Mason didn’t respond.
“Good night, Mr. Mason.”
The screen went blank.
Mason kept staring at it, unable to move.
This was the moment. The long silent moment when Nick Mason saw everything at once with a blinding white clarity:
Everything I thought I knew was a lie.
Whoever I thought I was working for.
Whatever I thought it would take to end this.
All of the people around me, the price they paid …
Lauren’s life ruined.
Sandoval dead.
Diana dead.
Gina, Adriana … Maybe gone forever.
Because everything I’ve done …
My whole plan …
My whole fucking bullshit plan to finally be free …
It was all for nothing.
There was never an exit strategy.
Because there was never a way out.
Cole broke the silence. “This was your final audition,” he said, nodding toward the dead bodyguards that littered the rest of the town house. “You passed.”
“How big is this organization?”
Cole paused a beat and then said, “You’ll never know.”
Another beat, then Cole reached forward and closed the laptop. The sound of it clicking shut was a note of finality that hung in the air between them.
Cole got up from the chair behind the desk, came around to stand in front of him. In that moment, they were the only two men left in the world. Englewood and Canaryville. Daimyo and samurai. Mason looked down into Cole’s eyes, the Nighthawk still hanging in his right hand.
“Take the envelope and get out of my city,” Cole said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, that blood is going to ruin the hardwood.”
As Cole turned to leave the room, Mason raised the barrel of his gun. Cole stopped in the doorway.
“Nick,” Cole said, still facing away from Mason, “do you really think this a good time to do something stupid?”
Mason didn’t respond. Neither man moved.
“You’re not going to shoot me in the back,” Cole said.
“So turn around.”
Cole shook his head, turned slowly to face Mason.
“What will they do to me?” Mason asked. “After everything they’ve invested …”
Mason watched Cole’s face as he worked out the equation. Then the curtain came down when he arrived at the answer. For the first time since he’d met him, that day he was brought to his cellblock, Nick Mason saw raw animal fear in Darius Cole’s eyes.
“Do you know how many men I killed for you?” Mason asked.
“We’re done, Nick. You’ll be killing for someone else now.”
“You’re right,” Mason said. “This one’s just for me. And Diana.”
Mason squeezed the trigger three times, the last slugs in his clip tearing through Cole’s body. Cole was driven back against the doorframe, his wide-open eyes staring back at Mason, until he finally slid to the floor.
Mason stood for a full minute, not moving. He waited to feel something, to experience some physical reaction to what he’d just done. But he’d been through too much, had already seen enough blood, to last a lifetime. Mason was immune to it now. He was empty.
Mason put the gun down on the desk, picked up the envelope, and stepped over Cole’s body on his way out.
He stopped in the room next to the terrace, the room he’d been sleeping in ever since the day he walked out of that prison. He opened the nightstand drawer and took out the tattered photograph of Gina and Adriana, taken before he went to prison when his daughter was only four years old and life, however imperfect, made sense.
He left everything else behind. None of it really belonged to him, anyway.
Then he walked through the town house, past the dead bodies and the drying pools of blood, down the stairs to open the front door for the last time and went out into the night.
• • •
TWELVE HOURS LATER, a 747 lifted off from O’Hare Airport and climbed into the sky. Its destination was Jakarta, the capital of the Republic of Indonesia. Nick Mason sat in a first-class window seat with everything he owned tucked into a carry-on bag under the seat in front of him.
As he looked out the window, the city of Chicago was spread out below him. It was a perfect clear day, so he could see the buildings of downtown, the seventy-one neighborhoods spreading out in three directions and the endless expanse of Lake Michigan to the east.
It was the only city he had ever loved. The only city he had ever called home.
Now he was leaving it, flying to the other side of the world. He didn’t know what he’d be asked to do next. What new horror he’d have to face.
He didn’t know who’d be waiting for him when this plane landed. Or if he’d ever come back.
He didn’t know who he was anymore.
Or if he’d ever be free.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Once again, this book would not have been possible without Shane Salerno, the one person who helped bring Nick Mason to life—and changed my life in the process. Thanks also to David Koll, Nick Carraro, Don Winslow, and everyone at The Story Factory.
I’m indebted to Joe Fitzpatrick, Assistant U.S. Attorney, Northern District of Illinois, and Chicago Police Detective John Campbell for all of your professional insight. And another big thank-you to Sara Minnich, Ivan Held, and everyone at Putnam.
I found the following books incredibly helpful, and highly recommend them:
The Perfect Kill: 21 Laws for Assassins, by Robert B. Baer
WITSEC: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program, by Pete Earley and Gerald Shur
Convictions: A Prosecutor’s Battles Against Mafia Killers, Drug Kingpins, and Enron Thieves, by John Kroger
Finally, to the people who’ve been with me since the beginning: Bill Keller and Frank Hayes, Maggie Griffin, Jan Long, and Nick Childs. And more than ever, my wife, Julia, who keeps everything going, my son, Nicholas, and my daughter, Antonia. I will never be a good enough writer to express how lucky I am to have you as my family.
Steve Hamilton is the New York Times–bestselling author of twelve novels, most recently The Second Life of Nick Mason and Die a Stranger. His debut, A Cold Day in Paradise, won both an Edgar and a Shamus Award for Best First Novel. His stand-alone novel The Lock Artist was a New York Times Notable Crime Book and won an Alex Award and the Edgar Award for Best Novel. He attended the University of Michigan, where he won the prestigious Hopwood Award for writing, and now lives in Cottekill, New York, with his wife and their two children.
authorstevehamilton.com
facebook.com/SteveHamiltonAuthor
twitter.com/authorsteve
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Exit Strategy Page 25
