Assassin (13 page)

"No. Sometimes, that's all that's required, but most of the time, it's a lot more complicated than that. And it's important that you be able to know where someone is without seeing them because a lot of the hits I've been on have been in the dark and sometimes they know you're coming. You need to be able to move around in a foreign setting, in the dark, and be aware of who is moving around in the dark with you. It could save your life."

"How many hits have you been on?"

Case looked away and stared unseeingly at one of the families gathered around a picnic table. Several dozen scenes of people dying at her hands flashed through her mind before she met Rain's eyes again.

"Seventy-two. Including the last one," Case said quietly.

Rain nodded. She wasn't sure what else to do. She hadn't expected Case to look so... lost.

Case shook her head. There was no point in dwelling on the past. Her life was what it was; she was a killer. That's all there was to it.

"Close your eyes, Rain."

Rain heard the change in tone and realized the teacher was back in control. She closed her eyes and waited.

"Describe the family at the picnic table to your right."

Rain started to open her eyes, but Case stopped her.

"No. Do it from memory. I don't expect you to be able to remember a whole lot, since I know you weren't paying attention, but that's something I want you to work on." Case walked around Rain in a slow circle. "Little details can become important when you least expect it. From now on, everywhere you go, I want you to be aware of how you would escape if you were ambushed. I want you to be able to recall the face and clothing of every single person you meet. Without having to try. I want this to become reflex. You need to learn how to take pictures with your mind that you can look at later on if you need to. It can mean the difference between finding your hit and losing him, or even becoming the target yourself." Case stopped in front of Rain. "Now, tell me about the family at the picnic table."

Rain racked her brain for the fleeting images she had picked up in her peripheral vision while she'd been focused on Case. She gave the most accurate description she could, including height, clothing, hair color, and even their positions around the table. When she couldn't come up with anything more, Case told her to open her eyes and look at the family.

Rain laughed a little at herself. Half of her descriptions were totally wrong, even the colors were completely off.

"Now, I want you to study them. Tell me what you see."

Rain started to describe the physical characteristics she saw, but Case cut her off.

"No. Tell me about them. Who's in charge? If you were to start shooting at them, who'd run for cover and who would shoot back if they could? If you walked over there and struck up a conversation, what do you think each person's reaction would be? Who would talk to you? Who would ignore you?"

Rain looked at Case. She was asking Rain to profile them and that really threw Rain. Case frowned at Rain's hesitation.

"A lot of the hits I've been sent on required me to study the Target and everyone around him or her. I needed to be able to predict everything. Antonio sent you to me, so I'm betting he's going to be sending you on the same kinds of assignments. You need these skills, Rain."

Rain nodded and began her profile, leaving out as many psychological terms as she could. Case listened to her and nodded every now and then when Rain made a particularly insightful comment that mirrored her own assessment of the people they were studying.

As the sun sank below the trees, they headed back to their campsite. They were both quiet as Rain prepared dinner and Case went through a few drills in the open area around the campfire. When Rain was finished getting the food going, they traded places. Case sat by the grill to keep an eye on the food and Rain practiced with her bo, twirling it around her body and moving through several of her forms. When she came to rest, Case hummed her approval.

"That was beautiful. Why haven't you ever fought in any tournaments? I'm sure I would have remembered you, if you had."

"You've competed professionally?"

"No, not professionally. I just keep track of who's who in the arts and I like to watch the matches when I get a chance. I've never had the time to devote to any competitions myself. I barely managed to set aside enough time to earn my degrees and that's only because I have a lot of masters all over the country that I can see whenever I want."

"Isn't that difficult? I just can't imagine Grand Master Kim being very happy, if I started learning Taekwondo from a bunch of other people."

"I helped them with a few problems. I also pay them an insane amount of money to not care or ask me any questions. So, they don't mind if I call them up at two in the morning to get my next lesson."

"What did you do for them?"

"Whatever meant the most to them. Master Wong's son was born with a heart defect. He needed a transplant, so I made sure he got one. Master Carlson had a bit of a gambling problem. I took care of it for him and now I make sure his debts are paid on time. That kind of thing." Case shrugged her shoulders. "People tend to be nice when you've helped them out."

Rain put away her bo and checked on the food.

"It's just about ready. Wanna get the plates?" Rain requested.

Case got up from her position sitting in front of the grill and pulled out their mess kits from the back of the truck. She grinned to herself as she remembered what they'd done there that afternoon. She closed the door and stood waiting for Rain to dish up their food onto the metal plates.

They sat in silence as they ate their dinners and contemplated the fire in front of them. Case finished her food and set the plate aside. She leaned back and then looked over at Rain.

"Rain?" Rain looked up and waited. "If you hadn't started working for Antonio, what do you think you'd be doing now?"

Rain looked down as she tried to come up with an answer. Finally, she just shrugged her shoulders.

"I don't know. I guess I never thought about it. What about you? You said you've been working for Carlotti for eight years. That's a long time. Was there something else you thought you'd be doing now?"

Case stared into the fire. Her voice came out in almost a whisper and Rain leaned forward to hear the woman's words.

"I didn't think I'd be doing anything. I always thought I'd be dead by now."

Rain put her dish aside and slowly walked the few steps to where Case was sitting on her sleeping bag. She sat down and gently put her arm around the small woman's shoulders. She didn't say anything, she just held her. After a few minutes, Case turned into the embrace and let Rain hold her more completely. It didn't take long before they were lying side by side, Case held securely in Rain's arms.

Rain listened as Case fell into a deep sleep. She watched the fire and tried again to reconcile her feelings for the assassin with her duty as an FBI agent. She just couldn't separate who she was from what she was feeling. When the time came, she would do her best to protect Case, but she knew she would do her job no matter what. Her brother deserved that. So did all the other families who had lost relatives and friends because of the Carlotti organization.

Rain mentally laughed at herself in derision. Here she was thinking about avenging her brother's death and she was sleeping with a woman who routinely killed people for the son of the man that had caused his death.

Rain shook her head. Not just sleeping with her. She really cared about Case. Rain tried to imagine the final bust. Taking Carlotti and his people down, which included Case. As she saw herself putting the cuffs on Case's wrists, her stomach clenched and she felt a pain in her chest. The vision changed and she saw herself letting Case go, telling the woman to run, to get away.

Rain squeezed Case a little tighter to her body and pulled the edge of the sleeping bag over their bodies. The fire had burned down low enough to be an unlikely danger and the truck was locked up. Rain closed her eyes. She was in a lot of trouble.

CHAPTER 13

"NO FUCKING WAY!" Case practically yelled into the pay phone.

She turned towards the phone in order to get a little more privacy, though there was no one around to listen in on her conversation. The sun hadn't even risen yet, though the sky was beginning to lighten. She'd gotten up to use the bathroom and had decided to check her voice mail while she was at it. She'd been surprised to find a message from Doc telling her to call him. Now, she was just annoyed and beginning to get a little pissed.

"I've barely had three days with her. She's not ready," Case insisted more quietly.

"What's there to be ready for? And anyway, you'll be there to help her make the delivery. He wouldn't make her go solo her first time."

"I did."

"Yeah, well, you were different."

Case sighed away from the mouthpiece and turned around to look up at the purple sky. The distant stars were beginning to fade in favor of the closest star's greater light. She shook her head. There was no getting out of this.

"All right. What's in the package?"

"A telescope. It needs to be hand-delivered and keep the receipt. No fireworks."

Case straightened.

"Doc, she's not ready for that. Those things are heavy."

Looking down the sight of a sniper rifle and pulling the trigger on an unsuspecting Target required a detachment she wasn't sure Rain was capable of yet.

"That's why you're going to be there to help her carry the thing. You just make sure the package gets delivered. If she can't handle it, she can go work for the local florist."

Pushing up daisies. Fuckin' great.

"He chose this job himself?"

"Yeah. He wants to know what she's made of."

"And I'm supposed to have turned her into Employee of the Month in less than a week? He's being fucking stupid."

"Yeah, well, he's the boss. He's allowed," Doc chuckled.

Fuck.

"Window of delivery?" Case asked with resignation clear in her voice.

"The next forty-eight hours. It's a private delivery, for his eyes only."

Witnesses would not be acceptable.

Case heard typing in the background and then one last key tap.

"I'm sending the complete file to you now," Doc said.

"Anything else?"

"If there is, it's in the attachment."

Case hung up the phone, loudly, and then scrubbed her face with her hands before running her fingers through her short hair. She looked up to the sky again and noticed it had turned light blue in the last couple minutes. She waited for answers to questions she hadn't asked, but none came.

Case headed back to the campsite. There were a few other early risers stumbling around their camps and Case nodded to them when they noticed her. As she came up to the site she was sharing with Rain, she saw the woman buried underneath the sleeping bag Rain had pulled over them during the night to protect them against the cold. Case could only see the top of the woman's dark head and she had to grin at the image of someone like Rain attempting to hide from the cool morning air.

Case knelt down next to the huddled body beneath the sleeping bag and pulled back the top edge to expose Rain's face. Rain's expression turned sour and she groaned a little as she tried to scoot down to regain the protective warmth of the cover. Case grinned again.

"Hey, sleepy. Time to get up."

Rain half-whined, half-groaned something unintelligible, but which was probably supposed to be a request for more sleep. Case thought about giving in, but only for a second. They would need all the time they could get.

"Come on. You gotta get up. Don't make me get rough," Case said in her most stern voice.

Rain opened one eye and looked at Case to gauge her seriousness. She decided Case didn't look like she was joking, so she sighed and turned over enough to face Case.

"What's so important that we have to be up before the crack of dawn?"

"Your first hit."

That woke Rain up.

"What?"

All trace of fuzziness left her and she sat up to get her blood flowing better.

"I talked to Doc. Antonio's decided he wants to know if you're up for this kind of work."

"Trial by fire, huh?" Rain tried for a little levity.

"Looks like it. Come on. We gotta get a move on. We have to get to New York, then get some stuff, and then I've got to walk you through a sniper hit before you do it for real."

Case stood up and began moving around the camp to gather their things and load them into the truck. Rain's stomach knotted up and she felt vaguely ill.

A sniper hit. She was going to have to kill someone or the last three years of her life would be for nothing.

Rain got up and began zipping up the sleeping bags, so that they could be rolled up and put away. The queasy feeling didn't go away, but Rain did her best to ignore it. She was just glad Case hadn't mentioned breakfast.

Rain looked over at Case and saw her sorting through things in the back of the truck. She carried the rolled up sleeping bags over to the truck and stashed them to Case's right. Case looked up at her.

"Hey. Why don't you go see if anyone around here would like any of this stuff? We can't take any of it with us on the plane."

Rain nodded and started with the campsite across from them, since it was clear they'd been up for a while.

In less than an hour, they'd given away all the camping equipment they'd bought and cleaned themselves up as best they could in the campground's sparse bathroom facilities. There was no sightseeing on the way back to the airport and almost no conversation either.

Case took care of everything with very little fuss. She returned the rental and bought their tickets, slipping the clerk the usual amount of money to allow them to carry their weapons on the plane, and Rain quietly followed her.

Rain couldn't seem to snap herself out of the strange daze that had come over her. Everything seemed surreal. It was like she'd gone on vacation and come back to an alternate universe.