The Killer

by Tom Wood

  Victor paid for his drink and stepped out into the cold. He looked both ways down the street. To the left, the road led into an industrial neighborhood; to the right, it headed toward the freeway intersection. He couldn’t see a sign for the metro and didn’t think she would come on foot. There were sirens in the distance, but the rain seemed louder.

  He crossed the road and found an alley where he could watch the entrance to the bar. At a time like this he would normally have taken out his gun, chambered a round, and flicked off the safety before putting it in the front of his waistband, to the left of his belt buckle, where he could get to the gun quickly. But he had no gun, only a knife. It wouldn’t be enough if they sent a kill team, but it was better than nothing.

  He had some shelter from the wind and the incessant downpour, but the rain still found him, and the chill still pricked his skin. Victor didn’t care. It felt great.

  Cold, wet, but still alive.

  He had been standing for exactly twenty minutes and smoked one delicious cigarette by the time a white taxi pulled up outside the bar and left a tall woman standing on the curb, a cloud of exhaust fumes disappearing into the air around her. She was dressed in an ankle-length gray coat. Dark hair tied back in a ponytail protruded from underneath a woolen hat. A burgundy scarf was wrapped around her neck.

  The broker.

  She took a moment to compose herself and went inside the bar. He was surprised the taxi had dropped her off right at her destination, even more surprised that she went in without even checking her surroundings. Either she had no idea what she was doing or was playing the part of someone who didn’t.

  There was no evidence of a kill team on the street, the road clear, sounds of cars only in the distance. A man was walking down the street with a dog, but Victor discounted him. Too much insulation around the midriff. The dog was a Doberman, and the man strained to keep it in check. A kill team wouldn’t use a dog, even as a distraction.

  Victor exited the alleyway quickly, head down, collar up, just a man who’d taken a short cut and was eager to be on his way. He stroked the Doberman before crossing the road. On the other side, he stood to the right of the bar’s entrance, his back against the wall. He kept his hands in front of him, outside of his jacket despite the cold. He lit a cigarette and smoked it slowly. He watched the roads.

  The door opened five minutes later. She stepped out into the night. Before she knew what was happening he took hold of her arm.

  “This way.”

  He heard the breath catch in her throat, but she didn’t resist. Victor took her west, further along the street, and turned into the first alley they came across. He pushed her against the wall and searched her. She took in big gulps of air.

  “I don’t have a gun.”

  It only took a few seconds for him to know she was unarmed. He’d wanted to find a gun so he could use it himself. He led her out of the alleyway.

  “Where are we going?”

  He didn’t answer her, just kept walking, his fingers tight on her arm, her legs working fast to keep up with him. He could see her looking at him out of the corner of his eye, but he didn’t look back. He kept his own gaze on his surroundings.

  Victor led her to the end of the street and into the industrial area. The roads were wide, clear. Fences lined the sidewalks, beyond which factories stood. Some with lights on, others without. A car appeared, heading toward them. Victor’s hand moved to his back. At ten yards, if it looked as if it was going to stop, he’d slit the broker’s throat and throw her into the road in front of the car before he started running. Down an alley, he’d find a hiding place, ambush the last man, drive the knife through his spine, take his gun, kill the others or die shooting.

  The car didn’t stop.

  The broker asked, “Tell me where you’re taking me.”

  He didn’t respond, but she got her answer five minutes later, after they had circled through the deserted streets. The bar was farther along the road.

  “Why are we back here?”

  He took her inside, ordered a drink for both of them, and took the table farthest from the door, near to the entrance to the restrooms. Earlier, on the other side, he’d seen a door marked staff only. There would be a back entrance somewhere on the other side should he need to use it.

  It had thrown him before to find out the broker was a woman, and it threw him again now as he looked at her. She was younger than he would have thought. Thirty, maybe as young as twenty-eight. That meant she was good at what she did or they were using her to confuse him. He didn’t let his surprise show.

  The broker was as wet as him now and didn’t look as if she liked it one bit. Not a field operative, then. She had a slim face, dark eyes. She sat with her fingers cupping her glass. She didn’t look at him much.

  “I didn’t bring anyone.”

  Victor almost believed her. His natural suspicion didn’t sit well with the person opposite him. She was too young, too scared, and too stupid to be setting him up. Maybe she was just involved in something way out of her depth and was desperate for his help. He had no plans to do so unless it also helped him. Or maybe he was wrong. Either way her chances of survival were not looking good. He rested his hands on the table.

  “Why did you have me come back to Paris?”

  “Someone is trying to kill us both.”

  It was tempting to be sarcastic but he resisted. “Because of Monday.”

  She shook her head. “The Paris job isn’t what you think.” She looked around the bar. “We shouldn’t talk here.”

  She was so nervous she couldn’t keep still, checking the door every few seconds as though she’d seen the move in a film. She was drawing too much attention.

  “Okay,” he said. “Where?”

  “I have an apartment in the east of the city. It’s safe.”

  Victor raised a skeptical eyebrow.

  “I’ve been staying there since yesterday,” she explained. “No one knows I’m there or I would have been killed already.”

  It was a well-delivered point. He believed her.

  Victor downed his drink. “Take me there.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  01:35 CET

  “Here we are.”

  The broker glanced at him before she turned the key and opened the door. She couldn’t have known it, but her next action would determine whether or not he would kill her right now. She stepped inside. If she’d have said or even gestured for Victor to go inside first he would have snapped her neck, knowing it was a trap. But she hadn’t. For the moment at least she stayed alive.

  Her building was prewar, seven stories of no character and in need of some maintenance. It might have looked good once, but those days were long gone. The apartment was little more than an empty shell, only the most basic of furniture and fixtures, simply decorated. A typical low-cost, inner-city rental. The broker flicked the light switch and walked into the center of the room.

  Victor flicked the light back off and closed the door behind him. She pivoted on the spot. In the gloom he could see the fear that spread across her features as she mistook the action. Victor ignored her, walked over to a table that stood by the wall, and flicked on a lamp, angling it so it wouldn’t cast their silhouettes onto the thin curtains.

  He kept his back to her for a moment longer than he needed, giving her a seemingly good opportunity to try something. He listened for movement, for the change of footing that would give her away. She didn’t do anything. He almost wanted her to just so he would know for sure. Victor faced her.

  “My name’s Rebecca,” she said.

  “I don’t care.” The broker started to speak again, but he cut her off. “Be quiet.”

  Victor looked around the room, examining light fixtures, plug sockets, under tables—checking for bugs. He searched the rest of the apartment. There was a meager kitchen, bathroom, a double bedroom. A tiny balcony was accessible from the kitchen. He had to be quick just in case time was an issue. He didn’t find anything.
>
  She was standing in exactly the same place when he reentered the lounge. There was a two-seater sofa and an armchair she could have chosen to sit in, but she hadn’t, her nerves plainly evident. It was a good sign.

  “I’m going to search you,” he said.

  “What? You already have—”

  “Take off your coat.”

  “You think I’m wearing a wire? Why would I?”

  “Take off your coat.”

  Victor’s tone didn’t change, but his gaze demanded obedience. Her mouth was open as if she was going to protest but she didn’t speak. She unbuttoned the long coat and slipped it off her shoulders. She looked at Victor.

  “Stand over there and hold out your arms.”

  She moved toward the table, into the desk lamp’s arc of light. She raised her arms so they were level with her shoulders. Her silhouette was cross-shaped on the wall.

  Victor stood in front of her. She was a tall woman, in modest heels only a couple of inches shorter than he. She had olive skin, dark eyes, the Mediterranean somewhere in her blood. He could see the hint of training in the way she was standing, the way she carried herself. Maybe military, but he guessed intelligence. There was fear in her eyes, but that fear was controlled. He could see the tiny, rapid flexing of the skin on her neck. Fast, but not overly so.

  She was wearing dark jeans, not tight but not loose either, a dark cardigan over a cream blouse. Smart-casual, playing down her looks but still allowing for shoes that were more stylish than practical.

  He ran his palms along the outside and underside of her arms, down her back, down the sides of her torso and center of her chest, not caring that she flinched when he touched her breasts as part of the search. He squatted down to check around her waist and her legs before standing again.

  “Take off your shoes and jeans.”

  She kicked off her shoes. “No, forget it. I’m not doing that.”

  “You will if you don’t want me to put my hand into your underwear.”

  She was stunned, glared at him, her eyes full of disgust. He held her gaze, showing no emotion. There was nothing to negotiate. She would do what he told her. After a moment he watched the fight drain out of her, and she nodded slowly. She took her shoes off first, then turned her head away so she didn’t have to look at him, unbuttoned her jeans, and slipped them off her hips. They fell to her feet.

  “Step out of them.”

  She did.

  “Stand with your legs a little farther apart.”

  Again she did as instructed.

  Victor looked at her closely for a moment. “Turn around.”

  She pivoted slowly on the spot.

  “Okay,” he said, satisfied. “Get dressed.”

  Victor stepped away and stood to the side of the lounge window, his back to the wall. The broker pulled up her jeans and put her shoes back on. He was embarrassed to find himself watching her as she dressed. He looked away before she noticed.

  “Are you happy now?” she asked when she was clothed.

  “Not exactly,” Victor answered quietly. “I’ve broken more rules than I can count by coming here so what you have to tell me had better be worth it.”

  “Otherwise what?” the broker challenged. “You’ll kill me?”

  “Yes.”

  It wasn’t just a threat, and Victor saw that she understood this. There was an immediate shift in her posture, a drop in her shoulders, the shifting of weight, the instinctive change in body language that told an enemy there was no threat, no challenge, no need for violence. He saw that though she may have convinced herself beforehand she could deal with him, she was fast finding out just how wrong she had been.

  The broker asked, “What’s your name?”

  The question caught Victor off balance. “Excuse me?”

  “I said, what do I call you? You were always referred to as Tesseract in our—”

  “Why Tesseract?”

  “I don’t know, it’s just a code name,” she answered. “So, what shall I call you?”

  “You don’t need to call me anything,” Victor said.

  “Okay.”

  “Tell me what you know.”

  “It’s the company that wants you dead.”

  She delivered the information as if it were a huge revelation. There was no change in his expression.

  “You already know,” she stated, surprised.

  He nodded.

  “But how?”

  “If you expected me to be shocked, I’m sorry to disappoint you. I haven’t been standing idle since this thing started.”

  “What else do you know?”

  “I’m not here to answer your questions. For now let’s stick to what you know.”

  The broker nodded and folded her arms in front of her chest. “This has to work both ways.”

  “I don’t remember agreeing to anything to that effect.”

  She stared at him for a moment as if she was considering a particularly choice retort. But he’d broken her will and instead she said simply, “It’s the CIA who wants you dead because it was the CIA who hired you.”

  Victor’s face showed nothing, but his mind was a mess with questions. So it was a CIA setup from the beginning. “How do you know that?” He found he disliked having to ask her questions immensely.

  “Because I used to work for them,” she answered.

  “Used to?”

  “They want me dead too.”

  “Explain.”

  “They killed my control and cut me loose. They want me dead just as much they want you.”

  “What about the flash drive?”

  “There’s something on it they want. Information, obviously.”

  “Information on what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then what good are you?”

  “Ask me something else and find out.”

  “Who was the man I killed?”

  “Andris Ozols.”

  “I didn’t ask for his name. Who was he?”

  “A former officer in the Russian navy.”

  “That wasn’t in the dossier.”

  “You didn’t need to know.”

  The muscles in his jaw flexed momentarily. “What was he doing in Paris?”

  “Selling the drive to someone.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You didn’t need to know?”

  “I guess not.”

  “What about the flash drive? Can you decrypt it?”

  “Do you have it?”

  “No,” he said.

  “But you have it somewhere?”

  “Yes. Can you decrypt it?”

  “Maybe. But I won’t know until I try. I have friends at the agency who—”

  “Not an option,” he said and immediately had an idea. Something he hadn’t considered until now.

  She saw him thinking. “What is it?”

  “Nothing,” he said. He changed the subject. “So they wanted me to get the drive before the buyer got hold of it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I assume at that point it would be considerably harder to obtain. The buyer must be too well protected or someone they didn’t dare kill.”

  “Who are you thinking?”

  Victor kept his thoughts to himself. “Why didn’t the CIA just do it, why use me? And why try and kill me afterward?”

  “Those two questions share the same answer.” The broker took a step forward. “But I can’t be sure.”

  “Then why am I listening to you?”

  “Because you don’t have a choice.”

  Victor was surprised by her words and more surprised by the strength of her tone. He reassessed his opinion on her will.

  “And neither do I,” she continued. “But what I do know is that they tried to have you killed to cover up the operation. They don’t want Ozols’s death ever coming back to haunt them.”

  Victor listened, face showing nothing.

  The broker continued, “If the
plan had worked all anyone would have to go on is the body of a killer in a Paris hotel room with no clue as to who hired you. At best they would have realized that you were a hired gun with no affiliation to anyone. Any connection between you and those who ordered Ozols’s death would have been neatly severed.”

  “And that’s it? They want me dead to cover up a job that I actually did? It’s not as though I’m going to advertise what I’d done. If nothing else it’s not the best way to generate new clients.”

  Victor realized there was more emotion in his voice than he would have liked to have revealed.

  “True,” she said. “But they couldn’t risk your being captured, interrogated.”

  “I couldn’t have told anyone anything because I don’t know anything.”

  “Be that as it may, if you’re dead they don’t have to worry. The link to those who ordered the hit dies when you do.”

  “But why use me? Why not some punk? Any amateur could have killed Ozols. The CIA didn’t need me to do it.”

  “Because some punk wouldn’t have taken a fraction of your precautions. Someone else would have left a trail to follow. At the time I wasn’t told why, but we needed a killer who had no record, someone who was capable but to all intents and purposes didn’t exist. They needed someone who was invisible, and you fit the criteria. I suppose you can take that as a compliment.”

  “I’m flattered.”

  “There’s no need to be sarcastic.”

  Victor ignored the comment. “And how do you fit into all this? Why do they want you dead too?”

  “I’m part of the chain. The operation failed. You lived; they didn’t get the drive; and now they need to cut all the links to make it clean.”

  “Guilty by association?”

  “Something like that.”

  “But they haven’t gotten to you yet.”

  “I didn’t give them the chance.”

  “Why exactly did you bring me here?”

  The broker moved from where she had been standing, a couple of steps to the left. Nervous release maybe. Victor watched her. Light from the lamp accentuated her cheekbones, danced on her full lips.

  “Because we can help each other,” she said.

  “Help each other to do what?”