Free Thirst No. 3 by Christopher Pike Page B

since the system proved useless in the last attack, I don’t fret over its absence.
    I have learned little about my assailant since he burned to death. I was able to retrace his steps and find his Gatling gun, and from there I was able to follow his path back to a van parked at the end of a road that lay about three miles from my home. A search of the van turned up nothing: no ID, fake or otherwise, no money, no hotel keys, no maps, not even a round of ammunition. Yet it’s clear the van was a rental, and I’ve passed its license plates on to the same FBI agents and detectives that are working on the IIC mystery.
    I feel the two mysteries must be connected. They enteredmy life at the same time—the same day—a remarkable coincidence, and I have never believed in coincidences. So far everything Lisa Fetch and Jeff Stephens told me about IIC has proven to be accurate. Although my sources have been unable to discover how the firm excels in the market, they have uncovered proof linking it to other investment companies. It appears IIC and its partners are quietly accumulating a trillion dollars without anyone knowing about it.
    Lisa had spoken of the disappearance of an old boyfriend, Randy Clifford, who vanished into thin air while hacking into IIC’s computer system. My friends in the FBI have been able to determine that a certain “Marko” visited him the night he vanished. Marko is known to the FBI to be a highly paid hit man with Mob connections. My people tell me his price is high for the best of assassins—a million even. It seems he can charge so much because he has the ability to make his “marks” disappear without a trace. I can only assume that’s how he earned his nickname.
    I plan to visit Marko soon.
    After all the noise on my property, I had to act fast to keep the local police and a stream of higher authorities from investigating too closely. I managed to keep my privacy the old-fashioned way—by paying exorbitant bribes through my East Coast attorneys. The money has worked so well, not a single person in town has asked why my house just happened to explode.
    But even people who have been paid to remain silent inevitably talk, and I fear such talk will get back to Teri and Matt.But since I never gave them my address in the countryside, they have no reason to connect me to the rumors going around town about the “house that got hit by the meteor.”
    I sort of like that rumor.
    I wonder who started it?
    My new home is a single story, a spacious rectangle, also located in the woods but hidden in the trees, with no view of a lake. It already possesses a lead-lined vault, which I have stocked with enough weapons to repel a small army. By coincidence, I now own a Gatling gun that is identical to the one that destroyed my original home.
    Sigh. That was one toy I could not bear to let the police take.
    Teri and Matt arrive on time, at three, on a Tuesday afternoon. We have a late lunch of swordfish, which I grill out back beside my Olympic-size pool. Now that I no longer have a lake to leap into, I enjoy the pool. Swimming is my favorite exercise. Naturally, my liver and leg wounds have totally healed. I don’t feel so much as a twinge when I do my hundred laps each morning.
    I have told Teri and Matt to bring their bathing suits, and it turns out Matt is every bit the athlete his girlfriend is. He could never compete against me, of course, but I note how hard he has to swim to get out of breath. He is competitive when it comes to Teri. The two race before we eat, and he makes a point of winning each lap. Teri sees it all as good fun, but I notice he doesn’t. The guy does not like to lose.
    I soon find that to be true when it comes to arguments.
    Teri’s eyes often stray to his well-muscled body, and I must say I find myself looking at him longer, and more often, than I should. There are no two ways about it—the guy is hot.
    I’m careful not to let Teri catch me looking.
    After we swim and eat, Teri