Chance Assassin: A Story of Love, Luck, and Murder (16 page)

“Step back,” he said, putting his arm up to force my compliance.  I kept my useless gun pointed at the car, pretending like I was Frank’s partner in more ways than one.  He smiled at me and shook his head, then popped the trunk.

The man shot up like a jack-in-the-box, duct tape wrapped around his mouth, wrists and ankles.  Frank had his gun pointed at his face faster than I’d hopped another foot back in surprise.

I was astounded to see just how alive the mark was.  There was no evidence of assault, no blood or bruises.  He blinked quickly at his surroundings, the setting sun brighter than anything he’d seen in hours.  Then he looked at me, his startled expression growing confused.

Frank grabbed the collar of his shirt, pulling him out of the trunk one-handed and letting him fall hard to the dry soil below, never once allowing his aim to falter.  He took a shovel from the trunk as well, tossing it a couple of feet away from the car.

The man barely struggled as Frank dragged him toward the now ominous garden tool.  I kept my stance up nonetheless, pointing my gun at his legs.  I knew I had no bullets, but even so, I didn’t want to aim it any closer to my future husband than needed.

Frank rolled him onto his front, standing with one foot on his back as he pulled out a knife and sliced the duct tape from his bound wrists.  The blade gleamed in his hand, making my knees go so weak that I had to hold onto the car.  Even watching him use a butter knife on an unsuspecting piece of toast was enough to make my whole body burn, inciting an erection under the table that would last long past dessert.  Much to my dismay, he’d misread my twisted desire as fear, and started using a fork to avoid upsetting me.

He kicked the man over and tossed the knife to his chest.  It bounced.

The mark was about sixty pounds overweight, a thick layer of fat over an even thicker layer of muscle.  The core of his body was like a barrel and he had large, strong limbs.  Frank had seemed intimidating to me when we first met, but at that moment I realized just how unusual I was in finding safety in his presence.  This man, who could bench press both of us without breaking a sweat, was so terrified of a willowy Frenchman that he didn’t dare to touch the knife until Frank nodded toward it, granting permission for him to unfasten his ankles.

“Toss it over there,” Frank said, flicking his gun back toward the car for just a second.  The man tossed the knife gently, underhanded.  It hit the dirt with a cloud of dust.  I quickly went to retrieve it, slipping it in my pocket and keeping my gun on him.

My heart was running a marathon without me, thrashing hard against my ribcage.  I felt a lot like I had before losing my virginity, the excitement outweighing the fear, but keeping it on the backburner in case.  Only this time the fear wouldn’t have the chance to escalate, to overshadow every feeling but apprehension and pain, the realization that I’d made the biggest mistake of my young life.

Still, my hands were shaking.

Frank calmly backed away from him, both hands supporting his weapon once more while the mark shakily pulled the tape off his mouth.  It was strange, but he seemed to be looking at me more than he was at his captor.  I wondered whether he considered us one in the same, after all, I had a weapon too.

“Pick up the shovel,” Frank said, standing just slightly in front of me.

“You don’t have to do this,” he said.  “I can pay you.”

I was wondering when the begging would commence. But I didn’t feel an ounce of pity for the man, and I knew Frank would feel even less.

“Do what he says,” I said firmly.  Frank would give me a hard time about that later, but for now, I felt fierce.

The man stared at me, sympathy instead of fear.  It made me so angry that I pulled the trigger, momentarily forgetting that Frank hadn’t provided ammunition.  Then Frank fired, making me jump twice my height straight into the air.  For just a moment, I’d thought the bullet had come out of
my
gun, and I returned to reality filled with disappointment.

His pistol was equipped with a silencer the same as mine, but I was used to the silent puff of air they have in movies, and not the suppressed bang that echoed through the stillness of the night, like distant thunder.

Frank hadn’t aimed to hit, but his message was received loud and clear.  The mark was on his feet, shovel in hand, eagerly awaiting further instructions.

“Walk twenty paces and start digging.”

He hesitated, looking to Frank and back to me again, the shovel as useless a weapon as mine.

“Or I shoot you in both legs, and make young Vincent here do the digging.”

“Hey!” I said, trying to be quiet so our adversary wouldn’t hear my discontent.  I never signed on for manual labor.  I sure as shit didn’t want to get stuck with the shovel, especially burying as big a man as him.  “I dig really slowly,” I piped in, deciding it would be best to convince both of them that having me dig was a bad idea.

“It’s your choice,” Frank continued, ignoring me completely.  “If you try to run, you will regret it.”

He stared at us, defiance not even making it to the top ten emotions on his face.  Then he turned around, his massive shoulders hunched, and he started walking.  Frank followed after a few steps, and so did I.

“Be good,
little Vincent
,” he said under his breath, reaching back to smack me upside the head and never breaking stride.  “That’s far enough,” he called out.

The mark stopped immediately, turning to us with tears streaming down his face.  I’d never seen a grown man cry before.  I couldn’t help but look away.  It was one thing to kill a man, but to break him first?  I wondered whether weeping was allowed in the great book of man laws if you were on your deathbed.  I’d never gotten past the chapter that said you weren’t supposed to kiss other boys.

“Dig,” Frank said coldly.

“Please,” he blubbered.

“Dig,” he repeated, and aimed his gun low.

The crying didn’t stop for a long time.  He sniffled as he dug, sometimes having to stop completely to get a hold of himself before continuing.  Frank and I watched in silence as he became smaller, disappearing into the growing hole at his feet.

I got to hold the flashlight when it got too dark, pointing it toward the parts of his grave that I thought needed more work.  Frank had gotten a little closer, something I was explicitly forbidden to do.

Finally, after hours of the only sound being the scraping of metal against dirt, I decided we all needed a little levity.  “What’s your name?” I called out to the hole.

Frank glanced at me, his face impassive.

The man stopped, looking up at me with dirt and sweat staining every inch of him.  “What?”

“Your name.  I’m Vincent.”

“Um, Walter.  Walter Jones.”

“I had a fish named Walter Gene!” I exclaimed.  “He died…too.”

Walter went a little green around the gills, looking uncomfortable like he wasn’t sure whether I was trying to be tactless.  That wasn’t my intention at all, it just came out that way.  But Frank seemed to find it very amusing.  I could see him snickering, the corners of his mouth raised as he kept his eyes on his victim.

“Sorry,” I said.  “So, what did you do?”

“I work in construction,” he said timidly, as if he wasn’t sure whether he was allowed to converse with me.  Or maybe he’d figured out that he was officially retired.

“No, I mean what did you do to deserve
this
?” I asked.  Frank had told me that usually the motive was money; inheritance, insurance, or simply getting the other person out of the picture for a bigger piece of the pie.  Though sometimes it was about love, unrequited or more commonly, scorned.  Either way, I figured that if someone was going to drop a hundred grand to have you killed, you probably deserved it. That’s the way he saw it too.

“I…I don’t know.” Walter said, beginning to sob once more.

I turned to Frank, looking at him expectantly.  Then Walter followed my lead.

“For fuck’s sake,” he muttered.  “You know what you did.”

“
I
don’t,” I piped in.

“He put a hit out on his own brother.  They think alike.”

“No,” Walter said.  “
You
?  But Charlie…I paid him…it isn’t supposed to work like this.”

Frank rolled his eyes.  “Don’t worry, I did your job first.”

I practically squealed over the delight of the double-cross.  One brother murdered, the other missing, assumed responsible.  Well played, Frank.

Walter cried harder.  Frank glared at me.

“It’s okay, Walt,” I said reassuringly.  “I’m sure everything will even out in the end.  Karma and all that.”

Frank watched him closely while he walked over to me, keeping me safe before telling me off.  But even
I
knew Walter wasn’t going to try anything.  He was too overcome with emotion, airing his dirty secret, the mutual betrayal of his brother, and soon the loss of his life, all in the same night

“Go back to the car,” he said sternly.

“Oh, Frank.  Please?  I’ll be good.  I’ll stop talking,” I begged.  I had a feeling that this was the last time he would let me anywhere near his mark, and I had to make it up to him so he’d change his mind.

Then something unexpected happened.  Walter started defending me, not from having to go back to the car, but from the mean assassin at my side.

“You don’t have to listen to him, Vincent,” he said, his voice suddenly confident.  “You’re young.  Things can change for you.”

I gaped at him.  Even Frank looked stunned, but he understood what was happening before I did, and he got a cruel smirk just as the realization came over me.  Walter was trying to pit us against one another.  He saw me as an innocent, someone mixed up with the wrong crowd.  He must’ve thought that if he talked to me the right way, I’d turn against Frank and save
him
.

“We can help each other, Vincent,” he continued, using my name again like we were old friends and not mere acquaintances.

I laughed, harder than I’d laughed in a long time.  “You have got to be kidding,” I said, watching the hope vanish from his face.  “I’m the one you ought to be scared of.  I
killed
my fucking goldfish.”

I moved closer to the edge of the grave, pointing my gun at him sideways like I’d seen them do in the movies.  I could feel Frank’s watchful eye on me, and I could imagine the bemused expression on his face.  I was on my absolute worst behavior.  “Bang!” I shouted, and laughed again.  “Keep digging, Walter.  We’ve got a ways to go.”

Frank pulled me back by my shirt, but I wasn’t finished yet.

“It’s called
loyalty
, Walt.  If you weren’t about to die, you could look it up.  You’re out of your mind to think I’d ever trade him for
you
.”

“Enough,” he said, his mouth close to my ear.  He didn’t sound angry, just no longer amused.

“Well, it’s true,” I said defensively, and stood behind my man.

“Dig,” Frank said.  “It’s past his bedtime.”

No one spoke after that.  Walter dug in silence, crying occasionally but he seemed to have accepted his fate.  There was more I would’ve liked to tell him; that Frank was a sweet guy, that he was only doing this job for the money, and if he got to know him he might even like him, but I kept quiet.  I was probably in a lot of trouble, and opening my mouth again would only exacerbate things.

As the sun was just beginning to glow on the horizon, Frank told him to stop.  That’s when Walter lost it, screaming at us and holding his shovel defensively, as if swinging it could ward off bullets.  All that accomplished was making Frank angry.  He didn’t like when people shouted, and he got very defensive when anything could be interpreted as a threat against me.

“Go to the car, Vincent,” he said, not allowing for any argument in the matter.

“I’m sorry about your brother, Walter,” I said, gently touching Frank’s arm to let him know I was leaving.  Then I walked to the car, not daring to look back even as I heard a single shot fired.

I sat on the closed trunk, watching Frank shovel dirt back into the hole.  It wasn’t like before, when he’d dug a small pit to burn our things.  His body language had changed, complete professionalism filling every heave of the shovel.  There was no sign that the Frank who occasionally smiled was still in there.

When he signaled for me to come, I ran to his side.  He’d only partially filled the hole, the sand covering Walter’s body and nothing else.  It dawned on me soon enough that this was my punishment.

“If I apologize―”

“You are filling this hole, V,” he said sternly, forcing the shovel into my hand.  At least he was calling me V again.  He tended to only call me Vincent when he was being serious.

I sighed and started scooping the loose dirt back in.  I was already dustier than he was, and he’d had to jump in the hole to retrieve his shovel.  Wearing black in this case wasn’t necessarily the best idea, though it wouldn’t be black that much longer.

“Am I in trouble?” I asked, watching Frank instead of paying attention to the slow process of filling a six foot deep hole.

“That was interesting, wasn’t it?” he asked with a sparkle of wonder in his eyes.  It reminded me of seeing a preview for a new soap opera episode; no matter how off-the-wall my theories were, the show’s writers always came up with something unexpected.  “His reaction to you, I mean.  A gun in your hand, and he thought you could be on
his
side.”

“So, I’m
not
in trouble?”

He smiled cryptically.  “Not as much as you think.”

A vague answer.  Of course.  I wouldn’t know whether I was riding in the trunk until it was time to go.  “If I was really your partner on this job, would I have done okay?”

Frank took his time answering that one.  He could’ve very easily insulted me, which I wouldn’t have blamed him for at all.  But he knew how much I wanted this, and he had to accept that I
had
tried, however badly I failed.  “Your emotions give you away,” he said.  “They rule you.  In this business, that could be catastrophic.  But everyone’s different, V.  This isn’t a normal job.  There aren’t a standard set of qualifications.  What you consider to be a weakness may be one of your greatest strengths.