Page 154 of Think Twice

That’s good. It will cause more chaos.

Myron Bolitar walks past the Imagine mosaic.

So close.

You pull down the bill of your cap, more out of habit than for anything approaching security. You are hiding at the mouth of a tunnel made from twigs and branches. Plenty of foot traffic passes you. Dog walkers stroll by for their pets’ nightly relief.

Myron Bolitar has his phone pressed against his ear.

Does that matter—that he might be talking to someone on the phone when you shoot him?

You can’t see how.

Your plan is not complicated. He walks by. You put the barrel of the gun against his head. You pull the trigger.

Myron is thirty yards away from you.

You now don a surgical mask. Better safe than sorry. They are rarer today—surgical masks—but far from uncommon, a hangover from the Covid era.

You are already wearing gloves, of course.

Twenty yards away.

You take out the Ruger LCR. You keep your arm at your side, your dark pants camouflaging your black gun.

Fifteen yards.

You snake your finger onto the trigger.

Seconds away now.

You feel the rush start coursing through you. The anticipation. No, this part isn’t as satisfying as the actual kill. That’s the sweetest—the moment the eyes close and the life leaves the body. But this, the foreplay of murder, is still a heady concoction.

And then, without warning, Myron deviates from the path.

What the…?

He slides quickly behind a tree and presses his back up against it.

Why, you wonder, would he do that?

Is he… hiding?

So it seems.

Does he know you’re here, waiting?

You can’t see how. You watch now as Myron turns his head left and right. Then he cautiously leans out just a little, just enough to look out.

You duck.

But he isn’t looking in your direction.

He is looking back down the path.

As if he knows you are coming for him. Except, of course, he’s looking in the wrong direction.

Did that make sense?