The Exterminators

by Bill Fitzhugh

  Klaus said, “A fifty-fifty split?”

  “Seems fair,” Parker said. “Neither of us can pull it off without the other. But we’ve got to move fast. Riviera promised me a forty-five day exclusive to do the job.” He gestured at Father Paul. “But five days later, St. Francis of Assassination here showed up, so I suspect Riviera hired Marcel to put the word out. Once it gets around that you’re in L.A. and you’re worth twenty million, there are going to be more mercenaries in this town than starving actors.”

  Klaus pointed at Bob. “What did I tell you?”

  Bob held his hands up in surrender. “Okay, you were right. I admit it.” Then, in more of a mumble he said, “Of course if you assume the worst about everything, sooner or later you’ll be right about something.”

  Klaus stared at Bob briefly, shaking his head. He knew there was nothing to be gained by arguing, so he returned his attention to Agent Parker. “Exactly how do you propose to kill us?”

  “Well, now, that’s the big question,” Agent Parker said. “And I’m open to suggestions. You conned the guy one time, but, what’s the expression? Fool me once, shame on, uhhh, shame on you. Fool me, uhhh, can’t get fooled again.’”

  “Yeah, something like that,” Mary said, having made the same mistake in the voting booth.

  “This time we’ll need more than a few Polaroids and a hat with a bloody hole in it.” He held his hands out and looked at everyone. “Any questions or suggestions? Comments? No? Well, that’s it. First we’ve got to relocate you guys and avoid getting killed by whoever else is after you and second we have to figure out how to convince Riviera that both of you are dead and that I’m the one who made you that way.”

  “Actually, we have a third problem,” Klaus said. He looked at Father Paul, sitting silently at the end of the couch. “What do we do with this guy?”

  Chapter Forty-six

  Father Paul had slipped into a state of contemplation. He sat there, quiet as the proverbial church mouse, his bound hands clasped in his lap. He stared into space, lost in ecclesiastical thoughts.

  He believed his prayer had been answered. The fasting had slowed his physical functions to the point that his mind was more in tune with Christ. His heart had bloomed like a flower opening to the righteous path, and he was filled with a sense of divine understanding that made him believe he was ready. He experienced such clarity and resolve as he never thought possible. He had achieved a state of actual grace and the ability to receive God’s instructions.

  This guidance lifted a mighty burden from his shoulders. He had done the thing he was morally obliged to do. Actually, he hadn’t done it, Agent Parker had, but in any event, it was done. These men had been warned of the danger they were in. It was up to them to seek forgiveness for their sins and to abandon their evil ways. It wasn’t Father Paul’s job to change them. That would interfere with His plan, whatever it was. That Father Paul didn’t understand the plan was of no consequence. Only the arrogant believe they can grasp such things.

  So he was free to go, free to return to St. Martin’s and continue his own work.

  Transported by this state of grace, Father Paul found himself deeply troubled by the fact that he had entertained the notion that he might kill two men for money. He was afraid of what this said about him, and this led him to reflect on the nature of temptation and its ability to stir the lower powers of the soul. God, he knew, never intended temptation; he merely allowed it as an opportunity to practice virtue and self-control; such a great God was He.

  Satan was the source of the temptation. He had dangled the twenty million in front of Father Paul as a test. Being good at what he does, Satan had made the temptation even more powerful by presenting the two men as murderers and the money as a way to help those in need. A moral win-win, so to speak. This way Father Paul would have to struggle even more with the choice. Upon realizing this, Father Paul felt truly blessed that the Lord had permitted Satan to test him this way, as such an event could be considered evidence that God wanted to show Father Paul that he had the strength of faith necessary to overcome temptation to which lesser mortals would succumb.

  This revelation resulted in a great sense of relief for Father Paul. He had passed the test. He had not given in to temptation. Notwithstanding the fact that he had never actually had an opportunity to kill Bob and Klaus, Father Paul convinced himself that he had held firm, handing Satan a defeat. He could feel the light of God in his soul. His troubles, resolved. His burden, lifted. He breathed deeply and gave thanks.

  But then Klaus said, “What do we do with this guy?” And all eyes turned to him.

  And it was at this moment that Father Paul realized his quandary hadn’t been solved so much as it had been transformed into something much, much worse.

  Chapter Forty-seven

  “What do we do with this guy?”

  “Good question.” Agent Parker considered it for a moment before he said, “What if we turn him over to Homeland Security with his duffle bag, try to sell him as a terrorist?”

  Klaus seemed dubious. “Unless you can arrange a terrorist background for him, the story will not hold very long.”

  “True,” Parker said. “And if the story doesn’t hold, they’ll kick him loose pretty quick.”

  “Yes, and what do you think his first order of business might be then?”

  “That’s a fair point. We don’t want that.”

  “Also,” Bob said, “wouldn’t he just tell them what we’re up to?”

  Parker dismissed that concern with a shrug and a chuckle. “So? If he tells Homeland Security the CIA is out to fake the deaths of two guys from the DOD in order to run a con on a Bolivian drug lord, they’ll either figure he’s nuts or it’s just us doing our job.” He tapped the side of his head as if it was a no-brainer. “In fact that’s exactly what we’d say. It’s just part of the War on Drugs. They’d swallow that.”

  Katy came back into the living room. She and Mary had been on the computer in Bob’s room looking for a new place to live. “Hey,” Katy said. “You ought to see this place we found in Malibu! It’s totally pimped! Mom wants to know how much we can spend.”

  “I don’t know yet,” Bob said. “I’ll talk to my boss tomorrow.” He hesitated before saying, “How much is it?”

  “It’s right on the beach!”

  “How much?”

  She shrugged. “Like twenty thousand a month or something.”

  Bob stared at Katy for a moment to see if she was joking.

  She kept a straight face and said, “What?”

  “Keep looking,” he said. “Inland.”

  Klaus wanted to consider more extreme options for Father Paul. He said, “What about your agency’s program, what do you call it, extraordinary rendition? Can you have him shipped to the Saudis or somewhere for ‘interrogation?’” He made the quotation marks with his fingers.

  “I like the way you think.” Parker chuckled again before he said, “An ex-case officer I know, old Bob Baer, said if you want a serious interrogation, you send a prisoner to Jordan. You want them tortured, send them to Syria. You want ’em to disappear, send them to Egypt.”

  “Egypt, huh?”

  “Yeah, but tell you the truth, these days it’s hard to get anybody on a rendition flight unless they’re a confirmed, hard-core Islamic fundamentalist.”

  Everybody looked at the jowly, white-haired Father Paul. Bob shook his head. “Even with this administration, I think that would be a tough sell. He looks too much like Santa Claus.”

  Father Paul looked up glumly. “Maybe you could convince them it was part of the War on the War on Christmas.” But no one seemed to be listening.

  Klaus said, “What does that leave us with?”

  Agent Parker rubbed his chin and said, “We either keep him like a pet for the rest of hi
s life or we exterminate.”

  No amount of God’s light in the soul could keep this from sounding like bad news to Father Paul. But what could he do? So far the truth hadn’t worked and he couldn’t think of any lies that would do any better. So he stuck with his story. “I’m not what you think I am,” he said.

  “You’re not a killer?”

  “I am a priest.”

  “You’ve never killed anyone?”

  Here, Father Paul paused. He couldn’t start lying now. Well, he could, but he decided not to. “Yes, I have killed.”

  “Ahhh, the plot thickens,” Agent Parker said.

  “I was in Vietnam. During that misguided war.” He paused, as if he couldn’t believe so many years had passed. “I was a tunnel rat.”

  “Ewww.” Agent Parker seemed impressed. “The Cu Chi complex? That was some serious hand-to-hand shit. No wonder you took me down so easily.”

  “Yes, I was trained,” Father Paul said. “It was terrible, nerve-wracking business, crawling around in those stifling black holes with a knife, a pistol, and a flashlight. That’s all you had, nothing else. When you came across the enemy, it was kill or be killed.” He shook his head, sadly, as he thought back on things he had done. “A man can do awful things if the circumstances are right. After what I did, I wanted to atone. That’s why I became a priest.”

  “That’s very touching,” Parker said. “Any of it true?

  “Check my military records,” Father Paul said.

  “Oh, I will,” was Parker’s reply. “But if it’s true, it just proves you’re not only a trained killer but an experienced one.” He reached down and gave Father Paul a pat on the shoulder. “You might want to work on a better story.”

  “Yes, I see your point. But it’s my past and I’m stuck with it.”

  Klaus looked at Agent Parker and said, “Are you sure Egypt is not an option?”

  As they continued discussing his fate, Father Paul realized that even if he told the whole story about Richard Mills’ deathbed confession, there was no way for him to prove it was true, nor was there any reason for them to believe him. And to complicate matters further, no one knew that Richard Mills was ‘The Mongoose.’ In the end Father Paul sat mute. He decided it wasn’t worth violating the seal of the confessional if it didn’t get him off the hook.

  The irony, of course, was that the whole mess resulted from the fruit of people’s beliefs. Father Paul believed Bob and Klaus were professional killers. Bob, Klaus, and Agent Parker believed the same thing about Father Paul. Both sides were wrong in their beliefs, but neither knew it, and, given the nature of faith, no amount of truth-telling would change anyone’s mind. Given all this, Father Paul suddenly felt as if he was back in the tunnels, rounding a corner, face-to-face with the Viet Cong. And he reached the only available conclusion.

  Once again, it was kill or be killed.

  Chapter Forty-eight

  Agent Parker and Father Paul followed Klaus back to his apartment. They locked the priest in the second bedroom. Parker took the fold-out sofa.

  Back at Bob’s place, Mary was soaking in a hot bath.

  Katy was in the guest bed with the blankets pulled up to her chin when Bob knocked on the door and stuck his head in the room. “Hey, Doodlebug, can I come in?”

  “Daaad,” she said in a sweet, exasperated tone. “I’m too old for that nickname.”

  He stepped in. “Sorry,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Old habit. You’ve always been Doodlebug. Want me to start calling you Antlion?”

  “Guh, be serious,” Katy said.

  “All right,” he said. “I’ll work on it.” He gave her a pat on the leg. “You okay? Got everything you need?”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  He looked at Katy’s freshly scrubbed face, relieved to see it free of all the make up she’d started wearing, apparently since he’d moved to L.A. He realized that his objection to all the eyeliner and eye shadow wasn’t that it made her look trashy, just older. He was constantly surprised to discover how hard it was to let his little girl grow up. But he knew better than to talk about that so he said, “Pretty exciting day, huh?”

  Katy played it teenage cool with a dismissive frown. “Better than average,” she said.

  “You think you’ll be able to sleep?”

  “Yeah, why not?”

  “I know your adrenaline kicked in during all the chaos. That stuff’s worse than caffeine, keeping you awake, even after you think it’s worn off.” Bob brushed the bangs from Katy’s forehead and said, “I just wanted to tell you how proud I am of you. You did really good back there.” He broke into a big smile. “I especially liked the blood-curdling scream. I think that really threw him.”

  “Thanks.” Katy seemed simultaneously embarrassed by the praise and eager for more. “It seemed like a good idea at the time, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, and your mom said you were great back at home. Said your Weaver stance was perfect.”

  “She did?” Katy seemed more surprised at her mother’s approval than pleased by it.

  Bob gave a serious nod. “Most kids wouldn’t be that composed in a situation like that, drawing down on an armed man.”

  Katy hunched her shoulders and said, “Most kids haven’t been trained by a world-class assassin.”

  “Yeah, well, Klaus is proud of you too.” He pinched the tip of her nose. “He told me to tell you that.”

  She smile broadly at that, then, after a second, her face slipped into concern. “What do you think’s going to happen? Are more assassins coming after you guys?”

  “It’s a definite possibility.” Bob cocked his head and his eyebrows and said, “You got your gun?”

  She rolled her eyes like it was a dumb question asked one time too many. “In the drawer, safety on.”

  “That’s my girl.”

  Katy looked over to the window. “Is that locked?”

  Bob got up, checked the latch. “Yeah, even has one of those rods in the track to keep it from sliding open. Just in case.”

  “Good. Can’t be too careful.”

  Bob crossed back to the bed, leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. “You scared?”

  Her bravado made her say, “No, not really.” But that wasn’t entirely true. She was afraid the truth sounded too childish, so she didn’t say that she was scared of losing him and Klaus. Instead she said, “It’s just kinda unreal that, you know, a bunch of assassins or whatever are out there looking for you. You know?”

  “Yeah, I know, but listen, it’s going to be fine. We’ve got our own personal CIA agent. Plus Klaus, the three of us, and the Department of Defense. What’s there to be scared of?”

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Mary and Katy spent the next day looking for a new place to live. They got home half an hour before Bob and Klaus returned from work with Thai food.

  Agent Parker was on the computer. Father Paul, hands still tied, fast still unbroken, was sitting on his bed drifting in and out of delirium or something close to it while watching Entertainment Tonight’s coverage of the deaths of Peter Innish and Ashley Novak.

  Mary poked her head into the guest room and said, “Sure you won’t join us?” She looked at Father Paul with remarkable sympathy given that she believed he wanted to kill her husband.

  Father Paul looked up with sunken eyes, shook his head. “No, thank you. I must continue my fast.” He turned his attention back to the perky host of Entertainment Tonight.

  In the dining room Bob pointed across the table. “Katy, pass me the gang ped, would you?” He spooned a heap of the red curry and chicken onto the jasmine rice. He looked at Mary and said, “So, I talked to Mr. Treadwell about the housing allowance. He tried to get us to move to another one of their places but I told him…”
r />   Klaus cleared his throat and looked at Bob as he dipped his satay in the peanut sauce.

  “…Klaus told him that we didn’t want them to have our address on file given that both the CIA and our friend, the priest, had already tracked us down in Corvalis. He said he understood. He okayed three grand a month.”

  Katy’s fork clanged onto her plate. “Guh! Three grand?” She looked at Bob as if he’d told her to sleep in a wet dumpster. “What sort of cheap outfit do you guys work for? You can’t get a decent one-bedroom for three grand, let alone a place for all five of us.” She pointed at the legal pad on the table next to the pad prik khing. “We did the research.”

  Mary looked at her notes. “Well, we won’t be moving to Brentwood, that’s a fact. Three grand puts us in Tarzana, Canoga Park, or farther north in the valley.”

  “Somebody just shoot me,” Katy said, before attacking her pad see ew.

  Agent Parker was fanning his face after accidentally eating a chili. He gulped half of his Thai iced tea and said, “You should know that I confirmed that there is, or was, a priest calling himself Father Paul at St. Martin’s in Seattle. The woman I spoke with there said he’d been missing for several days.” He drained the rest of his tea before saying, “And my friend at the Pentagon confirmed that a private Paul Anik—that’s what our man in there claims to be his name—served in Vietnam. B Company, 1st Battalion, 50th Infantry.”

  “So he’s telling the truth?”

  “Well, that’s a leap,” Agent Parker said as he segregated the rest of the chilies on his plate. “All we know for sure is the guy in the priest outfit knows these things are true. Whether he’s the same guy, we won’t know until we run his prints through the Pentagon database.”

  “So,” Klaus said, “it would be premature to send him to Egypt?”