hear the whole conversation?
Jonas laughed.“I am so not going to take creeper shots of him with my phone just to satisfy your curiosity.”
I couldn’t help but smile at that.
Jonas listened for a few minutes and then said,“Yeah, I will. Tell Devlin and the kids I say hi…I love you too.”
After hanging up the phone, Jonas stood at the window for a moment before finally turning his attention to the painting, putting his back to me once more. But I knew it didn’t matter either way because I wasn’t taking the shot.
