Free The Crimes of Jordan Wise by Bill Pronzini

like mine, watching all the disparate factors mesh perfectly, that gives you a godlike feeling of power and invincibility. Outwardly I was the same quiet, nondescript individual I'd always been, a small man going about his daily routine among larger men. Inwardly I stood apart from them, towered above them, like a minor deity observing the actions of mere mortals with an amused, winking, sometimes gloating eye.
     
    Annalise grew more and more anxious as time passed. I had to call her two and then three times a week to reassure her, keep her calm and focused. It wasn't that she was losing her nerve; it was the enforced waiting, alone in that shabby apartment in a strange city, imagining all sorts of disaster scenarios in spite of her better judgment. She would be fine when the time came for her part in the final phase, a role that was absolutely vital.
     
    I created, okayed, and passed on the final set of invoices, the last of them on the fifteenth, to ensure payment before the end of the month. As soon as I received notification of deposit from all six banks, I went around to each and closed the account, requesting wire transfers of the funds to the Wise Investments account in the Caymans. To forestall questions and suspicions, and to add an element of confusion for the FBI and insurance investigators, I gave each bank officer a different explanation for the closure and transfer: I was retiring, I was selling the business and buying another, I was moving to New York, Florida, Cozumel, Grand Cayman.
     
    The total score, including the few hundred dollars I had left in my own savings and checking accounts, was $602,496.
     
    I made my last call to Annalise in Chicago on Wednesday, the twenty-seventh. She said, sounding a little breathless, "I leave for Phoenix at noon tomorrow. The woman at the airline said there are plenty of seats, but I made a reservation anyway. Just to be sure."
     
    "Good."
     
    "Did you make yours in San Diego?"
     
    "All taken care of. The name of the motel is—?"
     
    "Greenbriar."
     
    "Phone number?"
     
    She recited it from memory.
     
    "The name I'll be using?"
     
    "Philip Smith."
     
    "Name and address of the garage?"
     
    "Mainline Parking, 1490 Alvarado."
     
    "Details of your route?"
     
    "All memorized. I'll take the maps along, but I don't think I'll need to look at them again."
     
    "Time to call me?"
     
    "Six o'clock Saturday night."
     
    "Sooner if you're ready early," I said. "I'll make sure to be in the room from five o'clock on."
     
    "God, Richard, it's almost over, isn't it?" She had been calling me Richard for months by then, without a slip; Jordan Wise had already ceased to exist for her. "Almost over!"
     
    "This phase. There's still one more."
     
    "I know, but it won't be bad once you're here. I miss you like crazy."
     
    I said I missed her the same way, and we told each to be careful driving. Just before she hung up she said, "Richard, I want you to know . . ." and there was a pause, and then for the first time she said, "I love you."
     
    I held those three words close the rest of the day, took them to bed with me that night.
     

    Friday, September 30.
     
    Jordan Wise went to Amthor Associates for the last time, sat at his desk in Accounting for the last time, finished preparing for the annual October audit for the last time. He went to lunch with Jim Sanderson, exchanged the usual tired complaints with him and the other drudges. And throughout the long, busy day, he stood apart and looked down at them from his superior height and smiled at their dull normalcy and winked at their foolish weekend plans and gloated at the thought of their reactions when they found out what he had done.
     
    At five o'clock he said good-bye to them for the last time, rode the elevator down to the lobby, walked to the parking garage where he had left his car with his one suitcase and one briefcase already locked in the trunk, drove out into the Friday-evening-commute traffic.
     
    And