Chapter 19

Jill took a deep breath, sensing Peralta's movements behind her. She glanced at Sabrina, who met her gaze for an instant and then turned away. She knew without a doubt that Sabrina would act the moment she did. She waited tensely for Peralta, trying to figure out just the right moment before he pulled the trigger.

"I'ts almost a shame to be wasting such a beautiful woman. Too bad we don't have time to get to know each other better, princess." he said coolly. Jill heard the hammer click back.

Jill tensed and prepared herself for action, her heart pounding furiously in her chest.

A split second later, the back wall suddenly exploded into the warehouse with a booming crash, the earsplitting squeal of tires and twisting metal causing her to whip her head around in terror. The cries of surprise from the two men who had been standing by were disturbingly cut short as a chunk of wall barreled into them powered by some unseen force, crushing them to the floor.

A speeding car had just caved in the entire back wall and skidded past her. It spun around and screeched to a halt as it crashed into a wall of crates, the engine still running.

Jill snapped out of her shock and leaped to her feet. Peralta was still holding the gun where she had been kneeling moments before, a look of shocked disbelief etched on his face, his brain still registering what had just happened. He hadn't even noticed that Jill had moved.

She sent a flying right hook at his face as hard as she could. He grunted in surprise and lurched to the side, momentarily off balance. Jill struck again, kneeing him in the groin. Peralta dropped the gun and fell to his knees. He swatted at Jill, who nimbly dodged his blow and sent a crippling karate chop to the side of his neck.

Peralta crumpled to the floor, unconscious.

"Jill!" Sabrina cried as she grabbed her friend's shoulder. She had watched in stunned silence as Jill took down Peralta and had just recovered from the shock of the past few seconds.

Jill whirled around, still pumped with adrenaline and ready to fight. She swung her fist blindly in Sabrina's direction, not realizing who she was in the heat of the moment.

"Whoa! It's me!" Sabrina cried, taking a quick step backwards to dodge the blow. Jill exhaled loudly and threw her arms around friend.

"Are you ok?" Jill whispered in Sabrina's ear.

"Yeah, I'm ok." Sabrina answered quickly. Jill pulled away from her to get a better look. Sabrina's lip was bleeding and she had a nasty gash on her cheek where Peralta hit her with his gun, but otherwise seemed to be fine. She reached up and brushed her hand alone the gash on Sabrina's face. "Are you sure?" she pressed, a concerned expression on her face.

Sabrina pulled away. "I'm sure."

The two girls looked around the demolished warehouse. Dust was still settling in the air around them. The car had brought down the entire back wall on top of Peralta's cronies. The girls cringed at the sight. The men most likely wouldn't be getting up any time soon. If it all. Their gaze fixed on the car, which was idling as it rested against the splintered wood of the crates it had destroyed. They both suddenly realized that it was Jill's car.

"Kelly's not in the car, is she?" Sabrina asked, her tone laced with dread.

Jill shook her head slowly. "I don't know. I'll look." she said softly. She certainly hoped she wasn't.

Peralta groaned and started to raise to his knees. Sabrina glowered at him and stomped hard on his back, sending him crashing back to the ground.

"Pig." she spat. She ripped his neck tie off and, pinning him down with a knee to his shoulder blades, grabbed his arms and tied them tightly behind him. Peralta hardly protested.

Jill fearfully approached the car, afraid of what she might find. As she neared it, it became obvious that there was someone inside. Somebody that wasn't moving.

"Oh, Kelly." Jill breathed. She rushed towards the car and put her face against the window. The glass was cracked, making it hard to see much more than an outline. She ran around to the other side of the car and found the window in the same condition. This one could be broken without hurting Kelly, though. Without thinking, Jill threw her elbow into it, shattering the rest of the glass. She pressed on it, until it fell away, inside the car.

The glass no longer obstructing her view, she peered inside. Kelly was slumped forward unconscious, her head and chest against the steering wheel. Jill threw the door open and crawled over to her friend, carefully avoiding the broken glass. She swallowed hard and reached a hand to Kelly's throat, wincing when her friend's skin felt wet with blood. She whispered a quick prayer and pressed two fingers along her neck.

There was a pulse and Jill could not have been more relieved.

"She's alive, Bri." she called out shakily.

"God, she's in there?!" Sabrina cried.

"Yeah." Jill answered distractedly. She gently lifted Kelly's head off of the steering wheel and leaned her back against her seat. Kelly's head lulled to the side and her limp body followed. Jill gave up and carefully lowered her to her side along the front seats. She gingerly brushed away the hair matted to Kelly's forehead, revealing a bloody scrape where her head had hit the wheel. There was already a bump forming. Jill winced and pressed her forearm to the wound, wiping away the blood with her sleeve.

"Kell, you idiot, you couldn't have taken two seconds to put your seatbelt on? How hard could that have been?" she gently chided her unconscious friend.

Noticing that Jill still hadn't emerged from the car, Sabrina started to get nervous.

"Is she ok?" she asked, her worry evident in her voice.

Jill poked her head out of the window. "She's knocked out, but she's breathing."

"That damn fool. She never listens."

"Well, technically, she followed the r-"

She was cut off when Peralta suddenly started thrashing violently, knocking Sabrina off of his back.

"Jill! Help me!" she cried, trying to keep Peralta from getting up.

Jill quickly scooted out of the car. "Wait there, Kell." she called needlessly. She hurried over to where Peralta was wrestling with Sabrina, scooping up the gun that he had dropped along the way. She knelt down and stuck the barrel between his eyes. His eyes widened in surprise.

"You know, I really dislike you. There is absolutely nothing I would love more than to blow your head off, right now. So keep right on fighting so I have a reason." she threatened in a bubbly, pleasant voice.

Peralta glared at her and stopped struggling.

"Thanks, princess." Jill said with a happy grin. Sabrina sighed and sat down on the floor, letting Jill handle Peralta for a moment.

"So, how much were you going to make off of this little scheme of yours." she asked.

Peralta said nothing.

"You know, you beat up my friend for not answering your questions. That makes me very angry." Jill said casually. She cocked the gun. "Very, very angry. And when I get angry, sometimes I just can't control myself." She gave Peralta a chilling smile that made even Sabrina feel uneasy.

"But why control myself when I have no witnesses and a loaded pistol?" she finished quietly.

Peralta paled and started to talk.

"Fifteen, twenty million." he grumbled.

Sabrina whistled. "That's a lot of cash. How many dealers did you have to give a rain check to tonight? Obviously you were only here to catch us."

"A lot." Peralta answered evasively. He let out a high pitched scream when Jill fired the gun into the air.

"Oh, it slipped. I hate when that happens." she said in a sugary sweet voice. She leveled the gun at his head. "You can just never tell if it'll happen again."

Peralta started to sweat, believing Jill to have lost her mind. "Eleven. That I know of. More might have shown up."

"And you'll gladly give us their names?" Jill asked.

Peralta shrank back from her. "Gladly." he agreed.

"Good idea, princess." Jill remarked in a condescending tone.

Sabrina stood and roughly grabbed Peralta's arm. "Ok, get up. We have places to go."

Peralta stood and walked over to the car where Sabrina kept the gun trained on him. Jill climbed inside and called for a police car and ambulance on the car phone. Kelly still lay unconscious on the front seat. Jill squeezed her hand.

"Hang in there, Kell. Help is coming."

Not knowing how badly she was injured, she decided to leave her in the car until the paramedics arrived. She made her comfortable and climbed out to wait with Sabrina.

"Ok, cops are on their way." she sang.

Peralta looked away, clearly still in disbelief at having been brought down.

"So, you gonna tell us why you killed Lisa Conrad, and all of those people?" Sabrina asked coolly.

Peralta turned and shot her a look of irritated bewilderment. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Oh come on, Artie. Why did you kill the Moretti brother?"

"I didn't kill anybody." he spat at her.

"We found your watch at Robert Moretti's house. Where is he?"

"How should I know?"

Sabrina gave him a piteous look. "Do I have to give the gun back to her?" she said innocently, handing Jill the gun. Jill was doing an excellent job of scaring him with her act, she had decided.

Jill aimed it at his head again, watching him sweat. Her facial expression suddenly twisted into one of anguish. "He was coming for me, officer! There was nothing I could do but shoot him or he would have killed me!" she wailed, her dramatization disturbingly convincing. The threat was clear.

Peralta had never feared a woman before, but Jill terrified him to his very core.

"Look, I swear. I didn't kill those people." he countered frantically.

"So you had someone else do it for you?" Sabrina asked.

Peralta shook his head. "I swear, I don't know what you're talking about. I'll admit to the drugs and I'll give you the names, but I didn't kill anybody."

Jill scoffed. "You nearly killed our friend. You would have killed us. Why should we believe you?"

"Well, circumstances changed, didn't they." Peralta said bitterly, looking at the wrecked car. "I didn't kill anybody."

"You're lying, Artie." Sabrina warned.

Peralta glared at her. "Fuck you. I didn't k-"

Sabrina shrieked in surprise as a round red hole suddenly appeared in Peralta's forehead with a muffled popping sound. He jerked in shock and then crumpled to the ground, dead.

"Jill!" Sabrina cried, looking at her friend with wide, unbelieving eyes.

Jill's eyes darted to her gun in horror, believing for a terrifying instant that it had discharged and killed him. Her gun had not been fired, though. "Wha-?" she started in distressed confusion.

"I did it." a voice from behind them called out. The man stepped out from the shadows he had been hiding in.

Sabrina and Jill spun around and felt the blood drain from their faces as they took in the impossible sight before them.

Robert Moretti.

Back from the dead.