Run for Your Life - James Patterson [15]
“I’m really here to give you a lesson,” he said.
“Give me a lesson?”
“In salesmanship,” the Teacher said, mimicking the prick’s supercilious tone. “You’ll be sew much more successful if you learn to treat all your customers with respect. Watch how it should be done.”
He pushed in the second earplug, then reached into the fanny pack again and drew out an oiled pistol.
“And here,” he said, with his words muffled in his own ears, “we have the Colt M1911 semiautomatic in .45 caliber. Would you care to try it, sir? I dew believe you’ll be impressed by its performance.” He flicked off the safety and put the hammer on full cock.
The clerk’s mouth opened in an O. His lips moved as he stammered words that the Teacher could barely hear. “Oh, my God . . . terribly s-sorry . . .” One soft, manicured hand flew to the cash register and punched open the drawer. “Please, take everything . . .”
But his other hand moved, too, dropping under the counter, no doubt to reach for a hidden alarm button.
The Teacher was expecting that. His finger twitched, and the first big .45-caliber round boomed like a stick of dynamite, blowing the display case into a cymbal crash of shattering glass. The clerk screamed, staggering backward, clutching at his mangled, bloody hand.
“I’m not here to take,” the Teacher said quietly. “I’m here to give you something you’ve wanted your whole life, but were afraid to ask for.
“Redemption.” He emptied the rest of the clip point-blank into the salesman’s chest.
Watching him careen backward, limbs flopping spastically like he’d been hit by a giant sledgehammer, was the most electrically satisfying moment of the Teacher’s life.
There were going to be more of those soon.
He reloaded the Colt with smooth, practiced motions as he hurried back down the steps. As he got to the door, he noticed another suave clerk, crouched beside a cashmere upholstered club chair. This man was shivering in shock, too terrified even to scream for help.
The Teacher paused long enough to press the Colt’s barrel against his cheek. Then he spun the big gun off his finger, caught it in the air, and stuffed it back into his fanny pack.
“You are the witness to history,” the Teacher said, patting the sniveling fop on the head. “I envy you.”
He opened the door enough to scan the streets again, then stepped out of the store and blended in with the passersby on 72nd—once again, just another anonymous guy in the crowd. But he headed straight for the westbound side of the street and hailed the first cab he saw. He instructed the turbaned driver to take him to the Port Authority Bus Terminal, then settled back in the seat and took out the Treo.
“Ralph Lauren Clerk” was the first item that came up on the screen. He deleted it from the list and checked his watch. The operation had taken just two minutes from start to finish, plus he’d caught a cab right off the bat—all even smoother than he could have hoped.
He wasn’t just the Teacher. He was the man.
Chapter 12
AT NINE THAT MORNING, I called my office to take a personal day. It was another no-brainer. If half a dozen sick kids wasn’t a personal crisis, what was? Then, after Mary Catherine and I made sure the troops were accounted for and tended to, I did something I hadn’t done in over a week. I pulled on my FULL-BLOODED IRISH T-shirt and a pair of sweats and went for a run.
As usual, I huffed it up to Grant’s Tomb at 122nd and Riverside to pay my respects to the general. It would have taken magic to make me resemble the lean Manhattan College Jasper center fielder I’d once been, but I managed to keep a steady, strong pace the entire way.
I studiously avoided newspaper stands that would have thrown last night’s debacle in my face, and not a single person started shooting at me. It was by far the nicest morning I’d had in recent memory.
When I got back home, I started at the top of my priority list—substituting a dollar bill for the tooth that Fiona had lost and left under her pillow. In the confusion last night, I’d forgotten all about it. The tooth fairy’s job